The first 2 weeks...

The first 2 weeks of marriage have been wonderful. Our week-long honeymoon in New Mexico and South Padre Island was perfect. Since being back in Utah, life has really kept us busy. We moved into our cute little condo last Monday.

It's been fun creating our own little home together. It's a beautiful place but small in size. It's just perfect for us actually, because we have to simplify our lives a bit and hang on to only the bare essentials. We're never more than 20 feet apart from each other and don't have to yell to be heard--it's great!

Life with Diego is wonderful. We wake up to his Mariachi grito alarm at 6:45 every morning. I shower and start getting ready while he makes the bed so perfectly and gets his things together. Then I start working on breakfast while he gets himself ready. There's always music playing...sometimes my Air Supply, sometimes his Tigres del Norte. I"m learning to adapt :) Often Diego helps prepare our meals or does it all himself. What a kind and helpful husband he is in every way. We try to fit a few extra quick things into our morning sometimes...a load of laundry, taking out the trash, organizing more things into cupboards, studying...We pray and eat breakfast together, clean up the kitchen, bundle up, lock up, kiss and part our separate ways. He walks to school for his daily 8am class, and I drive his monster truck to work. It's funny, I didn't expect this to be part of the deal. I planned to continue riding my bike or the bus to work, but since we've been so busy over the past few weeks and have been going to bed quite late...it's harder to get up any earlier than we do, and the morning routine finds us rushing out the door with only 5 or 10 minutes to get to work and school. Diego has told me every day for the last week to take his truck. I never asked for it, but he insists. I love that he takes such good care of me--that he wouldn't want me to be late or cold or stressed in any way...and that he would entrust me with his big red baby (La Peliroja).

Lately we've been meeting up on my lunch break. We'll run errands together, grab a bite to eat at home, watch the BYU devotional....things like that. Three days a week he goes in to work from 1-5...so I'll drop him off at the MTC at the end of my lunch break and pick him up when I get out of work. Our evenings during the last week consisted of moving into the apartment, shopping for apartment and reception necessities, home decorating, going to the temple, visiting with friends and family, meeting with the DJ, etc. Sometimes we'll come home from a long day and put in a movie or listen to music while we wind down and make dinner. We'll sometimes stay up a little later to read, exercise, talk and snuggle. Being married is so wonderful.

Our Wedding and Honeymoon...

Diego and I had such a beautiful sealing down in the Mesa Temple on December 26th. We each had so much family there from all over...once the seats filled up people had to stand against the wall. Our sealer, Brother Fish, was so special. He spoke both English and Spanish so everybody could understand his beautiful words... 

The reception in New Mexico was so great too...like a dream. The chapel cultural hall had been so beautifully decorated by Diego's family; it looked like a fancy outdoor reception tent...draped with soft cream and green fabric all along the ceiling and the walls. We walked in just as the large Mexican Mariachi band arrived, so it was an exciting entrance with great music and cheering. We were so happy. The food was great, the music, the dancing, the cheerful good people, new aunts, uncles, and little cousins smothering us with hugs and pulling us out to dance...What a special night.

We spent the next few days in New Mexico with Diego's family and his sister who had just returned from her mission. Then we flew down to South Padre Island, TX, where we had a wonderful honeymoon and did a lot of exploring on the beach, sand dunes, national wildlife refuge, beautiful river walks, went into Mexico for a day, went on a dolphin watch cruise, took lots of pics, etc.

We spent New Year's Eve and Day with my grandparents and several aunts, uncles and cousins in Bayview, Texas. We had a great time there for the countdown--imagine lots of little and big cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents with confetti, noisemakers and firecrackers going wild in the little canopy overlooking the resaca (river) under a full moon on a warm Texas night.

The next morning I went for a run along the resaca and a few miles of grapefruit and orange orchards. When I got, home Diego and I did some reading and had a really nice talk. Then we went into the kitchen where everything had come alive again with my grandfather making his famous Swedish pancakes for everybody!

A bit later in the morning we played a long, exciting football game with about 12 little and big cousins on the field between the orchard and the resaca. Diego picked me and all of the smallest cousins to be on his team. Yet, because he was such an amazing coach with such good game-plans and a real knack for making little kids feel like champs, our team came out victorious!

The Perfect Proposal

Thursday, Dec. 3, 2009

Last night Diego asked me to be his wife!! It was the most beautiful proposal ever! How perfect too—it was exactly one year from the night of our first official date. (Sometimes it pays to keep a journal and track these things )

He picked me up from Carolina’s at 9:30pm where I’d been throwing her a bridal shower. When he arrived he looked so handsome in nice jeans and a suave leather jacket, black shoes, black South-American button-up shirt, gelled hair, great cologne…smooth dark skin, beautiful eyes, big smile…he melts me. I invited him in for a second to say hi to all the girls, and one of the women from Venezuela asked me to sing him a song (since I’d made Kris sing to Carolina earlier). So I sang “Cielito Lindo” for him. I really do love the lunares on his face….and there just so happens to be one “junto a su boca.” He smiled and handled the embarrassment very well…like a man.

We then went out to dinner at Maria Bonita’s Mexican Restaurant. When we got there Maria greeted us both with a kiss and warm hug; calling me “Princesita” and him “Mi Campeón.” The restaurant was closed, but Diego had arranged with them to treat us to a special private dinner. Our table in the corner was beautiful…the only area still lit up by a lantern. We had caldo, Abuelita’s hot chocolate and an enormous elegant seafood platter with corn tortillas, limón, and a large plate of rice and beans on the side. It was an incredible meal! I couldn’t help but wonder if he was going to propose. When we were stuffed to our limit, however, we boxed up all the leftovers, paid, thanked Maria and the wonderful cook, and left—no proposal.