Hard Times

Today was kind of the most emotional day of my life. This morning my parents put my beautiful dog Chloe to sleep. She has been sick for a long time and has had these awful sores on her stomach that have been causing her to bleed a lot. It's been so heartbreaking watch her have less and less energy, and my parents finally made the decision to put her down. So we've known it was coming for a little while. I have been spending most of my nights with Chlo-lay-lay and each night leading up to today just got more and more heart breaking. She spent her last night sleeping in bed like she has done a couple nights a week for the past 13 years. She's been the only living thing that I could stand cuddling for the longest time. She was the crazy ball of energy dog who some of my friends really feared, but she has always been so playful and just loved everyone (even though her way of showing it was often just jumping on them). She was the great gift that Rory convinced our parents to get when we moved to America in 2004. I've never known this house without Chloe and every time I remember that she's not hear anymore just about crushes my heart completely. I decided not to go with my parents to put her to sleep because it would be way too hard for me. It was hard enough just FaceTiming all my siblings so they could say goodbye to her. But man at work I was just a wreck.. it took everything in me to not have a mental breakdown every ten minutes. I'm sorry this is so all over the place... my thoughts are extremely scatter brained... and honestly too sad to write too many coherent sentences.
I do want to thank everyone that has reached out to me today. This has been one of the hardest days in my life, and my friend Jadyn offered a great explanation for it that a friend told her when her pupper passed a few months ago: "Losing a pet can hurt more because their love is so pure that there is nothing to complicate your relationship with them." I love that she shared that with me... honestly made me cry even more at work, but I think it describes Chloe's death and my emotions perfectly.
Here are some of the photos I shot before I left for work this morning (I am feeding her licorice in some of the photos, that stuff was like crack cocaine to her):

This is so hilarious to me, I am so made that it is out of focus hahahah

Alright I really just had to get that out of my way before I started the rest of my weekly update.

I'm going to pick up from last Wednesday.

I went to the temple in the evening with Steph, Cob, Keaton & Abriel. It's so much fun having lots of friends being endowed now so we can all go do sessions together. Abriel just got home from her missions and is such a cutie, and just the happiest and kindest person in ever. Overall it was an amazing experience, and I am always grateful for the times that I spend in the temple just refueling my life and my goals.

While I was in the temple Zach was awaiting our wedding gift from my parents and my aunt Elin.... A PURPLE BED! He was waiting around allllll day for it and it finally came in the evening, and he got plenty of pictures capturing the exciting moments (cause he is the best), here is just a few:

It's official now, and I am puuumped about it! 

I spent most of my Thursday working on my dad's parking video for ASU... nothing too special.

On Friday I had an adventure taking photos of Jacie's family! It was honestly the most entertaining family photo session I have ever done. More than half of them haaaate taking family photos but they do it pretty often! I just had a hoot listening to Jacie's moms reactions to people being angry, it was too funny. Honestly I would go a little crazy trying to round up 18 people to do family photos, so her mom is a total champ for even attempting to get these photos done, let alone being successful at it!

After the pictures Cob and Keaton picked me up to party.. we were mostly just driving back and forth between our houses trying to figure out how to get all my raw photos to Jacie to give to her mom since she wanted to edit them herself. Once we finally got everything I needed we went bck to Cob's house and Zach was there after driving to Mesa from Tucson for the weekend! We spent most of the night playing different games and talking about all their plans for Zach's bachelor party, and of course having those crazy boys catch me up on their lives. I love living vicariously through them...but I am also so happy I am not in the dating scene anymore. Because I am an old person now I called the night early, sadly right when Jacie and Abriel arrived after going to a wedding... but old people need their sleep people.

On Saturday my aunt treated me to get my hair diiiiiiiiid at Epic Salon. I decided to go lighter for my wedding so, we went with a partial highlight. Usually I have a pretty tough head and I don't really have a problem with people not being super gentle. but holy cow my head was being a real baby this time around. I had two people working on my hair for some reason and while it made the process twice as fast,... it might my head jerk back and forth which was very painful... and for some reason when they were washing my hair (supposedly the most relaxing part) i started CRYING because I was in so much pain. LUCKILY I am in love with the result. Beauty is pain people. I wish I took a picture... buutt I didn't so you will have to wait a little longer to see that.

On Saturday night Zach, Steph and I went to a fireside with Elder Anderson at the Red Mountain institute. We met up with Keaton, Cob & their gang as well as Andy. It was a pretty good fireside about the importance of the Book of Mormon in our lives, and it was pretty cool because we were in like the 6th row back (this institute is freaking huge so you have to know how big of a deal it is that we got up that close). The only downside of being that close... was that my phone freaking started playing a Groupon ad OUT LOUD>... I was so embarrassed hahaha. Luckily not everyone in the world heard it and I was able to turn it off fairly quickly... just don't take your cell to these things people.. lesson learned.

After the fireside, Andy, Steph, Zach and I went to Chili's for some late din din. It was such a hilarious experience... we were all pretty tired (because we are old people) and so everything was hilarious to us. We made a joke about pretty much every sign that said the word fajita... it is important to note that once upon a time my brother EJ started calling fajitas FA-JEYE-TAS.... which sounds a little sexual, and that's why it was so hilarious to us. Zach and I got nachos and our waitor made them in the strangest way for us. Instead of stacking all the toppings all over a bunch of chips, he topped 10 chips with all the toppings individually... that's not a good way to describe it but it was so strange I promise. It was such a fun time though, I love these kids and I am happy to call them my best friends.

On Sunday Zach and I had round two of our marriage interview with our Bishop! This time around it was the sexual intimacy talk... which I was extremely hesitant about hearing my Bishop talk to me about, but it was actually awesome and he gave some great advice and went into like zero detail which I appreciated. We have officially passed the rounds with our Bishop and now we are on to the stake president! all fingers crossed for us!

We spent the rest of Sunday lounging around and doing a little bit of wedding plans with our parents. And of course we watch Big Brother... but I am so over this season it's so hard for me to sit through episodes anymore. 

The entire night I was craving takis or some sort of salty chips... I was going crazy. But I didn't want to break the Sabbath so I suffered without satisfying my savory craving. And just to prove to everyone one more time why Zach is the greatest human on earth... I woke up on Monday and made my way to my car to drive to work and what do you knooooow was hanging from my cars side mirrors, a Walmart bag with takis and chips in them, and a note from my "secret admirer". I am telling you people he is the greatest person on this planet.

I can't really remember what happened the rest of Monday besides me just soaking in all my last moments with Chloe... and same with Tuesday honestly. I just didn't want to leave her side. Tuesday also started the Facetiming rounds with my siblings to say goodbye to her.

But I can't think about the sadness right now so moving on... I got the plan from my boss to figure out how to make me living in Tucson work!!! And guys it's the perfect plan, I am so pumped that I get to keep my job and that I have this flexible plan that allows me to work from home and come to the office a few days a week. This is such a big blessing for Zach and I, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Today was tough obviously, but today was also good because Steph came over and did a trial run for my hair before my bridals photo session on Labor day! She went with me to buy extensions from Sally's, which turned out absolutely perfect (I was shocked). And through trial and error we have learned all the things I need to do on Monday when it's the real deal getting my hair done. We also tried my dress and veil on with my new hair... and guuuuuys this actually feels real now! I am so excited!!!! We are only 24 days away people, I hope you guys are getting as pumped as I am!