The Little Car that Could

(Kenzie)

This past Tuesday, September 22, Brad flew to Utah to get our other car, Kenzie that got stuck in Utah when we were making our way to California. The mechanic got it fixed and Brad was able to drive it all the way to Cali. Let me start at the beginning of this ordeal:

We left Utah for California on Monday, August 24, 2009 at 8am, right after I got off from work. I was dreading the long drive to California and it was well-warranted. Since we didn't have any furniture, we were able to fit all of our things in both our Hondas. Brad led the way in our old Honda, Kenzie, and I followed right behind in our Honda Fit. The drive went smoothly and everything seemed alright, until I noticed Brad exiting off the freeway into a rest area just past Nephi.
I didn't think nothing of it, thinking that he just needed to use the bathroom. When I parked right beside him, I saw that he had the car hood up. And then I thought, "Oh crap." Our worst fear had become a reality. Kenzie was overheating and we weren't even out of Utah. Brad met a car mechanic and he was able to inspect Kenzie and gave us the bad news that there was no way that we were going to be able to drive Kenize all the way to California in that condition. The only thing we could do was to try and drive Kenzie to his Grandma's who lived in Spanish Fork. And that was all the way back from where we first started (well, sorta. We started out in Orem, but close enough). I was very frustrated at this thought.
We carefully made our way back and his Grandma graciously allowed us to dump Kenzie in her driveway. I was sad leaving half our things in Utah, but what else can we do. Well, we could've stayed and tried getting Kenzie fixed, but I had a job interview to get to on Wednesday (which I was lucky to get at short notice). Luckily for me, Brad kept my spirits up and stayed positive the whole time.
I guess it was kinda a good thing (for me at least) that that had happened because I wouldn't have been able to enjoy the car ride without Brad in the car with me. He was really sweet because he drove the whole way and didn't once complained. We did stop in Mesquite and stayed the night at Virgin River Hotel. We finally arrived in California Tuesday night, August 25, 2009.
Being from a small island and never experiencing long car rides, it was really a whole new experience for me. It was the looooooongest car ride of my life. For one thing, I'm used to taking the plane to get to far places. What would have only taken an hour plane ride to Vegas took 6 painfully long hours of just sitting in the car. After arriving in Cali, I thought to myself that I was never ever going to do something like that ever. But of course, the reality still remains that it's the cheapest way to get to places. And that sucks for me. At least I got to see lots of cool scenery and lots and lots of desert... :)

Fourth of July at Stadium of Fire

Our Fourth of July was spent at the Stadium of Fire. It's a huge celebration that takes place every year in Provo. Every year we've enjoyed the fireworks from outside of the stadium, but this time we wanted to experience it from the inside. This year they had the Jonas Brothers performing with Glenn Beck as the host. It was truly a spectacular show, though we didn't care for the Jonas Brothers and the high-pitch screaming from all the little girls. Brad and I had to plug our ears the whole time the Jonas Brothers were on stage. Despite that, we thoroughly enjoyed the fireworks display.

Our Cat Companions, Frank and Cain

Brad and I have moved in with Uncle Dick and Aunt Anna in their nice home in Orem. We moved in around May 30th. We initially moved in so that we can watch grandma Jacob while they were away with Court and Matt on their month-long European vacation (yeah, wish I could that. :) one of these days.) We thought that we were finally moving for good to Cali at the end of June, but Brad's start date with Grant Thornton got pushed back to October 19. So, Dick and Anna were kind enough to let us stay with them until September when we would be finally moving.

While they were gone, we had the pleasure of having two cats as companions, Frank and Cain. Frank is Anna's cat and Cain is Jason and Bethany's cat (they live in grandma's basement). It's been fun to have such affectionate and playful cats to be around with. Here are our cat friends:
Frank likes to be around Brad; he esp likes helping Brad with his studying.I thought it was funny how Frank like just lying on Brad.This was especially funny to me. Both guys watching TV. Look how tubby Frank is.
Meet Cain:

He's such a funny cat. He likes to be in tight spots and he'll try to attack you from there; under couches and behind doors.
And like Frank, he likes to be with Brad.One of the cutest things he does is attacking his own tail. He reminds me of a dog. Another thing is when you're gone for a long time, he's super happy and excited to see you. He hugs your legs, rubs his head on your feet. And when you sit down, he climbs on your lap, puts his head under your hand, puts his paws on your shoulders, and then looks you in the eye as if to say, "Why'd you leave me?"

My 24th Birthday

I'm 24!!! My birthday, which was yesterday, was spent picnicking and hiking with Brad in Provo Canyon and having dinner with some of our friends. The weather was perfect. I thought it was going to be a rainy day, because thursday and friday had threatening storm clouds. Luckily, Saturday was perfect. Not hot, like it usually is here in the summer. There were clouds (not rain clouds) that covered the hot sun while we picnicked and hiked. Brad had gotten us a huge subway club, chips, fruit, and best of all, a little oreo chocolate cake. It was yum. The best part of my birthday was that he got me a laptop that I've wanted for so long. My laptop that I got my sophomore year in college died on my last semester of college. It was really sad. So after 2 years without a laptop, Brad finally got me one. I wanted an HP laptop, but a Toshiba works just as well. :)After our picnic, we had dinner at Sam Hawk (my favorite restaurant; it's Korean, mmmm) with my best friends, Ana & Erin, and some of our good friends (Brad's old roommates and their wives), Jacob & Shelly and Joey & Tyla.
All in all, it was a good day. :)

Visiting cousin Tau Jr. aka Kiuga

I finally got to meet up with my cousin Junior. He moved to Clearfield, UT (an hour 15 min drive from Provo) to attend Job Corp. He'll be graduating this November. The last time I saw him was 6 years ago when I left home to go to BYU. He used to be a skinny boy, but look at him now. :D.
He's now a 21 year old young man. I still see him as my little cousin that I grew up with, even though he's not little any more.
We met up with Jr at Job Corp and he introduced me and Brad to his girlfriend, Marie. She's a really nice girl from a little island in Micronesia (I don't think I've ever met anyone from there).
I wish we could have spent more time together, but he had time constraints with his school.
We ended up eating out at his favorite restaurant, Golden Corral (But of course, it has to be a buffet :D).
He'll be going home for the summer at the end of June. We'll get to hang out again when he gets back though. Until then...

Well done Tynishia! You go girl!

I'm so happy and proud of Ms. Tynishia Tufu, speller No. 4. She did amazing; she made it to the 3rd round, but didn't get to the semifinals. It must've been so nervewracking to be up there on stage spelling in front the cameras and all those people. I remember how nervous I was. It sucks because you will always remember that one word that threw you out of the competition. I didn't get a chance to compete again, but Tynishia does. There is always next year to try again little champ! :)

Meet Speller No. 4 at:

http://public.spellingbee.com/public/spellers/2009/4

Tynishia heads to Washington D.C for the Spelling Bee!

My little cousin, Tynishia, just left to D.C. for the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee. I'm so excited for her and I wish her all the best of luck there. I know she'll do great. This is the first time that she's been outside of Am. Samoa/Hawaii. I think it's so cute that she's excited to see President Obama at the White House. She's been studying so hard and she's only a 7th grader! She'll have another chance to go at it as an 8th grader. It was also really cute of her to mention me as her cousin in the paper. :D

A link to her story in the news: http://www.samoanewsonline.com/viewstory.php?storyid=6384&edition=1242986400

Congratulations Tynishia and I wish you the best!

Our Second Year Anniversary & Our Story!

I can't believe that we've been married two years. It was an incredible two years of my life. I am so blessed to have Brad in my life; he is truly such an amazing husband. He's made me so happy and I love how we're still so much in love. I'm so lucky to have to have him.

We were married in the Provo Temple two years ago. It was such an exciting and exhilarating day for me, being that I also graduated and received my diploma earlier in the day (I know, crazy).

Our Story:

We've known each other for 4 years now. We met one hot summer day in '05 when I finished up my Sophomore year in college. I vividly remember walking down the stairs from my apartment with my best friend Ana where we met Joey, Jeremy (Brad's roommates) and following right behind, Brad, who were just walking up the stairs. They were "introducing" Brad to the members in our ward. I thought to myself, right mhmm. It's funny how they just visited only the girls and I know that it was just an excuse for them to visit with girls. Brad had just arrived from Simi Valley and was just starting BYU.

Joey introduced me and Ana to new guy, Brad, and I thought that he was kinda cute. I talked with Joey and then walked over and talked a little bit with the ever-so-eccentric Jeremy, who always manages to catch me off guard with his random and off-color remarks, never seeming to relate to the topic of the conversation(well, if there ever was one).

Anyway, I finally made my way down the staircase to Brad and we started talking the usual getting-to-know-the-other-person conversation. After I told him I was from American Samoa, he was like wait, "Talofa! Did I say that right?" I was highly amused and he told me that he had a Hawaiian companion on his mission in Japan. We continued talking, and I thought to myself how cool this guy was.
He asked me out on a date not too long after. We watched a movie at the theater; funny thing is I don't remember what it was. I remember being so shy in front of him. I get high-strung when I'm with a cute guy. He later asked me to do the "Brownie Assignment" (a silly activity where guys were forced to make a dessert with a girl in the ward for Ward Dessert Night held once a week) with me. When he asked me to make brownies with him, I was so excited inside. I declined because I had already done the assignment with a different guy; you couldn't do it twice :(.
Anyway, I turned into a retard and started avoiding and being mean to him afterwards. It was because I had this preconceived notion of him having "yellow fever" (liking asian girls) because he served his mission in Japan. Nothing turns me off than the words "yellow fever."
I remember him calling several times at my apartment and I told my roommates to say I wasn't there or I was busy or something. I know, I was so mean. I pushed my thoughts of him aside and never thought anything of him. The summer went by and we continued on our separate lives. We would acknowledge each other every now and then at church activities.
I finished up my summer semester and most of my friends had left to go home before school started up again. My friend Sarah and I found ourselves alone in our apartment complex with nothing to do. So we decided to hang out with the boys at the Washington Apartments. Come to my surprise, Brad was still around. I thought he had left to go home. We hung out a lot of with the boys at Washington and I found myself liking Brad a lot, even though I was denying it the whole time. Next thing you know it he puts his arm around my shoulder and then I melted and was smiling from ear to ear. Ever since then, we've been inseparable!

Viva Espana!

One of the things I love watching is ballroom dancing. We got to watch BYU's Ballroom Dance Company perform Viva Espana, in which Kristi (Brad's cousin's wife) was performing. The show was amazing and so was Kristi. Here are some of our favorite parts:

We especially enjoyed the glow-in-the-dark routine.

One of Kristi's performances (in blue) and the cool finale.

Ari & Sarah's Wedding!

On Friday, April 3, 2009, an awesome couple we know got married at Westlake Village Inn in California:

Sarah & Ari

The ceremony was very beautiful and touching. Everything about it was picture perfect, especially Sarah: her dress, her hair, everything!

Despite being sleep-deprived (I was up for more than 24 hours because I worked the night previous to the wedding and had to fly Cali from Utah), I was surprisingly functional for the most part. I was feeding off of all the excitement in the air.

Us with Ari and Best Man, Corey.
The reception was gorgeous as well and it was so much fun. There were all kinds of fancy hor d'oeuvres (sushi and kebabs) and drinks for the cocktail portion of it. Dinner was so fancy too and of course very delicious. The main course was filet mignon! It was amazing I still had room for it all.
The cake was simple yet elegant. The cake toppers were the best: Princess Leia and Han Solo!
All in all, this was the most fun and elegant wedding I've been to.

Hare, Hare Krishna!

Last week was a week of fun for us. We got to hang out with Brad's former roomates and their wives (Joey & Tyla and Jacob & Shelley), saw the BYU Luau, ate fried oreo sundaes, got free dinner (we like free!), and saw Bedtime Stories (I recommend it; it was way cute).We also decided to attend the Festival of Colors last minute at the Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork, UT. It's a bizarre sight to find a Hindu temple in the middle of Utah.

It was too bad we got there too late. All the paint was gone, but it was cool to see all the people splattered with colors.And there were llamas? Reminds me of Tina from Napoleon Dynamite.
Even though we missed most of the festivities (the throwing around of paints :( part), it was still fun. I got to dance in the temple, which was way fun!

#1

Brad received a job offer last Fall 2008 from Grant Thornton, an accounting firm in California. He'll be graduating this April from BYU and then we'll be heading out to Cali where he'll start work in August.

Anyway, Grant Thornton recently ranked #1 of all the Public Accounting Firms. This is cool because they're the first non-Big Four firm to achieve this honor. So, yay for Brad!

A Guy's Day Out

Yesterday Brad and one of his former roommates (Joey) were able to hang out, while his wife was hosting a bridal shower. They went and bought the movie Twilight for his wife at Target and then they had subway sandwiches for lunch (Brad was kind enough to buy me one). They came back to our apartment and played Gears of War 2 afterwich, Joey's wife and I joined them in playing Rockband 2. It was tons of fun. I'm sure Brad had a great time hanging out with one of his old roomies.

Kazoku?

Brad and I were brainstorming some names to call our blog. Some of the names we came up with were:

The Krazee Kitchens

The Kitchenistas!

Kitchen Kooks

The Kworky Kitchens

Sweet Kitchen Memories

Life of the Kitchens

Brad came up with Kitchen Kazoku and I thought that was cute. Kazoku is Japanese for family. It's fitting being that I'm a 1/4 Japanese and he served his mission in Japan.

Going through the rituals...

It's time to go home. It's 6:09am and my coworker's here to replace me. Now I can go home to sweetums.

It's here in this hospital (in the lab specifically) where you'll find me working from 8:30pm until 6:30am for 7 days straight (starting Monday night and ending Monday morning), every other week. So I work 7 days straight and then I have 7 days off. I'm always counting down 'til my 7 days off ...

Little Miss Rainmaker Champ

My little cousin won the Island-wide Spelling Bee yesterday and gets to go to the the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C. I'm just so happy and proud of her. She's only in 7th grade and after completing 39 rounds (yup, unbelievable), she became triumphant. Her winning word was "dedicatee." She was absolutely amazing. She's such a little darling :). Here's the link to the article from Samoa News:

http://www.samoanewsonline.com/viewstory.php?storyid=4726&edition=1237456800

And if you look closely you'll find my name :).