Home is where the HEART is

So the other day I realized that we were coming up on the 2 year mark of when we bought our first home. (Yes, the one we are currently living in.) And I also realized that in all this time, I have never put up pictures of it! So TODAY is finally the day! I have decided to take YOU on a tour of our humble abode. LUCKY YOU! :)

Welcome to our home! It's not a mansion that's for sure, and it may be a lot smaller than some of you could ever picture yourselves in.. BUT it fits our little family perfectly!

When you walk in our front door, you will see one of my favorite sayings... It gets me through dark days & keeps me chuggin' along :)

Once you step inside, you'll quickly see our family room. I love the huge window and all the light it brings into our house. Before Tyler and I moved in, I rag rolled the walls in here, it was lots of fun!

Here is another favorite saying that sits on our fireplace

A wide view of our family room

Fireplace

Tyler's pride and joy, his 52" TV he won through his work this past Christmas. Anything bigger would have been TOO big for this room!

Our doggies' favorite hang out spot downstairs, THE COUCH

As you walk around the corner you'll see our Dining area which has a large glass door leading out to our backyard.

Our small & simple kitchen

Keep walking and you'll see our Laundry room & half bath

Let's head upstairs, Toby is waiting for us :)

View from the top of the first set of stairs

View of the second set of stairs from the top, I love my light fixtures!

The view from the stairs down the hallway. That first door on the left that you hardly see is 1 of 3 bedrooms, right now I am using it as my photography studio where I do a lot of babies. The next door is the full bathroom, the very end of the hall is bedroom #2 which is my photography office, and bedroom #3 is the master bedroom (our sleeping quarters) it's on the right.

Bedroom #2 Photography Office. I spend countless hours in here editing my life away & it's where I am RIGHT NOW! :)
Before I forget, check out my super awesome desk chair. My loving hubby got it for me for Christmas cuz my old one was horribly uncomfortable!

The view of my messy desk and huge big screen that I use to proof with my clients. Someday soon those cords will be neatly tucked out of site.. but for now they are just hanging there driving me NUTS!

Our quite girly bathroom, SORRY TYLER, I think it's super cute but have been contemplating going a bit more masculine for the sanity of my husband.

A few little detail shots of our bedroom. Under the window we have a plethora of framed pictures of us from our engagements, bridals, etc.

The most important saying in our house & it's in our bedroom to be a constant reminder.
"Always Kiss Me Goodnight"

Sorry but this is the only view of our bedroom you get! I am currently in the process of finding a new comforter for our bed. So if any of you have good ideas of where I could find one LET ME KNOW!

Well this concludes our tour, thanks for stopping by! I hope that each of you will get the opportunity to visit in REAL life soon! (if you haven't already that is..)
We love our little home!

VOTE FOR ME!

***UPDATE***
Thanks for those of you who voted for me! Unfortunately, I wasn't even close to winning :( Oh well, better luck next time?



Hey Everyone! I am trying to win a spot in a photography workshop with Julie Parker. I want this REALLY bad & I can't do it without your help!
Please click on this link:
http://julieparkerphotography.blogspot.com/2010/01/its-time-to-vote.html
and vote for me.. RACHAEL GAPINSKI!

You can only vote once per computer/phone. THANKS SO MUCH!

...Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!...

The holidays have been plenty busy but so so fun! 2009 I did a horrible job of documenting & photographing our lives so one of my resolutions for 2010 is to do better at it & take photographs at the majority of events this year! I know I will be very grateful later on if I do this.
Well due to me being a slacker, I don't have any photos of Thanksgiving. We had a big dinner at my parents house & everyone was there. Two weeks before Thanksgiving I started a very strict diet through one of my doctors to help prepare me for my training. With this diet I went through a detox off sugar & was only allowed certain meats and certain vegetables. So NO bread, NO dairy, NO carbs, NO fruit, NO SUGAR. Yes I know what you're thinking.. "RACH you are crazy!" and I may or may not agree with you :) It is an incredibly hard diet I will not lie, but it is truly amazing what a difference it has made. Within a month I had lost 15 lbs & my body fat percent is at 21%. Well for Thanksgiving I decided to cheat and eat those foods I wasn't allowed & it was soo good BUT I did regret it right after because I had the worst stomach ache for hours afterward. My body was not happy with me!
Besides that, we had such a great day with our family enjoying everyone's company. We even went to see New Moon later that day.
December 5th - The Young Women performed at our ward Christmas party. I sang a song with one of my young women & it was the first time I've performed in over 5 years!
Karli & Devanee came to watch me (thanks you guys, it meant a lot!) They took a video so that Tyler could see it since he wasn't able to make it.
Tyler stopped by for a minute but had to leave before it started :(
Me with one of my beehives, Leticia

Here is the video, you may need to turn your volume up! Also, I am the one singing the first verse, the 2nd verse is Jessica (one of the young women).


December 12th - We had our first annual Christmas scavenger hunt planned by Tim & Megan. It was held at the gateway & Tyler couldn't make it so Micah & I were a team. The other teams were Devanee & her friend Colton, Karli & her boyfriend Chase, and Aaron & Meghann. I'm proud to say that Micah and I were the winners! It was a lot of fun!
December 21st- The whole Gelter fam went to the Christmas Sing-a-long at the Energy Solutions Arena. I stole these two pictures off Megan & Tim's blog (thanks!).
Me, Mom & Devanee freezing our butts off outside while we were waiting to be let inside!
Tyler and I singing.. you can't really see Tyler but thats his arm I promise! :)
I actually remembered to have a picture of us taken with my camera YAY ME! :) The sing a long was a lot of fun, Jon Schmidt performed a little bit & his 8 year old daughter sang "Where are you Christmas" and "Reindeer Boogie" in front of the entire arena! (it was completely packed). She melted my heart, it was adorable!
Our favorite part of the holidays is spending time with family. We love playing games & just hanging out with the ones we love! Here's a picture of Toby trying to get in on the action! ;)
This is the only picture I took at Christmas, I am horrible I know! I just had to document the fact that we are SPOILED! This is only some of the gifts we received this Christmas. Before we opened gifts we read in the bible the story of Jesus' birth. It is always so great to be reminded of the true meaning of Christmas, and helps bring the spirit into it.
December 27 & 28th- We got to take a quick trip down to St.George to see my Gramma & Grampa Harris. It was amazing that we actually got the whole Gelter clan down there! We enjoyed spending more time together & time with our grandparents. We played the card game 'Scum', ate at in & out, played a little tennis, and relaxed in a hot tub! It was great!
New Years Eve I spent the majority of the day baking goodies for my family! Devanee helped out & we made Pumpkin Choc chip cookies with cream cheese icing, Oreo cookie truffles, lemon bars, a cheese ball, and a sparkling white punch! It was so much fun! And everyone seemed to love all of it! I even got a huge hug from my father in law when he saw that I brought him a plate of his favorite goodies!
We spent the majority of the night at my parents house with the family (minus Aaron, Megan & Porter-we missed you!) and Tyler & I went down to his grandparents house for a few hours to play games with his extended family. It was a lot of fun! My biggest goal of 2010 is to complete my marathon coming up in May. I am terrified yet SO excited! I will be making a post soon all about it soon. Thanks to those of you who have already helped me out!

On a side note....
Today is my niece Emerie's 1st birthday! I cannot believe she is already a year old. It seems like just yesterday I was meeting her for the first time in the hospital. This is a pic I took at her one year photo session a couple weeks ago. Love her expression! Love you Emerie you're such a big girl!