..Random..

Sorry in advance, this is quite random and more a journal entry than anything.. I just felt I needed to blog it...

I was just looking over our blog, and realized so many little things that we have overlooked over the past month or so & not posted about.
After Tyler's accident, we needed another car in a bad way. We talked about getting a total junker for the time being.. but after much thought we decided to plan for the future & get a bigger car.Okay, so this isn't a picture of OUR murano. But it looks exactly the same, I promise. :]
Tyler gave into my obsession I have with Muranos & let me get this cute "crossover" SUV. The other day he admitted to me that he was very happy about our purchase & that he's glad I convinced him. (See, I'm not all bad.. jk)
I am so thankful for such an amazing husband.. I am truly blessed & I do not deserve him. I have been sick for the past several days, and on Monday (when Tyler has a chance get a few extra hours of sleep) he woke up early to make me a delicious breakfast in bed. It was such an awesome surprise & I want to thank him from the bottom of my heart for being so thoughtful. If only for that brief moment, I felt better :] He has been so understanding this week as I've been unbelievably lazy and sick as a dog.. I try to make him dinner & things but he always ends up helping. Last night after what seemed like an eternity, he came home from work & I had just finished writing an entry in my journal. When he walked in he told me he had the exact same journal he got as a kid and had only written in it but a few times.. he went and got it & we spent the next 2 hours reading to each other out of our journals! It may sound lame, but it was so much fun! He gave up playing basketball just so he wouldn't leave his "sick wife" all by herself.. Come to find out we both got our journals as gifts in the SAME year.. 1999! It was the craziest coincidence, & it's one more reason we were tied to each other from the very beginning :]
I also very thankful the support I get from him with my photography. He believed in me from the very beginning and knew that I would be able to focus better on building my business if I wasn't working full time. So he told me to quit working & to focus on my photography business. It seems like it's taking forever to build into a money maker, but it is one step closer to a job that I can do as a Mom & that's my most important job I could ever have. He works so hard to provide for us & I want him to know how thankful I am for that.

I would never change any part of my life, if it would have led me somewhere else. Because I want to be right here working toward the same eternal goals as my husband. And I wouldn't trade that for anything.
My feelings said perfectly in this song...

And I wouldn't change a thing, I'd walk right back through the rain,
Back to every broken heart on the day that it was breaking.
And I'd relive all the years,
and be thankful for the tears I've cried with every stumble, step that led to you,
and got me here.
-Rascal Flatts

I hope Tyler knows how much he truly means to me, and that even though there are some tuff times, that I live for him.. & that I love him forever.

...Finally!...

Some of you may already know, and if you do that's fine I'm posting it anyways.. because I'm way excited :]
After the long wait, my photography website is officially up and running! It seems like I can now actually call myself a photographer. ha :]
I hope that through this website, I can continue to build my business & continue to do what I love!
Check it out & let me know what you think... oh, & tell your friends! :]

http://www.rachaeltyler.com

We are officially an AUNT & UNCLE!!

Finally!! Right Megan?!

This morning we got to go see our first niece, Emerie Anne! She was born last night, January 2nd at 11:35pm. The first baby born this year at Lakeview Hospital! And because of that they were greatly blessed. Besides getting a beautiful healthy baby girl, they got hundreds of dollars in gift cards & many gifts from the hospital! It was unbelievable!

She is so beautiful & looks a lot like her Mommy & a little like her Daddy :]

Congrats Tim & Megan! We love you guys...

...Christmas 2008...

So, we had to make a post about our Christmas, that's a given. First off, Tyler and I are slackers so we didn't take our own pictures (surprising coming from a photographer huh?!) So we stole a few from Megan & Tim's blog.. thanks guys! :]

I just wanna warn you that this post is long! It's more to document rather than entertain I guess.. so I won't be too offended if you don't read it :]

Our Christmas celebration started on Christmas Eve when we dressed up in our cute PJ's and went to Grandma & Grandpa Roberts for the tradition Aebleskivers for dinner. It was delicious & Grandpa Bruce put us right to work training us on how to make them! The main reason for this was because we had volunteered to make them for my family for Christmas brunch! (And we had never made them! ha ha) In less than no time, Tyler had it down like a pro.
We opened gifts from Grandma & Grandpa Roberts, which was fabulous because it was just what we needed. Food storage stuff & toilet in case there is no running water, etc.

Tyler and I decided to do our Christmas that night before bed because we knew we wouldn't have time on Christmas with having to go to his family's & to mine. Tyler was WAY to good to me this year, getting me lots of cute clothes, a way nice reflector for my photography, enchanted and twilight soundtracks, breaking dawn, and the pearl earrings I've been wanting!! (just to name a few). Tyler got lots of cute clothes, Nike Shox, and a new wallet. I'm so lame but he's hard to shop for because he never tells you what he wants! :]

We went to sleep & were awoken at 6am sharp by Carson (Tyler's littlest brother) telling us we needed to come over! To be honest, we weren't surprised but we seriously weren't ready to get out of bed! We headed over & checked out what Santa had brought them & then we gave them our gifts which the boys were so excited to get Rockband & we got his parents new cell phones & his dad an Ipod.. We then at breakfast there. Jeff (Tyler's dad) made this new recipe he found that was an egg, rice, bean, cheese casserole dish that was way yummy!We then headed over to my families' house to start cooking aebleskivers... we decided we wanted to make brown sugar bacon in the oven & sausage on the skillet as well. We were cooking away & then the fire alarm went off! Well needless to say, we burnt the bacon to a complete black crisp! Which was a total bummer because brown sugar bacon is delish! I managed to cook a few pieces on the skillet but there wasn't enough for everyone.. The brunch turned out better than I've made you imagine though!

We began seperating all the gifts, which is a total chore because there is always SO many! IT IS OFFICIAL... WE ARE SPOILED ROTTEN!
We love everything we got, our DVD collection outgrew our cabinet, we can't decide on where to hang our beautiful Simon Dewey painting, we are the talk of the town in our stylish new wardrobe (wink*) and Tyler is so excited about all his new tools!
Here is Tyler and I in our sweet UofU hoodies we got for Christmas from each other! Tyler got tickets to the UofU vs. BYU basketball game from Tim&Megan for Christmas which he is totally stoked about!

We were especially excited for our parents to open their gifts from us. We all pitched in and got my dad a giftcard for $200 to Lowe's to go towards his dream 60 gal compressor he's been wanting, and we put together 36 black and white photos to make my Mom a "picture wall" she's been wanting. It was so much fun doing this because 3 of the 6 siblings I got to take out on photo shoots, & we finally got some up to date pictures of Micah, he has grown up so much this year! (Check his shoot out on my photography blog)

We love going to Grandma and Grandpa Gapinski's for Christmas dinner & they are so good to us. We are so greatful for this holiday season we had, and we were made so fully aware of how blessed we are. We have such amazing family and friends, that we don't know where we'd be without. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts!! We hope everyone had a very merry christmas as well!

...Merry Christmas!...

From our home to yours.. we hope you have a very merry christmas! We hope this season has brought you brightness, love & hope... and that the coming year will bring you every happiness!!

♥ The Gapinskis

8 THINGS!

I got tagged by Megan, this is probably way boring cuz I'm not too exciting these days ha ha!

8 Of my Favorite Books-
I didn't do much reading until recently so this one could be hard...
Twilight Series
Religious books (BofM & Bible of course)
Too Soon to Say Goodbye
Skinny Biotch books (don't wanna swear in front of the kiddies..ha ha)
Les Miserables (the short version :])
The Harry Potter books
-k- this is sad i really can't think of any others that I love...

8 Things That Happened Yesterday- Does it have to be yesterday?!? Um,
1) laundry
2) edited pictures
3) packed and mailed Laura's Christmas gift
4) ordered photo prints
5) made peanut butter fingers
6) took my comforter to get dry cleaned
7) met my cute visiting teachers :]
8) posted this blog! ha ha


8 Things To Look Forward To-
1)Christmas with our families!
2)driving in my new car :]
3)having kids someday
4)Christmas Eve with Tyler's relatives
5)the future of my photography business!
6)finishing the BofM as a family (Ty & I)
7)Tax Return (I'll have to agree with you Meg)
8)learning more about photography :]

8 Things On My Wish List-
1)Lose weight!
2)To have kids
3)To have a great holiday season!
4)To get my website finished
5)To pay off our car loans :]
6)Learn how to cook well for Tyler!
7)Run a marathon
8)For everyone to have a very Merry Christmas! :]

8 Things I Love About Winter-
1) Christmas
2)New Years
3)Warm Fires
4)Yummy treats
5)Seeing snow from inside.. ha ha
6)Remembering Christ's birth
7)the spirit of giving
8)Love

8 To Tag-
Kiera
Meghann
Jacque
Morgan
Laura
Beki
Amberlee
Bridgette

TYLER IS SoOoOo stinkin old!

So, before all the craziness happened with Tyler's accident.. I was planning to post about his birthday last Sunday (dec. 7th).. So I'll just have to do it now.. a little late.. but oh well!

We had so much fun the day before his birthday celebrating with my parents and siblings & sister-in-laws! (Minus Karli... :( we missed you!) We went to Famous Dave's, which is a favorite place of our family's to go for birthday dinners! We got 2 trash can lids like usual.. and OH SO GOOD!
My Dad never smiles in pics so this was rare!! But just wait...

HA HA! L>O>V>E it!

Tyler got a few gifts to open....
I'm not sure what his favorite gift was.. because all of them were FABULOUS, and exactly what he wanted!! THANKS EVERYONE FOR THE GIFTS!! And Aaron & Meghann.. we have already used 1/3 of the gift certificate at Little Orient.. :] We can't wait to go eat at Olive Garden too! Thanks Mom & Dad for the UofU hoodie and t-shirt.. & Tyler you look hot wearing your new DC loafer shoes ha ha.. oh and you're tie is sexy as well! :]

On Tyler's official birthday, we got the pleasure of having dinner over at his parents casa, & his grandparent gapinski's came (what a great surprise!) and we had Tyler's favorite Pork & Seeds.. thanks Amy, you did a great job!! (Thank Cindy Mitchell for giving her the recipe!!)

Tyler got some gifts from his parents and his grandparents, thank you guys so much!! Now we don't have to borrow your hair cutting kit anymore :]

Tyler loved his birthday! Thank everyone who made it so great!!