Wit you

There are too many funny conversations/things Mike says not to post some of them. I'll call the series "Wit you". Here's one from last night:

Kristy: You know when we have kids, they'll probably look Japanese.
Mike: (said very matter-of-factly) Good. We'll get 'em some scholarships.

I'm constantly entertained.

Home Sweet Home

The Belvedere

I thought I'd post some pics of our place in SLC. These are all of the building. I'll take some of the inside of our apartment when we finish getting things in their places and pictures on the wall!

I have the funniest husband in the world

Conversations upon getting home tonight:

Mike: Ugggghhhhh!
Kristy: It's so hot in our apartment!
Mike: It's like where they send people to die!

The next conversation:
Mike: Let's read while you rub my feet.
Kristy: But they're black on the bottom.
Mike: (pause) Racisssssst.

Welcome to our life together.

1st home

I'm very sentimental about the first home Mike and I had. It was fun to go out looking for a place when we were engaged and think about our future together. To be totally honest, I wasn't sure if marriage was gonna be in the cards for me. I mean, I definitely wanted to get married, but I'd had my fair share of difficult dating experiences and was 31 before I met Mike. For him, this gig was easy! We met his 2nd month in the ward. I was girlfriend #1 and he was only 22. He still can't understand why finding someone to marry should be difficult. Ah, but for me ... I waited a long time to find the right guy. And he was totally worth the wait and past heartaches. 



OK so I'm a pretty sentimental person in general. In my life, there is a period of mourning for sold cars, favorite jeans that have fallen apart, even a good blow dryer that bites the dust (you know the kind that dries your hair fast, but doesn't fry the ends, and has a quiet motor. Yeah, hard to replace.) So leaving our first apartment together was difficult for me. While Mike is feeling a little homesick for his family, I am missing our apartment and the routine we were in there. It's where we started the habit of reading scriptures and praying together every day, where we cooked Sunday dinners (the smoke alarm going off every time and not because anything was burning), where we lived next door to a 30 year old published author with 2 small (girly) dogs. I had a hard time packing the boxes to leave. I look forward to having a house and raising children, but for now each place we live in will be our home. No matter how many times we move, I'll do my best to make our apartment/bungalow/house, a home/comfortable haven. We'll have memories associated with each and I'm sure I'll get misty-eyed each time we pack up. Here are some pics of our 1st apartment the day before moving in.

Some memories:
We got the keys to the place on December 31st so our New Year's Eve was spent watching Iron Man 2 in the new place. All we had in the apartment was the TV, Xbox, a couple blankets, a bottle of Martinelli's and two 2011 champagne glasses. We fell asleep on the floor watching the movie, missed the clock striking 12 and went home after we woke up around 12:30am. Exciting start to 2011.

On January 1st we moved all my stuff into the apartment and I lived there until the wedding day. It was below zero the day I moved in. Ugh. Bless the poor souls with good hearts who helped us in that endeavor. The next day after church, Mike and I went back to the apartment to make lunch and watch a movie. Boxes were everywhere, nothing put away yet. We were stopped by the maintenance guy in the courtyard who asked if we had water damage in our place. I'm sure our confused faces answered the question. We had no idea what he was talking about. He informed us that a pipe had burst in the apartment above us and that there was damage to that one as well as the apartment below us. As we walked up the stairs I felt almost certain we'd find water everywhere, but we didn't! The maintenance guy concluded that the water must have run straight down the wall to the first floor and skipped us miraculously. I was feeling pretty lucky/blessed as we talked and made lunch. We blessed the food and that's when I started hearing the drip, drip, drip. It was quiet and Mike didn't hear it at first. I kept hearing it so I scoped it out and sure enough ... drips from the ceiling into my box of shoes. No damage. It had just started so I moved the box, grabbed a bowl to catch the water and we went out to find our maintenance man. Soon, in another location, started another drip. Then another. Then another. We had a straight line of bowls on the floor and table catching the many drips. The maintenance guy came, grabbed his forehead and swore. He came back with a bucket, but not before the ceiling gave way and dumped about 30 gallons of water onto our floor and table. We heard it start to go so we jumped up and Mike started hurling boxes to me over the couch trying to get them out of the way. We were in shock. Mr. Fix It came in with his trusty bucket and started poking around another section of the ceiling. About 20 more gallons fell from the sky. My first thought was, "And now begin the Reintjes' adventures." Long story short, he had to cut a 3 foot by 4 foot hole in the ceiling, patch it over the course of the next week, have the carpet cleaners come twice and we had to run an industrial sized fan for about 3 days. And the "scar"/terrible patch job was always there to remind us. Good beginnings :)

Initial deep thoughts

Some things have been on my mind for the past 8 months or so concerning marriage and family and I've been wanting to get 'em out there. Mike and I got engaged last October and were married in January. As our families were in the initial stages of getting to know each other and people started to gather to Colorado for the wedding I was feeling a little overwhelmed emotionally, in a good way. I couldn't help but think that what started as a simple date involving only Mike and I now affected hundreds of people. Our seemingly small decision to go on a date and spend time together would now not only eternally affect us alone. That got me thinking about agency and choices. One of Satan's lies is that humans are islands unto themselves. Our decisions don't affect anyone but us, he says. To me, marriage is the epitome of this being called out and bared to the world for what it is - a bald-faced lie. How can anyone look at the decision to marry, and say that it only affects the two parties? I'm a daughter, granddaughter, sister, aunt, niece, friend. Because I am loved, my decisions matter not only to me, but to my family and friends. As a daughter, I care about the happiness of my parents. As a sister, I care about the well being and happiness of my siblings. They in turn care about me. I realized just how big the decision to go on a date with Mike was. That one decision led to more decisions to spend time together and meet each other's families. Eventually we made the huge decision to join our lives together forever, but we did not just join each other's lives. We joined each other's families. I felt the weight of this decision in a different way the last week before our wedding. I felt the weight of responsibility, again in a good way. I felt a stronger kind of love for Mike because I was witnessing the love of many more people in his life, for him. I want us to have a strong and happy marriage because I love Mike, but also because I know there are many others who love him too. I want our marriage to become a strength to others, and our home to be a retreat not only for us, but for all we love.

Unbeknownst to them, I made some silent promises to both our families that week before the wedding, similar promises I was going to be making to Mike - that I would treat him well, love him always, fulfill my responsibilities as a wife and future mother, always stay strong in the Church and nurture my faith. In my heart I promised that I'd do this marriage thing to the best of my abilities even though I knew those abilities were probably meager and definitely inexperienced, and that I'd pray hard for understanding in the areas I lacked. These promises were not just for me and my well being and happiness, but for Mike and everyone in our lives who are affected by our choices. Here we are, 7 months into this thing. So far so good. We're definitely not even close to perfect, but we sure love each other. And we're learning.

Finally ...

Ok, so I've been wanting to start this blog since January ... when we got married. I hemmed and hawed over what to name it. For weeks I asked for opinions, particularly hounding Mike for his input since, you know, he's a funny guy and all. All to no avail. I got suggestions that I liked, but nothing really clicked. I settled on tuh-mey-toh/tuh-mah-toh because in the short amount of time we'd been married, I was starting to see how Mike and I could look at the same thing (situation) and see it completely differently. It was blowing my mind. So, I felt the name appropriate because in the end, it's still a delicious red vegetable ... uh, I mean fruit. Anyway, this is our family adventure together. We'll post pics, funny stories and maybe even some deep thoughts. Stay tuned.

P.S. Mike doesn't like the blog name. Honey, I challenge you to to a blog naming duel. Go. Fight. Win.