Seth and Mariah

Well Seth survived finals! So for a treat, I had him re-do the bathroom floor. How nice of me huh? Well we have been wanting to do it since the summer, but he has been so busy with school, so we made a plan to do it the weekend after finals. It was my Christmas present and I absolutely LOVE it. He did a really good job. And it is 100x better than the nasty linoleum floor that was there before. I would take pictures of the end result, but we are actually in Maryland. We came out here to spend Christmas and New Years. We have been enjoying the break from work and school.

It took him quite awhile so it was good he had lots of help. After the floor got put in, the blue walls kind of distracted from the really nice floor, so we had no choice but to paint it, right? :) So we also painted the walls. Seth put in a lot of hours into the bathroom and I am very grateful for the upgrade! The picture above is of him scraping off the glue from the linoleum.

So I mentioned my friend Becca was engaged, well now she is married! Below is a picture of her and me at her reception. She looked so beautiful and so happy. It was a very nice reception and wedding! They make a great couple!


Becca was one of my companions in the mission field, and so of course I got to run into two of my other companions. Below is Star Christensen (my trainer), Me, and Janine Jovet (my third companion). It was really fun to catch up with them too!


So we received a present from Becca's reception, she handed out the fish from her table decorations. Seth and I acquired two of them, and they are two male Betta fish that Seth decided to name Bob and Bing. (After Bob Hope and Bing Crosby) So we really like our new little friends, they are very fun to watch swim around. And they are really pretty to look at too!


For Christmas, Seth's parents got a Wii and so we were playing with 'Wii Fit' which has some pretty entertaining games. Below is Seth movin' his "money makers". He called them that, not me. :) I didn't know my husband could move like that!! We had a great time playing around on that all Christmas day.




Hope you all are having a good Christmas!

For Thanksgiving this year, we went down to St. George. Seth went to see the new James Bond movie with all the boys and he really enjoyed it. He says be sure to watch the first one before you watch this one because it picks up right where it left off. I went to go see Twilight with Kylee. I wouldn't say I am obsessed with Twilight like some people are, but I was curious to see how they would do the movie. I enjoyed it, they did a good job, but to be honest, I am not a good critic of movies. I have heard some people who thought it was not very good at all and others that loved it. So I guess it just depends...


We took some family pictures with all the nieces and nephews and it was quite the feat. It was amazing to see just how big our little family is becoming. It was so fun to be able to spend time with them all. We love our families! On the left is Emily and Seth waiting for their turn to get their pictures taken. Below is Eliza getting rid of her cute headband. She had had enough of it!











A couple of weeks ago I surprised Seth with a 2-night get-away in Park City (It was free if you went to one of those timeshare sales pitches). After trying to get persuaded it was a good idea to buy a timeshare for about 3 hours, we got to enjoy the rest of the weekend. It was really fun to get away from school and just relax. I really surprised him good. He was really confused why I didn't want to hang out with anyone that weekend and wouldn't let him make plans, but I played it off pretty good because he was blind-sided Friday afternoon when I told him the plans. It was a fun weekend! Below is us at Baja Cantina, according to Seth, it is the "best fajita [he] has had since the mission".

So here we are, my sisters and I after we finished the Snow Canyon 1/2 Marathon in St. George. I may be smiling in that picture, but about 20 minutes after it was taken, I was not feeling too hot. (I will spare the details...) It was a pretty good race, but I had not really trained on any hills, so the last few hills almost did me in. But I made it and am happy that I finally ran a half marathon. It is something I have always wanted to do.

So the day after Halloween, we finally got to do the Murder Mystery that we have been wanting to do for about 4 months. It is hard to get a night where everyone is available, but finally we go to do it. I was quite impressed with some of the costumes, especially Jason's fake cigar that really puffed out fake smoke. It was awesome. So here we are:







Lastly, this is us in a corn maze supposedly shaped like David Archuleta. Since Seth is in the Young Men's, we went with the YW/YM in our ward for a Tuesday night activity. We thought we found the exit about 5 minutes into the maze, but then realized it was the kiddy-maze exit. haha

Well friends, as you can see it has been almost 2 months since we have posted anything. So here is the reason. Seth started Law School and Mariah got really busy at work during the tax extension deadlines for 9/15 and 10/15, so we were pretty busy to say the least. Seth is still really busy, but my schedule has definitely slowed down again. Now I can actually make dinner again instead of Seth eating Wendy's and frozen burritos every night. Seth is really enjoying law school although he feels the same way I did about the accounting program. It is like trying to drink from a fire hose. There is so much information they are teaching you and you wish you could just take it slow and really learn and study one topic. But you can't because if you do you will be left in the dust. It is already a struggle just to stay on top of things. So it is going well but is lots of work.

Seth is interested in getting this workout program called P90X, has anyone heard of it or done it? It looks like it is pretty intense, but I have heard that it works really well. I would love to hear if anyone has done it. I am training to do a 1/2 marathon on November 8th in St. George. I am going to run it with my sisters Kylee and Melissa. I have always wanted to run one, but just never done it, so we all finally decided to do it together. It will be the first for all of us. I have to admit, my training has had some bumps in it because of busy season at work, so it might be a interesting to say the least.

So we have sunburns because we went to the BYU v UNLV football game today. We have season tickets with our friends Jason and Shannon and have really enjoyed going with them. It is always fun to be there in the stadium and be so close to all the action. I just wish we played Utah at home this year because for once the game isn't Thanksgiving weekend and we could actually be there. Too bad!



This is my friend Becca and I hanging out before she moved to California to go to graduate school out there. Sad day! But then she decided to fall in love with Blake who is here in Salt Lake and now she is back temporarily while she plans the wedding. Yeah! The wedding will be in December. I am very excited for her.

Seth and I on the cruise ship leaving Ensenada :( Too bad we are not still there!

Above: Seth and Mariah Ocean Kayaking in Ensenada at the Bufadora Blow-hole.

So we decided we had to go on a fun vacation before Seth started law school and this is what we came up with.....A 4 day, 4 night cruise around California and down into Ensenada, Mexico and then go watch the play 'Wicked' in Los Angeles. So that is what we did... It was a blast. We really enjoyed the cruise and would have to say it is a good way to be able to see a lot of places, but sometimes you wish you could stay longer at a place than 8 hours. That was the only down side of the cruise. We loved the people (all LDS people assigned at our dinner table-how random is that?) and the food was great (they say the average Joe gains 10 lbs on a cruise and I can see why) (Luckily I didn't follow that trend) We did some fun stuff as you can see from the sweet pictures. It was a great break before we hit the grind with law school and tax extension busy season and we are lucky we were able to go.




Above: This is Seth and our cruise ship 'Monarch of the Seas'.


Above: Mariah getting ready to go snorkeling at "Lover's Cove" at Catalina Island.



Above: This is us with the BEST carne asada tacos on earth! (Hecho en Mexico) So good!


Above: This is my handsome husband in front of the entrance to the Pantages Theater in downtown LA on our way to see Wicked! (which was so good! I loved it and so did Seth)


Seth has started Law School now and he is busy busy. He really enjoys it so far and I think he is getting along pretty well. I have no doubt he will do well. This is what Seth has to say about starting law school, "It's intense." That about sums it up! Hope everyone is doing well!

When I was planning the Massive, Much-Needed Update I decided that it would be much better organized if I were to do it in multiple posts, and then the different posts (as I was thinking about them) began to arrange themselves in order of importance or significance. And then I figured, I certainly wouldn't want the most important post to go first, because that would put it at the bottom of the Massive, Much-Needed Update! No, I figured, the most important should go at the top. And so it is, it just took some planning.

I really like this picture of Mariah a lot. Don't worry, dear readership, we didn't suddenly have a baby without warning, that's our niece Eliza. I know, sigh of relief, right? I like this picture because this is normal looking Mariah. Mind you, I enjoy the dolled up pictures and stuff, but Mariah normal is still incredibly pretty, and that's how she looks to me. There's something about her that's captivating. I think she's the most beautiful girl ever, and the only reason I add the "I think" is because people are entitled to their own opinion, and some people like weird things like broccoli and macaroni and cheese, which they're free to do, and in that light I can't speak for everyone. But for me, she's beautiful.

Being married with Mariah has truly been awesome and keeps getting better. How can awesome keep getting better? I don't know, but I know it does. I've had to grow and learn so much, but I wouldn't want it any other way. I can't imagine things being any different than they are. She is all my reasons, my Mariah Fair.

And if anyone is still confused, the most important post of the Massive, Much-Needed Update is AT THE TOP, not the first post, which is down at the bottom.

It has definitely been a while since either of us has posted, and even longer since I've posted anything on our blog. So, I figured that today is the day! Theoretically, I'll have to add, because at the exact moment I'm feeling rather ambitious, but we'll have to see how theoretical ambition holds out against the harsh reality of that it's past lunch time and my stomach is talking to me. But I wanted to get this done today, so, shall we begin? The massive update!!

With the end of the spring term so also closed a chapter in my educational career- I turned in my 30-something page capstone paper and walked away, all set to graduate with my bachelor's degree in History this August. That is exciting. My paper was a study on the trends in American available historical literature on the Japanese kamikaze and how/if it's changed over time. Pretty nerdy, huh? Oh, I know I'm a history nerd, but I turned it in, am done with it, and I'm sure that Mariah is probably glad not to be hearing about the kamikaze everyday and every other book on the subject and my personal opinion on their authors. It's done! It's done! And now I have some time on my hands, which is a welcomed break. As part of my graduating celebrations, we were able to acquire a much needed upgrade: a new TV, as a gift from my parents. Actually, a 32 inch widescreen Samsung HDTV, which is a huge upgrade from our little 17 inch computer monitor, I'll tell you what. Here's a picture of our new found friend. We're actually not ashamed to watch movies with friends over anymore.

Cool, huh? Thanks Mom and Dad. We also acquired an Xbox 360 Elite, which, I'm not going to lie, is pretty cool. Here's where I'm going to take a little liberty and expand this blog in a new direction, but don't worry, it probably won't be too often. I am a fan of Halo 3, and a big fan of playing online with my cousins and friends who are now scattered across the United States, with whom we've been playing with for years. This past time we had guys in Virginia (Jared and Johnny), my cousin Adam in Wisconsin, my cousin Austin in Midway, and me in Provo; against, well, the guys we beat. A lot. See that? Halo brings people together. Anyway, I'll put this picture up and then we'll move on.


This is a pretty sweet picture of a pretty sweet stunt I was able to pull off last time we were playing. There was this aircraft flying over our base and killing us, with our team unable to shoot it down, so I was able to time it right and use a teleporter (called a man-cannon) to launch myself up and intercept the aircraft, grab on, kick the pilot off, and fly away. Now that's cool. Okay... I'm done.

LAKE POWELL!! I know you are all jealous. It is my favorite place on earth. There are so many things that I love about Lake Powell. One being the stars at night are absolutely amazing, the brightest I have ever seen. I love sleeping out under the stars! I also love the feeling of a good run on the wakeboard or on the ski. I also love spending the time with my family. There are always lots of laughs and good times. It is also just so relaxing and so peaceful, a great escape from the normal routine of life. It is just a beautiful place with the blue water and the rock formations. Seth was nice and missed two days of classes so that we could go. We made sure that it wouldn't be a big deal for him to miss, which it wasn't. And it was well worth it!!

Seth did all the work on our new blog look. He just sat down and figured out how to get a different background and how to make the slide show work. He is good at figuring out how to do things. So I give him all the credit for the cute additions.

We celebrated our 1-year anniversary last weekend. We stayed at the Anniversary Inn in Salt Lake and it was really fun. We ate some of our frozen cake from our reception, just enough to say that we ate some... It wasn't too great. This is our cake still frozen in tin foil.


We also got to go and visit my twin sister Becky (close enough, right?) and see her cute little addition to her family. His name is Tucker and he is a the cutest little baby. He keeps Becky super busy and up all night, but you can tell that she does such a good job with him. He knows his Mommy! We had a really good visit and it was fun to see their new apartment. I wish we lived closer to each other!

I just had to put this video on my blog. This is my niece Emily Lindsey (Amy and Ryan's daughter). The girls in the family think Aunt Mariah has the coolest shoes so they usually put them on when I come over. This time, I was so impressed by Emily's ability to strut in my shoes, I just had to catch it on video. What a girl she will be one day! I can only imagine! The cute thing is that her little heels won't stay straight on the shoe and so you will see she is trying to make her heels stay up on the shoe! I am so proud!




Also I have been tagged: I have never been tagged before so here it goes:

1. What was I doing 10 years ago:
Ten years ago? Well lets see....I would have recently turned 16 and I was so excited to get my drivers license. I drove around my Mom's VW bug....that is until my guy friends thought it was funny to lift it up and move it while I was in class. I loved coming out after basketball practice and to see my car sitting in the middle of the parking lot, obviously in the way of other people's cars. Great guys...don't worry, we got them back. So then I changed to drive a heavier vehicle that they wouldn't be able to lift and that was my Dad's 1970 Chevy Blazer which took us on many adventures. I remember my 16th surprise birthday party thrown at Kat's house which was a complete blast. Right about now would be soccer camp in Cedar City or a basketball camp, one of the two.

2. Five things on my to-do list today:
Make a new recipe for dinner (Parmesan chicken)
Decide on what to do for Seth for our one-year anniversary (it is on Sunday)
Mail a book we sold on half.com
Do this 'tag'
Sweep/Mop the kitchen

3. If I were a millionaire I would:
Pay my tithing
Buy a home
Go on a Cruise in the Carribean
Go to Hawaii and visit Kylee
Pay for Law School
Buy Seth a TV and an Xbox
Buy me some new clothes and shoes
Invest the rest


4. Bad Habbits:
I can't get myself up, so sometimes Seth has to carry me to the bathroom at 5:30 a.m. (the bus comes early). I get my to-do list and like to get things done, sometimes a little too much. Sometimes I am hesitant to spend money on things like 4 boxes of cereal for Seth (in one week), but I don't mind spending it on clothes for me. (Seth helped me with that one) And lots of other little things like that, but I am learning slowly.

5. Places I have lived:
1. St. George, Utah
2. Provo, Utah
3. Brownsville, Texas
4. Mission, Texas
5. Edinburg, Texas
6. Beeville, Texas
7. San Benito, Texas
8. Huntington Beach, California
8. Salt Lake City, Utah

6. Jobs I have had:
1. McArthur Welding (custodial)
2. Math Tutor for 3 years
3. Soccer Referee for the City of St. George
4. The good 'ol Rec Center
5. Bookkeeper
6. Accountant at Squire and Co. in Orem (Internship)
7. Accountant at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Orange County, CA (Internship)
8. Accountant for Kirk Holt in Springville
9. Accountant at Wisan, Smith, Racker & Prescott (current job)

Mariah: Last weekend we were able to go out to Maryland for Seth's sister's wedding. Jessica married a wonderful, smart man named Steven. The wedding was very nice and not too stressful (at least for me) I did get to do her hair (which caused me a little stress) but it turned out pretty nice. The weather had been rainy all week and the reception was to be held outside, but it turns out that the weather cleared up nicely for the wedding day. It was a beautiful sunny day as you can see from the pictures.

Seth: Okay, now it's my turn. Yeah, the wedding was great and wonderful and very sunny, but the pictures don't tell you what happened the day before, or right before the reception. My dad, Jacob, and I went over to the church (whose backyard the reception was going to be at) on Friday afternoon to make sure we could build a table for the cake, and when we got out of the car, the grass was up past our shins, and soggy! Regularly, the lawn's mowed by the caretakers, but we're assuming that they hadn't yet because it had been raining everyday for about a week (at least that's what they tell me). So, we run back to the house, grab a couple of mowers, and my dad and I went back so we could try and make it look nice. We had to go over the grass 3 to 4 times just to get it down, and then we went over again to try and make it nice. It really wasn't so bad, but it took about 2 hours with the two of us; we were almost late to the great big meet/greet lunch/dinner thing at our house with our family and Steven's. We rolled up just in time, covered in grass, to say the prayer. Quite the adventure, huh? And we raked the grass right before the reception because there were big clumps of mowed gumps all over the lawn, but I think I've written enough about that.

The wedding was really nice, and the weather was great. I was especially pleased by all of our family coming out for it, some even from California! I thought that was incredibly nice of them and made it a very special day. Mariah did a great job on Jessica's (I call her Jessica, some call her Luci, whatever, that's a whole different story) hair, even though she's sad she didn't get a picture of it. Here's pictures we took, and we added one of the road nearby my house for all those who haven't been back east to see what its like. Don't worry, I'll give you the secret my friend learned a year after he moved to Maryland. "Everywhere I look there's trees. I feel like we're deep back in the forest. And then I realized, there's stuff behind the trees. And then I felt okay."

This is MY Iron Man!! Seth is looking good lately. He has been working out a lot lately and he really enjoys it. I can notice a big difference too! And Seth really likes how it makes him feel. I have started to get back on my workout schedule and so we are having a 'get in shape' summer. We went to the movie Iron Man yesterday because Seth really wanted to see it. It was a good movie, Seth loved it. I had him stand by this poster on our way out because then we would have a fun picture to put on our blog! I wanted to give an update on what we are up to since we haven't mentioned our plans for the future. Seth got into BYU law school and some others, but we have decided to stay here at BYU for another 3 years while Seth earns his JD degree. We feel really blessed and are excited to start law school. Classes start the end of August. We will stay in the apartment we live in now which is a basement apartment that we really enjoy. We are part of a 'real' family ward and our calling is to teach the 16-17 year old Sunday School. We love teaching together. I am still working in Salt Lake at Wisan, Smith, Racker & Prescott, LLP. I ride the 801 express bus that gets me to Salt Lake pretty fast in the morning. Getting home can be slower because of traffic, but still isn't too bad. We have plans to fly to Maryland twice this summer for Jessica and Natasha's weddings in May and June respectively. We are happy that we get to go and be a part of that neat experience! Hopefully we can make it to Lake Powell this summer with my family in June. We will have to see because Seth is still in classes at BYU. He will finish up June 19th with his bachelors. We are coming up on our 1 year anniversary on June 1st! We can't believe it has gone so fast, but we have definitely enjoyed the past year together. Anyways, just thought I would give everyone the update.

Last weekend we went to Moab with some friends of ours (Jeff and Diana) and hiked Friday and Saturday. Friday we hiked around Arches National Park and Saturday we went to Canyonlands National Park and back to Arches because we couldn't get enough. This is at the Delicate Arch which was a couple mile's hike up a grizzly hill-type thing. Then Mariah got lost, and I had to use my tracker boy scout skills to find her. That took a couple of hours, but it all worked out in the end-- after the helicopter came. (that was Seth's addition, I never got lost.) Anyways, it was a lot of fun. We all got some sun, some more than others, I think Diana got the worst of it though. Seth wants me to put that he is the greatest because I have been wanting to go hiking for awhile and he finally took me. :) It was a really good trip, however, we don't recommend the 'Sunset Grill' on the hill. Not worth it!


I would post pictures from Saturday, but my battery died on Friday night (sad day) and so we still have to get the pictures from Jeff and Diana. For all that don't know the connection, Jeff was Seth's best man at our wedding. Seth and Jeff have been best friends since freshman year.

These are the two cutest little additions to the McArthur family. On the left is Amy and Ryan's baby boy, Tavish and on the right is Melissa and Brock's baby girl, Eliza. We were lucky to escape tax season for a weekend during March and go down to St. George for the baby blessings! How precious!!

This is Seth and me on our 'Annual Date' that we have now had 2 years in a row. Don't worry, we go on more than one date a year. But our goal is to have a 'really nice' date every December. For the past 2 Decembers, we went to the Nutcracker ballet at Capitol Theater in Salt Lake City. I remember our first time there in 2006, it was so fun. We ate at Olive Garden afterwards and I remember thinking Seth was the man for me (even though I had known him for 1 month). Well turns out he is!

So Seth and I have decided that we are not very good at keeping up to date with everyone we know, so we figured it would be a good idea to jump on the blog band-wagon and so others can know what we are up to. I am not promising a very great one, but hey, something is better than nothing! Hope you all enjoy.