Ruby & Brett Mansfield

Baby Projects

2012-02-12T17:40:00.001-08:00

We are currently at 33 weeks! Our little Evan will be joining us soon and we cannot wait. We are looking forward to meeting and holding our little guy. Pregnancy has been pretty easy for me, so I can't complain much, just starting to get uncomfortable with this big belly. I am getting a little anxious and nervous about labor and delivery. We are currently taking a prenatal class, which has been very educational and has helped me feel better about labor. Also my mom will be here before the baby is born and will be staying with us for a few weeks. It will be great having her here.

The last few months have been full with baby projects, and I still have many more I want to make. I just need more time, which I will have pretty soon when I stop working.
So here are some of my favorite projects. They were all pretty simple to do.

Blankets

Burp Rugs

Car Seat Cover

Oh Boy!

2011-11-25T20:29:00.000-08:00

22 weeks down, 18 more to go! We wish the baby was here already! As usual, it's been forever since the last post. The most exciting news is that we are expecting our first baby boy. Evan, should be joining us around March 27th. The pregnancy hasn't been bad at all. No sickness or crazy symptoms :) We have started working on the nursery, it's far from been done, but we at least have an idea of what we are doing. Here is a pic of the sweet baby at 20 weeks,
Another exciting thing is that I passed the Utah Property and Casualty Insurance test! It's something I have wanted to do for the last 4 months and I finally took the test.

Super Saturday!

2011-07-24T19:19:00.000-07:00

Lately all of our Saturdays have been about home work and projects. This weekend was super busy. I reupholstered my kitchen chairs, made a table runner for my dining table, and hemmed curtains. Brett did his usual and some more. He did yard work, put up paintings and mirrors, and installed a new light fixture on our dinning room.

We have had these chairs for about 4 years, there was nothing wrong with them other than that the fabric was stained from daily use. Chair project before:

and after:
Now they match my black and white kitchen :)
Table runner, curtains & new beautiful light fixture. As you can see we still need a lot of decor for our walls, all in time. I have to thank Bobby George for the amazing painting.

Also, I got an orchid plant. I have never taken care of flowers or plants before, so I am really excited to see it bloom (if I manage keep it alive).

Home Update

2011-07-18T19:33:00.000-07:00

It's been about 3 weeks since I got back from Peru and 2 months since we moved in our house. My surgery was a success and I have recovered completely. I made a big career change. I left Sears and now work for AllState. I am loving my new job! I do miss my awesome and amazing coworkers :( But I am lot happier and more relax now. I am loving life.
We have been spending a lot of time working on our home. We have a long list of small and big projects for the house. I am so glad I married a handy guy that knows how to do things around the house. Our most recent project was to add a half bath to the main level. When the house was built, they left the little room ready, but didn't put in the bathroom. So we chose the fixtures and Brett added the pipes, drains, water lines, installed a fan and light fixtures all by HIMSELF! It turned out super cute! Our current project is to put our decorations up in the walls. We have realized that we will be needing a lot more than what we currently have.

Finally a post

2011-06-14T11:11:00.001-07:00

We have had a lot of great things happen to us in the last few months. The biggest one is that we are finally Home Owners! Yay! It was quite the frustrating experience because we looked at so many homes. During 4 months, we looked at about 25 homes, considered building, put offers on 16 of them (yes, 16!), fell absolutely inlove with 3 of them, finally we found one we liked and our offer got accepted. In case you're wondering why it took so many homes, when we were house hunting, about 85% (I really want to say 99.99%) of the homes were short sales, which are a big pain! Once the offer got accepted, our loan got processed in 3 days (thanks to Andee), we closed 2 days later and moved in 3 days after that. Thanks to the in-laws for helping us move so quickly; we got everything moved in in just one day! Something we were worried about was selling our apartment lease, it would have cost us almost 2 months rent just to break the lease, but we found some girls that loved our apartment and took over our lease.

I have no current pictures of the house since we are still, yes 4 weeks later, putting stuff away. I obviously wanted to make it home immediately, so we have started painting and I believe Brett is halfway done with that job. By the way, we bought our home in Lehi, somewhere in the middle for both of our jobs.

Another thing is that I finally got the surgery I needed in my eye, and coming to see my family in Peru is a huge plus. I do miss my hubby a lot. Surgery wasn't too bad or painful, the bad part is having 10 stitches in the eyeball and having to spend 10 days inside the house without going anywhere. So not much of a vacation, but I am getting super pampered by my family and enjoying delicious food (which means getting at least 5 pounds heavier). Been inside the house so many days is also the reason for the long random blogging. Today is the first day I get to spend some time with my computer for more than 5 min a day (strict doctor orders). Just one more day before they take out my stitches! yay for me!

I haven't had a chance for many pictures with my family either, but I did get this one with my lovely sister before the surgery.

On a side note, our puppies are finally ready for sale! We already sold one and have 2 more for sale. In case interested or know someone interested in AKC Maltese http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=218&ad=15962056&cat=105&lpid=&search=maltese.

Puppies

2011-05-05T21:21:00.000-07:00

What have we been up to? Oh yeah... Taking care of the cutest little puppies in the world. Sammy and Lily gave us grandkids. On April 19th Lily delivered 2 girls and 2 boys!!! It was a crazy night, but they were all born healthy and are growing so quickly.

Coasters

2011-04-07T19:37:00.000-07:00

This week I decided to spend my day off doing some crafts. I spent some time online finding a project and fell inlove with these tile coasters. I had been wanting to make some for a while and finally found some that I really like. They were super easy and quick.
This was the final product. I used some ribbon to make it an awesome gift. These tiles are going to an amazing friend that gave me a beautiful painting as a gift.

Sweets

2011-03-30T20:03:00.000-07:00

I have found a new love and it's one to share. Baking, baking, and more baking! Once I find a new recipe I make it until I get sick of it. My coworkers seem to like me more than ever...they get to enjoy all the delicious treats. My latest favorite recipe is sugar cookies!

Christmas gifts

2010-12-17T09:01:00.001-08:00

This year I decided to make something for my mom and sister for Christmas. Since I got a sewing machine earlier on the year as a gift from Brett, I made some aprons. This was the first time I made something, so I was a little worried about the results. Just in case my mom and sister didn't like them, I sent them some other stuff with the aprons. They actually turned out really cute, and my mom and sister love them. So this how I started
I didn't take many pics in the middle of the process, so here it is done!
And when I was all done, I stuffed some smaller presents in the pockets and folded the aprons as presents.

Good News

2010-12-01T19:30:00.000-08:00

No, we are not pregnant yet. The good news is that Brett got a new job doing what he is going to school for. There is a lot to learn for him, but it is exciting and fun. I am so proud and excited for Brett. This is a great opportunity to develop in his major.
On a very different note, we got another dog. Her name is Lily and she is a cute little Maltese, just like Sammy. After a couple of days of awkwardness, they are now best buddies. We don't have any super cute pictures of her because we had to shave all her hair.

End of summer

2010-09-02T17:57:00.000-07:00

The summer is almost over. It has been a pretty difficult summer since Brett spent it in Mississippi and I stayed in Utah. I visited Brett for a weekend and he spent a week in Utah for his birthday and our anniversary. Oh yeah, we have been married for 3 fabulous years now! The sad part is that Brett just got here and I am going to Chicago for 3 weeks on Monday. I am going to spend 3 weeks at Sears corporate, which is a great opportunity for learning and making useful contacts.
That's it for our latest news!

2010-04-30T09:31:00.000-07:00

A lot has happened since January! I went to Peru to spend some time with my family for about a month; sadly Brett had to stay here and go to school. When I came back, I got a new job. I have been working there for a month and I like it so far. Since my new job is in Murray, we moved, again! So now we live 5 min from work. We love our new place. The only bad thing about it is that it is far from Brett's mom! We like to spend Sunday nights there to visit and play games.
About a month ago, I got a new car! Yay! We got me a brand new RAV4. I have wanted this car since I was old enough to drive!
My mom came to visit and spent 2 weeks with us. She came specially for graduation ceremony. Last Friday we all headed down to BYU for graduation! It was fun and made me feel accomplished. I was so glad to have so many family members there supporting and cheering me! After graduation Brett, Shellee, my mom, and I drove to Denver. My mom and I stayed there visiting family and flew back to Utah on Sunday night. Sadly, Brett and Shellee left from there to Mississippi, where they will be working all summer! Today I took my mom to the airport, she is on her way back to Peru. Now it is just Sammy and me!

This is my friend Cindy! I am so sad that she is moving to Kansas! I will miss you Cindy!After graduation we had dinner and ice cream cake! Thank you to all my family for being there!

Quick Update

2010-01-10T09:59:00.000-08:00

It has been a while since we posted something, but we are still here. I graduated from BYU last December and Brett will be back to school the 18th of this month! I will be taking a little vacation visiting my family in Peru this coming week!
For the past weeks we, and by "we" I mean mostly Brett, have been working on a hutch for our dinning room. We bought an old and kind of ugly looking hutch for $30 and refinished it. Sadly, Brett forgot to take pictures before starting to work on it, so we don't have before pictures. It was an ugly brown with a lot of honey and gold tones that we didn't like, so we made it black (for some reason, it looks brown in the pics, but it is really black).

Sammy's Tricks

2009-09-22T09:46:00.000-07:00

Our baby Sammy

2009-08-18T06:41:00.000-07:00

Here is a video of Sammy for those of you who haven't met him yet.
He loves to get into things. He chews up anything he can get his teeth on. It's not on the video, but at night he will go crazy and just run around the house as fast as he can for no reason. He is such a good puppy.

Deep Sea Fishing

2009-07-25T13:20:00.000-07:00

Yesterday the techs and respective wives went deep sea fishing. It was a nice day, and everything was fun until I felt sick. I just couldn't be standing for a while. Other than that, the fishing trip was fun. Brett caught a fish that we got to keep. Most of the fish people caught were too small and had to be put back in the water.

This is boat that took us fishing

Brett very proud with his fish, which he is cooking tonight for dinner!

Back to Philly

2009-07-21T12:32:00.000-07:00

My lovely sis is visiting for about 3 weeks. Last Sunday we headed down to Philadelphia to show her around. We also took Sammy with us. He had a great time and as usual a million people stopped us while walking to see him.

Independence Hall

Liberty Bell

The Franklin Fountain

Love Park

Sammy

Together with Rocky

Brett and Sammy got tired after a couple of minutes

and of course, since we were in Pennsylvania, I had to stop at a Super Giant and buy my favorite dessert: Brownie cheescake........yumm

Our baby Sammy

2009-07-10T18:15:00.000-07:00

Brett and I have wanted a little puppy for a long time, and we finally got one! His name is Sammy. He is the cutest little Maltese. He is really playful and loves to cuddle. He is the new addition to our little family! We took him for a little walk and every person that saw him told us how cute He is. We are very proud of our baby!

Washington, DC

2009-06-09T16:40:00.000-07:00

A quick summary: Brett and I moved to Long Branch, NJ. We'll be here all summer. I went to Peru for about a month and came back with my mom. She'll be here for a couple of weeks. So we finally got to do something fun last weekend. We went to Washington with Brett's sister and nieces. We had a great time. We visited the Washington Monument, the White House, the Abraham Lincoln memorial, the reflecting pool, and the WWI and WWII memorials.

The best part of the Lincoln memorial was when Jax decided to get passed the security chain and started climbing up the monument! Sadly, it all happened too fast to take a picture of it.

And of course my mom loved the baby!

What cutie!

Obviously this is not DC, but just some pictures with my mom. It was a very nice day!

Pier Village, Long Branch

2009-04-29T07:25:00.000-07:00

This is where we live!

The next two pictures are the view from our living room......

Loving beach living

2009-04-28T12:49:00.000-07:00

We got to Long Branch, NJ last Saturday. It is fabulous, and hot! Our apartment has an ocean view from the bedroom and living room. We are loving it here!

Goblin Valley

2009-04-06T14:50:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we packed some clothes and food, and drove to Goblin Valley with Brett's Family.
It was a fun weekend.
We got a big part of the family there. It was a little colder than we expected, but it was still fun. We got there Friday night, stayed all day Saturday and half day Sunday.
On Saturday morning, we had French toast, bacon, and sausage for breakfast. Thanks to Scott for cooking all this food for everyone.

We had some yummy hamburgers for lunch. We were too concerned with eating and didn't take any pictures. And for dinner we had dutch oven chicken and potatoes.
At the end of the night we roasted some marshmallows and made s'mores.
On Sunday morning, we had our Easter egg hunt. Some of Brett siblings will be gone for the summer before Easter, so we had ours a little early. The kids had a blast.

Summer Plans

2009-04-01T09:01:00.000-07:00

So we've been pretty busy with school and work all winter. Luckily, summer is right around the corner. In a couple of weeks we'll pack everything and leave to New Jersey for the summer! We'll be living right on the beach, which I love. But that's not all, I'll be leaving to Peru when we get to NJ. I'll spend a month with my family and then bring my mom to vacation with me for a couple of weeks. We have a lot to look forward to, except all the packing and cleaning!

Valentine's Day

2009-02-17T09:32:00.000-08:00

I had never seen (much less smell) a skunk other than Pepe Le Pew until a few days ago. Last week we were on the freeway on our way to Salt Lake. Everything was fine until a car next to us hit a skunk and it sprayed all over! Yeah, that was bad..........we washed our car as soon as we could and put air fresheners in it. It's been like 5 days, and it still smells a little. I'm not sure how that ties to Valentine's Day other than I used to think of Pepe Le Pew as a crazy romantic in love with a cat!
On a happier note, we had a great Valentine's Day. I had to work during the morning, which wasn't much fun, but later we went for dinner and a movie! I love that Brett and I need no more than each other, a good movie, and good popcorn to have a good time!

The Odgen's Wedding

2009-01-08T15:33:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we spent most of the day having fun with Brett's family at Kim's wedding. The sealing was in the morning, then there was a luncheon for the family, and the reception was at 6:30pm at the APX hangar. Everything looked so pretty! The best part for me was to watch all the little kids dance.

The Newlyweds: Kim & Steve

Brett, as a good uncle, took some time to dance with Jax.

She is getting so big so fast!

The Holidays

2009-01-05T17:57:00.000-08:00

Brett and I had a great time these holidays in Peru. We stayed with my family for about 2 weeks. We visited with friends and family and ate lots of delicious food all day! The weather was just perfect! It was shocking to get off the plane to this freeeeeezing weather. Now it's time to catch up with some pictures from our trip.

Dinner, dinner, and more dinners!

Good friends!

Family time

My lovely sister!

This is my one and only sister Cinthia. She is as crazy as it gets.......and as you can see, we love to be in pictures together!

Chan-Chan

Brett, my sister and I took a day and went to visit the "City of Mud"

Christmas Eve

We had a huge turkey dinner on Christmas Eve as it it tradition in Peru to have dinner and open presents at midnight. My two grandmas, uncles, aunts, and cousins joined us for dinner that night. It was very nice to have a house with many family members. Since we were eating and talking, we forgot to take more pictures of everyone....ooops!

New Year

New year came by really fast. We went out for dinner with my parents on the 31st. We also wore some silly 2009 glasses that we bought on the streets. Brett was amazed with the "old year dolls" that we make and burn on new year's eve.

The dolls before midnight.....
...... the dolls after midnight

Finally Home

2008-12-21T15:36:00.000-08:00

We are at home now! ... well home for me. We got here just fine. I always have the best luck with planes and luggage. I had never had a lost bag or a delayed flight.....until now. Our flight from Salt Lake was on time, but we were taxing for about an hour and a half. so we got late to our connection and lost it. It wasn't so bad until we were told that there were no flights until the next day. We were put on the waiting list for an 11pm flight for that same day and we got on it, luckily. so everything was fine until we got to Lima. Only one of our 4 bags made it to Peru. The worst part is that no one knew where they were. So we had to fill out some paper work and we are now hoping that our bags will be deliver to us soon.
We went shopping for some new clothes.....because we had none. the only bag that we got has all the Christmas presents, but no clothes.
Other than that, everything is being great. We went out for lunch and had some delicious fresh fish for lunch.....yummy. We'll post pictures soon.

It's December already!

2008-12-03T10:26:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving was last week and it was fun. The best part is that I had a whole week off from school!.......that was a nice break. Going back to Thanksgiving, we didn't go out of town, but we had a huge and delicious dinner with Brett's family. Thanks to all of the ones that cooked good food for us.
Time has gone way too fast!.... The good thing about this is that we are leaving to Peru in about 2 weeks......It's going to be fun and warm!

Halloween

2008-11-03T21:19:00.000-08:00

So Brett and I haven't done anything really exciting or fun lately. We both go to school full-time, Brett works full-time and I work part-time. We did carved our Halloween pumpkins though! It was the first time we did this together and it was fun! It took a lot longer than I thought it would. The smell of the pumpkin made me a little sick, so I probably won't do it again. Next year we'll buy the fake ones! We didn't dress up, I had to work and Brett stayed home to give candy to the trick or treaters.
We are just anxious to go to Peru for Christmas! Only 6 more weeks!

Stewart Falls

2008-09-29T09:24:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday Brett and I hiked to Stewart Falls. We are not very outdoorsy but we loved it. The weather was just perfect and the hike wasn't hard at all. The best part of this hike was that we got to see al the leaves changing colors; from green to yellow, orange, pink, red, purple ....... just beautiful.

Fall is Happening

2008-09-29T09:13:00.000-07:00

Like the colors?

Back home and back to school

2008-09-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

It's being a while and we haven't done much fun stuff in this time. Brett got back from Philly and we were desperately looking for a place to move. We finally found it and it took us a couple of weeks to get it ready, but it looks good now. In the middle of the organizing, we also had to start school, so it was crazy.

First Wedding Anniversary!

2008-08-05T16:59:00.000-07:00

Brett and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary last Sunday. It's being a year, but it feels like we just got married yesterday! We spent the day at New York and had a great time. We did a couple of things that we didn't get to do the last time we were there. First, we visited the statue of Liberty.

Then, we went to the Empire State building. The view was unbelievable!
After that, we walked by Chinatown! We ended the day with dinner at Carrabba's.

Longwood Gardens

2008-07-31T10:57:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we finally visited the gardens. We spent all morning there. It was so beautiful … I had my moment with nature! ... I loved the flowers and the water fountains. Even Brett had a great time! He was fascinated with all the weird plants from around the world and water fountains. We took over 200 pictures! Yes, we loved it!

Our favorite area was the kids' fountains!

Happy Birthday Brett!

2008-07-31T09:08:00.000-07:00

Brett turned 25 last Sunday! He feels he is getting old! ... We had plans to visit the Longwood Gardens, but it poured rain for hours that day. We stayed in and watched movies all night! We had cake, which was actually brownie cheesecake! This became my favorite dessert. I’ve never been a big fan of cheesecake, but this one is so good! Here is a picture, just to make you want some! You should try it!

Atlantic City

2008-06-02T14:31:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday Brett and I visited Atlantic City. It was a nice and hot day. This was the first time I saw the Atlantic Ocean and it looks pretty much the same as the Pacific! We ate some fresh fish for dinner and spent some time looking at the stores on the boardwalk. There are lots of hotels, casinos and restaurants in this place.

2008-06-02T14:18:00.000-07:00

The Boardwalk

And this is how Atlantic City looked like when we left.

Our Trip to New York

2008-05-26T09:33:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday we visited New York with some friends. It was a fun and long day! There is so much to see in New York. We saw Times Square, Battery Park, the Statue of Liberty, Central Park, the World Trade Center and others.

Brett and I in Times Square!

2008-05-26T09:24:00.000-07:00

Central Park

2008-05-26T09:20:00.000-07:00

2008-05-26T09:07:00.000-07:00

2008-05-26T09:02:00.000-07:00

Central Park, New York

2008-05-26T08:59:00.000-07:00

Can you see the Statue of Liberty in the background?

2008-05-26T08:43:00.000-07:00

A day in the park

2008-05-26T08:34:00.000-07:00

Love Park

2008-05-20T15:12:00.000-07:00

Downtown Philly

2008-05-20T15:02:00.000-07:00

A cloudy day at downtown Philly.