burgle*

Please don't be a burgle robber* because I'm about to tell you about my weekly routine.

On Sunday, I usually have church meetings starting at 11 am, then I have church from 1-4 pm. I usually try to make a delicious Sunday dinner, and sometimes that's hit and miss haha. A couple weeks ago I made rolls and they were amaaaazing (i.e. I'm pretty sure Levi ate 20 for dinner). The recipe is from Ann Dibb (Pres. Monson's daughter) so they were destined to be delicious. But then another time I made a crockpot meal and it wasn't even cooked all the way when we got home from church so that was fairly depressing.

On Monday, we get home from work, have FHE, then go to the gym. Also, let's talk about how Levi loves to "Welcome everyone to family night" in his best Cecil O. Samuelson voice and I just need you to know that it's eerily perfect. Like, I really think Cecil is there with me. He does the voice that Pres. Samuelson would do when he would welcome everyone to devotional every Tuesday at BYU. And in case you were wondering, "Stacy Heperi, a sociology major from Santa Rosa, California" is often assigned to give the opening prayer.

On Tuesday, Levi has class until 10 pm (oy.) and I go grocery shopping after work. In the summer, I didn't have work on Friday so I went grocery shopping then, but now I go on Tuesday. I tell you that because I've been going grocery shopping alone for a long time now. And here's the thing, I don't mind going grocery shopping alone. In fact, Levi likes to go a lot faster than I do which can be stressful for me, so it's kind of good to just have time to go down every aisle and make sure I have everything (and I usually still forget something, but still haha). The real problem for me is that we live on the back side of the apartment building on the second floor and it's a million degrees and uphill both ways as I'm sure you could guess, so I just hate having to carry all those groceries in. Plus, I always have Levi's mantra "Second trips are for the weak!" going around and around in my head and I don't know. It's hard guys. One day Levi is going to come home to find that I have been crushed to death by all the groceries halfway between the parking lot and our door.

On Wednesday, Levi has class until 7 and then we both have mutual (youth group at church) and then we don't usually get home until 8:45 or 9 pm. We love mutual though because those kids are awesome. Levi and I were both asked to serve in the youth programs when we first moved to Oklahoma and it was especially great back then because then when we would go to ward (church) activities and still didn't know very many people, we could just hang out with the youth haha. We've since made adult friends, but still. Those kids are neat.

On Thursday, Levi doesn't have class! So we both come home, have dinner, and then go to the gym. I used to not be such a fan of the gym, but now I don't even mind it and actually kind of like it. I used to do those classes like zumba but Levi has since convinced me to join him in his weightlifting. One time we were visiting Levi's family and we were eating dinner and Levi was like "Hey, guess how much Stacy can squat." And I was like, uhhh, okay. Haha, anyway he told them and for a while I thought it was so funny how he liked to tell people how much I could squat but then I remembered how horrifically embarrassing it must have been for him when I was first learning how to squat and literally could not even squat the bar without a) whining about it and b) losing my balance and toppling over. I've come a long way, people. So yes, he's allowed to be proud haha.

And then comes Friday! The beginning of the weekend! Once we get off work, it's time to party! Usually we go on a little date or something and then we hang out for the evening, maybe watch a movie or a show or something. Last week was the opening ceremonies of the Rugby World Cup as well as the first game and you guys. The world cup goes from now until Halloween! That's a long time! Which I really don't mind because I like rugby. Except it's confusing watching rugby during football season because I go back and forth between rugby and football and they're similar-ish, but definitely different. So when I'm watching football I'm like "you have to put the ball on the ground to get a touchdown!" or "you can't just smash him with your head like that!" but it turns out you totally can. Because it's football, not rugby. Anyway, we'll be watching a lot of rugby over the next six weeks. Obvi we're cheering for New Zealand, but we have to watch all the games so we can "check out the competition", duh. Also Levi asked me to make a banana cake for the opening ceremonies so I did. He went to cut the first piece and took the entire center section of the cake. Haha, that guy. Also the entire cake was gone in less than 24 hours, but mostly because it somehow qualifies as a breakfast and lunch food as well ;)

And then finally, Saturday. We go play soccer in the morning and then try to do as little as possible for the rest of the day. Usually we have to run errands, but if we can, we like to just watch football/rugby, take a nap, and go hang out outside or with friends or something. It's the best.

Anyway, that's all. I don't know why I felt the need to tell you that, but now you know.

*burgle robber: one time I woke up in the middle of the night and told Levi that I was worried about the front window being open because "burgle robbers" might come get us. I don't even know, it was so weird.

no but really. what is even happening right now?

Soooo...I wrote this post two months ago but then never posted it. Why? I have no idea. But I went to blog today and I found this in my drafts. My apologies. So basically this only catches you up to about the middle of May. Also, for once in my life there might be more pictures that words. So basically you won't drown in the paragraphs on nonsense as you look for the next picture. Celebrate the little things, I guess. Pffffft.

Things that have happened during my long absence:

 

+ went home to CA for the long weekend to celebrate my sister's bridal shower and so everyone could meet her fiance and to celebrate Valentine's day and mostly to eat chocolate covered strawberries.

+ chaperoned a youth dance. Levi said if one of the kids thought I was a teenager and asked me to dance, he would take me out to ice cream. Turns out Levi is the youngster because some girl asked him to dance! What the heck? Also, we didn't get any ice cream.

+ spent fifty billion years trying to find a dress for my sister's wedding. Finally found one! 

+ went to the medieval fair here in town. Medieval-ness is wild, for sure. But I did get to eat a turkey leg and part of levi's navajo taco and we also go to launch marshmallows off of mini catapults and saw a lot of interesting outfits and also I got a sunburn.

+ had our huge work event and didn't die from it.

+ made banana bread, but I think I want to try a different recipe for it now...one that is a little more moist.

+ had Levi's little brother in town! went to some of our favorite places: KD's restaurant, a Thunder game, guitar store, raising cane's, dick's sporting goods, etc. It was super fun!

+ levi got a new guitar! many thanks to his mom and grandma for it. he seriously loves it and plays it evvvvvery day (and sometimes tries to get out of doing the dishes by sneaking off to play...)

+ storm season started and we had a couple small tornadoes and a lot of thunderstorms. we've even had to get in the storm shelter once (and we took a #shelterselfie!). also, I really hate flash flooding. maybe you've been reading about the flooding in houston right now? (...oops. like I said, I wrote this two months ago haha) stuff like that is the worst to me. levi's car got flooded one night and it was the worst. and it's really scary. turn around, don't drown!

+ went out to provo for BYU graduation! we're so proud of lauren for graduating and we're excited to see where life takes her next! also, it's always good to go to our favorite food places in provo!

+ we went straight from provo to california for my sister's wedding! It was super fun and I just love love love being with my family. It always goes by too quickly, but I'll admit: I'm glad to be done with weddings for a while haha.

+ came back to oklahoma and we've had even more storms. it's been a really wet may! I don't mind the storms just as long as I'm in the safety of my own home. but you guys, driving in it is the pits, yo. also, the sky gets such weird color during the tornado-y storms. the pic above was taken at like 10 pm and it was way more yellow-y and weird than you can see here...

+ celebrated our anniversary!! I can't believe how quickly a year has flown by! the day started with me having to go clean the church (ha!) but then I came home to find flowers and donuts and my favorite juice waiting for me in bed with my favorite guy in the world! please note levi hiding under the covers (for modesty!).  it was such a fun day of hanging out together, reminiscing on all the incredible (and some less incredible) events that have transpired over the last year. we ended the evening with dinner on the 49th floor of the tallest building in town. It was amazing! It was almost cancelled due to--surprise!--a thunderstorm, but fortunately it wasn't. In fact, we ended up having an awesome "light show" (i.e. tons of lighting) while we ate our dinner. It was awesome. (Suuuuper crappy anniversary pic...really not sure what the guy was doing but it was so blurry and dark that I had to like edit it all weird (and I have no idea how to edit btdubs) but it's the best we have haha)

+ and then just this last weekend (lies. two months ago) was really fun. We had the long weekend and on Saturday we went up to Penn Square mall to redeem my reward for winning my family's March Madness bracket (1 pound of See's Candy!). Of course, as we were ready to leave, the flash floods were starting. Because of where we were parked, the water was deeper (probs 4 or 5 inches) so we wanted to get out of there before the water got to the engine! It continued to pour rain, but we made it home safely and spent the evening in our sweats and eating the chocolate!

+ and there you have it. The last three months in a nutshell. Out.

one of us can pick out their hair (levi, obvi) and the other is the real MVP (me, obvi)

oklahoma city, you haven't killed me yet.

We've been here for over a month now and I don't hate the place. In fact, I'm a huge fan. Both Levi and I feel really good about where we are right now and are really happy about our surroundings. Oklahoma is such a great place. The people here are so friendly and happy and it's great. As you might know, we're in Oklahoma City right now, but as soon as summer institute training is over for Levi, we're moving down to Moore and I CANNOT WAIT. As much as I love this studio apartment that has none of my stuff, I can't wait to move into our beautiful, gorgeous amazing apartment down in Moore. We've really been counting our blessings lately because we really shouldn't have gotten the apartment that we did. We were on a waiting list and didn't make it to the top for available july apartments so we thought all was lost but then there was a surprise availability and we got the apartment! We are incredibly grateful for it and we will be the entire time we live there!  Anyway, we technically already have the keys to our apartment and have even taken a few things down there but we're still living up here since I mean, Levi has to be at the bus at 6:30 am and also free food for him here and also free air conditioning and plus it would be a 20 minute drive, so I mean. But next FRIDAY! 11 days! I cannot wait!!!! And the Monday after that my parents will be arriving with all our beautiful and amazing wedding gifts and also the remainder of our belongings and I swear my mind will explode of happiness. We've been living in limbo for about two months and I just cannot wait to finally be settled into our own place that we won't have to move out of for a long time and I'll be able to make dinner and it's just going to be the best.

ANYWAY.

Other things have been happening in our lives and I now wish to share those things with you.

First of all, Levi is teaching. Here he is after his first day of successfully teaching little first graders. Fast forward to today and he only has three days left of summer school! Yeah!

A few weeks ago we went to the Oklahoma City temple which is actually in Yukon. Also, turns out we literally drove RIGHT past it when we were driving into Oklahoma City for the first time. As in it was on the right side of the road and we just drove on past. But in our defense (well, mostly my defense because I had somehow rerouted us and so I thought we definitely weren't going to be driving past it), it was night time so we maybe wouldn't have seen it anyway? Anyway, it was great. It's just right there in the middle of a nice little neighborhood and it's so small and we love it.

So, it turns out that contrary to my previous claims, you can't actually eat spaghetti 62 days in a row as I had been planning to do. Something weird happened with my digestive system or something and I was feeling very strange for a few days so I'm choosing to blame it on the mass amounts of spaghetti that were consumed. Anyway, I bought a chicken and I was hoping it would help. It was a really good chicken.

For months I've been begging Levi to show me what it looks like when he picks out his hair. One day he surprised me when he came out of the bathroom and it was such a great moment. I mean, look at it. Don't you just feel like you should say it's groovy or something? I also really wish for you to see pictures of Levi's hair in high school when it was way longer and so picking it out was significantly more hilarious. I love this guy. And that hair.

Dillon and Danielle are such great friends. I mean, look! They mailed us pesto bread and a gigantic cinnamon roll bread thing. It's just like the good old days when we would go over to their apartment and they would make us lots of delicious food and we would eat it all and then leave. Such a good friendship.

Have you ever watched Gilmore Girls? There is one thing you need to know about Gilmore Girls. They are always, I repeat, ALWAYS eating food. Every time we watch an episode we get hungry even though we really have no need to be hungry because we just ate a few hours ago but then they're eating burgers and fries and fancy meals and pizza and chinese (always chinese!) and it can make even the fullest stomach grumble for want of food. So one day, Levi and I decided to beat the system. We wanted to show those Gilmore Girls who was boss! And boss them we did! It was a weekend night and we decided to get Chinese (okay, Panda Express but it still counts) and eat it on our bed while we watched an episode of Gilmore Girls. It was seriously so fun and it made me really happy. Also, maybe Levi isn't going to like that I always talk about how we watch Gilmore Girls because maybe "all the boys" will think he's turned girly which he totally hasn't. I guess you just get a little desperate when you spend 14 hours a day with Teach for America and it's a nice little something to look forward to at the end of the day. So sue him.

It is important for you to understand something about Levi. He likes to play this special game. Say for example that we need to leave to go somewhere. So I'll say, "Hey, are you going to be ready in ten minutes?" I'm not saying it in a "there's no way you'll be ready in ten minutes so I just want you to know you're running behind" because that's mean and that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm saying it in a "would ten minutes be a good estimate for when we're going to be ready to leave?" Anyway, I'll say that and he'll say yes and then in ten minutes as I'm putting on lotion or my earrings or some other final touch he will have speedily dressed and stuff and he'll be ready just seconds (literally, seconds) before I'm ready and then he'll pace the apartment saying, "Just waitin' on you. Yep, I'm just here all ready to go and I'm just waitin' on you." It's pretty funny because he likes to pretend that he's been ready forever and that I thought he would never be ready in ten minutes and now would you look at that! he was ready first. 

Anyway, this picture is from one time when I was totes ready first and he was still in the bathroom or the shower or something so I texted him this from the kitchen along with a note that said "just waitin' on you." It was good stuff. In other news, that's our mini baby garbage can they gave us. In other other news, I broke those flips flops the other day when I was trying to get ketchup and mayo (to make fry sauce, of course) at the cafeteria and apparently people had been spilling ketchup everywhere (come on! are we all five years old?!) and so the ground was sticky and my flip flop got stuck as I tried to step away and the strap finally broke. It had been just clinging to life for the past two years, so it was time for them to go, but it was really sad and they were almost six years old so I was proud of them for the life they lived.

And finally, these pictures are from when we went to the patiently awaited for trip to Kevin Durant's restaurant in the beloved OKC. Levi was soooooooooo (times a billion) excited to go and I'll be honest, it was pretty awesome and really fun and also the food was delicious. Also Kevin Durant. I mean, come on. He's basically an idol in this Heperi home. And rightfully so. Also, I have a secret wish that one day we'll go to KD's restaurant and KD himself will be there and he'll walk up to me and say, "You the real MVP." I mean, a girl can dream, right? (But to be totally serious, I loved KD's MVP speech and thought that line was actually the best thing ever, so I'm kidding around with my dream, but I really do think he's amazing and if I did see him at that restaurant I would probably cry of happiness or something else equally embarrassing.)

Okay, the end.

part two-lio, foolio.

good news. more wedding pics! plus this one above is definitely one of my very favorites.

these ones are from after we came out of the temple and all our family and friends were there to meet us and celebrate with us. It was SUCH a fun and happy experience and I just loved having everyone there with us. I was so lucky to have so many friends and family there who had traveled long distance (California! New York! South Carolina! Missouri! New Mexico! Nevada! New Zealand! And beyond!) Both Levi and I just felt so blessed that day and so so happy that our wedding day had finally arrived. We waited a long time for this day. I still remember when I first set up a countdown app on my phone and there was 187 days on it. I thought for sure I would die before the day ever came.

But somehow we made it. And everything came together and was just the loveliest. All the details came together with the help of so many friends and family and we were just able to enjoy the day. And there are SO many pictures I love from this day! So that's why we now have part 2 of this big fat series of wedding posts.

But before I get to that, I've just been thinking this morning about how much I appreciate having Levi in my life. You're probably getting tired of hearing about this, but unfortunately I'm not tired of talking about it, so here you go: Levi. Teach for America takes forevvvvver and is ridiculously draining for him. I know they have really good intentions but sometimes I think they're going a little overboard. I mean, 6:30 am-8:30 pm seems just a little excessive. I still think it's a really great program, so what I'm trying to get at is I'm really proud of Levi for sticking with it. And then coming home and being with me and genuinely appreciating that part of the day and for spending time with me and not just passing out like he totally deserves to. He's also so on top of things and so responsible so that he doesn't have to do lesson planning when he's at home if he can at all help it--and if he does have to do stuff at home, we do it together and it's actually kind of fun (you should see the really beautiful chart I made for the class--super proud of it.)

Anyway, Levi gets tomorrow off (wooooooooooo!) and then he only has two more weeks of summer institute training and then we get to move into our new apartment and Levi gets to start working with the actual school he will be working at and we'll FINALLY get all of our stuff and can settle in and it will be glorious. (Turns out eating spaghetti 43 days in a row isn't so good for the digestive system. I want my dishes so I can make real food!) We really like it here in OKC but we're definitely ready to settle down in our recently acquired apartment down in Moore. And before anyone freaks out, yes I know. That's where the tornado was last year and yes I know. There were two conference talks about it and yes I know. The ward we'll be in is the ward that was hit by the tornado and yes I know. There were other places to live and yes I know it all. But what you don't know is that the missionaries literally live in the building right next to us as in WE'RE NEXT DOOR NEIGHBORS and another set of missionaries live just across the golf course and I'm not saying anything but I am saying that I feel like living next to the missionaries is a really good choice when you're dealing with tornados. BAM, winning.

But all jokes aside, don't worry we'll be safe.

Anyway, you're all here for the pictures, so here you go!

also these next three pictures are hilarious to me for some reason. It's like Levi and his dad are both confused and then they're like, oh hey! hugs!

seriously, such a great day.

and again, photos by the lovely Lindsey Orton!