Today I had the divine privilege of telling a Hawaiian that his daughter would not be getting her deposit back. First this man questioned by ability to confirm his daughter’s nullified deposit. Then when I told him that I could not (and would not) do anything to change it, he mocked my position as manager based on the fact that I would not take responsibility for his daughters lack of refund. So I politely bid him aloha, and suggested he say aloha to his moolah as well. Luckily this winner lives in Hawaii, so I don’t have to worry about him popping in to bombard me with any more of his twisted logic.

On the Upside, Summerwood Condos is over 90% full, he Civic has five new tires, and we got paid today. So Life is good.

Jon and I have been trying to think of the best ways to decorate our home, with things that are meaningful, we like, and don't cost us a ton of money!

Its somewhat of a catch 22, we definitely need our home decorated since we're guiding tours through it all the time.. but we haven't gotten paid (we get our check tomorrow). And of course- the better our place looks, the better it sells!

So we really needed some wall art, and we love the look of canvas photography and paintings.. but when we looked around online and at the stores they cost a lot more money than we wanted to spend. So we decided to make our own!
Here are our finished products:
The one above is Jon's! He had made a similar doodle with pen and ink on paper, and put the same idea in paint.

This one is mine. It looks a lot cooler in this picture because the background looks yellow.. really its just off white.

As we've been finishing off our music / hangout room, we decided we needed some super comfortable seating. Love sacs are expensive, but we found a brand that is the same concept but about half the price. It's called a monster sac, check out how big it is! We've been keeping it in our living room all weekend because its so comfy!

Jon and I are happy to report that before Monday morning, we figured that we were 2/3 full. By the end of today, 3/4 full! About a 10% increase in 3 days. We can't wait until we're entirely filled up so we can prepare for the 4 days of checkouts, cleaning, carpet cleaning, and maintenance- before all of the new tenants move in. Kendall and Mallory, our maintenance and cleaning managers have been the best thing that has happened to us! I don't know how the past managers even did it, there is so much that can fall through the cracks, and this couple helps us keep everything up-to-date. Last Saturday we went with them to see Dark Knight, they were great to have as company.

I'm proudly becoming a tough cookie! In only a matter of days :) I've happily threatened evictions (and not allowing tenants to re-sign), gotten tough on people with pets, charged late fees for not coming in with their late rent when they said they would!, and getting strict about contract rules. However, Jon is still the bigger man, and is taking all of the angry deposit phone calls for me. He has a good talent at being kind but not letting down his guard, and has the ability to take the tough comments and not let them get to him.

Unfortunately our bad smells in the kitchen area have not dissipated. The smell seems to move around.. and now it almost seems like its coming from the oven. The smell is haunting us. The carpet cleaners are coming next Tuesday, hopefully they can help us out!!! (moms, if you have any ideas why in the world there would be a move-able smell that we think is cat pee, but cannot identify, please let us know what to do! thanks)

Today was Rachel and my first day flying solo. Finally being able to take the reins gave the both of us renewed vigor to make our new place seem more like home. Rachel decided that we should purge the office of excess flowers, candles and an archaic, non-functioning computer, while I decided to purge the living room carpet of the mephitic cat pee. As a result of our ambitions, I spent nearly two hours with the Bissell carpet cleaner scrubbing the corners of the stained carpet with the fervor of someone who despises the scent of urine as an accompaniment to a nice dinner. After work, Rach and I went to Target and bought a proper stand for our television, and printed out four wedding pictures to put in our frames.

We finished off the evening with gourmet s’mores , the ingredients for which came in a package from my thoughtful mother. The smores were excellent, made with Trader Joes Cinnamon graham crackers, organic dark chocolate, and vanilla marshmallows, toasted slightly over one of our office candles.

It has been a while since we've written, but we have been very busy! Our new job keeps us active from 10 am to 4 pm, truly never a dull moment. Jon and I appreciate being busy and feel a lot of success from the work we get done. However, we are never even close to finished by the end of the day! And while we're glad we've had a couple of of weeks to train with the past managers, there are now too many cooks in the kitchen. While we wish they hadn't left us with some problems, we hope things will smooth out in a couple of months. In other words: we are looking forward to the day when the people who are mad at us are actually mad at us for things we've done. Every day we have a new story, I wish we could tell them all.

Last night we had a double date with James and a new interest of his. We went to Trafalga and played some mini golf and arcade games. Then we did "iron chef" where the couples are given an ingredient for a dessert and can't spend more than $7 to make it. Our ingredient was marshmallows, so we made our own rendition of s'mores. James and his date made a weird version of rice crispy treats. We found its funner to be creative rather than make something totally delicious. It was a fun night.

Move-In Day!

We were told on Friday, at midnight that we wouldn't be able to move in on Saturday. We were all packed up and were tired of having the date pushed back, so we convinced them to let us move. We started packing the U-haul at 2, and were all moved in at about 8pm. Seeing this empty moving truck was the best feeling in the world!Our muscles were super tired by the end of the day, as were we. We celebrated by going to CPK and using our fantastic celebration gift card! (thanks Joy!!) It was just what we needed at the end of the day. We also needed to get groceries to get through Sunday, so we went and just got the necessities. Then we plunked down for some deep sleep. However, before 6am I woke up to the thought, "did we ever take in the groceries??" I woke Jon up and we had to go out and get them. Luckily our items survived. Haha
Bethany, Brandon and baby Chandler stopped by on their long trip to Oregon! We loved spending some hours with them on Sunday, and it was really fun to cook for the first time in the condo, with them there as company.

Last weekend Phyllis and Kathleen came to visit us and take us out to dinner. It was so fun to learn about their history with Joy and Ruth, they immediately felt like family. They took us to Tucanos and I was happily surprised when they helped themselves to plenty of meat, and felt totally comfortable in the high energy environment. We soon learned their father was a meat cutter- no wonder! :)

Jon got to help out Dr. Moore at a chiropractic both at a health fair this Monday. He learned how to do posture analysis, and learned a lot about different schools and the philosophy behind chiropractic medicine.

We've trained even more this week, and have been rolling our eyes at all of the rude people. A lot of kids come in expecting a 5 star resort and complain that the kitchen is too small, or ask how new we are when we ask the manager a question. We just swallow our words because they look around and soon realize that is by far the best housing for UVU students, and it is sooo much better than the other places around here. Certainly better than any other student housing I've lived in! We also had someone who was mad because there was a $3 charge for putting his deposit on his card. I believe thats pretty standard.. but we offered to refund his $3. (but I plan on explaining he should always expect that with rent or school) Just amazing the little experiences we're having :)

We've been told we can move in on Saturday *cross your fingers* The carpets are getting cleaned in the morning, so they'll be ready that afternoon. We are getting so excited, especially since we will be showing off our own condo to the prospective residents. This gives us an excellent excuse to decorate well, and really make it feel open and home-y. We feel truly blessed.