Yes, we use diapers in the Blackburn home

I have to give an explanation to these next pictures. I really haven't just gone overboard trying to make my dog into a baby by putting her in diapers. She just barely reached her "womanhood" and went into heat. We don't want...stuff, to get all over our carpet so the vet recommended dog diapers. I know it sounds crazy but it works. She looked so cute in them, I couldn't resist putting a couple pictures on here.

Graduation

Well, my parents can officially say all of their kids have graduated from college. Karolyn got her bachelor's degree at the end of this last July. I have to say that going to her graduation brought back memories of my own. When I graduated...I didn't want to be done. There's times when I still wish I could go back. Well, I wish I could until I see Jon doing homework and then that desire leaves for awhile. :) But, looking back, it was the perfect time for me to graduate-whether I was ready or not. Anyway, here are some pictures I took of her graduation. We also took some videos but I won't put them on here because I think Karolyn would kill me. Let's just say...graduates can go crazy when the pressure of school is finally off...

Mountains and Strings

This was the first year that I got to go to Mountains and Strings as a coach/helper person, instead of as a student. I had gone in 2001-2004 as a student in high school and loved it so I was excited to go again. It was interesting to be on the other side watching all the students and to remember back when I was one of them. Oh how life changes after high school! I got the opportunity to play in/coach the Schumann quintet which was incredibly fun.


The top picture is a panoramic view of where I got to sleep. The middle section is called the Scovel Center where we rehearsed and then the section on the right is a bunch of rooms where we stayed. The kids had to stay in the dorms which weren't too far away from us.



I think I saw a different looking weird moth everyday. These are two that were sitting on my window one morning. They aren't the coolest ones I saw but the only ones I had a camera for. I think the one on the top right is pretty interesting though.


These are pictures from our horseback ride. Everyone just rode through the woods on their horses in a single file line. It wasn't the most exciting thing of the week but it was pretty relaxing to just slowly ride on a horse through some really beautiful scenery.



The next to last picture above is a picture of my quintet. It's sad that I look about the same age as all of them even though I'm at least 8 years older. Anyway, they were really amazing kids and I thought our quintet sounded really good by the end...although, I had my doubts about it during the middle of the week. The last picture is just a picture of the chamber orchestra. We performed outside but it happened to be a really cold, rainy night. We had to keep stopping in between each song to hide under the shelter so that our instruments didn't get wet.

May Birthdays

Our birthdays happened a couple months ago but since I'm not very good at keeping the blog updated yet, I'm just barely writing about it. Jon's birthday was on May 3rd and my birthday was on May 31st. Now we're both 24! Growing up, I always thought it would feel different when I got this old. Not that we're that old yet, but I guess I always thought I'd feel more mature or something by this age. Anyway, for both our birthdays we did the usual, go to one family on one day and the other family the next. Although we took a day to celebrate by ourselves so we each got a three day birthday. I'm not complaining. Unfortunately I didn't really get any good pictures of us on our birthdays so you just have to read this less than exciting entry.

I know, I know. It's ridiculous. More pictures of our dog!

Abby and Jasper frequently fall asleep together.
It was incredibly hard to get three dogs to look up and hold still at the same time.

Since we don't have children yet, we sort of go overboard on taking pictures of our dog. I just can't help it. She's soo cute. At least to us. :) These are pictures of Abby with her little dog friends. I used to make fun of people who treated their pets like they were human but I have to admit that we've been guilty of this lately. Since these pictures we have given Abby an incredibly cute haircut but I'll resist the urge to put more pictures up.

Happy Anniversary to us!

April 11th was our one year anniversary! It's hard to think that a year has already gone by but I'm happy to say we're still happily married. :) We mostly celebrated our anniversary on Saturday since April 11th landed on a sunday, but we went to dinner and stayed at the same hotel we stayed at for our honeymoon. I also learned I'm a duck killer. You have to ask me about it because I'd rather not write the details on here. Anyway, Jon and I are still excited about what the future holds for us and it's been a great year so far.

Happy Easter!

The five on the left are mine and the three on the right are Jon's. Enough said.

My lovely parents.

I had Derek hold the eggs so that it looked more "eastery." I don't know if eastery is a word, but you know what I mean.

*I couldn't get wording to go at the top of these pictures for some reason so I'll explain down here. This year, Easter Sunday was the same weekend as conference. We spent Saturday with my family and Sunday with Jon's. It was a great weekend all around. I mean, could it get any better than celebrating Easter and watching conference all in one weekend?

Isn't love grand?

Here are a few of our engagement pictures. I know that we didn't just get engaged and these are out of order but I like them and forget to post them earlier. :)

St. Patrick's Day

I bet you're all thinking, "Wow, I'm glad Natalie doesn't cook for me on St. Patrick's Day. Poor Jon." Also, ignore the messy counter in the background. It's not always like that.
I realize this isn't my most attractive picture. Please don't judge me when I'm not wearing makeup.


For St. Patrick's Day, I decided to make a dinner and color it with green food coloring. I know it's not very original and it looks terrible but it tasted good.

Scottish Fantasy by Bruch!

This is me after performing the Scottish Fantasy with the Rexburg Tabernacle Orchestra. I've been playing with the orchestra since high school and last year Brother Barrus asked me to solo with them. I was incredibly excited and scared! I had never played a solo with an actual orchestra so it was new for me but I was grateful to Brother Barrus for trusting me to do it. Normally I'm a violist but I had recently started playing around again on the violin(I tried it a little in high school) when he asked me to play with them. Learning a concerto on an instrument I wasn't as familiar with really pushed me but I loved it and it was a great learning experience for me.(For those of you who saw these pictures before, I figured out how to turn them the right way. Good for me.)