little letters with a few pictures.

dear erin and mike,

your wedding pictures look amazing.

steven and i are so excited to get ours soon.

love,

your sister / sister in law

p.s. we miss you. come visit us.

the new mr. & mrs. santiago

dear anthropologie,

thank you for the fat merchandise store credit. and thank you for having extra 25% off sale so i could get even more with it. now, please send me my new clothes. i'm anxious.

love,

an anxious customer

the bridesmaids and groomsmen with the new mr. & mrs. santiago

dear sisters {that includes you, sara},

remember when we were bridesmaids at erin and mike's wedding? and then remember when you were bridesmaids + lauren & andi when steven and i got married nearly 4 weeks ago? that was fun. let's do it again. steven and i will volunteer to be the bride and groom. i pick up my dry cleaned dress next week, so it's perfect.

love,

heidi hopper

dear steph,

i don't know if you even read this anymore, but luke is so dang cute. thanks for coming to both mine and erin's weddings.

love,

your {favorite} cousin

cousin stephanie with her husband paul and little luke!

dear parents,

i'm excited to see you in about 6 weeks. it'll be the first time we are home to visit, and not get married, or go to a wedding, or get engaged, or anything. okay, i lied. we are coming home for a wedding--katie & kyle's, and we will be involved, but it won't be as crazy since it's not our family. we love you. we miss you.

love,

your favorite daughter

dear waffle mania,

we had you on sunday. mmm, berries and whipped cream! it was so fun using our double flippy waffle maker for our 1st sunday of the month "waffle mania" tradition. a new tradition, since it was our first 1st sunday of the month together. and thanks em and blake for sharing it with us. we'll do it again? in a month? great.

love,

waffle lover

dear dinners,

umm, pardon me for tooting my own horn, but i've been making some so good dinners lately.  like that recreation of stonefire grill's bbq chopped chicken salad? yeah, i just need their exact bbq sauce and it's pretty much the same.  or how bout that mango salsa chicken last week? or the asian stir fry? or that rustic tuscan chicken with the fresh tomato and zucchini spaghetti squash i somehow made up? steven's really loving you. so am i.

love,

happy, healthy, hungry hoppers

dear gym,

it is so good to be back. regularly. we've had some tough, busy months this year, but we are back on track.

love,

gym rat {okay, not really a gym rat, per se}




dear apartment,

i'm sorry it has taken us so long to get you organized. i finally did my clothes. and you are all painted. and today i'll do all the "stuff."  and we'll get the pictures hung in a few days.  and the kitchen will be organized as soon as the bulk of our gifts arrive with the hoppers next week. hang in there.
love,
the hoppers

dear lauren,

we are SO excited for you to come next week!! you'll love it here! 

love,

your favorite {and only} sister in law

dear students,

i miss you. it's been 2 weeks already! i hope you remember everything i taught you. and i hope you remember that i'll always love you and think about you and pray for you. come visit me at color me mine. i'll give you a discount.

love,

miss kendrick / mrs. hopper {no, you can't call me mrs. kendrick}

p.s. none of you will read this.

dear body,

get out of bed. you read. you studied. you prayed. you checked your email. and you need to be done blogging. run to the gym. now.

love,

heidi hopper

we be paintin'

in the bahamas, we be jammin' 

{they be jammin' in jamaica and the bahamas}

but...

in the provo, we be paintin'

we already did the living room. now we be doin' the bedroom.

please excuse the foul pictures.

they are taken on my photo booth,

with my arms a little crooked.

and photo booth is a mirror image,

so it is actually opposite.

i hate cake...or do i?

if you know me, you know i pretty much HATE cake.  
i'm sure you have a question or two about that.


Q. did i have a wedding cake?  
A. yes. chocolate with raspberry filling. fondant with swiss dots and real cascading flowers {from our lovely florist.}
{photos of that beautiful thing will come in the mail soon from our lovely photographer.}


Q. did i eat any of it?
A.  yes/no.  yes--we "cut the cake" and i had my first bite of cake as mrs. hopper while steven had his.  no--that's the only bite i had.


Q. did you enjoy it?
A.  yes. my bite was a little cake and a lot of filling, so it was nice and moist and good.


Q. so, what did you eat if you didn't have cake?
A. we had a bunch of different kinds of cheesecakes at the reception. i had raspberry.


Q. why do you hate cake?
A. i hate the "cakiness" of it. and i hate frosting. and it's just not good enough for me to eat.


Q. but, haven't you been to the sweet tooth fairy and had a cupcake there?  and enjoyed it?
A. yes. i have. and yes. i enjoyed it. but, it wasn't really a cupcake. {remember? see here.} but, as previously explained, there's really only one kind of cake i like, and that is carrot cake. because it is so super moist and dense that it is like bread. carrot raisin bread is even better {like at mimi's cafe. yum.} so, at the sweet tooth fairy, they have pumpkin cupcakes in the fall. but it's just a pumpkin muffin or pumpkin bread in a cupcake tin with frosting on it.  they also have other flavors like it that are a bread or muffin with frosting on it. in fact, i called them out on it {me: isn't this just a muffin...with frosting on it?} and they said that a cupcake has frosting, a muffin doesn't.  hmm, alright. i'll take it. and their frosting is so good. not normal crisco/shortening/buttercream/canned {sick} frosting, but real cream cheese frosting. yum.


Q. alright, so you like some of the sweet tooth fairy's cupcakes because they are actually just muffins/bread with really good frosting on them. so what's up with the picture up there, huh? what's up with the bundt cake?
A.  okay, okay. at our arizona reception, steven's mom ordered a million little bundt cakes, called bundtinis, from nothing bundt cakes. {arizona, california, and utah locations--no fear. we're covered in all three "homes."}  pretty much a bundtini is a mini bundt cake, or a cupcake.  but here's the thing with bundt cakes--they are suuuuuper moist, and not cakey at all.  i never really eat bundt cake, just because it's never really there for me to eat and i never make 'em.  but at our reception, i think i had 6 of those little bundtinis.  a bunch of different flavors.  red velvet was so good. so cool and moist. and the cream cheese frosting--delicious. i highly recommend it.


Q. you're crazy, h.hopp.  are you going to eat cake now?
A. no. i still hate it.  but i'll have a super moist bundtini from nothing bundt cakes if the occasion arises. or a muffin/bread "cupcake" from the sweet tooth fairy.


confession: steven and i were buying paint at home depot on monday, which is conveniently located catty corner from the sweet tooth fairy.  we stopped at the mcdonald's in front of it to pick up a red box and i said, oh look there's the sweet tooth fairy.  he suggested we try it out.  so we did.  and i didn't get a muffin/bread one.  i got chocolate peanut butter. and it was good. but it was too cakey for me.  so, again, i say it was good, but i didn't really enjoy it.  
oh and confession 2: one of the 2nd grade teachers on my team got me a sweet tooth fairy cupcake as an end of school little thank you/i'll miss you over summer treat. strawberry. with real strawberries in the frosting and a chocolate dipped strawberry slice on top.  i ate it at lunch with the rest of my team.  same thing. it was good, but just too cakey. so i mixed it all up with the frosting to moisten it up and it was better. pretty good. but in the words of steven, "not my favorite."


this is long. as usual. and steven has been at work for 3 hours and still has 2 left.  and i am just writing thank yous and watching "so you think you can dance" on hulu. love that show. we need to hook up our cable before 7pm tomorrow!

and just in case you forgot what we looked like on our wedding day...

here you go.

sometimes when steven is gone, i just look at all of our pictures together, and engagement photos, and wedding photos, and honeymoon photos. just because he is so handsome. and he loves me so much. i think i love him more.

because you're dying to see our honeymoon photos...

life has been a little bit crazy upon our return from our wedding in california, honeymoon in the bahamas, and reception in arizona.

1) i finished my last week of teaching 2nd grade.

2) lots of trips to target and bed, bath, and beyond to get towels, shower curtains, pillows, etc.

3) we are proud costco executive members.

4) as of today, we have been painting our apartment.

5) em works at color me mine and hooked me up with a little part time summer job there.

6) steven's back to work at the mtc. full-time starts tomorrow.

so here are some pictures from our honeymoon.

i know steven and i are like way super attractive, but i am sparing you of our beach photos.

first night's dinner.

the food is amazing.

and it is all you can eat.

um, double trouble.

 the majesty of the seas.

Nassau, Bahamas.

lots of cruise ships lined up! 

ours is the one on the far right.

 we "climbed" the queen's staircase.

the slaves carved a canyon and the staircase with little chisels in honor of the queen freeing them. it took them 16 years. chisels. and a huge rock!  pretty cool.

um, that's the canyon.

chisel? no thank you. how about some dynamite?

{besides me.  i know i'm dynamite.}

it was hot and humid.

i was dyiiiiing.

we walked around nassau and went to the queen's staircase.  went back to the cruise ship for some lunch and to change into our beach garb.

i almost stole this little boy while his grandma was taking a dip.

steven stopped me.  that's why i married him.  well, one reason.

this was the "formal" dinner. we just went with "nice."

should've brought my wedding dress...

Coco Cay, Bahamas.

this was royal caribbean's private island.

they had a delicious bbq.

then we just laid out fat and happy on the beach for a couple of hours.

and for some reason i can't find those beach photos that don't have us in them.

so sad, too bad. they're on the camera still.

here's the majesty waiting for us in the middle of the ocean.

we had to swim to coco cay. it was hard holding my camera above the water the whole time.

and i tried on this hat on the cruise ship that night.

key west, florida.

so cute!

this is where ernest hemmingway had his little hermit hideout.  i took a picture of it as much as i could, but he built up all these walls and we didn't want to pay $30 for us to see it.

we rented bikes and rode all over the little island. so fun. and so hot.

and those photos for some reason didn't load. well, i think they loaded as movies, but i am too tired to figure that out, so you'll just have to wait or never see them.

 i love ice cream.

 arrrrgh! steven be a mighty fine pirate, eh?

oh, we rode to the sothernmost point of the continental usa.

so proud.

i wanted to sneak onto the key west waldorf astoria {thought that was only in nyc!} and go on this little thingy but, no trespassing.

steven has good map skills.

key west. handsome husband.

so every night we had some sort of towel creature and one day it was an elephant relaxing on our bed with my sunglasses on.

and this is us leaving arizona. yes. 4 bags. the red one has my wedding dress in it with like a few picture frames and dvds.  we had a lot of stuff. and now we wait 2.5 more weeks for steven's family to come move lauren up for byu {hoooooray!!!!} and bring us our gifts and a bbq and some crazy piano thing. oh and a tennis ball hopper so steven and i can play tennis. well, so he can teach me. he used to teach tennis, you know. and he is pretty darn good at it. and i told him that i have a power skirt and need to use it for tennis.

i hope that makes you feel a little better until we get our life a little more under control. i.e., our apartment painted and organized.

some wedding photos {1}

here are some photos from our perfect wedding day.

and by perfect, i mean perfect.

everything was perfect--temple sealing, family, friends, ring ceremony, weather {no sun, but clouds made for great pictures and no sweat!}, reception, food, decorations, flowers, venue {thank you olds}, everything.

all photos but the first {from my aunt's phone} were taken by my new father-in-law, brett l hopper.  photos from our photographer {reception, ring ceremony, all the after-temple shots} should be coming in a few weeks!

love the bridesmaid dresses that katie's mom, kim, made.  are you not obsessed with the big bow on the middle of the back?  yeah, me too.  that is the sole reason why i picked the pattern.  surprise, surprise.

and of course, my beautiful bridesmaids

{left to right}: emily, dana, sara {psuedo-sister}, erin {now santiago}, lauren {new sister-in-law!}, andi {FFP--future, female president, and new sister-in-law!}

my personal hairdresser and cousin, denae, doing a pre-photo touch up.  and my handsome paparupa.

andi stepped down as FFP to be my personal assistant all day and carry my dress.

thanks andi--you were perfect!!

and she loved it...

see?  she did love it.

best part. my new husband.

um, don't forget the 5" heels.

and i never tripped.

just after we came out of the temple.

steven was a little bit happy,

but i was even happier.

and we are so in love.

more photos from the wedding coming later.

then pictures of our honeymoon in the bahamas!

big news.

{thanks brett l!}

1) I am now Mrs. Hopper {it's day 9!!}

2)  I am teaching 1st grade next year

more about our perfect wedding day, arizona reception, and Bahamian cruise 

friends of lauren hopper--your secret's out.  welcome!