Keeping Up With the McGhee's

So much we have missed lately in our blogging so here is a quick update from our last post:

• Matt competed in a Web Analytics Competition sponsored by Adobe. His team of three won #1 at the University of Utah and went on to compete against five other universities throughout the nation. His team  won fourth place along with $1,500 and a very big fake check, although word on the street is that they should have placed 2nd or 3rd.
• I started my new job at Primary Children's Medical Center and I love it!
• KerMatt got new cell phones - Matt got a Motorola Droid 2 and I got an HTC Droid Incredible. We have been salivating over them for a while and they did not disappoint - they are awesome! 
• Matt flew out to San Francisco in early November to interview with Deloitte's San Jose office. He ate lots of food, spent time with the Adams Family and then came home to find out he got the job, which will start in August 2011 after he finishes school. 
• Hence, KerMatt is moving to the Bay Area in 2011!!!
• I got called to be the new Choir Director and music chairman for our ward and have been working to put together our Christmas program.
• Matt also won tickets to the Nov. 22nd San Diego Chargers game along with a chance to participate in a halftime competition where he would throw a football to win a hot tub. 
• On the night Matt came home from NorCal he started feeling sharp pain in his right side, which turned out to be appendicitis. He was rushed into the ER where they removed his appendix right away.
• Bottom line...Matt was grumpy from the post-surgery pain but was still determined to still get down to the Chargers game so we shipped him down to San Diego where he could recover. While he did not win the hot tub, he did get to spend the whole second quarter on the field.
• My sister Tori, had her first baby, Jackson Christopher, who is freaking adorable and my Mom came into town for the week so I got to spend Thanksgiving with her while Matt celebrated Thanksgiving with his family.
• We were both thankful for lots of good food.
• BYU barely lost to the Utes in an exciting game and I was disappointed.
• Matt got a Graduate Assistant job next semester which will cover one semester's tuition. Yay for us!
• Chargers beat the Colts - Matt wanted to make sure we didn't leave that out. 
• My fantasy football team beat Matt's for the second time this season putting me in #1 for our league thusfar. Although Matt has the most points overall he came in at #5. Matt's sister, Bekah, is #2 right now - yes we are the only two girls in the league and we are dominating! Our 10-year-old nephew Dylan is right behind us in #3.
• Matt spent another night at the University of Utah Sleep-Wake Center to figure out the best setting for a CPAP machine.
• Primary Children's just finished the 40th Festival of Trees which consumed my life for a week but was a wonderful experience. 
• Our good friend Brad came to visit us while he was out here for the American Outdoors Convention for work and we had a great time entertaining him.
• And Matt just finished his semester after a very busy last week of classes and final exams, projects, etc.. and now has a whole month of vacation ahead of him. He is 45% of the way through his Master's program and looking forward to four weeks of relaxing, Xbox, and football.
• We are both excited about heading down to San Diego for Christmas where we get to spend a week with family and friends.

Check out our photos of some of this madness:

Matt showing his big check from Adobe. Kristin, Jake and Keri just jumping in to help him hold it up

Matt when he arrived in San Fran

Matt the same day after he cleaned up for dinner with Deloitte

View of San Fran Bay Bridge from Matt's hotel room

Matt and his grandma Dottie during his NorCal trip

My poor honeyhead in the hospital after having his appendix removed

I touched up the photo but you can still see how pale he was :(

Matt enjoying his time on the field at the Chargers game

Matt during his famous football competition

Matt's family enjoying their Thanksgiving dinner

McGhee Thanksgiving dinner cont...

Tori and Bryan and new little bundle of cuteness, Jackson 

I hold Baby Jack anytime I get a chance and here he is modeling an Ewok onesie that Pikey and I made for him at Tori's baby shower.

Love that little guy :)

This is one of Keri's fave Christmas trees being sold at the Festival of Trees this year

Matt's second night in the Sleep-Wake Center

Chillin' with the girls in the bucket seat

Doo Da Dippity!

Yes, Matt and I managed to put together the most ridiculous costumes this year for Halloween. If you don't know what we are supposed to be, you would be right along with most of our friends and ward members it seems.

First of all, we are hamsters. And not just any hamsters, but the gangsta hamsters on the Kia Soul commercial - only the best commercial ever made. We have included the youtube and attached some pics from the commercial it for all those of you who have not seen it or just need a little refresher.

"You can get with this...or you can get with that."

"Doo Da Dippity!"

We had a ton of fun on Saturday at our friends, Mary & Tyler's Halloween Party. But I think next year, we'll go ahead and make costumes that are not so HOT! We were melting in all that fur and batting. And let me tell how hard it is to put together a hamster costume - I had to hand sew Matt's furry hamster pants and it really pushed the abilities of my sewing :) But he does win the best husband award for going along with my silliness. Love him! 

And on another happy note, I'm sure many of you already know but I got a new job at Primary Children's Medical Center and will be leaving the American Heart Association as of this Friday. I am sad to leave the AHA, but also very relieved as I have been itching for a change for quite a while. And what a change it will be! 

In my new position, I will be doing design work, media relations, and fundraising - specifically running their Telethon in Idaho. I'm looking forward to being able to use more creativity and learn different fundraising approaches especially from such a strong organization. Primary Children's (and Intermountain Healthcare - the parent company) has a very high reputation here in Utah (and all over the Mountain West) and they put on one of the biggest fundraising events here - the Festival of Trees. With that quickly approaching the first week of December, I am jumping head-first into my new position.

I also love their ingenuity in getting all overhead costs donated so they can say that 100% of all proceeds from their fundraising efforts goes directly to the children at Primary Children's.

And now my work is just on the outskirts of the University of Utah campus which means I'm even closer to Matt. His one request for me taking the job was to make sure they could provide him a dark room with a soft bed, blanket, and pillow for him to be able to take a nap between classes. Sillyhead! 

We are looking forward to the rest of the holiday season and hopefully fun times with good friends and family. 

 - KerMatt

October - last month before cold

We have been slacking on our blog, so here is an update for the past month. 

Matt has finally gone to a sleep doctor and has been working with specialists to improve his sleep. As part of this, he did an overnight sleep test at the University of Utah and he sent me this wonderful photo below of him after the techs had hooked him up for the night.

The test basically told us what we already knew - that Matt has sleep apnea among other issues. So now he will be going back to do another overnight sleep test, this time hooked up to a CPAP. We are looking forward to getting him a new CPAP with a custom fitted mask and the proper settings. I think Matt might be the youngest person to wear a CPAP - and let me tell you it is sexy :) 

I was given the opportunity to sing in the Saturday afternoon session of General Conference the first weekend of October. My stake, along with several other stakes from Sandy & Draper, put together a special family choir for this session. 

I loved the experience and the people that I met while doing it - although I ended up get a nasty head cold a few days before. My favorite part was sitting in the Conference Center after the session ended and watching everybody wave to President Monson as he walked out and waved to the audience. You just should have seen the huge grins on everyone's faces - they looked like little kids on Christmas morning. Being in the choir was a lot of work and a lot of time - not to mention the challenges it posed to me with the strict appearance restrictions - but it was definitely worth it!

Many people missed me as they showed me during the very first song so below is a screen shot from the session. I am in the bottom right with a dark blue shirt - next to a blonde lady.

Keri, along with the other 4 singers from the ward (Sister Rhay - bishop's wife, Brother Houggard, Bro. & Sis. Buhleman). Each ward was only allowed to select 5 singers.

Matt has been enjoying both BYU & University of Utah football this season. Since he is now a student at the U he has begun to appreciate the U and we even went to one of their football games. Below is a pic of Matt watching the game at the Rice-Eccles Stadium. He is sporting his new Steve Young jersey. His friend C-Bass hooked him up with a contact who gets authentic jerseys for cheap so we went ahead and got Matt 4 - yes 4 - new jerseys. He got this Steve Young 49er jersey, a throwback Gwynn Padres jersey, a white Phillip Rivers Chargers jersey and a Dwayne Wade basketball jersey. He is just lovin his new threads!  

We are looking forward to Halloween coming up - well I am mostly - since it is my favorite holiday. I had to spend almost 10 minutes this morning convincing Matt to dress up with me again this year. Initially he said no because my idea was "just too crazy" for him but thanks to my relentless persuasion he agreed to do so. I just have a great idea for our costumes and it wouldn't be as good without him. Stay tuned for pics of our fabulous costumes :)

September = Victory!

Do you remember the 21st night of September?

Love was changing the mind of pretenders

While chasing the clouds away

Hey hey hey,

Ba de ya - say do you remember

Ba de ya - dancing in September

Ba de ya - never was a cloudy day

Yes, first and foremost we did dance the night away on September 10th... at the Utah State Fair... while watching Boyz II Men perform. Well mostly Keri and her friends, Nicole, Charlotte, & Sheree did while Matt and his friend, Bryan Tanner, enjoyed laughing at us, eating fatty carnival food and getting compliments from other carnies on their ridiculous wigs. 

Keri didn't think she could ever be embarrassed by Matt, but somehow he managed to pull that off.

 These boyz... now men... were seriously impressive. They were so classy and sounded fabulous!

Keri (not sure why I'm tilting my head), Charlotte & Nicole in search of a FAT corndog to satisfy Nicole's craving.

Bryan Tanner (Matt's high school friend) & Matt looking RIDICULOUS! 

 What else can you say? :)

The pinnacle of the night... and by the way, this pic was taken after the concert - obviously not the end of the road for this concert. We just hadn't quite gotten the Boyz II Men out of our systems yet.

Besides chillin' with the carnies, KerMatt has been busy as ever with the usual routine. Matt is back at school. now working on his Master's while also interviewing with the Big 4 accounting firms again. He loves that he doesn't have to shave everyday at the U - quite the difference from BYU.

Keri put on her 6th Heart Walk event - having record breaking numbers of attendees (around 4,000). For example, we grew from 150 runners the past two years to more than 500 this year. We had a wonderful event and one of the most seamless Heart Walks I have worked on. The best part of the event was a tie between the bag pipers who led out the walk and Rory (Keri's cousin's husband) and his Ghost busters Club. And to top it all off, for the first time in my Heart Walk history, I haven't gotten sick right afterwards. Yeah!

Ghost buster's Club of Salt Lake

We couldn't finish this blog without mentioning FOOTBALL which has taken over as a priority in our lives (like it or not :) But in the biggest upset of our marriage, KerMatt went head to head in the Family Fantasy Football league - and Keri took the win by just 2 points! 2 points! And you know Matt helped me pick up a star quarterback the night before which made the difference. He is a good man and took the loss well... surprisingly.  He says "like the Chargers, I will finish the season strong." Check out the pic below for proof of Keri's victory, complete with our smack talk.

P.S. Check out the website we put together for Keri's dad's business - http://wire-riteelectric.com/ 

The house that built me...

Recently I've heard the new song "The House That Built Me" by Miranda Lambert (country singer). At first I hated the song because of the incessant twang but then one day I listened the words. And I loved them! I felt like the words were honest and real - and very relatable.

The song is about a woman going back to the house she grew up in and asking the people who now live there if she can walk through to feel her old memories.  

"I know they say you can’t go home again

I just had to come back one last time
Ma’am I know you don’t know me from Adam
But these handprints on the front steps are mine"

As she reminisces, she is hoping that these old memories will take away some of her current  sadness.

"You leave home and you move on and you do the best you can

I got lost in this old world and forgot who I am

I thought if I could touch this place or feeling
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it’s like I’m someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself"

Now not having actually grown up in one house in my own life, I am still touched by this song and can relate to wanting to go back to my care-free childhood instead of having the stress and responsibility I have to experience now. 

And when I think about all of the homes I grew up in, I think about how much of "me" I took away from each of these places.

For example:

Marigold House

• I learned to tie my shoe.
• I still remember the day that I figured this out with the "bunny ear" technique and experienced my own self-sufficiency. 
• I got trapped under the garage door (TWICE!).
• I learned that sometimes when your parents caution you, they actually know their stuff, such as staying out of the way when the door is closing.
• Dad did work on the new Jelly Belly factory and brought home endless goodies 
• I learned to appreciate the sweet things in life :)

Elmhurst House 

• My brother, Bo, spent one of my birthday parties running around outside and tripping over the garden hose to entertain my friends. 
• I learned that boys do stupid things to "impress" girls and brothers will try to steal your thunder :)
• Our house burnt down in 1988 while my family and I were across the street at church 
• I learned that if you are in the right place at the right time, you will be blessed - even through trials.
• I experienced the spirit of giving as I was overwhelmed with all of the kindness and unselfishness people offered us. Every day more and more boxes of clothing, dishes, blankets, etc would be given us. The children in my primary even did a penny drive and raised enough money in weeks to buy new scriptures for all 6 of my brothers and sister.
• We lost pretty much everything in that fire yet we were able to bounce back. I learned that material possessions are temporary and replaceable and it was the love of my family - and extended family who took all of us in - that carried us through this hard time. But they made it so fun for me that I can't remember this being a hard time - it just felt like an extended vacation at Grandma's house. I'm sure my parents would feel otherwise but I was 7 years old.

Lily House

• It snowed in Fairfield in December 1988 for the first time in like 8 years. 
• I learned that nothing is impossible - and brothers are mean and silly as Rocky picked me up out of bed, threw me in the snow and locked me outside in my nightgown. And then Bo and Josh were trying to ride their bikes down the snowy hill for the thrill of sliding all over.
• I learned that sometimes the best things in life are free - as we "somehow" had free cable in that house. 

Evergreen House

• Since I spent my formative pre-teen and teenage years here until I moved away to college, this is the house that 
• I learned to play the flute, the bells, sporadically practiced the piano and spent countless hours singing around the piano as my Mom played - deepening my love for music.
• I got to redecorate my room during high school for the first time and my mom let me pick everything, building my creativity.
• I experienced the joy of prank calls & TP'ing houses for the first time - then I worked on perfecting these skills.
• I learned to drive - and learned my mom was a much more patient teacher than my dad.
• I attempted to learn to drive with a stick shift but failed miserably until I was left without a car and with determination tried to rock the "Gator Man" truck. Some things are best just left alone though.
• I learned about dealing with crazy people such as neighbors.
• I started going to church dances and then dating - and oh the hours I spent getting ready with my friends for church dances.  
• I probably should have never discovered the joys of skipping class and finding creative ways to cover it up.
• I moved away and then experienced what it was like to come home from college and appreciate your home's sameness again.

"If I could walk around in I swear I’ll leave

Won’t take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me"

The simplicity of these memories seems so surreal now as I juggle my career, being a wife and a support to my husband, being a good friend and a good person overall and also keeping myself healthy and fit while developing my own individuality and creativity. So I hope to continue to appreciate the simple things in my life as it grows even more complex.

I realize also that it is not the homes that build you, but really the people that truly build you in those homes -whether it is yourself, your family or your friends.

Let the games begin...

Matt started his Masters program and is working on getting a TA position to discount some of his tuition. Apparently his intense BYU ISYS core has prepared him well for his masters classes as they are covering material he has already studied. He is also staying quite involved with the BYU ASM club and is applying this week to the Top 5 accounting firms again.

Keri's Heart Walk & Run is now only 3 WEEKS AWAY! Eeeh! While much is done for the prep, she still feels like she should be stressing out. This is her fifth Heart Walk to implement and she has a great planning committee of mainly young professionals and U of U or BYU students who have worked very hard to prepare. It will be exciting to see how this year's event turns out.Check out the article that Deseret News ran for us to highlight some of our top fundraising companies and our partnership with Ken Garff's Road To Success program. We will doing another follow up advertisement this next week with our Top 4. This has been an exciting piece for us as our companies have loved the attention, we have caught the eye of many in the community and now other offices have wanted to copy it.

Let's not also forget to mention the impending doom - or excitement, depending on which part of KerMatt you ask :) - of NFL beginning - and Fantasy Football taking off. Matt will be playing in three leagues this year - Family league, Friends league and an BYU ISYS Alumni league. Keri will be managing a team in the Family league and then co-managing a team with Matt in the Friends league. Keri had to restrain Matt at our ward activity last night as he was heavily recruiting others to join us, bless his heart. He just gets so passionate about his Fantasy Football :) Love him!

Keri also finished another home project inspired by the shutters that she previously restored. She turned a cd crate into a fake window box to sit right below the shutters in our kitchen. This project has been in the works for a couple of months and we are both quite happy with the finished product. Check out the pics.

We want to say congrats to our recent friends who have had their first babies - Brad & Sharee in Spokane with the little baby girl, Finley Rae, and then Dawn & Steve Hoem in Irvine with their little baby boy, Jensen. We are so happy for both of them and can't wait to see them in person!

We hope you all have a wonderful week!

- KerMatt

KerMatt springing for the Masters

As many of you probably already know, Matt has been accepted into the Master's program (MSIS or Master of Science in Information Systems) at the University of Utah. He also found out on Friday that he will receive Residency Status, which means that we will save on tuition BIG TIME! Now the third, and final step, of this piece is to find out  if we will be receiving any financial aid which may change our opinions on actually entering the program.

We are so excited for Matt and looking forward to this next year and the increased knowledge Matt will receive - even if it does mean another winter here in Utah. Although if it is as mild as last winter was, we will be just fine :)

Matt begins classes in just one week! And he will finish anytime between May 2011 and August 2011. He begins with a program orientation this Friday and a barbecue for both of us to attend on Saturday.

Keri is excited to have Matt going to school closer to her work now so she can see him more - maybe even have lunch together sometimes. She has been busy as usual getting ready for her Heart Walk coming up in just 5 weeks. Thanks to some great company donations, she was able to reach her fiscal year goals for the first time since she started with American Heart and she is looking forward to potentially reaching her event goal of raising $175k as well.

Also continuing with the exciting news, Keri has been invited to sing in a special Draper/Sandy Regional Choir for the afternoon session of General Conference in October. She will be having special practice sessions for the next 6 Sundays and looking forward to this experience. Though she does not own a black skirt well below her knees or a non-shiny earring so she'll have to work on that one a little.

Overall KerMatt has much to celebrate!

Little Red Riding Hood

On June 5th, I rode in the "Little Red Riding Hood" along with 2 of my co-workers. Rachel did the 58-miler with me and for this being her first time she sure had no problem keeping up. And then Jen (also a new rider) did the 33 miler with her mother-in-law. 

It was a blast and probably the best organized bike ride I've ever done. We started in Lewiston, UT, which is just a couple miles outside of Logan and we rode throughout the farm country that is Northern Utah. It felt good to be back on my bike doing a long ride again, especially at the turn off for the 80-milers and 100-milers knowing that wasn't me. Although I felt like weak sauce for not being them since I know that I can do those but all in all I was less sore, I saved a couple hours of riding and for Rachel's first experience this was probably way more enjoyable than a full century.


I  have never seen so much food at a ride as this one. Not only did they have every snack you could think of about every 15 miles and then Subway sandwiches for lunch but at the finish line they had all of this plus more! When we rode through the finish, we were handed a little cheap tiara (obviously this was a women only ride) and a strawberry daiquiri. Then you walk further and they had a whole trough of Creamies (best popsicles ever!). They had a whole chocolate fountain tent complete with tables full of things to dip. There was another large tent with an extensive  nacho/salsa bar and a candy table with little containers to put your candy in.


It was hard not to eat back all of those calories that I had just rode off! Seriously, I have no self control for this stuff, especially when Creamies are involved.


The best part was when Rachel and I stopped at the Finish and asked some ladies to take our picture with our bikes. I was a little tired obviously and I leaned towards Rachel for the pic, forgetting that I was still clipped into my bike. And down I went, still attached to my bike :) Oh the sillyhead.

McGhee Family Reunion - pics

We finally had the chance to upload pics from our recent McGhee Family Reunion that took place in May. Below are pics that highlight our adventures together in Park City:

2010 McGhee Family Picture

KerMatt pic - We took the family pic opportunity to document our first year of being married & still smiling :)

Though the weather this weekend was not that great, we spent a lot of time playing together in the pool

With so many little kids, we tried to keep them busy with all sorts of projects. You can see how serious Matt and I took our coloring :) Kathy & Bekah were fantastic about thinking of so many activities to keep the kids entertained.

As you can see, bead animals became quite the project for whole fam.What we also didn't document was Johana teaching Bekah and I how to make earrings as well. 

Speaking of a hit, the newest McGhee addition, baby Alicia, was very popular with all. With all that hair and those huge eyes, who wouldn't want to hold this little bundle of joy. Congrats to Bekah & Skyler!

One of the nights we sent the boys out bowling and threw a little princess party for the girls, complete with makeovers, nail painting and even a parade around the hotel we were staying at.

But no matter what we planned, nothing could stop us all from picking on each other and horsing around. Matt usually being the catalyst for this.

Good times at the park, except when I got stuck pushing both Carys & Calay on the swings simultaneously. My arms were sore for hours afterwards :) But I just couldn't resist those little laughs and shouts of "faster!"

Matt and I introduced the McGhees to the wonderful game of "Minute To Win It". Oh the silliness and laughter this provided and in fact, we had to shut it down pretty quickly when we discovered that our raucousness was going to wake the sleeping children.