"Sooper Bole"

Sunday morning we woke up to attend our local LifeChurch. Craig started a new series titled, "Once Upon a Marriage" and it is excellent.

http://www.lifechurch.tv/message-archive/watch/once-upon-a-marriage/1

After feeding our spirits for an hour or so, we decided we better feed our bodies as well. So, we met one of my best friends with her husband at a sandwich shop down the street. One heated argument too many, we left the restaurant with me not on speaking terms with Mr. Ican'tthinkofanametosayhere. Then, he started working on the house as soon as we got back.

The neighbor text me to ask about a basket she let me borrow to take some Scentsy to my co-workers. I went out to my car and realized I had left it up at work/school. She noticed me outside and invited me in to see the girls' latest toy.

There, in the middle of their doorway, sat a large air hockey table. Apparently they had gotten a killer deal on it and were keeping it around until the neighborhood garage sale day. Score. It was so much fun to play, and it reminded me of those long days at the roller skating rink in elementary school. The girls were playing until the big game came on that day. They had created a sign for one of the friends-that-was-a-boy that said, "Sooper Bole 2010"...I love kids.

Mr. Idon'tlikenottalkingtoyou asked me what I was doing as I stepped outside, and I went back into the house talking like normal. All of a sudden I realized a familiar look of frustration come across his face. Then, he went on to tell me that he had broke the neighbor's impact drill.

You see, just before Christmas his 3yr old drill burnt up while he was hanging some drywall. He borrowed his dad's for a while until he needed it for his own work. Then, he had to borrow the neighbor's impact drill in order to successfully hang wood, drywall, and wire on the brick fireplace facade prior to our stacked stone and mantel going up.

Bad day. The chuck busted on the neighbor's drill, and we were forced to visit our favorite Saturday place...on Sunday.

As soon as Steve saw us coming in (with our two puppies this time) he knew something was up. "It's Sunday. Y'all aren't supposed to be here." We told him about the drill, and we walked to the nearby aisle to pick out a replacement.

$59.99+tax= money we didn't want to spend...FLUSH*

We drove over to his parents' house to see everyone before heading over to my Momma and Daddy's for the Super Bowl and dinner.

Mexican food, half-funny commercials, and my family...it turned out to be a good day after all.

To end it all, I had my mom take a couple of pictures to remember our first...2nd Super Bowl together. The first of many years together.

We're Regulars

Since our anniversary fell in the middle of the week and we both had to work, we didn't get a chance to celebrate together. Mr. Icanbeprettysweet surprised me by driving us downtown to eat at Cattleman's. I had never been to the historical stockyards in OKC, and he took me out for lunch/dinner that afternoon. It was SO good.

Now, I won't lie. It wasn't the BEST steak I've ever had. The Chamberlain's we went to in Dallas definitely gave them competition. However, it was excellent. I loved their homemade croutons and the house dressing. I'm not really big on salads, but I finished the whole thing...and my entire filet.

Since I hadn't had the chance to see that area, we decided to check out some of the adorable western shops in the area. I found some of the cutest cowgirl boots (too bad my teensy feet were swallowed by the smallest sizes they came in ). After looking at some of the boutiques closeby, we decided to venture to my parents' house.

We weren't there long since they hadn't had a chance to eat yet. Once we left, we headed out to get some things for the house.

After weeks of making Lowe's our weekend stomping grounds, we are officially regulars. That's right...they know us by name (well...at least by our faces). Mr. We'realmostfinishedwiththefireplace pulled into our reserved parking place and we walked in the same doors we always do. As soon as we stepped inside, Steve and Laura were welcoming us back and asking how the house was coming along. We picked up the essential supplies to stone the fireplace and headed to the checkout.

"Well Hello strangers."

Did I mention he takes after his parents? Yeah, they're regulars at Lowe's too. So much so, that we ran into them with a list a mile long of things they had been researching all afternoon for their new house. We talked for a while and finally headed out.

Starbuck's...ymmm.

Mr. Whitechocolatemocha pulled into the drive-thru to order his usual. When they told us they didn't have any peppermint brownies left, I decided a double-chocolate brownie would do. Strike-two. They were out of all the brownies. That's when Mr. I'mnotgoingtoletdownmygirl playfully told the cashier that they were letting us down tonight. When we pulled around, the barista reached out and handed the venti mocha and told us it was on them tonight. We were just kidding! However, they wouldn't take our money. So, we drove away enjoying our little cup of warm, heavenly goodness...for free.

Thank you Lowe's associates that have enough kindness in your hearts to remember us and ask us about our lives. You are why we don't shop at Home Depot.

And thank YOU, Starbuck's barista that always gets our order right and manages to put up with my sensitive taste-buds and give me the child's temperature when I order my hot chocolate. You make a $3 cup of coffee worth it.

There are still some good people out there, and I'm very blessed to have come across them.

Dear John,

I have a confession.

I have a slight obsession with Nicholas Sparks books.

With this being said, my sister and I planned for a girls' night out to see the premiere of Dear John in theaters. As soon as I finished up at my internship, I headed over to my Momma and Daddy's to see my niece. After a while, my sister was on her way home so I hopped in the car to meet her at her house. After an hour of indecisive clothes-changing, she was ready to go (Love you sis!) We stopped at the closest gas station before braving the traffic near downtown.

Plan A)

Drive to Warren.

Pick up tickets.

Watch Dear John and cry in the balcony while eating dinner.

SOLD OUT

Plan B)

Pick up tickets for a later showing.

Drive to eat dinner.

Kill time at a nearby mall.

Drive back to Warren.

Watch Dear John and cry our eyes out.

SOLD OUT

Plan C)

Drive to Harkin's downtown.

Pick up any available ticket for the earliest showing of our movie.

Stand in line.

Watch Dear John and cry until we can't open our eyes anymore.

SOLD OUT

Plan D)

Make reservations to The Melting Pot over the phone.

Drive downtown to Harkin's.

Pick up tickets for a later showing.

Eat dinner and kill a couple of hours.

Watch Dear John and cry audibly for the entire theater to hear and until we can't open our eyes.

NO RESERVATIONS..BUT...We got the TICKETS!

Plan E)

Pay for parking.

Walk indecisively across town until we find a suitable location for dinner.

Stop at a local Italian restaurant.

Eat so much we can't move anymore.

Realize we have two hours to kill after dinner.

Sit and listen to each other make imitating comments from one of our latest Pixar movies.

Walk to the car.

Drive to Harkin's.

Stop at a Starbuck's.

Make ourselves completely miserable from drinking coffee after having a huge meal.

Stand in line for 45minutes.

Take our seats in the largest theater...middle of the middle.

Wait patiently.

Watch Dear John and excessively cry using a half a roll of toilet paper from the ladies' restroom.

It was wonderful

You're Hot Then You're Cold...brrr...

Friday+snowday=Good times

That morning, we discovered the Mr. Iworkataplacethatdoesn'tcareaboutmywell-being had to work. After trying (and re-trying) to light a fire with the formerly sleet-covered firewood, I decided I was going to head over to my parents' house while he was at work in case the electricity went out on us. We made it to the end of the street, around the corner, out of the neighborhood...

Once at the closest intersection, he made a quick phonecall to a co-worker to see if they were going to work. His words were somewhere along the lines of, "It's not worth my wife and kids losing me to get out on the roads for one day." Therefore, we turned the truck around and headed back to the neighborhood. While driving, we received a call from the neighbors that we were invited to a neighbors' dinner party. We picked up a double-batch of brownie mix for the party and a movie at the closest 7-11 before going back to the house.

I cleaned house, did laundry, played with the puppies, and baked the brownies while Mr. I'mdeterminedtogetsomethingfinishedonthishouse was done hanging some drywall over the top of our fireplace. Then, we headed across the street to meet everyone.

Altogether, there ended up being about 11 neighbors over while we ate homemade lasagna, salad, garlic bread, and brownies. After dinner, the kiddos slipped into the living room for a movie while we the adults played Barbie Uno, Uno Attack, and talked about "big-people stuff". When the movie was finished, we turned on the Wii and put in "Just Dance".

I don't think I've ever had so much fun dancing with friends. Talk about blackmail-worthy, we were all getting into it as we followed the movements on the screen. Then, we added karaoke to each of the following songs...and much more!

-Pump the jam
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbuhhYJTAl8&NR=1&feature=fvwp
-Can't touch this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zdez7o-op4&feature=channel
-Eye of the tiger
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w93Ozzl3Vx8&feature=channel
-Girls just wanna have fun
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvfVucZGM7Q&feature=channel
-Cotton eyed joe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqAFAXanXtY&feature=channel
-Ring my bell
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7I_N-Oizxc&feature=channel
-Hot n cold
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ta8BfGekGeA

Hours later, we finally called it a night, and headed out into the cold...brrr.

Winter Nights

Thursday morning I got up and around to head off to class for the morning. As soon as I got to my car, I realized the ice had already encased one side. Negative. Then, the battle played out in my mind like this:

1. I wait for my car to de-ice, hop in, drive on the soon-to-be-very-slick roads, get to class, go to one class for the day, turn around as the ice hits and when school is closed, possibly get in a wreck...

OR

2. Call-in, cuddle up in my pajamas, fix a warm breakfast, watch the ice and snow from a comfy/cozy/warm home, and enjoy a few extra hours without the risk of life-threatening roads.

Yep...no brainer.

So, I curled back into bed and waited until my mental alarm clock told me to get up.

Then, Mr. Alwaysthinkingofme decided to drive to our local convenience store to pick up what was left of the bundles of firewood in case the electricity went out and left me without heat. While we were there, we grabbed a movie to prepare for my boring night and headed back to the house.

Mr. Ihavetogotoworktomakealiving decided to brave the roads and started his pickup. After an hour of scraping snow and ice he headed off to work. I decided to walk over to the neighbor's house. A few minutes into the nail-painting of a five and seven year old, the phone rang. Mr. I'mheadedhomebecausemymeaniebossdidn'tcallandletmeknowthatworkwasclosedtoday had successfully made it to the parking lot (an hour later) and realized the entire plant had shut down. He, being the youngest at this job, was the only one to not receive a personal phonecall to let him know this valuable information.

I wrapped up the pretty nails and decided to let the girls come over and bake some sugar cookies. I forgot how much fun that age is. We made ginormous snowman cookies and shaped while we started a movie and popped some warm popcorn. Too bad we were out of sprinkles...that's just colored sugar, right? Wrong. After borrowing some sugar and tubes of food coloring to make our very own sprinkles. *drip, drip

Note to self: Gel food coloring does NOT mix with sugar...and adding water...makes sugar slush.

Well, no one said experiments have to turn out successful. Instead, we took water bottles with colored water outside to draw in the snow (which was really just sleet at this point). As one of the girls pointed out the similarity to snowcones, the idea sparked in their fun-filled minds and they decided we should make snowcones out of the ice. I'm not one to hinder an educational experience, so I went along with it. We used blue and red food coloring to make purple ice, and added in some strawberry flavoring. Then, we ate it.

Yes, I ate it (and I made Mr. Tryitforthegirls eat it too).

After the movie and experimental festivities were complete, I walked the girls back over the their house and decided it was time to enjoy a much-needed evening in.

But the Fire is so Delightful...

So, progress on the new house is coming along...slowly, but surely. Over the past few months we have torn out all the flooring, scraped "popcorn" ceilings, ripped out cabinets, rewired some electrical work, pulled off wood paneling and baseboards, taken down wood beams, destroyed a bookshelf, stripped wallpaper, worked on plumbing, updated appliances, and replaced some locks/doors.

After our first blizzard together (and no heat) we decided we needed a fireplace...just in case. Not knowing whether the fireplace insert we had was safe to use, we had a good neighbor come over and help pull the insert out of the wall. Ironically enough, there was a large arch sculpted in the brick behind the box that had been cut out into in order to fit the insert. We pulled out each of the 300+ bricks out of the existing hearth and saved them for later use. After an old friend came over and fixed our brickwork, we decided to start looking for fireplace ideas.

After much thought and planning, we both fell in love with the idea of a stacked stone fireplace with an oversized wooden mantel. This is our inspiration:

With the exception of the white woodwork, we have mimicked this fireplace in our idea book. While stone-searching, we came across a beautiful color called "alderwood" and placed the order this last Saturday. To celebrate one of our first final decisions together, we grabbed some yummy chocolate donuts and headed over to our weekend stopping place...Lowe's.

After much pacing and picking out what we needed, we hauled two sheets of plywood, 8 concrete cinder blocks, 600lbs. of concrete mix, a mailbox, and some nails and bits. Then, we managed to pull out an old metal mailbox and dig a 25"x25"x14" square hole for a concrete base to our new mailbox. (I use the word "we" loosely...mainly, my Mr. Handyman did all the heavy-work while I took pictures and watched the puppies.) A friend of his is going to make us a matching mailbox with all of the great bricks we saved in the process of taking out the hearth.

As for Sunday, we woke up first thing and headed off to church. There was a wonderful sermon on Margin and making a lifestyle change with our spiritual mentality and finances. Wow.

We grabbed a quick bite to eat at our local IHOP and made use of my coupon-clipping skills. Then, straight to the house to get to work. I started on my studies while Mr. I'llgetrightonthat changed and started measuring the existing fireplace. He cut the plywood to size and started to drill into the concrete. No go. He spent a good hour trying to make the basic drill and bit he had work. Finally, we asked a neighbor for a hammer drill. Oh my goodness! It took seconds (literally) to drill a hole. A little while later, all 15holes were drilled into the wood and brick for the lefthand side.

After I finished my classwork, I attempted to lend a helping hand on the fireplace work. As hard as I tried, I didn't feel I served as much help. Shortly afterwards, I fell asleep on the nearby couch.

Hours later, I awoke to Mr. I'msohungryIcouldeatahorse asking me to get up and around so we could get dinner. We met my parents at the pizza place and went back to their house for our weekend excitement with the fam. Before we knew it, time had passed and I was aware of the need to wake up at 6:30am the next morning for work. Bum deal.

Yet again, a weekend flew by.

BUT, this time next week...we'll be finishing up with a brand new fireplace to cuddle up to for our anniversary.

No...Year, Happy No Year

Being the indecisive couple we are, Mr. Idon'tknowwhatwecoulddo and I discussed for days what we were going to do to celebrate the new year. We finally decided we would grab dinner at our favorite place and get back to watch movies until midnight.

It wasn't until morning had rolled around on the day of New Year's Eve that Mr. Fullofsurprises informed me that I needed to be ready around 6 o'clock that evening to go. Knowing me, I asked him what we were going to do. He replied, "McDonald's has a special going on that if you dress up you get free chicken nuggets."

-So...can I wear nice jeans and boots? Or...do I need to wear a dress?

"A dress."

-Well, are boots okay? Do I need to wear high heels?

"Not boots, that's how you get the free shake."

I giggled and asked him what he had to wear since he couldn't wear heels.

"A suit."

What in the world? A suit? It was too cold outside for me to wear my little-black dress. After tearing through all of my dresses, I found it in my best interest to go ahead and hit some of my favorite stores within the upcoming hours. I threw on some comfy clothes and was out the door.

First store...no luck.

Second store...(As I'm in the dressing room) *Ring, ring*

'Yes?

"Have you found anything yet?"

-No. I'm trying on a few right now.

"Just make sure it's nice, nice, nice...and let me know what you find so I know what color suit to wear."

Moving on then...third store...two dresses to try on. (Hope for the best.)
Ding, ding, ding...we have a winner!

I found a black satin dress with pleated details on the skirt and side-pockets, plunge neck-line, and belted waistband. On sale! It fit perfectly!

I called Mr. Wonderful to let him know I had found a black dress and was on my way. After a LONG day of waiting, I finally got ready.

I rolled my hair in my hot roller, swept some bangs to the side, applied my makeup, teased my hair and slipped in my favorite bump-it :D, and added some darling new pins for the final touch.
Zzzzip. Dress...check. Jewelry...check. Pink 4 1/2" high heels...check, check.

I was officially ready to go (to McDonald's, right?)

Mr. Handsome looked perfect in that pin-striped suit of his. As we loaded into the pick-up truck, we passed the local McDonald's on the corner. Then, we pulled to a stop in front of one of his old friend's house.

Brrr...it was freezing outside! Literally. Ice was still adorning the local streets, and I could see my breath as we walked to the front doorstep.

Chocolate fondue...ymmm. Mr. WearesonotgoingtoMcDonald'stonight introduced me to all of his old friends as we sat and enjoyed snacks until everyone arrived.

Reservations at 8o'clock. We were going to the Petroleum Club downtown for dinner and fireworks.

-Smoked salmon, chilled shrimp, portobello mushroom, and scallion
-Fresh spinach salad
-Filet mignon with carrots and celery in burgundy sauce
-Chocolate pyramid mousse with truffles and fresh fruit

What a blast! We sat around and enjoyed each other's company and talked. The food was amazing! We listened to a live band and danced when we could. Hours later, the countdown began.

5
4
3
2

And, I started off a New Year with a sweet kiss, a sip of champagne, a gorgeous view of downtown, and a front row seat for the local fireworks.

Goodnight 2009. Thank you for the bittersweet ending to an old dream, the ability to move forward with my life, a happy beginning with someone I love, and all of the many, many precious memories we've shared together over the year. I am blessed.