Delightful Ramblings

Gonna try not to embarrass Spencer too much...

2011-08-24T16:38:00.000-05:00

So tonight I'm going to the Mack Brown Women's Clinic at UT. We've been trying the last four years to get me tickets, but they always sell-out right away. This year I happened to remember that it was happening soon and googled to see when it would take place. The tickets had gone on sale the day before, so I was sure it would be sold out. I was going to register a friend and myself, but it only let me do one and I kid you not, I literally got the last spot. That's right, I want to go badly enough that I'm willing to go alone.

Basically this thing was started to help get women more excited about the game and to learn more of the rules. I thought it would be great if I came up with some questions and excitedly told Spencer about my first idea. He looked at me like a deer in headlights and begged me not to ask that question in person. Ever since he keeps asking me if I have any questions about football that I might want to ask him in hopes that I don't embarrass him - HA! These include...

What should I be looking at besides the Quarterback?
Do you have a team Mom? If not, can I do it? If so, can I still please bake cookies for the team?
How do you make a fake-out work so well? I totally lose the ball sometimes...

OK... so I guess I can only think of 3 questions that I've come up with at this point that are kinda embarrassing. And don't worry, I won't be asking any of these questions. Honestly, I doubt I'll have the chance to ask anything at all. And me and my pregnant self are not going to get there before the doors open because this girl won't stand in the heat. No really... last night I had to stand in the house with the garage door open while Spencer was taking some measurements of the spot we're going to put an extra refrigerator so we could talk about it. I seriously couldn't handle standing in the heat. It's getting bad. So since I'm going to be showing up right as the doors open, I doubt I'll get a great seat. But that's OK, I really don't mind. It's going to be super fun and hopefully I'll learn a thing or two so I don't cheer at the wrong time while watching the game. Yes, that still occasionally happens, but way less than it used to.

And yes, this post was actually written by me. Aliens have not taken over my body and I actually like and watch football... well, mostly just the Longhorns and Colt McCoy. You can all thank me for hell now being frozen over.

So much to catch up on...

2011-08-19T13:08:00.000-05:00

Here's what's been happening in our world as of late...

* I think most everyone who reads this blog is friends with me on Facebook, so this is old news, but we're having a GIRL! To say I was surprised would be an understatement. I was so convinced it was a boy, but nope, it's a girl! Spencer's world is going to be rocked, but I totally know what to do with a girl! :-) I'm very excited for all the bows. Not just any bows, I'm more of a traditionalist when it comes to bows and ribbons. I'm not a big fan of the headbands, mesh things and large flowers.... but I LOVE the classic ribbons that I remember wearing as a little girl. So far I've been able to refrain myself from buying clothing and such, after all... that's what the grandparents and Aunt are for!

* We've made all kinds of decisions in the last month
that took me about my entire pregnancy to make:

- We picked out a stroller! No small feat I'll tell you. Holy cow there is so much crap out there when it comes to babies and kids. And of course everyone has an opinion on what you HAVE to buy. We wanted a stroller that would work the longest for everything we might need and landed on the Bumbleride Indie. Since I don't jog or go hiking on trails on a regular basis now, I figured I probably won't be starting with the new baby. So I felt like a Bob was a little more than we needed. Plus we'll be taking this sucker when we travel so I wanted something a little more slender. So there we go, decision made!

- We also ordered our crib. I like the wall color we already have in the nursery and didn't want to change it, but that room reads a little dark so I wanted to go with white furniture. (BTW... picture to the right is one I found online, it's not our nursery) Now to decide on the bedding. I want to find something that is pink and orange, but am SUPER picky. I'm not into all the animals and overly cutesy stuff that I've seen in stores. I found some stuff that I love at Layla Grace and added it to my pinterest and everything. Then I looked at the price. $400 for a skirt, bumper and crib sheet. What the what???? I don't think so. That's just ridiculous. So I think I'm going to have some bedding made which means I now need to find some good fabric stores and make a decision there. Have I mentioned that making decisions isn't my strong suit when it comes to this kind of thing? Poor Spencer.

- We also braved Ikea on a Saturday afternoon and got a dresser for the nursery. I wasn't finding anything I liked on Craigslist that was white and was completely unwilling to spend much money on a kid's dresser (that will double as the changing table), so Ikea it is. We even put it together in about 2 hours without fighting... I think our marriage will stand the test of time.

- As we made all these decisions, we also registered. Ummm... so not as fun as registering for wedding stuff. I've babysat a ton over the years, but I've never had a child of my own and considering I don't know what she'll like, I spent much of the time staring at the aisles full of choices just guessing. My favorite was when the worker at Buy Buy Baby (who looked to be like 16 years old) very seriously gave us this massive list of items we HAD to have as a minimum to bring the baby home. Uh, I'm pretty sure I'll be able to take care of my baby even if we don't have a wipe warmer. Oh yeah, and we definitely didn't register for the whirlpool baby bath. I don't think so.

So that's mostly what's going on for us. Just trying to enjoy our weekends of sleeping in, going to movies whenever we want and getting stuff prepped as well. Oh, and this HEAT! Oh my goodness, I officially quit summer this week, but apparently that doesn't make the 100+ degree weather go away. Man, it's been brutal. But hey, if I can survive being pregnant during the hottest summer in Texas on record, than I can survive anything. Maybe. :-)

Boy or Girl?

2011-06-21T13:52:00.001-05:00

Thursday's the big day... we find out what this little baby is going to be. Of course that's provided the baby cooperates.

So... will our baby be wearing this:

Or this?

Have any guesses? I feel like it's a boy and Spencer thinks it's a girl. One of us will be right! :-)

Can you guess which role I play in my marriage?

2011-06-15T16:59:00.000-05:00

What the what???

2011-06-09T21:16:00.000-05:00

Umm... I'm pretty sure our baby will not need a whirlpool tub. Just a guess.

One of the most overwhelming places EVER

2011-06-07T14:44:00.001-05:00

We've now been into Buy, Buy Baby and Babies R Us once. Just wanted to scope things out and see what items will be taking over our house for the next couple of years. Buy, Buy Baby is the Bed, Bath and Beyond version of baby stores. Let me just say I like it WAY more than Babies R US. It's cleaner, seems to have a wider and better selection and was overall a more pleasant experience.

But one thing was the same at both stores... I nearly had a panic attack in the stroller/car seat section. Seriously, one of the most overwhelming places ever. There are so many options. And it's not like you can just pick the one that's the prettiest. Nope, you have to think about safety, tires, cup holders, handles, how well it collapses, etc... And forget about being able to figure out how to work the thing on your own. It took us a good 5 minutes to figure out how to get one of the car seats out of it's base.

Even my husband who is a research genius is overwhelmed by the whole thing. After our first trip to this section, I looked at him and said "You're just going to have to research all this because I'm completely overwhelmed. I have to get out of here." Well, he started researching but found that everything is clearly influenced by the manufacturers and everyone has a different opinion. Here's the system we like the best thus far:

It's a Baby Trend and the things we liked? The handle is adjustable and it has that triangle thing on the car seat that will make carrying the thing a bit easier. Side note: I'm going to the gym today and telling my trainer that we seriously need to work on my upper body strength. The car seat alone seemed kinda heavy. I think I'm in trouble.

But seeing as I've never needed a stroller before, I don't know what the heck I need or want. So I'm asking all you Moms what you needed/wanted in your stroller. Let me clarify a few things: I am not a runner and don't have any plans to become one, but I would like to go on walks. I'm guessing we'll mostly be using the stroller when shopping, traveling, and going other places where you'll want to push the baby instead of carry it. And I already carry a big purse, so I'm guessing between me and the baby we're going to need something that will hold a good size bag.

So... what should I look for in a stroller? In other words, HELP!!!!!

Let the hormones begin

2011-06-03T11:07:00.000-05:00

3/25/2011

Had my first full-on pregnancy meltdown last night. We were happily watching my favorite show, The Office, and it got to the end where Michael proposed to Holly. That of course made me teary and then it hit me that Steve Carrell will be leaving the show. We're talking full-on heaving, snot-filled sobbing. Meanwhile Spencer is laughing hysterically and trying to comfort me all at the same time. I literally told him that I don't want to live in a world where "that's what she said" isn't around anymore. He promised we would keep it going.

Looking at the clip today I don't have nearly the reaction as I did last night. But hey, Spencer got a good story out of it. He said it's like every movie and tv show about pregnant women that he's ever seen. Glad I'm not disappointing him.

**UPDATE** Since I originally wrote this post, there have been many hormonal break-downs. I cried saying goodbye to one of my doctors who released me, sobbed during the last two Michael Scott episodes of The Office, and have cried during several other insignificant tv shows, movies and commercials. Doesn't take much to get the waterworks going these days. Poor Spencer. He's routinely asking me if I'm crying. :-)

Morning sickness is weird

2011-05-31T21:15:00.000-05:00

3/20/2011

I'll be 5 weeks tomorrow, so who knows if my "morning sickness" is going to get worse, but for now it's mid-day sickness. I feel great when I wake up which is a HUGE blessing. Makes it a lot easier to get up and going each day. Then around 10:30 the heartburn and nausea begins and I feel like I'm hitting a wall and am so tired. But then around 3:30 I start feeling normal again which is something I'm also thankful for. I'm exhausted by the end of the day, but I usually feel better. It's just so weird feeling sick for a part of the day and then have it go away (for the most part).

Today I took a nap and here's Gucci after Spencer scolded him for scratching on our bedroom door trying to find me:

A grainy pic, but so funny. Little does he know how rocked his world is going to be come November!

**UPDATE** The whole feeling great in the morning did NOT last. My "morning" sickness has been super inconsistent. Everything from being really sick all day and throwing up, to only small portions of the afternoon or evening. Never know what what the next day (or hour) will bring. I'm 15 weeks now and it seems like maybe I'm starting to feel better, but I'm not celebrating quite yet. Praying for an energetic 2nd trimester so I can start tackling some of those nesting projects I want to get to around the house!

WE'RE HAVING A BABY!!!!!!!!

2011-05-31T11:45:00.000-05:00

March 17, 2011

I cannot even believe this is happening! When you finally read this post, I will actually be in my second trimester. But since this is my first pregnancy and we found out so early, we're not making the "public" declaration until now. I find myself wanting to tell everyone. If you know me, you know I like to talk and I like to share what's going on in my life and hear what's going on for others. So you can only imagine how hard it is to not stop strangers and tell them that I'm pregnant. I mean, I'd be excited if some random person told me something like that. But I digress...

We've been trying to get pregnant for awhile and turned to an amazing fertility specialist last October to begin treatments. I ended up having surgery in January to roto-rooter out some endometriosis and other fun things that were going on. Basically nothing was as it should be... kinda makes sense that I couldn't get pregnant! After the surgery, we decided to try just 2-3 rounds of IUI before moving onto adoption. A little less than two weeks after the IUI, I had convinced myself that it hadn't worked. In fact, I spent several hours that Saturday afternoon crying. Spencer came home from SXSW to find me laying on the bed in my pink robe, a role of toilet paper by my side being used as tissues while watching the Notebook.

I'll let that image sink in.

Quite the sight I tell you. Well, the next morning I decided to take another home pregnancy test. As I was waiting and guessing if 3 minutes had past, I thought I saw a faint second line on my cheap dollar store test. I was sure I was seeing things, but decided to try a digital test. As I waited, I kept telling myself that it was going to be negative. And then Pregnant popped on the screen. (I should back up the story and add that the night before after my meltdown, I was in our guest room putting the duvet cover back on in preparation for a house guest. We had the window cracked and I swore that I heard someone whisper "hello Sarah." That send me screaming into the kitchen yelling that I heard a voice. Spencer went to investigate, saw that it was nothing and came back in the house, gave me a hug and told me I should take some Tylenol PM and go to bed. HA!) After seeing the positive test, I ran out the door much like I had the night before yelling "Oh my gosh, I'm pregnant!" over and over again. At first Spencer thought I had just heard something again. Makes me laugh just thinking about it.

We took two more tests that morning to just to be sure and were SO excited. I had my blood drawn the next morning and once that was confirmed we were really over the moon. The doctor has been watching me closely and so far, so good. My levels have been climbing and everything looks good. I actually started having some heartburn almost immediately after the IUI, but thought there couldn't be a correlation. It's still early, so I'm still feeling pretty good. I'm really tired and seem to have morning sickness in the afternoon. Just heartburn and some light nausea, nothing too bad. I've had a bad stomach for so long, I have a pretty high tolerance for that kind of thing. But if I start throwing up all the time, I may change my tune.

It is not lost on us how incredibly blessed and fortunate that this worked so quickly for us. Fertility is a painful experience and there are many amazing couples who have been through so much more than us. I'm grateful for every amount of discomfort that indicates the baby is growing and hope that I keep that perspective as the months (and symptoms!) go on.

I just bought this swimsuit for Kate's new baby girl and can't wait to start shopping for clothes for our baby!:

(When I showed Spencer the picture of this swimsuit that I had ordered for baby Nora, he promptly asked me why I had bought a costume for a baby. HA! I've got a lot to teach him about babies and clothes. :-))

Gonna be a busy week!

2010-11-22T10:59:00.000-06:00

I'm half posting this to keep me accountable to work instead of watching a movie or reading - HA! Ready or not, here I go!

Monday
* Deep clean both bathrooms
* Vacuum and clean baseboards
* Clean all doors in the interior of the house (something that's needed to be done since moving in, just haven't taken the time to do so)
* Touch-up paint? (Not sure I'll have time or energy to do this today)

Tuesday
* Laundry (guest sheets and towels, kitchen towels)
* Dust
* Iron curtains that were washed and hung to dry on Monday
* Clean all floors (a serious proposition with our hardwoods)
* Finish buying Christmas presents for the in-laws (we're doing our Christmas this weekend since we'll be in Seattle for the holiday)

Wednesday
* Bake - pumpkin cheesecake, pumpkin bread and Kentucky derby pie. I'll try to post pics and recipes when I'm finished.
* Wrap presents

OK... I better get off of here and actually start working on this. Happy Thanksgiving week everyone!

Big Change

2010-11-01T10:09:00.000-05:00

Well, three years after getting married, moving to Austin and almost immediately starting to work for our church, my last day was on Friday. Since everything you put on the internet is a permanent record, I'm not going to go into the details of why I quit. But I will say that it was most definitely time and we really felt like this was the right move for lots of reasons.

Tomorrow I start my new job and I'm SO excited. I'm going to work for a software company doing HR staffing coordination. When I worked at KPMG, I loved the recruiting aspect and often thought I would love to do that for a company. I got connected with this job through a former co-worker and low and behold, I'll be working with the recruiting team. They're a growing company that is going to be doing a ton of hiring which means if I do well, I should have lots of opportunity for growth. I'm very thankful for God's provision and perfect timing in bringing this role right now. I'll definitely miss all my coworkers at the church, but am super excited for something new.

A lot of what I've been thinking about and processing the last couple of years has been in relation to my job and I just haven't felt it was appropriate to talk about it on here. I'm hoping with this change that means I'll be blogging more, but that remains to be seen.

On the list today before I start the job? Work-out, costco, grocery store and cook dinner. I better get going. I'll leave you with a picture of Gucci waiting for more trick or treators last night. He couldn't understand why the kids weren't coming in to play. When they would come up to the door, he would jump up and look at them through the window with intense excitement. That dog is so ridiculously cute...

Weekend full of labor

2010-09-07T20:22:00.000-05:00

Was labor day intended for labor or for rest? Either way, we got a ton accomplished this last weekend. Saturday was our huge kick-off for Longhorn football. Celebrations included Spencer smoking a brisket for 14 hours overnight. Ummm yeah, it was awesome. That's what you could get if you come visit us in Austin! So much fun to be wearing burnt orange again and having football on the TV. Yes, I did say I'm excited about football. Without the actual fall weather down here, it's kind of my only cue that it's actually fall. That and the Yankee Autumn Leaves candle Bed Bath and Beyond sells this time of year and I burn incessantly.

But the really big news is our living room is 98% finished!!!! What a relief. I've been so stressed about it because I just didn't know where to start. I slowly started wrapping my head around it and fanatically looking at this blog. They are an adorable couple with an awesome house that they've totally re-done top to bottom. I'm in complete awe... I don't think I could ever undertake such a project. At any rate, here's what we did:

If you really want to see some before shots, I'll link them throughout... otherwise this post will be crazy long. And sorry for the quality of my "after" pictures. It was late and I really didn't care about taking the time to make sure they looked good. Hopefully Jeremy or Deena Leffel aren't reading this. The former owners had the living room really cluttered... it was beautiful, but really busy. And here's the living room a couple of months ago:

And here's our work as of 9pm last night:

So we moved the big leather chair in front of thewindows. It's crazy comfortable and that's a better viewing angle for the TV (and yes, that's football on the screen... the Boise/Virginia Tech game in fact).

We also got this awesome coffee table that is surprisingly made by Paula Dean. I never thought in a million years that I would buy Paula Dean furniture. But the best feature is it raises up which functionally is awesome (I've come a long way in picking things for functionality AND style).

And my very favorite part of the room is our new chair, throw, pillow and lamp shade... I love how it brings in some other colors and different lines. We got the chair, throw and pillow at West Elm (oh my goodness... how have I not shopped there before?!?!?!? Spencer says I became a different person after walking in. Everything was so beautiful and just feels like home. That's the thing about decorating, it's not about getting stuff, it's about creating an atmosphere. I love how this room finally feels homey.) We got the lamp shade at Target. Gucci was skeptical at first, but he's happily adapted. I still need something on this wall and to tweak the mantle, but that will come in time.

Lastly, my champ of a husband hung this shelving unit that we also got from West Elm. All of our furniture is dark and beautiful, but I just couldn't stand the thought of putting another dark, heavy piece in the room. We got the idea to put white shelves up during an Ikea trip awhile ago, but liked these from West Elm a lot better. No big shocker that I liked the thing that was more expensive. It's totally a curse. I'm fairly happy with the styling which I'm shocked about because normally it takes me forever to get the knick knacks right. But so far, so good...

I still want to get a white floor vase (that I have my eye on at West Elm) for in front of the mirror. And I'm not sure where to put Gucci's bed... it's not perfect anywhere, but so far I like this spot the best.

I also did some work in the kitchen, but frankly I feel like it's far from complete. Here's the view of the kitchen from the living room:

I'm not sure what design the kitchen was before we moved in, but here was the breakfast nook up until this past weekend:

I happy got rid of the straw valances, but I cannot for the life of me decide on curtains. I've narrowed it down (I think) to these two:

So here are my thoughts... I LOVE the pattern and the sheerness of the curtains on the left, but I'm afraid that with four panels along the three bay windows it will feel like too much and too dark. And too much of the same thing/look/style. You know what I mean? And I also love the circles curtain, but they are a much heavier curtain and I'm afraid it'll just be too much by the time I get all four panels up.

Thoughts? I seriously need some help on this one.

And then I mostly styled the hutch and the wall it's on, but I'm not sold on what I've got going on yet. I just can't get the right configuration for the top of the hutch. Again, thoughts would be appreciated:

So there you have it. Sorry for the really long post again, but I'm really pleased with our progress thus far. Now onto the bonus room and bedroom. But first we need to sell some furniture and save up some money.

Coveting...

2010-08-09T13:54:00.000-05:00

I love everything about this Crate and Barrel room... so beautiful! For my house, I really want the couch and the paintings for our bonus room that is right off the main hallway. I think the gray and yellow will be an awesome contrast to the beautiful red piece of furniture that's in the hallway just outside the french doors into the bonus room:

Sorry... not a great pic, but you get the idea.

Trouble with this vision? The sofa costs $1,600 and the paintings are $250 a pop. Why am I not surprised? I have a knack for picking the most expensive items in a store and falling head over heels for them... all before I see the price tag.

Sorry Spencer...

Flip this house...

2010-04-16T12:46:00.000-05:00

OK... so that's a little melodramatic, but we have made a ton of changes to the house and I finally took some pictures the other night before we had some friends over. I love having company... forces me to get the house clean. :-)

Now, before you look at the pictures I have a HUGE disclaimer: the house has not been decorated at all. We've painted and bought some new furniture, but there are still things that need to be replaced. Kate is going to come in July and help me actually decorate, but for now it works. And oh yeah, I ended up feeding my Pottery Barn addiction by getting a rug there. HA! But I love it, so I'm OK with it.

Lets start in my favorite room so far, our bedroom. I LOVE how it's turned out... even without it being decorated and being a little matchy-matchy with the furniture. I want to get some different bedside tables, lamps and such. But that will all come in time.

Master bedroom before:

Master mid-way through changes:

I love the drama of the brown and blue... I can't wait to get some more color and accesories in here. Goodness... looking at the before and after pictures makes me realize how much more there really is to do with adding pictures and such.

Living room before:

Living room mid-way through changes:

OK... so the Texas flag is NOT staying above the mantel. It's there right now because Spencer loves it and I'm giving him the chance to enjoy it until I find something else... HA!

And the throw pillows are from our old furniture that was a beige color. And the coffee table is going as well. So this definitely doesn't look how I want it to look yet, but at least you get an idea of the color and the couch and chair that we've purchased. You can't totally tell in these pictures, but we darkened the walls quite a bit with a color called Burnt Almond by Behr paint. Their paint is AWESOME btw.

And a picture of Gucci posing on the rug. He LOVES the rug and tries not to walk on the hard woods unless he has to. I'm not kidding. And he loves to pose for pictures. It's unbelievable.

I'm super happy with how the rug turned out. And I can't wait to actually decorate the room!

Kitchen before:

Kitchen mid-way through changes:

As you can see, we lightened the yellow. In fact, the color looks different in the breakfast nook area vs the kitchen itself. We also got rid of the light fixture above the table and added track lighting in the kitchen. It was one of those ugly box fluorescent light things. (Ignore the mess, we were cooking for the party)

And one of my favorite additions to the kitchen, we replaced the stained/messed up white porcelein sink with a new stainless steel one that matches the rest of the appliances:

Guest bedroom before:

I actually love the pink curtains in this room, but both Spencer and Kate vetoed me on keeping them. They said I have to have a little girl first before I can put something like that up. hahaha But the paint was not in good condition at all and the room really needed a fresh coat and new carpet.

Guest bedroom mid-way through changes:

Guest bathroom before:

For the life of me, I can't figure out why they would pick such a dark, muddy color for such a small space. I couldn't wait to change the color in the guest bath.

Guest bathroom mid-way through changes:

And on to the thing we're discovering needs the most work... the backyard. We've found out that the in-ground sprinkler system is messed up. When they originally moved the hot tub from the deck to the yard, they broke one of the pipes and rather than investigating it and fixing it, they just turned off that zone and another zone where the sprinkler heads were buried under 6 inches of packed dirt. So we have to get a specialist in here to figure out what's going on. And since the sprinkler heads were turned off in certain zones and they had two large dogs, the yard is completely jacked up. So we have to figure out what we'll be able to do to fix everything. And given the fact that neither one of my thumbs are green, I can use all the help I can get. But here's the progress we've made so far.

Backyard before:

Backyard mid-way through changes:

We built out the deck to and around the hot tub and moved the gazebo-thing over the hot tub. I can't believe how much bigger the deck looks. I can't wait to power wash it and stain it. For now we have to wait until we have the lawn figured out.

One of my favorite things about the house:

And one of Spencer's favorite things about the house:

So, that's what we've got so far. I can't wait to decorate and tie everything together. I just can't get over that this is our house. God is so good!

It's only a rug...

2010-03-31T14:11:00.002-05:00

How in the heck is it so difficult to find a rug? We have beautiful Brazilian cherry hardwood floors in our living area that were put in about 2-3 years ago and I LOVE them, but we desperately need a rug to help warm things up. And if nothing else, it'll help Gucci get on the couch better. I'm actually being serious here. He just can't get his footing on the slippery floor which means he can't get enough momentum to jump on the couch sometimes. What else can you expect from a dog named Gucci?

At any rate, I'm having such a hard time picking something out. We have a lot of earth tones in the room right now with the floors, our dark leather couch and chair and then the burnt orange curtains. I KNOW! The house came with burnt orange curtains, can you believe it?!?!? So perfect for Longhorn fans, it was meant to be! But now we need some color in the room. We're thinking a blue of some sort, but everything I find is either way too traditional:

OR way too modern:

I just can't find anything that has enough color that goes well with our design aesthetic. I did find a rug that I like at Pottery Barn, but there are two problems with it.

1. I'm trying to break my Pottery Barn addiction and make my house more "funky." Last time I was looking for a "funky" accessory, I googled "funky clocks" and then finally ended up buying one from Pottery Barn. HA!
2. I feel like it is too "earth-toned." It is lighter colors which is fabulous... here, I'll add some pictures. What do you all think?

Decisions, decisions... it's any wonder I made the decisions on the paint colors and fixtures as quickly as I did. When I was buying 10 different samples of paint at once, the guy did not believe me when I told him I was actually being quite decisive. He actually laughed. Little did he know that I returned about 8 different throw pillows before landing on the ones that I kept. I have a very patient husband.

I am so in love...

2010-03-24T16:29:00.000-05:00

I can't believe two posts ago I was writing about the house that we had a back-up offer on. Bad, bad blogger.

At any rate, we have purchased a new and even better house and we are so ecstatic. I just love everything about living in a house: driving into my garage, taking the trash to the curb (not the smelly dumpster at the apartment complex), letting Gucci out into the backyard, cleaning up the kitchen, having SPACE in the kitchen, grilling (one of the first purchases we've made since moving in), making my bed, organizing the closet, etc... It's all fabulous because it's all ours! I'm not just wasting my time, I'm protecting our investment! I just love it and feel so overwhelmed by how blessed we are.

The week after closing was INSANE!!! Here's our crazy list of what we decided to do in one week's time:
* We painted the master bedroom which has a chair rail so that means two colors in there, and painted the master closet
* Painted the living room and kitchen, the living room has tall ceilings which were made easier to paint by the scafolding our good friend and contractor Jason brought in
* Painted the guest bedroom and guest bathroom. This bedroom has a chair rail as well so we also put two colors in there
* Touch up paint in all of the other rooms which included entry hallway, bonus room, bedroom hallway, 3rd bedroom, master bathroom and all of the closets.
* Replaced all of the light fixtures and ceiling fans
* Replaced all the hardware (the woman before us had SPRAY PAINTED all of the brass doorknobs a pewter color and they were chipping off... yuck)
* Put a new kitchen sink in
* Installed track lighting in the kitchen
* Replaced all the carpeting
* Built out the deck and moved the gazebo-like structure that was on the deck over the hot tub. Yes, we have a hot tub... so in love with that!

I'm tired just thinking about it all. Thankfully we had both my wonderful father-in-law and Jason who tirelessly labored over the house that entire week even when we were gone to work. And then my awesome parents and mother-in-law came into town and cleaned and organized like it was nobody's business. The house was really dirty... my Mom even found dog hair in the refrigerator. SO gross! And we had a window cleaner come who said he thought the windows hadn't been cleaned in 5-10 years. Good grief. Jan got all the liners into all the drawers and cabinets and even worked on my closet - scary for her! And my Dad went crazy in the yard weeding and trimming hedges. Seriously, I can't even imagine what we would have done without all of them!

And of course I haven't taken one picture... totally lame of me. I was so busy working that I didn't even think to get some shots of us working on the house. I think maybe Ron has some... I'll have to check with him. And I haven't taken any after pictures of the house since making all of the changes because we really haven't decorated yet. We have some furniture coming in the next week or two and my dear friend and interior designer Kate is going to come this summer to help me put it all together. When we get the new furniture that we've already ordered, I'll take some pictures. For now I'll post the pictures from when they were selling the house... so really it looks quite a bit different now:

Front of the house:

Entry way/hall

Immediately to the right is a hallway that leads to the guest bedroom:

Guest bedroom... windows face the front yard

Guest bathroom (such a funky color that just made that room feel SO small)

Bedroom #3 also off that hallway

Off the main entry way/hallway, there's a bonus room that could really be any number of things. It has french doors into the entry way as well as french doors leading into the kitchen.

The main entry way/hallway leads into the living room area

You can see the kitchen counter in that last picture on the right... the living room opens up into the kitchen

Off the right of the living room is the door to the Master bed. We did NOT keep the red color and it looks amazingly different

As you can see, the doors in the above picture lead into our huge master bath which I just love

And that door above leads into our "L" shaped master closet that actually fits both Spencer AND my clothing. It's a miracle. :-)

And here is the back yard. It by far needs the most work. It was neglected and had they had two huge dogs that tore up the yard. Along with a broken sprinkler system that they didn't tell us about.

You can't really tell by looking at it, but we built out the deck so it wraps around the hot tub and we moved that tent thing over the hot tub. It really looks amazing and made that whole area look so much bigger. I can't wait until we can fix the grass and get some beds in there... it's going to be amazing. But I'm worried about plants. I don't have a good track record with plants. They usually die when left in my care. But I want to do better, I really do!

Well, there's a really long post for you after hardly any in the last few months. I'm feeling the bug to blog again... we'll see how long it lasts.

2010-01-14T21:41:00.000-06:00

Sarah: I feel the need to battle
Spencer: Baby, I don't want to battle dance with you
Sarah: Why?
Spencer: Because I don't battle dance

Old Dentist

2009-09-15T17:03:00.001-05:00

I just got an email from my old dentist with the following link (I couldn't bear to actually put the youtube video on my blog). This is the same guy that is most likely responsible for the fact that I had to have a root canal on the only filling I have in my mouth.

http://www.youtube.com/user/AustinDentalSpa

Are you really that surprised that I've found a new dentist?

HOME SWEET HOME?

2009-09-14T16:27:00.000-05:00

(I know, two posts within three days. Please don't die of shock)

Last week we put in a back-up offer on a house. SO exciting!!! We really had no intention of moving this quickly on a house, but things have just seemed to fall into place.

About a month ago we started looking at houses knowing that we would more than likely buy something next year. Two weeks ago we decided to talk to our broker and get some concrete details on what kind of mortgage we'll be able to get. The following weekend (Labor day weekend) we were driving Ron and Jan (my in-laws) around the neighborhood that we are most interested in. Spencer was looking at the zillow application on his iphone and found this house (pictured above). It's in our price range and the pictures of the inside were AMAZING. The house had just gone on the market that Thursday and we were eager to take a look. We called the seller's Realtor and never heard anything. The next day (Labor day), we called the Realtor again and still didn't hear anything. We went to lunch with Ron and Jan and decided to drive by the house one last time before they left to go back to Dallas. As we turned onto the street, we saw the owners pull into their driveway. I KNOW!!!! Spencer got out and they agreed to let us come back in 30 minutes and see the house. Needless to say, we loved it. I mean, just look at this picture:

So the seller's Realtor finally called us that night, but didn't really give us much info. We called our broker on Tuesday and he put us in touch with a Realtor who started working on an offer. Well, when he called the seller's Realtor he found out that there was an offer on Saturday and they went under contract on Monday or Tuesday. No-one told us this info. Kind of weird. But they said they would accept back-up offers. We decided to put in an offer of what we could afford thinking it wouldn't really be competitive and just let God do what He was going to do. We found out that it was a competitive bid and after a counter from the seller's we have an agreed-upon back-up contract.

At this point we're thinking we have less than 50% chance of getting the house. After talking with our Realtor on Friday we found out that the buyers who are under contract right now may have some issues getting a loan. Apparently they may need their parents to co-sign, but we're hearing that pretty much no one is giving out co-signed mortgages these days. So maybe there's a little more than 50% chance. We won't hear anything until mid-October, but it's exciting either way!

We're not letting ourselves get emotionally attached to this house. If it works out, awesome. If it doesn't, awesome. We just want a clear sign from God that we're doing the right thing. About the last thing we want is to be in a house we're not supposed to be in. They don't let you return houses like you can return throw pillows. (Took me eight returns before I finally settled on our current throw pillows on our couch) I'm loving the process even if we don't get this house. It's so much fun to dream and figure out what kind of house we want to be in. I will definitely keep everyone posted!

(PS... if you made it to the end and missed the link to the better pictures of the house earlier in the post, go here to get a better idea of how things look: http://vt.realtour.biz/?P=56016&T=NOTIDX)

2009-09-12T23:19:00.003-05:00

So I realize that I haven't blogged in over two months. Shameful... absolutely shameful. But I think I'm starting to get a vision of how I want my blog to look going forward... more to come (I hope).

Fall is upon us and I couldn't be happier. I somehow managed to survive the 68 days of 100+ degree weather this summer. Had we made it to 70 days we would have broken the record. Kinda of a bummer that we didn't, although I'm also happy to not have had those last two days.

100+ degree weather (often with humidity)... I don't think I fully understood that before moving here. It's oppressive. It's beyond oppressive. I hate to sweat, so the fact that you are guaranteed to sweat everyday just going to and from your car is kind of lame. But this summer I just realized that this is our winter. We can't go outside (unless you are in water of some sort or crazy enough to be outside in this weather), so we go from one air conditioned place to another. And then the other 8-9 months of the year are pretty amazing here. Sun almost everyday. Cold, but not too cold. Really quite amazing. I don't know if I could do the dark, gloomy weather again.

Despite the heat, this has been a really good summer. We got to go to Florida to visit my sister and some really good family friends. She has a new gig there and you can read about it here. While there we visited Epcot which was so much fun. I'm a total sucker for the Disney thing... completely magical in my opinion! I feel like we did a lot of other things, but I can't think of any of them right now. But my memory of the summer is good, so I guess we had fun! :-)

And now football is upon us and honestly I have been SO excited. I can't even believe that I get excited about football. But I do. And it is so much fun. But I honestly wonder if I would ever have been like this if it was anything other than Texas football - there's something amazing about it. Or maybe it has more to do with the amazing guy I married and how much he loves the game and how patient he has been to teach me everything. He also appreciates my enthusiasm which has made a huge difference. And our quarterback loves Jesus which further endears me to him and the team.

So that's a quick summary of things going on at this point. We've started looking at houses and actually put a back-up offer on a place that is AMAZING. It's quite the story that I'll have to share... maybe I'll even post it tomorrow!

Congrats on getting to the end. I think I'm ready to be a blogger again.

So sad...

2009-06-30T14:56:00.003-05:00

Just canceled my t-mobile account which permanently gets rid of my "425" phone number. :-(

But I have this to console me:

My current status: MELTING!!!

2009-06-25T13:59:00.001-05:00

10-Day Forecast

NEW: Larger Radar Maps & No Ads

		High / Low (°F)	Precip. %
Today Jun 25	Mostly Sunny	105°/79°	10 %
Fri Jun 26	Sunny	104°/79°	10 %
Sat Jun 27	Sunny	103°/78°	0 %
Sun Jun 28	Partly Cloudy	102°/80°	20 %
Mon Jun 29	Partly Cloudy	101°/79°	10 %
Tue Jun 30	Mostly Sunny	101°/79°	10 %
Wed Jul 01	Partly Cloudy	101°/77°	10 %
Thu Jul 02	Partly Cloudy	100°/77°	0 %
Fri Jul 03	Sunny	100°/78°	0 %
Sat Jul 04	Mostly Sunny	101°/78°	0 %
Last Updated Jun 25 12:18 p.m. CT

Gucci scared during a thunder storm:

2009-06-11T21:40:00.002-05:00

But it's in my heart!

2009-04-30T12:16:00.002-05:00

I have several things that I do not have a lot of talent for, but have in my heart. The biggest ones would be gardening and dancing. Dancing has to be at the top of my list. Oh how I long to move gracefully, but even this little girl has more moves than I do. Last night we were watching American Idol and groaning about how people cry when they get kicked off because "I want this so much" and "I've worked so hard for this!" Well, the reality is that even when you work really hard or want something really badly, you still may not be able to do it. I launched into this whole speech about this last night about how sometimes parents do a disservice to their kids because you can't always do everything you want to do. Spencer's response? "Yeah, like dancing." Harumph.

I also have it on my heart to garden. And I've killed all but one plant that I've brought into our house. I feel like this is something I need to conquer before we get a house. Like maybe I need to get a couple of plants for our patio to get me used to the idea. I just have no idea where to start. Spencer keeps trying to talk me into silk plants, but I have it in my heart to have real ones!!!!

So I'm going to be a hypocrite and keep dancing and trying to garden. :-)

Can anyone help??????

Still clumsy

2009-03-20T13:02:00.003-05:00

Today I was doing a work-out at home and feeling all proud of myself. There were glimpses of my ab muscles returning and overall I was pleased with my ability and coordination.

Then as I was stretching my legs on the floor with one of those rubber cords (laying on my back with my leg in the air), it slipped off my shoe and snapped me in the eye. My instant verbal response? "Aww man... and I was feeling all coordinated today."

It was just an illusion. Great stuff for the blog, but confirmation that my body does not move the way I wish it would.

Hope I don't have a black eye later...

It's funny cause it's true...

2009-03-05T20:41:00.001-06:00

I heart The Office

2009-02-20T19:22:00.001-06:00

Blog retirement?

2009-02-07T15:41:00.002-06:00

So I'm seriously considering it... for the past year I have just not really felt like blogging. Don't know why. I used to think about what I would blog about all the time... now it just seems like another thing I should do. And my posts have been P-I-T-I-F-U-L.

So the question is do I get rid of the blog all together or completely re-vamp it with a different purpose to my writing?

If you still look at this blog, consider yourself warned. ;-)

Hey look! We beat OU by 10 points too!!!!

2009-01-08T22:57:00.005-06:00

So this is the year I truly became a football fan. Or at least a Longhorn football fan (is there really any other team?). It has been a fabulous season with a truly amazing team. But it came to a screeching halt when we lost one game in a bitter end to Texas Tech (that's another post entirely). To make a long story short, the way they figure out the national champion in college football is MESSED UP and completely unfair.

We just watched the National Championship game (which we should have played in) and the team that kept us out of it completely lost it. The University of Oklahoma is our biggest rival and they were embarrassingly bad tonight. We beat them by 10 points back in October in a neutral field, but since they beat Tech and Tech beat us, they got to go to the National Championship. Oh, and then there's all the cheating and style points that OU goes after. Basically they'll run up the score when they're playing a team that isn't as great just to get style points rather than having great character and not embarrass the other team.

So while I'm thrilled OU lost tonight, I'm bummed that we didn't get to go. But I also really respect the character of our team and how even though it might have hurt them in the end, they played this season with integrity and honesty.

OK... even I can't believe I just wrote this post. I never in a million years thought I would be a football fan. HA!

A morning of firsts

2008-12-10T10:45:00.003-06:00

So last night it snowed!!! All of you non-Austinites are probably wondering what's the big deal. Well, for starters it was in the 70's for the majority of the day yesterday. But by about 9 or 10 last night it was snowing. Yeah, quite the shift in weather. And yesterday I was getting my hair done and I told my hair dresser that I was wishing for snow and was probably one of the only people in Austin wishing that. He laughed at me and said that in his 8 years of living in Austin he had only seen it snow ONCE! The most we usually get is one or two ice storms a year and those happen in January or February. So snow in December is a BIG deal.

And here's evidence of how novel it is... Spencer walked out to his car this morning to find that someone had written a message in the snow on my car:

So yeah, snow in Austin is definitely a "first."

One of the other firsts? I actually turned on the heat this morning. I literally haven't done that since we've been in this apartment... we moved in last May. But before you get all jealous that our electric bill must be amazingly low, think of the good 5-6 months where we have to blast the AC. It all evens out in the end.

And finally, Gucci ran from me this morning when I tried to take him to the bathroom. He hasn't done that since he got here. And apparently I'm becoming one of those people that talks about their dog as if it's their child. Yikes.

My recession Christmas card:

2008-12-08T21:44:00.003-06:00

Happy Holidays everyone! ;-)

http://mistletoemakeover.com/?9af6ab99532895e3a49b756b726286ab

It's a dog's life

2008-12-05T14:57:00.003-06:00

I'm trying to work on my laptop and Gucci pushed his way onto my lap. Like, seriously making me move my computer so he could cuddle up and sleep. Completely pathetic. He's snoring as I type. Completely and utterly pathetic.

But I adore him. HA!

Best.Husband.Ever.

2008-11-10T13:16:00.003-06:00

This was my birthday present from Spencer...

need I say anymore?

2008-11-06T16:27:00.003-06:00

Why aren't we allowed to disagree with each other politically? Why is our character called into question when hold different views on policy issues? I feel like a lot of what I've read/heard since Tuesday has been about the idiotic conservatives who are unreasonable and aren't willing to discuss anything OR the godless fanatical liberals. It's ironic because rather than allow for differing opinions, we put the other party down... and it's the EXACT same thing we are accusing them of doing.

I am so sick of BOTH SIDES!!!!! I'm tired of it being suggested that if I hold conservative values I am a small-minded person who can't think for myself. Conversely, I'm tired of it being suggested that I have no values or can't be a Christian if I am more liberal in my thinking.

You know how I voted? Completely and utterly on policy. I voted for a candidate whom I agree with their concept of what the role of government should be in our country. If you think you know who it is, you're probably wrong. And frankly it's none of your business. That's right... if you want to judge me for who I voted for, then you aren't someone I want to share that kind of thing with. I did not vote because of a campaign promise--- most of those are unrealistic and just good marketing. But I'm happy with my choice because I feel like I voiced my opinion.

I am fiercely proud of our country for putting an African-American in the White House. This is a historic election and I am so thrilled to see the themes of reconciliation taking place in our nation. My prayer is that he would continue with his promise of uniting the country and take advantage of the fact that people have come together. I also hope that his administration will be one of substance... I think there is potential for that, but it remains to be seen.

I'm happy to talk to people about my political views... but I have no interest in talking to those who berate and put-down others who do not share the same political view as them... no matter which side they land on. If you believe in a democratic and free America, then that means you believe in living and working with others who do not share the same political views as you. Even if you think their reasoning doesn't hold up, it is NOT your place to put them down. The same constitution that allows you to believe the way you do also allows them to believe something different.

I'm sorry for such a heated post after almost a month of silence, but I just read one blog post too many that I couldn't keep quiet anymore. I hope this is received in the manner it was meant... I want us to practice what we preach by not attacking those who disagree with us. It didn't work for the Pharisees and it certainly wasn't how Jesus handled things.

Matthew 7:1-5

1"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

3"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

I couldn't have said it better myself...

2008-10-09T23:25:00.001-05:00

http://karum.blogspot.com/2008/10/thinking-out-loud.html

Who said Christians can't have fun...

2008-09-24T16:54:00.002-05:00

http://www.theway.org/Current/M07/Mar07Flash4.html

NKOTB on The View

2008-09-03T11:17:00.002-05:00

Just got finished watching this on DVR and finally realized just how ridiculous they are. But I still love them. :-)

New roommate

2008-09-03T10:53:00.002-05:00

Guess who's moving in on Saturday?

We pick Gucci up from the airport on Saturday night and I am SO exited. Spencer keeps trying to convince me that we should change his name. My response? "You can call him anything you want, but we cannot change his name. It's his identity. He is a designer puppy." My husband is so good to humor me.

And one of my good friends down here has a little dog named Coco... I think they're destined to be fast friends. Maybe she can help him adjust to the heat. As Mom says, "Gucci, life as you know it is about to change." Woo-hoo!!!

My political two cents

2008-08-29T11:46:00.004-05:00

OK... so this is a topic that I have purposefully avoided on this blog. My husband works in politics (on the private/non-partisan side right now) and I admire him for doing so... it's not an easy career choice. And while I have a lot of opinions that I won't share on this blog out of respect and protection for what he is doing, I do feel compelled to say one thing. After spending time in DC and getting a bit of an insiders point of view, my advice when taking everything in over the next two months (on either side of things) is this:

Not everything is as it seems. Be smart: really do your research and understand what is the reality behind the promises of the candidates. My generation has been pretty apathetic towards politics and it's exciting to see people starting to care again with this election. I just hope we are smart enough to really examine all the issues and make decisions for ourselves.

So that is all I will write on this topic. I could rant and go on about things if given the opportunity, but at the heart of it I really feel that personal responsibility is crucial in this election.

Kendall's Shower

2008-08-06T12:12:00.012-05:00

We had a fabulous time at Kendall's shower on Sunday. And the planning was equally delightful (Kate and I are quite the pair when it comes to planning and shopping. Usually involves lots of laughing and late nights-- and usually we have overly-ambitious plans that have to be altered) . Kate made super cute red and black cupcakes that were absolutely perfect. Oh how we love beautiful things!

The beautiful Jacobsen girls

Cupcakes, Mimosas, strawberry lemonade, water with cucumber slices (thanks for the idea Tim Gunn!)

The spread... who knew meatballs would be such a hit with girls.... thanks Mom! :-)

Kate giving instructions on a game.

Kendall guessing what some of her "gifts" were... hahahaha

The fabulous trio. LOVE these girls!

Spent a lovely afternoon at LBC yesterday which I'll blog about later. The rest of the week has been filled with wedding planning and trying to squeeze some work in. Can't wait to see my beautiful friend get married on Friday... what a wonderful week!

Beautiful Northwest

2008-07-31T21:39:00.002-05:00

I'm in Portland right now en route to Seattle to celebrate the wedding of my dear and beautiful friend Kendall:

My beautiful friend Kate and her husband bought a new house in Portland and I wanted to stop here to see it and spend some much-needed quality time with my dear friend. It has been way too long since we've seen each other and hung out!!! We are driving up to Seattle tomorrow and I anticipate 4 hours of amazing conversation and this:

I love these girls SO much. It's going to be a fabulous week!

Disclaimer: Between the wedding and getting some work done this next week, I'm not going to have much time to do a lot of visiting. So to all of the fabulous people I won't get to see on this trip, I am so sorry. Good excuse to come up again sometime soon! :-)

Ugh, ugh, and UGH

2008-07-28T13:59:00.002-05:00

I think I've hit a wall when it comes to the hot weather. Good thing I'm about to get a little break. More on that later. :-)

Most Amazing Weekend

2008-07-18T12:58:00.001-05:00

So a couple of weekends ago I had one of the most amazing surprises of my life. Yes, yes... I know. I am so behind in my blogging, but oh well. And yes, life with my wonderful husband includes many surprises and he's the king of them... so my blog is often filled with stories of him surprising me, but this one tops the cake.

As you all know, Sex and the City The Movie came out about a month (or two) ago. I was SO excited, but really wanted to see the movie with one of my girlfriends that I had watched the series with. Ellie and I started talking online about how much we wanted to watch it together since we had watched the entire series together. Seriously, we could spend an entire day watching the show. At any rate, we were trying to figure out a time where one of us could fly to the other person so we could watch it. So I missed it opening weekend and purposefully avoided all talk of the movie so it wouldn't be ruined. I didn't see how I would get to see the movie with Ellie, but I was holding out hope.

Well unbeknownst to me, my wonderful husband and best friend were scheming to bring her out here to see the movie with me. I had been feeling homesick for my family and girlfriends and Spencer wanted to do something for me. So he worked with Ellie and planned to bring her out. Now this may not seem like that big of a deal, but keep in mind we had just moved to our new apartment and didn't even have a guest room put together so that Ellie would have a place to stay. So not only did he have to organize bringing her out here, but he had to get us to put the apartment all the way together by the time she got here. So every night of the week leading up to her arrival, he kept telling me that he wanted to get the apartment finished and everything put away. He worked tirelessly while I flitted (yes, actual flitting occurred. I'm rather good at it) around trying to distract him because I was getting bored with working on the apartment. Hahahaha

Fast forward to the Friday that Ellie came. We had made reservations at one of our favorite restaurants, Fogo de Chao, to celebrate Spencer's new job. Spencer had made the reservation for 9pm and told me some story about Fogo being really busy because of the Democratic state convention that was right next door and that was the earliest he could get us in. And I totally bought it.

I had worked out in the morning and then worked from home all day. So by the time Spencer came home, I wasn't ready yet. I start into this speech about how I wanted to clean the bathrooms on Saturday and he tells me that he doesn't want to do any work during the weekend, so we should just finish the cleaning before our dinner reservation. Sounded good to me. So we go to dinner and walk into the restaurant which was half-empty. I thought that was strange for about a second and then didn't give it a second thought. We enjoyed a lovely dinner, but Spencer said he was starting to feel a little sick. (He just needed to stall....) When we left the restaurant we stopped by this cute cupcake stand to get dessert. Spencer told me to stay in the car and when he was walking back, he took a phone call and it looked like he had forgotten his debit card or something somewhere. When he got back into the car I asked him if he had left his card at the restaurant. He replied that the guy from Alamo car rental called and said he had left his driver's license in the rental car that we had the weekend before for our trip to Padre Island for his cousin's wedding (hello run-on sentence). So off we went towards the airport to pick up the license. I just thought it was a funny end to the evening. We even stopped at a gas station while Spencer was "sick" to stall for time. It was rather amusing... but I felt so bad for the guy.

So we get to the airport and I wait in the car. After about 15 minutes, Spencer returns and opens the car door, but doesn't get in... he just stood there looking at me with a weird look on his face. I asked him if he got it and if everything was OK, and he just responded with a yes. And then I heard a tapping on my window... I turned around and it was ELLIE!!!!!! I totally started freaking out, screaming and jumping out of the car. It was awesome... totally awesome.

I could not even begin to believe what Spencer and Ellie had done... it was so great. And not only was she there, but they told me we had tickets for the All-ladies showing of SATC at the Alamo Drafthouse the next day with my friends Katherine and Kim. The Alamo is an awesome movie theater here in Austin where you can order food and drinks and watch movies... it's so much fun.

So we went to the movie the next day and let me tell you the estrogen was flowing! All the girls were SO excited and squealing with delight. We ordered cosmos and other SATC-themed dishes and all gasped when the movie started. I cried my way through the thing not only because of the story line, but also thinking about how wonderful my husband and friends are. I am one blessed girl. The movie was so good that we went and saw it again the next day.

It really was the perfect weekend. *Sigh*

I love this shot so I had to post it twice... cosmos and Carrie. ;-) The start of the movie was beautiful!

Ellie and I before the movie started!

Katherine and Kim

Our lovely, lovely drinks. :-)

WHY I HATE AT&T

2008-07-11T19:56:00.005-05:00

Sorry for my brashness, but AT&T sucks. Here's why:

1. Have you seen what they're charging for iphone plans?!?!?! It's ridiculous. And on top of the $30 data fee you pay a month, they're making you pay for text messaging. Yup, that's right. You have to pay extra just to text. Never mind the fact that you're using an iphone. You would think that would come standard, but no... AT&T had to find yet another way to rake you over the coals.

2. Their customer service is rude. When the Apple employee informed one of the AT&T representatives that we have waited a long time and just want our phone to work, she countered with "Well, I've been here for ten hours." Yup, super professional.

3. They knew that millions of people would be trying to buy iphones today, yet none of their systems are capable of handling the demand. I want to know what MBA-educated executive decided he'd rather spend money on his bonus then ensuring that their system could handle all the activations today.

4. We waited in line today to buy an iphone at the Apple store for longer than I care to admit. Once we got in the store, it took the AT&T people over 2 hours to get Spencer's phone connected. 2 hours... I don't need to say anything more.

Although AT&T completely SUCKS, our Apple specialist--the dashing Jeff Roth-- was AMAZING and couldn't have been more helpful. Not only did he battle the AT&T folks, he kept us entertained.

All this to say, the moment Apple gets out of their contract with AT&T, we'll be leaving. And I'll be laughing all the way. I'm definitely not in a good mood right now...

Happy Anniversary babe!

2008-07-06T09:33:00.002-05:00

Today is our one-year anniversary! We're off to celebrate (to a surprise destination) and I can hardly believe it's been an entire year.

We were so blessed by our wedding and now our first year together. Babe, it's been an incredible year and I wouldn't have wanted to share it with anyone else. Thank you for loving me so selflessly and making me so incredibly happy. I love you!!!

(once again the pics are so amazing that I had trouble just picking one. Thanks jl!)

One year ago today...

2008-07-05T10:06:00.008-05:00

we were getting ready for our rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. And they were SO MUCH FUN!!! I can hardly believe it's been a year...

2008-07-01T09:58:00.004-05:00

Carrie tagged me and I'm just now getting around to this... Enjoy!

A - Attached or single: Blissfully married for almost an ENTIRE YEAR!!!
B - Best Friend: Spencer, Emily, Ellie, Kendall & Kate
C - Cake or Pie: Mom's Kentucky Derby Pie (Pecan pie with chocolate chips)
D - Day of the Week: Saturday... an entire day to just hang out with my husband
E - Essential Item: Chocolate... completely and utterly addicted
F - Favorite Color: Pink and Tiffany Blue... couldn't decide between the two
G - Gummi Bears or Worms: Ehhh... if they're covered in chocolate I might be interested
H - Home town: Umm... I guess Everett. At what point does your current city as an adult become your home town? Or is where you grew up always your home town?
I - Indulgences: Lounging in the pool after having my coffee on Saturday. I try to restrict my coffee intake to the weekends.
J - January or July?: In Austin? Definitely January. In Seattle? Definitely July. But I am forever sentimentally attached to July since that's when I got married.
K - Kids: Got the baby bug... waiting for my husband to catch it and for us to buy a house. :-)
L - Life is incomplete without: My amazing Savior
M - Marriage Date: July 6, 2007
N - Number of Siblings: 1 amazing sister
O - Oranges or Apples: Crisp, Fuji apples. No other kind will do.
P - Phobias or Fears: Someone planting drugs in my luggage when I'm traveling abroad and I get thrown in a third world jail. I wouldn't survive. Seriously... just ask Spencer, I'm totally fascinated with prison shows--especially Locked Up: Abroad. And the whole time I'm freaked out that it's going to happen to me one day.
Q - Quote: "There's always a choice"
R - Reason To Smile: God, Husband, Family, Friends
S - Season: Fall
T - Tag Three: Bridget, Emily, Kristy
U - Unknown fact about me: I was in love with Tiger Woods when I was a teenager.
V - Vegetarian or Oppressor of Animal: Do you know where I live? BBQ is amazing.
W - Worst Habit: Procrastinating
X - Rays or Ultrasounds: Usually X-Rays are less painful and they don't make you drink 10 gallons of water and hold it before you go in.
Y - Your favorite food: I think we've gone over this... CHOCOLATE!
Z - Zodiac Sign: Scorpio, but I don't believe in it

A nightmare just woke me up...

2008-06-15T07:58:00.002-05:00

I was having one of the best dreams of my life. Donny, Danny, and Joey from NKOTB were at my childhood home on Teresa Avenue in Pittsburgh, PA. SO EXCITING.

They came to see this NKOTB exhibit that my parent's had put up throughout the house... a museum exhibit of sorts (have I mentioned that my parents are the coolest ever?). I was as giddy as a school girl. I remember being all flustered and telling Danny that I used to have a huge poster of him in my bedroom. (Side note... I can distinctly remember that when we moved to Seattle I was worried about my poster and one of the movers showed me how he had rolled it up in one of my dresser drawers. Wow, obsessed much?) All of a sudden the guys stepped up to some mikes and were about to do an impromptu concert. I was getting all settled in with the dog in my lap.

This is where the dream gets disturbing... I looked into the living room and saw a RAT!!!! Gucci was in my lap and I started to put him on the floor to scare the rat, but the rat lunged at him!!! I sat on a chair and screamed as loudly as I could, but everyone just looked at me like I was off my rocker. Then someone started running after the rat with a water bottle trying to kill it. I'm not sure if they were trying to drown it or just annoy it. Meanwhile I was still sitting in the chair clutching Gucci in my arms. At one point the rat shook itself like a dog to get the water off which was an amusing sight, but I digress. Then the unthinkable happened: I woke up. NNNNNOOOOOO!!!! I never got to see NKOTB perform a private concert in my own home. Crushing. Devastating. Depressing.

So now I'm awake 45 minutes earlier than I needed to be without an amazing dream. BUT this is where the story gets better. I came out to the living room to write about this tragedy and decided to look up the boys on itunes and to my complete delight I found all of their albums!!! I'm blissfully sitting here listening to 5 white guys from Boston sing a Jamaican-themed song. Complete bliss. And since it's not a tape I can skip through the songs and listen to them all. Complete and utter bliss.

I think maybe Jesus woke me up early from my dream so that I would get to buy the album. Is that sacriligious of me to say?

Tim Gunn... finally!!!!

2008-06-11T19:49:00.009-05:00

OK... so I just had one of the most amazing weekends of my life (doesn't have anything to do with the pics below) and I will blog about it, but I wanted to post these first. That's the type-A personality in me and it's just been far too long.

So seeing Tim Gunn in person was amazing and so much fun. We were in the back of the room where it was hot and we couldn't see that well, but it didn't diminish our enthusiasm. Tim Gunn is so cute and amusing and adorable and I loved every minute of it. :-)

Enjoy the pics below... I know they're repetitive. This is honestly the paired-down selection. I just wanted to capture all the classic Tim Gunn poses and looks.

In the car on the way... SOOOO excited.

First glance.... AHHHHH... still so excited!

Kim was also excited. As evidenced by the classic "thumbs up"

An equally excited Katherine

So poised

Oh.. how cute!!!

That MC lady was so annoying... she was always talking over Tim. And I don't know about everyone else, but I came to see him... not her

Look at him... you can just tell how caring and kind he is. Some of the many attributes I like about this guy!

Very seriously explaining how easy it is to take an outfit from daytime into evening wear. If you have the right pieces you can pull it off!

AHHHH... the classic reach for the glasses. LOVE IT!!!

"Make it work ladies"

Water with cucumber slices. Seriously one of the most refreshing and delicious ways to drink water that I've ever had!

Answering our questions about Project Runway, Tim Gunn's Guide to Style, and much more.

I just love all his expressions

Total happiness :-)

2008-05-14T15:06:00.003-05:00

"My comfort in my suffering is this: Your promise preserves my life."
Psalm 119:50

I just got off the phone with a man that had filled out an info card at church on Sunday. He lost his wife a couple of weeks ago and is now faced with raising his three children alone.

Sometimes my job feels so odd. Today I made some name tags, worked on the volunteer schedule, joked around with co-workers and then tried to find the words to comfort a man who is going through a horrible, horrible loss. All in the span of two hours. Lord, give me the words.

But it's stuff like this that makes me so excited about some of the work I've gotten to do in the last 8 months (holy cow, I've been working here for 8 months!!!). All of it has been deepening a desire in my heart to help people work through the hard stuff in their lives. So currently I'm looking into the various programs in Texas to become a counselor. I would love to go back to SPU or Mars Hill to get my Masters in Marriage and Family counseling, but I'm not sure that's what God has in store for us. It'll take another year before I'll probably be able to do anything, but I'm really excited at the idea of it all. Now I should probably start studying for the GMAT, but I'm not really excited about that. Who knows, maybe I'll end up at UT so I can become a true Longhorn. Now that would be fun.

My amazing Mother...

2008-05-13T13:34:00.002-05:00

I know this is late (my blogging has left much to be desired lately), but I have to write about my incredible Mother. I hope I can make it through this without crying...

My Mother is my rock. All throughout my life my Mom has been such a constant source of strength, love, and encouragement. When I think back on my childhood, I think of a woman who warmly nurtured my sister and I. She was full of kisses, laughter, and comfort. When I started to get sick, my Mom was one of my fiercest advocates. When doctors wouldn't believe that I was sick, not just depressed... she pushed them to figure it out. When teachers and school administrators didn't want to give me extra time to make-up assignments or extra grace for missing more class than normal, she figured out the law and fought to keep me in their classes. There's no way I would have graduated high school on time (with honors) had it not been for my Mom. And my Mom always knew how to make me feel better... there is something so comforting about her voice and touch.

As I became an adult, my Mom always encouraged me in whatever I did... even when it was crazy. Whether it was to fly to Paris the day we declared war on Iraq for a spring break trip with two other friends (Mom, I have no idea how you let me go without saying anything;-)) or to move across the country to pursue a relationship that led me to marrying my wonderful husband (although, that was more wonderful than crazy--- ok, maybe it's both). I'll never forget the day my Mom and Dad left me in Minnesota when I went to school there for like a minute. I cried the entire day. I had some perfume that my Mom also wore and I sprayed it on a sweatshirt and slept with it for like 3 nights.

And then I got married... the whole process would have been utterly incomplete if my Mother had not been there. I had so much fun planning the wedding with my Mom. She was always there to be excited for me, to give great advice, and help talk me through my couple of meltdowns that I experienced. That experience would not have been nearly as enjoyable or fulfilling without my Mom. I am so blessed.

As I mentioned, my Mom is my rock. That's why when we she told me and Spencer that she had breast cancer last December I nearly lost it. My Mom can't be sick. It's hard for me to wrap my brain around the thought of that. This is a woman who very rarely gets sick... maybe a cold or two a year, but rarely anything more. And when she does get sick, she doesn't slow down much. She seems indestructible.

At first I was really scared. But as I prayed more and learned more, I grew more and more peaceful. They found the cancer insanely early and were able to get it all with a lumpectomy and radiation. No chemo PTL!!! And through it all she stayed incredibly healthy and in amazing spirits. Once again, she was strong for all of us.

Mom is doing great now. She's finished with treatment and well on her way to being 100% back to normal. I haven't written about her cancer because I couldn't. I don't really know why... When it comes to things like this I often have to take the "Ignorance is Bliss" route and not think about it. It's too hard... too painful... I'll cry too much. I just have to believe that God will work things out. A friend recently said that she's learning how to feel things without having her heart completely broken. It's a thought that has been resonating in my head ever since. I want to have compassion and have my heart break without it being completely obliterated. I want to be able to be strong and supportive when things like this happen. My Mom knows how to do that.

I love my Mom more than I'll ever be able to express. She's the most amazing woman I've ever known and I will be forever thankful that she's my Mom. And I look forward to the many years that we have ahead of us and all the incredible lessons she'll teach me as I become a Mother.

Happy Mother's Day Mom... you really earned it this year. I LOVE YOU!!!!!

What to wear to meet Tim Gunn?!?!?!?!

2008-04-23T11:49:00.003-05:00

That's right people, I'm going to MEET Tim Gunn tonight!!!!!
Ok, well maybe I won't get to meet him as much as see him, but still!!!

A couple of weekends ago we were walking through Dillard's (kind of like Macy's) to get a wedding shower gift and Spencer pointed and said "Look!" At first I thought he was referencing the bedding on one of the display beds and I was surprised that he liked that particular color combination. But then he pointed to a sign that had a picture of my beloved Tim Gunn and I saw that he was making a guest appearance in a couple of weeks. EXCITEMENT!!!!! So I immediately called and got reservations for me and my lovely friend Katherine. And to my delight, our other lovely friend Kim(who is soon to be my neighbor) is also going to come!!! Yay!!!!

So I realize that there's a good chance that I'll just be seeing some sort of fashion show and they'll give a nod to Tim Gunn, but if I actually get to meet him I'll be so stoked. I am never star struck, but I definitely think this could be the case with him. But what will I say? That I adore him? Not sure he'll get that... probably will think I'm stalkerish. Or do I just ask for a makeover?

Which leads me to my next question. What do I wear?!?!?!?!?!?! I have absolutely no idea. I can't decide if I want to go cute and trendy as to show that I have half an idea about fashion, or do I go kind of frumpy so that he'll have pity on me and decide to give me a makeover? And I'll probably need some sort of sob story as to why I deserve one. Is moving to a new state right after getting married good enough? Yeah, I highly doubt that. Especially since I love Austin and being married is awesome, so I really don't have any complaints. *SIGH* I guess I'll have to come up with something else. I could just tell him that I've "let myself go" since getting married. That's a bit of a stretch, but I don't dress up as much anymore. Partly because I don't have to for work (Austin is even more casual than Seattle), but also because of how hot it gets here. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I'll try to take my camera and hopefully I'll be able to get a picture with the man himself. Oh goodness I'm excited!!!!!

Tim Gunn: Dictionary

2008-04-23T11:40:00.000-05:00

2008-04-15T13:36:00.002-05:00

One Word Meme (thanks Bridget!)

Yourself: hopeful
Your husband: brilliant
Your hair: curly
Your Mother: inspiring
Your Father: steadfast
Your Favorite Item: diamond
Your dream last night: forgettable
Your Favorite Drink: cosmo
Your Dream Car: lexusrx
Your Dream Home: colonial
The Room You Are In: living
Your fear: mediocrity
Where you Want to be in Ten Years? Mother
Who you hung out with last night: Spencer
What You’re Not: goaloriented
Muffins: applecinnamon
One of Your Wish List Items: house
Time: 1:46
The Last Thing You Did: im'd
What You Are Wearing: longhornsweatshirt
Your favorite weather: autumn
Your Favorite Book: Captivating
Last thing you ate: carrot
Your Life: amazing
Your mood: fatigued
Your Best Friends: gift
What are you thinking about right now: visitors
Your car: civic
What are you doing at the moment: resting
Your summer: HOT
Relationship status: blessing
What is on your tv: commercials
What is the weather like: windy
When is the last time you laughed: everyday

Totally enjoyed it...

2008-04-05T11:42:00.003-05:00

We don't usually go to opening-day movies, but it's been awhile since there's actually been anything we've wanted to see. So off to the Alamo Drafthouse we went. For you non-Austinites, the Alamo is this awesome theater that serves dinner, drinks, etc... it's so much fun. Granted, it's not the best food you've ever had, but it's nice having dinner and a movie all in one place (wow... does that make me sound old?)

Anyway, the movie was great and I highly recommend it. Very entertaining and it even made me excited for football season.

I know, I know... pick your chin up off the table. It's shocking, but true. Now if only I can get Spencer to get excited about shopping...

Happy April Fool's Day

2008-04-01T17:46:00.002-05:00

This morning I received the following email from my wonderful father-in-law addressed to my lovely mother-in-law:

Jan,

I’ve been interviewing for the past few weeks with a new start-up company that I have not discussed with you. I have found another job opportunity in Phoenix with the following company http://www.google.com/virgle/index.html (a subsidiary of Google). I received a call with an offer, and I thought I should tell you that I accepted on the phone. I wanted to give you a little advance notice. I plan on giving my two weeks notice before I leave work today. This opportunity was just too exciting to pass up!

Love U,

Ron Whelan

And since I'm one of the most gullible people ever, I totally fell for it. I lept out of bed (yes people, I lept) and grabbed the phone all freaked-out to call Spencer to see if he had read the email yet. After a couple panicked minutes (I couldn't imagine that Jan would take this news well) of re-reading the email over and over again, I realized I had been fooled. He totally and completely got me. Well done Ron!

So I went on the site and filled out the "application" to see if I would be eligible to live and work on Mars. Here were the results of my test:

Well, you're distressingly normal and could conceivably adjust to life as a deep space pioneer, though we recommend instead that you leave the Mars missions to the serious whack jobs who scored over 130 and instead finish year 3 of law school, tuck your toddler into bed, design Web 2.0 applications, run for Congress or do whatever other normal, healthy, middle-of-the-road thing you're currently doing with your normal, healthy, middle-of-the-road life. If you're determined to give Virgle a try, though, you can submit your video here.

I guess Mars life isn't for me... although I don't think I needed the application to tell me that. The first instance of me having to try to survive would probably result in my death. I think I will stick to my safe, middle-of-the-road life. HA!

2008-03-22T22:46:00.003-05:00

O Death, where is your sting?
O Hell, where is your victory?
Christ is risen, and you O Death are annihilated!
Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen.
Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice.
Christ is risen, and life reigns.
Christ is risen, and the tomb is emptied of its dead.
For Christ, having risen from the dead, has become
the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.
To Him be Glory and Power forever and ever! Amen.

Change in URL...

2008-02-29T13:28:00.003-06:00

So I'm sorry I haven't been able to post about the Michael Buble concert... I promise that will come shortly.

In the meantime, you may or may not have noticed that my url for this site has changed to:

delightfulramblings.com

My internet-expert husband didn't like me having a url that contained my entire name (even though it was my maiden name. wow, I have a maiden name) because he thought it wasn't very safe, so we changed it. I thought we had it linked up to automatically re-direct to the blog even if you typed in the old name, but when I typed the old url in by accident today, it didn't come up.

SO... if your link to this blog stops working, you'll know why and you can just change it to delightfulramblings.com.

SO EXCITED!!!

2008-02-27T12:52:00.000-06:00

Michael Buble in concert... tonight. I can hardly wait!!!!

For all you non-comformists, just ignore...

2008-02-25T20:03:00.003-06:00

Spencer just gave me the best compliment:

"You look so cute... like an ad for Mac(Apple laptops) and Pottery Barn all in one. "

2008-02-23T01:05:00.001-06:00

Sarah: Does it bother you that I wanted my Mom last night when I was sick?
Spencer: No... I could have used her help.

I WANT MY MOMMY!!!!

2008-02-21T22:59:00.002-06:00

Do you ever have one of those moments, even as adult, where you feel like no one else can comfort you but your Mom? Well I had one of those moments last night. I woke up at 4 in the morning with a 100 degree fever... so I was hot, then I was cold, and my throat hurt, and I was gassy, and I had a cough and I was just generally very miserable. My first instinct was to call out to my Mom. But instead I woke up my sweet husband and he got me some much needed medicine.

But there's nothing like the comfort of your Mom... especially when you're sick, which I've been a lot over my lifetime. It's funny because there are a lot of various symptoms that I can cope with, without even mentioning to anyone that I'm feeling poorly. But get the flu and I become a pitiful, whining, baby. My poor husband.

Thankfully I think I'm on the other side of it. And thankfully I don't have any babies yet because I'm not sure what I would have done today. I don't know how all you Mom's out there do it!

Sick

2008-02-20T18:44:00.005-06:00

I've got the flu. Yuck. It's been going around the office and when someone told me to "not get it" on Friday I had a pretty good feeling that I would.

My immune system sucks and therefore I caught the bug. I'm just hoping it'll be one day on the couch and I'll be back in business. We'll see.

When I searched "flu and cough" on getty the picture below is what I found... I'm easily entertained. :-)

2008-02-14T19:38:00.002-06:00

"O, Israel, put your hope in the LORD, for with the LORD is unfailing love and with him is full redemption." Psalm 130:7

Why couldn't the Grammys this year been more like last year???

2008-02-10T23:12:00.001-06:00

John Mayer Focus Group

2008-02-10T22:56:00.001-06:00

Highly disappointed

2008-02-10T21:56:00.000-06:00

We're watching the Grammy's right now and I have to say that I'm rather disappointed. The sound has been all messed-up and the performances haven't ben that great.

But I just saw the highlight of the whole night: Earlier in the evening Kanye West won a grammy and made comments about being home and how he deserves the award and plans on being at the Grammy's a lot. Good grief.

That wasn't the good part... the highlight came when Vince Gil won a Grammy and when he got to the stage his first remark was this:

"I just got handed a Grammy by a Beatle. Has that happened to you Kanye?"

Wow... pure genius. Way to put him in his place.

Good-bye myspace...

2008-01-30T11:41:00.000-06:00

Today is International Get Rid of Your MySpace Account day and I intend to participate.

Tom, I don't want anymore of your SPAM. Facebook is much, much better.

Join in the fun everyone!

IT'S HERE!!!!

2008-01-29T22:50:00.001-06:00

I was on my way to work and I saw a FedEx truck... I knew it was bringing my computer! I literally did a u-turn and followed it to our building. I bolted out of my car and ran after the driver. Needless to say I was very excited and I think I may have amused him a bit with my exuberance.

It's been a very good day.

Anxiously waiting...

2008-01-28T17:15:00.000-06:00

the arrival of my NEW MACBOOK!!!!

In October I started working part-time at our church as a contractor. I help with our Frontline ministries (ushers, greeters, parking attendants, etc...) and I help connect people with small groups. It's a great job and I love the people I'm working with. What? A job I love? I know, shocking! And such a huge blessing! Starting this month I am now full-time and that's a good thing because since the beginning of the year we've had over 1,000 new people start to attend. It's so incredibly exciting, but we definitely have our work cut out for us. Check it out here.

Anyway, back to the Macbook. Basically I work from home quite a bit and my lame Dell Inspiron that's like 5 years old is living on borrowed time. I can only sit with it on my lap for so long before it starts burning my legs because it gets so hot. So, we decided it was time for a Mac. I am SOOOOO excited!!! I think it should be coming in the mail tomorrow and I can hardly wait. It's going to be so much faster and lighter and I can't wait to work on it. And since I lost my ipod again (yup, this is the second one I've lost), it'll be nice to have a computer with nice speakers!

So instead of cleaning today I keep checking the FedEx site to see where it's at.... it's in Fort Worth last time I checked.

YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wife swap...

2008-01-23T20:01:00.000-06:00

Spencer had to drive up to Dallas for work today and that means he'll be home much later than normal. So what am I doing?

Working and watching shows I don't normally watch with him. You know, Ugly Betty, Project Runway, The Hills (a personal favorite and one he absolutely abhors) and Wife Swap.

Tonight I just watched Wife Swap... the premise of this show is that they take two families who have polar-opposite parenting styles and have the wives swap places. So an obsessively-compulsive wife who cleans all the time (and makes her children clean all the time) gets swapped with a magician's family who rarely cleans anything and pulls their children out of school to perform magic shows. Total chaos and conflict ensues. Makes for great TV. But tonight while I was watching something dawned on me: these parents are taking whatever their biggest insecurity is and over-compensating by making sure their children are the exact opposite. And that thought me led to something else... what kind of neurosis am I going to transfer to my kids? When they watch a movie will they be disgusted when the character walks around barefoot in a run-down motel room? I can hardly watch something like that... I know, crazy. And I'm sure there's other stuff, but I can't think of anything else and Spencer's not here to help remind me of my craziness. hahahaha

Well, we've got a couple years until we really have to figure out the parenting thing. And by God's grace we won't mess up our kids too much. Although they'll definitely be embarrassed by us... especially if I dance in public.

Ok... on to the next show and more work (I'll fill you in on the work thing soon) AND Project Runway. LOVE IT!!!! I still don't understand why Spencer doesn't get excited about watching a bunch of people make clothing... not sure there's a better premise for a TV show. Oh wait, yes there is... The Office!!! Oh, I do hope the writer's strike ends soon!

Please enjoy the brief intermission...

2008-01-20T15:02:00.001-06:00

I know I've been horrible at blogging. Good grief, it's been a whole month! Apologies all around.

I promise there's an update coming soon. In the meantime, I've included this video for your viewing enjoyment. If you want just the highlights, go here:
http://defamer.com/345201/defamers-top-five-creeptastic-moments-from-the-tom-cruise-scientology-video-you-know-the-one

I have one word to say about him: Certifiable.

Etiquette rules for airline travel... according to Sarah

2007-12-17T18:11:00.000-06:00

1. When sitting in the airport, it is very rude to have an incredibly loud conversation on your cell phone. Even if you speak a different language and I can't understand a word you're saying, it is still ANNOYING to listen to you babble on and on while I'm trying to write my Christmas cards in peace. Sheesh.

2. When there are assigned seats, it is not necessary to hover around the gate waiting to cut people off just so you can get in line first. We're all going to the same place and we'll all get there at the same time, so just take a chill pill.

3. When in the tunnel on your way into the airplane, it is not necessary to completely hold up the line to search for your ringing cell phone and then answer it and have a loud conversation in another language (surprisingly, this was a completely different lady than before). Believe it or not, your call will go to voice mail and you will be able to call back once you're more settled in the plane.... but only if you promise to do so QUIETLY.

4. If you are a man and you see a woman struggling to put her carry-on luggage up in the overhead compartment (it's only heavy because I have two albums full of wedding pictures, an extra stack of prints, my jewelry because I won't check it, my bible because I won't check it, Christmas cards because I didn't finish them before I left, my camera because I won't check it, and my makeup because I won't check it---totally and completely reasonable. Last night JL told me to pack light... HA) offer to help her load it. Trust me, it will make the whole process a lot faster. And don't look put-off if she asks for your help... it's your chance to show your manliness and impress the chicks (at least that's what you think you're accomplishing and as a thank you for helping us, we'll let you think that).

5. When at baggage claim, it is completely and utterly rude to come and stand between a person and the conveyor belt when they are only 2 feet away from said conveyor belt. They've already staked it out... walk the 20 feet to the other side to get one of the completely open spots. Trust me, the bags will come around to you.

Well, after travelling from Austin to Seattle today, those are my words of wisdom. These are my pet peeves every time I travel... it's unbelievable what a rush people are in to get where they are going and with such a sense of entitlement they can be so rude.

On the flip side, I had very lovely conversations with my seat mates and on my long flight from Dallas to SEA there was no-one sitting next to me and I was able to sleep for like 2-3 hours. Also Spencer ended up flying to Dallas this morning for work so we were able to go into the airport together which was really nice. I even met one of his bosses and found out that he thinks I'm a "doll." (Apparently a very good Southern compliment... I always love a good compliment. I make Spencer tell me over and over again what he thought the first time he met me, when he proposed, when he first saw me on our wedding day, etc.... hahahaha ) So all in all a very good day of travel.

It's good to be in the beautiful Northwest!!!

A little mimi...

2007-12-10T14:09:00.000-06:00

I spent entirely too much on this, but oh well... it was fun!

The rules are for each question type your answer into Google Image Search. Pick one image from the 1st page results. (I couldn't pick just one picture...)

1. Age you will be at your next birthday

2. Place you'd like to travel to

Tides Playa del Carmen:

(Our honeymoon spot... when can we go back?!?!?!?)

Paris and Italy with Spencer:

3. Favorite Place

Anywhere with Spencer:

(This picture cracked me up)

With my family:

Coffee with friends:

Washington DC in the fall:

Washington DC in the Spring:

4. Favorite Objects

My bible that Spencer gave me on our wedding day:

(what's ironic is that when I put this in google image, only one picture was of a bible... yet there was a picture of a bride and a tank. Go figure.)

Shoes:

Jewelry:

Flowers:

Computers:

5. Favorite Foods
Gluten-Free, Goat cheese pizza (But honestly I love Pizza Hut... stupid gluten)

Chocolate,

AND CHOCOLATE!!!!!

6. Favorite Colors
Pink:

Tiffany Blue:

7. Nickname

Sarah-Barah:

That's what my Dad calls me... and I thought this picture was HILARIOUS!!! Some girl named Sarah Barah created a myspace group that is in love with this guy. HA!

Rah:

-- you know, the last three letters of my name. My Uncle gave this nickname to me when I was really young and calls me by it to this day. Love it.

Princess *OR* Pretty, Pretty Princes:

Whatever you prefer ;-)

8. Place where you were born

Pittsburgh Pennsylvania

I don't remember it being this pretty...

2007-12-09T07:25:00.000-06:00

I stole the following from my sister's blog. It was so beautiful that it brought tears to my eyes and I just had to re-post it. Hope you are blessed and encouraged...

I will not forget waking up to the bells
The abbey billows from behind

Waking up to the sun over the Mt. of Olives

In triumphal procession over the valleys below.

Dwarfed by the walls that seemingly protect

The record of what has been and what is to come.

I will not read your words the same

They speak so differently now

Rich like the moon over the citadel of David

Deep like the tightly knit valleys and streaming rivers.

I will not forget how your voice sounded against St Anne’s walls

Grand waves of sound sensation, melodically moving

Speaking bravery into insecurity

Painting my soul with dreams and trust, wiping away any trace of trembling.

I will not forget that you have been my portion

I will not forget but rejoice that the boundary lines of my life have fallen in pleasant places

I will not forget that you are the God who dwells in the very crevices of my soul

Yet commands a place of honor in the promise land.

Oh, I will not forget

I will only remember the every shape of this Holy land

How You’ve fought for Your children

And still you captured me, enraptured me,

You tell me the epic story of who You have been, who You are, and all that You will ever be

For all who journey with You.

OREGON TREES FOR SALE!!!

2007-12-06T22:20:00.000-06:00

This is the sign I saw the other day driving home. That's right people, here in Texas they have to IMPORT their Christmas trees into the state.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but growing up in the Evergreen state with Christmas tree farms in great supply, I've grown accustomed to trekking up on a cold fall day to saw (or watch Dad and Em do all the work) down our family tree. I miss it....

And, Spencer just informed me that it never stays cold here. All winter long it'll just go between 30-50 degree days to 70-85 degree days. Totally and completely lame. I feel a bit misled, but Spencer swears he told me that it gets cold, warm, and then cold again. But he left out the part about that cycle repeating itself. He says that when he said it there was an implied "..." at the end. Whatever. I just thought it got warm once and then stayed cold.

Hmmmm.... no real Christmas tree farms and bi-polar weather. I'm not so sure about all of this. But I do love a lot of other things... guess the jury's still out.

Mary's song

2007-12-04T00:34:00.001-06:00

Luke 1:45-55

"And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord." And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever."

On Friday Spencer's taking me to...

2007-12-03T10:48:00.001-06:00

THE NUTCRACKER!!!!!!!

I am SO excited. Over dinner Friday night Spencer gave me the tickets as an early Christmas party. I asked him if he was so excited and his response was Mmmm-hmmm. Ok... not totally convinced. Then I asked him if he's ever seen it before. He replied that he did as a child and he fell asleep. Ha.... it's going to be a magical night! :-)

In other news it was 82 degrees yesterday... yes, you heard that right!!! I was not excited to have the air conditioning on in December, but was happy to wake up to a much colder morning today. At least we have sun almost everyday.

Ok, that's all for now. Not very exciting, but at least it's a new post!

Happy, HAPPY Thanksgiving

2007-11-22T22:32:00.000-06:00

We just turned on the heat in our apartment for the very first time. It went from 89 degrees yesterday to 40 degrees when we went to bed. That was followed by a very cold Thanksgiving day. LOVE IT!!!!

Amazing family, good food, lots of thankfulness.... life is so good.

Enjoy the feast of life everyone!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

2007-11-21T09:30:00.000-06:00

Mom and Dad are flying in today and I am SO excited!!! We'll join Ron and Jan at Aunt Patti and Uncle Ethan's house in San Antonio. It's going to be so grand to be together!

These are pictures from when Mom and Dad were here in August... yeah I've been pathetic at blogging. This first picture was taken at one of the Longhorn's practices... we had such hope for the season. But if Oklahoma can lose again we might just make it to a bowl game. (Yes people, I am talking football and I actually know what I'm talking about. Amazing, huh?)

This was Dad's birthday cookie... I had them put a dog on it in honor of Gucci. HA!

And last, but certainly not least... we're going to desperately miss my baby sister this Thanksgiving. This will be the first Thanksgiving that we haven't spent all together as a family. Sad. Hopefully she'll be able to eat some decent turkey in Israel.

Love you Emmy!!!!

(Notice the difference in quality between the first two pictures taken by our camera and the third one, taken by Jeremy at the rehearsal dinner. I wish he could just follow us around being our photographer. Jer, D? What do you think? Want to move to Austin and just photograph us all the time? Hahahahaha)

I adore Bridget Beth...

2007-11-15T23:14:00.000-06:00

When I moved to Philadelphia last year to be closer to Spencer, Bridget wrote me the most amazing card. She wished me love and happiness as I embarked on a romantic journey that was sure to be full of love and adventure. She told me that I would be very missed, but was so excited for me to go off and be with the man I would marry. And at the end she told me she would completely support me if I ever changed my mind and came home.

That's Bridget for you... she sweeps you off into the wonder and magic life has to offer, and is completely there for you when things are a bit yuckier. I have been blessed, as have all her other blog readers, to have been daily swept into her world as I read about her enchanting and encouraging life.

I love you Bridge... you captivate me constantly. I hope you return to us soon. Praying for you and wishing I could give you a hug right now.

2007-11-12T17:39:00.000-06:00

Kendall's visit: tons of adventures, little sleep, lots of laughter and complete weirdness at all times. Love it.

Classic Kendall:

With the lovely Katherine watching the UT/Tech game. Of course we dominated (sorry Rebekah); hook'em! Yes, those are beads around our heads. Burnt orange-football beads to be exact. Why? Who knows. Not sure why people are ever intimidated by us... especially SPU girls. But maybe it was the fact that we use to prance around in heels on the most heel-unfriendly campus ever.

Kendall's excited face at seeing the capitol for the first time.

This is our myspace bathroom picture showing just how hot we are. ;-)

At a bar called "Aquarium" standing in front of an aquarium. Strange place.

Miss you Ken-doll! Ready for you to move to Austin anytime now. ;-)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY....

2007-11-07T17:24:00.000-06:00

TO ME!!!! ;-)

Bad blogger...

2007-11-03T16:04:00.000-05:00

I've been really bad at blogging lately... I don't really have a good excuse. I just haven't felt like writing about things...

A lot has been going on... mostly really great stuff, but none that I've really wanted to talk about on here. I was in Seattle last weekend (yes, you did read that right) for a memorial. My dear friend Kay who threw me a wedding shower and was my personal attendant on my wedding day, lost her husband to cancer. He was almost to his last chemo session when he got an infection. It was incredibly sudden and incredibly devastating. He was a huge Huskies fan, so they had a tail-gate themed party to celebrate his life. Even though it was a sad reason to come up, it was nice seeing old friends at the tailgate and getting to spend some time with my parents. On Sunday we did some early birthday shopping and my parents got me some fabulous clothing! (Sorry to everyone I didn't get to see... I really didn't have the chance to visit anyone on this short trip)

I'm working part-time on a contract basis for our church right now. It's been going really well and I've enjoyed having some activities in my day-to-day life here in Austin. Other than that, we're just gearing up for all our visitors this month... so excited!!!!

I love married life and am starting to feel very settled in our happy little life here in Austin. The weather is cooler which is awesome, and the constant sunshine is so wonderful. Hopefully I'll get a little more inspired in my blogging... sorry for the lameness! :-)

FALL IS HERE!!!!!!!!!!

2007-10-22T16:49:00.000-05:00

After a lovely weekend in Colorado (where it snowed on Sunday. Yup... about 5 inches) I came home to my wonderful husband the following...

FALL WEATHER!!!!! That's right people... after what seemed to be an endless summer of 90+ degree weather (with some humidity), we finally have cold weather! I couldn't be happier. I secretly had started to doubt that it was ever going to get cold.

But I feel as though I deserve some of the credit because I've been trying to manipulate the weather into getting cold for the last two weeks. I started by using Bridget's trick of boiling spices on the stove which was SO AMAZING. Then I bought the best pumpkin in the whole entire world at Whole Foods.

It's one of the Texas Heirloom Pumpkins and it is called the "Fairytale Pumpkin." How delightful is that?!?! It basically looks like the orange pumpkin in the middle of this picture....

Although, the picture really doesn't do it justice... and I've been too lazy to take a picture. Anyway, I totally love the pumpkin even though it was a tad bit over-priced. But I officially feel like Texas has the best pumpkins ever, which is some sort of consolation considering I was wearing a jean skirt, t-shirt and sandals when I purchased it. Now I just need to find a corn husk to put near the pumpkin and maybe some squash... then it will be perfect.

So between the spices and the pumpkin, I think I single-handedly brought fall weather to Texas. And to celebrate, we're going to make...

my Mom's amazing vegetable-beef stew (and Spencer's going to make his chili which is one of his family's fall traditions). It is so yummy and it's my favorite thing to make in the fall, but up until now I've refused to make it because it was still hot outside.

Oh the bliss of a perfect, autumn day.

"I thought the Rockies would be a whole lot rockier than this..."

2007-10-17T06:37:00.000-05:00

Woo-hoo... I'm headed to Colorado to see Ellie and Stephen today! SO EXCITED!!!! I am totally ready for a weekend of shear girly-ness. (Sorry Stephen) Here's what our time will include: talking, laughing, talking, shopping, talking, watching Sex and the City, talking, pedicures, talking and I think probably some more talking. ;-)

It's going to be fabulous!

On a sadder note I hate having to leave Spencer. This will be the first time we've been apart since the wedding. And since we didn't live in the same city until we were married, I've been totally spoiled getting to be with him every single day!!!! I love being married. :-)

To my love...

2007-10-12T12:13:00.000-05:00

Happy Birthday to you....
Happy Birthday to you....
Happy Birthday dear Spencer,
Happy Birthday to you!!!!

I am so thankful that God has put you in my life and couldn't possibly love you anymore! It's been an incredible year and you have made it more magical than I ever could have imagined. Thank you for being such a wonderful husband... I love you!!!!

And thanks Jan for giving birth to this wonderful man 29 years ago. I asked him last night how long your labor was and he said he's never asked. That's a guy for you. Hopefully he didn't make you suffer too much. ;-)

Say what?

2007-10-09T22:37:00.000-05:00

Sarah: Do you know how much I love you?

Spencer: I don't know, this much? (Holding up a tiny space between thumb and forefinger)

Sarah: (exasperated) NO! I love you to infinity and beyond!!!!

Spencer: There is no such thing...

Sarah: Yes there is. I made it up just for you!

Spencer: No you didn't, Buzz Lightyear did.

Sarah: Oops. I thought I had heard it somewhere before. Well you know, words to live by.

Addendum to previous post...

2007-10-02T13:12:00.001-05:00

Apparently the guy wearing the #12 jersey in the video is NOT our esteemed QB, Colt McCoy. Spencer tells me there are so many football players that they run out of numbers and use the same number for both offense and defense players.

Well, I think that's just dumb. How's a girls supposed to watch a You Tube video and know that the #12 dancer is not Colt? Seriously. And I have to say that my love for football may have dropped a bit... I was so excited thinking the boy had dance moves. Definitely disappointed.

However, they have inspired me to learn the Soulja Boy dance. I've almost got it down... except I almost knocked over a lamp this morning doing it. Spencer says that when it comes to dancing I have no coordination or control over my body. He also said I should not move the bottom half of my body when I dance... I think he's just jealous of my skills. Ok, ok... maybe he is right, but I really hate to admit that.

Intriguing

2007-10-01T13:53:00.001-05:00

At the second reception this weekend (will explain later why there were two receptions) I saw this dance for the very first time. Hadn't even heard the song "Crank Dat Soulja Boy" before... yes, I must not be hip and with it anymore. Anyway, when I tried to replicate part of the dance for Spencer last night (btw...he says I'm the worst dancer ever and I think he might be right) he laughed and used this video to show me what it really looks like.

See why I like football now? Yes, I did admit that I like football... but really I meant that I like UT football. These guys are entertaining! And they know how to move... I can respect anyone who knows how to move. And you can even catch Colt (the QB... #12) dancing as well. Who knew the boy had rhytym? I have a whole new love and respect for the Longhorns. Hook 'em!

Exciting things to come...

2007-10-01T00:08:00.000-05:00

We spent the weekend in Hereford (in the Panhandle of Texas) to celebrate Spencer's cousin's wedding. Spencer and his Dad took pictures, Jan and I helped decorate, and I made my Hereford debut playing wedding music and singing Shania Twain's "From This Moment On." Classic.

Will post some pictures and narrative soon... could possibly include the debut of cowboy boots. I know, shocking.

Happy Monday everyone!

SO EXCITED!!!!

2007-09-27T14:44:00.001-05:00

Office season premier tonight... don't miss it!

Spencer says his favorite part is watching me laugh :-)

Reason #152 why I should eat breakfast in the morning...

2007-09-26T18:15:00.001-05:00

I recently joined the gym, Lifetime Fitness, and was told they have locations in a lot of different places. Sweet. Last night we drove up to Dallas for Spencer to do some work stuff and so we can fly out of here to go to Hereford this weekend for Spencer's cousin's wedding. I was told they have about 5 locations in the Dallas area so I was excited that I could work out this week and next.

Anyhoo... after dropping Spencer off at work this morning, I headed to Central Market. Upon arriving I noticed one of my gyms! This was so awesome especially since I wasn't even looking for it! So I headed in and handed them my membership card... the girl gave me a look like "What in the world do you think this is and why did you hand it to me?" I looked back at her confused and asked her "What?" She responded by saying "This is a Lifetime Fitness card." "Isn't this Lifetime Fitness?" I replied. Looking at me like I am a fool, she coldly responded "No, this is LA Fitness."

I sheepishly smiled, said sorry, and walked out the door. Yup, Sarah wins the smart award for the day.

I really shouldn't be allowed out of the house without breakfast... my blood sugar levels just don't allow it. Either I am a complete space cadet or a fire-breathing dragon. Nice, huh?

Totally and completely jealous...

2007-09-24T18:14:00.000-05:00

... it's fall and it's 87 degrees here. Yuck. Bleh. Gross. Dumb. Unfair. Silly. Nonsensical. Dumb. Unreasonable. Not-fun. Lame. Did I mention Dumb?

Fall is my absolute favorite season and I'm so jealous of everyone who is enjoying crisp mornings, evenings snuggled under blankets, my Mom's beef-vegetable stew, apple cider and the list goes on and on.

I could light my fall candle (pumpkin spice) but I don't feel it is appropriate while we still have the air conditioning on.

Oh well, I may be gloating in another two months when it's beautiful and everyone in Seattle is dealing with the gray skies. Or I could act like an adult. Gloating it is. :-)

And can I just add that I'm getting sick of the new Old Navy commercials? "If you are chilly, here take my sweater..." No, I'm not chilly. In fact I'm hot and sweaty on a way too regular basis, so I don't want your sweater.

BTW... I promise I'm actually in a good mood right now. And for those of you wondering, this blog is meant to be fun and lighthearted. I don't take what I write or myself too seriously most of the time, and you shouldn't either. I think most of my readers get that, but just wanted to clarify for a certain anonymous poster.

I Heart Tim Gunn

2007-09-19T18:22:00.000-05:00

I just love Tim Gunn. I first fell in love while watching him on Project Runway... brilliant show, but my love has reached new heights with his new show Tim Gunn's Guide To Style. I just love the man!!! He's totally his own, unique person and always gives his opinion... even when it may be harsh, but you never hate him for it! He seems like he is a genuinely nice person and truly cares about others, so you totally fall in love with him! And he's so cute!!! I just want to pinch his cheeks whenever stares at someone or something over his glasses and talks about fashion... love it!

After watching Guide to Style and talking about Tim Gunn almost non-stop for about 20 minutes earlier in the evening, Spencer and I had the following conversation while we were getting ready for bed:

Me: I just adore Tim Gunn

Spencer: Uh-huh

Me: Do you feel threatened?

Spencer: By a middle-aged, gay guy? No, I'm not threatened.

Isn't my husband the best?!?!?!?!

Happy Birthday to me!!!

2007-09-14T18:57:00.000-05:00

Nope... it's not my birthday yet, but I just found out that my beautiful friend Ken-doll is going to come and visit me in November! My birthday is on the 7th and she's coming the 8th through the 11th. Woo-hoo!!!! Ellie in October, Kendall in November... I am one lucky girl!!!

"Don't be jealous just because we're so ridiculously good-looking."

This is what we'll be doing the majority of the time...

... minus the double-chin, thank you very much.

Yes!!!

2007-09-11T14:02:00.000-05:00

Our wedding pictures are now on Jeremy's newly designed website! I have always been SO excited to have Jeremy take my wedding pictures AND then have them on his website.... so happy, happy day!

Check them out... www.jeremyleffel.com ...you seriously won't be disappointed! And I promise, once I go through the pictures a little more I'll get our favorites posted somewhere.

And Jeremy, thanks for all the flower girl pictures. ;-)

While watching the Cowboys...

2007-09-09T19:55:00.000-05:00

Sarah: I hope I don't dream about football tonight.

Spencer: I hope I do...

I want to go back...

2007-09-06T11:53:00.000-05:00

Today is our two month anniversary... that's right, two months of marital bliss! But I'm kind of wishing we could head back to our fabulous honeymoon spots. Spencer did an AMAZING job planning the perfect honeymoon... he completely surprised me, the only thing I knew was that we were headed to Mexico! Here are a few (ok, ok... so I kind of went a little photo crazy) pictures to show you what an amazing trip we had!

Spencer took me to Playa del Carmen, Mexico. It's about 45 minutes from Cancun and was absolutely incredible. The first place we stayed at was The Tides Riviera Maya and it was beyond belief. (Seriously, check out the link) We had our own private villa with a dipping pool. There were only 30 villas total at the resort, so it was very quiet and private. Everywhere you went you had to walk along these enchanting jungle paths. They were lined with lanterns, bird cages which were curiously empty, and beautiful vegetation. The occasional lizard could also be seen running around.

Every morning we had breakfast delivered to our villa and it was so wonderful. My favorite part was the freshly sliced mangos and the freshly squeezed mango juice... delicious! Everything was so magical about this place... our villa was mysteriously cleaned everyday whenever we went down to the beach-- no matter what time we went down. We never once saw a cleaner which made us think that someone down at the water would alert the cleaners when we came down. Everyone seemed to know who we were and it was so delightful to always be greeted as "Mr. and Mrs. Whelan." I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, but this truly was the most amazing vacation I've ever been on!

This is one of the "jungle paths" that we walked on to get anywhere

The walkway to the beach which was absolutely stunning

The glorious pool... loved it!

Seaside bar... also loved it, although the drinks weren't that great

Our hammock and dipping pool... we had breakfast at the little table to the left every morning.

Our incredible bed which was made twice everyday. I loved sleeping with the canopy closed. Amazing!

View from inside the villa... loved the sliding doors which made it even more luxurious!

No description needed.... BEAUTIFUL!!!

Me and my hubby enjoying lunch under the thatched cabana-thingy

A cute drink that didn't really taste good

Part of our honeymoon package at the Tides included a Mayan wedding ceremony. Now this service on its own is valued at $500 (not sure why) and we tried to get them to let us trade it for another dinner (we had to pay for our own meals outside of the included breakfast and dinner on the beach) but they wouldn't let us. So we decided, what the heck... let's have a Mayan wedding ceremony!

Our "wedding" was scheduled for 6:00pm and around 5:45 two women came to our villa to dress us for the ceremony. They wrapped me in a white skirt and put a traditional Mayan wedding shirt on me. They also put a crown of flowers in my head... definitely much different than what I wore for the wedding! Then at 6 they came back to the villa pounding drums, playing a pan flute, and chanting. Before we went outside I looked at Spencer and told him it sounded like the tribe was coming to take us to our death.

We went outside and were told that as we walked down to the water we must remain touching... this was very important. It was about a 10 minute walk down to the beach and the whole time they were playing their music and chanting. The "Shaman" (he may have been Mayan, but I don't think he was really a Shaman. He had his name, Jose, tattooed on his arm and he was the one who cleaned up after the ceremony) led the way waving a smoking thingy and leading the chants. Very amusing.

We got down to the beach and the ceremony began...

Here's the Shaman praying to the North, South, East, and West for their blessing/permission to be married.

These baskets of beans and flowers represented different elements of the earth. At one point in the ceremony, we mixed the white and yellow flower petals together to show our lives becoming one... or something like that. Later on they had us throw those petals into the ocean and make wishes for our marriage... I wished for lots of baby girls ;-).

Throwing the petals and making our "wishes"

During the ceremony we noticed everyone at the pool and beach were watching us. After we were finished and enjoying our complimentary drink on the beach (see below), many people came up to congratulate us and tell us how beautiful the ceremony was. My response in my head? You should have seen the real ceremony!!!

Our Mayan wedding was quite the experience and we have a lot of fun memories from it. Who wouldn't like having the majority of a hotel staff devoted to you for about an hour? :-)

Make sure you get Spencer to do the chant for you... he's pretty good at it. I can only remember one word: Hatch. And I don't even pronounce that correctly. In fact, when we had to say our "vows" in Mayan I got totally freaked out when I had to say them by myself. I doubt I really said anything...

After our Mayan wedding ceremony, we had a wonderful private dinner on the beach. It was so incredible and romantic! Ok... I really want to go back!!!

After several days at The Tides, we were ready to head to our next resort which was all-inclusive and had a little more to do. Our next stop was The Royal Hideaway and it was incredible as well. We were welcomed with a fresh wash cloth and glass of champagne. After checking into our room and swimming for a little bit, we headed to a show. It was supposed to be like Cirque de Solei, but it was more comical than anything else. My favorites from the show:

* Selena wannabe singing LeAnn Rhime's "How do I"
* Techno guy twirling a neon cube thing after doing the robot... classic
* A clown who wasn't funny
* Our waiters getting on stage to "perform" making the dessert
and finally...
* Three men who basically posed on each other. See pictures below... no further explanation needed. We laughed all night.

This is just how great housekeepers were at both places... they lined up my shoes! :-)

The swan and elephant... made out of towels. I thought the swan kind of looked like a snake. Freaked me out a little bit.

Our second dinner on the beach... wasn't as private, but was still amazing!

One of the great things about the Royal Hideaway was that it was all-inclusive. This was the pool-side bar where they would get our drinks that they delivered to us while we were in the pool! If you look closely you can see my favorite drink... a pina coloda and strawberry daquiri mixed... so good! And the restaurants were absolutely incredible! The whole thing was just phenomenal!

Ok, so this post is probably entirely too long, but I LOVED our honeymoon and I LOVE my husband for putting so much thought into planning the perfect vacation! I also LOVE my in-laws for giving us our honeymoon as our wedding gift! It was so incredible and we were so blessed to be able to go... it would have been a much different trip if they hadn't been so generous!

So... when are we going back?

Rocky Mountain High

2007-09-05T10:47:00.000-05:00

Come the middle of October, I'm headed to Denver to visit my beautiful Elle-Belle! We found an amazing deal from Southwest Dingfares and I can't wait to spend a weekend with my precious friend! Since Ellie and Stephen moved to Denver a year ago, I've only seen Ellie when we've been in the midst of wedding craziness and I'm so excited to hang out with her when we can just chill and laugh (which I guarantee we'll do a lot of!) and not stress out about wedding invitations or other such decisions that thankfully no longer have to be made!

It's just too bad that it won't be ski season yet. I'm trying to convince Spencer to ski with us, but for some reason he thinks he won't be good at it. Whatever... I can totally teach him. Or Stephen can teach him while Ellie and I go off to ski/dance (we have routines... seriously, we do) on our own. Ha!

Here are some more of the professional pictures. I still have to sort through all of them before I can post them to a site where everyone can see... I doubt you all want to look through 1200+ pictures! Although I could all day long! :-)

BTW... the JT concert was fabulous. And Spencer had one of his songs stuck in his head all day yesterday which is equally fabulous. I spent the day writing thank you notes and only got around 30 done in a 5-6 hour period... not fabulous. Oh well, only 80+ more to go!

Ok... that is all for now. Sorry for the random post!