Christmas Time is Here!

Steven and I are very excited to be celebrating our first married Christmas! Tomorrow is our half-iversary ... we'll have been married for 6 months!! We bought our first Christmas tree (my little 4 footer wasn't really working for us), and spent some time shopping and picking out some new ornaments and some outdoor decorations. We know it's silly, but we decided to go ahead and put lights out on our porch/balcony. I love seeing lights outside! I'll update with pictures of outside and of our little Christmas village another day. For now, here's the tree and ornaments!

First, the tree and the presents I (finally!) finished wrapping.

And the obligatory first Christmas Ornament. I knew I wanted something personalized, and it took me awhile to find something I liked. That resulted in this being one of the last ornaments to make it onto the tree!

We also picked up an ornament for Foster when we bought our personalized ornaments. We knew this one was perfect when we saw it, since our dog can hear the treat jar being opened from across the apartment.

Our pastor talked a couple of weeks ago about how his wife decorates for Christmas. He said that they make it a point not to focus on the baby so much that they forget about the sacrifice that came later. For that reason most of their decorations are crosses. I hope to find a new cross ornament every year to add to our tree. Here's our first!

Anyone who knows Steven knows how much he loves football, especially the Cowboys. We, of course, had to add several Dallas Cowboys ornaments to our tree. Because our tree is decorated in Blue and Silver (to look wintry and snowy of course), Steven has decided that it's a Dallas Cowboys tree. He's wrong of course, but believing that seems to make him happy!

The rest of the tree is decorated with ornaments that I've been collecting since Suzi and I got a tree in college. I'll try to post more of those with the rest of the decorations we put up later on this week. Last but not least is our angel. Ever since I was little I have loved the big, ornate angels, and I found one this year that I love!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

November Resolutions

So, in order to avoid the horrific-ness that is holiday weight gain, I recently started a new diet and exercise plan. So far it's all going ok, but it's hard not to eat bread!! I love love love bread. I'm already seeing results though, which is major motivation!

I also found out last week that my temporary job would end last Friday (the 30th), so I'm on the job hunt again. It's really frustrating, especially because I loved my job so much!

In the meantime, I'm playing housewife, which should (I hope) mean pictures of the new place soon! Especially since it's not so new anymore!

I feel so fancy...

Right before I left for Vegas, Steven's parents took all of us out to celebrate my birthday. We had a yummy dinner (although we spent a good portion of it being appalled by the clothing choices of the teenage girls headed to their homecoming dance), and went back to their house, where I wasn't expecting anything, other than a book I'd asked Steven for. He specifically told me that they were going to give me my present when they got home, and I thought that the shoes and purse I'd bought earlier in the month were my birthday presents from Steven. I was shocked when I was handed a big gift back that clearly weighed far too much to be a single paperback.

I opened it, and was shocked to find my very own Amazon Kindle. If you haven't used one before, holy cow, this is the coolest thing ever! I just finished my first book (yay for airplane reading) and just sent a new one to the Kindle from the Amazon store. For all of my fellow book lovers out there... this thing is worth every penny!

There is one downfall (although I will admit that it bothers Laura more than me) is that I can't share books with my sister anymore!

Off to Vegas

I leave for Las Vegas at 9:30 tomorrow morning, and I'll be gone for two whole weeks! I probably won't be able to update while I'm there, but I'm sure I'll have lots when I return. Hopefully the show will go great, and I'll be able to have some fun too!

Steven's moving some vacation around, so he'll be able to spend almost a week there with me. I'm sure that'll make it much easier.

Everyone have a great couple of weeks!

Go Cowboys!

I grew up in Texas. This means that football is not completely foreign to me. I (vaguely) remember the Cowboy's glory days in my childhood. I loved high school football, and followed Baylor football (sad as it may have been) throughout my college days.

One thing that was never prominent in my life was the Sunday afternoon obsession with professional football. Up until a year and a half or so ago, I really didn't know (or care) who was NFC vs AFC, and I usually had to look up who was going to the Super Bowl the week before so I didn't sound utterly clueless.

What can I say? Until I was 15, there was only one man in my house (seriously... even the cat was a girl), and my Dad was never a huge football fan. When we watched sports, it was typically the Olympics or occasionally baseball when my Aunt was around. Football was reserved for Friday Nights and Super Bowl parties with the youth group.

I am currently experiencing my second football season married to a die hard fan, who is from a die hard fan family. I have to say, it is an experience! I may not be the biggest football fan, but I am, slowly but surely learning to roll with it. And hey, the occasions where you can yell at the TV without looking like a complete idiot are few and far between. So, like it or not, I'm becoming a football... wait, scratch that ... Cowboys fan.

But I WILL NOT be caught dead in a pink Tony Romo jersey. I can promise you that!

Wordless Wednesday - Cuteness from the Weekend!

We're Home!

We made it back from Lubbock, safe and sound. Steven and I did get in a short walk, and I ran a few intervals on Saturday. Laura and I are back to running tomorrow!

Thunder and Lightning Do Not a Good Run Make

Laura and I headed out again (this time with Steven and Foster in tow) for day 2 of Couch-2-5K. I was able to jog for one more 90 second time frame than last time, and wasn't nearly as tired at the end of it. I probably would have been able to run one more, but the impending storms finally got scary enough that we gave up and headed home. Still no run, but way too much lightning for my taste.

Steven and I are heading to Lubbock this weekend to visit friends. Steven's best man Derek lives there with his wife Ashley and their two kids... one of whom was our ring bearer!

This is a shot of Derek and Thadan (the ring bearer) when they came to visit us in March. We took them to the zoo and had so much fun!

For those of you who weren't at the wedding, I'm pretty sure that Thadan was the most focused ring bearer I've ever seen. He practiced, practiced, practiced, and took his job very seriously. Of course, he did great! This is a shot of us with the whole family at the wedding. Well almost the whole family! Lucas was tired and not feeling photogenic, so he hid.

Saturday will be the first day for Laura and I to go solo on our runs, but I think Steven said he'd come to the park in Lubbock and walk while I run, and that should help!

Everyone have a great Labor Day!

I thought I was out of shape...

And I was right! Last night was rough! But I'm not giving up. Even though I couldn't run all of the intervals, I did run a couple of them, and I walked the rest of the time without stopping. Even that's an improvement over my usual couch potato self!

We run again Thursday! Goal for Thursday: Run at least half of the intervals.

Put on Your Running Shoes...

Ok, so it's more like dig them out of the bottom of the closet. I can admit that I'm not great ... ok make that I'm really bad ... about working out. When I do it all the time, I actually enjoy it, but I have trouble getting started, and I get distracted ... ok make that I make excuses ... alot.

But that ends today (I hope!). Laura and I are starting Couch to 5K tonight! It's a 9 week running program for people who aren't runners (like me!). We'll probably take more than 9 weeks to get through it (most of what I've read says most people take at least 12). It also only requires exercise 3 times a week (totally doable) and it transitions you up slowly from walking to jogging.

You can find the plan here: http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_3/181.shtml

Now for the goal: Allison (other little sister) is on student council this year and they're working a Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure later in the year. We want to be able to do more than walk it, we want to be able to run it!

In hopes of keeping myself accountable, I'm going to post how the workout goes every week. If you don't see a post here 3 times a week (we're aiming for Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday), call me on it!

That's all for now... week 1 starts tonight! I'll let you know how it goes.

Bad Blogger

I am such a bad blogger. I'm going to attempt to update this a little more often. Hopefully with pictures of the apartment if I can ever find my camera cord!

We haven't been up to much, other than working and playing with the puppy, but we did get to go see Wicked in Austin last weekend. That was amazing! Steven even loved it. I think I've finally convinced him that Broadway is good! Next stop ... Mary Poppins during the fair (I hope!).

School starts tomorrow, and it's the first time in my entire life, that I'm not going back! It's a very strange feeling. I'm not sure I like it! I miss buying school supplies :(

Work is going to be nuts this week, but I'm hoping to update at LEAST once a week! We'll see how that goes.

Happy Birthday Steven!

I can't wait to spend all day with you just having fun! Hope you have a fantastic 30th Birthday! I love you!

Happy Fourth of July!

We hope everyone enjoys all the festivities today! Don't forget to take a moment and remember those that are fighting for our freedom.

Churn, Churn, Churn

When we went to register for gifts for our wedding last fall, I intentionally left one thing off the list ... an ice cream maker! I was convinced we'd never use it, and I didn't see the point in watching it collect dust.

Well we opened our gifts on Sunday, and lo and behold, someone shopped off the registry and bought us an ice cream maker. They also included a very sweet note explaining the gift. While I won't share the complete note, the couple who gave it told us that they found it to be a great tool in marriage. They told us that whenever we hit a rough patch or an argument to just whip up a batch of ice cream, and, without fail, our argument would churn away with the ice cream. They also reminded us that it was for the good times as well, and a great way to celebrate.

And were they ever right. We used it for the first time last night, and I made up a batch of banana ice cream tonight to take over to John and Donna's for our little 4th of July celebration, and believe it or not, it really does bring out the kid in everyone! Steven and I had a blast making (and tasting) our new favorite dessert!

Tonight's recipe is from the Spork or Foon blog (and she adapted it from Pink Bites)

No-cook Banana Ice Cream Recipe: Adapted from PinkBites.com

makes 1 quart

You will need:

2 cups of half and half

1 can of sweetened condensed milk

1 cup of heavy cream

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 very ripe bananas

2 teaspoons of fresh lemon juice

Mix together the first four ingredients until combined, making sure the condensed milk is well blended with the other liquids. Chill until cold.

Pour mixture into an ice cream maker and freeze accordingly.

Mash the bananas with the lemon juice and add to the ice cream maker 2 minutes before it's finished. Transfer ice cream to a freezer safe container, cover and freeze for at least 3 hours.

I have a 4 qt ice cream maker and I doubled the recipe, it might be a little more than 5 people need, but it filled the ice cream maker perfectly!

Give it a try and let me know what you think!

And married life begins...

We got back from our honeymoon today after a crazy day and a half of traveling. We picked up Foster (who battled fleas while we were gone) from the parents and headed back to our apartment in the million degree heat! Now it's laundry and unpacking everything ... so much for the honeymoon, it's back to life!