dobby

dobby is our new shihranian puppy (half shih tzu/half pomeranian) we got him last friday, and since then, our lives have been taken over by this 3 pound ball of fur. we are having sleepless nights, worry about his bad habits (he has too many to mention) and can't even believe how happy we are he is in our lives. how could you not love this little face?!

a reason to drink coffee

normally i don't need a good reason to drink coffee. if it's brewed, or within a few miles distance...i'm there! however, tonight i had a really good reason to make a pot and drink 2 (or was it 3?) cups. we had a new mug! 

the mug came today as a christmas gift from one of our insurance partners. i was bracing myself for a paper weight or something engraved, so imagine my surprise when matt pulled out a robin egg's blue box. yes, it was a tiffany's box! once my pulse returned to it's normal level, i started to wonder what could possibly be in a tiffany's box that big. well, as it turns out, the box was home to a 'mug'. i know that's probably a misnomer for anything that comes from tiffany's, but i have to be honest and say that it is really quite hideous. i was hoping for a simple pattern, even solid white, but instead, the mug is covered in a muted map pattern! i probably wouldn't pay $3 for this mug at tj maxx, and now, i'm discovering i can't put it in the microwave (gold in the handle) and probably not in the dishwasher either!

however, i will put it on our shelf and use it every so often, and it will become part of the mug collection that every house has, because who can ever get rid of mugs? my other favorites - the 'it's a girl' mug that matt gave me as a 'prize' the first time we hung out together, a bright orange mug that matt picked out of a whole store when i made him spend the last bit of a gift card, and a recent mug from ella saying 'aunt-like mom...only cooler'. it's nice to know the tiffany's mug will have a home on the island of misfit mugs. 

st. francis would have been proud. for a moment.

while petsitting at tony and rachels, i let their dog pal out into the back yard. i noticed the neighbor boys playing with a chicken in the house behind theirs. it sounds sweet, but what they were really doing is carrying this chicken around by the tail. being the defender of animals that i am, i asked them if that was their chicken.

'yes, he's ours.' so i told them they should be nice to their chicken.
'oh yes, we're really nice. he likes when we pet him' i encouraged them to only pet the chicken from now on, rather than dragging it around by the tail.

i went back inside and those little kids started chasing the chicken, grabbing it by the tail when it was cornered, then throwing it against the tree. that was the last straw. i came running out of the house, so angry, and told them i never want to see them treat their chicken that way again. it made me very sad to see them, and do they think the chicken likes being treated that way? to all this they said (keep in mind they are about 3 and 5 years old) 'you mean you can really see us?'

i took advantage of this moment and told them i could see EVERYTHING and they should never be mean to their chicken again. then they ran into the house, leaving the chicken in peace for awhile. i was feeling very self righteous and stormed back into the house wondering how i had so quickly transformed into a scary-neighbor-lady i'm sure! i told matt the whole situation) we had just sat down to eat before all this. i picked up my fork, and realized i had just stabbed a huge piece of sesame chicken! for all my efforts to save that one little chicken from suffering, i sure had a lot of his relative on my plate!

i think there is a verse about this...pulling a speck out of someone else's eye?!

so much salmon

yesterday was an early morning drive to curves, so it was nice to come home at 1 and have the whole afternoon free. matt and i had grilled cheese then drove up to the zoo for about an hour. since it's been so rainy, the animals were all out and playing in the cooler weather. one of the best 'animal times' at the zoo. one of the leopards had a cub a few weeks old, so they were playing together just feet away from us. i just wanted to curl up with them both and take a little snooze in the sun!

when we came back, we made our alaskan salmon 4 ways (thanks, elisha for the recipes!): smoked salmon fettucini alfredo, smoked salmon dip, sour cream dill and lemon baked salmon, and a sort of sweet and sour version. tony and rachel came over for the fish feast, then we watched the ohio state game until late.

now, i'm looking at a huge bowl of leftover salmon dip wondering why i made over a pound?? i'm not sure how long this kind of thing keeps....

lemon zest candle burning

the apartment has that delicious after-cleaning feel. i went early to curves to cover the morning shift. i loved getting a chance to chat with the ladies. so much of the time i'm doing paperwork, or on the computer, or phone, so it's a rare thing to get time on the circuit. while i was gone, matt cleaned the whole apartment, did the laundry and got groceries for the week. it was the nicest thing to walk in and everything was clean and lovely.

the afternoon has been perfectly free. i've watched gilmore girls episodes, talked on the phone, made a cream cheese nacho dip, and watched snatches of football with matt. it's really nice to have a quiet afternoon - just the two of us. i've been considering a nap all day, so i might just nod off for a few minutes...to the smell of the lemon zest candle.

photobooth and free time

macs have so many great features, but the funnest would have to be photobooth. emily and i did this little photo shoot when i was in wilmington a few weeks ago. notice the tear on emily's cheek...we were both hysterical.

ella's visit to florida

curves after paint

more alaska pictures

croissants on the balcony. don't i look natural?

a quiet afternoon

its nice to have a quiet afternoon in the apartment. doing laundry, getting ready for the week, planning my target list for the afternoon (why do i love that store so much?) matt's family just left; it was so fun to have them here. we tried to stay cool as much as possible, went to some great restaurants, the zoo, the outlets, a vb dodgers game. it felt like a mini vacation even though we were working most of the week. some pictures later.

there are flowers all over the house from my birthday and having company. i just counted six vases, which i know will all start losing their petals at the same time, but they are beautiful for now.

i'll put up some pictures of alaska, curves and other summer things soon.

at laura fante's wedding

i didn't want to carry my purse into the reception, so we snapped this shot in the parking lot! i promise we were at a real wedding, even though there is no proof we were there!

our curves club (before)

we closed on the club june 29, and have learned more about actually running a business in the last week than during a semester of grad school. (they never mentioned what to do with 5 filing cabinets full of member files that are inactive? canceled? didn't fit anywhere else? we have no idea...!)

so here are some before pictures. we've been going in everyday for the past 7 days, so our first week as business owners has been, well, long. but terribly exciting. and such a good fit for us. matt works in the back office where he tries to keep a low profile. however, one member (named 'cookie' by the way!) always yells at him to come out and say hi to her. it's their little ritual already, and it's only been a week!

youth group girls at cheesecake factory

this spring...

it's almost been so long that i'm embarrassed to even post. either that, or my 'readers' (i know there are SO MANY ;) have long given up on me ever posting a thing after girls weekend 2007.
i could blame this on a lot of things - finishing up Regent (we've been graduates for 4 days now!), working at Curves (more on this later), and spending a lot of time with our youth kids. but really, it's been laziness. i certainly have time to read OTHER people's blogs regularly, so maybe this is one small step towards getting back into things.

a few pictures of our spring...

the keys (bahia honda state park)

hotdog dinner at john pennicamp state park

I cooked the dogs....
Matt ate them (well, i ate a few too - thankfully there is no picture!)

At long last...

girls weekend 2007

breakfast on the beach

we just got back from a valentine's day breakfast on the beach. valentine's day has always been a big day for us. (i'm 25 1/2 today too!) in 2003, it was our first 'official' date. matt was on snow crew, and since we had a blizzard that night, he was a little late picking me up. i still remember that i was in a white sweater, and he was wearing a blue pinstripe shirt. we went to caribou and talked until it closed. i came home that night absolutely soaring over this cute boy i went out with.

in 2004, we went to candlewood for the weekend. woke up on valentine's day (saturday) to the most beautiful blue sky and fresh white snow. matt walked with me outside to a path of roses on the snow. i followed them down to the dock where he asked me to marry him. later that day, my parents came home with matt's parents - a surprise trip. we had a valentines dinner that night and started talking about the wedding...

in 2005, we spent valentine's day in winnipeg. i've never seen that much snow in my life! we went out to dinner at the keg restaurant, and had the best french onion soup and caesar salad of my life.

in 2006, we watched the westminster dog show in the morning while eating chocolate chip muffins. had some friends over for lunch, then went to the beach in the afternoon. we walked forever, fed the seagulls, and stopped at the starbucks on the beach for a cinnamon dulce frappacino. that night, i made chicken salad with croissants and crackers, and matt brought me lilies and godiva ice cream. we watched the olympics at night. i think it was a mixture of curling and downhill ski jumping...

and this year. on monday night, i came home from work to beautiful pink roses on the counter. last night we went out with all the pastors from our church to The Mango Tree restaurant for a delicious meal. this morning, matt packed a beach breakfast, so we put down a blanket and enjoyed the beautiful sunshine and vanilla frappacino's, mini cinnamon and brown sugar bagels, and fresh strawberries. i'm working tonight, and matt is teaching at church, so it was so fun to have a morning picnic, although the day's not over...

until 2008 - there's our valentine's day history!

locked in

some past mlk jr day memories. my senior year at wheaton, it was the day that matt and i went ring shopping for the first time. the next year, it was the weekend that we went to norfolk to hang out with mark. by the way, if anyone is ever near where mark lives, visit him. he's an awesome host. last mlk jr. day, i was in seattle with my dearest friends having the best tomato soup of my life at pike's market.

so this mlk jr. day? i'm thinking of it as a recovery day. we had a girl's lock in last night at the church. we played twister (believe it or not, i held my own with 14 year old girls!), danced for hours and made too many blender-drink batches to count. we did all fall asleep around 2-3, so i got a few hours of sleep. tomorrow i'm working at curves at 6.30 am, so i'm taking today very slow. matt's will be home from atlanta tonight, so i'm going to get my fill of gilmore girls while i still can!

other news: hunter is visiting matt and i for 2 weeks while my parents are in india. we are having an absolute blast. the only tricky part is keeping him 'low profile', as the apartment complex doesn't exactly allow dogs that big. when i was a little girl, i read a book about a girl that hida monster in the basement. she tried to sneak by her mom, but this monster kept getting bigger because he ate so many apples that the mom finally realizes that a monster is in her basement. that's how i feel with hunter most of the time...that i'm keeping a monster in the basement! last night was his birthday, so i bought a cupcake and all the girls at the lock-in sang happy birthday to him. it was so cute. i think i'll have another celebration for him tonight since matt missed the first one. and i don't think hunter will mind the extra cupcake...

sledding in winnipeg

at The Keg in winnipeg