A must read...

"Time is all you have.

And you may find one day that you have less than you think."

-Randy Pausch

The Last Lecture

This is my favorite line from The Last Lecture which I finished reading this weekend.

The lecture & book are such open, honest accounts from a man who knows he has so little time yet wants to make the most of it.

It has certainly made me think a bit more about how I'm spending & enjoying each minute of each day.

It's a must read!

"date night"

Chris came home about 4:00 on Friday, which is soooo early for him to be home unless we're headed out of town.

It was a nice surprise especially since I had seen so little of him this week because I was working nights.

We decided to turn our Friday night into a "date night". We ran to Target for a few things, picked up a pizza on our way home, and watched The Departed (Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson). It was a great movie althought it was fairly violent. Hey, it managed to keep me awake running on 3 hours of sleep, so it was definitely good.

We enjoyed our "date night"!

2 years...

It's hard to believe that on Tuesday it will have been 2 years since we closed on our house. It's been such a fast 2 years!

We've made a lot of changes, and hope to have time to make some more changes to our house.

Here are some before & after shots...

Living room...

Hallway bathroom...

Bedroom, now office...

Guest bedroom...

Family room, now dining room (you can only see part of it)... Kitchen...
Dining room, now den...Master bedroom...

My cedar chest

This is my new cedar chest...

For now it's at the end of our bed.

I'm loving it!

The best of the Northwest...

A few of our favorite pictures from our Northwest trip...

Mt. RanierChris & I in front of Mt. Ranier.

Me inside Elliot Bay Book Company, Seattle, WA. We were there for more than an hour! Although it isn't as big as Powell's Bookstore (Portland, OR) which is the world's largest bookstore, I actually enjoyed Elliot Bay better. It's still bigger & better than any bookstore we have around here.
Sign outside of Pike Place Market (such an awesome place!).
Sea lions we saw floating on a buoy in Seattle's harbor. They were fighting here & the little one got thrown off :-(.
Seattle's skyline from the harbor
Cannon Beach, OR
Not the greatest of pictures, but it will always remind us of the frigid water temperatures (no swimming for us!)

Mt. Hood & Mirror Lake, OR

Columbia River Gorge, OR

"I hope you've had a good day"...

for whatever reason when I'm home in the evenings, I've taken to watching bits & pieces of the 6:30 Nightly News with Brian Williams.

Over the past few nights, I've noticed that I love how he ends each broadcast with:

"I hope you've had a good day"...

It makes me smile!

back on the east coast...

Well, we're back on the east coast after a wonderful vacation.

We're still recovering & geting back to our normal routines.

It's great to go on vacation, but it's always nice to come home again too!

I am so pleased to come home to fall-like weather too.

Fall is my favorite time of the year for so many reasons!

I was in such a fall-like mood Wednesday that I cooked beef stew in the crock-pot & baked cinnamon apples for dinner...yummy!

I'm planning to post some pictures & recap the highlights of our trip this weekend, so come back to check it all out.

Good night!

Pacific Northwest bound

We fly out to Portland in less than 48 hours...I'm so excited!!!

Here are some possible souvenirs to bring home that I'll be keeping an eye out for while we're gone:

1) I won't be bringing it home, but you better believe that I'll be having a cup of coffee at the 1st ever, original Starbucks! What should I have...hmmm?

2) Oregon has more than it's fair share of vineyards & wineries...a bottle of Oregon red wine would be a nice souvenir!

3) Powell's City of Books-the largest bookstore in the world is in Portland...I'll definitely be there (probably with a Starbuck's cup in hand!). I'll probably have to buy a book there just to say I did!

4) I have a new interest in pottery. Several stores in & around Portland have pottery made from the ash of Mt. St. Helens...how neat!

5) We'll definitely be hitting up Pike's Market while we're in Seattle. They apparently have great local crafts so who know's what awesome treasures we'll find there!

6) There is a lot of Native American history in the Pacific Northwest. We'd like to pick up another handmade totem pole replica to add to the one we bought in Alaska.

7) And best of all...I plan to take hundreds of pictures to capture all of the amazing thing we see. Pictures are the best souvenirs of all.

Pacific Northwest, here we come...

apples galore

Chris picked nearly all of the apples from our apple tree on Monday. It seems that there are about 30 lbs. of them thus far! We knew we had to do something with the ones he picked before we leave for Portland this-coming Tuesday. So, today we made 14 jars of delicious apple jelly. It was a lot of work, but it will be worth it!

On other random notes:

-We got almost 5 inches of rain from tropical storm Hanna in about an 8 hour time span!

-About 3 or 4 weeks ago I treated feet & my back to a pair of these Dansko clogs to wear to work. I cannot tell you the amazing difference it has made throughout the day. They were well worth $105!

-My parents wanted to buy me a cedar chest for my 25th birthday. It's something I've wanted for a long time. To make things easier as far as delivery with the distance we are from home, they gave me $ to pick one out. I went yesterday & ordered this beautiful chest. I can hardly wait to pick it up when we get back home from vacation!

-We leave for Portland Tuesday at 6 p.m. We're so looking forward to it!

-Last week I bought Randy Pausch's book, The Last Lecture. It's so inspiring. I think everyone should read it!

Think that's all for now. I'm off to continue the packing process!

dental woes & my burn...

At my 6-month dental check-up 2 weeks ago, my dentist found a decay in the next to last tooth on the upper right side of my mouth.

I went last Tuesday to have it filled. About 1/4 of the way into the process, the dentist stopped to take x-rays of the tooth pulp telling me that it seemed like a deep decay. She said I might need a root canal...ahhhh. So, I sat freaking out in the chair until she came back from looking at the x-rays & said that it was deep, but not to the pulp. 2 hours later...I finally left, but with only 1/2 of the filling done.

Needless to say, I was less than pleased. It took until about Saturday night before I could stop taking the extra strength Tylenol & could chew on the right side of my mouth.

Of course by then Monday rolled around & I had to go back for the 2nd 1/2 of the filling...wahoo. It was far more painful than the first, but luckily today it's feeling much better & I can officially chew on the right side of my mouth.

All in the midst of this, a rather unfortunate accident occurred last Thursday evening...it goes like this. I was cooking risotto for dinner. I had the broth that I had been boiling for about 15 minutes & I was in the process of slowly adding it to my risotto, chicken & tomato mixture. Somewhere in the process of adding it, I flipped the pot of boiling broth...ahhhhh. I was on the phone with Chris & I was literally screaming. I felt like I was burning all over. It was a horrible feeling. He got me calmed down & sent me to the shower. Looking back on it, it's sort of funny, but there I was standing clothed in my pajamas holding the phone out so Chris could keep me semi-calm. I feel so thankful because when it was all over and done with, I have a burn about the size of a half dollar on my right upper thigh & that's all. It's healing well (I know this because it itches like crazy!) and hopefully it won't scar. It was definitely a scary moment though.

I'm glad all of my woes are resolved so that we can enjoy our weekend at Lake Hartwell! Be back Monday!

A beautiful day for a baseball game...

Yankee Stadium...

there are almost no words to describe how amazing it was to be there. Although I have seen it many times on t.v., being there myself made it come to life.

Our seats were perfect & of course I took advantage of it & took over 100 pictures just while we were there. I also tried out the video capabilities on my camera & videoed the traditional 7th-inning singing of "Take me Out to the Ballgame" while I panned around the view of the stadium. Maybe by the time Abbey & I have seen a game at every baseball park I'll have a video of "Take me Out to the Ballgame" at every stadium!

We each enjoyed a slice of New York-style pizza & a hot dog while we were there...delicious!

It is such a shame that in just a short time the originial stadium will stand no more. It will always be known as "The House that Ruth Built".

The new stadium stands just across a 2-lane street from the original stadium & looks nearly just like it except it's bigger.

Here are a few of my favorite pictures...

NYC: Day 2

By 9:00 we were strolling from the cafe where we had breakfast to Rockefeller Center. We had just enough time to visit the NBC Store, see the NBC Rainbow Room, and buy a pair of designer sun glasses! (What trip to NYC would be complete without a pair?)

Then at last it was time to head to Yankee Stadium. We hailed a cab, which by the way we now are experts at, and off we went. I took lots of pictures from the window of the cab as we drove through parts of the city that I'd never seen. The views of Central Park were great, although I never got any good pictures of it.

Here's a random picture of a neat bridge from the cab window...sad thing is, I'm not sure which bridge it is!

New York City: Day 1

Well...We have returned from N.Y.C. after an amazingly fun, quick trip! We managed to cram a lot of stuff into less 2 days in the city.

Even though this is my 3rd trip to the city, I never cease to be amazed at everything from the massive buildings, the expansive number of stores, and of course, the charming residents & their lifestyle which I know I could never get used to.

Here's a recap of day 1...

I left Raleigh just before 9a.m. Saturday. Just before landing we flew right over Shea Stadium, home of the NY Mets. I was also able to see their new stadium just next to Shea. It was pretty cool.

After meeting up with Abbey, catching our shuttle to the Flatotel & storing our luggage there, we hit the streets! We had lunch at Bubba Gump's Shrimp Company (I definitely recommend the coconut shrimp...), and then we headed off to the Toys R' Us across the street where we rode the ferris wheel! Yes the two of us, at the ages of 19 & 25, were definitely the oldest, childless riders, but we had a blast. We rode in the orange & yellow Little Tikes car...how fun!

We walked around a little bit more & then we were off to stand in line at the TKTS booth for our 50% off Broadway show tickets. We were in line about 2:00 p.m., & had awesome tickets for GREASE, starring Taylor Hicks, before 3:30 p.m. We found the theater & scouted out a place for dinner & then headed back to the hotel to get our luggage & get ready for a night out on the town!

We put on our fun little dresses & headed out for dinner at a little Italian trattoria where the caesar salad & fettucini alfredo was delicious! We walked just next door to the Brooks Atkinson Theatre where we saw GREASE which was totally awesome. I loved knowing all of the songs & being able to sing along. The cast was so amazing & each of them were so perfect for their roles. I love Broadway shows!

After the show it was back to the hotel to get out of our cute, but most uncomfortable shoes & then over to the Cafe Duke for smoothies followed by part of a movie & then it was time for us to rest up for day 2...

Weekend recap..

We went to Carolina Beach on Saturday for an anniversary celebration. We had a great time. It was very hot, but my new tripod shelter courtesy of Chris' parents came in very handy. The beach was not crowded at all & the current was calmer than the last time we were there.

We stopped back in Wilmington for dinner at Elijah's Oyster Bar on the river. We enjoyed our delicious dinner on the deck with a view of the river. It was a great day-long getaway.

Sunday we had to catch up on some things around here, including homework, boo.. :-(. Chris did install our gutter guards which has been on our to-do list for a while. We love to check things off of our list.

Only 5 more days of school for this semester...yeah!!!
One of my classes is over, but my stats open-book final is open until Tuesday. Then, 3 weeks off!!!

Sissy & Jennifer are headed up today to visit until tomorrow afternoon & then we'll head home for a pre-birthday weekend in GA. We're looking forward to that.

Next weekend Abbey & I will be in N.Y.C.. We're soooo excited. We've spent so much time planning & anticipating the trip & it's finally almost here! There will be so many pictures to share.

Off to clean the house before our company arrives!

Anniversary, the beach, & early birthday gift...

Wednesday is mine & Chris' 3rd anniversary! It's so hard to believe how fast the 3 years has flown by. It's been wonderful, and I am so thankful to have been blessed with such a wonderful, loving husband.

Here are two of my favorite pictures from our wedding day...

To celebrate our anniversary, Chris is taking me to the beach Saturday. We'll just be there for the day, but that's plenty of time to take in some sun, sand, & a nice dinner. We're looking forward to it!

In preparation for our beach trip Saturday, Chris gave me an early birthday present on behalf of his parents. They had it shipped here probably 3 weeks or more ago, but I was told I couldn't have it...gotta hate that! When Chris told me his beach plans for us, he told me I could open my birthday present from his parents on Sunday before I went to work, so I did & they got me a tripod shelter for the beach. It's perfect! Chris set it up in the backyard overnight to stretch it out a bit & check out how to get it all set up. I think it's going to be perfect to shield some of the sun, but not too much & have a cooler place to chill out in the heat of the day! I can't wait to try it out on Saturday!