Oh Florida, How We Love You!!

We just got back from having a grand ole time on Ft. Meyers Beach with most of Danny's side of the family.  Don't get me wrong- I had a good time last year when we went, but we had only been married three weeks and I was still in the beginning stages of getting settled into the family.  This year was way more relaxing for me!

Lots of beach and pool time

Yummy restaurants.  So, I don't usually take a picture of my food but do you see these things?!?!  Seriously!!  I ordered pigs in a blanket for breakfast and they were HUGE!!  I was expecting a little more even pancake to sausage ratio.  Those pancakes were each about twice as big as I was thinking they would be.  Tasty, but it was a struggle to even finish two of those babies!

Beach volleyball- where I was merely a spectator this year.  No playing time for me when I'm looking more like a ball than a volleyball player:)

Goooorrrrrrgeous sunsets!!

A shuffleboard tournament which never got past the second round because of the rain the came through.  Danny and I just assumed that we would have won the whole thing:)

Visiting Dustin and Mandy- so good to see them again and to learn more about The New Beginnings ministry they moved down to be a part of!

And spending lots of quality time with my favorite person!

Oh, and I had my first encounter with hugely swollen feet thanks to the heat and the long van rides.  They're looking a little better now but I'm afraid they won't be back to normal until after the baby is born:(  I had a picture on here but decided enough people are grossed out by feet that it would be better to just leave it off.  But in case you're curious and want a reference point, they kind of resembled that picture of the pigs in a blanket!

Oink oink

Anyway, it was great to be there and enjoy the warm weather and sunshine.  We weren't sad at all to miss out on the snow that happened while we were gone:)

Shower #1

We went out to Illinois this weekend for my first baby shower!  It was a pretty full weekend and we had a great time.  My sis-in-law and two cousins did a great job of hosting a Saturday morning brunch shower.

Angie had asked me if there were any themes or anything I wanted for decorations and I decided on either books or something springy.  So she combined them and did "Books and Blossoms" decorations.  They were so cute!

And there we are.  Aren't we cute?!?!

Any disappointments I had over not having a boy are gone.  It was so fun to get girly things!  And at this point, my mind is so geared up for a girl it would just be weird if the sonogram was wrong and it's a boy!  I couldn't say that completely for a month or two after we found out, but now I'm good and ready and all excited for baby girl:)

There was even a special present that came up all the way from Jamaica.  Thanks Erin D- I love it!!

Saturday night some of the family got together at my parents for pizza.  We threw a bedsheet down in the kitchen for the kids to have a picnic.  The sheet didn't last long though- it was more fun to use it as a toy than a picnic blanket!

And it was Erin's birthday.  We managed to find a candle and sing to her before she polished off her drumstick all the way!

Sunday night we had a relaxing supper with just my family before we headed out.  I was kind of emotional about leaving this time.  I think just because it's the last time I'll be there and see my family before the baby comes.  And even though it's exciting, it will still be different from now on.  But it was a good reminder to cherish the times we do have together because as we hear in the fine country tune of "Time Marches On"..."the only thing that stays the same is everything changes". 

And on that note, I'm off to the library to stock up on books for our Florida trip later this week!

The Never Ending Saga Of The Couch

Back in the day- back in ooohhhhhh, say, 2002, I bought a couch.  It was my grandpa's couch that I got on his estate sale.  I loved that old couch.  Between my grandpa's house and my first two apartments, there were many good memories associated with it.  It was Big and Bulky and HEAVY!! It had a pullout bed which was great for when extra people were spending the night, however, it was not an easy piece of furniture to maneuver.  Somewhere in some box I have a picture of some friends hauling it over a second story balcony to transport it to my second apartment, because that was way easier than trying to take it down the stairs and around the corner.

  

Then I had a 7 1/2 year separation from my beloved couch.  My brother and sister-in-law kept it at their house while I lived in Alabama and even after I moved back and was living at my parents, with the intent to give it back once I had a place of my own.  When Danny and I got engaged, there was no question- the couch would come with me.  Finally the day for reunification had come!  We hauled it out to Indiana with plans to put it in our basement.  We (meaning any man who had a part in moving it- not me!) were quickly reminded of how Big and Bulky and HEAVY it was, but somehow after much grunting, groaning, and finagling, managed to get it down the steps and around the tight corner. WOE to the person who had to try and get it back out!  I think there was talk that if we ever move out of this house, the couch just might stay.  

Then came the house fire.  The company that stored all of our things while we waited for the house to be rebuilt said they tried and tried to get it out of the basement, but it was too hard.  Since the couch was salvageable, they said they would just come to the house to clean it rather than clean and store it in Ft. Wayne.  In the meantime, the couch became a catch all during the construction process.  It was filled with tools and collected dust like it was going out of style.  But it was just dust and we had full confidence that it could be cleaned.  Until the new carpet was laid.  One day we showed up at the house to look at the carpet, and the beloved couch was in the dumpster!  After an (extremely brief) mourning session, we moved on and started thinking about buying a couch for the basement.  We weren't super thrilled, as furniture shopping in the past had caused some stress.  But it was the best option, so off we went!  

We finally settled on one that we really liked, and were excited when delivery day came.  Between living room, kitchen, and now basement furniture, we had visited the same place in Ft. Wayne about 5 or 6 times in about a month and a half (along with several other places) and we were ready to be DONE!!

  

Enter the steps and sharp corner to get to the basement.

The couch didn't fit!  Oh how those poor delivery men tried.  But it just wasn't meant to be.

By the time they left, we had a small hole in our ceiling,

a couple dents in our drywall,

and some chipped drywall along with the popcorn scraped off the ceiling.

Ugh.  So frustrating!  But we had told them to try and fit it so there really wasn't much we could do about it.  But then it was back to the furniture store.  Again.  This time with a tape measure in hand.  It was Valentine's Day, which neither of us were too thrilled about, as furniture shopping had become something FAR from romantic.  But we did it anyway:)  Gotta love reality, huh?

We found a couch that would fit, and though it wasn't something we really loved, we were satisfied.  So we bought the couch, and were told we would have to wait ten days to get it because it was out of stock, which we said was fine.  Ten days passed.  Then 20.  And finally, as of today, we have a couch!!

SO glad to be done with it!  And maybe one day I'll feel as sentimental about this one as I did the other.

RIP, old couch!

P.S.  Who knew a post about a couch could get so long?!?!

Girls Weekend!

This weekend five of us girls met up in Merrillville, IN for a night of catching up and much fun:)  I guess it really wasn't a weekend- just one night.  But still worth it!  We just ordered in pizza at our hotel on Friday night, which was great because it gave us time to just be together and enjoy each other's company.  Saturday we had brunch at a yummy place called Jelly Pancake House and spent some time at the local mall before parting ways again.  Short but very sweet.  Out of an original 12, only five were able to make it.  The ones that couldn't come were very missed!!

Friday night while I was sleeping, someone in my dream was screaming at the top of their lungs.  The screaming wasn't stopping and I started to wake up.  Then I realized that other girls in the room were also waking up, and someone really was screaming!  Somewhere in our hotel (it sounded kind of close but we found out later it was on a completely different floor) there was what sounded like a grown man getting beaten up or something.  He was crying and yelling out for help, saying that he couldn't get to the door and someone was going to kill him.  And it just didn't stop.  This was about 1:15 in the morning and we were all pretty creeped out.  We all agreed that something was very wrong.  One girl called the front desk and another called 911.  Our window faced the hotel entrance and we saw that three cop cars showed up.  It's probably safe to assume that we weren't the only ones who called that night.  Based on what the front desk clerk said the next morning, we made some speculations about what might have been going on, but we really don't know.  We do know that the police led a man away in handcuffs, so we weren't completely off our rockers to think that someone really was in trouble!  It's not really something any of us would care to do/hear again, but it's definitely something we won't soon forget!

But to end on a lighter note, I sure do love my friends and I'm so glad it worked out to get together!!

One Year Down!

We had a great week celebrating our first anniversary.  That's right- a WEEK!  I guess we like to make the fun times last as long as possible.  I had given Danny seven different coupons to use once a day for the week leading up to our actual anniversary.  Things like:

Pizza Night!  We had homemade pizza with the toppings of his choice (BBQ, ham, bacon, pineapple- and it was deLICious!!) and played an intense game of pizza box football.  If you've never played, you're missing out:)  Okay maybe you're not really missing out, but it's a fun game!

Then there was the Moonlight Stroll where we took a walk at night and came back to warm up with hot chocolate in front of the fireplace.  My coat is long past the point of buttoning up these days so I wore Danny's huge marshmallow coat.  We got a good laugh out of that!

On Saturday, Danny had made some plans to surprise me with!  I knew something was up but I had no clue what it could be.  I had thought of a lot of different ideas as to what it was, but I was way off on all of them.  That guy went out and found us a rodeo to go to!  Now, I do love me some rodeo and he had never been to one.  He doesn't even really like country music!  (Some things I will never understand...)  So the fact that he thought of it on his own and made the effort to find something like that spoke volumes.  I loved it!!

It was a pretty small arena, and it was only bull riding.  So if bull riding's not your thing, don't go. But for the rest of us- it's great fun!  While we were there, we had a romantic dinner of hot dogs and a soft pretzel from the concession stand:)

Monday came around and we exchanged cards and small gifts, and discovered that we had bought the same card for each other!  I guess that's what you get when the local Wal*Mart only has a small selection of anniversary cards.  And only one of those happens to be for the first year.  Sometimes I miss having Hallmark close by!  Oh, and we also went out to Pasquetti's.  Those garlic knots are just delightful!

Then it was time for the traditional eating of the wedding cake that's been in the freezer for a year.  The sugar Bible my mom made as a cake topper didn't fare so well.

We thought it might taste pretty freezer burnt,

but it was shockingly still moist and tasty!

So tasty that I snarfed it right down and had a second piece!  But then again, chocolate cake is pretty much my favorite dessert:)

But now we have a tupperware full of leftover cake.  Danny's not the biggest fan of it, which means the rest of it will probably go to me.  Which gives me excitement and anxiety all at the same time:)  So if you like chocolate cake as much as I do, stop on by- I'll give you a piece!

Anyway.  It's been quite the first year together!  We packed a lot into those 12 months and so once March 2 finally rolled around it was kind of like "Really?  We're just now celebrating one year??  Feels like so much longer!!"  In a good way of course.  So here we are facing year number two and looking forward to what it might bring.  Love you, honey!!