I'm a Survivor

Everyone is complaining about how much food they ate yesterday. Not me. I guess that's one benefit of the Whole 30. I survived a Super Bowl party with plantain chips and La Croix. 

Want to know what else survived the weekend? My flash drive. I had a major freak out on Friday afternoon when my laptop got knocked over with my flash drive inside. The tip of my flash drive, which happened to contain important and irreplaceable files from my career, broke off. 

Brilliant husband to the rescue. 

Nathanial mentioned it could be salvaged with some quick soldering. A trip to Radio Shack and Lowe's later and we were in business. 

Of course Nathanial didn't tell me until after he was finished that he was never very good at soldering. 

I don't think many things exist that he's not good at. I'm happy to report the files were retrieved and backed up. 

Two Years Down. A Lifetime to Go.

Nathanial and I celebrated our SECOND wedding anniversary on Sunday. We opted for something a little more low key because I'm doing the Whole 30 (more on that in a future post) and Nathanial's arms still have a ways to go from last weekend's accident. We'll take a trip to further celebrate in the next few months after things calm down work wise. 

The traditional theme for the second year gift is cotton.

I stuck with the theme and opted to make a basket. I had an item for each letter of cotton (t is for tickets) along with some actual cotton items. 

Nathanial didn't really embrace the theme at all but got me something that's been at the top of my wish list for a while- a ladder bookshelf. 

I love it! It's the perfect addition to my office/ craft room. Now all that room needs is a new paint job. 

Nathanial fixed an incredible dinner. Lamb isn't something I eat often, but if it's always that good, I may need to add it to the rotation. 

We capped off the evening by watching our wedding video and then Rambo because marriage is all about balance. 

Here's to many more years of married bliss and adventures! 

When A Good Weekend Goes Bad

The weather this weekend was beautiful so we decided to head up to the property in Huntsville. It's always a welcome change to spend time outdoors soaking up the sunshine and Nathanial is able to let off some steam by doing manly things like ripping down fences. 

There are several large piles that needed to be burned so we figured that would be a good way to kickoff the day. 

Nathanial got the area ready by cutting up a huge dead tree, mowing the grass, etc. 

I loved seeing him and my dad together.

The fire started pretty quickly but some of the larger parts weren't going. Nathanial headed over to add some gasoline to the fire. 

What happened next is a blur. I remember a large whoosh sound and seeing a big fireball.

Nathanial took off running amid screams from my dad and I. At first he seemed to be fine but when he started pouring a case of bottled water on himself, I knew it wasn't good. 

His arms turned red and then gray pretty quickly, so he agreed to go the emergency room. They got us right in and began the process of trying to stop the burning. His face and arms were burned pretty badly. 

I'm not a great crisis wife to begin with and when the nurse started talking about the worst case scenarios, I lost it. I was crying so loudly she asked what she could do for me. I wanted to say stop terrifying me, but instead just pulled myself together. 

We spent the next few hours at the E.R.  Once his skin was cooled down, they applied burn cream and bandaged him up. They gave us some supplies for the rest of the week along with good instructions on how to care for the burns. 

It is evident God protected Nathanial given the amount of hair burned off around his head and his complete lack of eyelashes. We are so incredibly thankful. 

It could have been so much worse.

Nathanial has handled everything extremely well. No whining and minimal wincing when the burn cream is applied. He's a trooper. He has even managed to make it to work all week. Today has been  his highest pain level because parts of his skin are really stiff and other parts are raw. Please pray for his continued healing and that there will be no complications or infections. 

The Big Easy

It's a good thing I didn't resolve to blog more this year since I've gone 10 days without posting. 

Hope your year is off to a great start! 

We rang in the new year from New Orleans, from the comfort of our "boutique" hotel room because we're an old married couple and still jaded about large crowds. 

As Nathanial puts it, our trip to Louisiana was great minus the few hours we spent at the Sugar Bowl. Ah the life of an OSU fan. 

We got into New Orleans the afternoon of New Year's Eve. We drove around the French Quarter for nearly an hour trying to find a parking spot so we could see the parade. We finally decided to check into our hotel and then ride the street car over to the parade. There wasn't much in the way of signage so we were lucky to hop on the right route. The street car was jam packed with people. 

The parade was short but so fun. My favorite parts were the local bands. They definitely had swagger. 

After the parade, we met up with some of Nathanial's college friends to catch the end of the OU game. 

We headed back to our room after dinner. We used Uber for the first time and it was a great experience! We even missed the surge pricing because we headed back so early. 

Our hotel was labeled as a botique hotel but apparently that just means super tiny room. It was fine for the short time we were in the city but I wouldn't recommend it for a long stay. 

We tried to do all the touristy things before the game Friday. We had beignets at Cafe Du Monde. 

We walked around the shops of the market and surrounding French Quarter. Our best finds were a Sugar Bowl ornament and some yummy beef jerky. 

We had lunch at Mr. B's as recommended by my brother who frequents New Orleands for work. 

I had the shrimp. It was so messy.  

Nathanial got the bourbon pork chop and had a much better dining experience. 

We spent time after lunch exploring the city and then it was finally time for the game. 

It was raining pretty hard so we used Uber again. There was a pretty long line to get into the Superdome. Nathanial forgot he had his pocket knife on him and got scolded and had to throw it away before we could go inside. Criminal. 

Our seats were on the 50 yard line. Despite the blowout, it was still a fun game. 

We didn't get back from the game until after midnight so we had a pretty leisurely start to the day on Saturday. We decided to stop by the Oak Alley Plantation on our way home. It was my favorite part of the trip!

The tour was fascinating. I was especially impressed by the cedar wood surround that was painted by French artists to look like marble. 

Nathanial also took Monday off so we rounded out the weekend with some time outdoors at the family property. 

Some Mondays aren't so bad!

2015 - The Year of Alaska

I can't believe it's New Year's Eve. This year has flown by! 

The last few years, we've gotten in the habit of finding a word or phrase to characterize the year. This year was definitely the year of Alaska. When we moved there, I had no idea what to expect. And when we suddenly moved back to Texas, I had no idea how much I would miss Alaska. It has a piece of my heart. And always will. It's no surprise that my best memories of the year came from living in Alaska. 

I thought it would be fun to do a short recap of fun happenings from each month this year. 

January - 

We celebrated our first anniversary at the Hotel Alyeska. Nathanial pulled out all the stops and had so many surprises for me during the weekend. 

February - I ran my first freezing 5k. Let's be honest, I did it for the scarf. 

March -

So much happened in March. We got to experience the Iditarod and all the events that went along with Fur Rondy. My favorite was running with the reindeer. It was incredible! I also ran a St. Patrick's 5k. It was -3 at the start and my hair froze. The sunroof on my car randomly exploded as I was going down the highway. 

April - We celebrated Easter, Nathanial's birthday and I ran another 5k. 

May - The lights went out while we were attending a performance of Sister Act. This is also the month my running training group started. 

June - This is the month we got the most sunlight. We took full advantage by replanting our flower bed at midnight and watching a baseball game that didn't start until 10 p.m. I ran a 12k. My parents came to visit in the midst of a heat wave. 

July - Nathanial's grandparents came to visit us. A story I pitched at work got picked up by all the local outlets so I was on the news quite a bit. I ran a half marathon. 

August - I had the best birthday ever when Nathanial surprised me with a behind the scenes tour at the Wildlife center. We got to feed the animals! Nathanial's parents came to visit and we all ran a 1 mile race (complete with Alaska shaped medal). 

September - We attended the Alaska State Fair. We picked vegetables at a farm over Labor Day. 

October - This month it snowed for the first time this year. We found out we were moving and moved two weeks later. 

November - We started adjusting to life back in Texas. We closed on our house two days before Thanksgiving. I ran the Route 66 Half Marathon with my father-in -law. 

December - We got the house in order and spent the month with friends and family. We hosted our first (and second) Christmas. 

What a year! 

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

The first thing people want to know about our time in Alaska was how we handled the weather. It makes me laugh to think about it because dressing for Texas weather lately is much worse than dressing for Alaska. 80 degrees in December is crazy. 

Despite the warm weather, we're doing our best to be in the holiday spirit. We celebrated all weekend long. 

Friday night, our Sunday School class did an "As Seen on TV" white elephant gift exchange. We almost walked away with the clapper (clap on, clap off) but it was snatched up at the last second. 

Saturday afternoon we celebrated Christmas with my brother and his family since they'll be traveling Christmas Day. It was an afternoon filled with fun and lots of laughter. 

On the way home, Nathanial's car kept giving us weather alerts. That was especially exciting since we had his company party that evening. 

We got the worst of the weather on the way to the party. Once we were parked, it wasn't an issue. The evening was an elegant affair complete with magician. 

After church on Sunday, N hung a mirror over the mantle and helped me with some other projects around the house. I love how the Christmas decor looks. 

Here's our dining room. It was green last week. It looks so much better now! 

Can I just keep Christmas decorations up year round?

I just got this table on Friday. I love it and the Christmas prints from a talented college friend but am still figuring out how to style them. 

Even our dining table is festive!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Now if we could just get the weather to feel like Christmas. 

A Weekend of Animals: Zoo Lights and Christmas Parades

I'm happy to report I escaped the land of boxes and got everything unpacked. Our garage is crammed full of said boxes so I'm pretty embarrassed to open it these days. 

I spent the rest of my time last week running errands and trying to decide how to decorate the house. This house is shaped a lot differently so what worked in our Alaska house won't work here. It's a little daunting. 

I was especially overwhelmed at picking paint colors. Unfortunately that part hasn't gotten any better. The painter is 3/4 of the way done with the downstairs and I still can't decide if I like the color. Fingers crossed, that's just the paint fumes talking. 

Friday night, we hung out with our niece and nephew while their parents were at a Christmas party. We played a board game some friends of our introduced us to and had a blast. Saturday we saw them again as we watched the Baylor game. This meme pretty accurately sums it up. 

We also took in our community's Christmas parade. That kind of thing makes me love living in the suburbs. My favorite parts were the miniature donkey - I now need one - and the Polar Express float. 

Saturday evening, we met up with our friends Mason and Ashley, and convinced them to drive downtown to see the Zoo Lights. Neither husband was too impressed (with traffic, the hour long line to get in, or the LED lights, even though there were over a million of them.) They were good sports though. It was great getting to spend time with old friends. 

Found a moose!

The giraffes stole the show. 

Sunday, we went to church and got ready for the painter. 

I'm hoping he finishes today and I can decorate the Christmas tree without looking at this. 

The previous homeowners really liked color. I love avocado but not on my wall. Stay tuned to see how we transform the space.