I like...

So, I haven't posted in awhile, and so many things are going through my head, I thought I would steal my sister's idea and post...

I Like....


Smelling Spring (and Fall) coming... (yes they do have a specific smell, Fall makes me happiest)

When I fall back into "school girl" love and get butterflies when I see Tim...

Playing with Riley in the grass, watching him smile...

Feeling Jesus hug me at church...

Crying from the relief of honesty...

God revealing a part of His nature to me...

David Crowder Band...

Planning weddings...

Being around my niece and nephew...

Being around people who can just "let go"...

Dancing, lots and lots of dancing in the living room...

Paying off loans...

Trying a new recipe and it coming out good...

Hoping, believing, praying, experiencing Grace...

Reading a good book, the ones that make me cry (They don't have to be romance novels)...

A good pair of high heels...

Hanging out with my family, oh I miss you guys like crazy!!!...

Writing, blogging, any way of letting you know my opinion...

"Amazing Grace" and "Come Thou Fount"...

A clean house (its only clean when you come to visit)...

Tim's smile, laugh, heart basically anything about him...

Nice warm (not hot) beaches...

Going away, and then coming back...

You reading my blog then commenting!!!!

OK, I think that's long enough, have a wonderful day!!

DCB*

So, as you know, Valentine's Day is coming up. And I basically do not like Valentine's Day for several reasons. The main one being that I do not like that there is a day that tells me I must be romantic with and towards my husband. I will not let a person tell me that (that's probably drastic but...) much less a day. If I read the history of Valentine's Day, I believe there was a St. Valentine and he did good things for people??? Right??? Anyway, now it is just an awkward day for couples to be randomly romantic, as if they need a specific day to set aside to do that, or (and these are my favorite people because up until the year I met Tim, I never had a Valentine) a Day for single people to feel even more.

Second, this is our third Valentine's holiday together as a couple, and without going into details (it would seriously be a whole other blog) The first two have bombed. And it was not either me and Tim's fault, they just bombed. So, we decided to non-celebrate Valentine's day. So Tim did the coolest thing ever, he got us David Crowder Band concert tickets.

For anyone who knows Tim and I, we love this band. The Collision A CD is a CD we fell in love over literally. We both bought the CD's separately we would listen to the music, dissect every song, talk about it. My favorites would change to his, and he would like one of my songs. One night, we had a big hoe down in Tim's apartment with our friends to the song "I saw the light" on the CD. "Come and Listen" was played as the bridesmaids walked in, in our wedding. I mean seriously, sit Tim and I down and ask us about the David Crowder Band, and we could go on, and on and... Like, if God allows the David Crowder Band to lead some worship in a part of Heaven, I am pretty sure that is where you will find me and Tim. It's not just the music (although it is pretty awesome, ecclectic stuff) Its the lyrics. The words stated in the music are so subtle and cool when you are singing it, but when you go back and really listen to what you are singing... man, God uses his lyrics so powerfully to speak to my heart. So, yes, we love their music. It was at a concert of theirs Tim and I decided we go well together and can hang out with each other. They don't even know it, but I feel like they have just been with us since we have been married. Weird??? maybe, but true for me I guess. Anyway, you want to have a fun time, you come to a concert with us. You sing, and shout, and move your body and its all for Jesus.

So tonight we went and even stayed in line to be the last people to see them and talk with them. They are cool folks, really cool. So, I would consider this night a very non-Valentine's day date and ultimately my favorite so far. Tim did good:).

The Band, shreddin...

Us after the concert, I have no voice. Good thing you don't need that for a picture.

The band, patiently talking to everyone who came through in the line and signing autographs, they were awesome.

This is us with David Crowder himself. Very cool guy.

To close, I did actually speak with him, though I will admit I was a little nervous. I mean, God has influenced my life and and used his music in such an awesome way. I know the band are just humans, but still... I told him I loved their music and I even had one of their songs in our wedding. Mr. Crowder asked which one and I classically froze... crap what was the name of that song... I did finally answer with come and listen, but geeze.. how embarrassing to forget the name of their song that I had played at my wedding... oh well. He was so gracious, awesome people, good night!!

January 2010

Well, I have not posted in awhile, and for all of my blogging fans out there who have been anxiously waiting (in baited breath, of course) to know why I have taken such along sabbatical from writing about my life on the Internet, its simple. I have been busy. So busy in fact, with so many amazing adventures I decided to sum them up instead of do a post for each. I know, genius! So here was my amazing fun month:

Weekend #1: The Bellamy's came over!! The Bellamy's our friends who do Campus Outreach at Embry-Riddle. They are quite the fun couple and we had a great time hanging out with them and chillin'. Unfortunately, I stink at life and I did not take any pictures that weekend.

Weekend Highlight: Eating at the IKEA cafeteria then walking around the whole store!

Weekend #2: A trip to New Hampshire to celebrate Katie Harper's (Tim's sister's) upcoming marriage to her high school sweet heart. They are a very cool couple and balance each other out perfectly. The weekend was so much fun and Katie's engagement party was so much fun with lots of good food. And once again, I stink at life and did not bring my camera, however, Tim's mom did take pictures and hopefully I can get her to e-mail a few and then I can post them.

Weekend Highlight: Eating until it hurt, there was so much good food, I think I ate for a whole 48hrs.

Weekend #3: Joey, Jennifer, Savannah, and Weston all came down and fit into our two bedroom apartment for an extended weekend. SO MUCH FUN!! For a really good account of the weekend check out Jen's blog about it. I love it when there are a lot of people cramped into a tiny space (probably cause that is how I grew up, 6 people in a house with 3 1/2 rooms, makes for a bit of a space issue at times!) That weekend we took Savannah to the dog park to chase "Wriley" (our dog riley), the T-Rex restaurant in Downtown Disney, and Lake Eola Park. This weekend, I didn't stink at life and actually took pictures!! They will be below the highlight.

Weekend highlight: Taking a Sunday nap on the fold-out-bed in the living room while my sister was sleeping on the lazy boy chair, my nephew is sleeping in his pack-n-play and my niece is sleeping in our bed. The weather was gorgeous, we had our french doors open letting a nice cool breeze in with the fountain going in the background. A Sunday nap is even the most bestest when you are surrounded by those you love and miss!

Probably my favorite picture to date of me and Savannah:)

Oh priceless photo!

We really got the best seat in the restaurant, right next to Sarah Big Horn!

My main man, Weston, chillin in his convertible... I mean swing:)

Now, it might not look like the best picture, but I think the sunlight makes her look like she has a halo, my sweet angel Savannah! (However, all us girls know the halo is good for hiding those mischievous horns!)

Week #4: This one has just closed out. However, we got the privilege of housing the Cantwell clan with us this weekend. They spent the night with us Friday and Saturday night. And for most people who stay with us, we did the same routine, but it is SO much fun! Friday, I cooked a meal, and we just chilled. Saturday was dog park, hang out til Tim gets home, then Lake Eola! And once again I stink at life and took no pic's. The Cantwells are long time friends and are a part of a group that if Tim and I had our way in life, we would be neighbors forever! Oh well, God's plans are always higher and greater than ours!

Weekend Highlight: Laughing a lot! And then after dinner at Dexter's going over to the Lake Eola playground (yes the same one we took pic's of Savannah and Weston playing on, but there were no kids there at 9:30 at night) and playing on the playground like a five year old kid!

And just so you know, I know January has five weekends in it. The very first one was New Year's weekend. Mom and Dad came down and spent the day at Animal Kingdom at Disney, and me an mom went shoe shopping. Just so mom knows that I love her, a pic is posted below:

Yep, we are wearing matching colors.

So, January was busy, but so much fun! We LOVE visitors, we love to share our life with anyone who wants to come and play, chill, or hang out with us. No one has booked us for February so please come over! Hard to believe that the first month of the year has already passed. I pray that God would continue to grow me and teach me more about Himself and continue to open my heart to Him. Finally, on my last note, I just want to give a shout-out to my friend Emily Blackwell, she blogs too, and her last blog is a lot of what I have been going through down here dealing with loneliness! Here is a link to what she has been writing about, its good stuff!

Reflections while waiting for 2010...

So I have about 32min left in the year, and I figure while I wait in a chair, all family sleeping except for me (it wouldn't be as much of a big deal if it weren't for the fact that we are ushering in a new decade) I decided to make the time count and blog about my year in review...

Favorite things I have done:

Lots of surprising Tim and I have done this year. Earlier this year we flew up to New Hampshire to surprise Mom and Ed for their 15 year anniversary and then to my family's house for Christmas just in time for our Christmas Eve get-together. Both were fun events and Tim and I truly enjoy getting together with both of our families and spending time together.

GA/FL game. Game, not so much fun, seeing my beloved Dawgs get pummeled is not easy to take, but playing ultimate Frisbee and getting together with most of the family at Amelia Island and spending some good quality time together is priceless.

Jersey Shore. Too much fun. Different beach, I have never "chilled" at any beach farther north than South Carolina. So, although the water was a bit colder than my body is used to, the Jersey Shore is amazing. Board walk, unforgettable, especially getting to ride our bikes through it during the day. Even on the rainy days, we had fun playing board games or putting together a puzzle. And the food, oh my goodness the food!! Vic's, Kelly's Tavern, Uncle Nick's (just guessing on this one) and an amazing seafood place who's name I cannot think of at this time. These four days were jam packed and we look forward to more of them!

There are more, we spent an amazing week in Houston, so graciously hosted by Tim's Aunt Meg and Uncle Jon. And there is always the Amelia trip, I look forward to reinstating the yearly trip, so much fun relaxing and playing endless games of volleyball with you crazy folks.

Favorite Music that has gotten me through the year:

1. How He loves Us (David Crowder version)

2. Perfect People- Natalie Grant

3. Surely We can Change - David Crowder

4. Give me Your Eyes - Brandon Heath

5. Fifteen- Taylor Swift (oh how I wish she would have been around when I was in middle school!)

6. Words I would Say- Sidewalk Prophets (the whole CD is amazing)

7. Soundtrack to Fireproof - So glad that Stephen and Alex had the courage to put a movie out that spoke so honestly about marriage and its importance.

8. I'm just going to say the WHOLE CD of Church Music by David Crowder, LOVE his lyrics.

Favorite Quote by Pastor Johnny:
"You are going to end up where you are going if you do not change the direction you are heading."

And on that note, here are my goals, a "New Years Resolution" if you will for the new year:

1. Establish total discipline in spending time with the Lord, knowing him not just as my Lord, but more intimately, like a Daddy (Abba)

2. Run two miles. That's it, I'm not going for a marathon here, just two stinkin miles without feeling like I'm going to have a heart attack.

3. Volunteer more at church.

4. Be a better friend. For all those that I let down, you will never tell me because you are amazing people, but unless you live with me, I have probably failed our friendship/relationship in the most terrible way. I want to be a better friend for you next year.

Ok, I think that about covers it, I dwindled the time down to less than 10 minutes until the new year. I can hear fireworks in the background. So, that probably is a good cue to go, but before I do I just want to give a shoutout to the Edfeldts, the Heil family, the McConnell family, and all of those who had a different year in that they lost some very amazing and wonderful people that are dearly missed. We long for Heaven and our great reunion.

So, I can't think of any way to end this than by leaving my favorite verse:
he LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing
Zeph. 3:17

Oh, We got you SO good!

Tim and I pulled a BIG one, I mean huge. We made approximately at least four people cry, in a good way, at Christmas Eve. Yes, we told our family that we would not be able to, under any circumstance, be in GA for Christmas. Fooled you fam! Tim and I had quite the adventure, flying in to Atl in the morning, living at the airport, taking a taxi to the home (only to be confused as he drops us off a whole block before the home) and completely surprising the entire family! Christmas Eve was so amazing, I am so glad God blessed me with a husband that likes to see his wife happy!

I was playing around with snapfish and they have a link where you can see all the picture from our weekend. And once I can e-mail the pictures Tim and I took on his phone from the airport, I can give an update blog and walk you through our day with pictures.

It was an amazing Christmas, I love waking up Saturday morning knowing I was spending Christmas in GA. And once again, I was reminded of what a holy day this was, as this day is the day designated to celebrate God's greatest gift to the earh, Jesus Christ, through Him we have Salavation and the privilege to live for something so much greater than ourselves.

I can use this...

To complain, right? I mean, I know it is mine and Tim's blog, but I run it, sometimes Tim walks by as I am blogging and complains about me blogging and then approves of all I have posted and then walks away. But I feel like I run 99.9% of this sucker, and I should get to use this as an outlet for me. I am much better at writing down my thoughts and feels than talking anyway. So, I will write my complaint.

And it is to complain about me. I wish I was not lazy. I wasn't at one point in my life. In high school, I was a cheerleader into two seasons, when I wasn't at my school gym, I was at another gym practicing, tumbling or something of the sort. I took honors classes, or advanced classes. For goodness sake I took physics my junior year and got a B in the class, that is pretty darn good for not knowing the math that it takes to understand physics!!! I went to college, and got a little more lazy in the beginning. But one semester I took 18 hours and had a job, and I got almost all A's. That is really impressive, at least for me. So the question begs.... WHY AM I SO LAZY!!! I have always worked hard. It kills me to know that my everyday routine is to go to work, come home, and sit around for five hours and then at 10 o'clock at night decide things need to be done...AH! I hate that I am mad at myself right now!! So, I am going to go finish wrapping presents, and try to come to the bottom of my laziness problem. And really, what I really need is prayer. If you guys could pray that God would reveal to me why I have become so slothful (it is a deadly sin). This really is something that affects my marriage (Tim hates laziness, I think it is because he is so Godly) and it is affecting my spiritual life. And as my sister writes about how she runs today, I kick myself because I am getting fatter and I still continue to sit on this couch. Jenn, you are truly an inspiration to me. My future as a mother, a good wife, and servant of God depends on kicking this habit of lazy. I ask for your prayers, not that one day I wake up and all the sudden I am just not lazy anymore, but that God would reveal to me the source of the sin.

That would be helpful, because I really don't want to get fat either. Night!

You better...

Save some time for reading this post, it may take awhile, cause I'm going all the way back...

To October as more fun things happened that I so rudely decided that the world could wait to hear about, (just kidding), but a lot has happened. First, I need to educate those on my husband, Tim. He is a man that LOVES to be connected with others. He loves to "make connections" if you will, and when the Chick-fil-a conference came down to Orlando, Tim could not wait to see the Cathy's and introduce himself, he was so excited to see them, and Bubba is such a hoot, he was handing Tim gifts as he was talking to Tim! But anyway, part of this experience and education about Tim, is that he LOVES planes. Loves them, he still stops talking to me to watch the plane, I have never taken offense to this because I love watching his passion. I honestly do not know how God is going to use that in Tim's life, but God gave Tim that passion, and God will be the one to use that passion to glorify Himself. So moving on, Truett Cathy flew down on his plane, and I have some lovely family members that were kind enough to get Tim "connected" with John Dixon, who was such a great guy, and let Tim take a tour of the plane.

Here is Tim in front of the airplane, this might looke like an ordinary smile, but it is actually his "Iam SO excited smile" trust me, there is a difference.


This picture is blurry, and you can't read the inscription, but Mr. Cathy puts this inscription on his plane, and Tim has stated that he has seen it elsewhere on other vehicles. I honestly can't remember what is says, hopefully Amy will leave a comment stating what it says, but it is basically a reminder to all that these gifts come from God and we are to be good stewards of them. Tim was very blown away and had an awesome experience touring the plane.

Ending our beautiful and exciting month of October was the GA/FL game. April gave a good synopsis of the game: we come, we eat really good food, we go to the game, we lose, we go back to the condo and eat more really good food. The most fun was had playing ultimate Frisbee and jumping into the ocean after than walking out of the Jacksonville stadium ashamed... Some pictures from the event:

Everyone getting ready before the game, hoping to use their "dawgs win celebreation tools." We did not use them...

Us before the game, before I sweated off all my make up and lost my voice yelling. Side note, Jennifer got me that wonderful purse for a Christmas gift, matched my outfit perfectly!

I was quite unhappy with the scoreboard the whole game :(

My first GA game that I attended that got me insanely addicted to UGA was the GA vs Northwestern game. It was a complete blowout, and the stadium was full, but not crazy and packed like this! GA/FL was Tim's first game, which I thought was very cool. But I still want him to go to one "between the hedges" to get the full effect one day!

And, I'm just throwing this one in cause Amy is hilarious!

OK, now we are finally in November, and I think at least my mom knows what that means, MY ANNIVERSARY!! I know two years is not that long, and it is not, Tim and I can't wait to be sitting on rocking chairs holding hands when we are eighty years old. He is still my best friend, I am still my crazy weird self around him, and we have loved getting to live in our own little world here in Orlando. But our anniversary gives us an excuse to go out of town, spend money, and take a long needed vacation. Tim's Aunt Meg and Uncle Jon were kind enough to open their home in Houston to host our gig.

Our first full day there, we went with Aunt Meg to our first dog show. They have the most adorable puppy who is a German Short-Hair that they show. Very cool!

This was just one of the dogs that was a winner, but it is an English Bulldog, and it WILL be our next dog, because I get to pick. They are so adorable :)

Just a couple of people at a dog show, lots of fun!

The next day we went to a mall called The Galleria, it reminded me of Phipps Plaza in Atlanta except it also had an ice-skating rink in it. Did we go ice-skating? Yes! Was I excited? Yes! Until I realized the last time I went ice-skating was OVER ten years ago! Oh crap! Here is what happened:

Me skating around looking like a fool, trying not to fall.

Stop for a fun picture on the ice, see I look like I'm having SO much fun!!

We go back to skating and the only way I would do it is if Tim promised to hold my hand, that is not a "pose" face, that is really sheer terror as I have realized what I got myself into.

I was not holding Tim's hand, I was clinching onto it for dear life.

Did I mention Tim was a pro at skating and had no problems whatsoever, and at one time he skated circles around my clumsy self??? Oh yeah, he's a skating pro! seriously...

The next day was our anniversary day, so we decided to stay at home and relax and go out to dinner that evening. The Vitarious's have a kyak, so Tim and I were discussing about going out on the lake that is in their back yard. It wasn't until I saw that kyak that I realized it was only for one person. Did we try to fit two in it anyway? Yes we did. Aunt Meg told us her daughter goes out on it all the time with her friends, so it should not be any harder for us.

Then Tim and I realized we DO weigh a lot more than two teenage girls. Here is our first try at it, I am in sheer terror, again, because as you can see, this kyak is a little back heavy (don't know why?? jk) and the slightes move of his orr was making the whole thing shake BIG time, that was going to send us tumbling into that VERY cold lake. Luckily, we did get back to the shore to try a different method:

This worked a little better, the kyak was still shaky, but our center of gravity was more in the middle, so it was doable. However, if you can see my legs, they were so pressed against the side of the kyak I lost feeling in the bottom of my shins. We did have fun though, it was quite an adventure.

That night we got dressed up to go to Vic and Anthony's.


I'm kind of upset that we did not take a picture with the food, it was an awesome steakhouse were the meat just melts in your mouth. Amazing. It was recommended to us by a friend and we thanked him for giving us a great place to eat for the evening.

Wednesday, Grammy and Grumpy came into town and unfortuneatly, we did not take any pictures that day (I need to work on that) but it was a fun day of catching up with them and relaxing around the house. Thursday we spent the day at a Museum in downtown Houston, and then went to dinner with one of my friend's, Kim and her boyfriend. That was a fun evening as well, and unfortunately, agian we only took pictures at the museum:

Me and Dinorsaurs.

Tim getting eaten by dinosaurs.

I love faceshots, I do them all the time with Tim. This is us having fun at the Museum.

To be honest with you, we did so much. There was a butterfly garden we went to at the museum (all who know me, know I love butterflies) I took SO many pictures, it is almost too much. We did a lot of relaxing that week, it was actually nice to go on vacation and relax and not be so busy we can't sleep or just lay around. And, I am officially going to have to cut this blog into two because I have pictures of our last adventure which was on Thankgsiving as we tooled around Orlando, with Riley, trying to find the perfect Christmas picture. More to come on that! So I hope you enjoy the catching up, more updates to come later!