Another 13th birthday - Jessica.

My cousin, Jessie (which is what we called her growing up - though she is now going by ¨Jessica,¨ I still call her Jessie), also had a birthday on the 13th. For her privacy (many women over 25 do not broadcast their age) I won´t say how old she is but she is over 25 and younger then me. Anyway, she was really my only cousin growing up since I only have three cousins, but she was the only one on my momś side, which we saw more. We grew up spending a lot of time together because our grandma watched us a great deal (thanks G-ma!) and had a great time. There are so many stories I can´t even begin to recite them all. I still have trouble with her and my brother (they are the same age) growing up every year because I still see them as 8 year-old kids. :) So, happy birthday Jessie - hope itś a great one!

Happy Birthday Kennedy and Preston!

So, I´ve been meaning to do this for quite some time now and I actually think about it often so now I´m finally going to start it the best I can. What, you ask? A birthday ¨tribute¨ of sorts. All these birthdays pass and I really want to give a nice ¨shout out¨ (to use a super annoying phrase coined somewhere during the 90s that is obnoxious and, well, annoying) to those folks.
So, first in this ¨series¨ is Kennedy and Preston. They turned one yesterday. Codyś awesome cousin, Trish and her fabulous husband, Joe had twins - a girl and a boy last year - unfortunately, quite early. To back up, Trish and Joe are two of the greatest people ever and are an absolutely adorable couple. You can just tell they are wild about each other. I´ve rarely met a guy who is so head over heels for a girl as Joe is about Trish - he adores her and you can see that in everything he does. Anyway, they were pregnant with twins last year during our wedding and, unfortunately, at that point Trish was on bed rest. She was so cute and felt bad for missing the wedding, but made her dad come to the wedding even though she was potentially due any minute. Well, the kids hung on six more days, in enough time for her dad to get back to Wisconsin, until they made their entrance. Unfortunately they were early so were in the hospital for quite some time. When we went up in May for a wedding they were still in the hospital but we got to stop by and see them. While they were super tiny, they were adorable. It was so cool to get to meet them. They are now both home and doing good. And a year later, here they are celebrating their first birthday. So happy birthday Preston and Kennedy - hope you have a great celebration!!!

Sigh

We have floors. You have no idea how happy this makes me. It seems like forever ago that we (meaning ¨I¨) tore out the carpet upstairs in the beginning of this insane quest to rid ourselves of old nasty carpet and update to more wood and new carpet. Well, the long, seemingly endless, journey is finally complete - sort of. Last Tuesday they started the floors - lots of installing new floor in a spare room and sanding the stairs (they were in pretty rough shape - they are, afterall 100 years old). Unfortunately, they were unable to start the painting of the stairs that day because they were not done sanding. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday they put the three coats of polyurethane on the stairs, meaning we couldn´t go upstairs at all until Saturday morning. All in all it wasn´t TOO painful. They usually called on their way here and I ran home from work for a little bit while they painted. They called on Friday while I was in Jefferson City and Cody in a meeting so they had to come back later - so much for giving us a heads up. Anyway, the spare room is gorgeous - absolutely love it. The stairs look better - much much better - but still old - but in a cute, antique sort of way. I still have a good bit of painting of trim and installing quarter round around the new wood to do (wood people charge an arm and a leg to do this so I figured I can do it myself) but I´m getting there. We spent the ENTIRE weekend moving EVERYTHING out of the bedroom (where it was living while they redid the spare room) and all into the spare room -same with the Boy Room - everything out into the dining and living room. We actually slept on the futon in the dining room last night - that was certainly a first. So today they came (insanely late as always) and put in the carpet. Now itś the race to get things as put back together as possible before my bonus parents come on Friday. While they totally would´t care what the house looks like (theyŕe that sort of people), they only see our house a few times a year at best so we really want to show its best side. :) Thankfully Cody was home today (no school on Mondays) and this weekend (no group meetings - thatś a first) to help out - after today itś all me until his folks get here. But I really think I can get a good bit done -hopefully.
Honestly, that is all there is in terms of news. Not too exciting for the rest of the world but has been turning our world upside down and back again. :) I´ĺl be glad when our house is back to somewhat normal mode.

No kidding.

Rain / Snow Showers

This is what weather.com has listed as our forecast for Saturday. Sounds great, huh? I think the Weather Man forgot it's APRIL!

Hanging with the flooring people.

PTO (paid time off - the replacement in corporate america for sick and vacation time) rocks - at least sometimes. While in an ideal world we would only use our PTO time for fabulous vacations to far away exotic lands, given the strength of the dollar, I'd like to meet one person who can afford such vacations to far away lands at this point. So I've got the next best thing going today. Nothing. That's right folks - today I am doing nothing (not really true but in the grand scheme of things it's nothign). While this morning I woke my happy butt up, got dressed, drove all the way to work only to realize I left my garage pass at home, drove back home and got said garage pass, went to work, turned on computer and prepared for morning court, I then got the call from the wood people that they would like to start the installation/refinishing today instead of Thursday. While this is fabulous in many ways (get it done sooner!!) it was certainly not in my "schedule" for the day.
So I finished morning court, went home to let them in and I am now babysitting the wood installation people. While I briefly considered leaving them to their own vices while I saundered back to work, they have twice now opened the basement door (no clue why) where I have the three cats stashed (we have a lock on the kitty door for times like this) and they have run out the front door (luckily it is "mild" outside because the front door has been open all day for ventilation - lots of dust from sanding) and I have had to run down the street finding them because they are scared to death of the noises in the house right now. So no leaving them unsupervised anymore. So I had to take a half day today - and I get paid for it. Thank you PTO time. Something is just fun about not being at work and being paid for it. :)
Well what am I doing with my time? Napping? Watching daytime TV (shoot me if this ever happens)? Painting my nails? Nope - because I am compulsive and absolutely have no clue how to relax and do nothing and get very angry if I am not "productive" in some sort with every day, I am rearranging the basement. Sounds fun, huh? I am going through every single box (we have 5 Atari's - anyone want one?) and throwing away crap/junk. I have a "keepsake" box from middle school, one from high school and one for "beyond." I am combinging them into one. One keepsake box is enough. I am throwing out all sorts of old crap, that while it is cute and has memories, has no physical place in my life - it is bascially taking up room in my overflowing basement. For instance, old playbills. Wow - memories. But what in God's green earth am I going to do with them? Nothing - except keep them in a box which I never go through unless I want to throw some stuff away. So I am keeping mostly pictures, notes (written by and to me), and writings (journals and notebooks of thoughts/drawings - yes, I suck at drawing but I used to do a lot of it) - and the rest is going in the garbage. So if you ever wanted to know a lot of juicy secrets about me and all sorts of embarassing tales, your best bet is to go through my garbage can tonight. :)

Opps. . . almost forgot.

I found out today that I passed the Illinois Bar Exam. I'm honestly not sure what to think about that. Basically I either feel like I bull shit way better then I thought or that the lawyers of Illinois are a lot stupider then I thought. I am shocked they let me pass that exam. I seriously seriously blew that test. And while I'm happy I didn't fail, I'm not particuarly happy I passed. Does that make sense? I'm glad I didn't fail because as much as I say it wouldn't have bothered me, it would have stung somewhere that I failed at something that I wanted to achieve. So I'm glad I don't have to explain to the world why I failed. But on the other hand, I'm also not really happy like I should be that I passed because I don't feel the sort of accomplishment that comes with studying for something, doing your best and achieving an objective. Normally doing something like this feels really good but I don't feel accomplished at all because I know I did so bad and I don't feel I really deserved it. I feel like I totally bombed on the test and only because everyone else must have done so bad that somehow I passed. So, while I passed and thus didn't waste all that money I don't really feel accomplished either. It's like if you interview for a job, know you did horribly and have no business getting the job, but get the job anyway because you were the only person they interviewed that passed the drug test - yeah, you may have gotten the job, but not because you deserved it, only because everyone else was so stupid.
Anyway, hopefully that will be one of the last I ever have to take. The whole process is really getting old and is not enjoyable in the least. But at least I can add another state on my resume. Not that I will be working on my resume any time soon. . . . . hint, hint, hint. :)

Happy 366 Days!

Well, I guess our first anniversay is extra special. While most people only have to wait 365 days for thier first anniversary, we had to make it one extra day thanks to Leap Year. But lo and behold, we made it. We were really sweating that one extra day. :)
Today is our very first wedding anniversary. Aside from being really cool that we have a wedding anniversary now it's very convenient because for years we've had all sorts of random anniversaries - our first anniversary (1996), our getting back together anniversary (2004), me moving to STL anniversary (2004), our engaged anniversary (2005), etc. Now we just have to worry about one. That's just cool. It's sort of a symbol of taking all those years and all those special days and all of a sudden wrapping them up into one big package - our wedding anniversary.
Cody and I are pretty laid back about celebrating things like our anniversary, birthdays, etc. We really make an effort to make every day a celebration, so we don't want to blow those "special" days out of proportion and make the rest of the year somehow less special or important - plus we're just laid back folks. But today we really wanted to take in the first anniversary and how cool and really special it was. So we went out to dinner and had a really good time hanging out with each other (we spent most of the day moving furniture and pulling up carpet tack strips for the floor people to come put in new wood - great bonding time). I was so touched by the people who called, emailed or wrote to wish us a happy 1st - I didn't think anyone would remember except for us! It really made us both feel so blessed to not only have each other but also those around us to share this with. While the wedding planning was not the most fun part of any of our lives, the wedding was priceless and the memories we have with our friends and family are totally irreplaceable.
Since we've had so many "special" days and anniversaries over our years together I didn't really expect to feel that much different about today, but it really is so much more special then I would have expected. We got to chat about our zillion years together and how things have come together for us where we are now and all our thoughts on the past, our present and our future. While what we do with our lives certainly wouldn't work for everyone or every relationship, I really think what we do works so well for us and I'm so happy we've had the time together to develop our lives into a place where we are both happy and comfortable. It's certainly taken a lot of trial and error and a lot of experimenting on what works and what doesn't work for us but we both are really enjoying where we are right now and are just blessed that things have turned out the way they have.
So, happy 1st anniversary Babe. As we've said so many times before, only 99 to go! You really do mean the world to me and there's not anyone else in this entire world that could ever even come close to making me as happy as you do. We really got it right this time and I am so thankful every day I get to spend my life with you. You rock!

Baby Bash!

Saturday Cody and I threw our first baby shower! Actually it was an "anti baby shower" - our friends are way too cool for a "regular" baby shower. Plus we'll find any excuse to have a keg party. So, we gathered the troops, got a keg and food and had a good old fashioned party - with some baby stuff. I actually made two things I had never made before in my life - a turkey and a diaper cake.

First - the turkey. Back at Christmas when turkeys were on sale we bought one thinking there would be some reason at some point to make a turkey. Well this was the perfect occassion. So we got all excited, took the turkey out early enough to dethaw (this took about a half a millinium) and were ready to cook our turkey. Only one problem - Cody left to get the keg and left me with a raw turkey. While I am not a vegetarian, I'm just not a huge fan of meat. Most of what we eat is already cut up beef (though we rarely eat beef - mostly because I don't know how to buy or cook it) or chicken breasts. I don't really buy anything that needs any more man-handling then that. I thought I would be okay with the turkey - just take it out of the bag, put it in the pan and pop it in the oven, right? I was wrong. That was the grossest thing I had ever seen or touched. For some reason I'm okay with a cooked turkey but I got really freaked out by the dead/raw turkey. It was disgusting. I seriously thought I would throw up after looking at the raw bird and the cavern that is its insides - so super gross. But I managed to close my eyes, put the bird in the pan, put the pan in the oven and close the door - the rest was up to Cody. In the end it tasted very good and we made cute little turkey sandwiches, but I will never look at turkey the same again. I'm going to stick with a ham at holidays.

Second, my diaper cake. You always see those cakes made out of diapers and they always look so cute. So I thought I would try my crafty hand at making one for our friends because they are just that cool and worth it. I thought it would be a quick and simple process -I was wrong. But in the end, and with a lot of help from Google, I made a darn cool looking three layer cake out of diapers and burp clothes (or wash clothes - I can't remember and can't tell the difference). I was quite proud of myself.

So, all in all the party was awesome. The keg was floating by the end of the night - always a good sign -and the happy parents to be had a lot of cool loot. We're very happy for them both and can't wait to meet the little girl. :)

Been a while.

How can there be "so much going on" at the same time there is "nothing going on"? I have been basically going crazy these last few weeks with flooring people. To add to our already indecisive natures and our insane mission to get the absolute most out of our money, the flooring industry in St. Louis is crap. My current wrath is at both some local flooring companies (that either quoted us outrageous prices to refinish old floors or put in new ones or that just didn't show up several times) or a national chain, that rhymes with Dome Mepot, that just can't seem to figure out what a floor is. I have gone around and around trying to get some prices - a seemingly easy process that has lasted weeks. So today, weeks after ripping all my carpet out of upstairs, living with (very sharp) carpet tacks on the stairs and the rooms, living downstairs with the upstairs completely torn up and moved around, I finally have a floor contractor. We went with a local company that I absolutely LOVE. The lady calls me back, is super nice and understanding and has been so kind in working with me and my seemingly endless concerns and questions (this is a big deal for us and thus I have put a LOT of thought and energy into it) - plus I wanted to support local business since I am about ready to burn down our local Home Depot out of frustration. So we should have new wood next week. Still have to figure the carpet out. Home Depot acts like I'm the first person in the history of the store to want carpet. Go figure.

In other news/thoughts:

In case you haven't seen this yet, you should watch this. While I'm not usually one to awe over anything on Oprah or get all giddy about things floating around on the internet, this is pretty good. If you watch the abridged Oprah version (that's what the link is to), you can link to the original, much longer, version that is just as good. Pretty moving stuff. It's all about achieving your childhood dreams and all that stuff. This guy had dreams, went after them and did a good job getting them. Cody and I discussed this and are still debating what our childhood dreams even are or were. I guess we can't ever reach our goals or dreams without figuring out what they are - gotta work on that.

I've stopped drinking on the weekdays - at least for a while. I know, I'm lame and old and no fun. But I think it's a good thing because booze has a lot of calories (and I'm trying to drop my "Midwest Middle") and I was drinking not a ton but often so we've taken up hot tea instead. How old and lame, huh? Instead of coming home and relaxing with a beer, we now come home and relax with a cup of hot herbal tea. :) But no worries, we're still fun enough to drink on the weekends. :)

I'm sort of running again. Had a numbing shot in my knee (oww!) a few weeks ago and was able to run great - meaning something is wrong (duh). But I've been taking it pretty easy and building up and I did 40 minutes today with only very little pain so I'm very encouraged. My goal is the STL half marathon in September and the Chicago marathon in October. We'll have to see. :)

Other then that, I do have some really cool news that I think I will be able to officially post about soon. It's over the moon great. :)

Gators in the Final Four!

Or, as Cody likes to say, they're going for a Back to Back to Baby Back. I thought that was pretty cute. Get it? Baby back? NIT? Pretty funny, huh? Anyway, now we're resting all our hopes for a season that was pretty dismissal in a tournament that we are still relatively embarassed to play in. Being the Gators - with the Back to Back Championships - people give you a lot of crap. Around here I've heard more then once "so, where are the Gators in the tourney?" I assumed they were asking this because their team (usually University of Missouri) was actually in the NCAA tournament (since the Gator's aren't in it I've pretty much ignored it). Well, NO! Mizzou (that's what they call the University of Missouri) isn't even in the NIT! If only I had checked this out I would have had such a great retort with all the Gator jokes about not being in the Big Dance. Well, at least now we have some hopes for a Back to Back to Baby Back and I've learned that there really are teams that don't even make the NIT (I sort of assumed everyone made it). :)

Aside from this, life is, as usual, nutty. More rain and storms. We lost power for a bit while Cody was at school (which is where he lives - over 9 hours of school a week plus working 40+ hours - doesn't sound like fun - better him then me) and I was freaked out and he wasn't here but now we have power (hense the computer and internet to post this) so life is good again. I'm just curious to see what floods next.

The flooring saga continues. You would think you'd just decide what you want, go to a store and buy it. Well, not us. We are obsessed, as always, with getting ALL available information, getting the best people to do the project for the best price (we refuse to overpay for things - okay, so we're thrifty (read: cheap)) and absolutely tormented by options. But we are moving forward. :)

Better start building the Ark!

St. Louis, being a river city, tends to have a tenacious relationship with water every spring. Every so often (by "every so often" I mean at least once a year, sometimes twice) it rains and rains and rains and rains and then combined with some sort of snow melting or rain upstream causes all the rivers around here to flood. Obviously the Mississippi is pretty well contained by a number of locks, damns and flood walls but there are still portions that are "allowed" to flood. The Riverfront is one of those. Cody and I drove down to the Arch and the Riverfront yesterday to gawk (with the rest of St. Louis - obviously there is just SO much to do here in the spring) at the rising water.

This is a photo of a statue of Lewis and Clark. Can't see the statue? See the thing poking out of the water? That's the top of the head and the arm of either Lewis or Clark waving a hat in the air. The rest of the illustrious statue is under the water - that's just an example of how deep the water is.

I just thought this was funny. Follow the sign for Arch/Riverfront Parking. If you have a boat.

Anyway, while the Mississippi wasn't terribly flooded (while this looks bad, it's not half as bad as it could be) the Meramec was, causing whole roads to be shut down, a major part of an interstate to close and several feet of water in homes and businesses - one Steak and Shake had 7 ft of water - not that I could care less if Steak and Shake floods.

Anyway, that's most of the excitement around St. Louis. Oh, and it SNOWED on EASTER! I think the weather man must have gotten Christmas and Easter confused because this was just not right. There is an old saying in St. Louis that if you don't like the weather to just wait five minutes and it will change. :)

Happy Spring Equinox!

12 hours of sun. And 12 hours of night. That's sure better then 18 hours of night. :) There are some days I just like and this is one of them. I like the feeling of spring on its way (even if we're still lucky to see a day over 60 degrees). It's just a happy thought.
When we were younger my brother and I were convinced that you could balance and egg on its end on each equinox. Whether or not this is true is still speculation but I think he claims to have done it one year. I think my mom and brother even have a photo where they claimed to have balanced an egg on its end. If it were me I would attempt for 30 seconds to balance a Cadbury egg and if I couldn't do it then I would just eat it. :)
Happy Spring everyone! One day closer to summer. I really think I could live in St. Louis forever if I could just discard winter.

Runner Up University

Okay, so this is really mean and I try really hard not to be a really mean person but this is just too funny. So everyone knows UF beat Ohio State for the 2006 Football National Championship. And then beat them for the 2007 Basketball National Championship. Well, this year neither UF nor Ohio State made the big dance and both have been relegated to the NIT (which people fondly refer to as the ¨Not In the Tournament¨ bracket). Anyway, as luck would have it for good old Ohio State, if both UF and Ohio State continue to win in the NIT (both won their respective first round games) they could face in yet another championship. As they say in Gainesville, ¨The Ohio State University - Property of The University of Florida.¨ :)

Cody's Fur Coat

Now I know why Cody is comfortable leaving the heat at 58 degrees - he always has a nice warm scarf around his neck. This cat is seriously obsessed with my husband. One day her and I will have to have a nice long chat. If I go over to sit by him she will swat me away - crazy jealous cat. :)

Why Gators and Roadtrips Rock.

This past weekend our local University of Florida Alumni Association group - the St. Louis Gateway Gators - went on a road trip to Kentucky to watch the Gators play UK in basketball in Rupp Arena. We don't get to see many Gator games being so far north and none of us had ever been to Rupp - plus it wasn't impossible to get tickets as usual because neither UF or UK are that good this year.
The trip was fabulous. We had such a great time. There are so much funny stories to tell there isn't even enough room. We left here Saturday morning with one car and one rented minivan (me driving since the rental was in my name) for a total of 11 people. The car ride, as usual, was hilarious enough in itself and then we got to talking about what we missed about Florida - which led to Chick-fil-A. We have one Chick-Fil-A in STL -it's in a mall that is about 15 miles from us and now that they have a huge stretch of the interstate shut down until 2010, there is absolutely no good way to get there - for any of us. So a recent Gator addition to STL called her brother and found out there was a Chick-Fil-A in Louisville Kentucky. Another recent Gator addition to STL got out his GPS (aka Bitching Betty) and found the Chick-Fil-A on there. We were psyched. So we got off the interstate - in the cold, snow and ice (in Kentucky where they are NOT prepared for such things) - and kept driving and turning and driving and turning. Finally it tells us to turn left and we realize that the Chick-Fil-A is in a mall - so that was funny. So we got out and ran our hearts out into the mall food court - but no Chick-Fil-A - apparently Betty was no updated and the Chick-Fil-A had shut down and had moved. In any event, the Gator Club finally found Chick-Fil-A and we were happy. It was just a really really funny event - especially since by that time the van had finished about a half a bottle of Segrams 7 (not me- I was driving).
There were just all sorts of funny stories - Cody fell twice pretty hard on the snow because he was drunk. Then we got back to the hotel and Cody had found himself a bottle of A1 and was eating it on his salad that he had leftover from Chick-Fil-A. A group got kicked out of the hotel bar for trying to bring in beer and then some 12 year olds asked them to buy them some beer. All sorts of fun stories - it was a great time by all. I forgot how much fun roadtrips can be. :)

The Ups and Downs of Living in an Old House

Living in an old house in the greatest thing in the whole world. Living in an old house is also the biggest pain in the butt in the whole world. The current trials and tribulations: flooring.
We moved into our house close to three years ago. Downstairs we had beautiful super old wood floors (original wood) except the addition which had carpet (it was put in the last 15 years or so) and the bathroom and kitchen. Upstairs we had the same carpet - carpet that I HATE. Absolutely hate this stuff - it's super gross because the lady before us never cleaned it and had a really dirty dog so I never feel comfortable even walking on it - for three years. Since we moved in it's been one excuse after another as to why we haven't finished the flooring the way we liked. But now I'm done with excuses - we've been here three years and while it will be an absolute pain to deal with the floors, it either needs to get done or I need to accept that it will never get done and get it off my darn "to do" list. :)
So I talked Cody into jumping off the perverbial flooring cliff with me. There are a number of issues - for instance we have carpet upstairs but know there is at least to some degree old hardwood underneath the carpet. We have stairs that are currently carpet (I cannot stand carpet on stairs - while it is gorgeous in other people's homes it is WAY too much work for me to keep clean) and are unsure if underneath is hardwood or plywood or plywood painted (and likely with lead paint). So tonight we got started figuring all this out. We went all around upstairs with a razor knife and just started cutting the carpet up all over the place. The verdict? Our spare bedroom is 90% good old hardwood that just needs to be finished and 10% plywood where they had to fill in places for old vents, etc. The hallway is hardwood - yeah! The stairs are wood - but not the same hardwood or plywood - but a wood that I think they can "finish" and while the size won't totally match the rest of the wood I'll be happy enough with it because it will have a runner over it. Our bedroom on the other hand looks like it is about 50% hardwood and 50% plywood - basically they used the bedroom hardwood to fill in spots in the downstairs wood when they rehabbed the house. So the good news is we get a new hardwood room and hardwood stairs (two less places with yucky carpet!!), but we will still have two carpeted rooms - but I guess that's okay because we are getting the hardwood rooms really cheap because they don't have to put anything new in, only finish what is already there.
So the next few weeks are an exciting dance of contractors and us painting trying to get it all right at the right time. We are going to try to get the wood guys out first for the spare room while we finish painting our room and the hallway. Then the wood guys can do the hallway and lastly the carpet people can do our room after the painting is done. This is a lot of things that have to happen perfectly in the right order - I'm crossing my fingers. :)

Who is this man?

Do you ever look at your mate/spouse and wonder who in the hell that person is? Well, I usually don't. While I by no means of the imagination know everything about Cody, or ever will, we know each other pretty darn well and can foresee a lot of what the other one does - at least to the point where the other's behavior is ever "shocking." Well, today I had two "shocks."
First - while I was in the bathroom changing out of my workout gear and into my going to Home Depot gear (which includes the first pair of pants I can find on the floor and a shirt that doesn't have too much cat hair on it) Cody came in and was looking in the mirror. He said "I think I'm going to take my earring out." Just like that - all simple, calm and matter of a fact. But back up a minute - this kid has had this earring in longer then I have known him. When we first met he actually had another earring and then I lent him one of mine that he lost so my grandma actually got him the earring that he has been wearing for 10 years now. I seriously don't even notice it at all anymore - I've never know Cody without the earring. People ask him all the time when he is going to take it out and he snarks back "when you stop asking me" or something equally "leave the hell alone" attitude. Which I adore - he's his own person and everyone should just leave him alone about whether he likes the earring or not. People asked if he would take it out for the wedding pictures and I hadn't even thought about it. Anyway, I thought the day he took it out would be this big event, but no, just like that he took it out, put it in the jar with all my earrings and said that he was going to try without it for a bit. I just stared blankly at him, like "WHAT? Are you kidding. That was it? Just like that?" My jaw dropped. He had just changed something that he had been holding onto as "his" in just a split second, just like that. I'm still a little floored.
Second - and this one is equally "shocking." Cody and I cannot make decisions. Everyone knows this. We cannot pick dates, where to eat, what movie to watch, what game to play, where to go on trips, etc. We typically procrastinate until the choice gets made for us - and usually that is just fine by us. This is why almost three years after buying our house, it is still not all the way painted- we could not pick a colour for our bedroom. First we wanted it a nice blue, but then I got over that. Then we were going to paint it generic tan like the rest of the house - plus we had that paint already. But then during the wedding planning process I really fell in love with the colour green. No clue why. I had never been particularly fond of green over any other colour - but all of a sudden I loved it. And I still really like it. So on a number of occasions we have looked at dozens of paint swatches and tried to find a perfect green. No success yet. So while we were at Home Depot buying our "greenhouse" supplies, we took a trip through the paint department to get some more paint for our hallway (Cody's parents are coming to visit - YEA - and people visiting always gets me moving off my butt to get things done - in a very good way). While we were waiting for the hallway paint (same tan as the rest of the house) we started looking at green. I kept saying "look at this one," "what about this one," "do you like this one." I never really expected us to actually pick a colour - after all we had done this dozens of times. I figured we look at a few, kill some time and maybe take some home to hold against the wall and then eventually throw away. So he looked them all over and then I showed him one and all of a sudden he said, "yeah, let's get that one." I was floored. "You're kidding? Just like that? Let's get this one?" Yup - just like that. A process that has been dragging on for three years now was over just like that. He just picked one. That was it. Since a decision had just been made and I would potentially have a painted bedroom shortly I was all about this - I grabbed the paint, we took it to the guy and ever so confidently said "we want this one." Just like that.

I am still sort of floored. He (and 'we' and 'me') never makes decisions like that. We're so insanely annoyingly overly cautious so many times. But, nope, not today. Just like that my husband has no earring and I have a bedroom paint colour. Just like that.

It's not what you think. . . .

It's not what it looks like - seriously. Cody and I have become totally nuts. It all started when we first moved into our house. I've always wanted a house so that I could have a garden and when we finally got a house I couldn't wait to start one. The next spring (since we moved into the house in June) I forced Cody to the stores around town looking for veggie plants. So we both picked out a few - me some tomatos and an eggplant and him a lot of peppers. So I sort of forced him into helping me plant them and then it just took off from there. He loved to check on them and make sure they were okay and then when they started producing fruit you would have thought we hit the lottery.

So last year he couldn't wait to get the garden started. We waited until we got back from the honeymoon (I cannot believe we have been married almost a year - damn does time fly!) and then went on our hunt for plants. We planted a few different varieties last year -some worked great, others not so much.

So when we were at the store the other day we ran across the seed packets. I told him seeds are a pain in the butt and we'll just wait until April/May like everyone else and buy our little saplings to plant directly into the ground. Well, apparently that was just not good enough. He thought the idea of planting seeds was just fabulous. So we each picked out some seed packets, bought our little peat pots and went to town. We got them all planted in their little pots and got them set in these little tin things to make watering easier. Our theory was that we would put them in front of a sunny window and let them grow until spring. Little did we realize that we live in MISSOURI and there is no sun here in the winter. So for the last few days our seeds have been sitting on the ironing board by a window but with no sun. So we did what all inteligent people do - we got on the internet. And we found that most places (Missouri included) do not get enough sunlight through windows to support seedlings. But "sun lights" do.

So off we were to Home Depot where we found a balast and two "grow lights." We already had the set of shelves so we went to town. We took the treadmill downstairs (we were meaning to do this anyway because when Cody runs on the treadmill it shakes the chandelier and walls downstairs) and set up the shelves where the treadmill was. Then we set up our light and loaded up our seedlings. We made the bottom two shelves "cat friendly" in the hopes that would entice them to stay off the shelf with the seedlings - we'll see if that works. So anyway, our plan is to rotate them daily, raise the light as the plants (hopefully) get bigger and bigger and if all works out right, by the time spring ever comes the plants will be ready to move outdoors into the veggie garden area (bigger and improved from last year). Cross your fingers or else I'm going to have a very upset husband on my hands. But we are really learning a lot about all this and are having a hell of a time with it. Plus we get yummy veggies. :)

A few photos.

Here is my own personal "winter wonderland" -

This is our backyard - or it was before someone covered it in cotton balls. That little house looking thing is our garage - we debate back and forth whether that was an old house back in the 1800s or something (our house wasn't built until the late 1800s or early 1900s). Anyway that thing on the right is my raised flower bed I built - except you can barely see it - and the snow hadn't even ended by the time I took this photo. The little arcs are the border to our vegatable garden - barely visable under the mass of snow. READY FOR SPRING!

Winter Wonderland My Butt

Snow, snow, snow. When I first moved here it was a novelty. Even back in November/December it was neat - the first snow of the season, sledding, snowball fights, snow angels, getting exercise shoveling the stuff. But itś MARCH now and I´m gosh darn tired of the stuff. People say itś so pretty and itś a ¨Winter Wonderland"- maybe if you live in the North Pole and Santa is your neighbor, but not in Missouri. I´m just plain tired of the stuff. Yesterday it started ¨icing¨ - yeah, like on a cake, but not as sweet. Rain turned to freezing rain turned to sleet which later turned to ice. I now know more about the process of precipitation freezing then I ever wished to know. Anyway, it simply involved some elbow grease and a ice scraper. Then over night it started snowing. And snowing. And snowing. I think the weather failed to switch its calendar to MARCH (Have I mentioned itś MARCH and itś supposed to be not crappy anymore?). So it was snowing. And of course we all have to go to work because us making Corporate America money is more important than our lives. If we die in the snow/ice they just find someone else in Corporate America to take our places - we are not indispensable. Anyway, so we mosey into work. Where it continues to snow and snow and snow. Finally I make it home in the ice and slush and dirty nasty snow/slush/water stuff in a car barely a foot off the ground so it gets stuck in snow very easily. When I got home I fell only twice (which is an improvement over the last few months) walking from the street to the house (not a far distance). I brought out my handy dandy ruler stick and measured the snow around the house - between 6-8 inches. Not too bad for MARCH.
Anyway, it really is pretty if youŕe inside and don´t have to go to work and can sit under the covers, watch Oprah and sip hot cocoa (spiked with Baileyś preferably). I´m just getting really tired of the winter. I tried to be patient and understanding. I tried to feel blessed by having all four seasons (people ask me if I was sad in Florida not having all four seasons - the answer is NO - I was not sad - we had quite enough change of season for me - plus when your supposed one ¨season¨ is good, why do you need three more?!?!?). So I´m doing my best to grin and bear it but I really wish spring would get here already!
In other news, I´m back to normal at work - no more being sick or bar studying. While the worst part of being a lawyer is billable hours (that and spending your entire life getting yelled at) it was actually sort of fun to be back in the billable hunt these past few days after such a crummy month in February. I´m sure that exciting feeling will wane by the end of the week though. :)