Ho Ho Holidays!

I love christmas! I love the food, I love spending quality time with my family, and I love decorations. I love everything about christmas. Mark and I went down to Mobile to celebrate christmas in my parent's home. My sister's family came as well. We all had a fantastic time. I think me and my niece were the most excited. My absolute favorite thing about christmas is to see the reactions on my family's faces when they open their gifts. My niece's reaction was perfect! Per my sister's suggestion, I bought Emory some new Disney Princess and Fancy Nancy underwear. Then I found some very cute socks that were brightly colored and had the days of the week on them. I then had a sudden realization, I am THAT aunt! I am that aunt that gives underwear and socks as presents! I do not want to be THAT aunt! Even though my sister told me that Emory wants those items and that she would be overjoyed when she opened her present, I had to get her something fun. I went to look for a coloring book and found a Disney Princess coloring/sticker book. I knew Emory would like it because I loved it! I almost got one for myself. :) When she opened her present, she did like the underwear, she liked the socks more because there was a purple pair (her new favorite color), but when she pulled the coloring/sticker book out of her bag, her face lit up and she immediately started chattering about a friend of hers who had one and she wished that she had one just like it! Needless to say I was elated because she loved her gift.

Mark and I drove down to Mobile on the backroads from T-town. It was actually a very pleasant drive. We drove through the boonies of Alabama. We saw Catfish farms, horses, cows, and two donkeys. We also were fortunate to pass by not one but 2 paper mills. Childhood memories came flooding back to me as I breathed in their putrid stink. My dad worked in Sylacauga and sometimes Mom would drive us kids down there to visit him at the hospital. On our way, we had to pass through Childersburg where a papermill resided. All of us kids would hold our noses and breathe through our mouths. Good times!

Now we look forward to New Year's and resolutions!

Hodge-Podge!

Oh my! I cannot believe it has been that lomg since the last time I have blogged! My father wrote me an e-mail telling me to update my blog. I did not even know that he read my blog! Thank you Daddy for reminding me to update my blog!

So, I got a job. I am working at BPAC again! Going back to that clinic was like going home. I know the job, I know my coworkers and what to expect from them, I know my bosses, and I know our clients. I love my job!

My nephew is growing! Emory, my niece is growing as well. She just turned three in October and Ethan is now three months old and weighs 15 pounds! I got to look after him on Saturday and he is such a laid back, happy boy. I cannot wait to meet my children.

My parents came into town a few weeks ago for Ethan's baptism. It was so great to see them! I cannot wait till christmas so that I may see them again. Mark was unable to see them because he has been so busy.

Mark and school have a very intimate marriage. Law school is a very demanding wife. Needless to say, we do not see as much of each other as we want to. Law school lives up to her rumored behavior of sucking time from your life. This semester is almost over and the next one will be here before we know it!

I cannot believe how this football season has shapped up. Such promise at the beginning has turned into disappointment! The iron bowl is the only game left of any importance before the sec championship. Did I mention that I am going to the sec championship? That's right!

The Jade is doing fine. She gets to go to work with me and play all day! The guys at the clinic take such great care of her. The bitties are also doing well. It is time for their shots! They cannot wait, I am sure of it.

Halloween came and went with little excitement as well as my birthday. We had an eighties themed party at Blue Monkey for my birthday and Kara and I were the only ones who dressed up! We did not dress up for halloween though I did get Jade a costume. The plan was for her to answer the door for the trick or treaters but none came. Very dissapointing.

Our next adventure is Thanksgiving and then Christmas. Mark said that we could get a tree this year! Hopefully he will not go back on his word!

No work and no play makes Grace an anxious girl?

No, I do not have a job yet. It is now September and I do not have a job. Day after day I pray that this time I venture out to apply for a job I will get a call back for an interview. Day after day I hear nothing. This is the longest time I have been unemployed since I was 19 years old. I am going crazy! Not really, but I need a job.

Well, if I do not have a job how do I fill my time you ask? I am not only the cook, maid, and errand girl anymore. I am now a landscape architect! Well, maybe not an architect of our landscape, but I now mow and edge the "lawn" (I say "lawn" because we have weeds not grass). I have been working on our backyard as well trying to kill all the weeds. I started with weeds as high as mid thigh and in clusters as big as size 4 soccer balls. After a grounds crew did a poor job of dealing with the height of our "lawn" I have been tackling the large clusters of weeds. I have sprayed and watered just to have succeeded in turning a quarter of our backyard into a dust bowl and the other 3/4 are still thriving like champs.

I have also become the "get 'er done!" person when it comes to repairs to be made that should have been made before we moved in. Case in point, our microwave made a funny noise when a friend tried to heat up some left over pizza when he came to help us paint in June. We told our landlord about it at that time and I have had a working microwave for only ten days now. I know that might seem miniscule, but when your oven does not work either, how are we to eat? I am very thankful to now have a working oven for 2 days. I hate to be rude but it should have been working since we moved in over a month ago!

The best job I have aquired while being stuck at home is dog trainer. Since Jade was a puppy, both of us have been very involved in her up bringing. We have been so committed to her that she became our child. We discussed in depth how to discipline her, when to feed her, crate training her, leash training her, and so much more. We need to be on the same page so as to not send comflicting signals that might confuse her while understanding that she is not human. She was actually a pretty easy dog to train. She was house broken in one month and had all your basic commands down pat by two weeks. One thing we had to realize about her is that she will be a puppy for a long time and we could not let her roam the house unattended lest she chew up anything valuable or get into something that could be detrimental to her health. So, we bought her a play pin. It kept her confined without having to be stuck in her crate all day. I was a miracle worker for us and, even though she was very capable of jumping out of it, she loved it. However, when we moved to our new place, the play pin did not fit so well. I then took it upon myself to transition her to the kitchen. It took me and Jade one week to go from pin to kitchen with a babygate to just kitchen. It is so great to have her out of my living room! It is also better for her to finally be able to have full access to her water bowl and to be able to lie in her padded crate whenever she wants instead of on the hard wood floor. Now if I could just teach her how to fetch me a beer . . .

So, as you see I am not completely without things to keep me occupied, but we still have no income. I really, really need a job!

Nephew Ethan is here!

Yeah! My nephew, Ethan Skocelas, is finally here! I am sure that the rest of us cannot be as gleeful as my sister! I know I will be in her position one day and would appreciate the recognition when the time comes. She is such a wonderful person! I cannot imagine having the ability to share my newborn with so many people. I know I would want to be so selfish and not let anyone one else hold him, at least until he starts to cry! I cannot claim that I will even allow Mark to hold my newborn! They had just as many people visiting this delivery as her first delivery. I do not know how she puts up with all that commotion just hours after delivering. I pray that I will have it together to not only allow people to touch my newborn but to hold conversation and be patient enough to repeat myself over and over!

Did I mentoion how perfect he looked! God did another great job weaving my sister and brother in law into one person! I was given the opportunity today to spend some time with my family and I was allowed to hold Ethan after his lunch and he gracefully fell asleep on my chest. I hated having to put him down in his bed to finish his nap. I already love him so much! Emory, my niece, seems to have adjusted pretty well so far. She is so sweet to her new baby brother other than asking if they could put him back into mother's belly! It was basically a question of couriosity not animosity!

All Moved In

Wow! It was tough, but we got it done!

Thank you all who kept us in your prayers on July 31st. Even though we were delayed 45 miniutes due to rain, we managed to get everything to Tuscaloosa safe and sound! It took about five hours to load the truck and about one hour to unload it! Mark tackled the 24foot monster of a truck. I am glad I did not have to drive it! Picking up the truck was not bad but returning it . . . now that is a horse of a different color. We drove across town for about twenty minutes, stopped and turned around because we thought we missed the place to drop it off, just to turn around again and the place was up the road from where we stopped the first time! Then I had to battle the steep dirt road in the Cobra as I followed the truck into the lot. Fun, fun! We have only one more box to unpack but we have to wait until we can buy a new bookshelf.

The animals are adjusting fine! Jade loves her new outdoor space! The kitties have found new places to hide! I love being able to park my car in a garage and its so much easier to unload groceries! It is so nice to not have to battle for a parking spot in an apartment complex!

Mark starts oreintation tomorrow and I have completed my first round of job searching yesterday. My sister is being induced this thursday so my mom came into town yesterday. She came over today to see our new place and to hang out for a bit with us. I always forget how much I miss my parents until I get to see them again. I cannot wait for Baby Ethan to get here!

Everybody Loves Atlanta!

Nicole and Robert (some friends of ours) came to visit us from the Ham last weekend. Friday night, we went to Dave and Busters and had a blast. I swear that place is worse than a casino! Well, I have never been to a casino, but I imagine that money slips through wallets and exchanges hands just as quickly! In my head, I held an ideal that D & B would be very similar to my old Chuck E. Cheese days, and it was to an extent. First, you get a prepaid credit card (which they charge you 2 bucks for) and choose how much you want to spend. Of course, this all depends on the game token : dollar : tokens per game ratio. I do not want to get into it, because it is very confusing! :) Did I mention that I had coupons for a not so great deal? Secondly, you have to swipe your card like a credit card to play the games. After eating dinner, Nicole and I started off with a couple rounds of Ski Ball. I love Ski Ball! Then, I found my true talent playing a coin game. When the game starts, it gives you several coins to drop in the slot of your choice. Then it will push your coin forward and hopefully push other coins up front forward and over the edge and the machine will spit out tickets! Mark and Robert played basketball and some other games. The best part is that you can drink and play at the same time! Man, I could spend a fortune in that place! At the end of the night, we all took a stroll through the prize store and cashed in our tickets. Nicole and Robert had over 2400 tickets and Mark and I had over 4200 tickets. Nicole saw a huge plush giraffe when we all first walked past the store before starting to play. It was 3000 tickets, but she did not have enough to get it and she had to have it because she talked about all night so we all combined our tickets. In the end we walked away with 2 plastic D & B cups, 2 t-shirts, a plush Buzz (GT's mascot's name), a plush blue dog, and the 6 foot giraffe (I named her Jazzy which is short for Jasmine). I want to go back so bad!
On Saturday, we went to Six Flags! Nicole signed us up for Flash passes so we did not have to wait in line, but we still only got to ride 4 rides. I had many not so great coupons for Six Flags too! I did, however, have two great coupons to get them into the park! :) After waiting in line to park, we had to wait in a line to get tickets, and another line to get into the park and then another line to get the Flash Pass. All this took about 2 hours! Blah! The first ride we went on was the Mindbender! It was great, but I got a little freaked out because I had not mentally prepared myself for the day's activities. After eating lunch, we rode the Batman! I really like that ride! Acrophobia was next and I do NOT like that ride! I fell victim to peer pressure and agreed to ride, but when it came time to actually sit in the seat, Nicole bailed and I desparately wanted to follow in her foot steps! Unfortunately, I did not decide quickly enough and up I rose and around I went, then down I came and I shall never do it again! You know that feeling of anxiety that would overcome you when you did something really bad and you knew your parents knew about it, but you had to confront them anyway knowing what would happen? Multiply that by one million and you have my level of anxiety and distress 200ft in the air, listening to the guy count down to the moment I would plummet face down to the ground, trusting and praying that the hydraulics were engineered by a Tech Grad and not a Georgia Grad! I could barely walk when the ride was over and my hands shook for the next ten minutes. The last ride that we rode was the Goliath, but I decided to sit that one out because I had had enough excitement for one day. Nicole and Robert drove back to the Ham from Six Flags and Mark and I enjoyed a relaxing evening at home! Thanks to them for a wonderful weekend and a small dose of fear factor!

*+*July 4th*+*

When most people think of family holidays, their minds usually think of Christmas and Thanksgiving first, birthdays might follow as a close second, then Labor Day, Memorial Day, and Spring Break bring up the rear because these holidays revolve around weekends. July 4th is like a floating holiday people take at a more convenient time. For me, July 4th has always ment a great time with family and an excuse to play with fire!
July 4th was always my third favorite holiday after Christmas and my birthday. My parents would take us on two vacations every Summer as a child. One would be a week in Texas visiting my Dad's family (which I always enjoyed as well) and the other was July 4th in Atlanta visiting my Mom's family. My mom has two older brothers and both of them would bring their families as well. Everyone brought fireworks because you could not buy fireworks in Georgia but you could set them off. There was always a ton of fireworks! On other nights my cousins and I would spend hours collecting as many lightning bugs as we could. One year, a neighbor of my grandparents I had become friends with invited me to join her flag twirling group and walk in the Dunwoody parade. I was super excited and my mom bought me this great red, white, and blue dress to wear. The only drawback was I had to take a nap before the parade! Another year, my Aunt took all of us and our cousins to Stone Mountain to see the laser light show and the fireworks. We brought blankets to sit on, a cooler for cokes, and snacks. We had such a great time, we decided to go again another year! Unfortunately, those trips were retired as all of us kids grew up and with the passing of my grandparents.
Last year, my sister invited Mark and I to go with them to Thunder on the Mountain. If you have never been, its an awesome display of fireworks around Vulcan. Nothing like Stone Mountain, but still pretty great! We had a fantastic time that night with my sister, brother-in-law, my neice and their friends.
This year, we did not go anywhere and it was great! I loved being able to relax and sleep in a bit. All we did was go to the pool for about an hour, eat at Dreamland (of course we had to have BBQ!) and watch the fireworks display at Lenox on tv!
To this day, I am always excited about the forth because of all the great memories I have of my family and my childhood. I look forward to having kids and getting together with family to form many new memories!

Our eyes were bigger than our hands!

Last weekend, Mark and I strolled down to T-Town and painted our house. I think we bit off a little more than we could chew in one weekend, but with the help of friends and family we got it done.
We got into town on Thursday and immediately went to Home Depot (after eating at Wings of course!) to purchase all the supplies we would need to paint a house. Except the paint because we had already purchased it. Little did we know that this would be the first trip to a home improvement store, but not the only trip!
Friday began slowly with a sleepy wake-up call at 7am. After a quick breakfast and a 45 minute drive, we began working on cleaning up the basebaords and walls to tape off everything. This was my nightmare and I could only take so much. Not because I have an aversion to cleaning but because I have an aversion to hundreds of pairs of eight legs and eyes. That's right! They were everywhere and they came in all sizes! Luckily, I have a very sweet husband and a generous Mother in Law who took care of eliminating most of them. After the nightmare was over, the taping began. We taped and taped and taped until the word lost all meaning! We sent Mother Kajdos home about 6pm because Mark and I had planned on putting the first coat of paint on the walls of the office and the guest room. We did not leave till about 11pm. What a first day!
Saturday began with an even harsher wake-up call at 7am. After another quick breakfast, another 45 minute drive, a visit to Lowe's AND a 30 minute search for a Starbucks, we got started on painting the largest area of the house. Kara and I started by painting with a brush and Mark started the rolling. It worked out great for me that he liked to roll and it worked out great for him that I liked the brush work. Matt showed up about 1pm and with all of us working very hard with very few breaks we got everything done, except the master bedroom. Can you believe that we ran out of paint? Kara went with me on the third and final trip to Home Depot to get one more gallon of paint at 9pm. That seemed to finish us all up and we headed home about 10pm.
I bet you can guess how Sunday started! An early alarm at 7am. It was especially hard for Mark since he stayed up to hang out with friends till almost 3am, but we made it down to the house by 9:30am and the clean up began! Mark and his mom removed the tape around the baseboards while I was up and down the ladder removing the tape around the ceiling and painting over mistakes. We left about 2pm with a satisfied feeling and pictures!
All in all, everything went well and I do not want to see another paint brush for a very long time!

Happy Anniversary!

Today is our 7 year anniversary! I know that now we are married some people might think that it is ridiculous to recognize our dating anniversary, but this day has ment so much to us for 6 years. And now we have achieved 7 years together! We have accomplished so much together over these past several years (I can actually use the word several!). We have grown up together, experienced college together, and owned pets together. We have loved together and lost together. We have visited other nations and conquered the interstates together. We also have many of the same friends that have stuck by our sides as well as both of our wonderful families. We have moved numerous times and put up with trash roomates together. We have known each other since 6th grade and we are best friends. The Lord chose to save us, bring us to Him and then bring us together. His unconditional love has taught us how to love each other even when we are angry. I love my Mark with all my heart and I look forward to a lifetime of many more accomplishments with him!

Rainbow House

Mark and I are planning on painting the house we will be renting in Tuscaloosa next weekend. If you have ever painted a room, then you know the headaches that go along with it (and I am not talking paint fumes though they do give me a migraine). Picking out the new color can be fun, but because there are so many other colors to choose from you tend to second guess your first, second, and maybe even your third and fourth choices. Then you get a small sample and a brush, go home and paint a small area, let it dry, and your choice is made. Mark and I spent about an hour and thirty minutes picking out colors for our new place and each color has a stunt double. Next move was to take the swatches to the house and see what they look like in the light up against the walls. We went down there last weekend to test them out. Unfortunately, it is too expensive to buy samples of 14 different colors and we also do not have the time to come back and see what they look like in different lighting at different times of the day. We did do the whole "hey, what do think?" "what about from the doorway?" "how about here in the corner?" and it seemed to work just fine for us. We settled on 6 great colors that work together and flow nicely threw out the whole house. We even eliminated one color completely. We then bought our paint and we are ready to throw down on some hard work next weekend. We are thinking it will take us the entire weekend to complete the job. We plan on doing the prep work on Friday (cleaning, taping, setting up) and we have recruited Mark's parents to help us. Saturday, the actual painting begins and we have recruited help on that day as well. Of course, what ever does not get done on Saturday will be completed on Sunday. We have no help recruited for that day! :)

Please pray for us next weekend that everything goes smoothly and without any hiccups!

Trash or Treasure

It never fails to amaze me how much junk a person can collect in one year. And by a person I mean Mark and me together and individually.

When we moved to Atlanta, I did not realize how much stuff I had collected over three years. I had something around 8-10 garbage bags of clothes that I donated and double that amount of trash bags full of trash. Bar stools were gotten rid of along with countless other odd items still left over from my high school days. I was pretty satisfied with the work that Mark and I did on weeding out the needed and not necessary.

Now that we are moving again, I have begun the same process. I have not started packing, packing, but I have started to clean out boxes that were never unpacked in the first place! I must assume that if a box full of items was not useful for the past 10 months, it should be tossed out in its entirity. Unfortunately, my curiosity gets the best of me and I have an uncontrollable urge to find out what these unuseful items must be! In the end, it turned out to be very educational and rewarding.

There were many exclamations of "hey, that's where the staplers were!" and "I forgot these pictures existed! Look how tan I am!" and my all time favorite, "what the hell is that?!" I never thought that I would need to unpack, to be able to pack, just to unpack again!

Memorial Day Weekend

Mark and I traveled to Mobile, AL for Memorial Day weekend. We had a fantastic time! This was Jade's first marathon car trip and she did very well!

We arrived Thursday evening just in time for dinner. Even though we had not been to Mobile since last Summer, nothing had changed. Friday, my Dad had to leave after work to go to a conference in New Orleans to speak about a medical precedure on Liver cancer. He practiced his speach for me Thursday night and it was really good! My mom and I went and had pedicures done Friday afternoon, after that, Mark and I went bowling with Josh and his girlfriend, Jamie, and then Mark, Mom & I went to eat at Wings! It was a great day!

Saturday, we all went to eat at the Oyster House! Then we came home and watched a movie with Mom and Dad. On Sunday, we went to church at Grace and heard a wonderful sermon on happiness. It was so good to see some old friends and to meet some of my parents friends. For lunch, Josh invited Mark and me to eat at BWW with him, Jamie and her daughter. You can never go wrong with BWW. Sunday afternoon my parents took a nap and we went to Home Depot to pick out paint colors for our house in T-Town. That evening, I played a round of cribbage with my Daddy and he won best 2 out of 3. Believe me that is not a good thing! He has bragging rights until our next match!

Unfortunately, we had to leave Monday afternoon, but not before Mark and I had a wonderful morning full of conversation and coffee with Mom and Dad. I cannot wait until I am able to see them again!

Ok so a lot of stuff has been happening, but I have been too busy to blog so this might be a long one!
A few weeks ago, Mark and I made a trip to Birmingham to see family and friends and to also head to Tuscaloosa to look for a place to live. I had done lots and lots of research online trying to weed out suitable places that would also accept our Rottie. I found this one (that's right, one!) apartment complex that had lax enough rules on dog breed and size and also looked amazing! We were also informed, from the plethora of info that Alabama sent Mark, about a realestate company that rents houses amd apartments among the usual realestate activities. Fortunately, the houses for rent did not look that bad online. Sorry I cannot say the same for the apartments for rent! Mark called both of these places and scheduled appointments for us to check them out.

The apartment complex was awesome! They were nice people and the apartments were very spacious, some had hardwood floors, and came with a one car garage attatched to each apartment! The price was right as well, but we still had to meet with the realestate agent. On our way we talked and decided unless a house blows us away completely, we would be heading back to the apartment complex. Well, a house blew us away! Given, we only looked at two houses, but I had looked at thirty online and none of them compaired to the garden home! I am also very excited to inform you that we sign a lease this week and we will be moving in two months!

It is such a cute house! It has three bedrooms and two bathrooms (just what we wanted!), a two car garage, and a fenced in square of land out back for Jade! They also did not mind our dog!

Praise the Lord! He answered our prayers and blessed us with a more beautiful home than I could have imagined! Did I mention that we get to paint it!!

Weekend Blessings!!

Ok, so Mark graduated May 1!! The ceremony was boring, but it made me proud to see him walk across the stage knowing he has accomplished the second goal he has set for himself in his education. His parents and his brother were there as well as a close friend of the family. I was pleasantly surprised when they were calling out the names and an old high school mate's name echoed in the Georgia Dome. Unfortunately, I was unable to say hello to her and her family, but Mark spoke to her and told her I was there. We went to a late dinner together to celebrate Mark's hard work and also look forward a year when we will be in the same place attending Mark's brother's graduation from GT. I am telling you that these Kajdos boys are going to produce more degrees together than there are members of the family! Both of them will not only achieve an undergraduate and Master's degrees, but Adam is planning on getting his PhD and Mark will be starting Law school in the Fall!

I cannot say enough about how proud I am of Mark's hard work these past several semesters. The long days and nights of attending class and working on project after project. It was not a rare occurance that I went to bed many, many hours before he closed his eyes just to wake at the same time as me and the Sun. Mark is not just a hard worker, but a dedicated student who enjoys what he is studying and committed to making sure he has the right answer every time no matter how many hours and pieces of paper it takes! This Fall he will be attending Law School at Alabama. I am convenced that he is thoroughly prepared to take on that challenge and excell in every class!

Sunday was our one year anniversary! I know! I cannot believe that it has been a year already! We are no longer newlyweds! But it is depressing to think that this time last year we were in the Virgin Islands sunning ourselves on the beach! A whole year to reflect on blessings and miscommunications! At least we were together and not long distance. To celebrate our one year accomplishment of both of us still living, we went to the Georgia Aquarium. It was something that neither of us had done before and we were both excited to spend that time together. We also decided to see the Titanic exhibit that was at the Georgia Aquarium. After walking around for about four hours we went to eat at Pappadeaux's. It is a Cajan seafood restaurant and it satisfied our desire for an excellant meal. We splurged and had a bottle of wine with our meal. My bedtime creeped up on us quickly after coming home and watching a movie together. All in all it was a wonderful day and a great weekend!

Pobrecita!!

My poor baby girl got hurt this week! Mark was playing with her in the field like we do every day. She was having a blast chasing her frisbee and her tennis ball when she walked up to Mark ready for another chase and he noticed her foot had blood on it. He examined it and she had split her toe nail!! Of course he immediately called me and I asked him to bring her to work for Dr. R to look at her. It was not too bad, her toe nail just needed to be clipped back and then bandaged untill bedtime. It was the much needed Elisabethan Collar that really got to her. She was so pitiful!! All night she acted as if she was being punished with the forelorn looks and the refusal to eat her dinner. She did not seem to mind the collar. Everytime we had to put it back on her she sat still and and lifted her chin for us, but after it was velcroed in place the eyes would droop and the tongue would slowly come out and go back in again. She layed around all evening pouting. Finally, bedtime came and it was time to take the bandage off. She was very good and sat very still for me. Mark had to hold her head so she would stop licking my hands as I was working on unwrapping the very well taped up bandage! The very second she new her imprisionment was over, she started racing around and wanting to play. Of course she had to get in a cat chase before being banished to her crate for the night! All in all she is just fine and back to her annoying self!!

I just want to thank the Lord for this beautiful Spring He has given us! The air is clear and warm and there is not a cloud in the sky.

Lots of busy days ahead of us! Mark will be walking on May 1, 2009 and May 3rd will be our one year anniversary!! The house hunting begins shortly after next weekend in Tuscaloosa. Keep us in your prayers that we will be able to find good housing that will allow our Rottie and that is in our price range. Oh, and the packing has begun! Thankfully it will not be too bad because we never really fully unpacked!

The Lord has been so good to us to guide us where He wants us to be. The move to Tuscaloosa was not our first choice, but it is were God wants us to be and we are looking forward to the move.

Weekend in Birmingham

Mark and I went to Birmingham this past weekend for the second time this year! I know it has been way too long inbetween trips but school is very demanding of Mark's time. We arrived Thursday afternoon about four (just ahead of traffic!), immediately dropped the dog off, and headed to Wings ( our favorite place to eat). Our wings were of course fabulous, but our time spent there was cut short due to a very friendly drunk guy who could not keep his hands off Mark and an old coworker.
Friday started off with a wonderful surprise! I was invited to go with my sister's family to her ultrasound to find out the sex of their baby. It's a boy! Everyone was excited except for my neice, Emory. She was super concerned that the nurse was hurting my sister, so to try to ease her discomfort, I took Emory to the caffeteria to pick out a special drink ( also so Sarah could finish up her Dr.'s appointment). Emory picked out a purple drink and a red drink for Aunt Grace! Next stop was to drop Emory off at a friend's house and Sarah and I had a great time seeing friends and shopping! Later that night, Mark and I went to eat at another one of our favorite places, Kobe, and went bowling with some frinds. I won the first game, but I was challenged well!
Saturday morning I got to sleep in some and then go to the mall and lunch with another friend. We went to Zaxby's (what else!) after some very important sho shopping. Mark and I then went to have some Margarittas with Kara and had a great time! When alcohol is involved, you know it will great, especially with her!! A wedding was next on our agenda and then an evening with our old high school buddies. There was alcohol there too!
Unfortunately, we had to head back to Atlanta on Sunday but not before a fantastic lunch with my inlaws and getting my mother-in-law started up on FB.
It was a great weekend!!! I love you all!!

Who Put All The Sugar On The Trees?

Ok so I am a little late on telling ya'll about our snow day, but better late than never, right? I honestly do not watch the news on a consistant basis so the fact that one of my friends called me super excited Sunday morning that it was snowing in Alabama was kind of a shock. But, unfortunately, I do not live in Alabama, I live in Georgia where it was raining, not snowing! Mark and I were very dissapointed. Mark more so than me, but both of us were walking around the apartment grumbling and complaining that of course it was snowing were we did not live anymore (a very pleasant way to start out our Sunday morning don't you think!) Let me stop right here and call Mark out on his 50/50's. If you have been around him long enough, you will find out that Mark is not a "lucky" person when it comes to 50/50. His chances statistically speaking are the same as everyone else, however his "luck" is more like 10/90 realistically. I am not kidding you! I did not believe it at first, but I have had to regretfully agree with him that yes in fact he is wrong 90% of the time when faced with 50/50's. (he will not abmit to being wrong on any other occasion!) So the fact that it was snowing in Alabama and raining in Georgia really got under his skin! Well, not but about an hour later the snow started to come down in large white clumps. It was a beautiful scene watching the snow fall! I called my friend to let her know that it had started to snow and finally be able to genuinely share in her excitement.
God blessed us again for Mark's open lab to be cancelled due to the weather, so Mark did not have to drive to Tech on the icey roads. Instead we took Jade outside to enjoy the unusual weather. It was her first snow and she did not know what it was at first. We treaded though the melting mush to her field so she could run around and play in it. She had a blast!! Juking this way and that way, leaping over hills and bushes and sliding around on the wet ground! We took several pictures and videos which are posted on both mine and Mark's Facebook pages. Go check them out!
One of my mother's favorite childhood stories to tell about me is when we were sitting in a chair together one winter's morning and I looked out the window behind us at the snow that had fallen the night before. A mixture of shock, disbelief, and wonder spread over my face as I asked my mother, "who put all the sugar on the trees?" I gave my mother the story of a lifetime after I exclaimed triumphantly, "I know! Dan did it!"

Series of Unfortunate Events

Okay, so last week was a doozie! It started off with a bad Monday, which is never good. Tuesdays are never good days for me because I have to bring the dog with me to work. I never know how she will behave. But this past Tuesday was horrible! One of my responsibilities at work is to print out the next day's appointment sheets and call the clients to remind them of their appointments. I had just printed out the sheets and I was getting up to get them when my pinkie finger on my left hand got stuck between the counter and my chair as I swiveled. I had some good momentum going as I was swiveling (it amuses me to make myself spin in my chair!) and so I smashed my finger so well that it took two tugs to remove it from its pinned position. I immediately jumped up and stated dancing around because it was some of the worst pain I had ever experience! I also had to keep a scream bottled up because we had a client in the first exam room which is very close to my desk. My entire hand was killing me. It felt like every one of my fingers was being cut off and the pain was quickly spreading up my arm. I have never gotten nausiated from seeing blood, but after I looked at my pinkie I started to feel the blood drain from my face and became very weak. I knew I was about to faint so I went to the bathroom (so I was not on display at my desk), put my head between my legs and fainted. I was not out but a few seconds and then had to vomit. That, however, did not make me feel better. I got up to get a band-aid from my boss's medicine cabinate, but she wanted me to wash my hand first. On my way back to the bathroom, a coworker asked me to look something up for her, but I could not think straight to do it. I walked back to the back, stumbling the whole way, fighting not to faint again, when my boss looked at me and told me to go sit in her office. I did and tried to put my head between my legs, but i could not keep it there. All I could do is rock back and forth trying not to focus on the intense pain, but on not fainting and not vomiting. Another one of my coworkers brought me a cup of water and a cold wash cloth because I was pouring sweat. The moment I realized that I was in shock was when my hands started to tingle like they were going to sleep. It did not take long for the sensation to rise all the way up my arms and for them to turn completely white. My hands became immobile and were stuck in a crab's pinscher like position and I was slurring my words. At this point, I was solely focusing on willing myself not to get into anymore trouble than my body already was. Thankfully that only lasted for about a minute, then the blood started to flow back into my limbs. I made a full recovery just in time to eat lunch!

My next unfortunate event occured on Saturday night at a restaurant. I was eating fried rice when someone asked me a question. When I went to answer, I inhaled a piece of corn and could not breathe. I coughed it up pretty quickly though. The third unfortunate event was this morning. I was sitting at my desk and had to sneeze so I sneezed. I then had to blow my nose as a result of that sneeze. Then my nose started gushing blood. I stopped my hemoraging rather quickly. Pay attention next time something happens to you. Chances are they happen in threes so watch out!

FB

Once upon a time I was free. I did stuff that every normal, free person does. I worked, went to school, did homework, hung out with my friends on the weekends and got as much sleep as possible. I did not get "online" that much. I checked me email twice a month (which annoyed my mother), I used the internet for school and did basic research. Then a friend, who will remain nameless, kept bugging me to sign up on Facebook. I did not want to becasue I have never been that interested in doing computer related things. The more and more my friends talked about it the more curious I became. So I logged on for the first time, filled out all my info, and immediately became a slave to Facebook.

First, my enslavemnet started off slow. I would log on once a day to change my status and to read about what my friends are doing. Everyday, I would have more and more friend requests so naturally that increased the number of times a day I would log on to Facebook. Suddenly, I started to receive "flair" and "bumperstickers" and "invites" to causes and events. After I figured out how to access all that stuff, the length of time I spent logged on would increase. It started off low, about five to seven minutes, then the time rapidly started to increase until it spilled over and I needed to log on more times a day to get in all I wanted to look at on Facebook. Soon, the enslavement increased. I did not notice it at first because the chains were tightening in very small increments. But, it did not take long to realize that I no longer type like I used to. My sentences were all screwed up. Sometimes, they were not even sentences just sentence fragments. I no longer capitalized anything. I started using alien acronyms like "lol", "brb" & "ttyl" among many others. What finally caught my attention was that I no longer used any kind of puctuation at the end of a sentence except the exclamation point. I did not use puntuation at all in my sentences anymore. I found myself using commas, colons, semicolons and parentheses to form different smiley faces and hearts. The clincher was when my coworkers invited me to join a specific application on Facebook called Mob Wars! I joined and immediatley I was hooked permanently. Of course, I had to bring my husband in on it too! What kind of wife would I be if I did not include him in everything?! Now, I check FB more times a day than I can count and I stay connected longer than I care to reveal.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine's Day is the holiday of love. It triggers fantasies of beautiful flowers, sparkling gifts, and love in every girl's mind and anxiety & inevitable doom in every guy's mind.

Mark and I learned very early that higher expectations lead to a harder fall. Our first Valentine's Day was a complete disaster. It was not because of the traditions expected of the holiday, it was for personal reasons. The second time V-Day rolled around we thought we would do it right. We made plans to go to dinner with another couple to J. Alexanders. The pressure got to both of us and we ended up fighting the entire night. Third time's a charm, right? We did nothing. We got each other small gifts and I think we rented a movie and ordered pizza. We learned that pressure ruins everything. The fourth year, Mark sent me some beautiful Daisies to my work and we made plans for the weekend, but that night we fought over a stupid miscommunication. The next year we did absolutely nothing except give each other cards because Mark could not make in into town. I am pretty sure there was a fight about that, too. Last year, we were planning a wedding and that put enough pressure on us. We did not need to add fuel to the fire! This year, Mark and I got it right. He surprised me by sending me 32 long stemmed white, pink, & red Tulips. He remembered my favorite flower! Then he took me to one of my absolute favorite restaurants (The Melting Pot) the night before V-Day (less presure!). We had a fabulous time! I almost thought that the night was going to be ruined because of Mark's school. He was handed a take home test Thursday at 3pm. When he got home, he ate a quick meal (his last before we went out) and got started on his test about 4pm. He worked on that test until 5:30am , went to bed, and got back up at 8:30am to continue the test. I know because I am a light sleeper and it always wakes me when he gets up and down. When I got up at 9:30am, I immediately made him some coffee and kept it coming until he had to leave to turn in his test at school at 3:30pm. He worked on his test the entire time. Bless his heart! He did not even eat since he started the test! He was so stressed and sleep deprived that I thought he would not be up to dressing up and going out, but he surprised me! He was in a good mood and ready to shower and go eat even though he just drove in Atlanta rush hour to turn in his test. He even opened the car door for me and was willing to have his picture taken to remember the occasion. He looked good, too! I rarely get to see him in anything other than cargo pants and a t-shirt, so the button down and tie was a welcomed change! To be fair, he hardly gets to see me in anything other than scrubs so I know he was pleased to see me all spiffed up as well!

Dog Parking

One of the best bonuses I have discovered about living in Atlanta is Brook Run Park. Legend has it that the park was built on the site of an old insane asylum called Brook Run, and because of that, the park is said to be haunted! Fortunately, I have yet to be graced with the presence of anything supernatural. Brook Run is a park located smack dab in between my apartment and where I work. It has a playground for small and big kids, an inground skateboard ramp, several walking paths and best of all, an off leash dog park! It is the best way for us to exercise Jade. She is so social. Jade sniffs every dog and every human in the park. She loves to play with other dogs especially small, fluffy dogs. Jade also enjoys being chased and boxing with the heavy weights!

When Mark and I were discussing adopting a dog, we of course discussed which breed would best fit our life style. The Rottwieler breed made it to the number one slot. After a lot of research, it was confirmed that we would start looking for a breeder. We knew from the get go that we would have to battle the steriotype that comes with the breed. This being said, it does not make it any easier to deal with naive people. Owning a Rott narrowed down possible places to live in Atlanta to one. Even then the rules were bent to allow us to live there. It has also given us some negative experiences at Brook Run, but they definately do not out weigh the positive experiences.

Two weeks we took Jade to Brook Run three times. On Thursday, Jade bounded inside the gate and after conducting some specific business of hers, she immediately made a friend. The owner of the other dog politely asked me if Jade was a Boxer. How could someone get a Boxer and a Rottie mixed up is the thought that went threw my mind, but I lightly laughed and answered no that she was a Rottie. Immediately he picked his dog up and left without another word. Of course my heart sank deep into my chest. How could someone not want their dog to play with a friendly, energetic, loving dog just because of its breeding? I sometimes cannot help but feel a little prickly, like a porcupine, when we arrive inside the gate, anticipating someone to treat her like that again.

Last week, we also took Jade to Brook Run three times. When I took her there on Thursday, I met a very nice gentleman who told me that Jade reminded him of his Rottie whom he had just lost to cancer. He was over joyed to see her run and play! At times like these I swell with pride to know that others see her like I see her. Several people, including children, fell in love with her on Saturday and Sunday and just could not stop saying how wonderful she is. We never get tired of hearing compliments! :)

Cold, Cold, Cold!

I cannot believe that it was 16 degrees this morning with a wind chill factor of 1 degree! The last time I remember it being that cold was when I went skiing in Telurid! I am sure I looked like a marshmellow walking into work today. The view I have from inside the clinic is a wall of windows. It is hard to believe that suck a gorgeous day could still make people run inside.I am looking forward to the warm weather that is heading our way this weekend.

Jade usually loves her bathes, but today's bath was not so enjoyable for her. Poor thing was so cold she was shaking when I was shampooing her up. It also did not help that where she has to stay, it takes a long while to heat up. Everybody at work is so kind to look after her and keep turning the dryer on to help warm her up!

Our bedroom is always fridgid on the cold, cold nights. We have to keep our bedroom door closed to have a "hair free" zone. Mark is allergic to cat dander and he snores less when we do not let them inside to sleep on our bed. Of course, if you enter the room and leave the door even slightly cracked, they will push it open and charge under the bed. Then its this big ordeal to chase them out. During the day and when we go to bed at night, if they see us enter and exit our bedroom, I will hear them pushing on the door to test if it will open. Apparently, they do not want to miss out on any chance of getting into mom and dad's room! As a result of the bad kitties, the room never heats up. The sun never has an opportunity to shine in our bedroom window because it gets blocked by another building. Our apartment faces East so all afternoon the sun smiles through our sliding glass doors. Which is good in the Winter, bad in the Summer. Needless to say the bedroom stays at least 10 degrees colder if not more, and I sleep with three blankets. Double pained windows, what is that?

My first entry!

Mark and I are currently living in Atlanta. He is attending Georgia Tech getting his Masters degree in ME. He will be graduating May 1, 2009. He received his undergraduate degree in ME from Tech in December 2007. Mark wants to ultimately become an Intellectual Properties Lawyer. He has applied to a few schools. His top two choices are the University of Virginia and the University of Alabama. I am along for the ride!

I am working for a vet clinic in Dunwoody. I am the receptionist. I used to work for my brother-in-law and assisted with the animals with him. I miss getting to hold the animals. I now get to answer the phone all day and check people in and out.

Mark and I have two kittes and a dog. Charlotte is a silver tabby and Ginger is a calico. Our dog, Jade, is a one year old Rottwieler. She is so much fun!