"Spotted" at Walmart

Terrible pun, I know. Clever use of a paint job!

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I have been feeling increasingly worn out lately. My job's schedule fluctuates as the summer continues, so right now, I am in the worst part. I sometimes get off work after 8:30pm, and sometimes turn around to work at 9:30am. It does not leave much time to recuperate from the mental stresses.

We have also been working on our house all summer long, and I will share about that when it is closer to being finished, but suffice to say, any free time I take means something else, i.e. housework is left undone. I would much rather be shooting or reading a book over doing the dishes.

I came home from work last evening to find my husband doing work (along with my dad) outside, as it poured rain. C was drenched, and getting miserable. They finished up what they were doing and he requested hot cocoa. The rain stopped, but an hour or so later, I requested a cuddle session on the couch. It was so nice to just sit, calm down, and de-stress while discussing different things. These are the type of memories I look back on and know that I am rich in love and friendships.

I would have grabbed a cup of cocoa for myself, except by that hour, I knew it would keep me awake, so I refrained. It sure was tempting though!

I am feeling more prepared to tackle today's work day after last night's necessary calming down. Do you do anything in particular to process and then let your work day go, or to de-stress?

Us

A month late, but these are our Valentine's portraits that I forced C to take with me. C actually went on a business trip over Valentine's, so we celebrated after he came back. We went out to breakfast. :)

I had big intentions of a nice photoshoot...but it was quite chilly. I really like this one, so it's sufficient, I suppose :)

Leg Cramps, Not Sugar

Yesterday morning, I woke up to a painful cramp in my leg. I don't get them often, and I usually can get my leg to relax so that I can go back to sleep fairly easily when they do occur.

I stirred quite a bit to wake myself up and heard C stirring as well. To let him know what was happening, I said, "I'm having a charley horse." but it came out very high pitched and whiny sounding in my pain. C scoffed at me and went back to sleep. I was mildly offended that he was not trying to ease my pain. Shortly after, he asked me what I had said. I repeated back to him, and he had an "ah" moment.

"I thought you said, 'I want a chocolate milkshake.' and I almost said, 'I have no sympathy for you.' "

Thanks sugar fast! That would have gone over real well if he had said that! Definitely got a good laugh out of this one :)

5 Years

Last Saturday, the 29th, marked five years that C and I have been together. In the grand scheme of things, five years is not long, but I really wanted to ensure that we celebrated the day.

We went out to our favorite pizza place and afterward, to the beach. I'm so happy C tolerates me wanting to take photos of us! This was my favorite of the ones we took.

I can't wait to see what the next 5 look like, and the next 5 and the next :)

Little Moments

This past Sunday marked five years of C and I almost being a couple. Our official five year mark is in a couple more weeks, but May 16th is the day C broke the silence and told me how he felt, amazing me since I had no idea he felt the same way. I have been marvelling this month at five years together. I probably did not say that right, but what I mean is the passage of time. Sometimes it seems like so much longer, but mostly so short. I spent some time yesterday going through images I had taken from 2005, and just shaking my head at how life changes. Little brothers grow up, and friendships grow apart. But time also can knit together, and C and I fit that description I think.

I proclaimed that we needed to go out to eat on our day off, in honor of five years. But really, I just wanted to eat out :P We went to a recently opened "Bistro" in the tourist district and decided that it was worth a try, despite the higher prices. C got a kabob with chicken, pineapple, onion and bell pepper marinated in a sauce and fried over a grill, and served with rice. I got a grilled turkey sandwich, marinated in a similar concoction. It was an interesting meal, and quite tasty. Not sure if we will go again, just because it was pricey (and honestly, will it stay open past the summer? :( )

We departed and went to the grocery store. I let C pick the ice cream flavor, since I usually do the shopping by myself. He stared at the case for a while, obviously weighing the pros and cons of the different flavors. I grew tired of standing still, waiting for a decision and so I leaned closer to him. Distractedly, he hugged me, but then looked down and smiled, then kissed my forehead. I hugged him back and his attention went back to the ice cream before him. I stood with him for a bit, content to be with him as people continued shopping around us.

I loved feeling for a second that the world was stopping for us, to savor an embrace from the one you love. Not long after, C picked his flavor and the world started up again. I forgot about the exchange as I went through the checkout line, but after getting home I thought of it again, realizing how precious the moment was. Those are the times I want to remember and cherish, moments of quiet love amidst the craziness of the world.

Snow Day!

No, that doesn't mean that we got to stay home from work! That doesn't exist here!

I've been wanting photos of C and I in the snow for months. Wednesday, it finally was snowing in the daytime when C was home! But by the time I got my equipment set up and him outside..it had stopped.

Yeah. The technical problems with this one abound. I still think it's fun!

Later, it started snowing like crazy! So I got my wish :)

Done!

I love being done with the semester! It is the greatest feeling in the world. The weight on your back suddenly lifts and there is free time in abundance. Supposedly anyway!

I am done a week earlier than I expected to be, so that is a great blessing. I finished wrapping all the Christmas presents that I have yesterday. I still have a few more I need to buy, but it feels good to have a pile near my tree.

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Last night before we fell asleep, C started telling me some stories about Luann (the comic strip). He reads the comics on his lunch break and had to update me on the latest with Luann, Garfield and Pickles. It was super funny. I kept laughing about how it was 1AM and he was getting in depth and describing the story lines of these cartoon characters and their personality traits. It was great. :)

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Christmas is in 2 weeks! Hard to believe. We finally have real snow here, so it definitely feels like Christmas now.

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For my photography class, we picked out the best images from the class and made a slideshow of them. I had probably 13 images picked for it, which was pretty cool. The slideshow will hopefully be showing at the movie theatre before they show movies. It's definitely a cool opportunity for me to get my name out there more. I'm excited about it.

I'm going to try to hang out with friends today. I haven't gotten to do much of that with school. Wish me luck!

Two Photos

I love to take photos of C and I, when he cooperates. He wasn't too cooperative last night, but I did get a couple I liked. Last night's sunset was magical with a blanket of fog over the Bay.

Day 550

Today is day 550 of our marriage. I wanted to make a big to do about day 500, but it slipped my mind until too late. Sunday was our 1.5 year/18 month anniversary.

Where do 550 mornings and nights go? I dunno, but they sure have been awesome :) Marriage is incredible and well worth the tense moments and slight arguments. Can't wait till Day 18250! (50 years)

Up

We went to see Up tonight. It was a great and humorous story, but extremely touching as well. Whenever C and I watch a touching movie together, we both end up crying. And this was no exception.

The old man in the film and his wife were adorable together. So loving, creating such great memories together, and then Karl had to live on his own without her after her passing.

We left the movie quiet, but sweet towards each other. We headed to the beach for a walk, holding hands as we went.I don't want to get old, but knowing C will be with me through it makes it bearable. Looking forward to the years of memories we will have together makes me smile and so do the memories we have already made together. The stacks of photos and scrapbooks we have of each other. Long walks on the beach. Laughing together at Star Trek episodes. Our wedding day. Our honeymoon. Someday finding out we are expecting a child. Our child's birth. Watching our kids grow up.Knowing C is by my side will make all trials we go through in life easier and I am excited to see what is in store. Though, he did tell me today that he was pretty sure he won't float off with our house to South America :)

Things I've Learned in Marriage

I wrote this post in June of 2008 after I had been married for 2 months. I figured I'd bring some of it back for this week, and add some more! Our one year wedding anniversary is on the 4th of April, so I figured this was appropriate!!

Things I have discovered about living on my own and married life:

• Doing the dishes can actually be an enjoyable past time..or at least tolerable.
• Cooking is much more fun when doing it with your husband.
• We buy a lot of ice cream. We went a week without some a few weeks back and that was horrible =P
• You actually have to make and enforce a routine, otherwise it won't happen.
• It's great having a husband who isn't afraid to kill spiders.
• Grocery shopping is considered "cute" when you are newlyweds.
• Getting asked about the married life several times a day gets old.
• Living on your own is actually not nearly as hard as I was imagining it to be. I miss my parents and my cats, but I am pretty happy being moved out.
• Not living with cats is a pretty sad existence (if you love cats), which is amplified when going to the in-law's place and playing with their cats.
• Being married and taking care of yourself actually means you have less free time and time together (sometimes) than you did before...figure that one out.
• Having 2 days off in a row together is such a blessing! (much more so than just one)

I would add now, 10 months later:

• Those stereotypes I always heard about marriage? Yeah, it is easy for them to come true. That's where the work comes in!
• Getting asked about when we are having children gets old after about the second time. Especially when it is people that don't need to know.
• Living by ourselves is such a blessing. After babysitting for my in laws twice now, I definitely understand why you move out when you get married and don't have kids right away! Coming home to our own quiet place was so relaxing after those times!
• Trying to do homework and actually focusing on it is hard on a marriage. There is not a lot of freedom to stop thinking about what needs to get done to spend time together that is rich.
  

For more of what others have learned, visit Musings of a Housewife!

I love good worship!

I've been meaning to blog for several days, just haven't sat down to do it.

On Monday, I spent nearly 2 hours chatting with coworkers. I went into Husband's work and hung out with him and his coworker while he showed me some things they have been working on. I can't think of anything else that happened.

Yesterday we killed some mold on our windowsills.

When we woke up this morning, we drove off for breakfast. We talked about 3 different places for breakfast, which ended up as a wild goose chase as each one was closed. We didn't want to go to Duncan House, where we always go for breakfast. We finally settled on Caribou, because we didn't want to go back home. It was good, but by that point, of over 20 minutes of wandering town, we just wanted food and the excitement was gone :P Oh well, it was still nice.
Then we got our tires changed on our cars. Due to poor planning on our part, no one could pick us up. Then we called our friends who live pretty close. So we walked over there and hung out for an hour, chatting. It was fun.
And youth group tonight was really good. Heard an amazing testimony from a YWAMer, and then we prayed for each other and got words. It was really nice. So today was a good day, but a bit rushed. Oh and Grace led worship. It was super good. I love singing Angela Pinkston's songs!

Husband and I have been making an effort to spend more time together this weekend, and it's so nice. Just throwing that out there.

Tomorrow I will hopefully get a lot done (right) I have to make another trip into work for a paycheck.

I started playing Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass last night. It's pretty fun, and I think I can do ok with this one :P (I'm not the greatest at video games by any means) Wish me luck!

5 months

Today is 5 months of marriage for us! Caleb brought me a dozen roses :)

Our small group leaders are going to be running youth group for the next few months. They never had any desire to do it, but were asked and have been considering it for a bit. They asked us to consider helping with them. We're going to go next Wednesday and see how it goes. I haven't been to youth group in 2 years. I'm excited to get back into it, but Caleb isn't as much. Time will tell what happens with this!

My classes are going fine so far. I found a girl in one of them who attended KBC with me. She transferred to Anchorage for this semester, though, so it will be frustrating to communicate with her about this class. It'll be fun to reconnect with her though.

It's getting dark at 9pm now! I hate impending winter! I wish that winter would go as quickly as summer always seems to.

I need to start studying now. Until I get into the swing of classes, I'm not sure of the frequency of my blogging. It may be more or less or about the same. Just a heads up!