whitney and the washer

As of today, I am officially a handy person to have around the house. I was working on getting the apartment cleaned up and back in order. One of the things on my list was to do a few loads of laundry. I don't think I've written about it here on the blog, but we now have a washer and dryer. Thank you to Will and Christian. When they moved into their apartment (in the same complex as us) there was one left behind. Since they already have one, they asked us if we'd like them. HECK YES! Wow, I love them... both Will and Christian and the washer and dryer.
Anyway, Today I started a load of laundry, shut the door, and started tackling (folding) the largest basket of socks on the face of the earth. I hate socks. Still not the point of this story. When I went into the laundry room 30 minutes later, and the washer still hadn't filled up. What's going on? I didn't know what to do, so I emailed Blake and also called upon my good friend, Google for some help. I was seriously hoping that we wouldn't have to call a repair man, but feared that we would. It should also be noted that all of my clothes that actually fit me currently were wet and soaked in soap... not fun. Long (and not that exciting) story short, all I had to do was pull the drain hose out of the wall some to stop the siphoning and ta-da, it was fixed! I really felt like Mrs. Fix-it after I figured that one out.
On a side note, we had Carrie and Jay stay with us this weekend. We haven't seen them in a while, and it was great to catch up with my old roommate. We also played Raving Rabbids and looked thoroughly stupid doing it. Carrie, I miss you already! Come back!

silly rabbits...

Oh man, tonight we started playing the funnest (yes, I know that isn't a word) Wii game ever, Raving Rabbids. Click here for some videos. It is just a bunch of silly games involving ugly little rabbit things. So far we've shot rabbits dressed as chickens, danced to silly songs using the wii fit balance board, and sledded down a mountain sitting on a cow. Now if that isn't quality entertainment, I don't know what is. Plus, I'm going to be really sore tomorrow. So it is a fun game and a great workout. What more can you ask for from a game? Anyway, thanks to Tyler for Christmas, we now own this amazing game, so if you want to come over and make a fool of yourself, consider yourself invited. I'll always take the opportunity to laugh at anyone's expense.
... And if this post sounds like I'm writing in another language (Grandmother), maybe you should skip on down to the next post. It's a good one.
By the way, this is a Rabbid. Told you they were ugly.

The day that Dallas went to the mall

It is the day after Christmas, and what does the entire state of Texas decide to do? Go to Northpark Mall, of course. We know, because we were there too. First, we drove around the parking lot for a long time before finding a spot to park, and I don't mean a close spot to park, we would have been happy with any spot that was in the same county as the mall. We finally spotted someone backing out, and Blake hurried to put on his blinker and claim the spot. We weren't really in a hurry, so there were no hard feelings toward the mall, we were just happy to be finally heading inside. We entered through Nordstroms and needed to go down one level before we could get in to the rest of the mall, so we went for the escalator. That is when my day was made. All of the parking mess and crowds were made worth it by one man's actions. Here's how it went... He rushed in front of us to get to the down escalator, grabbed both hand rails, and promptly forgot how to use an escalator. Blake and I expected him to continue moving so we were both standing a little closer behind him than we normally would have been, but I don't think he noticed. He was concentrating too hard on getting onto the moving steps. It took him about 4 tries before he succeeded in getting onto the escalator. I think we were both too bewildered to laugh, look at each other, or even say anything, but when he finally succeeded in getting onto the escalator, I leaned over to Blake and simply said "Buddy the Elf". He knew exactly what I meant and attempted to pretend to ride the escalator like Buddy did in "The Elf". The only problem came when he stepped on the girl behind us. Remember? The mall was already crazy busy and the guy in front of us held the line up for a while, so there was a whole line of people behind us. Anyway, here's a clip from "The Elf" so you can experience just what we did today. No, the guy wasn't wearing all green with yellow tights. If he were, we'd be looking for the hidden cameras. If the video decides not to work, try this link.

We went about our shopping at the mall, and for the most part it was uneventful until we were leaving. We left the same way we came in, and it just so happened that our parking spot was on the far end of the parking garage from where we were. There was this guy driving by us in the opposite direction looking for a parking place. He rolled down his window and said, "Are you leaving?" Blake said, "Yes, but we are way down on the other end of the garage." The guy replied, "Great, no problem, what are you driving?" Blake said, "A Corolla." And the guy finished with, "See you there!"
We walked down to the end of the garage and there was the guy waiting. We both thought out of all the cars in this huge garage, he isn't going to find our "Corolla down on the end." The Corolla is much too common. That is also when we looked around and realized that if we said we are in the "Mercedes or Jaguar down at the end", he never would have been able to find us. Ahh, Dallas. You love your cars.

Recent thoughts and happenings

I don't have anything super exciting to post right now, but I do have some bullet points that I'd like to share.

• I love the Christmas season. Our Christmas trees have been up since just before Thanksgiving and we left for our trip. (and yes, we have 2 trees.)
• This weekend we finished our Christmas cards and sent them out.
• Today I wrapped Christmas gifts and put them under the tree.
• I've been collecting recipes for Christmas candy that I can make. I'll get Blake's input and make that this week.
• I LOVE our fireplace. It is gas and turns on with a light switch. I run it all day long (because we don't pay for the gas... awesome.)
• Bo had to go to the vet last week and get a bunch of teeth pulled and the 3 that he has left cleaned. This has been happening yearly since he was a puppy. Poor guy.
• Bo can still do all of the things he could do before getting his teeth pulled.
• Last Friday, we went to the Watermark Christmas party. There were tabasco shots, a dunking booth, powdered sugar snow angels, and a bucket of egg nog involved. Not like any Christmas party you've heard of, right?
  
• Texas weather is crazy. Yesterday it was 80 degrees and beautiful. This morning when we woke up, it was 30 degrees and we are expecting freezing rain.
  
• I was taking Bo outside this morning, and Blake was going to work and he accidentally locked me out of the apartment. Of all mornings... I went down to the office and they gave me a spare key after verifying my SS#.
  

girly "room"...

I'm excited. Really, for 2 reasons.
1. We finally finished "moving in" this weekend. The main part of our apartment has been done for a while, but our closets were a disaster area. If you know me well (yes, mom, that's you), you know that my closets are typically a mess. NOT ANY MORE THOUGH! When you have as many closets as we do, and as little stuff as we do, there is no reason for a mess. In fact we have enough closet room to have this:

Yes, it is a "craft" closet. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it. I can cut paper to my heart's content and I don't have to clean it up when I'm done as to not have a junky house. I can just shut the door. We also have our printer and hard drives in there... all connected wirelessly to the computers in the house. (and yes, I said hard driveS... we have a total of 5 external hard drives, and yes, we do use them all for various purposes.)
Anyway, don't you know Blake had something to say about my closet... He said "So, we move from a 'closet apartment' to a real apartment, but you insist on putting your work area in a closet? What? Are you just more productive in small, cramped spaces?"
Maybe I am, but I know I love a good art project.

Study this photo...

Yes, If you are wondering why Blake is in a produce section at a grocery store with food in front of him, you have correctly identified the photo. I had told Blake that we need to find some good, hole-in-the-wall Mexican food near our apartment. He has succeeded with flying colors. He asked around at work to see what the favorites are, and came across this place. It is inside of a "El Rancho" grocery store. We had some really yummy tacos and burritos. Blake's Spanish
skills came handy as all of the signs were in Spanish. We decided on some food, 4 kinds of fresh salsa that I couldn't read what they were, but we decided that one of them had to have cinnamon in it. Neither of us cared for that one, but we did like the others, 2 of which were
green, and also a more traditional pico style. Also, the meal wouldn't have been complete without some good Mexican soda. Love it.
After we ate, we needed to pick up a few grocery items. I enjoyed the produce section where the jalapenos were $.67 per pound, cilantro was 3 bunches for $1, and limes were 25 for $1. Score. I sure did get some stuff to make salsa.
The story doesn't end here though... When we got in the check out line, there was this case of pop ice things in fun flavors. Blake got "rice pudding" and I got coconut. The guy in line behind us got the same one as Blake, so Blake asked him if it was good. The guys said yes, and then said, "by the way, what are you doing here?" haha, I had already noted that we were the only white people in the store, but I wasn't expecting for someone to point that out. I was too busy laughing to answer, but Blake said, "we're here for the food" pointing to where we'd gotten the tacos. The guy agreed that they were good, and we went about our checkout business.
I plan to go back soon. Maybe I'll tan first though.

Happy Halloween

Hope everyone has a fun filled evening. Check out our awesome decorations. We saw the Frankenstein cake at walmart. It was on sale because tomorrow it goes out of season. We got that, 1 bag of candy, and a $1 candy bowl, and we are in business for a Halloween party.
Fun times.

the desk

the hotdog that you saw in the video below is the subject of this post as well. You see, it is version 2 of the hotdog that I got for him back in may. It has been his obsession since that moment. The original hotdog is now discolored and missing it's squeaker. I mentioned to my mom that it was time for a new hotdog and I haven't been able to find one around us, but she knew where to find one. And by one, I actually mean 2. She got him a new hotdog AND a new hamburger. Blake and I thought that since he still had the old hotdog, we'd hold the new one back till the hamburger is worn out, so I put the hotdog on the desk... out of his reach... so I thought. The other evening, I was getting dinner together and turned around and he had the NEW hotdog in his mouth. I asked Blake if he gave it to Bo, and no, he hadn't. I couldn't figure out how he had gotten it, so I put it back on the desk and watched. This is what I saw...

If the video doesn't work, try this.

Bo's favorite game.

I made a movie displaying bo's favorite game. The "prize" is one of his favorite toys, a hot dog. Blake was playing this game with him yesterday and bo searched (without us realizing) for 30 minutes. Needless to say, he was distressed when the search came to an end. We don't usually let it go that long. He usually finds his toy long before that mark. Not last night though! I thought his search warranted a post and video of his own. Enjoy!

If the video doesn't work, try this.

slowly but surely...

slowly but surely, we are getting our apartment together. This is the latest in our list of projects...

It has been a few days in the making, and still more to do. Here's how it went. Sunday night, Blake and I decided on the pictures we wanted to get printed. I retouched them all and turned them black and white. Tuesday, I went out to Granbury and my mom let me use her big photo printer to print them all. THANK YOU, MOM! That saved us a bundle of cash for sure. Since Blake was so obsessed about getting these things hung, on Wednesday, he drug me to Hobby Lobby, and every other craft store in town to get frames. 10 of them... matching. Let me tell you, it is a challenge to find 10 frames that are the same and in good shape. Finally, we accomplished that mission. Blake also insisted that we get a picture framed for the kitchen... just to give it some color in there. That mission... also accomplished. Also, on Blake's framing agenda... frame a piece of art to go above the fireplace. That one is going to take a while to get done because it is so big, so that one will take a week or so to get back. Too bad.
Today, Blake insisted that all 10 pictures were level and evenly spaced over the couch. I had to spend the entire morning on the top of a ladder making that happen.
Anyway, you may have noticed that we are missing a picture. Well, this morning as Blake and I were putting them all together, one of the pieces of glass literally shattered in my hand. Well, I shouldn't say shattered, but it did break into several pieces, and I didn't drop it. The place where we got the frames ONLY had 10, so I'm hoping that we can find another one so we can fix it. Always something fun!
Side note: if you believed any word of Blake dragging me around town for frames or obsessing over them being level... maybe you need to get to know us a little better. It wasn't him that was doing the dragging... it was me. I just thought it would sound more interesting that way.

new curtains.

We finally got our curtains for the bedroom today. I say we just got them, but they have actually been sitting in the resident's office of the apartment complex for 5 days. Thank you Fedex ground for leaving a note on our door letting us know. Blake did a great job of putting them up... Thanks, Blake! You are an expert curtain hanger by now.
I know... 2 posts in 1 day. I'm on a roll. Good night!

Just a concert

Here are some quick photos from a concert that we went to on friday night. It just so happened that Blake's favorite band, Project 86, was in the area. We had to go. Tyler, my brother, also decided to join us. Fun and lots of laughs were had by all. Especially when that kid decided it would be cool to stage dive at a concert that was NOT EVEN NEAR capacity and fell to the ground. I know that when I see a body flying directly at my face, I'm going to move, and apparently Blake and Tyler had the same idea. I hope he never does that stunt again.

another one...

One more picture to add to the others... our bedroom. bed made and all.

decorating efforts

Here are a few pictures of our living room... new furniture and all. Blake and I... well, really blake, has been working hard on it. It has only taken 3 or 4 tries to get the curtain rod right, but that's another story.




A few of bo, because he was being so cute and he hasn't made the blog in a while.

recent happenings... back in TX

It's been a while since my last post. Sorry! I spent a week and a half in NYC and worked like crazy like I was there. While there, I squeezed in a few visits with friends which was nice. NYC is so great. Here's a picture I took one morning at Rockefeller center. It was about 7:30 am, so there were not a lot of people there yet. Click on it to see it a little bigger.

Anyway, I flew back to Dallas on Wednesday. Thursday, I took a day to rest. Wow, I really needed that... more than you know. Friday, we had a new sofa delivered, went to a couple of stores to pick out some stuff for the apartment, and met up with some friends from college. Fun, busy day. That said, the living room is coming together in the new place. The next step is getting stuff hung up on the wall. We've been putting that off until we knew where everything would eventually settle. Once that is done, I'll be sure and share pictures. I think it is looking good though. Also, while I was gone, blake refinished our dining room table. He did great, so now we just have to get that inside and set up.
That's about all for now, but check back soon for more stuff that is going on with us. I'm sure you won't want to miss that.

Sonic Hates Me

Every once in a while Whitney and I go to Sonic, a drive in restaurant that does everything in it's power to aggravate me. We have ben perhaps 3 to 5 times since we headed back to Texas. Each time, both Whitney and I have ordered Cherry Limeades, same size, same everything. Each time the drinks have been handed to me, and each time, Whitney's contains a cherry, and mine does not. I don't know if you are aware, but part o the charm of this drink is that when you are finished, there is a cherry ( albeit a candied cherry) that has been soaking in this sprite, cherry and lime juices. Sonic has seen fit to abandon tradition and start, what I can only see as a personal attack on me, the customer.

Well, I have had it with them and their playing favorites with cherries. I am no longer ordering said drink, and am serious reconsidering where to take my drive-in drink orders. If anyone has suggestions as to where I can order a cherry limeade with a cherry, I would greatly appreciate it. Until then, you are on notice Sonic.

Only in Texas...

... Do you have a man meet you at the door of the grocery store, tell
you he will pick the best/fastest cart there is, wipe the selected
cart off with antibacterial wipes, and then dry it off for us.
Wow. You'd never find that in any other city we've lived in. I was
floored.
If that weren't good enough, once we got in the store, we saw the
scene in the photograph... A tortilla factory right in the middle of
the store. You can't see him in the picture, but there was a guy there
making tortillas. Fresh! We didn't get any today, but don't worry, we
plan on doing so at some point soon.
Only in Texas...

Bath time with Bo

Last night, it was bath time for Bo. He HATES a bath more than anything. In fact, if he is being a jerk to either Blake or me, we tell him that it is bath time. That usually makes him nice again. All it takes is a threat. Anyway, I knew he was getting a bath last night, but I hadn't told him that yet. I was just doing dishes and getting the bath stuff ready (stealthfully, of course. I didn't want to tip him off.) It doesn't matter how careful I am about getting out the dog shampoo, conditioner, scissors, comb and towel... he still always figures it out and hides. Poor guy, he didn't hide well enough last night. He got a good hair cut and bath.
Here he is after the bath... wet, mad and cold. After I snuggled him for a little bit, it was hair dryer time. As usual, after that was over, he was HYPER. This is a picture I snapped of him with my phone in the 1 second I got him to be still. Crazy. There you have it. That is a typical bath time with Bo.

PS - I updated the sidebar for the blog. What do you think? Does it make finding things easier? Any suggestions?

revision to previous post

Apparently the quiz from the last post is a hoax. I retook the quiz using the same answers as last time, and this time I'm "Sophisticated". So, that means I range anywhere from "Rustic Comfort" to "Sophisticated"... using the same answers. No, I don't think so.
That said, I found another quiz. Try it here.
Come on... tell me what style you are! Leave a comment.

Today, I am "The Modernist":
As a modernist, you live by the motto that less is more. To you, interiors should be minimal and sparse, not embellished and cluttered. With a focus on color, texture and shape, the bones of a modern space evoke a neutral yet elegant environment. Timeless, white-lacquer walls, interesting woods like bamboo and gray oak, and fancy stones like polished limestone and carrara marble add contemporary sophistication. For warmth and interest, you’ve painted a few walls in bold accent colors or hung simple wallpapers made of grass cloth or metallic foils in intimate spaces such as the bedroom and bathroom. To further energize the room, you’ve added geometric touches in rugs and throw pillows and upholstered a few of your mid-century modern favorites in pop colors like indigo blue, apple red and canary yellow. Organic yet linear accessories such as trees (hold the fakes, please!), coral and orchids complete your design.

What is your design style?

We have a new apartment, or well, we will in a week. I told you a little bit about our new apartment here, so you know that it is 1200 sq ft. (a big change over 350 in NYC.) That said, we're going to need some new stuff to fill it up, so I've been looking at furniture online so I can have a good idea of what I like, show it to Blake to see if he likes it, and can find the best deal. I ran across this quiz on hgtv.com. It asks you 10 questions about what you like, and tells you your style based on that. Go ahead... Take the quiz and tell me your results. I'm curious what style everyone is going to be. Click here.
The quiz said that I am "Rustic Comfort"(read the full description below). I still don't know that I agree with that title because pretty much nothing I choose is "rustic", but after reading the description, I can see how that might work, but I would change it to "Contemporary Comfort". I think that would fit me much better because I like contemporary styled furniture, but I don't want to be sitting on weird plastic furniture either. I can see where the functional comes into play from our stay in NYC. It was a rule that everything in the apartment must serve at least 2 but preferably 3 purposes.
I also think that "rustic comfort" might just be a catch all... for the person who chose too many different styles in the quiz. Maybe in that case, they should call it "eclectic comfort" or even "eclectic contemporary". Yeah, that might fit me better than "rustic". What's your take?

Rustic Comfort

The verdict is in, but there's a twist. Your design style is a combination: part updated country, part ethnic flair, both with a contemporary look and feel. You need a home with casual and practical style – an environment that'll work for kids, pets, company and more. The emphasis is on simple yet attractive, durable furniture will hold up over time while your colorful accessories energize and entertain for years.

"The furniture for this design style could be contemporary or traditional, says Julie Rackley, an interior designer in Bellevue, Washington. "The common threads are comfort and durability" That means easy-to-clean synthetic blends like micro-fiber, which cleans up swiftly with a sponge. (So long silk!) Function is a key consideration as well. A multi-purpose ottoman that doubles as a coffee table or storage unit would work for you.

little miss muffet...

I don't remember the rest of that nursery rhyme, but I did see this outside of our apartment yesterday. Scary! What do I do? Grab my camera and take a picture of it, of course. Anyone know what kind of spider it is?

who does this remind you of?

Another Office clip that hits close to home. Who does Jim make you think of?

skwinkles

Blake and I went to Target tonight to get some dog food, and in the checkout lane I saw this for $.52:
Skwinkles SalsaGheti. I "you won'ted" (dared) Blake to eat them. He said "OK." Turns out it was the best 52 cents I've ever spent. Keep reading.
When we got home, I broke out the camera and told him to dig in. I was getting this dare on film. Here's the first taste.Just a little cringe after the first bite.Managing a smile... and describing the taste as "Cherry Twizzlers with Seasoned Salt". Now doesn't that make you want some of your own?
Also included in the package was this package of goo. He decided to be safe and taste the goo before dipping the spaghetti into it. His description of this was, "Rotten Taco Bell hot sauce." He proceeded to dip the spaghetti.
A nice pre eating smile.
... And the aftermath. Yes, it was that bad.
He did however say that this is only the second worst Mexican junk food he has eaten. The first being the Mexican Doritos that we got while on our honeymoon. We couldn't read what the flavor was supposed to be because it wasn't in English, but it could ONLY have said "vomit". There is nothing else we could come up with to describe the taste. BAD. I'm sure all the locals know to steer clear of the things and to just laugh at all the tourists that say... "Green package... must be lime or something like that." So, the Skwinkles... they were close, but will never equal the Mexican Doritos. Never.
Here's the dare... Anyone who is willing to eat your own Skwinkles, tell me. Nothing would give me more pleasure than to purchase a package for you. Rules are, you must have pictures taken to prove you actually ate them. Dare is on.

the office = real life episode 2

Blake and I have enjoyed watching the Olympics this week, and when I saw this clip, it really made me laugh. If you haven't read my philosophy (originating from my mom) on who I live with (Blake and Bo), now might be a good time to catch up on it before you continue reading this post. Click here to go back to it.
Alright, so we are all read up now, huh? Now you are ready to continue with this clip of Dwight. Several times, I've posted about the hotdog (and other toys) that Bo is obsessed with, and while Bo may not go "rabbit hunting" or "hampster hiding" like Dwight talks about, he does go "monkey and hotdog hunting" when we hide his toys in random places around the apartment. He doesn't give up for anything for any reason. You might even say it is the same intensity as Dwight in the clip.


Here's another clip that for some reason seems to hit home. It just so happens to be Olympic related also. When we saw this clip on TV, Blake was picking on Bo at that very moment. I laughed out loud at him.

BUSTED!

Today was laundry day here at home. Normally that wouldn't really be "blog worthy", and it still isn't except I just had to share what I found as I was cleaning out all of the jeans pockets before throwing them in the wash. Here's what I found... 2 wrinkled receipts and 3 starburst wrappers. Looks like someone had some sugar... (blake)... the 7-eleven receipt was for a chocolate donut and a cinnamon roll... mmm, the things you can find out about a person by digging in their pockets. Love you, Blake!And, I've written about this before, but I finally caught a picture. This is Bo digging for his beloved hotdog that I hid under the covers. Check out that tail... straight up in the air. He was moving so fast that most of the pictures I took of him, he was blurry. I finally had to resort to my flash... not something I like to do. Crazy... crazy for sure.

working on stuff...

The last few days have been moving planning central around here. Task at hand... Get things from here (california) and everything from New York including the furniture from our apartment as well as all of our stuff from storage in Queens to meet in the middle... Dallas. crazy for sure. Blake has been on the phone with movers ALL DAY. Poor guy. They aren't the nicest folks around. On a high note, we found an apartment and put our application in today. Big relief! Though I'm not going to tell you the address on here, just in case there are stalkers reading this, I will tell you that it is right at 1200 square feet. NYC friends: you read that correctly. We're excited. Our NYC apartment was a whole 350 square feet if you count the long hall in the entryway. I don't think it takes a math expert to figure out that it is A LOT bigger. It comes complete with 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a fireplace, balcony and all of the other comforts you get in the real world. That said... We'll have an extra bedroom and bathroom just waiting for someone to come use them. Please consider this your open invite.
Alright, that's what's happening with us today. Stay tuned for more...

A bit of a different direction...

As some of you know, and many of you don't, we are currently in California so I can work for Apple for the summer. It is a program that is set up so that retail employees who are good at what they do have the opportunity to advance in the company into the corporate environment. Things have been going really well here, and we have loved the experience. The weather is great, there are so many things we haven't seen, there is so much more space than New York, there are less homeless people chasing you on the street for money. Overall, we like it a lot here, and couldn't picture ourselves going back to New York after this.

This is probably why we are not going back to New York at the end of this month. (That isn't entirely true, I will be going back for a few days to get all of our stuff together and coordinate movers in getting our stuff out of storage, out of our apartment, and selling the rest online.) The funny thing is, we won't be staying in California either. About the same time I applied for the position here with Apple, maybe the month before, I had spoken with a guy at a pretty cool church in Dallas about working there to help on their technical team. I have been practicing my sound skills, technical skills and nun-chuck skills at the church we went to in New York, and felt like it was something I wanted to pursue as a career. A couple of weeks ago they offered me a position to work there full time, helping with sound, lights, technical aspects of the church, and training others in "the way of the tech".

Whitney and I prayed a lot about it, because we did not want to rush into anything just because there was something we wanted to do. We did not want to stay in California just because it was the financially smart thing to do. (I don't know if you know this, but Apple makes some pretty awesome stuff, and is a really good company to work for.) We also did not want to run into something where it wouldn't be a good fit, where we didn't believe that we were doing the right thing, and where we didn't feel like we were doing something that would help us grow in Christ. We like the church, we like the people, we feel that the church and my role there will meet us where we are, so we have decided to take things in a different direction than we had originally planned at the start of the summer.

We are super excited to be moving to Dallas. There is so much that needs to be done, but we are confident that everything will go as smoothly as it normally does. Thank you all for any prayers and support you can give us. We definitely appreciate them.

foooooore

I just thought I'd share some photos from our minigolf fun today. It is a beautiful sunny day that topped out at around 70 degrees (love that), so we decided it might be fun to check out the golf place that we have driven by a few times and always said it looked like fun. It was as fun as it has looked all summer.
Take a look...

How cute is this place?
Blake actually got a hole in one on this one. He hit the ball in the big red hole.
I didn't do so great on this hole. It was fun anyway.


Check out Blake's orange ball flying down the path toward the fort.
We went all the way to china. Blake was prepared.
The final score. It was a close one, but I squeeked out the win. Blake: 61, Whitney 58, but that is just because blake struggled with the last hole, and I just so happened to get it in on the first try.
Blake's reaction after tallying the scores.

things that make me happy

Just thought I'd compile a list of things that in general, I just like. Beyond the first few, they are in no particular order as that order could change from day to day.

1. my husband - this goes without saying. He's my best friend for sure. I enjoy living life with him.
2. my friends and family - I love and miss you all when I'm not with you.
3. bo - he keeps us company and at the same time keeps us crazy. How does he manage that? (as I type, he's demanding that I turn my attention to him.)
   
4. our car - 4 years ago, that wouldn't have made my list, but after living 3 years of going without one, I'm happy and thankful every time I get in it.
5. in-n-out burger - it's yummy, cheap, and less than 5 minutes from our apartment. love it.
6. chili's - just the smell as I enter makes my mouth water. (that is true)
7. airplanes - while I hate the hassle of flying, I love that they can get me across the country in a few hours so I can see the people I love.
8. the internet - what did we do before it? we now use it to research everything before we buy, keep up with everyone we know, and find a new place to eat.
9. iPhone - we carry the world in our pocket everyday. I can instantly look up a random fact to prove I'm right or get directions to anywhere we can think of going. More recently it now tells us where we should go to eat. (if you have an iPhone, download the "urbanspoon" app. love it.)
10. my small ESV Bible - My husband picked it out and gave it to me, it's handy, it's hard cover for durability, and I just like that version.
11. Project Runway - I know it's silly, but for some reason, I love that show.
12. the roomba - because right now... as I type... my apartment is getting vacuumed. (and every so often bo just so happens to be in its path and he almost gets run over. that is what he gets for giving me endless attitude.)
13. a dishwasher - because I can simply put the dirty dishes in it, and they come out clean! it's amazing!
14. bo's little squeeky hot dog toy - because to entertain him, all I have to do is hide it under the rug. He digs and digs and digs some more till he can get it out (or I give it to him).
15. new clothes - I like to wear them for the first time before washing them. Why? I don't know. I just do.
16. a good, strong, hot shower - I don't like those puny ones where it feels like I have to wash my hair for 10 minutes to get the soap out.
17. a bathroom with a vent - for many reasons... Do I have to explain? (ok... Our apartment in NYC didn't have a vent. The closest we got to one was the little window that opened up into the shaft area and faced other apartments. Can you say awkward?)
18. California weather - I think this is a no brainer. Who wouldn't like their summers to be 70 degrees?
19. suitcases with wheels - why didn't someone think of that sooner? Who wants to actually carry a bag when they can pull it?
    
20. a memory foam mattress - I don't think we will ever get any other kind. We both sleep great and sleep hard...
21. Diet Dr. Pepper - it wakes me up and tastes really good.
22. mexican food and hamburgers - my favorite foods hands down.
23. Did I mention that I really like that stupid squeeky hot dog toy that bo has? He's still digging in the rug for it. He is so tired yet for some reason he still won't give it up.
24. clean sheets for the bed - and I like it when they are cold on my skin when I get in them. There is no better feeling.
25. nice people - anywhere I can find them.