Pictures!

Trevor, Geoff, and Kyle next to the buttercream roses I taught them to make!! Hehe.

Lee and Shannon dancing with Shannon's parents at their wedding.

Us at Lee and Shannon's wedding - why does Geoff look so giant?!?! He's not *that* big!

My first fondant cake!! So fun. But it was soooo dry in the classroom so the drape is pretty cracked up, boo!!

Just a different view. I'm officially in love with fondant!

Organics and fondant

Highlight of the day: I ordered a bi-weekly delivery of a small organic fruits and veggies bin from Organics to You. I can't wait! My co-worker who referred me will get a free small fruits and veggies bin if I get two orders, which is awesome. I didn't even know that, I just put her name down as the referral source and then saw that, so it's a nice little bonus!

I also started my Fondant and Gum Paste class yesterday. Soooo fun! I'm really enjoying fondant. So this week for cake stuff I need to make another batch of royal icing (one of my batches didn't turn out very well... it can happen due to humidity, etc... as my instructor says icing consistency can vary depending on "if there was a bluebird out in Holland that day"). Then I have the third class of course 2 on Thursday. For next Sunday, I need to prepare a cake, leveled and iced for my second class of the Fondant course. Then next Thursday is my final class of course 2 and I need to bring a cake to that one too. Lots of cake stuff coming up in the next 2 weeks! I love it. And the guys love it too... they are always asking me to teach them stuff, it's very cute and funny. Darn, I left my camera at home, otherwise I would post a picture of three of them next to the roses they made last Thursday!

Friday Geoff and I went to The Way - it was disappointing... partially because I wasn't very engaged for whatever reason. I had prayed that day that I wasn't using The Way as something I was relying on to make me happy or anything, and I think God intentionally made it sort of "mneh" for me that night . I'm not explaining this well at all, but long story short it ended up being a good thing overall. Saturday we went to a wedding at the Grand Lodge - it was fun! We didn't stay very long but we had a good time. Saturday night seems to be a blur, I don't remember doing much. We did get a lot of chores done around the house. Sunday morning we went to church at Solid Rock, which is where The Way is held. This time it was Geoff's turn to not feel very engaged! He liked it though and I think we will choose it as our church - #1 reason is they have weekly communion, which is important to both of us (more critical to him, but I have always really appreciated churches that have it). Westport is a great church and they're doing wonderful things, but it just doesn't work quite as well for Geoff. I like Solid Rock better too because it's a little bigger and I love bigger churches. I am SO excited about The Way and Solid Rock. They have been fabulous in our lives and our relationship. Sunday we had BLTs for lunch, tacos for dinner, and strawberries for dessert. YAY for cooking at home. We're trying to get back into that again, one of the reasons for the organics box.

Today Geoff and I are meeting at home and then going to the gym. He's going to play racquetball with his friend Scott and I'm going to go to Body Works with my friend Cindy. Should be most excellent.

April

Okay. Last week was SO busy at work. Thursday I had class one of course 2 in my cake decorating series! I have the same instructor, her name is Pam and she is great. There are only 4 students in this class - they were all in my course 1 class too. The Way was cancelled on Friday night because there was a retreat - Thursday through Saturday, which are odd days but I suppose Easter put a kink in things. I did not go because of the date choices, which I suspect was an issue for others as well. Geoff has been *EXHAUSTED* because he has an inventory at work tomorrow so he hasn't wanted to do much after work. Needless to say, I definitely had a little cabin fever this weekend. Friday we stayed in and watched a couple of movies. Oddly, they both kept me interested for the entire time. I have no idea why, because that NEVER happens. Saturday I got up in the morning and cleaned the downstairs bathroom, the kitchen, etc. Then I started work - I've had two big projects at work lately so I've been working on them and got behind on normal day to day emails, tasks, etc. So I spent all day Saturday getting caught up on work-related issues. I got my email box down from about 250 to 13 emails! YEAH! That's always a good feeling. Saturday night (at about 8 - I had no idea I was working so late) I went to Olive Garden with Addy... yum! We had a great conversation and then went back and hung out at my house for a while. Sunday morning I got up and went to church for Easter... I tried a new church which I shall not mention because I was not a huge fan. I can't even pinpoint what I didn't like about it, and I know sometimes holiday/"special" services are harder to "evaluate", but it just didn't really work for me. I most likely won't try that church again. I brought Geoff Starbucks because he got Starbucks for me last year at Easter, and then I went home and read Nelson DeMille's new book Wild Fire. I love Nelson DeMille. He is my favorite author! If you haven't read his stuff and want to start, start with Plum Island. It's the first one I started with, my sophomore year in high school, and it's great. It's also the first one with recurring character John Corey. Corey appears in 4 of his books, including Wild Fire. So good!

Didn't really do much else yesterday, and by last night I was pretty crabby and wanted to get out and do stuff. Luckily I have a full agenda for today - I am going to stop by the bank, go apply for a part-time job at Hallmark (I LOVE working retail and I miss it and I've been waiting for them to be hiring for a while and now they are!), then go to Costco (I have a big list - 4 things I need pretty soon here and another few things that I will need in the next few months that there are coupons for in the April coupon book so I'm going to go ahead and buy them now), then go to the first neighborhood watch meeting! I'm really excited about that, I want to get to know more of my neighbors and also get the streets cleaned up a little (there are a lot of cars parked on the street all the time, and it looks junky and is super dangerous cause there are so many kids). After that I will go home and do some laundry and update Quicken. Ohhh how I love being busy. Just another great benefit of a part time job! I really hope that it's a good fit and that I get the job. So, that's my plan!

Cake Pics!

My second to last course cake - clowns. The technique is called "figure piping"

A clown up close. Sorry for the blurriness! None of my clown close up shots came out very well.

Geoff making icing. :) Hehe.

My course 1 final cake! This one was for my friend Kristie's birthday.

Close up of rose and leaf detail

Answering to demands

Okay, I'm alive and I have not abandoned my blog. Here's what happened - I had taken the pictures from my last cake class and wanted to put them up on my blog, only I hadn't downloaded them for like a week. About a week ago I finally put them on my computer, but then it had been so long since I blogged that the task just seemed daunting. So, I just shyed away. Then yesterday I decided (and Patrick confirmed) that I could and should just jump back in. I know you are all tortured by the fact that you will not know what happened for the last two weeks of my life, but that's okay.

Side note: one of my roommates is cooking steak and it smells SO GOOD right now. I think they must have dumped like the entire bottle of garlic powder on there. YUM.

So, cake decorating class is over, it was great - the next one starts this week! I can't wait! It really is a blast. I've been running more and Addy and I have been trying to run together at least once a weekend. Today's run was BRUTAL, I just was not feeling it.

Geoff has gone with me to The Way three times now - WOW. It has been so great for our relationship! The first time he went and was like "first of all I found the speaker to be really full of himself and then I felt like I wasn't a good Christian because I wasn't worshiping with my arms up" (he comes from a Lutheran background and hasn't had a whole ton of experience with more contemporary churches). So I pointed out that we ALL have areas of weakness and because of that particular speaker's background, it's logical that he would be more likely to sound full of himself. And I said that one of the things I love about The Way is that you are free to worship in the way that connects you with God best! If that's sitting or standing or kneeling or arms up or down or whatever, it's all about you and God. He said he wanted to try it again and LOVED IT the next time. He said what'd I'd said (especially about worshipping freely) made a lot of sense to him and he felt much more comfortable. YAY. Plus the speaker that night was excellent. We had another great conversation after that evening which was cool. Then we went again this past Friday night and had without a doubt what was one of the most important conversations of our entire relationship. It was fabulous and I'm still excited about it. God has REALLY blessed us through that ministry.

We're going to Arizona again in another month for Hart and Becky's wedding - that's VERY exciting, I can't wait for that! That's about it for excitement right now in our lives. I'll be back tomorrow. :)

Busy week! (and a grammar question)

This week is busy! Sunday was great - we went to the casino for brunch and played for a few minutes... to my dismay, there were no penny slots. So I did 5 cent slots for 15 or 20 minutes. I lost $1.05. Boo. (that is the worst I've ever done!) After that we went off-roading in Hart's Jeep - it was great! Super fun. We learned all about different types of cactui. Then we had dinner at a place called Oregano's - yum. Great food. Monday morning we both came back. I wasn't feeling well Monday afternoon / evening, so I didn't really get much done. Waste of a day, which is irritating. Tuesday afternoon I had my Remicade, and then went home and popped a cake in the oven, did the dishes, cleaned the kitchen, emptied the dishwasher, unpacked, and tidied up my room. Geoff got home after about an hour and we had dinner at Hall Street Grill. We got home late and then went to bed. Well, actually I looked at cacti on the wiki first. It was fun. :)

Tonight I need to finish prepping for cake decorating class tomorrow (icing my cake, making a few more batches of icing, packing everything up, etc.) and then we're having dinner at Cheesecake Factory with Geoff's parents and his stepsister who is in town because she is on spring break! YAY, I love her. Tomorrow I have a class at the gym and then I have to rush over to Michaels for cake decorating. Geoff is taking Rebecca skiing tomorrow night... fun! Friday we're going to my friend Kendra's birthday BBQ, and Saturday we're going to Geoff's aunt and uncle's St. Patrick's Day party and then his friend Kyle's birthday party. Plus there is TONS to do around the house... it is a disaster. I was definitely feeling a little stressed about this last night, but there will be enough time. I need to update my Quicken... it is so behind and it makes me angry!

HUGE grammar drama! - Geoff wrote a note to one of our roommates asking him to make some time to talk to us tonight. He wrote "plaese make some time to talk to Kelly and me" and I said "no, it should be me and Kelly", so he corrected it. Then he wrote it again on a seperate white board and wrote it "Kelly and me" again... I corrected it again and he changed it to "me and Kelly". Not a huge deal... but then this morning his roommate had written back and responded and then wrote "P.S. it should say Kelly and me". Then I was like "OH NO - could I be WRONG?!" So I immediately emailed my mom, my personal grammar expert. She replied and said "I think me and geoff is correct. When you use "I" you say Geoff and I, but usually me goes first." That didn't sound like a very concrete answer, so I researched on the internet. I think I've concluded that it really doesn't matter - although for etiquette reasons, some consider "Kelly and me" to be more correct because it is more polite to put the other person before yourself. However, others argue that "me and Kelly" is more correct because "Kelly" could be replaced with "the most wonderful woman in the entire world" and it just sounds weird to put "and me" after that... "me and the most wonderful woman in the world" sounds better. Along those lines, I read in multiple places that it's not grammatically incorrect to say "I and Geoff went to the store"... again, it's a "politeness" issue. My mom has also sent an email to her sister (the other grammar expert in the family) to have her weigh in on the subject. I'd love to hear what you think too!

Here are a couple of my sources:
Source 1
Which is correct: 'my friend and me' or 'my friend and I'?

That depends on where you and your friend are in the sentence. In colloquial speech 'me' is often used where standard grammar requires 'I', especially when someone else is mentioned too. Sometimes people use 'I' instead of 'me', because they know 'me' is sometimes wrong, but have not understood the principle. (Others resort to 'myself', which can sound rather pompous.) I am the subject of the sentence, but the object of the sentence is me. If in doubt, take your friend out of the sentence.

Me and my friend went to a party last night. [Wrong]
I and my friend went to a party last night.
My friend and me went to a party last night. [Wrong]
My friend and I went to a party last night.

The mayor has invited me and my husband.
The mayor has invited I and my husband. [Wrong]
The mayor has invited my husband and me.
The mayor has invited my husband and I. [Wrong]

Incidentally, saying 'my friend and I' instead of 'I and my friend' is not better grammar, it's just being polite.

Source 2
I'm not saying that "me and Jane" is correct etiquette -- it just sounds better to most ears. There's no grammatical difference between "me and Jane" and "Jane and me", as far as I know. Grammar doesn't care about the order of the pair, but etiquette does.

Source 3
I hate to be technical on this point, but since it's the nature of our discussion, I believe it is proper to say "Pizza was delivered to me and Mike." You are correct with "Mike and I ordered pizza" wherein you allow Mike to be first, but since "me" is the direct object in the second, it should be first, so as to not run into the problem shown in this example: "Pizza was delivered to all of the little underground trolls that frolic in the woods and me." It gets somewhat confusing at that point.

A quick AZ Post

Arizona is AWESOME. I really really really want to move here - maybe a year or more down the line I will have that opportunity! Wednesday we got here and then after work had dinner with some people from work at Gardunos, a Mexican place that I have been to before in New Mexico with my grandparents. Then I went to my hotel but they'd overbooked it so I had to go all over creation to the new hotel they got for me - greeeaaaat. Luckily Geoff helped me out on the phone, finding the new place and all! I did get the night for free though. Thursday after work I drove up to Scottsdale to find Patrick's apartment. We hung out for a short bit and then went to sushi with Hart and Becky at Sushi Eye. YUM. I got in trouble for not sharing sushi, but I have learned the ways of these AZ people. Then we had this AMAZING warm cookie with ice cream and whipped cream at Tilted Kilt, then went to go pick up Geoff at the airport. Oh - I had a glass of wine at Tilted Kilt and it was HOT. They're like "hey, that's what our room temperature is here". So weird. Friday Geoff and I went to CSK Auto Headquarters (first picture below) so he could say he's been there. We also went to one of the Checker (second picture below) stores here too. We also ate at In-N-Out... yum. We did random driving around for the rest of the night. For dinner, we met Patrick, Hart, and Becky at Grilled Expedition - AWESOME food. Then we went back to Tilted Kilt so Geoff could try a cookie. Then a quick stop at Walmart for closed toe shoes and then we go-karted. I apparently go-kart like "an old lady on the freeway" - sad! Geoff thought I was having a miserable time and crying in my helmet the whole time... NOT TRUE! I was having a blast I just seem a little slower than others. My average lap time was a full 10 seconds slower than everyone else's. And I only got to do 11 of the 16 laps everyone else did. Seriously, I was THAT slow. Oh well. It was a blast, and Hart says Patrick and Becky started out that way too! Saturday Patrick, Geoff, and I went to Paradise Bakery for lunch - I never thought I'd say this, but I like it BETTER than Panera! Insane! Great food though. Then off to a Cubs spring training game! There are a few pictures from the game below... I had a BLAST. I love baseball... it's so nice and warm and relaxing and fun. After that we went and looked at bikes for Patrick... I hope he gets one! I LOVE biking. Then we picked up Hart for dinner and went to Los Dos... my coworker has RAVED about this place to me for about a year. The margaritas were great... I haven't had a margarita like that any place other than Mexico. The atmosphere was fabulous and the food was good too. SPICY. But good. It was seriously a great place, I loved it. Picture below! That is outside in the cantina. It was perfect. Perfect night. Then we played the Wii at Hart's house - I had NO IDEA how much fun it would be, it was great. Unfortunately he has two cats and I'm SUPER allergic to cats. I took Benedryl before we went but that made me tired... so I was tired and allergic. We went home after an hour or so. But I still had a super fun night. Now we're off to Casino Arizona for the Sunday brunch and then some gambling! YAAAAY for penny slots! :) Hehe. More to come later.

Oh yes - Geoff finally got a blog! Check it out!

Hello World

Wow, it seems that I haven't REALLY posted in a while.

Let's see... Thursday I went to the gym with Cindy and then went to cake decorating! It was REALLY fun, we went through all of the materials you'd need for class and then we watched our instructor decorate a cake doing all of the techniques we'll learn in this class (it's Wilton Course I, there are 2 more courses after this). After that I went home and watched 24 with Geoff.

Friday I took my usual nap (yay) and then Geoff came home from work with Comet, his parent's dog. His parents were in Vegas for the weekend so he picked the dog up from doggy day care and then was taking it back to their house. I went with him and we picked up Qdoba for dinner, then hung out at his parent's for a while. After that we went to The Way - it was Geoff's first time and he was a little overwhelmed/uncomfortable. He is not used to that style of worship, which generated a REALLY good discussion! It was one of my favorite conversations we've had in recent memory. It was fun... challenging and interesting. (he will probably think my use of the word "fun" here will be odd). The normal main speaker was sick, so he is going to go back at least a few more times to give the main speaker a chance and to see if he could adapt to that style of worship. We did run into several people we/he knew though - people from Quarterlife (the singles group where we met), a couple of friends of his brother, and my next door neighbor's brother. Oh, and a girl that is a friend of our friend Jenny... we couldn't realize how we knew her (and she couldn't figure out how she knew us), then realized that we'd all taken ballroom dancing lessons together last spring! RANDOM!! It's kinda fun how many people you run into at something like that. After that Geoff spent the night at his parent's house to babysit the dog.

Saturday Geoff didn't have to work until noon, so we went to Ihop for breakfast. I had their new cinnamon roll french toast, YUM! After that Geoff went to work and I went to town on the cake decorating!! It was pretty fun. I really don't remember what all I did Saturday - it was a worthless day I guess. Oh well. I had to bake the cakes and the first one took a while to decorate because I wasn't used to it. We had pizza for dinner. Oh!! I know what else I did - I went to a store called Cash & Carry (Smart & Final in other places). A coworker recommended it as a place to get cake supplies and it was GREAT. They had cake boxes (good for giving away cakes), cake boards, powdered sugar in big amounts, etc. And I didn't even explore the whole store, I'm saving that as a treat! It was like a Costco, but smaller, no membership fees, and geared more towards caterers for the most part. They had TONS of takeout containers, etc. They had more food items than I was expecting though. Anyway, definitely recommend checking the place out! Good prices and they take credit cards.

Sunday I slept in WAY late and missed church - ick! Then Geoff and I had lunch at Bugatti's and he asked if he could watch me decorate my cake. He had way more fun that he thought he would, and he even helped some too (he did the blue on the edge of the dino cake). Then he went to work. I went for a bike ride with Trevor and Eric and then came home, sat on the porch for a while (it was a GORGEOUS day) and then took a shower. Geoff and I met his parents at BW3s for dinner and heard all about their Vegas trip. They wanted to thank Geoff for taking care of the dog, so they got him a hat and shirt from the Shelby Museum (he is OBSESSED with the Shelby Mustang). We had a nice dinner and they invited us to go with them to Vegas next year (this same week) for the NASCAR race. Geoff and his stepdad really love NASCAR. They will get three day tickets for all of the pre-race events and Julie and I will just go for race day (we will be at the pool the rest of the time!). We'd go on Thursday and come back early Monday morning. How fun! So that's in the works. Then we went home, watched 24, and went to bed.

This week marks the "one year anniversary" of when Geoff and I remember getting to know each other better. On Wednesday of this week (Thursday this year, it was March 8th) we had Quarterlife and went to Applebees afterwards. Geoff was sitting directly across from me (he says he made Eric switch seats with him because he wanted to sit right across from me, I don't remember that). I was leaving for Spain the next morning to go see my sister, so I wanted to stay up all night packing, watching 24, etc. So I invited anyone to go to the 24 Hour Starbucks with me... my friend Serena and Geoff went. Actually several other people went too, but Serena, Geoff, and I stayed until 2 or 3 in the morning! (they both work retail and had the next day off). It started snowing about midnight and it was BEAUTIFUL. :) Geoff was going to volunteer to keep me company and awake while I packed, but earlier in the night I'd been talking about how it annoys me when people invite themselves to thigns, so he didn't (of course I didn't know all of that until later). But yeah, it was a great night, we talked for hours with Serena and had a blast. I did end up sleeping a little bit and then Geoff sent me a text the next morning to make sure I got to the airport okay (it had snowed quite a bit and he had chains on his truck). So sweet! When I told him that was this week last year he said "Let's go to Starbucks Wedneady night!" Too bad I'll be in Arizona without him. ;-)

I was thinking today about how different all of the blogs that I read are. I go into detail about every boring thing I do. Some people tend to be more topical, just focus on one thing that came up during the day. Those people tend to generate more comments. Some people are more random. And yet they're all interesting to read. Part of the fun of blogging is getting to know the person you're reading about better, and part of that is seeing their writing style.

Cake Pic Captions

Here’s the rundown on all the cake pics below (I finally realized that it’s much easier to do all of the pics and then the text, blogger doesn’t do captions very well):

1. The first two cakes I baked, cooling on my new cooling rack.
2. My cake decorating caddy – you can see quite a few tips and my 4 different bottles of color
3. My first layer… with the icing “dam” and then with raspberry filling
4. My first cake, iced but not decorated
5. The final result of my first cake… it looked a lot better before I tried adding the leaves (we don’t do leaves in class for 3 more weeks!)
6. Detail of my purple flower, with star filling
7. My second cake. I did dinos because I bought a box of 101 cookie cutters as patterns and dinos were one of the options. I thought a dino cake would be fun. I wish I had a 3 year old.
8. A picture of Mt. Hood over my house! My house is the tan one right below the mountain. How fun is that?!

The long awaited Cake Pics!

Fuzzy Posters and Cake, oh my!

So Monday Geoff was REALLY cute and sweet... he was just adorable. Can't get over it. Then Tuesday he was "poopy"... just feeling kinda blah, didn't want to do anything all day. But I needed to do a ton of errands! So he did them all with me anyway... we went to Bed Bath and Beyond and got a credit, returned something to Target and something else to Target, deposited some money into my bank - see, good errands! Got like $200 back between all of those things. We also went to Michaels to sign up for Wilton Course I - Cake Decorating. YAY!!! The course was free with purchase of the Wilton caddy. So while we were there, he asked if we could get Fuzzy Posters to decorate. Um, okay you weirdo! His family always spends Christmas afternoon watching movies and coloring Fuzzy Posters. So he wanted to do that. Apparently, he has a secret passion for coloring that I never knew about! He said he even likes coloring books! Funny. But cute. So we bought them and colored them while we were watching 24. It was my very first Fuzzy Poster - I'm almost done!

Yesterday we went to Costco to get oil for an oil change in the Tahoe, and then we went to Sears to look at appliances. My dryer took THREE HOURS to dry a load of towels the other night and I've had it up to here! A coworker just got a new washer and dryer from Sears and RAVES about them constantly. A weeks worth of jeans and fleeces for a family of 4 in one load dried in 40 minutes?!?! Wow. Geoff also told me he could put new tile in the bathroom (the laundry room is also a bathroom) and I could paint it... it would be GREAT. That room is so ugly... the floor is really cheap quality and has lots of dings and the wall is all banged up. Not sure why, the rest of the house is in great condition. But it's always been that way. I think grey tile with grey walls and a blue washer/dryer would be GREAT! But... we'll see. Not quite yet. After that we went home and watched more 24. We are in the middle of season 2 and it's REALLY GOOD.

Can't wait for cake decorating class tonight! This weekend I plan to make and decorate a few cakes, don't worry, there will be pictures!

Yikes

First of all, I have an anonymous commenter. Who are you?! I am confused.

Second, my hair is a HIT. I'm told the pictures don't do it justice at all, but people are raving about it. Everyone who has seen it in person seems to just love it. Geoff says it makes my eyes look bluer. It is fabulous!

So this morning I googled Costco Obsession just to see what people were saying about Costco and how easily it is to be obsessed. MY OWN BLOG popped up on the third page... I was like "oh, hello!". So then I googled it in quotes ("Costco Obsession") and it came up as the 4th item on the 1st page. Yikes. Maybe I should have given up Costco for Lent. There's always next year.

Did I tell you I'm going to Arizona on business next week and Geoff is coming with me? YAY I'm excited. It should be a fabulous trip. I will get to see Patrick and Hart and Becky and it will just be super funness! :)

The camera's debut!

Geoff at Schuck's!












The box that started it all!!
















Me at Schuck's


The picture after Geoff touched up my hair.

Cure to Boredom!

Yesterday was BORING! I didn't do anything all day! I got some food at Qdoba, read a little, watched the last two episodes of The OC (ever), and hung out. Didn't clean or do anything remotely productive! Met Geoff at Helvetia Tavern for dinner at 8:30, then hung out for a bit.

Today, I resolved to be DIFFERENT. So, I met Addy at Chipotle for lunch at noon, then went to Express for new jeans. That didn't really work out, so I went to Fred Meyer, where I purchased lettuce, jeans, and HAIRCOLOR. That's right. I have never been anything other than blonde, so I decided it was time for a change! I looked at the color aisle, saw a box that jumped out at me, and snatched it up. I thought if I put too much thought into it, I might never be able to pick out a color. So I went with this one. It's chillin' in my hair as I speak - I have no idea what it will turn out like, but I can promise there will be pictures! After Fred Meyer, I went to Great Clips because I decided I needed a haircut too... I LOVE the cut. It's shoulder length and very layered. There will be pics of that too (kinda hard to show you pics of the color and not the cut now isn't it?!). So in just 8 more minutes, I get to rinse this color out and see how I look with auburn brown hair. YEAH!!!!!! :) Then I think I'm going to do some scrapbooking and probably visit Geoff at work!

Is pink the new red?

So Wednesday after work I went home and unpacked. Then when Geoff got home we headed out and went to the Bike Gallery to get a bike pump and a new tube for Geoff's bike. It has been broken since oh, approximately NOVEMBER!! Then we went to Best Buy to look at camera bags, which I deemed too expensive. I usually consider most things at Best Buy too expensive. To me, it's mostly a place to go and look and write down model numbers, then go home and purchase online! Then we went to Staples to look at the XD cards they had on sale for $15. What do you know, they were out of stock! Surprise, surprise. You can't find them that cheap anywhere, including online! So we went to Costco and got a compact flash card (which also fits in Geoff's camera) for $30 cheaper than the price at Staples or Best Buy. AND I found a coupon for them for $15 off which starts next week at Costco, so we'll go back and try to apply that coupon. YEAH. Then we went to TGI Fridays and both got their appetizer, dinner, and dessert special for $12.99. Don't recommend that! The appetizers and dinners were okay but desserts were not so much. We both took home half of our meals to have for lunch the next day. When we got home we watched 24 from Monday night. Fun!

Last night when I got home, Geoff was already there and fixing his bike. I was CRABBY - I needed to go for a long bike ride and not talk to anyone! So I took the trash and recycling out, checked the mail, and then grabbed my bike. Couple of exciting things in the mail: a 10% off any digital camera at Best Buy coupon, Sports Illustrated for Geoff, and a late birthday present for me! Geoff was done with his bike by that point so he left with me on my ride - we headed for Cedar Hills, an area about 5 miles away from me. About 3 miles into it, Geoff realized how flat my tires were - I didn't realize that when you have flatter tires it's harder to ride! So we stopped off at Vinnie's house, which is only about half a mile out of the way, and aired up. WHAT A DIFFERENCE! I will always check my tires before I ride now! So we got to Cedar Hills and ate at Bugatti's - YUM!! I had a BLTA sandwich and it was really really tasty! It totally hit the spot. Then we went over to Best Buy and looked at cameras - I used some birthday money to buy one that was on sale and I had they coupon for - YAY. It's cute and pink. :) (the box says it's "red"... Geoff and I think that's the funniest thing ever... it's soooo pink!) Maybe they just call it red so that men will buy it too?!?! But I think they'd regret it if they did! The guy at the store said they sold a TON of them for Valentine's Day. So that was exciting. Then we biked home - Geoff led this time because he forgot his bike light - I have a front and rear light and the rear light is screwed on but the front is removable - so he put it on his bike and led us along. HE RODE FAST. It took us probably 30 - 35 minutes to ride there (hard to say because of our stop) and less than 25 minutes to ride back. It was good though. Then we finished up his taxes and watched Grey's Anatomy. YAY fun fun night. And the ride DEFINITELY helped my crabbiness!

I'm back!

YAY, I'm back! The vacation was FABULOUS. Here's what happened:

Friday: Geoff got home around 3 and we left by 3:30. We drove straight through until we got to Sisters where we ate at the Snow Cap... I ate there before I climbed Middle Sister and loved it - Geoff liked it just as much! Then we got some ice cream at the Snow Cap and headed to the house where we were staying with my family friends. Geoff thought their house was BEAUTIFUL and that they were really nice. We chatted with them for a couple of hours and then went to bed so we could get up early the next morning to go ski!

Saturday: We woke up and had breakfast - oatmeal for me, Cheerios and marionberries for Geoff. Then we headed out. My boots were a disaster... for some reason I have GIANT CALVES. I never knew this... actually, it might just be from running. Anyway, it was a nightmare - anything that would fit my calves was WAY too big in the foot. So I was pretty much miserable in terms of boot fit the entire day... I would take Advil and feel better for a while but that would go away pretty quickly. There were also a TON of people there which is never quite as fun. Geoff is a phenominal skier but was very patient with me all day, which I greatly appreciated. We had lunch at the lodge in the middle of the mountain, and then Geoff went up to the summit and I skiied down and met at the bottom. It was really fun... I do love skiing, it just wasn't my day. After that we went home and got showered and cleaned up, then went out to REI, the Columbia outlet, and a few local ski shops to look for boots for me. We thought maybe I could find some boots that fit better - but there was nothing! Then we went to Target to get some Advil and and also went to GI Joes to try some other boots, but still, nothing. Then we had dinner and FRIED ICE CREAM at the place I really wanted to go. Geoff agreed that their food was great! The funniest part was that I couldn't remember what the third topping to the ice cream was... I knew it was strawberries and whipped cream, and then Geoff said "Honey" and I said "yes?" and he said "HONEY" and I was like "what?!" and he said "HONEY!!!!" and I was like "ohhhhhhh....!!!" HONEY, as in the stuff from BEES... not as in "hun" or "sweetie". Hehe. It is probably funnier if you hear it with the voice inflections, but you get the gist. After that we went home and watched National Treasure (a purchase from Target).

Sunday: We decided not to ski... we slept in late and then got up and went out for breakfast at The Original Pancake House. This is in the same franchise as Walker Brothers in Chicago so I was hoping for an amazing breakfast, and it was good, but not as good as I had hoped. I could definitely tell some similarities, but their hash browns and waffles were NOT the same. Sad, because I love the Walker Brothers hash browns! Let's see... then we went to REI again to check out some other stuff. Seems like we went to a few other stores as well but I cannot recall them at the moment! We talked about going to the mountain a little later but didn't end up doing that either. Oh, I know what we did - we went home so Geoff could watch the Daytona 500. He did that while I helped Karolyn with her computer. After that we headed out... we went to Target where I bought 24, and we went to Costco where I bought some socks and Geoff bought DaVinci Code (the movie) and Michael Creighton's new book. Then we went to dinner at a place called Bella Cucina in the Old Mill District in Bend - WONDERFUL food! Geoff said it was the best meal he'd had in months. It was really super tasty! It was small and intimate and wonderful. After that we went home and watched quite a few episodes of Season 1 of 24 and then I fell asleep!

Monday: My birthday! I got TONS of Facebook messages on my wall, that was fun. I also got a Wusthof Carver - yay, I have really been looking forward to that knife! - from my parents. And several gift certificates which gave me enough to get the Calphalon Contemporary pan that I've been wanting! 2 interesting things to note: (1) the price of that pan went up $5 ON MY BIRTHDAY... seriously, the price changed online on my birthday, how random is that? and (2) Bed Bath and Beyond does not have in-store pickup. Lame. Geoff gave me the Sex and the City Complete Series which I have been wanting for either 1 or 2 years (can't remember exactly when it came out!). That was pretty exciting! We went to breakfast at iHOP and as we were leaving I saw a sign that said "free birthday breakfast!" So I busted out my ID and got a free breakfast! Then I sang a song that I appropriately titled "free big bacon omelette". I invited Geoff to make up his own song about my free breakfast, but he polititely declined... so I told him I'd teach him MY song, which he also declined... so then I told him a rap or interpretive dance would also be acceptable. Yeah -- still declined! So then I made up my own interpretive dance. I think he pretty much thinks I'm the weirdest person ever. It was fun though! Then we went to Sears to look at tools, then home to shower! After that we talked to Karolyn for a bit and then headed out to go SHOPPING! We went to Old Navy and bought me a BUNCH of clothes and a few things for Geoff. Then we stopped into Costco to buy something... or maybe we just looked. We want a deep fryer but they were sold out. Then we headed to Target where I got EVEN MORE clothes and we also looked at a store called Sportsmans Warehouse, we went to Bed Bath and Beyond to buy my pan, and we went to Best Buy to look at digital cameras for him and me (we want two VERY DIFFERENT types of cameras - I want a point and shoot and he wants an SLR). I was super excited to have new clothes for the first time in 10 or 15 years - literally, I RARELY buy new clothes and certainly not that many! We also went to Barnes and Noble so I could buy the new Nelson DeMille book - he is my favorite author and my favorite character, John Corey, is in this book. I can't wait to read it! After that we set out to find some food - we ended up at the sketchiest place of all time. Okay, so that's a total exaggeration, but it was WEIRD, especially for my birthday dinner! They had "mountain oysters" which Geoff informed me are TESTICLES! WEIRD!!!! But we had a ton of food and it was an *experience*, so it was okay. It was entertaining. And it makes me laugh when I think about it. After that we stopped by Best Buy to look at cameras again and then headed home to watch more 24. I fell asleep after one episode. It was a good birthday!

Tuesday: We were all excited to finally go skiing again - and the weather was AWFUL. It snowed all morning, but you couldn't see anything at the mountain, a lot of the lifts opened late, etc. So Geoff said he'd rather skip it, which surprised me, but we did. We went to Pilot Butte Drive In for lunch - SO GOOD! We ate so much in Bend, I swear I gained 10 pounds, but it was tasty! Geoff read Time Magazine and I read the local paper while we ate. Then we headed back home and got packed up and left around 2. We were home by 6 - or should I say to Costco by 6? We went to the Aloha and Hillsboro stores looking for the deep fryer, but they were both out! (it was on sale this week). BUMMER. But... Geoff got a camera. It is SUPER nice and was a wonderful deal and included TWO lenses! We also upgraded our Costco membership so we get 2% back on things now. Then we got a pizza at Costco (yes I will admit I have a new Costco obsession) and headed home to watch some more 24. I took a nice long shower while he unloaded the car... so sweet! Then I fell right to sleep.

This afternoon I will either go to the gym or for a bike ride - haven't decided yet. I need to go to Costco again (YES AGAIN!!!) for lettuce... so we'll check out the third store in the area to see if THEY have the deep fryer. We're going to go to Staples to get a cheap xd card (that's what his new camera takes). Then we are going to go to Best Buy to get a camera bag for him and LOOK at the cameras for me. Again! Our life is on repeate lately. Then we'll go home and unpack, then we'll both update our Quickens and finish up Geoff's taxes. Exciting night I tell ya! Actually I'm looking forward to it a lot. Then we'll either watch more of season 1 of 24 or watch the episode from Monday night that we still haven't seen yet. I'm looking forward to it!

Work is slow!

Work is going by sooo slowly, I am ready to leave and head down to Bend! I did just get back from my birthday lunch at Chevy's, that was fun! I'm really ready to go though.

So last night I went to the gym with Cindy and Addy - Cindy's super sore today! It is cracking me up! After that I went home, took a shower, and watched 30 Minute Meals while I packed. Then at 7 I went to Vin's house to go pick up his snowshoes for Geoff to use, then ran by REI to get a new bite valve for my Camelbak. Then I went home, had a little dinner, and waited for a fellow who was going to come over and look at the Bronco. I had a bad feeling that Geoff was going to be late - I told the guy to come over at 8:30, but you know how it is. Anyway, the guy showed up at 8:23... and so he started looking at the Bronco (which I know nothing about) and I was waiting and waiting and waiting for Geoff. I went in to call him and he said he was running late, but on his way home. When I went back outside, the guy was smoking a cigarette! Anyway, Geoff showed up around 8:50 (after almost 30 minutes with the scary man!). The guy took it for a test drive (the headlights wouldn't work at first, but they finally did) and then made an offer which Geoff accepted. So he sold the Bronco! I'm so excited, it will be nice to have it gone, be able to cancel the insurance, and not have to worry about it anymore. YEAH!

After that Geoff went to BW3s to get some wings and then we went back home and watched Grey's. I love that show. After that we got the Tahoe all packed up. I decided to just take a big plastic bin for all of our snow stuff... easier than packing it all up. I threw both of our pairs of hiking boots in there, my snowshoes, both sets of ski pants, masks, gloves, hats, scarves, etc. Everything except our coats fit. I thought Geoff would make fun (he usually does of my obsession with bins), but he said he actually appreciates it, because I'm always so organized and we know where everything is. I love the bin! It is jammed full... I think on the way back I may take the snowshoes out. But that’s okay. Geoff did find one think to make fun of me with – when he was packing for his cruise he was thinking he was gonna have to sit on his suitcase to close it and I said “no no, we don’t sit on suitcases, if you do you packed wrong”. But last night I put my knee on the bin to close it and he said “oh, so we don’t sit on suitcases, but we do put our knee on bins?!?!” It was REALLY funny. But maybe you had to be there. Also, I put in my daypack... Geoff had never seen my daypack before, he loved it! He was like "wow, this is really nice!" He usually doesn't love my things, so that was fun. It really IS a nice pack... it made a huge difference in my hiking once I bought it. It's the only North Face item I've ever owned. We're going to put the Camelbak in it and take it skiing. So we got the bin packed up, both of our duffel bags with clothes and stuff, my gym bag, and my giant box of the 4 vases of flowers (I put a blanket in there so they wouldn't move around). That was upstairs. Then downstairs we grabbed his skis, our winter coats, and a couple of other things, plus got a cooler ready (just needs ice) and loaded up the Tahoe. We are good to go for right after work today! We're both hoping to leave by 2:30, but we'll see. I'm guessing at least one of us will get stuck at work until at least 3. I checked out the road conditions and it looks REALLY clear out there (a little rainy), so we will definitely take the Santiam Pass. Good, I strongly prefer that route. Can't wait!

Side note: I remember when a guy I worked with had a splash guard for his Nalgene bottle, and I asked him where he got it. He said "REI" very casually and I acted like I knew what he was talking about. A few months later, I was in Seattle and saw REI and I was like "OH, there's that store, I better stop and get the splash guard!" I had no idea it was a giant national chain (well, sorta). They have all of 2 (1 at the time) in the whole state of Illinois. Now I'm just your average crunchy Oregon girl! Complete with REI membership.

Teeeeheeeeheeee

I just sent Geoff the "Will you marry me" ecard. I wrote "C'mon. It's funny. Who DOES this?!" I can't wait to see what he says. And hopefully he reads his email before my blog!

Best Valentine's Ever!

So yesterday was definitely the best Valentine's Day ever - maybe because I wasn't really expecting anything good. Geoff had asked me a couple of times "when are you going home?" so I knew he was up to something. So I went home (after a couple of errands which I will explain in a minute) around 4:30 yesterday. I walked in and there was a beautiful bouquet of flowers in the kitchen with a card. I LOVE CARDS. Seriously, I would rather get a card than almost any other present - especially when the text of the card AND what the person has written are really good! So I was pleased but not surprised or shocked or anything. So I grab the card, leave the flowers, and haul the rest of my stuff upstairs - where there were THREE MORE VASES OF A DOZEN ROSES EACH. Yeah, didn't expect THAT! There was once vase of red roses, one vase of light pink roses, and one vase of bright pink roses. Sooooo happy. I couldn't believe he surprised me. He has never done that the entire time we've been dating. It was great! He had been worried all day that I wouldn't be happy but I SO was! Definitely the best surprise from him and the best Valentine's Day present I ever got!

For his Valentine's Day present I got him a Nalgene bottle (he told me he wanted one for the gym, but that was over a month ago... the color is slate) and a ski mask. I was trying to think of something to put in the Nalgene bottle, but I couldn't! Then I remembered how he drinks a lot of Gatorade during basketball, so I got him some Gatorade mix and put it into individual little plastic baggies with the right amount to make a Nalgene full of Gatorade. I tried to find cute little Valentine's baggies but they didn't have them (at 2 different stores)! I also got him a funnel. I wrapped up all of these presents and put them in a bag. When we were talking about it, I told him I got him 4 things - although one was about 8 (the gatorade in the little baggies). He asked if they were one time use or permanent things, I said 3 of the things were permanent and the one that was 8 was one time use. He was confused! You probably are not too.

Side note: I was looking at Hallmark.com and found an ecard to propose. I love the idea of proposing in a card, but an E CARD?!?!?! Seems like Ryan's blog might have covered this a couple of years ago, but I must have buried it deep in my mind!

Anyway, onward. I watched Rachael Ray and then went to pick up Geoff's skis from REI. Then I went to the gym and did the stepmill for a while, then ran for a bit. Geoff got there about 8:30 and we played racquetball until 9:15! I hate racquetball. I really do. That crazy little ball flying at you from all directions... I can't handle it! It was actually pretty fun, but Geoff even admitted that I'm NOT so good at it. Then we were hungry so we went to PF Changs for dinner. We didn't even change clothes, and then they asked if we had a reservation. I thought "we look like this... do you THINK we have a reservation?" Anyway, he opened all of his presents - after he'd opened the Nalgene bottle he said "wow, and I can put Gatorade in here!" and I thought "just you wait, buddy". Then when he got to the Gatorade package, he was like "this is weird. it feels like sugar. or maybe flower". I was like "stop poking it! open it!" He loved it... he loved opening all of the weird little things I got him. It was a fun dinner. We were happy. It was just a WONDERFUL day.

My mom also sent me a Thai cookbook for Valentine's Day - I can't WAIT to use it. I love Thai.

My calves hurt today from the stepmill. I love saying that word. I think it's funny.

Today Geoff took his Bronco to the DEQ to get tested. It passed! It's good for 2 more years now, which is a good selling point. We have a guy coming out today to look at it. He's already said he will make a low offer, which is okay, but I still hope he buys it. Geoff is a little sad because he has to part with his baby, but it will be a good thing for us overall. It has a lot of body damage, some problems with the rear and driver side windows, the 4x4 doesn't work, the air conditioning doesn't work, etc. So it's certainly not in perfect condition.

Tomorrow we head to Bend for a weekend of skiing, the best fried ice cream ever (vanilla ice cream in a crisp cinnamon crumb coating served in a flour tortilla "bowl" and topped with strawberry sauce, honey and whipped cream), outlet shopping, and fun! I seriously cannot wait! I am taking all of the flowers I got down there - I want to be able to enjoy them longer before I day. I asked if that was okay and got this response "I'm envious...................4 bouquets!!!! By all means, bring them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I will certainly enjoy them while you're here!!!!!!!!!!!!" Hehe. :) Geoff says I need to come up with a system that does not involve him being touched in ANY WAY by flowers while driving. I will shimmy up a box or something for them tonight - they don't call me an IE for nothin'!

Tonight I think I'm going to go to my class at the gym, then whip up some jambalaya with sausage. That is the first meal Geoff ever cooked for me, the night we started dating, and I LOVED it. I can't wait to make it again. I hope it's another great day!

I need to learn mythology

So, Addy and Geoff BOTH ditched me at the gym last night... but they came to trivia with me which was fun. None of us knew anything about mythology so it was pretty brutal. Really fun night overall though!

This morning Geoff and I met at REI to rent skis. What we didn't know was that REI doesn't rent skis! When I got there he was just waiting for me and looking at the skis they sell to pass the time. He has wanted new skis forever... he skis a LOT and has never had his own. So anyway, I noticed the prices on the skis and they were on huge clearance. I told him it might make sense to get his own... he was SHOCKED. So we ended up buying him new skis (they came with bindings!), boots (these are not QUITE his boots but very close), and poles. He's VERY VERY happy. And he doesn't even know what I actually got him for Valentine's Day yet - just a couple of little things, I will post those later just in case he reads my blog before that. The guy at REI was like "you better get her something really good for Valentine's Day after this!" He said "I will!" So we'll see...

I also figured that he needs to ski approximately 14 times to break even on the cost of rentals - that will be easy! He will ski 3 days this weekend, plus he has 4 days left on his Mt. Hood pass - that's 7 times this year. If he skis that much next year, that will make up the cost in just 2 years. WOW that's super quick. And I have a feeling he'll have these skis at least a good 10 years. Good investment. I am excited for his skis! And VERY excited to go skiing this weekend.

Alright, off to another meeting. Tonight I think I'm going to the gym with Addy and then later tonight going to the gym with Geoff to play racquetball - I HATE racquetball, I can't stand that crazy little ball bouncing all over the place, but I told him I would play with him just this once. Yikes! I'll let you know how that goes tomorrow!

Sleepy!

Sunday when the guys came home it was fun! Geoff was all cute and shmoopy, we hung out for a couple of hours and then decided to go to Hall Street Grill for dinner. I have a discount card from work that made dinner quite affordable there. Yeah! After that we watched the 2 hour special of ABC Extreme Makeover: Home Edition and then went to sleep.

Monday I did not feel like going to the gym... so weird, because I normally LOVE Mondays at the gym. But I couldn't get motivated. It was BEAUTIFUL outside, so I went home and cleaned off all the patio furniture and put some on the front porch and sat outside and watched the neighborhood kids play. I also fixed Geoff's grill and tightened some screws in the fence. Geoff was super late getting home, but we decided to get some ribeyes and grill them up for dinner... yum. Then he left for basketball at the church. I promised I would wait for him to watch 24, so I thought "hmm, what will I do with myself now?" So I *very carefully* got out my bike (this was a sight to be seen, it was hanging in the garage on top of his old Bronco so I had to very carefully try to get it off the hook, around Geoff's bike hanging next to it, and on to stable ground without dropping it on the hood of the Bronco. I was mostly successful... there may have been one small incident where it slightly fell on top of the Bronco, but we won't speak of that). Anyway, I got on my jacket, grabbed some gloves, the garage door opener, some fresh water, my GPS, and was out the door! It's about 4 miles to Target. Then I looked around for Addy for a while... and finally heard her about 6 aisles from where I was... I visited with her for about an hour, it was GREAT!!! Then I took a slightly longer route back - yes, I'll admit it, I biked an extra 2 miles to avoid a hill. Hehe. So about 10 miles round trip (okay, so it was only 9.74!!) and a great visit to see Addy. The funniest part was that I got back RIGHT as Geoff and Eric were getting out of the Tahoe after basketball. What great timing! So I took a quick shower, then Geoff took a quick shower, and then we watched 24 (that took until midnight, ugh!!)

There is a guy at work who plays basketball with Geoff... and he wasn't there last night so I was giving him a hard time... and he said he got in a car accident on the way to basketball!! Ooops... he was stopped on the road and an older lady came and hit him SO HARD that he hit the woman in front of him. WOW! He said he'd never been in an accident before and always made fun of how traumatized people seem to be, but he was very disoriented himself. He didn't move until someone came and knocked on his window to see if he was okay. He tried to go to basketball after that but his wife (who's a nurse) was like NO WAY come home. So he's okay, which is good... unless you count the fact that he completely blanked out on my name in the middle of a meeting today. Hilarious. He's a super funny guy.

Today I'm going to the gym with Addy (I'm ditching Geoff... we were gonna play raquetball!) for a quick bit. Then we're all going home (Geoff included, he's going to go to the gym anyway) and taking showers, then heading out to trivia! I love Trivia Tuesdays! Mythology is the category tonight... should be interesting, I know NOTHING about mythology.

I'm craving ice cream. From either Texas or Oregon.

Sunday

Just filed my taxes! Both federal and state are done, yay. I love doing my taxes. And it's nice having them done.

My mom's mom (Mimi) and my dad's dad (Poppy) are both not doing very well. Let's start with Mimi. When I was a sophomore in college, she had a "stroke". I use the " " because at the time they thought it was a stroke, but then a few months later they went back and said there was actually no real evidence of her having a stroke. But ever since then she hasn't made any real effort - she just started staying in bed all the time, not caring about anything, and letting herself deteriorate. She won't do PT and just doesn't care. Her husband, my mom's dad (Gaggy), does whatever she says instead of pushing her to try to get better. Taking care of her the past 6 years has finally gotten to him and he is starting to look and sound older and worse. My parents and aunts and uncles are trying to get them to sell their house and move into an older folks community, but my grandmother's condition is so bad (she can't even get herself into a wheelchair) that many of these communities won't take her. It is sad because my grandfather is being brought down to her level. (her doctor says this is quite common, the one who is doing better is brought down by the person who is doing worse).

My dad's parents are having a similar situation but in reverse. Poppy spent his entire career in the Air Force and has problems with his hearing and his hips as a result. My mom always said that he dedicated his life to our country and is suffering as a result - I think she is frustrated that her own mother just decided to give up, and that my dad's dad actually has something to "show" for the pain he is going through now. Anyway, again, my dad's mom (Mommom) can't take care of Poppy, so they too are looking at selling their house and moving to a condo or somewhere smaller. Poppy is in better shape than Mimi, he can get around with a walker most of the time, but he is still worse off than Mommom.

The lesson I have learned from this is you need to start BEFORE it's too late. I told my parents that in 15 - 20 years we are going to have to look at getting them into a retirement community! That way they will have downsized their house and won't have to worry about cooking as much, they'll be around other older folks, and there will be a way for them to get more help and assistance as they need it. If you wait until you're too old, you're either too stubborn and don't want to give up your home, or you're too invalid and you can't get into a retirement community. So, I'm starting early with my parents.

Geoff decided we should name our favorite Food Network stars. They are Paula, Rachael, Emeril, Bobby Flay, and Alton Brown. We are NOT fans of Barefoot Contessa. Most other people we are pretty neutral on.

The house all to myself!

I am home alone all weekend - well, actually I only have about 24 hours left. SAD! I have gotten so much done.

Okay let's back up... Thursday after work I took a nap, then went to Cheesecake Factory for dinner with Geoff and then we stopped by his parents house to see the progress on their house. After that we watched Grey's and ate our cheesecake. I know it was a "big episode"... but I wasn't such a fan. It was alright.

Friday after work I helped Geoff pack, saw the guys off, and then headed out to The Way. I met up with Katie and saw a bunch of old friends from Quarterlife and had some great chats. I was kinda looking for the friend of Geoff's brother (Andrew - that's the friend's name, not the brother's name) and then I finally saw him - STANDING RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME!! So cool! We chatted during the "give someone a big bear hug" time. And since the drummer (Brook) was on his honeymoon with the lead singer and main speaker's (John Mark's) little sister (Elizabeth) - guess who the substitute drummer was? That's right, it was Jeff from Kutless! How much fun is that? I thought it was pretty cool. We had a guest speaker named Andy, and Katie was like "hey, he used to work at the Starbucks across the street from my house!". And sure enough, he talked about Starbucks. I was not up to going out last night, so I went to Target afterwards - and made some great finds. I was looking for a cake storage thing (which I found) and a little sewing machine. I found the sewing machine... and actually ended up just buying an even smaller little handheld one. I am not very happy with it though, so I'm going to take it back today. But none of that is important - what I am REALLY excited about is my Dirt Devil Kone! They came out around Christmas and I fell in love with the pink one. But they are $40 and I thought that was too much for a dustbuster. So as I was wandering around looking for the sewing machine, I happened to see a Kone with a clearance sticker on it - $10.04!!! They only had the black and grey ones in stock, and it looked like only the black was on clearance. So I snatched it up. I LOVE IT. It looks fabulous, it's hanging out in my living room and it works REALLY well. I vacuumed my whole stairs with it, they have never been so clean. It's awesome. For 10 bucks!

This morning I made bacon and eggs for breakfast, disinfected the entire kitchen, swept and mopped everywhere, have done 2 loads of laundry, and watched an episode of Rachael Ray. Now I just have to vacuum downstairs and upstairs and finish cleaning my room a little. Exciting! I haven't made a decision about if I will go to the gym or not today - I am feeling pretty good and haven't even had to take any medicine, but I don't want to have to, either! I did decide that I'm definitely going to go for a run tomorrow morning before church. YAY! Can't wait. I might hit the gym later this afternoon or evening and just walk or ride the bike or something to get back into things.

Is the whole world sick?

I was going to title this post "Dying a slow and painful death" but Geoff says I am too dramatic when I'm sick and I think he might be right. Seriously though - everyone I work with, my family all over the country, etc... everyone is sick! It seems to be a super sick year for some reason.

Monday was excellent - I went to the gym for a long time, came home, had leftovers for dinner, did a little cleaning. Then around 8:00 I started to feel kinda sick... like sore throat, really achy, VERY cold and feverish. So around 8:30 I took some Tylenol Cold PM, got in bed, and watched 24. It was a horrible night - I kept waking up freezing cold and shaking, it was no bueno at all! In the morning I had a low fever and was really achy, but I didn't have any of the cold-like symptoms, so I went to work.

For a few hours. I came home at 11 and was still achy and now nauseous as well. It's like the cold and flu combined. Or something. I dunno. I slept a little and did some work and watched Racheal Ray when she came on at 6. Geoff came home around 9 and I whined to him for a while. Then this morning I stayed home from work again and whined to Geoff some more. I think he was really excited to go into work at noon. I feel slightly better this afternoon. I better be able to go to work tomorrow! I'm bored and I hate not being able to work out. UGH!

Good Weekend!

So the weekend was pretty fun. Saturday I slept in until around 9, then got up and watched some Food Network with Geoff. I think he's just excited that there's finally SOME TV I'll watch, so he'll watch whatever I want. It's quite funny. Around 10:45 we left for Chipotle to meet his mom and 2 cousins for lunch. However, they were running late, so we ended up meeting them at Muchas Gracias which is much closer to where Geoff works (he had to work at noon). I'm not a huge fan, so I declined eating. I then hung out with Geoff and his boss at work for a bit, then went home. Cleaned up a little bit but didn't do too much other than that. Actually I watched some TBS, they had Father of the Bride and Father of the Bride Part II on. At around 6, I did some Yoga Booty Ballet - I actually bought it about a year ago but had NEVER done it. It was pretty fun! (I had planned on a nice run and bike ride but it was raining so I skipped them). Geoff came home around 8:30 and we made steaks and watched Legally Blonde on TBS. Oh, and I showed him how to do his taxes with Turbo Tax - he's never done them on his own before so that was pretty fun!

Sunday morning I went up and went for a run - it was beautiful outside, and I ran 1.8 miles and walked some for 2.7 miles total. Once again, my furthest run yet. Plus it was outside which is just soooo much more fun. Then I went to church at Westport and then came home. At 2, Food Network started a Paula's Party marathon - that show is HILARIOUS. If you have never seen it, you should watch it! People started coming over for the Super Bowl but I just kept watching Paula. Geoff didn't get home until around 4 (he had a TERRIBLE day at work and was very grumpy!) and so then he watched the Super Bowl downstairs with everyone. Around 5 I was way bored and the TV was REALLY loud (I had a headache which is why I wasn't downstairs watching the Super Bowl with everyone), so I went to go see Catch and Release. I adore Jennifer Garner, but other than that it wasn't a great movie. But I love going to movies by myself so it was fun all the same. When I came home, the house was empty and quiet again, yay. (wow, I sound like quite the hermit this weekend!) Geoff, Trevor, and I watched another episode of Paula - Trevor could not believe her! She seriously is hilarious. Paula's Party is better than Paula's Home Cooking though. Then there was an episode of Iron Chef and then a wedding cake challenge. (side note: just noticed from someone's website that that was the 2005 wedding cake challenge. interesting.)

And that was the weekend. Pretty slow after Friday.

I'm going to Bend for my birthday weekend now for sure!! We're going Friday - Tuesday... nice long weekend and lots of skiing. YAY!

Friday evening

Ahhh, Fridays are sweet! I had lunch with some people at work, we went to a Japanese place. It wasn't so good, and neither was the company (they were friends of my coworker, and pretty crude), but that's okay. I went home at 3 and had a nice rest. I didn't sleep but I enjoyed my Friday "naptime". After that I made some taco meat and had a taco salad for dinner... and then went to Portland Running Co. On my way, I had a FABULOUS conversation with my dad. He is so awesome! Portland Running Co was CROWDED! I asked if it's always like that on Friday nights, and the guy (Will, who was awesome... there is one woman that almost always helps me when I'm there, but she was busy tonight. She did stop and say hello and ask how I was doing though) say it's usually DEAD. Wow what a long annoying sentence. Anyway, he helped me out... I tried on 4 different pairs of shoes and finally picked this one. That wasn't the best link I found do them, but almost all the other links showed the orange version and I actually have the purple version. I actually really wanted a pair of Brooks shoes that were green, but they weren't as comfy. I made myself actually pick the right pair for RUNNING, not looking cute. Imagine that. So I can't WAIT to go for my run tomorrow! I'm going to lunch with Geoff, his mom, and his two cousins, but after that it's run time!!! I'm also going to go for a bike ride. And guess what - it's all going to be outside, none of this inside gym business. YEAH for it being a little warm out! I have my GPS all ready to go... it's been sad that it hasn't been used in several months! It's going to be a fabulous day.

I'm in a happy mood. The Way was AWESOME again... I am so enjoying the company and the talks are absolutely fabulous. I came home and journaled and just feel so entirely in the presence of God. It is a good thing. I was praying for all of the conversations that I know are taking place at the Steak 'N Shake in Indianapolis right now - this weekend is Greek Conference, Greek Intervarsity's huge conference every year. It's at the Marriott and it's a beautiful beautiful place... I have been to many conferences there (Intervarsity and Campus Crusade both have them there) and I love it. (although I gotta admit, the Westin is still nicer!... but they're connected) And they're also connected to the RCA Dome, which is the Colts stadium. So it's gotta be just crazy there this weekend. Anyway before I got all link-happy and sharing my fun college ministry conference memories with you, I was telling you about Steak 'N Shake. At every one of these conferences, Steak 'N Shake is the place to be late at night, after all the speakers have finished, the music has quieted for the night, the small groups have wrapped up... people bundle up and face the cold and head out to talk, eat, and share. I pray that God is changing hearts there right now... that people are exposed to the love of Christ for the first time. That women are gathered with the sorority sisters, new members, students, and alumni and are sharing what Christ is doing in their lives and in their houses. I pray that fraternity brothers are challenging each other and lifting each other up. Tomorrow will be a beautiful day of fabulous talks, amazing music, small groups, free time to explore Indy, and tacky prom at night. It's a beautiful thing, and I WILL go back as an alumni small group leader one year. God will change lives there this weekend and I can't wait to hear the stories of what he does. And I'm telling you - it's all starting tonight at Steak 'N Shake. I miss Indy. My faith has absolutely been changed and transformed from many long hours and late nights sitting in the lobby of the Westin journaling and praying. Being a student and having those opportunities is something that is of tremendous value to me. Whenever I go back and read those parts of those journals, my heart smiles.

I asked Geoff if we could go to Bend for my birthday weekend (2 weeks away!). He's not sure if he can get the time off because he has a men's retreat next weekend, and that'd be two weekends in a row, but he's going to try! I have family friends (my dad's best friend) that live there so we can stay for free, and we have season passes to Mt. Bachelor that we got free with our Tahoe! (ya know, free for $30K) I hope we can go... I miss skiing, I haven't been in years and I love it!

My roommates are annoying me right now - all three of them, and their friend Kyle, are downstairs watching THE LOUDEST MOVIE KNOWN TO MAN. It doesn't help that the giant HDTV with surround sound is DIRECTLY UNDERNEATH my bedroom. Since none of them are ever in my bedroom, especially when a movie is on, they have no idea how much THE BASS SHAKES MY ENTIRE ROOM CONSTANTLY WHEN THEY ARE WATCHING MOVIES. Can you sense my bitterness? Yes, I could go downstairs and tell them to please turn off the surround sound, but I feel bad doing that. Is it worse to have a hard heart about something and be annoyed about it, or to tell 4 people to stop doing something they enjoy? I don't want them to have to turn down the movie just because I can't hear myself think. But I also don't want to have any grudges against them. I struggle with this a lot. I usually end up not saying anything. And it's only in terms of movies. I'm pretty outspoken about everything else... if something is going on that is bothering me, I will let someone know right away. For example, one of them ran the dishwasher when it wasn't full, and I said "hey, do you mind waiting until it's full?" No big deal. But to ask them to turn a movie down... can't do it!! What the heck is wrong with me?! I pray it's over soon - I've been home for 70 minutes, so it can't be too much longer than another hour, assuming I walked in RIGHT when it started. I hope. Anyway. It's annoying. Thank you for letting me vent. Oh, and I'd also like to discuss how they call Friday nights their "men's meetings" - they say they are becoming better men of God and using Wild at Heart to learn to challenge each other and build their faith... but as far as I can tell they mostly go to movies, watch movies at home, go out to eat, and wrestle. To be fair, I *KNOW* that's not true, and most weeks they do spend at least some time doing real men's meeting stuff. They'll do stuff like share their goals with each other, tell each other their strengths and weaknesses, pray for each other, etc. But every time I'm at home for a men's meeting - I just hear loud horseplay or loud movies. Geoff's mom and I spend a lot of time mocking the men's meetings... but admittedly it is cool that they WANT to try to be stronger men of God.

I love tax time! I feel like I already discussed this, or at least I know I mentioned Turbo Tax... but it is fun! I love the little ticker in the top left hand corner of Turbo Tax that shows your refund / payment amount going up or down as you go through all of the steps of Turbo Tax. It's like a fun little game. I think I FINALLY have all of my tax stuff - I got 3 more documents today and I think it's all I need! I am going to try to submit on Monday (which clearly indicates I'm getting a refund this year, otherwise you can guarantee I'd be waiting until April to file). My only question is that I sold some stock from our employee stock purchase plan, and I sold it immediately at the grant date. It seems like from reading our company website and from something a coworker told me that this is reported on my W-2, but the amount is also reported on my 1099-B from my financial service company. So I need to call our corporate help line to verify if it is already on my W-2 or if I need to put it in there again. It makes a pretty significant difference in my refund, so I'm REALLY hoping it's in the W-2. We'll see though - should be easy enough to find out!!

Thanks again for reading - I so enjoy writing, and it's really good for me to get all of my thoughts out in writing. I'm a MUCH more eloquent writer than speaker, and it clears my head. I'm one of those people who CANNOT STOP THINKING (which makes it hard to sleep at night!), but sometimes once I write something down, I don't have to worry and obsess over it as much. It's a good thing, and this is a wonderful outlet for it. Also, I've been really good about journaling lately too... usually I'm good about one or the other, not both. So that's really cool!

Friday, happy day

So Tuesday after work we went to Costco as mentioned... I love the Costco. We bought about 6 pounds of hamburger (I split it up into 8 baggies and froze it), 4 ribeyes, a big thing of taco seasoning, a big bag of chocolate chips, spaghetti sauce, dishwashing liquid, and paper towels. YAY! Then we went home to watch Studio 60 from the night before. Good show! We decided to not go to trivia since none of our close friends were going and we both REALLY wanted a steak. So we grilled up a steak and just hung out.

Wednesday I was SUPER crabby - not sure why, but it was not my day. So after work I didn't go swim (that was actually a poor choice, because swimming usually helps make me less crabby... but I did go for a walk which helped a lot) and just went home and hung out with Geoff. We actually had a lot of fun. We both had our computers and there was a Woot-Off going on that night (it's part of woot.com, they sell stuff quickly and they have occasional bags of Random Crap which could be anything from socks to an XBox360 for a dollar). Geoff and I have a lot of fun together when there are Woot-Offs (this was our second) so we just stayed at home and enjoyed that. It's hard to explain and yes I realize how lame that sounds, but it honestly was really fun.

Thursday I hit the gym after work and then went to PF Changs for Katie's birthday party. Yum, I had mongolian beef which was probably my favorite thing I've ever had there (never had it before). After that I went home, took the trash out (Geoff helped a lot!), and then watched Grey's with Geoff. Yesterday was the 7th anniversary of Geoff's dad's death, so he went skiing all day and then to BW3s with his mom and stepdad. I had told him that I would go skiing with him, but he wanted to be alone which was totally cool. I also told Katie that I might not be able to make her party if something came up, but he said he wanted me to go have fun. So he had dinner with his parents which was cool.

As an aside... my roommate (Trevor) was telling me about some new slippers he had that cost $50. I was like "What the heck?!" And he was like "well, I wanted some slippers because the pergo downstairs is cold, and these were the only ones I liked. I was surprised when the person told me how much they cost, but I bought them anyway because I liked them so much!" He got them out to show them to me... turns out they are Ugg slippers!! Too funny. He had no idea... and there was me, thinking only Paris Hilton and college sorority girls wore Uggs. Love it!