Random thoughts

After a good long talk with an old friend last night, I silently thanked God for my ability to be able to use my creativity to reach out & touch people. Thank you.

The recipe exchange is under way!! send them on over! I am excited to start creating in the kitchen & trying new recipes. Cooking is another form of art for me.

This morning while walking to work I started laughing out loud at myself. I caught a glimpse of myself in a shiny dark wall, walking to work while reading a book AND munching on an apple. What a bookworm I am!!! When people around me turned to look, I smiled at them. A crazy bookworm. As I sit here blogging, I'm still munching on my apple and smiling at the memory of catching myself in the bookworm act.

I'm going out to lunch with Jenni today. We are going to Manny's!! Can't wait for the steak salad. I'm so predictable.

A new blog header is in the works. After the votes came in, it looks like people like to see a fresh design. I've been itching to change it, and my creative palate is ready for a new design....so stay tuned! I'm in a very spirited mood today, so I'm sure there will be more posting later. This inspired me today. Beautiful hummingbird.

I told you it would be random!

Some good news...

Oops I forgot some GOOD news to share! Our friends Joe & Steph got engaged last weekend so now they are beginning to plan their wedding & are getting ready to join the married club...congrats you two!!! I also just found out that a really good friend of mine is moving back to Minnesota from Chicago in June. Tess is coming back!! This is amazing :) We went to college together & I love her dearly. Welcome home Tess!!! (picture of us from our wedding).

Under the weather...

I came home yesterday with a really sore throat & a headache. Great!! Just what I need. Mr. Man picked me up a little care package consisting of; one jug of orange juice; two different packs of sudafed; a bottle of vitamin c vitamins, some throat candies & a milkshake. It was awesome. Today I'm feeling better, but not well enough to sit out in the rain at his softball games!! Nope, I'm curled up in our bed, reading a good book & blogging. Soon I'll be watching grey's & american idol. I can't wait to take a hot shower and go to bed early. I'm old =)

Dishin' with Damsels

I created a recipe exchange blog, Dishin' with Damsels where people can share recipes they love. I got the idea from my friend Whitney & I thought it was awesome! Feel free to join in. All you need to do is e-mail me your recipes and I will post them. That way people can visit one common site and find great recipes that work-instead of making the same recipes over & over! I put a link to the blog on the left sidebar if you want to visit later =)

So many words.

I just returned from an hour & a half trip to the Minneapolis public library. oops. I was just going to go "check it out" qucikly-yep, all 4 floors of it. As I stood outside of the big glass building, I knew I was in trouble. I don't even know where the time went but I wandered the isles, running my fingers along the edges of the books & stopping here or there to linger at a title or page through one. It was pure happiness! I ended up checking out 4 books, none of which I went searching for. And now I'll sit through my afternoon in a dream like state and plan my next visit.....oh for, tomorrow! So many words inside one building, and so little time to appreciate them all.

yessss!

My husband is so sweet!!!! he got me a subscription to American Photo, an awesome photography magazine. I've been wanting one for awhile and I never told him about it so I was completely surprised-how he comes up with these ideas I do not know, but he is so thoughtful and in tune to me. I was super excited and wanted to share...off to read my first issue before bed :)
If you are reading this, thanks babe!!!

The Book Thief.

Best book I've ever read, hands down. I'm not sure how else to start this post. It was fantastic. I stumbled across an online book review, and knew I had to find this book. I've read my fair share of disturbing plot lines & horrific stories. I was a psych major for my first year & a half of college, and even then it stayed my minor- so I'm used to a fair degree. I found myself gripping this book and turning page after page, barely gasping for air to finish this heart-wrenching, gut churning story. I'll give a little synopsis without any spoilers (you can find the same info on the back of the book-but in much, much better writing :) A little girl named Liesel & her brother are being given to a foster family by her own mother-she can't afford to keep them. On the way to Himmel Street her brother dies. The book thief is born. She steals her very first book that night, as he is buried in a hole of dirt next to the train station. Her life on Himmel Street is torturous at first. She's haunted by her mother leaving & her brother dying. The war is going on & Hitler is in full force. She finds comfort in her quiet but loving foster father, while her foster mother loathes them both. Eventually a Jew travels to live with them, hiding in their basement. The relationship they develop is undescribable. It is such a touching & heartwarming story, although a time of severe hardships and losses. The book theif eventually realizes that words are so powerful-they can change a person, a life, a world. Words are so precious to her because she cannot read. Once she learns, she becomes obsessed with them. The book is written from Death's point of view, as if Death were a character. At the end of the book, I was crying so hard I could barely see. I find myself wanting to visit Germany & find 33 Himmel street. You'll have to read the rest of the book to see what happens. Markus is an exceptional writer. The way the book is written is brillant. I highly recommend it if you enjoy that time period in history (Nazi Germany, concentration camps, the Jewish struggle, war, etc.)I'm afraid to read another book after this one-for fear of disappointment. This marks my third book on our list so I am slowly making my way! Speaking of said list, yesterday we went on a crazy cleaning spree and I tackled round one of cleaning out our closet. I HATE doing this. Not only do I hate dealing with laundry & organizing clothing, I am really bad at getting rid of things. I tend to convince myself that I will someday wear every item in my closet. Even if it's been sitting there for years, I hate it, & it doesn't fit me. So yesterday I went through everything ::sigh:: and got rid of a huge garbage bag full of stuff (think those large heavy duty black garbage bags) yay! Afterwards it felt great. We are donating everything to the Lupus Foundation because they so conveniently placed a bag on our front porch & asked for it to be filled. Sometimes God is sooooo humorous :) But it was perfect. So I filled the bag yesterday & tonight Jay is going to go through the rest of his stuff and add to it. It's nice because they will take any household items as well, so I am going to try and go through that stuff in time to send it off with the clothing. That means I get to tackle our hutch next....which is completely packed with crap. We don't have much storage, and instead of getting rid of more "things" ...we stuffed them into the house. I can't wait to cleanse our house of unneccesary crap. Ok, sorry about the boring post! sometimes life is just boring like that =)

April showers bring May flowers :)

What a great day for a caribou run, reading, blogging, editing & updating websites! (thanks to everyone who has voted on our poll!) I love rainy Sundays...it allows me to get so much done. I also have a bunch of cleaning to get done, but time for the fun stuff first =) My wedding went fantastic last night and I got some great pictures. I'll get some sneak peeks up on my photog. blog shortly. Listening to the rain on the roof makes me sleepy and really want a nap...hmmm....zzzzz. Crap my washer is beeping, gotta switch the loads. I'll be back later for a better re-cap of our weekend...until then, enjoy the rain!

Bad genes.

So I was looking through some summer pictures this afternoon, getting excited for everything we have planned this year & I came across this picture. Someone please look at me & feel sorry for me. The girl can't tan. It's like finding a cow with stripes. I would like to note that this picture was taken right after we returned from our honeymoon in MEXICO. As in like 5 days later. Oh and did I mention this was taken after a day on the boat? in the sun? So sad. I'm the fair skinned, blonde haired irish girl that burns and gets tan for a day before it goes back to beautiful white. ughhh. Everyone else in my family tans fantasticly it's so not fair. So tell me this-is it because I don't spend time in the sun often enough? because my sister can be outside for 3.7 minutes and she looks like a bronze goddess, and anyone who knows my Mom knows that she is always tan. I spend a lot of time on the weekends outdoors and eventually I will get a little sun-kissed, but mostly it's made up of freckles. I don't get it, but I think I got the bad pick of the gene pool!!!! Oh and I miss my long blonde hair!
ON a better note, my husband is smokin! yep, he's alllll mine. As you can see, he get's brown. I like to blame that on the fact that he is outside every single day coaching for work, and not because his skin is jealous-worthy. (OK so I'm green with envy). I will try to get tan this summer, mark my words.

Let the creative juices flow...

I've been in a right-brain-creative updating phase the past couple of days! First-notice the poll I added to the left sidebar. Please give us your opinion! (it's anonymous) I couldn't sleep last night, so many creative ideas swirling around my head. We've updated our mini "biographies" on the sidebar & I also worked on my photography website-it definetly needed some updating. So check those out! I just felt that we needed some changes for the upcoming season....summer!! I have another wedding coming up this weekend so I'm pretty excited about that. I forgot to share that I found a GREAT assistant named Whitney-SO relieved about that. She's a nice person and reliable=perfect. We are teaming up this summer and shooting weddings together so that will be fun. Jay's headed out of town tomorrow for a softball tournament in wisconsin, so we are having a big date night tonight! I'm working half of the day and then taking off early. Can't wait to start the weekend :)

Happy Earth Day!

Earth day is a perfect opportunity to take a moment and reflect on what you are doing to help the environment-no matter how large or how small! Every little bit helps. We started by recycling when we bought a home & moved in together. Now we are trying our best to be "green" in other aspects of our life-by turning off lights and electronics when not in use (this includes items that are plugged in but not turned on), switching to energy-saving lightbulbs, and re-using plastic bags for groceries or using cloth instead. We've also been shopping at Trader Joe's-an organic grocery store, and we love it! It's fresh, healthy, natural & has good prices. If you have one near your house, check it out! Have a great day everyone and be kind to the earth :)

The Lovely Bones

I just finished another book called The Lovely Bones. I came across it at a friends house and borrowed it without knowing much about it. It's set in 1973, where a young girl named Susie is raped and killed by her neighbor, a serial killer of young women. She watches her family from heaven as they grieve for her, and get so close to solving her murder when it's right in front of them. It's really a sad book, and I didn't like it that much-at parts it's hazy and you can't tell who's point of view they are speaking from. I hesitate to say the plot was unbelievable, because I loved Harry Potter and Twilight-which are not believable at all. This leads me to believe the writing was not the best. It didn't convince me, didn't draw me in to want more. I am easily mesmorized by excellent writing, but this just didn't do it for me. It actually took me awhile to finish the book, I put it down for a few months and then decided I needed to finish. Parts of it were really interesting but overall it was slow. They are making a film adaptation of the book coming out in Decemeber, so maybe that will be better-or at least the story will be more clear. It was entertaining but I think I would only give it 2.5 stars out of 5.

Here we are!

Geez we need a breather! This spring has been so good to us. This past weekend Jay's mom came into town and we had a blast with her. We went out for a yummy dinner at Granite City on Friday night, and then spent the night talking and catching up at home. On Saturday I had my first wedding of the season, and it went really really well. If you want to take a peek at some of the pictures, I posted some sneak peeks for the bride on my photography blog (see the left hand sidebar under Abbey's Photography). It was better than I could have expected! I have another coming up this weekend-busy busy but loving it! It's so nice to have the opportunity to do what I love in my free time, but to also make the extra money to fund what we love to do best: travel! It really opens the door and the opportunities to be able to accomplish things we would never have without it. Another reason we are truly blessed :) Anyways, Jay's brother & his girlfriend came over on Saturday and they grilled out and enjoyed the nice weather. Jay's mom had brought us down some birdfeeders (which happened to be on our 101 list!) so they set three of them up on the porch. We love them, as silly as it sounds! Jay checks every morning to see if he can catch a bird eating out of them. The rest of the weekend went by fast-Sunday we spent the rainy day running errands together. We wandered around a bookstore and picked out some new books and then we got some lunch together. I spent the afternoon reading and Jay watched the game next to me. Yay Twins!!

So we sat down and decided to begin the 101 in 1001 challenge. We thought it was such a cool idea, because usually we make a list of our goals but it's usually open-ended or the goals are too vague. "Lose weight" or "Be healthier," "work out more" etc. We worked hard to make the goals specific, measurable, & reachable although challenging. When we complete an item, we'll try to blog a little something about it and the experience to share with you. I think that's it for now!

Our fun little idea...101 in 1001.

Jay & I have decided to create a 101 in 1001 list. We were inspired by day zero to start this project. It's basically a list of 101 things that you would like to accomplish in 1001 days (approximately 2.75 years) Below are the rules. We hope you will find interest, humor, & inspiration as you watch us on our journey through 1001 days, and many new experiences!

We'll keep you updated by blogging about our experiences here at our main blog. We are excited not only to grow as a couple-but also as individuals, creatively, intellectually, socially and financially.

The Mission: Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.
The Criteria: Tasks must be specific (no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (represent some amount of work on your part).

Finished items will be grey.
In-progress items will be blue.

We compiled our list and started on April 18th, 2009. Our last day to complete the list is January 15th, 2012. Ready, set, go!

To see the complete list & details, click the link on the left sidebar of our blog under "101 in 1001" titled "The List" ....happy blogging!

Summertime is finally here....

That old ball park, man, is back in gear! I heard that Kenney Chesney song on my Pandora playlist before lunch & it got me in the mood for summer. It sure feels like it-my Dad & I just enjoyed a beautiful lunch on Nicollet Mall outside. It's 67 degrees :) We went to Masa & had some fresh mexican. I love working downtown when the weather is nice. I am looking forward to the thursday farmers market. Ok, back to reality & back to work!

Easter Bunny was good to us ;)

Here are a few pictures from our Easter weekend! Yes, my Mom is awesome and even though we are married she knows we are still kids at heart, and she makes us Easter baskets!! Thanks Mom!
Some of our magnificent eggs. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of our homemade chocolate creme eggs (think cadbury creme eggs) because they got eaten so fast :)

A beautiful Easter Lily.

Here are a few pictures of us practicing Al's hair for prom. (Yes, I'm the lucky hair stylist AND makeup artist!) This is also a good picture of the hair piece I made for her.

She has SO much hair that I didn't know what to do with all of it. She decided she wanted a hair style similar to what I wore at our wedding.

The back, the curls are already falling out. Her hair is so heavy that curls never hold, so this will be quite a challenge for me! It doesn't matter though-either way she is going to be so beautiful!!

Ok so this week has completely caught me by surprise, with it already being Thursday! Saturday is my first wedding of the season, so tonight I am meeting with my assistant to go over details, the schedule, etc. I'm equally nervous and excited! Well, probably a little more excited :) Then tomorrow Jay's Mom is coming into town to celebrate her birthday/Easter, so that will be fun to catch up with her. I need to get a ton of things accomplished tonight, and I hope I can get everything done. The weather is so nice that all I want to do is be outside and play!! Hopefully I'll get a few minutes for that tonight...but lets be serious, I will be running around like a chicken with my head cut off! Jay and I have also started a fun little idea that I will post in the next couple of days-he's such a fun person and I'm so glad he is open to anything! More to come on that later!

More to come!

These past couple of days have been so busy I haven't even had a chance to put up pictures from Easter yet!! We have so many updates too! Tonight I have some down time while I wait for Jay to get done with baseball so I will have more time to blog....until then, have a great afternoon! Don't forget to send in your taxes! ;)

Mission Accomplished.

A good time was had by all! Saturday after all our baking and crafting we made (a different kind) of enchiladas and had a mexican fiesta with margaritas and everything. Man did that create some laughter :) Sometimes I wonder where my craziness comes from and then I hang out with my family and remember!! We are loud and crazy and quirky. Jay has long gotten over the shell-shock of being part of it, and he fits perfectly into place. How lucky I am to have him love every part of me and my family too.

Easter Sunday we woke up and went to Church and had a fabulous lunch with the whole family. It was another beautiful day, too bad the boys were all glued inside to watch the Master's on t.v....I literally thought it would never end! But we did sneak in some games and even a ruthless competition of Monopoly. Jay and I were sooo tired after driving home that we stopped at McDonald's for dinner and grabbed a movie, eating and watching the movie in bed. It was a lazy Sunday night and we were in bed by 9! Those are the best kind though.

Today I am working until around 3:30 and then heading to the Mall of America to get some dinner and go shopping with my Mom & Al....I am really looking forward to it. Jay's got baseball tonight so we'll meet at home later for Dancing with the Stars and relaxation :)

R & R

It was so nice to have some time off from work yesterday...the weather was amazing! Jay did some grilling, and I relaxed for the whole afternoon :) It was heavenly. I finally got outside and went for a run and got some fresh air. Jay had a game in the early evening, so he left and I had a few hours to myself. I packed and got ready for the weekend! We ended up driving down to Bunny's after his game because it was going to be too late to drive to Anoka for dinner with Jay's family. So we are post-poning a dinner for a few weeks and hopefully joining together to celebrate the birthdays of Vonn and myself. I just went for another long run outside in the sunshine, and now everyone is resting before all the fun begins tonight! We have a lot of family traditions tied into the holidays so we always a lot to look forward to. Tonight we'll be dying the eggs, and making the yummy chocolate candies-my great Grandmother's recipe :)

Easter Break

Yay for an early weekend! It will be a much-needed break from work. I'm looking forward to a little break. Tonight I am making homemade chicken enchiladas from scratch and enjoying some time in the kitchen again! Baseball games have started for the highschool so Jay's not getting home as late as he was during the tryout period (yay!!) so we will have a full night together. After dinner, it's back to the gym! Sooo excited for tomorrow-and all the things planned we have for Bunny's as well. We are dying Easter eggs, making homemade chocolate eggs, and cooking a lot. I can't wait for a weekend full of family fun. It starts tonight!! :)

Ready, set, Go!

The race is back on to get in shape for summer :) Again I feel as if my legs are going to fall off due to soreness from our workouts! It's such a bittersweet feeling...I love it and I hate it at the same time. We are on workout number 4 tonight and that means the next couple sessions are packed with squats, burpies, mountain climbers, and uphill sprints. Doesn't sound fun but it sure feels great leaving the gym! I'm trying to throw some bike rides in the mix too so I can get out and enjoy the fresh air. It's SO nice to be able to be outside and enjoy the semi-decent weather. I am praying for no more snow!

Tonight we have plans to get to the gym and then get a movie (ok, so I just made up the movie part up a second ago, but Jay's pretty persuadable so I'm going to try my luck! :) We have plans to make dinner at home tonight which is good because not only does it save money it is much healthier!

Easter

Last night while thinking about our Easter plans, I came across one of my favorite Bible verses from the book of John...and it inspired our new header for the Easter week :) "I am the vine and you are the branches"-He is our roots, and His hope is that our lives are an extension of His, branching out from our Maker and reaching our full poential, by living in his perfect image. It is only through him that we can do this. He inspires me daily to be a better person, through His word and through His blessings He's given me.

Speaking of Easter, last night my wonderful husband came home with the most beautiful Easter Tulips for me! What a nice surprise, and a reminder of Spring...we are excited to celebrate Easter, one of my favorite holidays of the year. What a peaceful, comforting and joyful holiday! Thanks babe for the thoughtful gift!

Sunshine

I'm so happy the sun is shining today! One of the things that I love about Minnesota is that even when it's cold, the sun is still shining. I don't think I could go too long without a sunny day. It seems like this week is supposed to be pretty nice so I'm excited for some decent weather. Last night's Twins game was fun even though we lost--which was a bummer because the Mariners aren't usually that great. But it was still fun to be there for the final opener at the Dome and the atmosphere was electric! The dome was packed. The Twins sure have a huge fan base! We took my sister and her boyfriend so it was really fun to talk and catch up with them.

Jay got me tickets to see Eric Hutchinson for my birthday and I am SO pumped! I'm so glad he's coming back. I've emailed him several different times to come back, and to come back to the Varsity so it's a smaller show. He e-mailed me back personally thanking me for coming to his show, and to let me know he was coming back, AND to the Varsity! So I am really excited for that, he is such a cool guy....the show isn't until early May, and he wanted to surprise me with the tickets, but I kept talking about the show and he was afraid I would buy them (I was so close!)..so he let the secret out early :) He's such a good husband! This is a picture of Eric from his website.
We don't have much planned this week besides hitting the gym...it feels so good to get back into our routine, and it's a huge motivation to have him get me there. I feel so much better after a good workout together. Jay has this Friday off and I'm hoping I do as well so we can relax and get to Church on Good Friday. Friday night we are heading to Jay's Dads house for dinner so it will be really fun to catch up since we have not seen them in a long time. I have to continually remind him to call and make plans otherwise time goes by without seeing them (why can't boys plan anything without a little help?! :) Saturday morning we are heading down to Bunny's for Easter so that will be super fun! Although we don't have much planned during the week, I'm sure it will fly by and the weekend will be here before we know it.

Old memories

We had a great weekend and Monday came too soon, like usual! I was actually surprised by Adventureland, it was a lot better than I thought it would be and we actually really enjoyed it! The rest of the weekend was really low key and nice-Jay and I sat in bed most of Saturday and read (yes we are nerds!!) and then we finally got up and ready just in time to go enjoy a dinner out together. Sometimes it's just so nice to do nothing together! Sunday we had some lunch with friends and relaxed at home for the afternoon. We went to my Mom's house for dinner and watched the CMA's before heading to the gym. I started feeling sick over the weekend, but I really think the gym helped! I felt refreshed and rejuvenated after working out. We started back on our Making The Cut Program! I'm really excited because I really enjoy these workouts and they always kick my butt into shape. Tonight will probably just be a training (running) session because we are headed to the Dome for the Twins FINAL home opener there! So excited :)

Anyways, one of Jay's college roomates and his girl friend came up for the weekend and we also spent some time with them..it was good to see them again! They brought up our camera that Jay left with them months ago...so I happily discovered the pictures on it all over again last night...and here are some that I wanted to share (even though months late!) These are from the private show at the Varsity Theatre we went to in December. O.A.R was the main performer, but Ryan Starr, Matt White, Missy Higgins, and my fav Eric Hutchinson also played. It was one of the best concerts I've ever been too. It didn't hurt that we got to meet many of them, and were in the front row right at the stage :) Those are my favorite kinds of concerts-the small, private crowds that make for an intimate concert! A lot of the artists played acoustically and that was awesome too. These pictures put me in a good mood just looking at them. Don't you love memories that do that to you?
Eric

O.A.R.

Matt White

Missy

Me & Eric =)

O.A.R. jammin!

Mixed emotions

I am excited it is Friday but also a little bummed because that means Justin's spring break is over ;( We had such a great week together! Tonight I'm going to see Adventureland and get some dinner with Jenni. It will be nice to have a relaxing night! I have a feeling it could quite possibly end with Twilight ;)

We talked/planned more of our trip to Portland this past week. We are really looking forward to our Anniversary trip. Expecially me-because the last vacation I had was our Honeymoon! (an this winter has been soooo long and cold!) I know people usually vacation in the winter here, but I am actually looking forward to going in June so we can enjoy the nice weather all week. We have gotten a lot of suggestions of wineries to visit in the Willamette Valley and it looks sooo beautiful. Only a two more months to go...I can hardly wait for a week of NOTHING to do in the beautiful forests/coasts of Oregon with Jay!

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

YUM!

I just got back from lunch and had the most delicious steak salad at Manny's...I highly recommend it if anyone is visiting there! They have such great food. It was fun to share a moment with Jay at lunch before getting back to work. He doesn't get downtown very often unless we are going to a Twins game, so it was fun to have him here. I wished that I could have gone home with him! Tonight he has practice and a parents meeting so I have the night to myself....:) I don't even know what I'm going to do with myself because this week has been CRAZY and we have been so busy, so it will be nice to have nothing to do for the night!

Dinner date!

Last night Jay and I spent the night going out to eat with my Mom....and when I say spent the night I mean we spent hours of the night talking with her! She had just returned from Phoenix, Arizona so it was great catching up with her over dinner. Before we knew it, it was 9:30 pm! We were too tired to work out afterwards so we just came home and went to bed.

The night before we got a free redbox coupon rental so we rented a movie and had a date night at home. We got some mexican food and enjoyed the night together. It's been nice that he's on spring break because he is always home when I get home (he has practice during the day now) and I love it! Today he is coming downtown and we are going to have lunch together at Manny's steakhouse....yum! I am so excited.