Meet Trooper!

Meet Trooper, the newest addition to the family! He joined us several weeks ago. He is a mini australian shepherd and is around 14 weeks old. He likes to play with his many toys, hide his rawhide chews, can sit and down and is a fuzzy, furry ball of fun! He gets to go to work with Nick everyday and probably has the best life a dog could ask for. (And yes, Nick needs to clean out his truck).

Growing up and being rational

Growing up is nothing like I imagined it to be when I was a kid. When you are young, you look at adults and think they are so old, so put together, have everything figured out. Then you yourself grow up and you continually wonder when you are going to be a "grown up." You start to make steps toward it- you get a job, you buy a house, you become self sufficient, get married, get a dog. Is the sum of all these things the meaning of being a grown up? Responsibility? Or maybe you experience things, you travel, go through break-ups, friends move away, you lose your job-and all these things make you wiser-experience? Both responsibility and experience?

Whatever it is that creates a "grown" up, I still don't feel "older." My dad tells me that you never do feel older, you just keep adding another digit to your age each year. I have just been thinking about this a lot lately as I begin to ponder more permanent and more life altering decisions.

While we are on the topic of pondering-why is it that ideas always seem really great at night, but in the morning you wake up and you are either panicked at the idea or you decide it was a bad idea? Are people inherently more rational in the morning than they are at night? Or is it that a new day brings caution and by the end of the day, caution goes away? Also, are morning people more rational and night people more reckless or creative? So many questions.

Fall Leaves

The east side of Portland seems to get more wind than the west side. The upside? We have 3 absolutely stunning maple trees with lots of leaves-when the wind blows during the fall, the leaves tend to fall off the trees all at the same time which means less time spent cleaning up leaves. That is, of course, assuming I was going to clean them up...currently, they are all over the lawn and since Nick and I plan to take out the lawn, do a whole bunch of landscaping including the installation of sprinklers, etc and then re-planting the lawn, I am not all that motivated to save the current grass from suffocation under the blanket of leaves. Other than the sheet of leaves looking spectacularly bad, I am really not that worried about it. Besides, when you landscape, things always look really bad before they look good. Take, for example, the hole we have created where Nick's shop will be. Currently, it is, well, a little boy's paradise (a mini construction site for tonka trucks) and maybe a man's paradise, too-mud wrestling, anyone? By next year, it will be a beautiful shop where Nick will be able to do projects and as an added bonus, my garage will be...that's right-Mine.


I completely forgot to wish Nick a happy birthday on here. 27 years ago, Nick entered the world in a blaze of glory-taaadaaaa! His mom and dad were stoked...and then he started doing things...Joni (Nick's mom) eloquently says he was a "busy" kid. Among my favorite Nick stories as told by Joni:

• Running into the house "mom, i'm thirsty, can I have a cup of water?" Joni grabs a cup, Nick leaves, comes back..."mom, I'm still really thirsty..." she refills said cup of water, Nick leaves, comes back...."mom, we started a fire and can't put it out!"
• Pulling a glass coffee table onto himself (as a toddler) and going to the ER :-(
  
• Having his pediatrician tell Joni that if she could keep him alive through 18, she was an amazing mother
• Learning to pick the lock on his older brothers bedroom door and taking apart all his technique lego sets
• Pushing the baby gate from the top of the stairs, riding it down and giggling at the bottom "I ok!" also as a toddler
• Competing in a backhoe competition at age (10? 13?) for skill (including picking up an egg with a spoon attatched to the bucket) and almost winning first!
• Running naked through the same hotel he and I got married at when he was a toddler
• His dedication to everything he does including coming back from 2 knee injuries to play football (the first freshman year and the second junior year).

I have to say-I am married to one amazing, hillarious, fun loving and talented individual. I don't know how I lucked out...but I sure did!

Happy Halloween everyone!

September already?

Yep, thats Nick, with his weldor inside the pipe, welding away- and who ever said management can't actually do the work...

Crazy view of the Lake in McCall

It feels like this year has blown by at some sort of incredibly fast rate! September 16th, already!

Things have been busy so here is just a quick, how-do-you-do, yes I still know my blog exists, entry:

• Poor Nick has been back out of town for, well, since May of this year. He was in Toledo working on a pipe project which was with his Dad. They even got to room together at the sweet Comfort Inn in Newport, lucky them! After leaving the Toledo project in August, Nick got to go back to Ontario (Oregon). There are, of course, goods and bads to Nick being in Ontario. The bad? Well, Nick is gone. The good? It makes it easier for me to fly out to Boise and drive up to McCall!
• Which brings me to BUSY! After hosting Amanda's bachelorette with Jessica, I had one weekend off (however, Nick didn't come home until Saturday and left Sunday) and then the following weekend was Amanda's wedding (as mentioned in the prior post). The following weekend (Labor Day), I flew out to Boise and we headed up to McCall for a weekend of Tennis, walks, studying (for the CPA exam) and general R&R.
• This past weekend, Nick headed back to McCall (alone) and I headed to Eugene to see my parents, meet up with a classmate from School Year Abroad Spain (Junior year in high school) and my Grandpas somethingith birthday party. I also met up with Kate, a classmate from Sheldon that I haven't seen since Junior year in high school! It was great to catch up with her, with Ben from SYA and great to see my family.
• That brings us to Nick. Poor Nick has not been home in 3 weeks. Sad. And when he does get to come home, he has to drive back from Ontario (400 miles) on Friday and then turn around and drive back on Sunday (the same 400 miles). And a BORING 400 miles at that. I'm not sure about you guys, but have you ever driven I-84 across the state of Oregon? You dont get flatter or more boring than that drive. The guy must really love me to want to drive that all the way back just to see me for a day and a half!

So-other than a ton of additional stuff happening these days that I just cant remember at the moment, that is what we have been up to.

This is hail in McCall-they have some of the coolest weather up there-snow like you wouldn't believe, hail, thunderstorms, rain...I truly love it up there!

My Best Friends Wedding

I always thought it would be entertaining to do a post called my best friends wedding (haha). Well, over the weekend, specifically, August 28, 2009 - my best friend (since I was 2) got married to an amazing guy (Josh). I would like to add that it was my wonderful husband's idea over  years ago to introduce them (what a matchmaker). 

The wedding was held at Roche Harbor, San Juan Island, Washington. Ali (also a bridesmaid), Russell (the pseudo babysitter) and Tanner (the ring bearer) drove 6 hours up on Wednesday night after a disastrous run in with the spray tan machine (orange fingers and toes anyone) and a near complete meltdown of Russell as he recounted a friends episode where Ross spray tanned his front 3 times and his back 0.  Off we drove and finally made it to Whidby Island, WA where Amanda graciously lent us her garage room attachment thingy. Tanner experienced his first night in a sleeping-bag (Ali, seriously, this kid has got to get out more!) I almost forgot the best part-none of us eat fast food, like ever. We were STARVING and the cooler with the sandwiches was burried in the trunk-"lets go to Carls JR" some bright individual said in the car. Russell got sick (sorta) and the rest of us felt like garbage. 

We awoke the next morning and headed to the ferry landing where we met up with Jess and Neil, Scott and Heidi and, unbeknownst to us, pretty much everyone else in the wedding party. We took the ferry over (1 hour of pure beauty) and then settled in at Roche Harbor Resort (beautiful, historic, amazing). Rehearsal dinner, rehearsal, drinks, bed. 

We spent Friday morning primping, makeup, hair, mimosas, food, repeat. The wedding was AMAZING and fun was had by all! 

Memorable moments:

• Carls JR disaster
• Spray tanning (were our fingers supposed to be orange?)
• Tanner in a sleeping bag
• Tanner waking in the middle of the night ("mom, i'm really scared!" "Tanner! Grab your pillow and get in bed!"
• Tanner not being able to fall asleep "mom, I feel weird" "weird sick, or just weird" "I dunno, just weird, whats that on the ceiling, mom, turn on the lights"
• Russell breaking the blow up bed he was sleeping on "kenzie, does this thing have a built in pillow?"
• Russell talking about Sarah, nonstop
• Amanda and Josh looking amazing! And so sweet with eachother
• Quality time with the girls
• Kenzie stumbles into the room late at night and Russ, Ali and Tanner are in the room "Ali, Russ doesnt have any blankets and is still dressed" "He's drunk, just stop talking to him and he will go back to sleep"
• Jessica waking up the whole old hotel because she left her room key in the room for her middle of the night bathroom trip and then pounding on the door for hours while Neil was passed out. 
• The first dance song stopping and the whole group clapping a beat for Amanda and Josh
• Losing our voices singing Michael Jackson's Smooth Criminal (how many times does he say Annie are you okay?)
• Discovering Ceu, a brazilian singer. 

OK, pictures!

Vern, Patty, Scott, Heidi - Such cool parents!!

The harbor, so beautiful

The sweet couple

The girls, rehearsal, Ali, Mckenzie, Jessica, Kindra

We got aviators (Josh is a Navy pilot) and I wanted to be cool

At the bridal table, Ali, Me, Kindra

Cocktail hour, Ali, Russ, Kenzie 

The whole gang. Sharp looking group if I must say so myself!

The girls again!

Hia! How's it going up there?!

On the ferry, Ali, Tanner, Me, Russ

Heat Wave

We are in the middle of a heat wave. It was 106 yesterday (although my car registered 107) and it is supposed to be even warmer today. Not that I want to get a rise out of anyone or make political statements-but...isnt it kind of strange that we have had the hottest summer on record and the coldest winter with piles of snow in the NW? Im just saying. Maybe there is something to this whole climate change thing. Maybe I will look back at this post 20 years from now (when climate change is a total reality) and remember when it was a debate about whether it existed.

That aside, it is HOT and we dont even live in the desert! The car gets to 145 degrees while sitting in the sun. Now I know why I dont live in hot climates and love the snow so much. You can not only play in the snow, you can bundle up and avoid the chill. With this, there is no avoidance beyond staying inside...and how fun is that?!? Not very.

Aaah, now this is more like it! Which picture is more welcoming...hahaha

Makeup and weekend

I wish that I would have know about Make up forever ("HD makeup") when I got married. This stuff is amazing. I hate liquid foundations or makeup in general for that matter-but this stuff makes you look so flawless, especially in photographs-it is incredible. It was designed for actors when HD came out since HD was so unforgiving. I have to say, I love this stuff and I dont ever have good things to say about makeup.

Over the past weekend, Monique turned 30 and rented a party bus, which was actually a school bus that takes you around to different bars in the Portland area (it is called bar fly). It was a fun night out with some of my favorite girls. There are quite a few pictures up on facebook. Here is one of a few of the girls:

Jen, Monique and I