Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

It's been about ten gazillion years since I've done a Fill-in-the-Blank Friday - I think it's high time I resumed that little weekly tradition. As always, from the lovely Lauren...

 

1.   I am       so in love with my puppy, and her sweet little beagle ears. I LOVE her ears!!!  .

2.  I wish   that people would get along. Why can't people just love each other? I want everybody to be happy, and be friends, or at least civil... .

3.  I like       being with Mark, autumn, my family, sweet things, baking, corduroys, flats, my iPhone, traveling, vegetables, and Mary Kay Satin Hands, just to name a few things :)     .

4.  I can   do all things through Christ, who strengthens me  .

5.  I hope     my butternut squash and caramelized onion galette that I'm making for dinner turns out as wonderfully delicious as it sounds...  .

6.  I think         too much, sometimes   .

7.  I was        SO excited to find a Starbucks giftcard in the letter my mom sent the other day - my mom is awesome :)    .

 

 

And now, my to-do list for today:

-Play with Luna. 

-Do laundry while Luna naps.

-Play with Luna.

-Pack for next week's travels while Luna naps.

-Play with Luna.

-Make galette dough while Luna naps.

-Pawn Luna off on Mark when he gets home, and go run some errands.

-Play with Luna.

-Make galette for dinner.

This is pretty much what most of my days look like. That baby girl takes up lots of time.

But oh, I love her so.

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

This week's topic: Birthdays!! (Which I love!)

As always, if you want to play along, go visit Lauren at the little things we do.

1. Birthdays are:       not often enough! I love love love birthdays.

2.  My favorite birthday memory was      honestly, I think this year's. They're getting better as I get older. I got to see my family, I watched my sister play in a really awesome concert, I got a new set of china, and Elissa came to visit me after we came home from my parents' house. I'm not sure how a birthday can get much better than that :)   .

3.  A birthday tradition I (or my family) has is       well, I've sort of declared a birthday month, which is sort of vain and selfish, I guess... My mom always always bakes and decorates a cake for everybody's birthday. I've never in my life had a store-bought cake for my birthday, and I'd like to keep it that way (unless said cake was from Pastry Art Bake Shoppe. I'd take one of those.) I'm keeping with that tradition in my own family as well  .

4.  If I had to choose one birthday meal to eat for the rest of my birthdays hence forward, I would choose       Mmmm... that's a tough decision. I'm going to say one of the Surin restaurants around here - they're Thai, and AMAZING  .

5.  My birthday is on     March 23rd. I'm a spring baby :) .

6.  If I could take a birthday trip I would go       to Italy! And stay for my entire birthday month :)  .

7.  The best gift I've ever received for my birthday was       this is also tough, as I've received quite a few nice gifts. My china this last year was pretty amazing. I got a trip one year, when I was in high school. It was a school trip, but it was a pretty amazing school trip, so I still count it as a good present :) And Mark gave me a Tiffany necklace a couple years ago - that was pretty nice :)     .

 

 

And now an update on me ... this week has been crazy. I can't believe it's already Friday! My car should be fixed this morning. I miss it so. I love that little Jetta... 

Also, I was going to go to Nashville on an impromptu visit with Lissa, but since my car wasn't fixed, that plan changed. Back and forth and back and forth my week has been, it seems like.

I do get to see Kelly today - we're going to lunch somewhere before she goes home to Chattanooga.

And Mark, after he gets back from the library, is going to Griffin today to visit poor Thomas. I'll be by myself this weekend - wish I had some company :(

And then on Monday, my momma's coming to visit! I'm so excited - we will have such fun :)

And that's about it. 

Happy Friday!

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

As always, if you want to play along, check out Lauren's blog! Here we go...

1.  The last thing I do before going to sleep is       kiss Mark goodnight     .

2.  When I can't sleep I      rub my feet on the fitted sheet - for some reason, I've always done this, even when I was little, and it helps me relax. Weird, I know.  .

3.  The first thing I do when I wake up is      pee. And check blogs.   .

4.  When I'm tired I       am not a happy person. Depending on how tired I am, sometimes I'll curl up wherever I am and just fall asleep, and then not want to move.   .

5.  My dream bedroom would be     huge, with our current bedframe (I love it!), only king-size and a blue/white/brown theme. The palest of blue walls, almost white. Lots of big windows. Dark brown dressers with fun knobs. Hardwood floors with a big white rug. Two walk-in closets (so Mark can have his own) with special shelves for my shoes and a little sitting area. A reading nook with a big comfy chair against its own window. A big bathroom with a claw-foot tub and a separate shower. Oh, if only...  .

6.  If I could wake up anywhere tomorrow morning it would be       on a farmstay in Italy, in a stucco bedroom looking out over vineyards and tomato plants. Please?   .

7.  The longest sleep I've ever had was      I honestly don't remember - it was either the time I had my wisdom teeth removed, or possibly when I had a really severe case of TMJ and they prescribed me a muscle relaxer. Either way, I was sedated. I'm not a big sleeper - 7 or 8 hours a night, and I'm good to go.       .

 

8.  I sleep on my     tummy. It's going to be bad when I get pregnant - I will NEVER be able to sleep  .

9.  When I sleep, I like to wear        t-shirts, and depending on how hot or cold I am, just underwear, shorts, capris, or flannel pjs. And in the winter, I've been known to sleep in a hoodie and sweatpants. I like to be warm when I sleep  .

10.  My bedtime is usually      around 10.  When I work, it's more like 9. Mark calls me a grandma       .

 

Also, a quick update..

 

Yesterday was a fun-filled day. I had a day-long battle with soap scum. I hate cleaning the bathtub more than anything in the whole world, because for some reason, it builds up soap scum like nobody's business. I don't know if it's the natural soap I use, or if it's whatever cheap material that the tub is made of, but I was literally scraping it off with a spatula yesterday. RIDICULOUS. And it really hasn't been that long since I cleaned it the last time. So today, I think I'm going to go and buy either some vinegar or some lemons (or lemon juice) and coat the bathtub in it and let it sit for a while, and then get a toothbrush or something and scrub scrub scrub. What sucks is that in a week or two, it'll be just as bad all over again. 

 

Anybody have any really good soap-scum prevention ideas?

 

Amid my intense fight with the soap scum, I also went to Samford and met Mark for lunch. It's always a little odd going back there ... every time I go, I feel older, and it feels like some imprint of a home that I've nearly forgotten. It's a very strange feeling. But it's not uncomfortable ... I still love that campus. I forget how hilly it is though - my calves always hurt after I go visit! (Maybe I should walk around campus all the time - and then my calves would look good instead of hurting!) 

 

We finished Season 4 of 24 ... and Mark wouldn't let me start watching season 5 last night, because he said he didn't want to watch another 4 hours :) Oops ... I get a little intense sometimes. :) I can't help it though - the cliffhangers are as bad as the ones on LOST, but you aren't quite as confused about WHAT THE HECK is happening.

 

Happy Friday! It's almost the weekend! 

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

 It's time for filling in blanks again, but first, a quick update, bullet-style!

• My house is cleaner than it has been in a while. Or, tidier at least. I got in one of those MOODS yesterday, you know the kind, where you want to purge everything unnecessary from your life and make things neat and organized again. Well, I did that with our wine cart (which has become a catch all for STUFF), our downstairs storage closet, the sink under the downstairs bathroom, and my kitchen cabinet with our pretty serving platters. And I did a gazillion loads of laundry, and cleaned the bathrooms and our bedroom. And the kitchen. Go me.
• I am not ready for Mark to be gone for 11 days. 
• But I am SO EXCITED about Kelly coming to visit!!
• I got out Mark's old film SLR yesterday, and played with the manual focus mode a bit. My sister only shoots film, and I'm kind of inspired by that. Film really IS prettier, I've noticed. Once I get good, I might buy a cheap older SLR model, where you can adjust the shutter speed and stuff. (You can't on Mark's.)

• I still need to see Toy Story 3. According to Kelly's boyfriend, need is a severe understatement.

 

And now, onto the blankety-blanks! As always, if you want to play along, go visit Lauren at the little things we do !

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

 

1.  This weekend for The 4th of July I'll be        at work. and husbandless. and familyless. what a way to spend a holiday weekend...   .

2.  Fireworks are       loud. But the really pretty ones are fun. I like the Disney fireworks the best! .

3.  Nothing says summer like       strawberry lemonade, (actually, let's be honest, strawberry EVERYTHING), sundresses, tomatoes, green (everything's green in the summer! Grass, trees, leaves ... I love it!) and flip flops. I love summer.  .

4.  My favorite summer memory is        There are so many! Going to the lake with Mark's family every year... Centrifuge and World Changers trips way back when with my high school youth group... But honestly, my favorite SUMMER was the summer before Mark and I got engaged. I was living with Elissa (who was sick, but wonderful), and Mark and I got to go to New York together, and I was nannying some amazing kids... it was perfect .

5.  My favorite thing about sumer is    all the amazing food - fresh fruit and veggies, all the time - eating outside on the patio, the SUN. Oh, how I love the sun, vacationing, and the giddy, fill-your-heart-up happy feeling that just fills my chest up on warm (or even hot) sunny days  .

6.  Summer in a word is       bliss  .

7.  If I could choose to have summer or winter year round I'd pick        SUMMER!! I do not like winter. At all. I love spring, I love summer, and I love fall in a different, sort of nostalgic way ... but winter makes me grumpy. I don't do cold very well. I'd rather have 80-90 degree weather than 30-40 any day of the week.    .

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

It's Friday again! And this week - FOOD blanks!!

As always, if you want to play along, go see Lauren at the little things we do!

1.  If I could choose my last meal it would be        a toss up between lamb chops with mashed garlicky cheesy potatoes and veggies, and some sort of Asian-y ahi tuna salad with wasabi vinegarette  .

2.  My favorite person to share a meal with is       Mark, because I love him and he is so, so easy to please (he likes food, period.) and Elissa, because she appreciates food the same way as I do .

3.  The best meal I've ever had was       ...That is such a difficult question. There was a meal in Charleston that I had, involving the best tomato soup EVER, and some sort of salmon-y something, and I remember thinking "This might be the best thing I've ever put in my mouth." Also coming to mind is every time I've ever eaten ahi tuna. It's my favorite.  .

4.  The one food that makes me feel instantly better when I'm having a bad day is       a Baby Bite. From Pastry Art Bake Shoppe. They're these little mini-cupcakes turned upside down and drowned in buttercream. Oh. My. God. They're so good. And they make pretty much anything better  .

5.  My absolute specialty in the kitchen is     hmmm. Also a good question. I make a mean Strawberry Buttercream Icing. Pretty much any kind of icing. And cakey-type-thing. I like to bake. Oh, but I know - my absolute specialty is this AMAZING recipe for Thumbprint cookies. I don't make them very often, because I will literally eat all of them. But they're pretty amazing   .

6.  The city that has the best food is       Charleston. Or Savannah. Either one.    and my favorite restaurant there is        I honestly don't remember any!! There was this one seafood place we went to in Charleston that was PHENOMENAL... but I don't remember the names of ANY of the restaurants we ate at :( But Nashville also has some pretty rockin' food, and my favorite place there might be The Perch, which is this fantastic crepe place. SO YUM. 

7.  My favorite healthy snack is      fruit, namely oranges, strawberries, and the occasional nectarine      .

8.  In my opinion the nationality which has the best food is       a tie between Thai food and Italian food. How can I pick??     .

9.  If I could learn to cook anything in the world (and be really good at it!) I'd choose      something really impressive, like souffle. Although, I might die quickly if I cooked that very often, so maybe something healthier ... like curry dishes, especially of the Thai variety. I've still not quite mastered the art of curry (how much? what kind? paired with what? with a base of what?), but it is fast becoming one of those foods I love to eat, so being able to cook it and make it taste wonderful would be nice.       .

10.  The most outrageous dessert I've ever had was       I don't know about outrageous, but one of the most sinful and delightful desserts I've ever eaten (and made!) is amaretto pie. It is rich, and cold, and lovely. And the homemade crust with the crushed-up almonds, I die. Yummmm.       .

 I love food. Can't you tell?

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

It's fill-in-the-blank Friday time again ... to play along, go over and visit Lauren at the little things we do!

1.  The best thing about being in school was/is       choir. It was the first time I really ever felt like I was a part of something. (Think Glee ... that was my life in high school.) And this will sound nerdy, but I also just really loved learning. The best part of college was everything :)  .

2.  The worst thing about being in school was/is       being picked on/bullied. I was less than popular in middle school and high school, and it wasn't until college that I really came into my own. Until then, I was made fun of a lot... .

3.  My favorite subject in school was/is         in high school, it was American Studies, which was a combo class of U.S. History and American Lit. combined. I also really liked anatomy .

4.  One subject I wish I could have mastered/would like to master is       I wish I could have learned Spainish ... it would have helped so much with what I do now .

5.  I could never get tired of studying      Human physiology and pathophysiology. I told you, I'm a nerd .

6.  The most memorable teacher I had was       There are a lot. I liked my teachers better than my classmates in most cases. In high school, the most influential were my choir director, Mrs. Hamilton, and the teachers of that American Studies class, Mrs. Ireland and Major Dean. In nursing school, it was Mrs. Money, who always believed in my potential as a NICU nurse and encouraged me to puruse that specialty when no one else did  .

7.  If I could choose between going to school for the rest of my life or working for the rest of my life, I'd choose       Honestly, that is a really tough question. If I could go to school and have it the same as my 4 years in undergrad, then I'd probably go to school forever. (As long as I had a money tree growing in my front yard or something, to fund all my fun and expensive endeavors...) But I do love to work. I think I would miss my babies if I quit... But my perfect picture of life (that hopefully will be attainable someday) is to be a Mommy most of the time, and work prn a few days a month. That is the ideal :)     .

Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!

I don't know why I'm up so stinkin' early. I woke up, on my own, at 5:45 this morning ... and didn't wake up to a pretty sight - my kitty's butt was in my face! Thanks a lot, Mrs. Norris.

Also annoying: I got 2 phone calls and 2 texts from either a prank caller/texter or possibly a drunk girl trying to reach her (not)boyfriend - very suggestive, bordering on vulgar... and nobody said anything when I picked up the phone the first time. All this happened after midnight. AFTER I had been asleep for over an hour. I sent him/her a not-nice text back this morning, saying basically DO NOT CALL OR TEXT THIS NUMBER AGAIN. Hopefully that will take care of it. And, the mean part in me sort of wanted to wake them up before 6 like they woke me up in the middle of the night. Just to show them. ... Anyway, that's my prank call story for today. (I hope the story ends there, at least...)

Moving on ... Fill-in-the-Blank Friday!! It's been forever since I've done one of these things! Great theme this week ... if you want to play, just hop on over to The Little Things We Do and play along!

1. My dream vacation would be a 2-3 week-long trip to Italy and the Mediterranean area - Greece, Sicily, etc. Or ... I could probably just spend 3 weeks in Italy alone... I've always wanted to go to Europe, and just haven't ever made it there. It makes top five on the Things I Want to Do Before I Die list. And I want to go with my best friend, since Mark isn't too particularly keen on Italy. He can come along if he wants to. .

2. The best trip I've ever taken was either our cruise a few weeks ago, or my American Studies trip in 11th grade. The cruise definitely has high points - it was GORGEOUS, the food was amazing, I got to snorkel for the first time, etc etc etc... But the American studies trip was pretty awesome too. We took a (fast-paced) tour of the Northeast - starting in D.C., we went to NYC, Boston, Rhode Island, Gettysburg... and I think that's all. It was an amazing trip with some of my really good friends, and it was the first time I'd ever been that far North .

3. The most important items to take on a road trip are an iPod, food, and a pillow .

4. The next trip I'm looking forward to is hopefully my next trip to Nashville to visit Elissa! I always have such a great time there - I just don't know exactly when we'll be going. I'm also trying to talk Mark into a short trip somewhere this fall. He protests, saying we can't afford it ... but hopefully our census at work will pick up some, I'll work extra, and we'll be able to go somewhere :) .

5. If I had to pick one CD to listen to for a long road trip it would be Oh man, just one?? I like my iPod playlists ... and my entire collection of songs, really, on long trips. But if I had to just pick one, that I wouldn't get tired of ... Coldplay's Viva la Vida, the Avett Brothers' I and Love and You, or a Jack Johnson CD. Or Glen Hansard. .

6. The biggest disaster I've ever encountered while traveling was when we went to Edisto Island with my family when Kelly and I were younger. The whole trip was a disaster. First of all, I was about 14 and extremely moody. I was NOT excited about being there. Then Kelly broke her arm bicycling with a girl we met there - she rolled down a hill in straight into a tree. Only Kelly could manage this. So I was bored all day while they took her to the ER. Then my dad tried to take us to this battleship. (I STILL hate battleships.) It was closed, or we couldn't go on it for some reason, or SOMETHING, and Daddy wasn't happy about that. Then they cancelled some tour we were going to take. Then we got stuck in Wendy's for several hours with no power during a major storm - I think a small hurricane was coming through. Basically ... the entire trip was awful. NOT a good vacation. Oh, and then a few weeks after we got back, our house got sprayed by a skunk. The week after I started high school. And I had to go to school, smelling like a skunk, and move into a hotel while our house was fumigated. That was not my best summer, to be honest... .

7. My favorite traveling memory is ...as usual, I have several. Mark and I went to visit Andy in New York City while he was interning up there the summer before our senior year. That whole trip is happy memories, but one stands out - we were eating brunch at St. Bart's Cafe, and I was drinking a mimosa and eating scones, and I think it was the first time I realized that I was an adult. I felt grown up, independent, and mature. And so, so, blissfully happy. (Until I got home, and found out that I overdrafted. Not so mature. Not so happy.) And then when my mom and sister and I went to Hilton Head and Savannah, I remember taking a trolley tour of Savannah, where you could get out, walk around, make pictures, and then get back on the next trolley that came along. It was just an extremely fun day with my extremely fun favorite girls, and I have some really excellent pictures from that day. And THEN, possibly my all-time-favorite traveling memory was on our honeymoon to Disney World. I had made reservations at the restaurant at the Contemporary Resort - to this day, the most expensive place I've ever eaten. There's a balcony off the restaurant, and after dinner, we went out with our glasses of free champagne because it was our honeymoon and watched the Magic Kingdom Fireworks show from the best seat in the house. Watching those fireworks with my brand new husband and our whole lives ahead of us was so, so amazing, and such ... I don't know, it was very moving. Sadly, I don't have any pictures because I forgot my camera, but I don't think I need any to remember that. .