Friday, September 30, 2011

Cute & Witty Blog Title

I had a relatively busy week this week! I {finally} was able to pick up a shift with my part-time gig giving flu and pneumonia vaccines on Wednesday in between two work days at this hospital. Therefore, last night, after I got home from the hospital I was WIPED. I went to bed at 9:30 and, of course, woke up with a nasty headache. I was really bummed that I didn't get to enjoy a super night's sleep and feel lovely and refreshed, but the day ended well!

DATE NIGHT!
Like the crappy camera phone pic? We went to the Apple store to fix Phill's computer {thank God it ended up being a simple thing}, then to the exquisite China Harvest Buffet for a $5.99 meal. We like to keep it classy. Also, here's this:
It's not super noticeable in this pic, but my hair is getting really long! It's easier to tell from the back...and when I'm not wearing brown...

But the big news of the week...
WE'RE COMING HOME FOR CHRISTMAS!

After nagging my bosses like crazy to check if I could get the time off, they finally took a good look at it yesterday and said I was approved! YAY! So, Phill and I booked our tickets today! Yay for Chase rewards points making it much more doable! I know Phill is excited in his keep-it-to-himself sort of way, but I'm more of the wear-it-on-my-sleeve sort. December 19-26 we're Midwest bound!

I'M SO SUPER EXCITED!!!

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Today



Post-pool time! Only the 2nd time all summer (wait, it's Autumn now...) I've been in the pool!

I'm making a quilt for Margot =)


Life has been pretty much same ol, same ol around here lately. Work, church, Margot, trying to sleep, workout, Internet TV. I have been switching up my diet lately, though. At the beginning of this week I had the bright idea to do a cleanse...The Master Cleanse. Since our trip at the beginning of the month I have been eating really poorly and feeling my clothes getting a bit more snug, even though I've still been working out regularly. So, I thought a cleanse would be a great way to jump start my body into a healthier lifestyle again.

Basically I "lasted" about a day and a half before I had to quit because I felt horrible. I didn't like the drink, so I didn't drink enough of it. Therefore, I wasn't getting hardly any calories leaving me seriously wiped out.

So, what I've been doing instead is a bit of a modified raw food diet. The die hard raw food peeps don't cook anything EVER. I would say I'm planning to stick to at least 75% raw. So far it's great! I think because I have a set meal plan in order, my brain literally just isn't considering any of the other processed unhealthy foods that I often crave. I'm loving me some kale and spinach salads, and gobs of grapes. Mmmm grapes :-) Plus I really feel awesome and it's only been 2 days of this stuff. I'm excited to continue with it especially since I know I'm doing great for my body.

Happy Friday everyone!

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

For Gracie

I have a favor to ask. Our children's pastor at New Life, Randy Cuellar, has a 10 year old daughter who was diagnosed with a rare brain cancer when she was about 2 years old. Randy and his wife, Shelly, were told it was likely she would not survive. Miraculously, though, she pulled through and is alive today!

Now, the bad news. Considering how rare this particular cancer/tumor is, you can imagine their shock when they were told roughly a week ago that their 2 1/2 year old daughter, Gracie, now has the same cancer.
Gracie and Randy

Gracie has already undergone a very long, but successful, surgery where the tumor was removed. This is great news! But, of course, there is still so much more for this little girl to endure including chemotherapy, healing from surgery, pain and fear.



If you are a praying person, could you please take an extra minute or two in your prayer time and remember Grace, Randy, Shelly, and the whole Cuellar family? Randy and his family mean so much to the New Life community so it's really, really difficult to know they are going through such a scary, trying time.

Monday, September 19, 2011

Bay View in Review

I'm just now getting around to posting some photos taken with Phill's iPhone from our trip up north. Aaaaahhhhhh it was so great being up there again with nearly the entire family. Games, food (ugh still recovering), beautiful weather, aaaaaaannnd maybe a joke or two about the underwater crucifix. Oh yeah. It's a real thing. Kinda creepy.






And then there are these gems of Trey I found on mom's phone while on our trip back:

Happy Monday everyone! I surprisingly was called off work so I'll be getting the apartment ready for a little How I Met Your Mother premiere showing tonight!

Monday, September 12, 2011

A Near-Death Experience

I never would have thought that a sandwich could cause me such panic.

But it did.



Guys...a peanut butter & jelly sandwich almost killed me. For reals. Ok, it wasn't that serious, but I really did nearly require the Heimlich maneuver. At Velocity last night I volunteered to participate in the game. Turns out, the game was to eat 3 PB&Js as fast as you can. Well, I gave it a go and scarfed about half the sandwich in the first 10 seconds...then I started chewing it all. This is a s.l.o.w. process, but I was really wanting to show how awesome of a leader I am by playing along with the kids so I was like, "Oh yeah I got this" and I continued chewing and tried to swallow it all down so I could continue to finish the rest of the sandwich.

This is when the near-death ensued.

That gigantic glob of peanut buttery-jelly-bready mess CLOGGED MY THROAT.

I looked to Danny, who was running the game, and motioned that I needed some water, but he didn't seem to understand that it was emergent! I ran off the stage and headed toward the bathroom because if it took inducing vomiting to get that glob out of my throat, then that's what had to happen! Of course someone was in the bathroom (of course). Luckily, just then Dalton tossed a bottle of water to me and the gigantic glob of terribleness was able to be coughed forward from my throat into my mouth so I could breathe.

*sigh

My throat was sore the rest of the night. Weird story, right? Needless to say, I was unsuccessful at pulling off the 'I'm an awesome leader who dominates games' feat. Maybe next time.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

What A Beautiful Piece of Heartache

**In reference to the title, while this is the emotion felt from our trip and the return thereafter, you should seriously listen to Over The Rhine {specifically this album, Good Dog Bad Dog}. My absolute favorite band, even featured in our wedding.

Oh, guys. We had such an excellent time back east {how weird does that sound saying "back east" in reference to HOME?}.  From the moment we touched ground in Indiana I was giddy with excitement. I was HOME. I truly had believed that I was establishing a sense of home in Peoria, which is certainly true, but there will always be Home in Indiana. Simply thinking on it again while writing this has me reminiscing of the genuine good time spent with my incredible friends and loving family. I miss them all {you all!} already.

Wednesday was spent arriving, hugging, and smiling a lot. After family dinner and catch-up I spent some ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC time with my sisters dearest friends, Kari and Natasha. I hardly know how to put in to words how much these two ladies mean to me. They are both family....like, seriously. Both Kari and Tash mean so much to me and my entire family, including Mom, Dad, and Trey, of course.

The 3 of us fabulous friends walked the streets of Huntington to my new friend, Allie's, home where we then had more good times consuming too much ice cream and watching Harry Potter. We fell asleep on the couch and I felt as though I was back in high school staying out too late without a care. The plus being that now we are older and have evolved in our friendships and I don't get in trouble for being out all night :-)

The party on Thursday went off without a hitch. The night was complete with a surprise visit from Phill's parents and grandparents! It was SO great for them to make the inconvenient trip to be able to spend even a short amount of time with us while we were back in the Midwest. We had such a great time with family and friends over puppy chow and many drinks. Always a good time. Thank you so much to everyone who came! My heart was overflowing with love!

Friday was spent traveling up to Bay View, Michigan with the Carmien family cottage {aka, one of the best places in the world} as our destination. Our weekend was so good. Board games, food, bike rides, morning walks, a run that really woke me up in the best way, ice cream, winery trips to discover the wonderful treat that is cherry wine, lovely family time, and crisp, cool weather! I was LOVING wearing long pants and sweaters. Now that we're back in AZ I'm jealous of everyone feeling legitimate Autumn right now!

The whole Carmien family, minus Jenny & Tim. We missed you guys!
Good looking family, huh? My only regret is not taking more pictures. I will have some more iPhone photos to post later, though.

Now, we're getting back into the swing of things. I'm studying for my NRP test, job searching like a boss, and cuddling with Margot. This trip was truly a heart and soul refresher.