temple weekend

it really was a lovely weekend. despite my wrong turns and hasty lane changes, i do believe this was one of the most enjoyable temple trips i've been on in a while. it was nice to not be in a hurry, or have a wedding to focus on (not that i don't love a good wedding) but its nice just to be there for me. to focus on my life and take the time to learn new things or just remember what i already knew! i drove down with my cousin, and had such great conversations we didn't even listen to music. maybe thats not really a big thing, except for me, i'm always listening to something, no matter where i'm going or who i'm with. it was kind of nice to just have the wheels and wind be our soundtrack instead of jack johnson. (don't worry tho, we pulled some out on the way home!) we must have talked about everything: trucks, dogs, work, our houses, sunday rituals, in-laws, traditions, moving, food, losing weight, favorite bands, memories, goals, horses, our wards and callings, our sisters, the word of wisdom, the temple, clothes, cars, u-turns, our moms...haha, oh, our moms! that topic was a little more prevalent on the ride home after a weekend with both of them!

so my cousin is a little obsessed with taking pictures, so nevermind the fact that we were sweating through our church clothes at this point, and my toes were killing me thanks to my heels, or that my other cousin was dead sick in the car waiting for us to come back (sorry cass!) - there were pictures to be taken!

i had decided this was the last one - how fast can i make a get-away in these heels?! in that case, why on earth am i still wearing them?

taking our time on the way home, we stopped in Micanopy, which is a little north of ocala. it was such a cute little town that had been turned into an antique stop and tourist attraction - this was the town that they filmed Doc Hollywood in, with michael j fox. took me like 10 minutes before i remembered what movie that was! anyways, we had some lunch and then hit the shops!

this was an old mansion that is now an inn...too bad i forgot the name.

so i almost got kicked out of this store by an ancient woman by taking this picture. apparently i am not allowed to take pictures of attractive displays for my personal enjoyment.

too bad sucka. egg beaters rock.

this was the hospital in doc hollywood - and now its full of really dusty junk.

right outside the cafe where we had lunch (and later ice cream), this guy was flaunting his latest catch. turns out it wasn't real, but carved from wood!

chels told me i had to document how gross the car had gotten with all our food, trash, buys, and who knows what else was back there. but hey, what else do you expect out of me on a road trip?

just for emily, really

I realized I should probably put the rest of the pictures i took of the floor on here so you can really see what it looks like emily! enjoy!

living room:

master bedroom:

the "kids" room - i really need to find another name for it since we DON'T have kids here anymore!

the green room:

and i just realized i've forgotten to take one of the dining room! drats.

a well deserved makeover

as most of you know, we moved into kyre's sister's house (formally their grandparents) and have taken over some long awaited house projects to get it ready to sell in a year or so. most of the projects are simple - you know painting, replacing outlets and faceplates, painting, landscaping, painting, fixing doors, hanging doors, painting doors...oh and painting! But the biggest job we had to do was refinish the floors. the house really is amazing - it's so spacious and is great for entertaining, and the floors are the original ones from when it was build in the 50's! they were rather sad looking though. after my brother in law put their brand new floors in the house they're building, i was so sad to have to come home to our blackened and uneven planks. but "have no fear," as my dad often says, their day has come!

this gives you the best before and after visual - this was a closet we kind of forgot while sanding the dining room:

the kitchen - before, when these guys were seriously struggling:

the kitchen - wait, WHAT?! is this even the same room?

i wish i could take more credit for the actual elbow grease (and armpit sweat) put into these floors, but alas, i cannot. the most i contributed was some serious vacuuming and the delivering of beverages to kyre and evan. but hydration is important, so i feel i did my part. it took a lot more than just one day, that's for sure, but thanks to the hospitality of some kind friends and their crazy dog, and my parents, we're ready to move back in tomorrow!

thank goodness. being homeless sucks.

catching up

I'm almost as bad at blogging as i am journal writing these days. sad, but true. I finally downloaded the rest of the pics of my camera, so lets just review, shall we?

Kyre and I took a lovely 16 hour driving trip one weekend to spend some quality time with a long time friend and his wife and baby (who we had yet to meet!) Nelly and I talked more than i had expected - her english is awesome and my portuguese sucked. well worth the drive i must say.

A while ago (last june, in fact), kyre and i went to savannah, ga for our anniversary and took the paula deen tour. one stop was at the Byrd Cookie Company, where they have like every flavor of cookie you can imagine. even jalapeno cheddar. not like that would be my first pick for a treat, but hey, to each his own. my mom went back closer to christmas and we all received a little box of cookies from there! i finally opened mine, which was Peach something or other. and my gosh, they were amazing. if i weren't completely skint, i would buy every single person i know a box.

after a long day of driving and engagement pictures with my home girl, some serious snackage and seafood was in order. too bad i can't even remember the name of this place, but it was awesome. on the beach, quick and amazing service - our server got smashed by the fridge door, was bleeding, and still got our drinks refilled before they emptied. and the nachos weren't too shabby either.

i decided to try my hand at raw shirmp, ew. i don't know why, but sometimes raw fish (and meat in general) grosses me out to the point of taking my appetite.

i made it through though, no worries.

so for my parent's anniversary last month, i made them a shrimp dinner. my dad took pity on me and even helped me shell and devein them! good ole rog.

how bout another round?

I can't believe I finally did it - we finally did it! We finally graduated, hooray! It was great fun to have a little cheering section of our family as we walked across the stage, where there were numerous hand sanitizing stations available for our use - thanks swine flu. But you know I used that mess!

You know we kept the party rockin - everyone came to our place to hang, equipped with barbeque, watermelon, horseshoes, jammin tunes, and great conversations. The only people who didn't make it were my aunt and uncle, who somehow got misplaced in Myers Park and got frustrated trying to get here, so they went home early. We missed them, but I do understand - getting lost happens to the best of us.

The best thing about being married is getting to have a whole other set of family traditions to take part in. Ok, maybe that's not the BEST thing, but it is fun! So among the many new traditions I've come to love, there's a couple I find quite humorous (now keep in mind some if not all of these have stories to them, but to be honest i just don't remember them): Siddack (still haven't tasted that one yet!), singing songs outside with little candles on Christmas Eve, tin foil presents, cans of peanuts on your birthday, The Birthday Lady (and I WILL find that tape because I do believe a certain someone missed out on that part of initiation, ahem, sarah.), fried cookies (which we made on Sunday and were so delish I must make them again!)and of course the famous game of hot and cold for birthday gifts.

So Kyre and I have adapted hot and cold for just about any gift we want, so I should have figured this was coming, right? Silly me.

Needless to say, this beast is amazing.