Mexico, baby!

Ahhhh Mexico, how I miss you.

Our recent getaway to Puerto Morelos was absolutely perfect.

Perfect in every single way.

I never thought I'd say this, but it was just as

fabulous as our honeymoon in Jamaica.

I don't even know how to describe how beautiful

our resort was. Maybe a good description

would be heaven on earth...

Oh, how I miss the sun in my face and the sand between my toes.

But probably the thing I miss the most is waking up

to the sound of the ocean as the cool breeze filled our room.

The time we had together, just the two of us, was wonderful.

It was such a refreshing trip for our relationship and marriage.

I just wish I had taken more pictures.

Guess I was too busy having fun!

We will be returning soon.

Josh just doesn't know it yet. :)

It is Official

I
am
addicted
to



Josh & I literally spent our whole evening
watching the first season together.

It
is
so
good.

I think I uttered the words,
"Please! Just one more episode,"
about a hundred times.
No lie.

Where have we been all this time!?
Do you watch LOST?

Night on the Town

For a while I thought dating was a thing of the past, and really it kind of was for the first six months we lived here. Josh and I didn't go on a single date for six whole months! But things have changed; we are dating again, and it sure feels good. Since January we have been on 3 dates {one of those was an overnight date!}, and there is no stopping us now. Date nights are now a luxury, and when we do get to go out together we definitely cherish the time we have together...just the two of us.

A couple weeks ago, my parents came in town for one reason. Well, they actually came for two reasons. Noah is always a reason grandparents come visit. But the main reason they came was so Josh and I could go on a date. An overnight date. 24 hours of dating! Doesn't get better than that, right?

Before we left, we went to Kincaid's with my parents for lunch so we could catch up a little bit. We really enjoyed that time with my parents.

And then we were on our way! Bye-bye sweet Noah. Have fun with Granddad & Mimi!

Downtown Dallas is not a place we often visit, so we thought it would be fun to stay there for the evening. We booked a room at the Magnolia hotel, and loved it! It was a very elegant hotel with a historic feel to it. I think it is one of the older hotels in downtown.

The entry way where the elevators were located. Beautiful.



Our room. It was nice and cozy.

After we dropped our stuff off in our room and settled in, we decided to get out and have some fun! Our first stop was the Bodies Exhibition. Josh wanted to go to the John F. Kennedy museum, so I had to bat my eyelashes and work a little magic on Josh to persuade him to go to Bodies. Of course he couldn't resist my charm, so he gave in. So we decided to walk because it was so beautiful outside, and the exhibit was only only about 10 blocks away. We had a lot of fun walking along the streets of Dallas. Downtown Dallas is completely different than even Downtown Fort Worth. We finally arrived, and I was so so excited. What can I say, I am a nurse. The human body is so amazing!

The Bodies Exhibition was amazing. AMAZING! The depth of knowledge that exists in that building is unreal. The exhibit consists of 20 human cadavers and 260 body parts that have undergone a process called plastination.

The Exhibition allows people to learn about their own bodies and, ultimately, teaches them how to take better care of their health and make positive lifestyle choices. The Exhibition enables them to see and understand the medical conditions friends and family members face in a whole new way – by highlighting pressing health concerns, including obesity, breast cancer, colon cancer, cirrhosis of the liver, ectopic pregnancy, arthritis, osteoporosis and bone fractures. The Exhibition also highlights damage done to organs due to the perils of smoking and dietary excesses. -- Bodies Webpage

We definitely left with a better understanding of the human body; it was very informative. But I think what we gained from it the most is how truly intricate and detailed the human body is. We were left in awe at what an intricate Designer and Creator our awesome God is. If you haven't been to the Bodies Exhibit I encourage you to go! You will not be disappointed.

After we left the Bodies Exhibit, we decided to walk back to the hotel to take advantage of the free happy hour! We thought we would rest our feet, get a Coke, and talk about what we wanted to do next. So we started our 10 block journey back to the hotel. As we were walking we came across the original Spaghetti Warehouse! I had to take a picture. That place is one of our favorites!

Almost immediately after I took the above picture and we started walking again, we were stopped by a street vendor with an armful of roses. He was feisty; there was no stopping this guy. He says to Josh, "Look at this beautiful lady you are with," as he sticks a rose in my hand. "Don't you want your beautiful lady to have some roses?" As soon as Josh starts to say no thanks and tries to take the rose from me to give back to street vendor {apparently I had a death grip on the thing, and Josh said I was smiling like there's no tomorrow}, the guy says, "Give her a kiss! Come on boy. Give your woman a kiss!" At this point, Josh is still trying to get out of it, and he isn't giving me a kiss. Ha. You should have seen the guy. He starts going off on a tangent telling him what a lucky guy he is to have such a beautiful woman... blah, blah, blah, blah, blah... and that he better lay one on me. Josh then realizes he has lost the battle and leans over and plants one on me as the guy says to him, "Just give me whatever you want as a donation for the flowers."

Josh gets his wallet out, and the guy leans in and says, "That'll be $10, sir." And me, well I was just standing there happy as a june bug with my 3 red roses. Did I mention they were beautiful? Anyway, so Josh {unhappily} forks over $10, and we were on our way.

Yeah, we got ripped off. Oh well. It is a funny story to laugh about now.

Our cozy little area where we enjoyed our free Cokes. Isn't it beautiful!? It was just so nice to sit and put our feet up for a bit.

After we relaxed in the hotel for a while, we decided to go to the Butcher Shop Steakhouse for dinner. We had never heard of it before, but we thought we'd give it a try. Apparently you can cook your own steak there, but we decided to let them cook it for us. Anyway, to make a long story short, it was wonderful! We would definitely go back.

We debated whether or not to go to Simply Fondue for dinner, but we decided we would just go for dessert. And oh my, it was yummy! Another place you must try if you are in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

I'm not sure if it was a sugar rush or what, but my crazy husband was cracking me up. At one point he was going all wild with the skewers, he stabbed himself in the hand with it. Haha.

Our amazing dessert. We ordered Reeses Pieces Chocolate fondue to dip our desserts in. The plate was covered in all sorts of wonderful things to dip in our chocolate fondue: strawberries, marshmallows, bananas, brownies, cherries, and rise krispy treats. Yeah, amazing! I think we gained probably 10 pounds from everything we ate that night.

After we stuffed our faces in chocolate, we decided to go see a movie: Alice in Wonderland 3D. We weren't sure if we would like it or not {Johnny Depp is a little kooky}, but we really did enjoy it. We were diggin' our 3D glasses too.

After the movie, we went back to the hotel, put our pj's on, and watched some t.v. and then we were out! We had a busy day.

The next morning we woke up, got dressed, and decided to head over to the J.F.K. Museum. We didn't have much time before we had to get back, so we only got through about half of the museum. So sad. But the parts we did get through were very interesting. We will definitely have to go back through it again.

We had the best time together. It was so nice to spend some quality time alone where we could talk and just enjoy one another. And we did pretty good and only talked about Noah, oh maybe, 20 times total. Ha. We sure did miss the little guy, and we were so happy to see him when we came back.

So far, we are averaging one date a month. Not too bad.

Thank you so much Dad & Mom for taking the time to come down to watch Noah for us. We appreciate it so much!

December Catch Up & the New Year!

We are back home, and it feels so good! We have been to Amarillo {for a funeral}, Oklahoma, and back to Amarillo over the past three weeks. Whew! Talk about a lot of traveling, but it was well worth it since we were able to spend Christmas with both of our families. However, it's nice to be home after a bunch of traveling. I hope your Christmas was as wonderful as ours!

I have a little bit of catching up to do for the month of December. I don't know about you, but the month of December flew by! I knew it would. Right up until our trip to Oklahoma, I had all of our Christmas gifts {unwrapped} under our tree. Usually wrapping gifts is something I love doing, and most of the time I have the gifts wrapped & placed under the tree weeks before Christmas arrives, but not this year. I was a little behind {or lazy; I'm not sure which}. There were also a few December events I didn't get around to blogging about, so better late then never. Here they are:

We had a birthday this month. Josh turned 26 on December 11th! Shame on me for not blogging about it. The weekend of his birthday was also the weekend of the big Christmas drama at our church, so we didn't get a chance to go out and celebrate. And we still haven't been out to celebrate, but will one of these days, right honey?

Speaking of Josh, I have some really exciting news to share, and I want to take a minute to brag on him. In October, Josh took the BEI Master interpreter certification test. The BEI Master is the highest certification for ASL interpreters in the state of Texas. Well, last week we found out that Josh passed the test! I couldn't be prouder of him.

Yesterday was a pretty exciting day {despite the fact we had a 6 hour drive home}! Josh & I celebrated 3 years of marriage. Can you believe it? I can't! What a wonderful three years it's been. Here are a few pictures of the evening I married my best friend:



Ahhh! Sweet memories. Oh how I would love to go back to size 6! New years resolution, perhaps?

Guess what?! While we were in Amarillo Noah got his first haircut {more detail & pics on that later}, and oh boy he looks stinkin' cute! Here is a little teaser. You'll see his new do soon!



The count down begins! 2010 is quickly approaching, and I am really excited about the new year. I've been thinking the past couple of days of some things I would like to accomplish this year. Here goes:

1. Completely give up Dr. Pepper. And yes, I am serious. If you know me, you know giving up Dr. Pepper is no easy task, because I love it! So tonight when the clock strikes 12:00, I say goodbye for good.

2. Potty train little Noah. Well at least start the process of potty training. When do little boys usually potty train anyway?

3. Control my spending on Etsy {haha I already know I'll break this one}.

4. Take a few photography classes to expand my knowledge of photography & my fabulous new camera.

5. Work on my relationship with Josh. We have a wonderful marriage, but things obviously change when kids come into the picture. This year I would like to go on more dates together, and spend more one on one time with each other. I'll admit it right now, since we've lived in Fort Worth, we haven't been on one date.

6. Spend more time meditating on God's word on a daily basis.

What are your New Year's Resolutions? Have you thought about what you would like to accomplish this year?

Before I go, I would like to wish my grandmother, Gigi, a happy birthday!! Hope you have had a wonderful day! We love you, Gigi.

20 minutes until the new year rings in! Happy New Year Everyone!! I pray God's blessings on each one of you this year.

Christmas In Oklahoma Continued

I'm back with part two of our Christmas in Oklahoma. If you didn't see the last post click here.

I will never again take as many pictures as I did this past trip. Ok, that's probably a lie. The problem I have is that I want to post all of the pictures, but if I did you would probably go cross eyed from looking at all of them and I would end up with carpel tunnel from all of the uploading and editing. So... I have to pick and choose, and it's so hard! Anyway, here are my favorites of our last day in Oklahoma.

Wednesday morning we celebrated Christmas with my family. But before we opened any presents, we went to Ihop together to eat some breakfast, and it was sooo good.

Every year before we open presents we search for the hidden pickle ornament on the Christmas tree. My mom started this tradition of searching for the pickle a few years ago; it's so much fun. Whoever finds the pickle first gets an extra little gift. Well this year Abby found the pickle {lucky duck} and got a gift card to Target. Didn't you find it first last year?



Noah opening up his very first stocking. Boy, he's cute.



I love this picture of Noah & my mom. So sweet.



Everyone showing off their gifts.




Noah's favorite gifts were his books & miniature toy cars.




Samson & Delilah eating their gifts.



Isn't my new camera bag fabulous?! I love it! It is a handmade camera bag my parents got off of Etsy. Now I have a safe place to store my camera and lenses. Yay!



Wednesday evening we went over to my Nana's house and had Christmas with all my extended family. We had a wonderful evening full of wonderful food, gifts, and fellowship.

My Aunt Sherri and cousin Madison are amazing. They made all of the desserts you see below. Every. single. one. And they were delicious!!



Noah got a camo teepee for Christmas from his great grandparents, Nana & Roger. He wasn't real sure of it that evening, but I have a feeling this little teepee will be one of his favorite things to play with over the next couple of years.




Madison playing a Christmas tune on her flute for us.



Leave it to Josh & Matt to throw my little baby like a basketball. Noah was loving every minute of it.



Noah's first grab box experience. Oh, I should probably explain to you what a grab box actually is. It is basically a big box full of wrapped gifts with strings attached to each of them. On each side of the box is a name with several strings taped to the box. Each person, either oldest to youngest or vice-versa, takes turns pulling a string to open up a gift picked out by Nana. We all love the grab box, and look forward to it every Christmas we are with Nana. Thank you Nana for all of the hard work you put into the grab box to make it so very special for all of us. What a blessing to watch Noah experience the grab box this year for the very first time. I know he will grow to love it just like the rest of us.




Whew! We got though Christmas in Oklahoma. Hope you enjoyed all the pictures. We are leaving for Amarillo tomorrow to celebrate Christmas with Josh's side of the family, so I'll be back with more next week. But don't worry, I'll have a post or two in the mean time.

Have a wonderful night!

Hitting the Road to Oklahoma

Yep, tomorrow after church we are headed to Oklahoma to celebrate Christmas with my side of the family. We are really excited to see everyone and spend some good quality time together.

But I ask myself? Why, oh why do I wait until the last minute to do laundry & pack? It is 1:28 am and I am still waiting on the laundry to dry so I can pack. Oh well. Someday I'll learn.

Really, I do have a few things I could get done while I wait, so I should probably get off the computer and get busy.

Here are a few pictures taken today from my new camera. Oh, I love it! I just can't stop taking pictures!





And one of my really weird husband. Haha.



Goodnight.