Sunday, December 28, 2008

our first Christmas.

in pictures...
as always if you click them they'll be a bit bigger.


Wednesday, December 24, 2008

merry Christmas!



from james and shel
(this was the card james and i designed. i could only print a limited amount so i wanted to share with everyone!)

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

since we've been home.

- we went to the andrew peterson (and friends, like bebo norman, and caedmon's call) Christmas concert.
- i played wii for the first time. we bowled.
- james got 6 strikes in a row while bowling for real. (not the wii)
- we've eaten a lot of great food.
- we've visited grandpa at the mall for coffee many mornings.
- we played cards and crap out/farkle with ua most nights. i scored over 3000 points in one roll!
- we saw a lot of Christmas lights in frankfort.
- james actually had a conversation with emma and she let him sit next to her.
- we had our Christmas with the hildebrandts. the vanderbrandt Christmas if you will.
- we froze our butts off, but not as much as the boys (luke, erik, aaron and corey) must have at the bears game last night.
- we watched some football.
- we started and finished our Christmas shopping.
- we have made a few presents each.
- we've been to grace twice and seen many old friends.
- we have relaxed.
- and most importantly...we are actually in the same country this year!

Thursday, December 18, 2008

my best friend turns 6.

happy birthday magglio!

can't believe you are six already!

and i cannot go this day without thinking of his brother copper. we still miss you buddy!

planning on making some pupcakes later. he's home with nana and papa, so i'm waiting for them to get here so i can see him. we also bought him a new bone and a stuffed turtle he can rip to shreds in 20 minutes.

james is thrilled to be home for this! (note the sarcasm)

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

catching up.

on the last few weeks. it's been crazy. so we'll just do some bullets of random happenings.

- i rode over with erica to fort bragg for her baby shower. it was a good weekend. nice to catch up with friends. i stayed with jake, paige and emmitt. i think emmitt was bummed jimmie lee wasn't there. paige and i went to a tree lighting and walked around downtown. then on the drive home erica and i stopped at jimmy john's. it was a great end to the trip! she is due next month with brayden. can't wait to meet him!


- james worked like crazy. didn't get home before 2am one night last week. we have 3 weeks of leave now so we are enjoying our time together.

- while he was working i spent some time with ben, celina and aidan. i babysat aidan one day, took their Christmas picture, the next night i met up at their house for a youth group planning meeting, and saturday the leaders met at the church at 5:30am to kidnap the kids. we only have 4 kids in the youth group. 2 are brothers so we went to their house first. woke them up at 6am by kyle playing "gloria" on his trumpet, and reading part of luke 2. next we went to kara's house. same thing, only she was waiting for us, and the first words out of her mouth were "are we having pudgie pies?" they didn't know where we were headed. the plan was to go to the hospital to see a newborn. we even bought some gifts. we set it up with the new mom, and were going to be there at 7:30am. then the nurse called and said her supervisor said it wasn't a good idea. so instead we went to a manger scene, read the rest of the passage, then on to iHop. early, but fun morning.

- i went to the eye doctor one day. was supposed to test my new contacts. complained i couldn't see out of the left one at all. he thought i had it in inside out, so i switched it, still blurry. then he realized i hadn't taken my other contact out! i felt like such a ditz! :)

- and finally, we had the 5th RTB holiday ball. no one wanted to be there since they were officially on leave as of that morning, but we still had a good dinner and were in good company. didn't get to stay for any of the actual ball part. we left after the speeches, and after james and the other guys (two of his good friends, and two others) retired the colors. he was on colorguard and i never saw him do it before, we had a few laughs at their expense. they were all shaking a lot!

- we drove up sunday, stopped in seymour and stayed the night at dav and whit's. now we are up in lafayette. adrienne flies in tonight! can't wait to see her again. spending a lot of time with family, visiting with james' and just relaxing.

happy day!

Friday, December 12, 2008

it's no fun...

decorating by yourself. so much different than last year!

Thursday, December 11, 2008

he remembered!

how did i get blessed with a husband like james?

before i begin you should know.

1. we don't have a garbage disposal.
2. i hate food left in dishes.

james has been working until 2am all week. he expects me to get out of bed and cook dinner for him then. (yea right) so i started cooking things i can easily heat up for him when he gets home.

the other night it was a hamburger helper type thing. i hadn't done this kind before so i wasn't sure if he'd like it. sure enough, he didn't, but he played it off well, and ate half the bowl.

well i woke up the next morning to find the bowl in the sink, food still in it, and filled with water.

yuck. i soon had a few choice words flying, let it sit a bit longer, and finally got the courage to drain and dump it out.

i had totally forgotten about it by the time he came home last night, but the first words when he walked in the door were..."before i forget, i am so sorry about that bowl this morning. i don't know what i was thinking. i got to work and thought "did i really just do that?"

apparently he was too tired that morning and not thinking straight.

i'm just so happy he remembered, and said something! made me smile.

Monday, December 8, 2008

lights.



james hates these old fashioned lights, but i love them. thankfully he was willing to put them up for me.

afterward, i saw our neighbor at rite aid. she said her husband saw james up on the roof and now thinks he needs to get on theirs. you should see their yard already! it has every blow up, light up, Christmas thing in it. their house has all sorts of lights, and here he wants to put up more because of our dinky little ones!

the first picture is from our first snow. if you look close you can see flurries.

the ornament is one of my favorites, my wooden shoes. because...you know...they say "if you're not dutch, you're not much."

the snowman welcomes you to our house, courtesy of cheryl.

just wanted to share our holiday joy around here.

we'll be heading to indiana in less than a week, so we have to enjoy it as much as we can now!

Sunday, December 7, 2008

homesick.

i had to apologize to ma because in all the years i went to camp, and all the times i moved away from home, i never got homesick. ever.

this weekend. i caught a bit of that disease that plagues so many campers!

ma was disappointed to hear that i wasn't homesick for their home in indiana, but our home here in georgia.

i went over to fort bragg without james. not the first weekend i've been away from him since we've been married. remember the baseball trip? but for some reason this weekend was harder. probably because i was around all of his friends, in the town he used to live in, where i used to visit him, only this time he wasn't there.

it was weird.

i had a good time seeing everyone, but man i miss him!

and it sucks when i come home and he's working all night. hopefully he'll be home before the morning comes.

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

17.

that's always been a favorite number of mine. i was born on 17mar. james and i met when i was 17. it's just a good number!

well my old roommate's old roommate, megan, tagged me. i'm supposed to share 17 things about me. so here goes...(oh and i tried to find pictures of the different things, but this is all i had on this computer.)

1. at one point in my life i had 13 piercings. 11 in my ears, 1 in my tongue and belly button. now i have none, but i do have 4 tattoos.

2. i have kept a journal since '95. i have over 13 filled, and i use them as my records. i refer to them quite often to remember what year something happened.

3. i was an athletic trainer for 3 years in high school, 7 seasons, and i sometimes miss it.

4. james and i wrote hundreds of letters to each other the 15 months he was deployed. i put them all in vellum pockets i sewed and stuck them in a scrapbook. i told my parents no one can read them until after he and i pass. :)

5. my first e-mail ever was spiritsprinkles at hotmail dot com. it was an inside joke at camp. i kept it until i went to college.

6. my best friend growing up lived in the sister house to the house in prancer. it was gorgeous and had a huge banister we used to slide down.

7. i ate a bowl of fries, a grape all sport and laffy taffy's almost everyday for lunch in high school.

8. i have a group of really good friends that i have never met. my FIFs (freaky internet friends) we were part of an august wedding message board. i first "met" them a year and half ago. we talk daily and they were there for the deployment, levi's health problems, the baby, the miscarriage and so much more. we have gotten really close and i am so thankful for them.

9. my first date ever was with james. he was 16 i was 17 and we were both volunteering at lutherhaven. we went to walmart, burger king and the parking lot of auto zone to eat our food. that's where i got my first kiss ever, after i threw up from being so nervous!

10. the 2nd time around we talked for 9 months before we met up. i was in indy and texas, he was in italy and north carolina. we got together on Christmas eve in lafayette.


11. when i move to a new city one of the first things i look up is if they have a jimmy john's.


12. i'm crazy about bird things, but i don't like real birds. i don't trust animals that can be over my head...cats fall in this category.

13. i am very ocd when it comes to certain things. a big one is numbers, like on volume controls. i have specific numbers it cannot be on.

14. i'm actually thankful for everything james and i have gone through over the last 8 1/2 years. i wouldn't change a thing. it made us closer and appreciate each other better. it also gave us the chance to grow up and be ready to be together.

15. one of my favorite vacations was a trip to myrtle beach the summer after my senior year with james' family. we went parasailing, hung out on the beach, walked along it at night, went on a skycoaster ride, cruised the strip and had a blast. the only bad part? wrecking the rental sebring. it wasn't our fault, but james was way too young to drive a rental. the airbags went off and my fear of driving was heightened. good part? he was so caring and concerned through it all. i got a glimpse of a different side of him. i'll never forget that moment.


16. i always order the same thing at fast food restaurants. each place has a meal i always get, and i never change!

17. at our wedding we rode away on the harley. i was still in my wedding dress, barefoot with no jacket. we drove to his dad's house to get my car. about 20-25 minutes outside of town. it was so cold and still it was one of my favorite rides.


i tag any of the 808 girls.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

4 months ago...


Monday, December 1, 2008

thanksgiving.

james' mom came down last tuesday. she stayed until friday so we were able to celebrate thanksgiving together.

we took her to the square for lunch, watched movies, and took a drive out to suches. we pointed out the appalachian trail to her, and she sounded just like ma..."oh i have to go walk on it!"

we walked over to adam and erica's for thanksgiving dinner. his uncle cooked for us and it was delicous! different than home, but very enjoyable.

we also got to play some euchre. i think i play more euchre when i am outside of indiana. my theory, people in indiana are tired of it until they live somewhere that noone plays. so when you do find people to play you HAVE to play! we've played a few games with ben and celina, and then more on thanksgiving.

it was so wonderful to have james and adam home. we made a toast to them since we all remember what last year was like. we're blessed they could be here.

saturday james and i went out looking for a Christmas tree. we will be on leave in two weeks, but we can enjoy the tree in the mean time! we drove around for awhile. shopped for a few Christmas tree supplies (stand, topper and stocking for james. somehow i found one that matches mine!) then stopped for lunch at jimmy john's. they just opened one a month ago. it's a bit of a drive, but closer than atlanta! i was so excited!

of course the time we stopped at the Christmas tree farm it was pouring down rain. we hopped out of the truck and i ran and found our tree. we set it up that night, after rearranging our furniture. the house smells so good now!

most of the ornaments are mine, a few are ours, and there are none of james', but he said he doesn't have any. whit said dave doesn't have much either, so maybe it's a girl thing. looking forward to getting a lot more of our own. my favorite is the ring dish from our wedding. tate carried it down the aisle with our rings, and now it's an ornament. front and center on our tree!

i've also been working on the tree skirt. i added a bunch to it yesterday. i need more ties, so i don't think it will get done this Christmas, but at least it covers the front part of the tree now!

i felt like i was living with my brothers again because i had to force james to hang just one ornament!


today i woke up and while i was getting ready for the doctor i looked outside and saw it was snowing! it isn't even that cold today, but it's been a steady snow. i screamed like a little kid "IT'S SNOWING" and magglio and i ran outside to catch snowflakes on our tongues. well, i did he just ran around. weatherman says it's supposed to last until 1am. james just started a new cycle today so i'm sure they are freezing their butts off.

oh and doctor said i have an ear infection, and tmj. oh joy! hoping the ear infection clears up quick with these drops.

happy december!

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