Holiday Picture

Thank you so much to Faith for taking our family Christmas pictures this year, they look so great!

 

 

Merry (late) Christmas!!!

Despite being away from my family for the first Christmas ever, I still had a pretty good one!

The Friday before Christmas, Chelsea picked up Hubby and me and took us down to their dad's house. From there, we went on to Debbie's family's house for some Secret Santa, lots of food and lots of laughs.

My Santa got me a new computer chair to go with the desk my mom got for me, so now I don't have to use my dining room chair anymore to sit at my desk! Woohoo!

On Christmas Eve, at 11:00pm, Chris and I met Jeanette, April, Chelsea and Kalen in Pauls Valley and we attended a midnight church service.

Now, I'm not religious, but I still went, and though Chris and Jeanette loved the service, I don't think I'll be going next year. It was beautiful, but I didn't feel like I fit in because I don't believe in the same things as everyone else.

I'm glad I went and experienced it though.

At the end of the service there was a candle lighting and it was beautiful.

As we walked in, everyone was given a candle, and at the end, the ushers walked down the aisle with candles and lit the candle of whomever was seated on the edge of each row, then we would light one another's candles with our own. The lights went out, and the whole room was light by the candles.

Christmas morning, Chris and I had our very first Christmas together EVER!

Usually in the past, we had to celebrate either over video calls, pictures and videos. This year, we got to be there with one another, and while I did (and do) miss my family, it was nice to be able to celebrate with Chris for once.

I ended up with a new iPod, a new point-and-shoot camera, some eyeshadows, a ton of candy, a Wii console (thanks to Momma Ma), some pretty drinking glasses (again, thanks to Momma Ma) and a good chunk of money.

Not too bad huh?

After presents, Chris and I trekked on down to Jeanette's house for some delicious food and more family time. There, we played dirty Santa, and I got a pretty picture frame and a candle/candle holder, while Chris snagged a $25 gift card for an AMC movie theater.

At around 5/6, Chris and I took Anna and Gabe to Chris' dad's house for the night.

This morning, we all got up and waited for the rest of the Figs to show.

Once everyone arrived, we had a super yummy breakfast with an omelet roll, Debbie's delicious breakfast casserole, some pigs in a blanket, other pig in a blanket type stuff with bacon, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some.

More presents included a lot of candy, a pretty little ring and a chunk of cash.

Chris and I said our goodbyes, stopped back by Jeanette's to deliver one final present and pick up some leftovers from yesterday, then we were back on our way.

Silly as we are, we decided to stop by the mall to spend some Christmas money.

Guitar Center wasn't too bad, but the prices were more than MusiciansFriend.com, and the Apple store didn't have any cases I liked to protect my spiffy new iPod.

So off to GameStop we went, where we found 3 new Wii games!

Then to BestBuy we traveled, where we found me an incredible new case for my iPod that looks comparable to the famous OtterBox! In blue!!

Finally, we ventured to WalMart for a Wiimote, nunchuck, some new earphones, clearanced candy canes, and some sponges.

When we finally got home to the disastrous mess of a living room, what did we do, but play Mario Party 8!

It's still the holiday season...the cleaning can wait another day or two.

Until then...off to bed I must go, for I have training at the Riverwind casino tomorrow for my job at Newcastle.

Goodnight!

Wedding Wednesday

"We come here to remember..."

Last Sunday, Chris took me to the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial, and it was a very upsetting experience.

 For those of you who are unaware of the events surrounding the bombing, I'll give a little bit of a background.

On April 19th, 1995, 168 lives were lost, including 19 children under the age of 6, and even more lives were changed forever.

At 9:02am, a Ryder rental truck that had been parked in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Downtown Oklahoma City was rigged to explode. The bomb went off, killing many of the employees, visitors, and children in the on-site daycare, all due to two men that were upset with the Government.  

A third of the building was completely destroyed and the rest of the building was left unstable and dangerous for the bombing survivors. Prior to the September 11 attack, this bombing was the most deadly terrorist attack, with the most property damage, on American soil. Today, it remains the most deadly act of domestic terrorism in United States history.

In order to enter the memorial, you must pass through the gates of time. One is stamped with 9:01, which represents the moment before the bomb went off...the moment of Oklahoma City's innocence.  Across from the first gate, is an identical one with 9:03 stamped on it, which stands for the minute just after the attack, when hundreds of lives were changed forever as well as the hope that came from the horror in the time after the bombing.

Between the two gates is the reflecting pool, which occupies the street that the Ryder truck was parked on. It is a shallow pool of gently flowing water to provide a quiet area for peaceful thoughts and to soothe wounds.

Beside the gates and the reflecting pool is the field of empty chairs. Each chair rests atop a glass base represents a life lost in the bombing, with smaller chairs for the 19 children killed and a name etched on each one.

The chairs are arranged in 9 rows for each floor of the building. Each chair is placed on the field according to where they were in the building at the time of the bombing.

By day, the glass beneath the chairs allows the chairs to look like they are floating, and by night, lights glow beneath the chairs as beacons of hope.

For the holidays, each chair was decorated with wreaths and ribbons. The field looked like a graveyard, and though it was a beautiful sight with the 168 chairs light up and decorated, it was also very sad to look at. It seemed like a graveyard on the field, and it was incredibly upsetting to look at all the lights for the lives lost, and to think of how many more lives were forever changed in the worst of ways.

As Chris and I went through the memorial, I realized how easy it would be for someone to do something like this again. If someone decided to destroy another federal building, or even a mall or apartment complex, unless they were acting strange and nervous, how would we know? How could we stop them from repeating this terrible act?

Who is to say that we are truly safe anywhere?

I know that we can't live in fear, but it's a terrifying thought that our lives, and the lives of our loved ones are partially in the hands of those terrorists and murderers. If they were to snap and finally go though with another bombing or other act of violence, our lives and out loved ones lives could essentially be over.

There are school shootings, mall shootings, and acts of violence like this all the time unfortunately, and it's incredibly scary to me.

Again, I know we can't live in fear, but it's a very scary thought to have in the back of my mind.

Wedding Wednesday

Christmas is fast aproaching!

Christmas is almost 2 weeks away!
I feel like there is still so much I have to do, but there really isn't. I just have a few stocking stuffers to buy for Chris, plus one more gift for him, get my Christmas cards sent out, and buy a $25 gift for the gift exchange at Mom-in-law's.

Unfortunately, my little point and shoot camera decided to crap out after a year, so I don't have any good quality pictures to share...just some from my cell phone (which doesn't take the best quality photos)

This year, Chris and I bought a real tree for our Christmas tree. I can't remember ever having a real tree, so this was a treat for me! We also made some ornaments with the in-laws at Mom-in-law's house. This year we made little cupcakes, and they're too cute! Sparkley and cute.
I've been in a crafty mood lately, so I also made a wreath to hang up on the front door. Instead of a traditional wreath though, I made a snowflake! It used up like 50 popsicle sticks, a bunch of glitter, white paint, and glue.
It took a LOT longer than I planned, made more of a mess, and my back was killing me from hunching over it.

It's also kinda crooked, but it's still cute I think.
I also picked up Chris and my stockings that Jeanette made for us. Chris' is police themed, and mine is blue with little silver stars. We had picked up some stocking hangers from Bed Bath & Beyond a week or so ago since we don't have a chimney to hang out stockings over, and we set them up at the little window hole thingy leading in to the kitchen.
Clever huh?
It would have been cuter if they had "Mr." and "Mrs." but this is cute too, don't you agree?

Ooh! I also got a new computer desk for my birthday thanks to my Momma Ma. It took forever to put together, and again, my back was killing me by the time it was over, but I really like it. I've wanted an "L" shaped desk for a while, and now I have one!
My iMac is too wide to fit in the little cubby hold though, so it sits just in front. haha, good thing it's thin!
Now all I need is a computer chair, which I'm hoping to get at Dad-in-law & Debbie's Christmas this year at her family's house.

The apartment is coming along...we just need to get some pictures printed and keep it clean, and it'll be a good little home.

Well...I guess that's all for now.
Just sharing my excitement for the upcoming holidays!
Ta-ta for now!

Wedding...Thursday?

Wedding Wednesday!

Long Awaited Honeymoon Blog

I have other things I want to blog about, but I can put that off for another post.

I've put off this one for too long now.

So...the big honeymoon!

On Saturday (way back at the beginning of October) Chris and I drove down to Galveston, Texas. Our ship didn't sail until Sunday, so we had to kill some time once we finished our 8 hour drive from Norman.

We first found the car lot where we were going to leave the car. It had barbed wire and razor wire, so I wasn't too worried about anyone hopping the fence to get in, and there were quite a few cars parked there. I also believe they had 24 hour security.

After that, we parked and walked along the beach. When we were ready to get some shut eye, we found a WalMart and designated its parking lot as the place where we were going to sleep that night. It wasn't the best sleep I'd ever had, and I wasn't entirely comfortable (both in sleeping in a parking lot, and because I was in the front seat of a car instead of a comfy bed) but it was manageable and there was a WalMart security guy driving around all night which put me at ease.

When we woke up, we drove around and saw a bunch of houses on stilts. It was so weird, but it made sense. If there were to be a flood, the houses would be fine from the water.

We boarded the ship at around 10 or 11, and holy wow was it big! There was a water slide on the top deck (no, we didn't go on it) as well as like 3 swimming pools and 4-6 hot tubs. There were 2 large buffets, a pizza place, a deli, 4 restaurants, a casino, a large stage, and so so SO much more. The level with the casino also had some gift shops, but they didn't really sell trinkets, instead they had large bottles of hard liquor, cases of 10 cartons of cigarettes, diamonds, tanzenite, Rolex watches, and a lot of other expensive stuff. Not your typical gift shop.

The first two days were spent at sea. I took Dramamine and slept a lot, which kinda sucked, but we still had fun. There was a comedy club called The Punchliner and Chris and I made almost every show for the first two nights. There were two kid-friendly shows, and three adults only shows.

By far, our favorite comedian was Mutzie. He was absolutely hilarious, and all he did for his entire 45 minutes was interact with the crowd. Even in his adult shows, he didn't use any profanity, and even the adult content wasn't too outrageously adult. More-so rated PG-13 than R. He was incredibly kind and you could really tell that he cared about his fans. I really hope he comes around soon. I'd love to get to see a show of his again.

Every night, housekeeping left us little towel animals on our bed with the next day's schedule and some dinner mints. Chris and I took a free class on towel animals, and now we can make an elephant, a dog, a frog, and a brontosaurus.

Speaking of dinner, we had an assigned restaurant, table, waiter and assigned dinner guests. Our tablemates were really awesome (also on their honeymoon) but unfortunately, they only came to dinner twice the whole week. See, you could choose to eat at your assigned time, or go to one of the buffets, or order something from 24 hour room service. Chris and I went to dinner every night before the comedy club or show.

The first place we stopped at was Jamaica. Let me just say, it wasn't what I was expecting as far as the scenery, but it was everything I had imagined as far as people offering up "the good stuff". Chris and I got offered drugs about 5 times total, and it was ridiculous!

We didn't have an excursion booked for Jamaica, so we figured we'd just walk around and see the sights. We asked one of the Carnival employees what he suggested we do, and his answer surprised us. He told us, we shouldn't leave the port on our own, but that we should take the shuttle to the designated tourist spots, which included a shopping center, the beach, Margaritaville, and a craft market.

Chris and I stopped first at the beach. It was $5 a person to get in, and $5 to rent an umbrella or chairs, but since it was so hot and I was afraid of burning, we scraped up an extra $5 for the umbrella rental and just used our towels to sit on. The water was incredibly beautiful! If the beaches in San Diego looked like they did in Jamaica, I would most definitely have been a beach girl.

The water was crystal clear, and even if you picked up a handful of sand and dropped it, you could watch the individual grains fall back to the bottom. So outrageously beautiful!

We saw a stingray (I swam the other way) and some fish swimming around with us. It was cool being able to actually SEE in the water rather than just stepping and crossing my finger that no creepy-swimmys were under my feet.

After the beach, we thought we'd stop at the craft market, but one swing around the little area and we were right back on the shuttle to the ship. The people were very pushy, and I felt really uncomfortable.

The second stop was in the Cayman Islands. There, we had a dolphin encounter and a turtle farm visit. we took a little bus to the turtle farm and got to walk around and look at turtles ranging from little babies to like 600lb giants! I don't think I've ever gotten so close to a turtle before, and they were actually kinda cute!

Right across the street was the dolphin encounter, and it was amazing! We got on some live jackets and split in to groups to go to our dolphin pools. We had quite a few people in our group, so we had some standing about waist deep on a stand in the water while the other held on to the wall on the other side of the pool.

The dolphin we got to meet was Alma. The dolphin encounter place saved most of their dolphins, and Alma was no exception. She had gotten too close to a boat's propeller and her tail got cut up.

We got to shake hands, get kisses, play with a ball, and do a lot of tricks with Alma, and it was so cool! I had tons of dolphin novelties when I was younger, and though I had lived in San Diego for 20 years, I never had a real dolphin encounter. I pet one at Sea World once, but I never got to do much more than that. It made the little kid inside me squeal.

Needless to say, we had an absolute blast!

The third stop was Cozumel. As soon as we got off the ship, we had to walk through a super long gift shop in order to get anywhere. It was crazy, but nearly the whole gift shop had inexpensive hard liquor. 2 large bottles of Crown Royal,  Jose Cuervo, and a lot more for $22. Now, I'm not a drinker, but that seems pretty cheap to me. What was even more crazy, is they were giving out samples! "Here, take a shot on us!" WHAT?!?!? People were taking pictures of the price tags and taking samples. It was nuts.

Anyhow, Chris and I booked an ATV ride through the jungle and to see some Mayan ruins. Well, it rained for 3-4 days prior to our arrival it rained and rained and rained. So we got a little bit muddy.

It was a lot of fun on the ATV ride, but I think that's mostly because Chris and I were the first two riders behind our guide. At the beginning, they told us to separate in to those who had experience riding ATVs and those who didn't. Chris and I had experience, so up to the front we went!

The only reason I know that the middle/back was no fun, is because Mr. Chris broke the axle on his quad and got sent to the back for a little while. He asked to come back up to be with his wife again (that still sounds weird...I'm a wife...) and they let him once we stopped again. Luckily the people that ran the tour weren't mad at Chris. A pin came out, and they said it's not the first time it's happened and wont be the last.

Our last day was also at sea, and I was ready to get back on land. The water was very rocky, and I had to take a Dramamine as well as Bonine to keep from feeling incredibly sick.

When we finally got back to Texas, we got off the ship pretty quickly and smoothly. We had to go through customs, and when we claimed $10 each worth of souvenirs, the customs lady laughed a little and said "Big spenders aren't you?". A lot of people were bringing back alcohol, jewelry, cigarettes, and a lot of other stuff from the ports or ship gift shops.

It rained and rained and rained the whole drive home. We made it home safe and sound though, and while we had a lot of fun on the cruise, I like my feet on stable ground.