I can't believe today is the last day of November! This year has honestly flown by. I'm so excited that Christmas is almost here. It's my favorite time of year and always has been. I just love everything about Christmas. I'm especially loving the joy that Garrett is getting out of the holiday so far. He loved helping me decorate our tree last weekend and he enjoys moving ornaments around on a daily basis. He's broken 2 or 3 of them already. He enjoys pointing Santa out to me anywhere that he sees him, he runs to be the first one to turn on the Christmas tree lights every morning, he loves playing with the nativity set that I've put on the hearth. I'm trying to insure that he learns early on that Christmas isn't just about Santa and presents, but that it's Jesus' birthday. (Yes, I know that Jesus probably wasn't really born in the month of December, but there's nothing wrong with celebrating on December 25th.) I think it helps that his Sunday school class and Mother's Day Out class both sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and talk about His birth and how it all happened. I'm sure he doesn't understand everything, but I'm glad that he's learning the real meaning of Christmas. He walks around singing Happy Birthday all of the time now too. It's really cute!
One new tradition that we're starting this year now that he's older and willing to watch longer movies: we're watching Polar Express. I think it has a great message, so I definitely plan to make watching this movie an annual thing. Probably if we buy it we'll watch it more than just this time of year, but it's on TV (right now, actually) and we also rented it last week, so he's really getting into it. If you haven't seen that movie, you definitely need to rent it! It's so good! The music is great too.
I'm looking forward to having a bake-a-thon next week. This will be the first time that I've had Garrett help me with baking, but I think he will enjoy it and he'll be a big help. I love making chocolate-dipped pretzels, cookies, and I plan to include peanut butter balls in our baking this year, maybe even some fudge too.
One small brag, I am done Christmas shopping! I'm so excited to be done and I can't wait to start wrapping presents. Yes, I'm the weirdo who loves wrapping presents. It's fun for me to try to make a present look nice and use pretty paper and bows. I'm really excited to give Keith one of his presents. His family draws names and I drew Keith's name this year. Since I'm the only person giving him any Christmas presents I wanted to give him something really good, and I think I accomplished that. I'll find out on Christmas Eve when we exchange gifts with his family. I'm a little nervous because it's more money than I would normally spend, but I think he'll be excited when he sees it.
I am sad that I won't be celebrating Christmas with all of my family again this year. I will get to have a mini-Christmas with my parents in a couple of weeks, but I would love for all of my family to be able to get together for Christmas sometime soon. I'm sure it will be awhile before that happens, but I will pray hard that it happens sooner rather than later. I am glad that I'm able to start my own family traditions with Keith and Garrett. Most of them mirror the ones that we had growing up, but I'm enjoying passing my family traditions down to Garrett. Honestly, I'm also passing them to Keith. His family never really made a big deal about Christmas. Everybody would get one big gift, they didn't typically do stockings, and they didn't always have a tree. It makes me a little sad when I think about what Christmas was like for them growing up. But Keith doesn't feel like he's missed out on anything. I'm sure he thinks I'm a weirdo for going all out like I do every year. But he never complains. He's a great guy.
Everyone better be sure and post blogs about your Christmas when it's all said and done! I love hearing about how other people celebrate holidays.
I hope everyone has a super, Merry Christmas!
Friday, November 30, 2007
Friday, November 23, 2007
Little of This, Little of That
A few random things to share.
I mentioned in an earlier blog that we bought a treadmill. Well, it arrived this week, so the website we ordered from was apparently legit. Good to know. The treadmill is nice and much bigger than I thought it would be. Keith and I put it together Wednesday night and set it up in our guest room. I learned that evening that my husband had never been on a treadmill before. After putting it together, I hopped on to give it a test run (not literally). I cranked it up to about 2 and a half miles per hour, and that was plenty fast for me, someone who is pretty out of shape currently. Keith tried to bump it up more and gets me to 3 mph where I finally told him to knock it off. So after 5 minutes of walking I got off. Keith then took his turn. He realized that 3 mph for someone who hasn't been exercising regularly is pretty brisk. He actually put himself up to 4 before discovering he couldn't walk without holding onto the side bars and he broke out into a sweat. I laughed. Atleast now he knows what it's like to walk on a treadmill, and he discovered he needs to do it regularly (so do I).
Yesterday was Thanksgiving and we all have plenty to be thankful for. I discovered this even more so yesterday. After stuffing ourselves, Keith headed out to his family's gun range along with his dad, a friend, and his friend's son. Briefly, I just want to inform everyone who does not know Keith, he is super hyper about gun safety and always has been. He double and triple checks to be sure guns aren't loaded before doing anything with them. We keep all of our guns locked up in a gun safe. Keith also refuses to do target practice with just anybody because he knows that there are a lot of people who aren't safe to be around with guns. So, he figured that the group he was going out with yesterday were safe to shoot with. Well, he figured wrong. His friend got out a gun and laid it on the tailgate of his truck. I never found out what exactly he was doing to the gun, but he hadn't loaded it yet. However, he accidentally bumped the trigger and the gun went off. Apparently there had been a bullet in the chamber that he was unaware of. The bullet went through the side of his truck and passed in front of Keith, missing him by about a foot. Keith said he could actually feel the bullet going by and he thought he had been shot. His dad came running over as soon as he heard the gun go off and Keith was hollaring at him to see where he was hit. Keith was afraid to look himself over because he didn't think he could handle seeing blood pouring out. As soon as his dad had checked him out and told him he was fine, Keith almost threw up and passed out at the same time. He was so shaken up over it that he was still white as a sheet when I saw him about an hour later. He had to just sit there for awhile before he felt like he could head back to his parents' house (which was maybe 5 minutes away). We've been very thankful since then and have thanked God many times. I can't even imagine where I would be if things had been different. It's a good reminder of how brief our life is here and that we have no control over when our time is up here on Earth.
And to end on a light note, I thought I would share with you a funny moment with Garrett. Just a little background, Garrett is still picking up words and saying more and more all of the time. He has said many 3 word sentences, but that's about it. Today I got out all of the Christmas decorations and put up the tree. Then I had Garrett help me decorate, not much got done, but it was fun watching him hang 10 things on one branch. While he was decorating, I was attempting to get a cute picture of him that I would be able to use for our Christmas cards this year. It wasn't really working out, so I asked Garrett to come and stand in front of the tree for a second and say cheese. Anytime I get out my cell phone and act like I'm going to take a picture with it, he comes running and screams cheese, he loves it! But for some reason the process isn't quite as fun with the digital camera. So his response to my request for his cooperation with a picture was this "I don't wanna say cheese". I was floored, simply because he said this with crystal clarity as well as the fact that he's never said such a long sentence before. So my response was just to laugh and attempt to get his cooperation without him realizing it later on. I did get a couple of good shots, thankfully. But now that he's discovered he can say this, everything is "I don't wanna...". I'm quite sure this is going to get old real quick, but I was really proud of his language abilities at that particular moment.
I mentioned in an earlier blog that we bought a treadmill. Well, it arrived this week, so the website we ordered from was apparently legit. Good to know. The treadmill is nice and much bigger than I thought it would be. Keith and I put it together Wednesday night and set it up in our guest room. I learned that evening that my husband had never been on a treadmill before. After putting it together, I hopped on to give it a test run (not literally). I cranked it up to about 2 and a half miles per hour, and that was plenty fast for me, someone who is pretty out of shape currently. Keith tried to bump it up more and gets me to 3 mph where I finally told him to knock it off. So after 5 minutes of walking I got off. Keith then took his turn. He realized that 3 mph for someone who hasn't been exercising regularly is pretty brisk. He actually put himself up to 4 before discovering he couldn't walk without holding onto the side bars and he broke out into a sweat. I laughed. Atleast now he knows what it's like to walk on a treadmill, and he discovered he needs to do it regularly (so do I).
Yesterday was Thanksgiving and we all have plenty to be thankful for. I discovered this even more so yesterday. After stuffing ourselves, Keith headed out to his family's gun range along with his dad, a friend, and his friend's son. Briefly, I just want to inform everyone who does not know Keith, he is super hyper about gun safety and always has been. He double and triple checks to be sure guns aren't loaded before doing anything with them. We keep all of our guns locked up in a gun safe. Keith also refuses to do target practice with just anybody because he knows that there are a lot of people who aren't safe to be around with guns. So, he figured that the group he was going out with yesterday were safe to shoot with. Well, he figured wrong. His friend got out a gun and laid it on the tailgate of his truck. I never found out what exactly he was doing to the gun, but he hadn't loaded it yet. However, he accidentally bumped the trigger and the gun went off. Apparently there had been a bullet in the chamber that he was unaware of. The bullet went through the side of his truck and passed in front of Keith, missing him by about a foot. Keith said he could actually feel the bullet going by and he thought he had been shot. His dad came running over as soon as he heard the gun go off and Keith was hollaring at him to see where he was hit. Keith was afraid to look himself over because he didn't think he could handle seeing blood pouring out. As soon as his dad had checked him out and told him he was fine, Keith almost threw up and passed out at the same time. He was so shaken up over it that he was still white as a sheet when I saw him about an hour later. He had to just sit there for awhile before he felt like he could head back to his parents' house (which was maybe 5 minutes away). We've been very thankful since then and have thanked God many times. I can't even imagine where I would be if things had been different. It's a good reminder of how brief our life is here and that we have no control over when our time is up here on Earth.
And to end on a light note, I thought I would share with you a funny moment with Garrett. Just a little background, Garrett is still picking up words and saying more and more all of the time. He has said many 3 word sentences, but that's about it. Today I got out all of the Christmas decorations and put up the tree. Then I had Garrett help me decorate, not much got done, but it was fun watching him hang 10 things on one branch. While he was decorating, I was attempting to get a cute picture of him that I would be able to use for our Christmas cards this year. It wasn't really working out, so I asked Garrett to come and stand in front of the tree for a second and say cheese. Anytime I get out my cell phone and act like I'm going to take a picture with it, he comes running and screams cheese, he loves it! But for some reason the process isn't quite as fun with the digital camera. So his response to my request for his cooperation with a picture was this "I don't wanna say cheese". I was floored, simply because he said this with crystal clarity as well as the fact that he's never said such a long sentence before. So my response was just to laugh and attempt to get his cooperation without him realizing it later on. I did get a couple of good shots, thankfully. But now that he's discovered he can say this, everything is "I don't wanna...". I'm quite sure this is going to get old real quick, but I was really proud of his language abilities at that particular moment.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
You Don't Have to Live Like This
Last night our Sunday school class went to hear this speaker. His name is Rob Bell, and I'm sure you've probably never heard of him. I know he was unfamiliar to me, up until about 2 years ago. Our class did some video devotionals by Rob Bell 2 summers ago. We were knocked out by some of the things that he taught in them. There was one that I will never forget. The video starts out with Rob telling a story from his past when his son was young, less than a year old. Their family had gone to a cabin somewhere for vacation. One morning, Rob and his son got up early and went on a walk in the woods surrounding the cabin. He had his son in one of those backpack, baby carriers. After they had walked a good ways, it starts raining, so Rob reaches back to pull his son's hood up over his head and they take off back for the cabin. What Rob doesn't realize is that his son has pulled the hood back off of his head, so he's getting soaked. Rob is very set on getting them back before they get too wet, but by this point it is pouring down. This entire time, his son is back there howling up a storm because he's uncomfortable and just does not understand why in the world his dad is allowing him to get wet. What he doesn't realize is that his dad is trying his best to get them to the shelter of their cabin. In this video, Rob compares this story to our relationship with God. We may be in the midst of getting rained on in our lives and we think "where is God in all of this, why isn't he doing something to help me!" What we don't realize is God is right there and he's taking us to shelter, we just may not get there as fast as we want to. That story has stuck with me over the past 2 years, maybe because I was 7 months pregnant with my son at the time of watching this video, I'm not sure, but, to me, it makes a strong statement in the fact that we need to have faith that God is going to see us through the rough times in our lives, regardless of how long we have to endure those rough times, He is right there, walking us through them.
Steve, our former Sunday school teacher, associate pastor, pretty cool guy, found out that Rob Bell was on a speaking tour through the country and wanted to know if our Sunday school class would be interested in attending. (Of course he didn't ask us this until after he had already bought him and his wife front row tickets, so we got stuck in the nosebleed section while he was getting sweated on by Rob. Just teasing, Steve! ) So we had a group of 22 people head over to hear Rob speak last night. I was really impressed with how many people were there. I am a terrible guesser when it comes to numbers, so while I want to say there was a couple thousand people there, that's probably not anywhere close to being right. But for the locals, if you're familiar with Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie, that's where we were and it was about 3/4 full. Rob started out talking about the gods that people worshipped thousands of years ago. Initially, I was worried that we were going to be in for a long night because I could not see where this was going. We didn't really have any idea as to what he would be speaking about, just that the title of the tour was "The Gods Aren't Angry". But after going through and sharing with us some interesting facts about the different gods and what they were responsible for (the same god that was responsible for hunting was also responsible for small animals, kind of ironic), he also went over how the sacrificing part went. Basically it boiled down to this, people sacrificed (either gave crops, or killed animals (even their own children in some cases)) important things in order to appease the gods, if they were being blessed, they gave more in order to continue to be blessed, if they were suffering, they still gave more in order to try and get the gods back on their side, so it was a vicious cycle, with no one winning. So then Rob tells the story of Abraham. Abraham had a son named Isaac who he was asked, by God, to sacrifice. So Abraham obediently takes Isaac to the mountain willing to sacrifice him. At the last minute, an angel stops him and gives him a ram to sacrifice instead. Now, what Rob pointed out that was interesting is that most new Christians, or people who aren't really familiar with the Bible, if they are to read this story their initial reaction is to be horrified. What kind of God would ask someone to kill their child, and on the other side of that, what kind of person would willingly go out and do this? But the point he was making was that during the time of Abraham, those other things were going on with the other gods where people were sacrificing their first born children with much frequency. So for Abraham this really wasn't totally abnormal. He knew the other gods were demanding this, so he easily assumed the same from the God he worshipped. But God did this in order to prove to Abraham that He is NOTHING like those other gods. He isn't going to ask you to sacrifice your children in the hopes that you will get on His good side. He went on to share some other stories from the Bible and talked about the fact that Jesus became the ultimate sacrifice so this wouldn't have to be done anymore. I'm leaving a lot out here, I'm just trying to touch on the high points for me. So I'm sorry if this sounds somewhat scattered.
At the end he began sharing stories of how people have done their own "sacrificing" for their friends and loved ones. One single mother of 4 was given a house by people in her church, simply because they knew she was newly divorced and about to lose her current house. Another family had lost their job and were having trouble putting food on the table, so some friends from church took them to Sam's and bought them $900 worth of food. One woman had been severely scarred on her face by a bad accident, the doctor wanted her husband in the room as he removed her bandages, her mouth was all crooked because it had been badly torn, she was disfigured, yet her husband leaned down and kissed her and said "I like it!" These are all stories that really touched me and made me ask myself what I'm doing for other people. What are my sacrifices? In Romans 12:1, we are told to present ourselves as a "living sacrifice". We don't live in the day and age where we have to drag animals or crops to an altar to sacrifice, but we should be sacrificing of ourselves in order to serve God daily. It was a very important message that I needed to hear.
Steve, our former Sunday school teacher, associate pastor, pretty cool guy, found out that Rob Bell was on a speaking tour through the country and wanted to know if our Sunday school class would be interested in attending. (Of course he didn't ask us this until after he had already bought him and his wife front row tickets, so we got stuck in the nosebleed section while he was getting sweated on by Rob. Just teasing, Steve! ) So we had a group of 22 people head over to hear Rob speak last night. I was really impressed with how many people were there. I am a terrible guesser when it comes to numbers, so while I want to say there was a couple thousand people there, that's probably not anywhere close to being right. But for the locals, if you're familiar with Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie, that's where we were and it was about 3/4 full. Rob started out talking about the gods that people worshipped thousands of years ago. Initially, I was worried that we were going to be in for a long night because I could not see where this was going. We didn't really have any idea as to what he would be speaking about, just that the title of the tour was "The Gods Aren't Angry". But after going through and sharing with us some interesting facts about the different gods and what they were responsible for (the same god that was responsible for hunting was also responsible for small animals, kind of ironic), he also went over how the sacrificing part went. Basically it boiled down to this, people sacrificed (either gave crops, or killed animals (even their own children in some cases)) important things in order to appease the gods, if they were being blessed, they gave more in order to continue to be blessed, if they were suffering, they still gave more in order to try and get the gods back on their side, so it was a vicious cycle, with no one winning. So then Rob tells the story of Abraham. Abraham had a son named Isaac who he was asked, by God, to sacrifice. So Abraham obediently takes Isaac to the mountain willing to sacrifice him. At the last minute, an angel stops him and gives him a ram to sacrifice instead. Now, what Rob pointed out that was interesting is that most new Christians, or people who aren't really familiar with the Bible, if they are to read this story their initial reaction is to be horrified. What kind of God would ask someone to kill their child, and on the other side of that, what kind of person would willingly go out and do this? But the point he was making was that during the time of Abraham, those other things were going on with the other gods where people were sacrificing their first born children with much frequency. So for Abraham this really wasn't totally abnormal. He knew the other gods were demanding this, so he easily assumed the same from the God he worshipped. But God did this in order to prove to Abraham that He is NOTHING like those other gods. He isn't going to ask you to sacrifice your children in the hopes that you will get on His good side. He went on to share some other stories from the Bible and talked about the fact that Jesus became the ultimate sacrifice so this wouldn't have to be done anymore. I'm leaving a lot out here, I'm just trying to touch on the high points for me. So I'm sorry if this sounds somewhat scattered.
At the end he began sharing stories of how people have done their own "sacrificing" for their friends and loved ones. One single mother of 4 was given a house by people in her church, simply because they knew she was newly divorced and about to lose her current house. Another family had lost their job and were having trouble putting food on the table, so some friends from church took them to Sam's and bought them $900 worth of food. One woman had been severely scarred on her face by a bad accident, the doctor wanted her husband in the room as he removed her bandages, her mouth was all crooked because it had been badly torn, she was disfigured, yet her husband leaned down and kissed her and said "I like it!" These are all stories that really touched me and made me ask myself what I'm doing for other people. What are my sacrifices? In Romans 12:1, we are told to present ourselves as a "living sacrifice". We don't live in the day and age where we have to drag animals or crops to an altar to sacrifice, but we should be sacrificing of ourselves in order to serve God daily. It was a very important message that I needed to hear.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Finally, I Can Get Into Shape, Maybe...
We broke down and made a big purchase that I have been hoping for. I am so excited to finally add a treadmill to our household! This particular treadmill has the space saver feature, so for now we plan to just put it in our guest room, until the time comes when we have another child who needs that room and then we'll be able to fit it in our bedroom. I have debated off and on over the past 5 plus years of marriage whether or not I wanted to buy a big, bulky piece of equipment like this. I always figured that I would just walk outside or do an exercise video, but has that happened? Of course not. I have walked off and on outside in our neighborhood since we've lived here, but this is Texas and we're limited with the number of days with good weather where we can actually workout outside without needing emergency care.
Over the past month or so it has really hit me that I'm getting older. I have honestly been overweight my entire life so that part has really never bothered me (I know many of you are in shock right now since body image is such a big thing in today's society). I was brought up to love myself regardless of how big or small I may be. But now that I'm pushing 30, I have been reminded many times that I need to get healthy. It's not so much about losing weight as it is about getting healthy. However, I know that I have to lose some weight in order to be healthy and I also need to get active. Yes, I do have a 2 year old who has taken on the job as my personal trainer ever since he started walking, so I do get some activity chasing him around and my heart gets a good workout when he scares me to death by attempting to stand on the back of the couch, or falling on his head on our tile floor. But really I need something a little more monotonous. I figure a treadmill fits that bill. On top of the aging aspect, I also have a strong family history of diabetes and I have an equally strong fear that I will one day be diabetic. I'm in hopes that if I start now with getting healthy, I will either prolong the diagnosis or maybe even eliminate it. Heart disease is another issue that I face in my family tree. My paternal grandpa has recently had 2 heart attacks along with multiple strokes in the past. He's doing pretty well now, but his mom died around the age of 60 from massive strokes. Unfortunately it is an all-too real scenerio that I do not want to replay 30 years from now. The healthier I am, the better.
I've been looking around for the past few months for a treadmill. Initially I had planned to buy one off of craigslist, since I have such a huge infatuation with that website. But I was a little horrified to see many pictures of these treadmills being sold for $300-$400 sitting in people's garages covered in dirt. Keith and I (and Garrett of course) went to Sears and Academy today to check out some treadmills in person. Then we got home and looked some up online. I found a great deal at a very random website. I'm crossing my fingers that they're reputable because it's just one of those online places that doesn't have a storefront anywhere. It looked pretty nice and a lot of other websites linked to this one, so hopefully that means something. If not, you'll be reading a blog in the near future about how this website ripped us off.
So, now is the part where I set some goals for myself and have my friends help to keep me accountable. Between now and the end of the year, my goal is to walk on the treadmill 3 times a week. I can't honestly say how long I will walk, but definitely no less than 30 minutes to start out with. Then once we start the new year, I plan to up that along with eating better. I really think I can do this and I feel motivated to get into action. You guys help me stick with this! If you have any tips as to how to keep myself going, please share them! One thing that I know will help me to stay motivated is the fact that this will give me a block of time to listen to my iPod. I know that's goofy, but I have limited amounts of time to actually listen to it, so I'm looking forward to getting myself up on that treadmill and singing my heart out to Rascall Flatts, the Bee Gees, Phillips, Craig, and Dean, Firehouse, REO Speedwagon, Nickleback, etc. I love music, all kinds, and love to sing along. So if you happen to come by my house during the day, sometime in the future and you hear somebody singing at the top of their lungs, it will probably be me on my treadmill. You may want to come back later because I'm sure I won't be able to hear you.
Over the past month or so it has really hit me that I'm getting older. I have honestly been overweight my entire life so that part has really never bothered me (I know many of you are in shock right now since body image is such a big thing in today's society). I was brought up to love myself regardless of how big or small I may be. But now that I'm pushing 30, I have been reminded many times that I need to get healthy. It's not so much about losing weight as it is about getting healthy. However, I know that I have to lose some weight in order to be healthy and I also need to get active. Yes, I do have a 2 year old who has taken on the job as my personal trainer ever since he started walking, so I do get some activity chasing him around and my heart gets a good workout when he scares me to death by attempting to stand on the back of the couch, or falling on his head on our tile floor. But really I need something a little more monotonous. I figure a treadmill fits that bill. On top of the aging aspect, I also have a strong family history of diabetes and I have an equally strong fear that I will one day be diabetic. I'm in hopes that if I start now with getting healthy, I will either prolong the diagnosis or maybe even eliminate it. Heart disease is another issue that I face in my family tree. My paternal grandpa has recently had 2 heart attacks along with multiple strokes in the past. He's doing pretty well now, but his mom died around the age of 60 from massive strokes. Unfortunately it is an all-too real scenerio that I do not want to replay 30 years from now. The healthier I am, the better.
I've been looking around for the past few months for a treadmill. Initially I had planned to buy one off of craigslist, since I have such a huge infatuation with that website. But I was a little horrified to see many pictures of these treadmills being sold for $300-$400 sitting in people's garages covered in dirt. Keith and I (and Garrett of course) went to Sears and Academy today to check out some treadmills in person. Then we got home and looked some up online. I found a great deal at a very random website. I'm crossing my fingers that they're reputable because it's just one of those online places that doesn't have a storefront anywhere. It looked pretty nice and a lot of other websites linked to this one, so hopefully that means something. If not, you'll be reading a blog in the near future about how this website ripped us off.
So, now is the part where I set some goals for myself and have my friends help to keep me accountable. Between now and the end of the year, my goal is to walk on the treadmill 3 times a week. I can't honestly say how long I will walk, but definitely no less than 30 minutes to start out with. Then once we start the new year, I plan to up that along with eating better. I really think I can do this and I feel motivated to get into action. You guys help me stick with this! If you have any tips as to how to keep myself going, please share them! One thing that I know will help me to stay motivated is the fact that this will give me a block of time to listen to my iPod. I know that's goofy, but I have limited amounts of time to actually listen to it, so I'm looking forward to getting myself up on that treadmill and singing my heart out to Rascall Flatts, the Bee Gees, Phillips, Craig, and Dean, Firehouse, REO Speedwagon, Nickleback, etc. I love music, all kinds, and love to sing along. So if you happen to come by my house during the day, sometime in the future and you hear somebody singing at the top of their lungs, it will probably be me on my treadmill. You may want to come back later because I'm sure I won't be able to hear you.
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Good Eatin'
I read my friend Steve's blog yesterday where he was talking about eating at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. This got me to thinking about the first (and only) time that I've eaten at this restaurant.
Back in June, Keith and I celebrated our 5th anniversary. Over the past 5 years we haven't really done anything special to celebrate our anniversary, but we thought this was an important one so we decided to go to San Antonio for a couple of days. This was my first time leaving Garrett overnight and I was so ready to get to sleep in for once in the past 2 years! We went to San Antonio and stayed in a nice hotel. When we first got there, the SA Spurs were having a parade down the river in celebration for their NBA championship. It was a little chaotic downtown, but neat to get to see the actual parade from our window.
On our last night in town (we did all the typical tourist stuff while there, Alamo, riverboat tour, mall, etc) we decided we wanted to eat at a really nice place. Keith had been to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse in Chicago, and maybe another city like New York?, and really enjoyed it, so he wanted us to go there while we had the chance. We saw the address where it was located and figured it wasn't but a few blocks past the mall, which was where we had been walking to every day. We figured we could handle that walk and got started. Now, first thing is that this is the month of June, in San Antonio, Texas. At 5:00 pm. It was hot and humid outside. By the time we were halfway to the mall, we're both sweating. Because Ruth's Chris is a nice restaurant, I had called to check on their dress code and learned that I would be fine wearing nice capris. So I ironed mine and Keith's clothes and tried to make us look as nice as possible with what we had brought. By this point in our walking, all of that effort had gone down the drain. I'm sure we looked like someone had thrown us in the pool with our clothes on. Once we got past the mall, we looked ahead a few blocks and see the interstate! Not only is it the interstate, but it also doesn't have sidewalks running underneath it. We cannot see Ruth's Chris on this side, so we assumed it's on the other side of the interstate. Now, we have two options, one, we can hike under the interstate probably walking alongside some homeless people and will be mistaken as one ourselves since we look awful by now, or two, we can get a cab to drive us like 3 blocks. We got a cab. Keith is very familiar with the cab routine, but this was my first cab ride. Thankfully he had the a/c going full blast so we were able to dry ourselves off and fix up as best as possible before arriving at the restaurant. When we walk inside Ruth's Chris, the hostess of course had seen us arrive in a cab. She asks us where we're staying and after we told her the name of the hotel, she says, "Oh, we have a free shuttle that takes our customers to and from the downtown hotels. Be sure to let your waiter know when you're finished with your meal and the shuttle will take you back." Boy, didn't we feel dumb! We could have saved ourselves permenant sweat stains on our clothing had we asked about a shuttle, but who knew? Live and learn.
Seeing as how we arrived at the restaurant around 5:00, we were two of the few people there. I'm sure they thought we were senior citizens in young peoples' bodies, but we were hungry. The food was excellent and the service was outstanding! It is definitely not the place to go for a cheap dinner, but you will get your money's worth. Keith and I both had salads for an appetizer, delicious steaks for the main course along with several side dishes that were outstanding, and then it was followed up with dessert. They also brought us a small loaf of bread while we were waiting for our salads. I cut off slices for the two of us and while we were eating them, the waiter comes over and replaces our loaf with a new one! On the one hand that is so wasteful! I hope someone took that loaf home and ate it because it was good. On the other hand, it's always nice to be treated as if you're someone super important. We would take a sip of our drinks and someone would immediately come to our table to refill them. Impeccible service, most definitely! The final bill wasn't too bad considering how excellent the whole experience was. We paid a little over $100 for everything including a (very generous) tip. Of course that could have been their early bird special. I am definitely ready to go back for more of that great food!
Back in June, Keith and I celebrated our 5th anniversary. Over the past 5 years we haven't really done anything special to celebrate our anniversary, but we thought this was an important one so we decided to go to San Antonio for a couple of days. This was my first time leaving Garrett overnight and I was so ready to get to sleep in for once in the past 2 years! We went to San Antonio and stayed in a nice hotel. When we first got there, the SA Spurs were having a parade down the river in celebration for their NBA championship. It was a little chaotic downtown, but neat to get to see the actual parade from our window.
On our last night in town (we did all the typical tourist stuff while there, Alamo, riverboat tour, mall, etc) we decided we wanted to eat at a really nice place. Keith had been to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse in Chicago, and maybe another city like New York?, and really enjoyed it, so he wanted us to go there while we had the chance. We saw the address where it was located and figured it wasn't but a few blocks past the mall, which was where we had been walking to every day. We figured we could handle that walk and got started. Now, first thing is that this is the month of June, in San Antonio, Texas. At 5:00 pm. It was hot and humid outside. By the time we were halfway to the mall, we're both sweating. Because Ruth's Chris is a nice restaurant, I had called to check on their dress code and learned that I would be fine wearing nice capris. So I ironed mine and Keith's clothes and tried to make us look as nice as possible with what we had brought. By this point in our walking, all of that effort had gone down the drain. I'm sure we looked like someone had thrown us in the pool with our clothes on. Once we got past the mall, we looked ahead a few blocks and see the interstate! Not only is it the interstate, but it also doesn't have sidewalks running underneath it. We cannot see Ruth's Chris on this side, so we assumed it's on the other side of the interstate. Now, we have two options, one, we can hike under the interstate probably walking alongside some homeless people and will be mistaken as one ourselves since we look awful by now, or two, we can get a cab to drive us like 3 blocks. We got a cab. Keith is very familiar with the cab routine, but this was my first cab ride. Thankfully he had the a/c going full blast so we were able to dry ourselves off and fix up as best as possible before arriving at the restaurant. When we walk inside Ruth's Chris, the hostess of course had seen us arrive in a cab. She asks us where we're staying and after we told her the name of the hotel, she says, "Oh, we have a free shuttle that takes our customers to and from the downtown hotels. Be sure to let your waiter know when you're finished with your meal and the shuttle will take you back." Boy, didn't we feel dumb! We could have saved ourselves permenant sweat stains on our clothing had we asked about a shuttle, but who knew? Live and learn.
Seeing as how we arrived at the restaurant around 5:00, we were two of the few people there. I'm sure they thought we were senior citizens in young peoples' bodies, but we were hungry. The food was excellent and the service was outstanding! It is definitely not the place to go for a cheap dinner, but you will get your money's worth. Keith and I both had salads for an appetizer, delicious steaks for the main course along with several side dishes that were outstanding, and then it was followed up with dessert. They also brought us a small loaf of bread while we were waiting for our salads. I cut off slices for the two of us and while we were eating them, the waiter comes over and replaces our loaf with a new one! On the one hand that is so wasteful! I hope someone took that loaf home and ate it because it was good. On the other hand, it's always nice to be treated as if you're someone super important. We would take a sip of our drinks and someone would immediately come to our table to refill them. Impeccible service, most definitely! The final bill wasn't too bad considering how excellent the whole experience was. We paid a little over $100 for everything including a (very generous) tip. Of course that could have been their early bird special. I am definitely ready to go back for more of that great food!
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Random Thoughts
~The movie "1408" was weird.
~I heart Craigslist! I have found so many great deals on there, mostly toys, but hey, when you're paying half of the brand new price for something that looks brand new, it's a great deal.
~I hate daylight savings time. I guess we're technically now getting out of daylight savings time(?) but I still hate having to change the clocks twice a year. It's a pain having to adjust to the new times, especially getting my child adjusted.
~I am so excited it's November! I love the holidays and I can't wait to put up my Christmas tree and all of the decorations.
~I've already started listening to Christmas CD's in the car.
~I love it when my house is clean. Not necessarily spotless, but when everything is picked up and there isn't any noticeable dirt, it's a nice feeling.
~I hate to dust.
~Garrett's bedroom window has a big bush in front of it and it scares me sometimes at night when I go in there and there's enough light outside to where that bush casts a big shadow on his window. I need to buy some long curtains for his room. I wonder if it scares him.
~I got out the pottychair yesterday. I'm nervous about beginning potty-training with Garrett. I think I'll just take it slow and just start out by introducing the chair to him and see where that leads.
~I am addicted to reading. I have read 10 books in the last 7 days (around 200 pages each). It's not a good thing because then my housework and my playtime with Garrett suffers, but if I'm in the middle of a good book, it's so hard to put it down. I think I need to hide the library card from myself for a while.
~I heart my iPod, but I wouldn't mind one of the fancier ones with the screen and more space.
~I can't wait for the new season of Lost to start! I will be glued to the TV every week when that show comes on. Don't call me during that time!
~I wish I could hire a stylist to come over every morning and fix my hair. I feel like it always looks unkempt, even if I actually attempt to do something with it.
~I'm getting 2 cavities filled on Tuesday. That should be fun.
~I just ordered some of my Christmas gifts online. I love doing my Christmas shopping online, it's so easy!
~I love to buy gifts for my family. It's so fun to pick out things that I think that particular person will like. Keith's family is hard to buy for though. Especially his mom and sister. I always dread picking their names during the annual name draw for the Christmas exchange. Luckily this year I drew Keith and he drew his mom. I'll make him figure out what to get her.
~I am really ready to start working out and get into shape and lose some weight. I want a treadmill in order to do this. I'm dropping major hints in order to get it for my birthday next month. It doesn't have to be a fancy one, as long as I can walk on it, it will be fine.
~I hope we get snow for atleast one day in our area this winter.
~I think it's funny when Garrett calls me and Keith by our first names. I probably won't when he's doing it a couple of years from now.
~I'm so glad that my son has some manners. Thank you, welcome, sorry, bless you (he doesn't have please quite down just yet). He even tells himself "Bless You" if he sneezes. I hope that will continue on for the rest of his life.
~I'm worried about one of my grandparents dying. Currently all 4 are still alive and healthy, but I know that isn't going to last forever. It will be very sad to lose someone whom I have been close to for the past almost 30 years.
~I love getting pedicures! I used to think painting your toes was stupid, but I didn't know what I was missing. When you have it professionally done, it's super!
~I think golf is the most stupid sport ever.
~Whoever came up with the idea for Netflix rocks! (I'm actually a Blockbuster On-line person, but I know Netflix originated the idea.)
~I heart Craigslist! I have found so many great deals on there, mostly toys, but hey, when you're paying half of the brand new price for something that looks brand new, it's a great deal.
~I hate daylight savings time. I guess we're technically now getting out of daylight savings time(?) but I still hate having to change the clocks twice a year. It's a pain having to adjust to the new times, especially getting my child adjusted.
~I am so excited it's November! I love the holidays and I can't wait to put up my Christmas tree and all of the decorations.
~I've already started listening to Christmas CD's in the car.
~I love it when my house is clean. Not necessarily spotless, but when everything is picked up and there isn't any noticeable dirt, it's a nice feeling.
~I hate to dust.
~Garrett's bedroom window has a big bush in front of it and it scares me sometimes at night when I go in there and there's enough light outside to where that bush casts a big shadow on his window. I need to buy some long curtains for his room. I wonder if it scares him.
~I got out the pottychair yesterday. I'm nervous about beginning potty-training with Garrett. I think I'll just take it slow and just start out by introducing the chair to him and see where that leads.
~I am addicted to reading. I have read 10 books in the last 7 days (around 200 pages each). It's not a good thing because then my housework and my playtime with Garrett suffers, but if I'm in the middle of a good book, it's so hard to put it down. I think I need to hide the library card from myself for a while.
~I heart my iPod, but I wouldn't mind one of the fancier ones with the screen and more space.
~I can't wait for the new season of Lost to start! I will be glued to the TV every week when that show comes on. Don't call me during that time!
~I wish I could hire a stylist to come over every morning and fix my hair. I feel like it always looks unkempt, even if I actually attempt to do something with it.
~I'm getting 2 cavities filled on Tuesday. That should be fun.
~I just ordered some of my Christmas gifts online. I love doing my Christmas shopping online, it's so easy!
~I love to buy gifts for my family. It's so fun to pick out things that I think that particular person will like. Keith's family is hard to buy for though. Especially his mom and sister. I always dread picking their names during the annual name draw for the Christmas exchange. Luckily this year I drew Keith and he drew his mom. I'll make him figure out what to get her.
~I am really ready to start working out and get into shape and lose some weight. I want a treadmill in order to do this. I'm dropping major hints in order to get it for my birthday next month. It doesn't have to be a fancy one, as long as I can walk on it, it will be fine.
~I hope we get snow for atleast one day in our area this winter.
~I think it's funny when Garrett calls me and Keith by our first names. I probably won't when he's doing it a couple of years from now.
~I'm so glad that my son has some manners. Thank you, welcome, sorry, bless you (he doesn't have please quite down just yet). He even tells himself "Bless You" if he sneezes. I hope that will continue on for the rest of his life.
~I'm worried about one of my grandparents dying. Currently all 4 are still alive and healthy, but I know that isn't going to last forever. It will be very sad to lose someone whom I have been close to for the past almost 30 years.
~I love getting pedicures! I used to think painting your toes was stupid, but I didn't know what I was missing. When you have it professionally done, it's super!
~I think golf is the most stupid sport ever.
~Whoever came up with the idea for Netflix rocks! (I'm actually a Blockbuster On-line person, but I know Netflix originated the idea.)
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Home Again, Naturally
Bear with me, this is long and mostly just a recap of our visit.
So after the initial insanity of our flight to Indianapolis, we did eventually make it there. My parents are currently living in an apartment while they get their church going, so we kicked my brother Jesse out of his room (thanks, Jesse!) and put a twin air mattress on the floor for Garrett. Let me just start by saying that Garrett is a wild sleeper, he thrashes and cries out in his sleep. The first night he didn't get into bed until midnight due to the crazy day spent in Memphis. Keith and I didn't sleep well due to adjusting to Garrett's weird bed antics, but we all got up Friday morning pretty well refreshed and just happy to be there. My mom had the day off for fall break, which also meant that my brother Jesse was home from school. My dad had worked extra time during the week so he was able to be off that day as well. Unfortunately my sister Christie did have to work. That morning my other sister Grace came over with her 2 kids Riley and Jake. Garrett was excited to see his cousins. Jake is only 8 months younger than Garrett, so they're becoming closer and closer the more they see each other. Us women were wanting to go shopping so we decided to bring the kids with us. This meant 3 women with 3 kids ages 4, 2, and 18 months attempting to shop in Kohl's. It took us an hour and we weren't really finished, but it was time to meet the guys for lunch. I got a good deal on a winter coat for Garrett. Yes, we live in Texas, but there are many days where it's really cold outside and I am having trouble finding a nice, thick coat for him to wear this winter, so thankfully I found one on sale there. I also had to buy him the prerequisite Indiana clothing. He already has an Indianapolis Colts jersey that my parents sent him for his 2nd birthday, and a pair of Indiana Hoosier shorts sent to him by one of my close friends who still lives there. Since I lived 9 years of my life there, I am a Hoosier fan through and through, so I bought him an IU jacket with matching pants. I'm sure everyone in Texas will love to see him wear it, but I love it so that's all that matters. I also bought myself (and my dad) an IU Christmas ornament, so I'm really excited to put that baby on the Christmas tree this year.
We then met up with the guys at Culver's. Even though we have Culver's here in Texas, Keith and I had never eaten at one before. It was really good. Since the kids weren't really cooperating with our attempts at shopping, we all ended up heading home. My mom helped me to get Garrett down to sleep for a nap and then she and I left for more shopping at Target. (Grace had gone home so that her kids would get naps as well.) Riley's birthday is next month, so I bought her birthday present while we were out with plans to give it to her before we left. It was nice to spend some alone time with my mom. We don't get to do that very often anymore, especially considering I'm the oldest of 5 kids, there are now 3 grandkids, plus 3 in-laws added to our family, so alone, quiet time is pretty rare. Friday night we ate a yummy, home-cooked meal by my mom at their apartment. Roast, mashed potatoes, all the good stuff. Friday nights are when my dad's church has Bible study (currently). So my mom stayed home with the 2 boys so they could get to bed at a decent time and the rest of us headed out to someone else's home for Bible study. It was really good. They are in the midst of discussing relationships and Friday night's lesson was focused on the parent-child relationship (namely discipline). It was very good and I learned that I definitely discipline out of anger which is something I need to work on. It was fun though because my dad was teaching the lesson and he had 4 out of 5 of his kids there, so we all enjoyed sharing our moments of discipline growing up. I think the rest of the group got a kick out of hearing our stories. Everyone was really friendly. They have a good, solid group of people that they are starting their church with.
On Saturday we all left and went our separate ways. The women and children (minus Christie again, due to working at her darn job ) headed for Greencastle. As luck would have it, my best friend since I was born, was in town visiting her family. She now lives in Florida. I haven't seen her since she got married and she now has 2 kids. Her sister was in town with her and she and my sister are best friends (weird, I know). So we all made plans to meet up at a tea room type restaurant. We obviously weren't thinking. This was 6 women with 6 kids (all under the age of 5) in a place that really wasn't meant for kids. I mean, the tables had thick pieces of glass on top of the table cloths. Unfortunately my son got a hold of some metal silverware and started banging away on the glass. Apparently the manager didn't like this, so she came and took it away from him and brought plastic instead. I honestly didn't think he was banging that hard and he wasn't being loud, but of course after she took it away from him he got hysterical and wouldn't sit there any longer. So my mom ended up holding him the rest of the meal. But all in all, we had fun, it was so nice to see Mary again and her kids are adorable. After eating we all went to a local park for an hour for the kids to play. We decided later that we should have just picked up McDonald's and eaten lunch at the park. We probably would have enjoyed ourselves a lot more.
After the park we were supposed to meet the guys at my Aunt Pat's house. She lives out in the boonies on like 50 acres. It was so pretty because there's a ton of trees and with it being fall, the leaves were turning and some had already fallen. The kids had a lot of fun playing in the leaves and the adults had a lot of fun taking pictures of them. We were able to get some really cute outdoor shots of everyone. Aunt Pat made us a nice, big homemade meal which included steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, veggies, homemade yeast rolls, etc. It was all so yummy. She always goes overboard when we all come out for a visit.
The next day was Sunday and we all went to church. As I mentioned above, my parents have moved to the Indianapolis area to start a church. They currently meet in a historical building called the Interurban Depot, it used to be an old train station. It's really neat, with brick walls and really high ceilings and cool windows. They had almost 30 people in their service, and that didn't count an early service that my dad held for the first time with a cheer group who left for a competition earlier that morning. I think my dad said there were about 15-20 people in that service. So it was a good morning for them! The service was awesome, totally laid back, and very inviting. One of the neat parts of it was during their Sunday school time they are learning the books of the Bible. I've grown up knowing them, but I realize that many people (my husband included) don't know them, so I think that's a great idea, considering a good number of their people are new Christians or younger kids. My siblings, plus atleast one other girl, do the praise and worship songs, and they are great. I know Christie is praying hard for someone to join their church who can play the keyboard. She would then be able to get out her drums and add them to their music, but for now they have the keyboard and 2 guitars. After church we all (all as in the majority of the people in the last service!!) went to eat at Pizza King. Now, for those of you who don't live in the Greencastle/Indy/Plainfield area, you probably haven't heard of this pizza place. I grew up getting pizzas or subs from the local Pizza King every Sunday night. It was our weekly tradition and I loved it! I've craved Pizza King ever since we moved from there and every time we go back I have to go there and eat. Their pizzas are a really thin crust and all of the toppings are chopped up really fine. They also cut the pie up into square pieces, which I think contributes to it's appeal. It was very yummy. I love the actual restaurant too. It's set up like a train station, with each booth having a window on one side that looks onto mini train tracks. The mini train actually brings you your drinks! Plus each booth has a small TV where, for a quarter, you can watch cable TV at your own booth. Pretty awesome! Especially considering we had kids with us and cartoons kept them quiet so we were able to visit and eat in peace.
Sunday afternoon was pretty quiet with all the kids down for naps and everyone else resting. My mom and I played Skip-bo, which is always a fun game. Then once the kids were up from their naps we had the Toy Party. The Toy Party is something my mom implemented way back when I was probably 7 or 8 years old. It was about 3 or 4 weeks before Christmas and of course us kids (there were 3 of us at that time) were desperate to open one of the many presents already sitting under the tree. So one Saturday my mom kicked us all out of the kitchen and we weren't allowed to come back in until she was ready. After an hour or more, she called us in and it was so cool. She had decorated the kitchen table with toys and Christmas decorations. Each of us had our place set and next to our plates was a wrapped present. My mom had made chicken nuggets and fries. My dad put on an apron and folded a towel over his arm and pretended to be a French waiter, with a silly accent and everything. We "ordered" our food and they both served us. It was a lot of fun. We then got to open our presents. (I burned my finger on a candle, but didn't tell my mom because I didn't want to ruin the fun we were having.) It became a yearly tradition up until we got married. Once we were older, we started drawing names for the toy party and exchanging presents that way instead. After us three oldest ones got married and moved out, it became a movie exchange party. Anyway, I say all of this to say that my mom is starting a new tradition where she wants to have a Toy Party for her grandkids. It won't necessarily have a Christmas theme since she knows that we all won't be around at the holidays, but whenever all of her grandkids are together she will have a Toy Party. Since this year it was close to Halloween, all of the grandkids wore their costumes. It was really cute. Garrett was a turtle, Jake was a lion, and Riley was a beauty queen/princess. They each got a few smaller presents, plus one bigger present and they all had chicken nuggets and fries served by my parents, just like always. The table was decorated really cute with a variety of different toys and we spelled out "Toy Party" with blocks. I think the kids had fun and we got some cute pictures. That night after everybody went to bed, Keith, Christie, and I all watched a movie called "Bugs" (I think) with Ashley Judd. It was really weird and not a movie I would recommend. But I enjoyed getting to spend some time with Christie and watching a movie I hadn't seen before.
On Monday my mom had to head back to work, but my dad had the day off. He took us around and showed us a variety of stuff, mainly places where they were looking into possibly buying a house in the future, or where my sister and her family might buy a house. It was fun to look around the town. We had lunch at a place called "Red Robin" which was good (all the fries you can eat) and we went by my mom's work so we could see her office. When my mom got home we visited some and then I made supper. I wanted to fix a meal at some point and had thought about doing breakfast, but there wasn't a breakfast time where everyone was available, so we just had breakfast for supper. It was fun making the meal and we had a nice evening together (minus Christie again! because of work, but we did send her a plate up there). The kids all put on their new pj's from Nana and Pawpaw and we attempted to get a few pictures of them, they weren't too cooperative, but they did have fun tackling each other and Pawpaw.
Tuesday morning we got up and prepared to head home. Of course that's always tough. On the one hand, we were ready to sleep in our own beds and not share a room with Garrett at night (he either climbed into bed with us or I ended up on the air mattress with him each night), but on the other hand, it's always very hard to leave your family. Especially since I don't get to see them very often. My dad took us to the airport on his lunch break and we said goodbye outside. That was actually a little easier. The last time I was up there my parents took me to the airport and waited with me and I cried buckets when I had to get in line for security. It didn't help that Garrett was reaching for them the whole time. It was really hard. So I'm glad I was able to avoid that, even though it's also nice to have someone seeing you off at the airport as well. Initially our flight did not have a good start. We had been sitting on the plane for about 10 minutes when the pilot comes on and says that they had to update some paperwork in the cockpit, so it would be a few minutes before we would be ready to take off. Keith and I were already on edge after our trip up there, so we were both very stressed after hearing that. But after about 15 minutes we were pushing back from the gate. After we took off and were able to turn on electronic devices, we got out the DVD player. While at my parents' we discovered that the DVD player itself worked just fine, but the battery was fried. So we went to Walmart and bought some other kind of battery-type thing where we just plugged the DVD player into it and it worked just fine. Unfortunately, Garrett remembered all of the fun he had with shoving toys inside the DVD player on the trip going there, so he wasn't really interested with sitting there and watching a movie. Somehow we managed to keep him mostly happy up until about 30 minutes before we were supposed to land. Then he snapped and decided he wanted out of his seat belt, immediately. He went into hysterics and wouldn't stop. I picked him up and held him trying to muffle his screaming with my shirt and a baby wipe, but that didn't work. After about 10 minutes (I'm not kidding) of non-stop screaming and crying, Keith took him and he got quiet and went to sleep. I'm sure our fellow passengers were hating us right about then, but honestly, what can you do? I was trying everything. Thankfully nobody said anything to Keith about holding him when we landed, and he stayed asleep up until we got our luggage. Then we had to wait for a shuttle bus to take us to the terminal where we had parked (of course we landed in a different terminal than the one we took off from, that's just Murphy's Law). After about a half hour of waiting and then riding the shuttle, we were finally at our truck. It was nice to be headed home after that horrendous display that Garrett put on in the plane. I was worn out. We got home around 6:00 on Tuesday night, Garrett was in bed by 7:00 and we were in bed by 9:30.
Garrett has been asking where everyone is now that we've been home for a day. It doesn't quite make sense to him that he was just playing with Nana and Pawpaw and now they're not here. Thankfully we will get to see them again in December when Brad and Kristen graduate. We're looking forward to that!
So after the initial insanity of our flight to Indianapolis, we did eventually make it there. My parents are currently living in an apartment while they get their church going, so we kicked my brother Jesse out of his room (thanks, Jesse!) and put a twin air mattress on the floor for Garrett. Let me just start by saying that Garrett is a wild sleeper, he thrashes and cries out in his sleep. The first night he didn't get into bed until midnight due to the crazy day spent in Memphis. Keith and I didn't sleep well due to adjusting to Garrett's weird bed antics, but we all got up Friday morning pretty well refreshed and just happy to be there. My mom had the day off for fall break, which also meant that my brother Jesse was home from school. My dad had worked extra time during the week so he was able to be off that day as well. Unfortunately my sister Christie did have to work. That morning my other sister Grace came over with her 2 kids Riley and Jake. Garrett was excited to see his cousins. Jake is only 8 months younger than Garrett, so they're becoming closer and closer the more they see each other. Us women were wanting to go shopping so we decided to bring the kids with us. This meant 3 women with 3 kids ages 4, 2, and 18 months attempting to shop in Kohl's. It took us an hour and we weren't really finished, but it was time to meet the guys for lunch. I got a good deal on a winter coat for Garrett. Yes, we live in Texas, but there are many days where it's really cold outside and I am having trouble finding a nice, thick coat for him to wear this winter, so thankfully I found one on sale there. I also had to buy him the prerequisite Indiana clothing. He already has an Indianapolis Colts jersey that my parents sent him for his 2nd birthday, and a pair of Indiana Hoosier shorts sent to him by one of my close friends who still lives there. Since I lived 9 years of my life there, I am a Hoosier fan through and through, so I bought him an IU jacket with matching pants. I'm sure everyone in Texas will love to see him wear it, but I love it so that's all that matters. I also bought myself (and my dad) an IU Christmas ornament, so I'm really excited to put that baby on the Christmas tree this year.
We then met up with the guys at Culver's. Even though we have Culver's here in Texas, Keith and I had never eaten at one before. It was really good. Since the kids weren't really cooperating with our attempts at shopping, we all ended up heading home. My mom helped me to get Garrett down to sleep for a nap and then she and I left for more shopping at Target. (Grace had gone home so that her kids would get naps as well.) Riley's birthday is next month, so I bought her birthday present while we were out with plans to give it to her before we left. It was nice to spend some alone time with my mom. We don't get to do that very often anymore, especially considering I'm the oldest of 5 kids, there are now 3 grandkids, plus 3 in-laws added to our family, so alone, quiet time is pretty rare. Friday night we ate a yummy, home-cooked meal by my mom at their apartment. Roast, mashed potatoes, all the good stuff. Friday nights are when my dad's church has Bible study (currently). So my mom stayed home with the 2 boys so they could get to bed at a decent time and the rest of us headed out to someone else's home for Bible study. It was really good. They are in the midst of discussing relationships and Friday night's lesson was focused on the parent-child relationship (namely discipline). It was very good and I learned that I definitely discipline out of anger which is something I need to work on. It was fun though because my dad was teaching the lesson and he had 4 out of 5 of his kids there, so we all enjoyed sharing our moments of discipline growing up. I think the rest of the group got a kick out of hearing our stories. Everyone was really friendly. They have a good, solid group of people that they are starting their church with.
On Saturday we all left and went our separate ways. The women and children (minus Christie again, due to working at her darn job ) headed for Greencastle. As luck would have it, my best friend since I was born, was in town visiting her family. She now lives in Florida. I haven't seen her since she got married and she now has 2 kids. Her sister was in town with her and she and my sister are best friends (weird, I know). So we all made plans to meet up at a tea room type restaurant. We obviously weren't thinking. This was 6 women with 6 kids (all under the age of 5) in a place that really wasn't meant for kids. I mean, the tables had thick pieces of glass on top of the table cloths. Unfortunately my son got a hold of some metal silverware and started banging away on the glass. Apparently the manager didn't like this, so she came and took it away from him and brought plastic instead. I honestly didn't think he was banging that hard and he wasn't being loud, but of course after she took it away from him he got hysterical and wouldn't sit there any longer. So my mom ended up holding him the rest of the meal. But all in all, we had fun, it was so nice to see Mary again and her kids are adorable. After eating we all went to a local park for an hour for the kids to play. We decided later that we should have just picked up McDonald's and eaten lunch at the park. We probably would have enjoyed ourselves a lot more.
After the park we were supposed to meet the guys at my Aunt Pat's house. She lives out in the boonies on like 50 acres. It was so pretty because there's a ton of trees and with it being fall, the leaves were turning and some had already fallen. The kids had a lot of fun playing in the leaves and the adults had a lot of fun taking pictures of them. We were able to get some really cute outdoor shots of everyone. Aunt Pat made us a nice, big homemade meal which included steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, veggies, homemade yeast rolls, etc. It was all so yummy. She always goes overboard when we all come out for a visit.
The next day was Sunday and we all went to church. As I mentioned above, my parents have moved to the Indianapolis area to start a church. They currently meet in a historical building called the Interurban Depot, it used to be an old train station. It's really neat, with brick walls and really high ceilings and cool windows. They had almost 30 people in their service, and that didn't count an early service that my dad held for the first time with a cheer group who left for a competition earlier that morning. I think my dad said there were about 15-20 people in that service. So it was a good morning for them! The service was awesome, totally laid back, and very inviting. One of the neat parts of it was during their Sunday school time they are learning the books of the Bible. I've grown up knowing them, but I realize that many people (my husband included) don't know them, so I think that's a great idea, considering a good number of their people are new Christians or younger kids. My siblings, plus atleast one other girl, do the praise and worship songs, and they are great. I know Christie is praying hard for someone to join their church who can play the keyboard. She would then be able to get out her drums and add them to their music, but for now they have the keyboard and 2 guitars. After church we all (all as in the majority of the people in the last service!!) went to eat at Pizza King. Now, for those of you who don't live in the Greencastle/Indy/Plainfield area, you probably haven't heard of this pizza place. I grew up getting pizzas or subs from the local Pizza King every Sunday night. It was our weekly tradition and I loved it! I've craved Pizza King ever since we moved from there and every time we go back I have to go there and eat. Their pizzas are a really thin crust and all of the toppings are chopped up really fine. They also cut the pie up into square pieces, which I think contributes to it's appeal. It was very yummy. I love the actual restaurant too. It's set up like a train station, with each booth having a window on one side that looks onto mini train tracks. The mini train actually brings you your drinks! Plus each booth has a small TV where, for a quarter, you can watch cable TV at your own booth. Pretty awesome! Especially considering we had kids with us and cartoons kept them quiet so we were able to visit and eat in peace.
Sunday afternoon was pretty quiet with all the kids down for naps and everyone else resting. My mom and I played Skip-bo, which is always a fun game. Then once the kids were up from their naps we had the Toy Party. The Toy Party is something my mom implemented way back when I was probably 7 or 8 years old. It was about 3 or 4 weeks before Christmas and of course us kids (there were 3 of us at that time) were desperate to open one of the many presents already sitting under the tree. So one Saturday my mom kicked us all out of the kitchen and we weren't allowed to come back in until she was ready. After an hour or more, she called us in and it was so cool. She had decorated the kitchen table with toys and Christmas decorations. Each of us had our place set and next to our plates was a wrapped present. My mom had made chicken nuggets and fries. My dad put on an apron and folded a towel over his arm and pretended to be a French waiter, with a silly accent and everything. We "ordered" our food and they both served us. It was a lot of fun. We then got to open our presents. (I burned my finger on a candle, but didn't tell my mom because I didn't want to ruin the fun we were having.) It became a yearly tradition up until we got married. Once we were older, we started drawing names for the toy party and exchanging presents that way instead. After us three oldest ones got married and moved out, it became a movie exchange party. Anyway, I say all of this to say that my mom is starting a new tradition where she wants to have a Toy Party for her grandkids. It won't necessarily have a Christmas theme since she knows that we all won't be around at the holidays, but whenever all of her grandkids are together she will have a Toy Party. Since this year it was close to Halloween, all of the grandkids wore their costumes. It was really cute. Garrett was a turtle, Jake was a lion, and Riley was a beauty queen/princess. They each got a few smaller presents, plus one bigger present and they all had chicken nuggets and fries served by my parents, just like always. The table was decorated really cute with a variety of different toys and we spelled out "Toy Party" with blocks. I think the kids had fun and we got some cute pictures. That night after everybody went to bed, Keith, Christie, and I all watched a movie called "Bugs" (I think) with Ashley Judd. It was really weird and not a movie I would recommend. But I enjoyed getting to spend some time with Christie and watching a movie I hadn't seen before.
On Monday my mom had to head back to work, but my dad had the day off. He took us around and showed us a variety of stuff, mainly places where they were looking into possibly buying a house in the future, or where my sister and her family might buy a house. It was fun to look around the town. We had lunch at a place called "Red Robin" which was good (all the fries you can eat) and we went by my mom's work so we could see her office. When my mom got home we visited some and then I made supper. I wanted to fix a meal at some point and had thought about doing breakfast, but there wasn't a breakfast time where everyone was available, so we just had breakfast for supper. It was fun making the meal and we had a nice evening together (minus Christie again! because of work, but we did send her a plate up there). The kids all put on their new pj's from Nana and Pawpaw and we attempted to get a few pictures of them, they weren't too cooperative, but they did have fun tackling each other and Pawpaw.
Tuesday morning we got up and prepared to head home. Of course that's always tough. On the one hand, we were ready to sleep in our own beds and not share a room with Garrett at night (he either climbed into bed with us or I ended up on the air mattress with him each night), but on the other hand, it's always very hard to leave your family. Especially since I don't get to see them very often. My dad took us to the airport on his lunch break and we said goodbye outside. That was actually a little easier. The last time I was up there my parents took me to the airport and waited with me and I cried buckets when I had to get in line for security. It didn't help that Garrett was reaching for them the whole time. It was really hard. So I'm glad I was able to avoid that, even though it's also nice to have someone seeing you off at the airport as well. Initially our flight did not have a good start. We had been sitting on the plane for about 10 minutes when the pilot comes on and says that they had to update some paperwork in the cockpit, so it would be a few minutes before we would be ready to take off. Keith and I were already on edge after our trip up there, so we were both very stressed after hearing that. But after about 15 minutes we were pushing back from the gate. After we took off and were able to turn on electronic devices, we got out the DVD player. While at my parents' we discovered that the DVD player itself worked just fine, but the battery was fried. So we went to Walmart and bought some other kind of battery-type thing where we just plugged the DVD player into it and it worked just fine. Unfortunately, Garrett remembered all of the fun he had with shoving toys inside the DVD player on the trip going there, so he wasn't really interested with sitting there and watching a movie. Somehow we managed to keep him mostly happy up until about 30 minutes before we were supposed to land. Then he snapped and decided he wanted out of his seat belt, immediately. He went into hysterics and wouldn't stop. I picked him up and held him trying to muffle his screaming with my shirt and a baby wipe, but that didn't work. After about 10 minutes (I'm not kidding) of non-stop screaming and crying, Keith took him and he got quiet and went to sleep. I'm sure our fellow passengers were hating us right about then, but honestly, what can you do? I was trying everything. Thankfully nobody said anything to Keith about holding him when we landed, and he stayed asleep up until we got our luggage. Then we had to wait for a shuttle bus to take us to the terminal where we had parked (of course we landed in a different terminal than the one we took off from, that's just Murphy's Law). After about a half hour of waiting and then riding the shuttle, we were finally at our truck. It was nice to be headed home after that horrendous display that Garrett put on in the plane. I was worn out. We got home around 6:00 on Tuesday night, Garrett was in bed by 7:00 and we were in bed by 9:30.
Garrett has been asking where everyone is now that we've been home for a day. It doesn't quite make sense to him that he was just playing with Nana and Pawpaw and now they're not here. Thankfully we will get to see them again in December when Brad and Kristen graduate. We're looking forward to that!
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