Our wedding baker has a website...

...and our cake is on the home page. Cool.

http://cakeofchattanooga.com/

My first Christmas!

This first pic was from October. The last two with Mom are from today. Hannah is such a cutie!

Love actually...is...all around.

Merry Christmas, everyone! Ahem. Excuse me. Happy Christmas, everyone!

We've had a pleasant holiday. We returned home this evening and opened presents. Ben gave me the biggest surprise. I said to him a few weeks ago in my 500 mph way, "I want this bag - it's Vera Bradley, you can get it at the grapevine in the mall, it's the diaper bag in the navy and green paisley - I want it to replace my gym bag." Somehow, even tho I was going at full throttle and said that all in approimately 1.3 seconds, my amazing husband remembered...and I opened (amongst other things) my navy and green paisley vera bradley diaper (new gym) bag. yay! he's so cool. love the hubby.

Pre Vera Bradley gym bag, we made a big triangle. Went to Nashvillage on Sunday afternoon. Somehow managed to hurt the knee in a furniture store - have no idea how - and hope will be able to run tomorrow. Keeping fingers crossed. Anyway - so played games with the fam which was fun. Xmas eve did lunch with the fam and ben and dad dorked out to Forbidden Planet. Then we made our way to M-town. Had lunch with the in laws today before coming home. All around a fairly good christmas.

Oh, yeah, ben and i bought an rc helicopter and rc truck on Saturday night - ben has had so much fun with the new toys. Mika is not pleased. :-)

So, yeah, the christmas Love Actually watching ritual once again took place this evening. We can almost recite it by heart now.

Anyway, should post some pics of the lovely Hannah! She is so incredibly cute now. We saw her back in October for the anniversary celebration for Mac'r and she was starting to walk behind rolly toys at that point. She's still trying now...tip-toeing and needing finger support but getting there. She'll be on her way soon.

So there you have it - a summary of xmas festivities in the life of the S-C household.

Sooooo...

...Nothin' much goin' on. Got to hang out with my MIL yesterday which was cool. She got us a gift certificate to an art gallery last year for Christmas and we hadn't been able to use it so she and I went yesterday.

Had lunch at a cute teahouse.

Is it scary that I'm really liking the Miley Cyrus song? :-) I have xm so I don't know what gets played on the regular stations, so it may be another Miley song by now (sometimes XM is really ahead of everyone else and sometimes it's really behind.) So, yeah, anyway, "See You Again" is the one I like...putting it on my mp3 player today I think.

Also love "Dream Catch Me" (Newton Faulkner), "Flourescent Adolescent" (Arctic Monkeys), "When Did Your Heart Go Missing" (Rooney), "Shadow of the Day" (Linkin Park), and "No One" by Alicia Keys. All good stuff. AK's voice is just amazing.

So, yeah, it's Christmas and I'm not sure if we'll do a tree or not this year. Ben comes home today (YAY!) - this was a surprise early return, so I'm super excited. We hadn't planned on doing one since he was not supposed to be back for some time, but maybe now we will. We're not going to be selfish this christmas - we're actually going to be with family this year and not on some trip somewhere like we had originally planned (we were thinking Whistler Blackcomb - just north of Vancouver since we've never been but maybe another time). I think it has made both sides very happy which is cool....but it will be a lot of driving in a very short amt of time. Ben and I had both experienced the craziness of trying to accomodate 2 families in past relationships and neither of us was keen on it in our relationship together. But, this year there are special circumstances.

Work is crazy right now...and so is regular life...there is so much on the "to do" list for both...and I have no clue how to get it all accomplished. I really need to hire some help for my regular life. Especially since something always seems to go wrong and it just puts me even more behind. I had this one weird week a couple of weeks ago where everything broke all at once. First it was the iron....then my hairdryer. Then I ripped the silk lining in the sleeve of my black jacket. 20 seconds later, I picked up my carryon bag and the handle broke off. It continued on all week...I can't even remember all of the things that broke. So, that really set me back...trying to replace things. Also, had to take Mika to the vet to get his teeth cleaned...really scheduled that at the worst time. Poor guy...he was a cheap drunk and had to stay the night to get off the drugs. I was so lonely without him. :-( Thankfully this past week went much better, but I'm still so behind on things. And loads to do today and what am I doing? Blogging. Silly Stacey.

Oh, so I bought the most amazing LBD so I hope we have a formal Christmas party to attend or New Year's...or something! If not, we'll just have a dress uppy Stacey's birthday, I guess.

So, yeah...Wow. Birthday. Hm. Not sure what I think about this one yet. I was cool about it, but then I went out last weekend. Hehe. That changed my mind about things. But, oh, maybe we'll get to go skiing...that would be cool. I'm just itching to go. Must discuss with husband. Always hated the day that is my b'day since it's always so cold (and that total lack of enthusiasm from friends and family since it's so close to the holidays doesn't really help), but since we love to ski it has become a good reason to make a trip somewhere. Which in turn might help the segueway. So, maybe I'm not a cute 24 year old anymore, but I can afford so much more, including last minute ski trips. Hehe. That's consolation isn't it?

So glad Ben is coming home....I've missed him...

Bienvenido a Miami!

So, we had a great (warm!!!) Thanksgiving trip to Miami this weekend. Thankfully, we had excellent weather - sunny & low 80's daily. But, wow...travel today out of MIA was insane. Insane. I don't know if I want to do a return on the Sunday post T-giving again (Denver last year was nowhere near as crazy). 2.5 hrs early and was pretty much darting up to the very last moment. Big sigh when I sat down on that plane. Ugh. Turbulence on flight to Chatty was pretty creepy. Glad to be on ground again - and I'm not usually a frightened flyer by any means.

Didn't take many pics this trip, but might post one or two when I have a chance.

Oh! We had sad news over the trip...the Elph has kicked the bucket. That poor camara has really gotten an insane amount of use over the years and deserves a good rest. :-) Thankfully, I bought the awesome Sony for the UK trip...but may buy another Elph. I love having a tiny camara in my purse at all times...you never know what you'll come across that's just dying to have its photo taken. (Or when you just have to sneak a pic of Ben drinking coffee on the tube like a proper Londoner without anyone noticing :-) )

Sad news in Miami - Kimora, the singer at the National, moved to Turkey. We were sad...we really enjoyed her last time we were there.

Walking down the boardwalk we came across a gay guy bash. It was funny. Very cut men in very small speedos running around everywhere. There were hundreds in one big group dance session (the music was quite good actually) towards the center - all moving in one semi naked wavelike motion. Quite interesting. We didn't see anything like that in Key West (or Brighton).

Other than that, we mostly just hung out on the beach and at the tiki bar. It was such a good time...relaxing. People in Miami are nice...and beautiful. Hehe. Must go for a run tomorrow.

An unlucky week...

First a sprained ankle & now a sinus infection. :-(

I guess I'm just going to put the treat bags outside as I don't want to make the entire neighborhood of children sick tonight. That also gets a :-( since I love seeing the kids in their costumes. Oh, well, there's always next year.

Oh. I almost forgot...as Kenny whatever his name said last night, Sabrina got Cheet-tahed. There's no point in even watching dancing now...no one else is any good.

Shower for the twins!

I was having camara malfunctions, so unfortunately, these aren't the best pics. :-( But we did have a great time and the cake from Vine Street was sinfully good.

Opening presents!

Me with the 2 pregnant ladies

Some pics from our trip to Chi-town last month...

Does it show that I come from the poor school district of Davidson County when I say at this age, "I didn't know Chicago had a river!"

:-)

Serious Michigan Avenue shopper...

:-) Looks like I'm taking notes for class or some such....

My crazy weekend...

Ok. So. I decided that since the house hasn't sold and it didn't look as though the house would be selling anytime soon, that I wanted to make the house the way I want it to be - have always wanted it to be. For some reason, the lovely builder of the house put wallpaper in the baths. Hello. Who puts wallpaper in a house that is built in the 2000's? Geez. Anyway, it never bothered Ben but has always aggravated me...so I finally convinced him that if we are going to stay in the house since it hasn't sold, we should at least improve it to our standards. So...we hired the fellows that pressure washed the house in the spring to come remove the wallpaper. I also decided to have the baths tiled while we're at it. So, yeah - maybe not the most brilliant thing to do all at once...especially for someone who is as insanely crazy about the house being *perfect* at all times as I am.

So. They show up on Monday afternoon 1 hour late of course. Take down some wallpaper in 1 bath. Leave and can't come back until Saturday. They say they'll show up at 9 and again are EXTREMELY late...but I'm still ok....even though this is now the 4th time they have been late to my house. They start working. What happened first? Hm. I believe it was every smoke detector in my entire house going off all at once bec they were using some equipment in the house that apparently produced too much smoke. Finally get those to stop. Whew. That was loud. And obnoxious. Then, a neat thing happened while on the phone with Mom. An older fellow showed up who was interested in the house who thought that we had moved out and that he could just walk in while some workers were there...but he ran into me instead. (He said, "I finally found your house again! I've been searching for it for weeks now." Apparently, he had driven by and when he tried to bring his wife back, couldn't find it again.) Anyway, his wife was in the car and I let them look around - they were very sweet and seemed enthusiastic about the house...but they said they had to sell theirs first, though, so we'll see. We might be here for another year with the way the market is right now. So back to tiling. Suddenly, everything comes to a halt. I ask - through a difficult language barrier - what's going on. They can't find the tile I picked out. Right. No reason to ensure that they have access to it when I pick it out. Makes total sense. Hand me some tile and say "pick one", then discover you have no access to it. Brilliant. So, I have the smart idea that we don't have to use the specific tile that I picked out - and say I'll meet the one searching for it and pick another. Leave tilers & huge mess at house while go out to pick new tile. Chemistry with the tile seller thankfully got us a discount, bec picked new tile that goes very well but more expensive. Return home. Bird in house. (Poor thing, it was so scared). Get bird out of house and clean up bird poop. Things calm down. Finally they all leave around 7pm, house still a wreck, tile laid but not grouted & walls still a huge mess. Unsure if I can walk on tile that isn't grouted. Oh, yeah. They were actually going to leave without putting a toilet back in place...I almost forgot about that part...so I made them put one back in and then they left. Thanfully, I noticed it. Hehe. That would have been interesting.

Today things are looking up. They have just about completed one bath and I have to say that the tile is absolutely gorgeous. I can't wait until the room is painted. I only wish we had done this a year ago like I wanted.

They did show up about 30 mins late again today. I was very disappointed in them bec I had made it a point to keep reiterating that they would be here at the specified time. One fellow showed up on time, but the rest came rolling in much later. I was not pleased. So, I actually told the ringleader that he needed to come when he said he was going to come and that customers expect and appreciate punctuality. I was shocked that I had to tell someone older than me these things.

Sometimes the language barrier is cute. One fellow asked me, "How many years do you have?" and made a wide gesture. I said, "Oh, we've owned the house for about 4 years." hehe. Then he said, "No, how many years do you have?" and pointed at me. That was cute. He told me he had 33 years.

I was hoping that this whole thing would be done before next weekend as we have some events to attend, but I'm not sure it will. I CANNOT wait for this warzone to get cleaned up. Poor Mika hasn't eaten anything in 2 days and hid under the chair for most of yesterday afternoon - I felt so bad for him. But he'll appreciate the beauty of the tile, right? :-)

So not a good writer - was telling Ben the whole story and we were just "hee-hawing" as he always says...but I just reread through this and it sounds rather bitchy (plus I left out the funny stories I have from my conversation with mom). I don't really mean for it to - the whole thing was rather comical, except for the not having access to the tile issue (and thus having to pay more - but not as much as we would have without friendly tile guy who pinky swore with me on the tile that I picked). And the tile and walls do look lovely. I just can't wait to be able to enjoy my new & improved house (and not feel like an outsider in it!) We're not going to want to move.

For Amber!

1. Who is your man? Ben
2. How long have you been together? nearing 4 years
3. How long dated? Just under 2 years of dating before 9 mo's of being engaged & 1 year married - whoohoo! Go us! I'm so proud. There were times I didn't think we'd get this far, but things are WONDERFUL now. I really do <3 my husband.
4. How old is your man? Will turn the big 3-0 shortly...like we can seriously start counting the hours it's so close
5. Who eats more? Me probably. But who takes in more calories via alcohol is another question altogether :-)
6. Who said "I love you" first? I don't remember - is that bad? hehe. Probably me. But Ben told me he wanted to marry me about 3 or 4 mo's into it.
7. Who is taller? Ben (see the pic for the blog...I'm a shorty)
8. Who sings better? BEN! heehe. I'm the worst singer ever.
9. Who is smarter? Um...this is a tricky question to answer. We'll just say that I've always performed better on tests, but I have no mechanical sense whatsoever. "babe...can you fix this for me?" is a common question in our household. But I teach him about the Revolutionary War, art and even finance sometimes. :-)
10. Whose temper is worse? Mine - poor ben. But I'm getting better...marriage teaches you to not sweat the small stuff
11. Who does the laundry? If my husband knew that certain items didn't need to be dried, he could go for it...however, he refuses to learn what doesn't need to be dried so that he doesn't ever have to do it. hehe. Maybe he's smarter than I give him credit for. :-)
12. Who takes out the garbage? Ew. Ben. Unless he's in that other country, then I'm forced to
13. Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Me! But Ben says i'm in the middle. :-)
14. Who pays the bills? Ben pays the shared ones and we have individual ones - even though we're married we still have separate accounts. We're looking into this whole thing - maybe we should work toward big goals together. Must hire financial planner soon.
15. Who is better with the computer? I wouldn't have this blog without ben's help :-)
16. Who mows the lawn? The kid down the street
17. Who cooks dinner? Um, people cook? Hehe. We used to do Sunday dinners together, but that has fallen by the wayside with our erratic schecules
18. Who drives when you are together? Ben - except for when I pick him up at the airport - poor baby, he's usually too tired
19. Who pays when you go out? This has flipflopped over the years, but my wonderful husband usually does now
20. Who is most stubborn? Oh, boy, that's a dead tie right there. But I have to admit that usually it's ben that says, "I don't want to fight about this, let's talk it over." I'm learning.
21. Who is the first to admit when they are wrong? Me! Ben would NEVER admit he is wrong, even when I show him the proof!
22. Whose parents do you see the most? Um...I'm not sure...that's probably about even...we usually independently see our folks without the other just because that's how it works out.
23. Who kissed who first? Good lord I hate to admit this, but I think I kissed ben...although he says that it was a mutual thing. At Big River while playing pool. Hehe. So. Tacky.
24. Who asked who out? Ben asked me out - I thought he was a jerky frat guy and wasn't expecting the phone call. Actually, when he said, "This is Ben", I thought it was another Ben I knew..hehe...I couldn't figure out why that Ben was asking me out.
25. Who proposed? Ben. Boston. NYE. In the Westin Copley Place Bar. To cheers & free drinks. :-) Good memory.
26. Who is more sensitive? Me - I'm an ESFP, Ben's a INTJ - the Myers Briggs tester told us we would never make it! (notice that we share no letters)
27. Who has more friends? Me - Ben is pretty introverted normally, hence the INTJ
28. Who has more siblings? Ben - his 2 versus my 1
29. Who wears the pants in the family? Ummmm...I guess it's an ebb and flow kind of thing - one day I'm being chastised but the next it's ben who's screwing up.

Thanks, Amber for "tagging" me! Hope you guys had a great time at the wedding last night - I hate it that I couldn't go (see future blog for explanation). Email me (do you have it?) and let's all hang out again so I can lust over you & Shanon's houses! :-)

Can you believe it's been a year already?

So we did our anniversary in Chi-town this weekend. Did one of those Brazilian meat places for dinner last night - I had never done that before, although Ben had tried it in Shanghai. Brazzaz or some such. I've seen Fogo in Buckhead and always wanted to try it, but never have. I dunno if Brazzaz is a chain or not. Anyhoo, we had amazing weather so that was cool and did a piano bar...which was, um, interesting. Very smoky. Yuck. Dry cleaner's dream as Ben called it. This was not the most interesting or fun trip we have taken. I know that sounds bratty to those who don't know me (and only two people in this world know why I wasn't keen on this trip, Ben being one) but we'll just say it was the equivalent of "I'm sorry" flowers for broken promises and general insensitivity.

So, anyway, happy 1 year to us. I guess we're not "newlyweds" any longer.

Oh...I had the top tier of our wedding cake remade and they actually let me carry it on. I wasn't aware that you could bring food on like that. Anyway, so the cake made it safely and I even remembered the cake "jewelry" (although, the flowers were all broken off of their stems in my checked luggage, damn AA) and I had the Anna Griffen plates and napkins that matched our invites (the prettiest ever, of course) for us to eat it on. It was sweet.

Ben is watching Ken Burn's WWII documentary and I just can't take it. I just can't. Anything WWII horrifies me. And they're not even showing anything about the concentration camps. I grew up with a mother who has some sick interest in concentration camps and I have seen too many images of naked frames thrown in pits for burning. Too many.

Lovely

There's a typhoon headed straight for Shanghai.

Someone asked..

..what I'm running to these days...so here's the latest playlist (in no particular order):

Amy Winehouse, You Know I'm No Good, Rehab
Carrie Underwood, I'll Stand By You
Bjork, It's Oh So Quiet
Everything But the Girl, Missing
Dashboard Confessional, Stolen
Corinne Bailey Rae, Put Your Records On
Lily Allen, Alfie
Mika, Love Today
Quietdrive, Time after Time
Ok Go, Here it Goes Again
Fleming and John, That's All I Know
Christina Aguilara, Candyman
Dixie Chicks, Sin Wagon
Timbaland, The Way I Are
John Legend, PDA (We Just Don't Care)
Cake, Stickshifts and Safety Belts
Various Shins & Postal Service

Anyway, these are what's getting me through runs these days.

Jess's shower at work! (and for Andre, too)

Love the dress!

Isn't Evan cute?

Crazy rock climbers...

I clicked just a second too soon - wish I had him further in his fall.

Viva la Mika!

I don't need the cheese or the car keys, boy I like you just the way you are!

So. Not much going on around these parts. Well, work has been incredibly busy and somewhat stressful as of late and not looking to let up until around Christmas.

Oh, yeah - I've been working with a physical trainer. Wow. In only a few short weeks, there has been a remarkable change.

This is why I'm so busy these days - I've gone from 3 workouts per week to 6.

Jess's shower is coming up! Yay!

Oh....and we're going to Chicago. And maybe another trip to the UK (a short one for me).

Um. I like silence in the house. Ben likes NPR. I'm ok with NPR when I'm driving, but I like silence in the house. We must compromise.

Ok...should probably get moving - always tons to do on Saturdays and Sundays, isn't there?

We used to close down bars...

...now we close down Babies R Us.

Hehe.

We got Jess registered for the twins on Friday night! Wow...I didn't know how expensive babies were. I mean, I knew that I couldn't have a kid when I was 20, but I didn't realize how much it would affect our lifestyle if we were to become pregnant now...which we don't wish to be...and won't be for quite some time (if ever).

I ordered Chinese takeaway last evening and when I picked it up the girl said, "Takeaway?" rather dumbly but at the same time with a smirk. Poor thing. Maybe one day she'll get out of Chattanooga.

Ben is home! Yay! But he has been very sick. Poor thing. He did seem to feel better today though.

I really like that Propel "Under Pressure" commercial - it just played - and I agree wholeheartedly that running is a great stress reliever...although I think (now) that yoga and pilates are a bit better.

Speaking of, I think I'll pop in a pilates DVD before I head off to bed. *YAWN*

A man said to the universe:

"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."

So, anyway...what's going on?

Nothing much outside of the normal here.

Oh, we had a horrible offer on the house and I'm slightly irritated with the waste of my time.

I think I feel a cold sore coming on.

I realized the other day that the walls of my cubicle say a lot about me. Isn't it interesting how someone could know so much about you just by walking by your workplace?

Not that anyone would be interested in knowing anything about me.

Sooooo...things are busy. Not much time these days. But feeling good.

Oh, saw an old high school friend this week - that was cool. Hadn't seen him in over 11 years. Crazy. Anyway, it was funny - we both kept trying to think of people that we keep in touch with, but everytime we would start to say, "Oh! I talked to..." we would realize it was a college person.

And there's not much to say.

My husband's way of fighting the crazy early morning sun in the UK

And last, a special thanks to Tom Tom for helping us navigate our way through the country. I will never understand how you're supposed to know where you are when no roads have names...but somehow Tom Tom does. She worked great (and even rerouted us when she knew there was a men's soccer game going on in the Cockfield town center). Unfortunately, I was never able to get a good pic of Tom Tom...but she'll remain in our memories forever. Tom Tom, we'll always have Felsham....

Random...

Eating!

For some reason, we ate a lot of Italian and a lot of sandwiches from little Italian looking shops while in the UK. Plus, a couple of fish and chips. Everything was yummy...including the canneloni we picked up at Waitrose (the "expensive store" from what we hear.) Oh, yeah, and of couse we hit the Felsham pub twice - and sat at the bar. I'm sure we were the talk of the town - those crazy Americans that want to eat at the bar?!

Harrod's Food Halls were absolutely amazing - we were like kids in a candy shop. I won't even say how much our lunch there was...but well worth the experience. Yummy gelato, too.

Liverpool Street Station was a source of food, too, strangely enough. The Upper Crust supplied me with lots of hot chocolate and several shared sandwiches for Ben and I. By the time we made it into the station, we were usually starved and running late...so it was a good option. Oh, it was also the source of this terrible doughnut - the English just don't seem to understand that you need to put sugar in pastries - and who knows why Ben picked up this horrible looking meal. Yuck!

We also ate Sultana Bran - what the heck are santanas? Raisins. Right.

What the heck's Brown Sauce? I dunno, but I'm scared to try it. :-)

These chips were awesome - took pic so I can look them up online - hope to find them in the States somewhere.

And then there was the over 900 year old cathredral at Norwich

Cute town.

Brighton was freezing! (But there were still people in the water...)

Crazy Brits...

We <3 English pubs!