winter road

Even though this road of ours is now barely a road - it's been washed out by all this miserable rain we've been having - I still wanted to post this picture that we took a couple weeks ago because it's so pretty.

longest month ever

I'm so glad February is here. I thought January would never end. It just seemed to drag on and on and on. I guess that's normal - the letdown after everything that goes on during Christmas and New Years, the dreary weather (we've actually had more rain than snow - yuk), nursing a couple sick/recovering kittens (they were both spayed on the same day) and we had a couple personal not-so-happy moments during the month that made it even worse. But with all the bad things that have happened recently, we have been able to do some fun things too - the concert mentioned a couple posts ago, my first ever youth group retreat (pretty sad when you're the "leader"), the Super Bowl party and enjoying the Patriots' loss, and baking a Barbie cake for my aunt's birthday.


The representatives from Greene Valley PCA at the Pittsburgh Presbytery Senior High Snow Camp in Ligonier, PA.

















The cone-heads.

















My homemade Super Bowl cookies. This is the 3rd year I've had to make Patriots helmets since I started doing this in 2004, I'm so sick of it.

















We got to watch the big game through the lens of a projector on Andrew's living room wall. It was so awesome, unlike this photo. The picture was perfectly clear and did I mention huge?! I think it was about 8' x 10'. If you look very closely, you can see me to the right of the "screen", the players were bigger than life-size.

















The Gone with the Wind inspired Barbie cake.

ugh!

I just updated my template (as you can see) and all my links to friends' blogs and other cool sites have been deleted! ugh!!

Reba & Kelly Clarkson

We got to go to this awesome concert Saturday night at the coliseum at WVU. Bobby surprised me with these tickets in late November. It was so cool to see a legend, Reba, and an American Idol, Kelly, on the same stage. And they sang together all night. We thought they would perform one at a time, then sing a couple songs together, but that wasn't the case - it was great! Our camera doesn't take great photos far away at night, but here are a couple pictures anyway.

Sister-lovin'

They love to cuddle up together in the tiny little bed I made them, in front of the fireplace.

The story of 6 Christmases

Isn't it sad that we count Christmases by the number of times gifts are opened? It is, but since I consider myself immersed in today's culture, I'm going to keep that for the title of this blog post. So here we go.

Christmas #1 (Oklahoma)
Christmas Eve - we gathered with Bobby's dad's family at Nanny's house for food (another reoccurring theme) and presents. We didn't really open any presents here, just watched everyone else; but we did later that night, so I combined them together.



Christmas #2 (Oklahoma)
Christmas Morning - the 5 of us (Bobby, me, Mindy, and Bobby's parents) opened presents from/to each other. It was a great morning. We got great gift cards, had tons of fun giving great gifts, and everyone enjoyed it. Then we ate signature sugar cookies. Don't we all look smashing in our matching flannel pants made by Nanny?



Christmas #3 (Oklahoma)
Christmas Day - today the festivities included Bobby's mom's family. There were about 21 people in attendance, lots of presents, a ton of fudge, and 3 turkeys! (and yes, Bobby got to smoke 2 of them)



Christmas #4 (Pennsylvania)
December 28 - Bobby and I finally got to exchange gifts between the two of us. I got an awesome pair of cowboy boots (that I picked out in Oklahoma), Reba's new Duets cd (since we are going to her concert in a couple weeks), and a cool new journaling ESV Bible. Bobby got a laptop chiller, the Perfect Pushup, 3 flash drives, 2 dvds, and a bunch of other little stuff that I can't remember right now. Surprisingly, no food was involved with this Christmas.



Christmas #5 (Pennsylvania)
December 29 day - The Hammond Christmas (my dad's family) here in our cabin! We got to use our china (including the awesome Christmas china that Aunt Lori got us) for the first time. There were 11 people here, including my cousin Becky's boyfriend - this was our first meeting with him. ooooooo. We had a fabulous brunch for our formal meal and then opened presents for about 3 hours, it was so much fun!




Here we all are:
Christmas #6 (Pennsylvania)
December 29 night - our last Christmas, the grand gift exchange with my parents. My mom way overdid herself again, but we are very grateful! We got an cool iHome thingy for our iPod, two really nice stadium/canoe seats (Currie will appreciate that since we borrowed his a couple times), our most expensive pair of sheets ever, a couple shirts (those are mine, not bobby's), gift cards, money for Bobby's deer head mounting, Dancing with the Stars PS2 game! (bobby's really excited about this...haha), and our favorite, Guitar Hero III!! What does that say about us? We got the same gift as the kids in our Youth Group. I think it says we are cool and young at heart! :-)


And of course, no Christmas of ours would be complete without pictures of our animals opening their gifts. So here are the kittens and Bunny. The turtles enjoyed some fishies a couple weeks ago.





The end!

Fiesta Bowl - WVU vs OU

Tonight is the big game... old school versus new school. Bobby's hometown school vs his current school. Childhood vs adulthood.

It's Oklahoma vs West Virginia.

We stocked up on our Tostito's snacks (chips, salsa, and queso) and we'll be eating quesadillas. And of course, we will be wearing these:

Notice how they are different, yet still both neutral (not favoring either team). One shirt was purchased in Oklahoma, the other in West Virginia.

Even Bunny is torn... look here and here.

Our trip down south

You wore that?

We had the privilege to go to a family wedding in Atlanta last weekend, it was a great time. This was my first real trip to HOTlanta; I've been through the airport a couple times, including my layover to South Africa a couple years ago, but this was the first time I got to actually do stuff there. We drove all day Thursday, then Friday a few of us went to Coca Cola and CNN, did the whole tour and everything, they were pretty interesting (even though I hate Coke). Friday night was the "rehearsal dinner." That is in quotes because there wasn't actually a rehearsal, just dinner. And the dress was casual, but once you see the picture, you're notice that this isn't our typical casual (especially now that we live on a farm!) But it was fun to dress up and pretend we're trendy and chic. Saturday us girls went shopping at Highlands and Atlantic Station, which were great. I couldn't believe I wasn't wearing a coat all day on December 8th! Then Saturday night was the wedding, which was black-tie optional. Bobby wore a black tie, but not the full tux. Seems like we hit it right on the nose... Everyone over 40 wore tuxes and everyone in their 30's wore suits. I think we all looked pretty snazzy.

Reunited and it feels so good

Sunday there was a brunch, also sort of dressy, and then it was good-bye Atlanta and hello Aiken! We got to go see the Spencers and spend a few hours with them, it was so great. Something funny happened on the way to their apartment, we got caught in the Aiken Christmas parade! I guess you had to be there, but it was hilarious to me, because I wasn't expecting any traffic, thinking it wasn't a huge town, so we were shocked when it took nearly 30 minutes just to get through downtown. But anyway, we finally got there and had a wonderful time. Eva entertained us the entire time, we were so amazed at how much she has come out of her shell since St Louis. The funniest part was when we were showing them pictures on our laptop and we pulled up pictures of Bobby's (dead) deer and Eva got so happy & excited, she was laughing hysterically... so cute and naive.

Armpit of North Carolina

We made the rest of our drive home on Monday after spending two hours in a store called JR in Statesville, NC. Apparently the locals think this place is a dump, but us northeners thought it was awesome! Ok, not awesome, there was a lot of junk there, but it definately was a neat little place to stop. Now we're back in PA and trying to dry out from all the rain that we've been having lately. But more snow may be on the way tomorrow!!!

Giving Thanks... all week long

We all know that the Thanksgiving should not just be a one day celebration, it should be a constant state of mind. Well, in light of that, we extended it to an entire week.

Thursday morning began with the Youth Group sponsored pancake breakfast and worship service. Bobby has a copy of the liturgy on his blog. We had a wonderful turnout, close to 50 people I think. We all had a great time and were very encouraged by the support of our church. Of course there were lots of grumbles due to the early starting time (everyone was there to start cooking at 6:30!) but after we brought out the Rockstars, everyone was good spirits. It was a fun time of working together, serving the church and community, and reflecting on all we have to be thankful for. "Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good. His love endures forever."

Thursday evening we went out to dinner at the Century Inn with friends and family. Such notable guests of the Inn include LaFayette and Andrew Jackson. I had a delicious turkey dinner and Bobby had salmon.

Then it was off to bed early to get up early for Black Friday shopping. My mom was disappointed that I wasn't willing to get up at 3 or 4, 5:15 was the earliest that these eyes open up. We didn't get some of the fantastic deals we were hoping for, but we did get a good start on shopping.

Then the big day finally came, Saturday, the day we have our big family dinner. As usual, it was quite a feast and a wonderful time of visiting with family and friends. We had 16 in attendance. (not at our cabin, but over at my aunt and uncle's big house in the dining room designed for Thanksgiving dinner)



Sunday is the day when the hunters begin arriving for the first day of buck, Monday - a state holiday in Pennsylvania.

I originally thought Monday was just Bobby's big day (hunting) but since he didn't get anything, it was unfortunately a disappointment for him. But not for me. I got invited to go to the Steelers Monday night football game! It was a lousy game and the weather was miserable. But we were sitting in the club level, so we stayed warm & dry. That's definately the way to go. (If you can afford the tickets.)

Birthday

Last weekend (the weekend before my birthday), my family had a surprise party for me here at the farm. This past weekend, Bobby and I went to Pittsburgh. We did a little shopping downtown Saturday afternoon, then drove through some not-so-good neighborhoods to find Trader Joe's where I stocked up on a few bags of my favorite pretzel thins, had dinner at Church Brew Works - cool place!. I had a nice Pittsburgh-style salad (which means there were fries on it) and Bobby ate chicken & crawfish etoufee.





































We then drove to the North Hills to go to Target to get Bobby a Troy Polamalu jersey, and then ended up at the condo downtown to sleep. Sunday morning we woke up early and walked all the way over to Station Square to have the world famous brunch at the Grand Concourse. It was amazing. A few items on the brunch include: prime rib, smoked salmon, shrimp, homemade donuts, made-to-order omelets, Belgian waffles, and bananas foster! Then we hopped on the Gateway Clipper boat to be shuttled over to Heinz Field for the Steelers game.

The boat was full of black & gold.



















Stiller fans unloading.




















We took a gamble here and lost unfortunately. We didn't have any tickets and were planning on getting them from scalpers. What we weren't prepared for were the outrageous prices they were asking. We had what we thought was a lot of cash on us (mostly birthday money) but it turned out that we barely had enough for ONE ticket!! They were asking over 4 times the face-value price of the tickets. And we just couldn't do it... Even if we had that much cash on us, we couldn't spend it all on tickets. Even though I really wanted to go to that game. It was Browns vs Steelers! One of the greatest football rivalries ever. And we were right there, standing outside the stadium. So, sadly we had to walk back to the condo and watch the game on tv, while we could see Heinz Field out the window. It was painful, but we still enjoyed it. Whew, it was a close one! But fortunately the Steelers pulled it out at the end and won a good one for me.

This is where I wanted to be!




















But... rather than watching it from inside the stadium (in the rain) we saw it from this comfy couch.



















We left the city as soon as the game was over and got back in time for youth group. Where they had a little birthday cake for me and sang happy birthday.