Rainy Season

It's been quite rainy and stormy recently which I LOVE!! The only down side to having it rain so much is that it does funny things to our house. During the summer the back corner of the house connected to the laundry room started sinking. So then the door from the kitchen to the laundry room kept getting stuck. At one point I would have to run up to the door and slam into it to get it to close. Trying to get it open was near impossible too. Then our lovely landlords came over and shaved off part of the door so it wouldn't stick and that did the trick!
Now we have a new problem. The fireplace leaks. It started doing it one night while we were watching some show and I was getting really worried. I put a pitcher under it but Stephen said not to worry because it probably would leak that much. I probably only caught two out of every three drops but when we looked at the pitcher in the morning and it was full of water!

It's gross water too!! The funny part is that it was leaking from between the outside of the fireplace and the molding that makes up the ledge. What a random spot to leak from.

Ahh, the joys of rainy weather. I am very thankful that we have only had these minor issues to deal with. Last night Stephen took me to a meeting for the flood victims in our county. We had some massive storms on my birthday and the day before it which lead to some heavy flooding in our county and city. We had nothing bad happen to us personally but it was serious enough to be deemed a disaster by the state of Texas. Unfortunately the loss of homes and goods weren't enough to get any governmental money, so now for two months the families have had to live elsewhere while they tried to clean out their homes and hope for something to help them. Stephen went to the meeting as a representative from the city and I went to support him. It was heartbreaking to hear what these people have had to do in the meantime. Many are not able to fix up their homes without additional help but luckily it appears that help is on it's way.

Lately I've been kinda depressed about certain aspects of our situation. While things are tight here we are certainly in a better situation than these people and I am so thankful that all we have had to worry about are the leaks in our house.

October Pumpkins

I went grocery shopping and found some amazing pumpkins. I'm used to the normal variety and was surprised/excited to find these exotic ones. First up we have the Cinderella Pumpkins. There more red/orange and are very fat and squatty. So why are they called Cinderella? I'm sure that neither she or her coach were fat and squatty. Next we have Fairytale Pumpkins. Apparently greenish pumpkins that looked like they've been frosted are deemed romantic enough to be in a Fairytale. They are kinda magical looking.

And finally our assortment of miscellaneous gourds. I'm not actually sure what the sign says on this one. My two favorites have the be the brown bubbly looking one in front of the sign and the huge green one with the curved elongated neck. For some reason it reminds me of a swan.

Stephen's Birthday recap

For Stephen's birthday we drove down to Dallas which is about two hours away. We got down there and made sure we hit a Panda Express first thing. And I don't have a picture to prove it. There is no Panda Express any closer to us and Stephen misses it like no other. He really wants to try and get a Panda Express in town.
After Panda we saw a Target in the same area and so we went to buy his birthday present.

He is always waking up in the morning from headaches from our pillows and I knew I could never pick out one that would suit him so I let him choose one for himself. After looking at all the normal pillows and deciding they were too flat, Stephen went with a non-traditional arm-chair pillow. It was funny watching him try them all out and the above picture is of the winner.

Coming out of Target we happened to see this semi truck with a container full of flowers. It's sorta hard to see and for some reason was hilarious to us.

The real reason for the trip to Dallas was for Stephen to buy a new graphics card for his computer. (Actually I'm not really sure what we got but that sounds about right.) There aren't many electronics stores in town and Dallas not only has the closest Panda Express but they also have the closest Fry's Electronics. Apparently Fry's Electronics does not like it when people take pictures in store and so I don't have any documentation of the HOURS that were spent here. You know, I always have felt pretty computer savvy until I walk into a place like that and hear all the different pricey gadgets and gizmos that you can (and should) spend to place into your computer. I like things extremely user-friendly. Stephen at one point was asking for my opinion and while I am interested, I have no idea what he and the sales clerk were talking about. It sounded like alphabet soup to me and so I went with the prettier box. I'm sure that was a ton of help.

When we got home there was a package waiting for Stephen. It looked kinda funny because the address had been blacked out so many times, but I'm glad it arrived safely ;)

What could it be but a microwaveable single serving of cake! How marvelous. Thank you Pollyanna (and mom too who happened to send one earlier in her package).

We had half of a cake already from something else and so I decided to make the microwaveable one for Stephen.
I wasn't really thinking and put the candles into the cake right when it came out of the microwave and when we pulled them out they looked like this.
They did not look like this when they went in! The cake actually melted the wax and so Stephen had to be careful and only eat where the wax wasn't. Oops.

Happy Birthday Stephen!

Today Stephen turns the big 3-0! We have several things planned for today, I don't want to mention them now but hopefully I will take pictures and I'll share them later. I thought it would be fun to go through a flashback of Stephen's life. Plus it's fun to see him as a child because then it gives me ideas as to what our children will look like :)
Here is Stephen, his brother Daniel and mom and dad. I love Stephen's hair and I'm kinda hoping that our children will have platinum blonde hair like some of my nephews. Here's Stephen at the beach. And yes I will be commentating on the pictures even when it's quite obvious what you are looking at ;)
I love this picture! I'm laughing as I look at it. Stephen's the oldest holding the hose.
And here you can see his BLONDE hair. I love it!

I believe this one is at Sliding Rock in Arizona. Look at those skinny legs!
He looks like he's about the strangle his poor brother. I don't think he ever grew out of that phase.
Here he is I believe in Japan with his mom. Of course this could be one of his brothers and I just don't know the difference. I'm sure he will correct me later if I am wrong.
Here they are in Hawaii.

Stephen apparently broke his bones as as child. I never dealt with things like this and I am scared to have to go through it with our children!

Here's a more recent photo of Stephen. I was going to post some high school pictures of Stephen that we have, but they are all hard copies and I don't know how to use his scanner. Sure I could have asked him for help but I didn't want him to know what I was doing.
And here he is Christmas last year at my sister's house. I had to put at least one recent silly photo!
I love my husband and am so grateful for him.

Here's to starting a great new decade!!

Fish

Saturday we attended a fish-fry put on by Stephen's work. Now Stephen does not like fish, in fact he refuses to eat it. I on the other hand LOVE fish. Not all fish, just most things that come from the water. They served fried catfish (which was fantastic), hush-puppies, fries and hot dogs that Stephen was thankful for. It had been so long since I had last had fish that I kept thinking about it all weekend long. Right in the middle of General Conference on Sunday I had a HUGE craving for my favorite dish at Red Lobster. I could picture, taste, smell, and feel the grilled salmon in my mouth (I could taste the fork too!) with a little bit of lemon, the buttery shrimp scampi and of course the mashed potatoes(which I seriously could live off of right now).

Stephen has said that he will go with me to Red Lobster but I've never made him go because I don't want him to be grossed out!! He came home from work last night and said we were going to go on an adventure, or maybe it was just a surprise, but I had NO IDEA where we were going which is exactly what he wanted. We first went to a store that we both wanted to see and then he took me to Red Lobster. Oh my goodness I was in HEAVEN!!! But I had to get proof that Stephen was actually there and had something to eat (no fish was in it...he checked to make sure). And this is what he thought of being there.
We both had a marvelous time. (And surprisingly the salmon wasn't as good as I had imagined it, too spicy, but the shrimp and potatoes were to die for!)