Alive

No have not fallen off the face of the earth. Just life and not motivated to update this. Not sure how many people are reading now (or ever were) and with Facebook, I just don't blog. I got so behind on happenings that I guess I gave up. Maybe I will find the motivation after the holidays. Have started an exercise routine, new job and trying to finish projects I started (Mom's scrapbook that was supposed to be a Christmas present a couple years ago!).

Bird Nest

You can just barely see the light blue egg inside the nest. There are actually at least two eggs in it. I have been trying to resurrect this flower basket the past few days (I am terrible at remembering to water). Yesterday morning when I went out to water, this bird flew away but I thought it had just been perched on the edge of the basket. Then last night when I went to water it the bird flapped away like it had been nestled inside sleeping. So I asked Henry if a bird would make a nest in there and when he said definitely, I had him take it down and take a peek. He saw the nest immediately and thought there was one egg but I saw a second one (this was at 10:15pm). He didn't want to get the mama bird too worked up about us investigating so he hung it back up before I had time to run and get my camera. I did grab my phone and this was the best picture I could get. This morning I peeked out to see if I could tell if mama had come back and she had! Now I guess the flowers are going to die after all but hopefully to give life to two birds.

(PS--more posts/updates coming soon. I am off Friday and blogging is on the list of things to do.)

New Yorkers visit NC (again)

Back in November Henry's parents and Grandma came for a visit. They got here on a Friday night and left Wednesday. It was a great time. We went to the Holly Day Fair here in town on Saturday and just kind of relaxed. Went to church Sunday morning and it was such a lovely day.

Mom and Grandma reading on the balcony after church. Such a lovely day that we decided that going to the beach would be a great idea. So we booked a suite (great deal since it was offseason!) and left Monday early afternoon. We went to Ocean Isle, my favorite beach.

When we got checked in and headed out on the beach, the sunset was on one side....
and the moon on the other.
Of course too cold to go in the water although everyone but Grandma and Mom did wade in. We went out the next morning before we checked out too. Dad and Grandma were so funny looking for shells. They both left with a couple large handfuls worth!

Then we drove along the coast to Oak Island to go check out the lighthouse.



Found a plantation/gardens on the map, so continued north along the coast and went to Orton Plantation. It was very interesting but a lot of walking. Below is the main house were people actually live.

We then stopped to eat lunch and were trying to figure if there was something else we could see before heading home. We weren't far from Wilmington so thought we would head over to the USS North Carolina battleship. Turned out we were even closer than we realized and it took about 5 mins to get there. We didn't have quite enough time to see it thoroughly before they closed but it was still really fun.
Always a big grin with a gun in the hands! Or maybe the grin gets bigger the bigger the gun is??? Just wish he'd smile like that when its a picture of us together!


So a great trip! Oh, and we did take them to the Japanese steakhouse. I didn't take hardly any pictures...we had an okay chef. And poor Grandma....growing up in the Depression Era, she always finishes everything on her plate. I had told her beforehand there was no way she would ever be able to finish all the food. But she still tried! She ate more than I did, and I could tell she was past full but kept eating. She couldn't believe that she still took home enough food for 2-3 more meals. One other thing we did was Mom and I went to a formal wear shop so I could hopefully try on the bridesmaid dress for Jennie's wedding. Which I did and ordered it after we got back from the beach. I think that covers pretty much everything (only 2 months late).

The snow!!!!!!!!! The beautiful wonderful close everything down SNOW
This was at about 8am and it hasn't stopped yet.

Melting Pot

Just about gone. And now time for some silly faces.


I need to come up with a name for this face he just loves to do. Here I think we're taking this nice picture and he's making this dopey face!





So then I did it.....and wish I hadn't it because he's actually smiling.

Finally a nice one although the lighting is weird.
This restaurant is unbelievably yummy. I don't know if we would have ever gone if it weren't for a good friend giving us a gift card. We both want to go back but the price will probably keep us away for a little while. In the meantime, I am hoping to get/buy their cookbook soon!! But I'm sure it won't be as good.

God in control

The start of a new year is not very positive for me this year. It means Henry’s one year of being home is coming to an end, and he will be leaving again in a few months. It’s especially on my mind now that they are training like crazy (last week was 5am-9pm every night except Fri when he got home at almost midnight). This week they are in the field, so no contact and climbing into an empty bed alone every night. And of course every night, my thought is “I have 12 months of this to look forward to”. Ugh! The other problem is this thought that has been running through my mind like a broken record, “How many times can we push our luck?” Because this will be the 4th time he’s deployed and so far the worst thing has been this last one when he fell and broke his arm. Well it just hit me, GOD IS STILL IN CONTROL. Our professor at IWU, Dr Martin used to say that if we are true biblical Christians, words such as luck, fortune, chance, etc, cannot be part of our vocabulary. So as I sat here once again thinking “We are pushing our luck”, I realized what I was saying. That God is not in control but luck or chance is. WRONG That is not what has kept Henry safe previously and is not what will in the future! Whew. Can breathe a little easier now. Thankfully God has no limits. No limit on what He can do, to the number of times He will save us, protect us, forgive us..............

And for anybody that says this gets easier….they’re probably lying.

Steal

My most recent steal (deal):

And I LOVE IT! You probably can't tell but it's a Nine West bag. I call it an overnight bag because it's so big and you normally would have to pay $120 for it and may be able to get it for sale around $50-60. I got it for $22!!!!!

Lazy Sunday

Mac has spent most of the day this way. He only moved because Piglet jumped up and took his spot.


How I wish I had spent the entire day. It was pretty lazy but I did do dishes, some laundry and made baked oatmeal in the crockpot. Besides, I have a feeling the bum cats spend EVERY day this way, not just Sundays.

Japanese steakhouse

This place is so yummy and fun! We went for the first time and went back not even a week later it was so good. Oh and it's top on our list of places to take Mom & Dad D when they're down next week.

Home Improvement

Back in June, when Henry had the month off from work, we had planned to rip out our living room carpet and install hardwood. Here are photos.First Henry decided to tear up a small area to see what was underneath. But it meant he had to move a lot of the furniture and it wouldn't be very livable.

So just about everything got moved into the spare bedroom.

Then we decided doing it ourselves with the shape of the room and never having done it before probably would be risky, so we would pay to have it done. So this was my living space for the day while the new floor was installed.

And the poor babies spent almost every minute here:

They would come out if the noise stopped long enough but then it would start again and they were back under in a flash.



And finally......THE FINISHED PRODUCT:


WE LOVE IT!!!!!

DC trip Day 3 pics

DC trip Day 2 pics

To explain the order a little bit: we got to the Natural History Museum sometime around 2pm or so and it was PACKED! I got shoved repeatedly and got really claustrophobic trying to see the Hope Diamond. We had tickets for the International Spy Museum at 4pm so we saw just about everything and headed to the Spy Museum (which by the way, was the only one we had to pay to go through--$35 total--and was NOT worth it at all!). The Natural History Museum happened to be open until 730pm that day instead of the usual 5pm. So we hurried back about 6pm. Found a couple new areas we hadn't seen and went back to the Hope Diamond with only about 10 other people there! The entire museum had really emptied out and was much more enjoyable.

DC pics

Got the slideshow fixed, so enjoy!

DC trip Day 1

What a day! Got in about 3pm and after checking in to our hotel, headed downtown. I really did not want to have the stress of driving but Henry wanted to. So we made it down there in one piece and since we hadn't eaten since 9am, went to eat at Hard Rock Cafe. Very yummy and filling! Didn't completely finish mine and still did not eat any "supper". Then had our first incident.....a parking ticket, darn it. So we moved to a different place and headed to the International Spy Museum that was going to be closing soon so could only purchase tickets for tomorrow. This is where the second incident occurs. Both needed to use the restroom so we went in, and I had my sunglasses hanging on my shirt, bent over to flush and there goes the glasses. I thought there is no way they are going to be able to fit and reach to grab them out and touch them and they're gone! Thank goodness even though they were Fossil glasses, I only paid $10 for them and needed new ones (which I purchased in the Spy Museum gift shop for $12). So it's a great story to laugh about. Third incident came when driving home and Henry thought he could make it through a yellow light and turns out they do the red light photos. So we have a $25 parking ticket, flushed sunglasses and probably a $75 red light ticket all in just 5 hrs! We still have 2 1/2 days left here! Was trying to post a slideshow of most of the pics taken today but having problems so the one above is my favorite. Did I mention the weather was perfect?

Capitol, here we come!

I am so behind on blogging. At this point I doubt I'll post everything that I would have from the past couple months if I had stayed on top of it. But anyway.......tomorrow morning we are heading to Washington DC for a long weekend of sightseeing!! I'm SO excited!!!!!! And I figured out this afternoon it's because it is the first time in quite a while that it is a real vacation without some big stressful event (wedding/funeral/etc) and a large distance to travel and it's not a major holiday. So it should be really enjoyable. Just trying to remember not to be too crazy and get stressed out if we don't get to see/do everything! Happy weekend to all!

Anxious

Nervous excitement! We are just starting to get showers from my "namesake". (Which I keep insisting it's not because it's spelled Hanna, not Hannah!) This is the first time we have had a real threat of a hurricane since Henry and I moved here. Looks like it won't be a hurricane by the time it gets to us but still strong winds with possibility of tornadoes.

Among the living

"Hungry I is."


We are still here. At least Yoda (Mac) has proof. Hopefully some updates soon.