Eat Good, Workout Hard

Happy Halloween everybody! I hope that you are all having a great day. Except its Sunday so pretty much everyone has already celebrated their Halloween. Except here in Norman where the world revolves around football and because there was a game last night, trick-or-treaters are supposed to go out tonight. The rest of the state did their trick-or-treating last night but not Norman. So I hope we don't get any trick-or-treaters because I didn't buy a single bag of candy. I think only one kid came last year so I didn't want to end up with leftover candy, because we all know what happens when I have sweets laying around the house....I eat them. Friday night Mike and I went to a little pumpkin patch, if you can call it that. The pumpkin patches around here aren't like the ones that we are normally familiar with. To actually go to a pumpkin patch and pick out your pumpkin, you have to pay like an $8 admission fee because they have like activities and stuff that you can do. And I am not even sure if that includes the price of the pumpkin. Well I wasn't feeling like I wanted to spend that much money just to go pick out a pumpkin so we just go to this little church yard where they sell pumpkins. We went to the same place last year. Except this year, we waited way too late in the season to go and all the nasty pumpkins were left, which was kind of what I expected, so we didn't even buy pumpkins but at least we got a picture.

No craft this weekend, and with Mike spending the majority of the day at the school preparing for next weeks competition, I was able to go to the mall and to Hobby Lobby and just walk around and enjoy some alone time. Not that I need alone time, I have plenty of that. But shopping is always great to make the time go by.

Saturday nights game against Colorado didn't start until 8:15 at night. We don't really know why, but because it was Halloween weekend, plus an easy OU win, plus it was such a late game, there was a bit of a lighter crowd. It was so nice. Thank goodness the drunk people in front of us only lasted through the 1st quarter. I can't stand drunk college students. OU won 43-10. Only one more home game left for us to go to this season.....bittersweet.

My gym pass paid in full by my work starts tomorrow. I will be a full fledged member of our local YMCA. I am so looking forward to it. I may actually start running again. Mike and I ran from the stadium to the car last night, and I actually kinda missed it. Plus we all know treadmill running is much easier on the knees, so we'll see how that goes.

 

Will

Why do such awful things happen to the most wonderful people? And why do the great things happen to those who don't deserve it? My dear sweet friend gave birth to her twin boys on Monday morning at 23 weeks. She had an hour with Benson and Lincoln before they returned home to our Heavenly Father. She is so strong. I can't imagine what she is going through.

Haven't you always wondered why things like this happen? What is it that God is trying to teach us? In 5 years will we look back and understand why we had to go through so much turmoil, or will we always wonder, even when such trials have passed, why we had to experience such pain? I don't know why God does things the way he does. But I was once taught by an old friend, do not pray for things to go your way, pray that the Lord's will may also become your own, that you may better understand the things that occur in your life.

I have a good life. I have a wonderful husband, a nice home, a good job, and supportive family and friends. Things definitely don't always go my way. Some days it seems like things never go my way. But who is to say that my way is the right way. Maybe we all just need to get on our knees and ask our Father what it is that He wants us to do, be the instrument.

"To Everything There Is A Season..."

Bad bad weekend for sports.

OU....how could you let us down like that? Horrible defense and not much better of an offense. You were #1 in the nation and you choked. Lame.

Yankees. Seriously? You let the Rangers go the the World Series. And quite easily I should add. Lame.

Mike finished up his first competition this week. This one was the Moot Court competition, the same type of competition he competed in last year. As always, he did great. His team made it into the top 8 and he personally won 4th place for the speaker award. Amazing. As always.

Saturday means another craft down. Yesterday we decided to use up some of the wood that we had leftover from last week's craft and create a Thanksgiving decoration. Andrea and I went our own route and both ideas turned out so adorable. Our friend Karen joined in the festivities yesterday and made the Christmas Countdown craft that we did last week. Hers turned out great! We had a lot of fun and, as always, I am looking forward to next Saturday!

 

I heard some awful news on Friday about one of my best friends back in Utah. She is pregnant with twins and on Wednesday afternoon she went into pre-term labor at 22 weeks. Things are not looking good for the babies. When I got the chance to talk to her on Friday night, she sounded exhausted but amazingly, she seemed very calm. Please pray for my sweet friend, she could absolutely use all the prayers she can get. She is such a strong person and I know she'll make it through this. Just another of our Heavenly Father's crazy ways of teaching us a little bit more about ourselves.

Michael's has started putting out there Christmas merchandise again. So I started scouting the place out at least a couple times a week waiting for my candle to appear. And on Saturday...it did! And I even had a 40% off coupon on hand. So yes, if you were to walk into my house, right now for instance, it already smells like Christmas. I seriously wait all year for this candle to come out. For all who are interested, the scent is "Holly Berry" and the brand is Ashland. I am pretty sure this candle is sold exclusively at Michael's but it is worth tracking down. And the best part about it....regular price its only $5.99 for the largest size! And thats if you ever pay full price. Usually they are on some sort of sale or you can at least find a coupon for it. Get one. I totally recommend it.

4

4 years ago today was our first date. It was Friday the 13th....but it seemed to work out pretty well for us. For all who are interested, we went to dinner and then to a corn maze.

4 years ago tomorrow (so I don't have to do a separate post tomorrow) we had what some would call a "DTR" (define the relationship) and became an official couple.

Yep, this may sound retarded to some that I remember these dates. I actually quizzed Mike last night on these dates along with what I was wearing on each day between Oct. 10-14, but he couldn't remember. I still haven't quite figured out why I can remember. But anyway, these days are special to me.

And for all who are curious, our first kiss was on Oct. 26th.

I love my Michael. And I am so grateful for the month of October in 2006. He changed my life completely. I knew it the moment I told him to be Peter Pan that Halloween, and he did. Tights and all.

Love you babe.

Us

 Look at these super cute Halloween Candy Corn Wreath's that we made! My friend Andrea and I glued and glued for over 2 hours to get these wreaths done but I am so happy with the final product. I hung it on my front door, and it looks great, but the picture that you get to see is flipped because that is what happened when I uploaded it. I, once again, couldn't get it to flip right. If anyone else has figured out how to get this fixed, please let me know. Its only the pictures that have no people in them, so I am betting its some facial recognition thing. Anyway, super fun wreath to make. The link for how to do it is right here.

Today I created a new tradition. Well first off, happy 4 year anniversary to Mike today who got home from his mission on October 10, 2006! (Also today is our 4 year anniversary for holding hands for the first time. Yes, Mike held my hand the day he got home from his mission, for the first time ever. It scared the heck out of me. That's a different story for a different day.) Anyway, two of Mike's favorite foods from the mission were Patacones, which are friend plantains, and what he calls "immigration hot dogs" because the vendor that sold these hot dogs was outside the immigration building in Panama. When we visited Panama in 2008, I had the pleasure of trying both and both were just as delicious as he described. So today, guess what we had for dinner? Yep, patacones and immigration hot dogs. The hot dogs are actually a kind of hot dog that is popular in Colombia, and it has pineapple sauce, coleslaw, and crushed potato chips on it, along with the typical hot dog toppings. And I think dinner was a success! Mike seemed to enjoy it anyway. After dinner he said, "You realize what you have done right?" I actually had no idea what I had done. He said, "You have created a tradition. Now every year on October 10th this is what we have to have for dinner. Even when we have kids." Yay, I love new traditions! Here are the links for the Patacones and Colombian Hot Dogs.

Cheesy I know, but we love our new carpet. And this is right after we got it in. We love it.

I became an official employee at my job on October 4th. I was supposed to be on contract until November 30th, but they must have decided that they just really love me. But that means that I will get benefits soon! I am so excited!

And look how cute we are!

I love my siblings. Miss you guys.