Day 2

Day Two:

A picture of you and the person you have been closest with the longest.

This is a picture of my and my very best friend, Katie. Or Kat Kat as I call her. Don't ask. The nicknames happened a long time ago. She lives a MILLION miles away in Alaska. (Okay, a million might be an exaggeration, but still, it's Alaska!) But nothing has ever changed between us, no matter the distance. I've known this lovely lady since 3rd grade and she is one beautiful person, inside and out. Honestly one of the most amazing souls I have ever met. I am so grateful to have such a wonderful friend in my life.

In other news, it was back to work at the flower shop today, and it was S-L-O-W! Thank goodness for sudoku on my phone!  School also starts on Wednesday and it has been more than a little stressful trying to get everything in order for that.  Who knew that going to school mostly online could be so hectic? I thought it was supposed to be easier? Just call me old-fashioned, but I guess I'm just used to actually, physically, going to my classes.

And now I have the hiccups, so I must go. 

You need to understand, my hiccups are epic. Ask anyone. Especially when coupled with a coughing fit. You can imagine the scenario, I'm sure.

30 days.

First off, Happy New Year!!! Since when is it 2011? Seriously, I still feel like it should be 2005...or something. Anyone else with me? Oh well, I hope everyone's 2011 is filled with health, wealth, and happiness!

So I've seen this one floating around the internet for a while, and I suppose I'll give it a try. It's called 30 days, and it's basically a picture a day with an explanation to go along with it. I'm not even sure if anyone will be interested in this, so I promise to write about something else as well as the picture a day routine, but I figured this is a good way for the whole wide world of internet peoples to get to know me a little better. Enjoy friends, enjoy.

Day One: A picture of yourself with twelve facts.

I didn't want to choose any of the typical go-to pictures of myself, so I rooted around a bit and found this one. It was taken at Salem Lake in NC.


12 facts:


1. I love the water. Specifically the ocean, but any large body of water will do.


2. I got my Bachelor's degree in Music Performance.


3. I am getting my Master's degree in Special Education.


4. I like to cook, and  pretend I am really great at it. I can hold my own, though. Just don't ask me to make toast.


5. My Dad is completely blind and has been since he was 5 years old. He is my hero.


6. Macaroni and Cheese is my favorite food. Always has been, always will be. The end.


7. I find myself becoming more and more like my mother every day, and I love that.


8. I am in love* with my cat, Squirt. We have full blown conversations sometimes.
         * Disclaimer: I do not love everything he does, for example, knocking over my Christmas tree at 2:00 AM the other morning. Thus, not only do we love like family, we argue like family. (Well, as much as you can argue with an amazingly, adorable kitty.)


9. I physically need the sunshine. It makes me happy. I can prove this. When I was a newborn I had something wrong with me that could only be cured by sticking my newborn naked body in the windowsill with the sun shining on me for a few hours a day. Maybe it was jaundice? I don't know, I was a newborn for gracious sakes. BUT, I do blame that for why I crave the sunshine so much.


10. I love, love, love to read. Especially if it is in a hammock, outside in the sunshine. Duh.


11. My fiance' is quite possibly the greatest thing to ever happen to me. Now, I promise not to get too sappy on ya'll, but he let me be me and showed me how beautiful I am. Not the easiest thing to do for a girl whose had self-confidence issues all her life.


12. Fact: This took me way longer than I expected it would. It is hard to just come up with 12 facts about yourself on the spot! 






Just for good measure. Here's your daily dose of Squirt.

And, yes, that is a leopard print snuggie he is snuggling with. Don't judge.

Spontaneous.

So two nights ago I got the idea to finally chop my long, long, super long, locks off. (Did I mention that they were long?)

I always knew that when the time had come to chop all of the length off that it would be a spontaneous kind of deal. I am not a real plan-it-out type of girl with that stuff. If I think about it for too long, I'll end up not doing it.

So the scoop is:

I've been growing my crazy mane since my high school days. I used to babysit the worlds most precious girl named, Emily. She was four at the time and right after I had left home to go to art school (where the High School students lived in dorms and only breathed, ate, and slept art) I found out that Emily had been diagnosed with a brain tumor.  I was nothing short of devastated. I had never heard of something happening to someone so little, or so innocent, and it threw my world completely off.

Some of you might wonder how close a 17 year old could actually be to a 4 year old, but let me tell you something, kids are amazing. I have always felt connected to children with their wide-eyed view of the world. Emily and I would call each other our "bestest friend" and she would sometimes hold up the communion line at church to make sure that I saw her waving to me. She was just that kind of girl. Sweet and she absolutely loved any and everyone.

Wanting to help in some way, I found out about Locks of Love, where generous people donate 10 inches or longer of their hair to children, adults, whomever it may be, who cannot grow hair on their own, or have lost it from radiation treatments. I decided to start growing my hair then and have since been growing it as long as I could manage.

I could have probably donated years ago, but by that point I had worked so hard at growing it that I had felt some silly attachment to it.

Then two days ago I remembered why I had started growing it in the first place. And that was all I needed to make the appointment.

After remembering the real reason for growing out my precious locks, getting it all cut off was surprisingly easy. It was so freeing to know that I had finally done what I had planned to do all of these years. While it may not have helped Emily directly, I know that it will go to someone who needs it and will love it more than I ever could.

I donated over 12 inches and I couldn't feel happier.

It has been over 3 years since Emily passed away, and it still brings tears to my eyes thinking about her wonderful spirit throughout her short life. Her smile was one of the greatest gifts she could ever give anyone, and I know that everyone who knew her felt the same.

So goodbye, long locks. (Please excuse the poor cell phone camera quality, this was as I was walking out my door to go the appointment)

And hello, short hair.

I know you will go to someone who needs it, and that makes me happier than anything else.

Christmas Cheer!

I have made it back from my marathon Christmas celebration this weekend, and have finally gotten most of my stuff put away and organized!

I hope everyone had an amazing holiday and had as much fun as I did!

So this will be a smorgazboard of updates from the last week. So many updates that I had to make up a word for it.

Uh-huh, yeah.

I'm not sure if you all know, but Matt's family has an amazing cookie recipe that has been passed down in the family. It is the Butter Cookie recipe. And it is delicious (when I say delicious, I mean, President Truman would ask for these cookies personally when the recipe was first originated.) When Matt asked me to marry him, I received this recipe, along with all of the hardware to make it.

Now, I can't tell you what's in the recipe, or how to make it. But I can tell you that it involves a cookie press (difficult, difficult piece of equipment for this job) and about this much butter:

Don't be afraid. Just be ready to unzip your pants a little to be able to fit into them later.

Paula Deen would be so proud.

Side note: I need to meet Paula Deen at some point in my lifetime. She is only one of the greatest women. Ever.


So you mix all of your secret ingredients together and then you put your dough into the cookie press and start pressing out lines of cookies. This proves to be much more difficult than one might imagine.

See those air pockets. Yeah. Those aren't supposed to be there, but gosh darn it, I just couldn't get any better ones.

But be warned. This recipe (should you ever receive it, or one like it) makes about a million cookies in one batch. No really. See for yourself.

Oh, so many cookies. Mmmmmmm.

Now, on to the actual Christmas events. I first went to Wilmington with Matthew to celebrate his birthday (Christmas Eve baby!) and we had a delicious lunch of prime rib, yorkshire pudding, mashed potatoes, green beans, and gravy. I will not go into detail of this meal because simply listing the ingredients has made my mouth start to salivate. 

After that I headed to my folk's house in central NC and we celebrated our Christmas on Christmas Eve. That way we could head out bright and early to go see the rest of the family in a different location in NC on Christmas Day. 

I don't have too many pictures of the loot, but there was a tear jearker one involved. 

This was drawn by my brother. My younger-holy-cow-how-did-he-do-that brother. This simply took my breath away.

If you haven't seen pictures of me and Mr. Fiance, this is all you need. It's like looking into a mirror.

Scary good. It even tricked my cat, Squirt, into giving the picture version of me nose kisses.

Let me also mention that this crazy, talented brother of mine drew this in 2 DAYS. How on earth??

Snoopy also got a great gift as well:

These winter cold spurts are just proving too much for poor ol' snoop-dog. So he got himself a nice fancy jacket! How cute!

So yes, back to when we went to be with the rest of our family on Christmas day. It was so much fun! I rarely get to see the rest of my family, so it is always so nice to spend time with them. I cannot believe how fast the younger ones are growing! Here's a few pictures of them opening (tearing into) the gifts :)

The adults then played dirty Santa, and I must say, I got my gifts stolen the most. BY FAR!  :)

I really did have a blast. I always wish we could stay longer!

On an ending note to this crazy, long, picture filled post, the snow was a lovely surprise this year. I have never experienced a white Christmas and it was a wonderful cherry on top of the sundae for me. (Mmmm, Sundae's!)

(Not sure why that turned out so blue! Oh well!)

Hope everyone had a Merry, wonderful, magical Christmas!

I'm off to go make myself a Sundae, and to take care of one very sick man of mine :(

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

We have flakes! It has begun to snow. Snow-age if you will!

Merry Christmas to you and yours! I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday and gets to spend it with their family and friends. 

I'll start updating more after all of the holiday festivities start to die down. 

Promise. 

Love,

Me.

The place I call home.

You know the saying, "Home is where the heart is"? Well, home for me is where the water is.

Luckily, the water is right outside my doorstep.

Good gracious. It's sunsets like this that make me appreciate my teensy, tiny, rather expensive for it's size, apartment.

It has been raining all week, then all of a sudden the clouds broke up and the sky cleared just so we could all witness this beautiful ending to the day.

And then it got cloudy again.

Boo.


But the real reason I am here is to talk to you about these:

Doritos 3rd degree burn flavored chips.


HOLY MOLY. These things are HOT! I mean, I am definitely a wuss when it comes to spicy things, but geez.

Now, I may or may not have been warned about these by my wonderful fiance', and I may or may not have waited until he was not around to try them anyways. I also may or may not have been reduced to insta-tears after one bite. I can neither confirm nor deny these things.

But I can tell ya that they are hot. Feel the burn all the way down your throat, hot.

Gives me the shivers.

I'd much rather be eating these:

The end.


Also, while I'm on the topic of everything. (Wasn't I on the topic of everything?)

I got a little motivated and did my hair up real nice today. I'm not sure what came over me, but I was bored and felt like spending oh, you know, 20 or so minutes on my hair. (Really, what was I thinking?)

I've done this style quite a few times last year, and it was a hit every time.

But, boy, did I underestimate the power of small towners. I got SO many compliments it made my head spin!

It's a fishtail braid, and it took me quite a few tries to finally get it right my first time.

I honestly believe that people here have never seen such a thing. And I'm not gonna lie. That makes me a little happy.

Here are some of the things people said about my hair today.

"Oh my, that's just lovely, how in heavens do you do that??"

"Now, what do you call that kind of style? Is it a type of braid or something?"

"Well lookie there! That's a real nice thing you got going on with your hair there!"

I love hearing things like this from strangers. Especially strangers in the grocery store line who come up and touch your hair to feel its structure and softness.

Have I mentioned that I love small towns (probably once.... or twice... at least). I feel like the big city girl in this town.

"I think it's time we go our separate ways."

"What's that you're yelling, Bertha?....You're here to stay, whether I like it or not?? Well that's just not fair!"

Do I sound crazy yet?

Good.

Because I feel crazy.

My sweet, precious, super old, super rickety Honda is in the shop.

AGAIN.

So now I am left car-less.  The check engine light came on yesterday and I can't be havin' that whilst traveling all over NC for the holidays.

This is frustrating for a few reasons.

1. I have not yet made friendships close enough to ask people to help drive me to and from work and other miscellaneous errands everyday.
                - This duty will fall to Matt for now, and is not a good solution as it is difficult for him to just pick up and leave work, at part of his busiest time of day, to pick me up from work and take me home, then head back to work. Which, by the way, are on opposite ends of town. Actually, they aren't even technically in the same town.

2. I feel that Bertha (my Honda) has been to the shop one too many times (she's probably having a love affair...), and that this may be her last time.
                - This is not a good solution because I cannot afford a new vehicle. It simply is not possible right now, and I don't appreciate being cheated on with the repair shop. Really lowers one's self confidence.

3. I need a reliable car. The end.


I guess I should have seen another incident like this coming. Bertha's been having transmission trouble for quite some time now. I should have treated her better.


Sorry there are no pictures of her. It's dark outside, and in case you haven't heard, we had a bit of a spat. A lover's quarrel if you will.

What's a girl to do?