Random Holiday Pics

Chris and Sarah

Ty and I

Our Quagmire that got so sick and died over the holidays, despite a $150 vet bill.


Sarah and Josh enjoying sweets

Chris and I being strange

Sarah and I cooking for a new years eve party

Zandra and I by the pool. I had just sprained my ankle, hence the icy dip in the pool.

Our Christmas Tree.

Me, winning Phase 10, Chris looking worried, and Sarah looking angry. Ha ha!!! Victory will be mine!

Josh took most of the pics, so he's not in that many. I'll post more when I transfer them from the camera.

Blessed

I have been thinking lately about the greatness of God: How He is good, and how He is faithful. Amid my pondering I realized that when we are not happy, it becomes so easy to let our thought processes slip into a skeptical, antagonistic way of thinking, and that that way of thinking will really mess us up.

The skeptical, antagonistic mind has trouble recognizing God as being faithful. When we are not where we'd hope to be in life, we begin to call God's faithfulness into question. I realized tonight that though we may not happy in some areas of life, whether it be spiritually, physically or mentally, that we need to stop being passive and lazily pointing a finger at God for the status of our situations, when God has fully equipped us with what we need to improve our situations.

A memory from my childhood surfaces: I was dog tired and trying to sleep one night, but was kept awake by a bug crawling on a piece of paper in my floor. The bug made so much noise, but I was so sleepy that I didn't want to move. I ended up praying that God would just strike the bug dead so that there would be silence and I could sleep. Upon ending my prayer, I heard "I gave you hands. Use them."

Of course, there are situations physical and spiritual that need divine intervention from God, but in the smaller aspects of day to day life, let us put forth the effort and use what God has given us to improve our lives in the areas that need to be improved upon.

Randomness

I've got to this post by thanking God for an answered prayer: Traci and Bill found our wedding video on their hard drive, and were able to send me, not one, but two copies of our Dec wedding! Yes, I am very happy!

I've been excited about the anniversary coming up, that I have given in and given Josh a couple early gifts. I brought him a huge bamboo plant that he has been wanting, but I didn't go small. With the help of two plant nursery workers, we crammed over 10 feet of bamboo plant into our vehicle. Needless to say, Josh was shocked. He didn't expect one that big, because they usually cost $85.00. I got this one for half price, too! Here's the top half of it. A year from now, it will have huge stalks. You can see how tall it is in comparison with our roof in the background.

On the things to be happy about list, the next in line would be the holidays being upon us.

Josh and I couldn't wait until after Thanksgiving to buy a tree, so we bought a Douglas Fir from a small family Christmas tree stand last night. The tree came together beautifully. In the background, you will see three puppy stockings belonging to Ben, Joe, and Ty. Jack Sparrow, the cat will soon have his very own stocking.

On this tree are some ornaments that just deserve being noted. Several State of TX ornaments are on the tree. They are badges of honor that attest to my strength for surviving working in a terrible place. I got one for every year I worked there, so now that I'm no longer there they just gleam so brightly on the Christmas tree every year. The second one is a dog that looks like Ty, all rolled in a strand of Christmas lights. My mom gave this to me last year. Still a favorite.

My next favorite thing about the holiday season is a chance to dress up for Christmas parties. I went shopping and came home with two dresses. My plan was to return the one Josh didn't like, but he liked them both. So what to do? I ridiculously took pictures of myself in the dresses and held a "Vote for the Dress" poll on my facebook profile. Below are pics of the winning red dress.

I learned that taking pics of myself is really difficult....and that I make strange faces in the process.

Now, we just have to figure out if Josh is going to go all out "big pimping'" in his white suite from Okinawa or not. We will be sure to post some pics soon.

OK, so this blog was kind of boring, but that's all I've got for now. We will be having Thanksgiving dinner with our neighbors, so I will post pics soon.

2 Years Already

December 3rd will mark officially mark two years that Josh and I have been married. Our two years have been good, wild, crazy and quite an adventure.


Josh has been a very good husband and I couldn't have found a better man to share my life with. I'm thankful for everything I've been given through our relationship.


I was so blessed to be able to have our wedding in Texas, in the beautiful hill country, and then a wonderful tropical wedding with family in Saipan. Two weddings. What more could a girl ask for? I still remember shopping for my wedding dress with my mom, and planning some details for the Saipan wedding with my future mom in law. Those were exciting times.

The sad thing is that I am hormonal right now, and really depressed to the point of tears, because I wanted to be able to watch our wedding DVDs on our anniversary, but the DVD of our wedding in Texas is still gone, MIA. It has been gone for two years now, and along with it, the original footage. All I have are some pictures. Before our trip to Saipan, Josh thought he copied the wedding DVD into our computer before we left. We left the DVD in Saipan, and returned home to find that Josh had not copied the DVD after all.

I am still scratching my head, thinking why wasn't more than one DVD made? Why did Josh think he had copied it onto our computer? Why is the original footage gone? Why haven't I been able to solve the case of the missing DVD in two years?

If anyone reading this knows where the wedding DVD might be, or has any footage of the Texas wedding, can you please, please, please let me know?

Pumpkin Carving Pics

I went to Walmart to have the tires on our car replaced, and during my three hour wait there I came across pumpkins on sale. I haven't carved a pumpkin in a while, so I brought two home with me.

This would be me, trying to capture a picture of excitement.

Here is Josh, having fun. Sorry I forgot to rotate the pic before I loaded it.

Gotta love my outfit. lol It was cold outside.

That's it!

Dog Beach Time!!!

Here are some pics from last weekend. We took the dogs to their favorite dog beach to burn off some energy.

Happy boys on their way to the dog beach.

Ty and I in the middle of a swim race. We're getting ready to turn around and go back to the beach.

I let the dogs win at the end. I wanted to stay in and enjoy the water.


Here's Josh's crazy hair. Yes, he finally has hair again!!!

Enjoying the sun.

Random Pic of Skyway Bridge

Another random Florida view on the way back from the dog beach.

Hillsborough County Traffic Cops

Working within the legal system on a daily basis, you find yourself weighing the justice in each situation you see. One of the sad injustices I've come across while in working within the legal field in Texas, was misuse and abuse of authority. Namely, favor being secured by "generous" contributions to certain campaigns.

Anyway, today I came across another blatant misuse of authority. When my husband was in Hillsborough county, stopped at a traffic light, the cop behind him decided he was bored and would run my husband's plates. He then proceeded to pull my husband over and tell him he was writing him a citation for expired vehicle registration. Our registration was still valid, as reflected by the vehicle stickers. This cop was obviously bored or just felt like harassing someone. Upon realizing his mistake, and that he couldn't write a ticket for expired tags, the cop began to survey our vehicle, and wrote my husband a citation for a burnt out light bulb. The cop told my husband that the fee would only be $7 if paid within 30 day. My husband made the ridiculously long drive to the sheriff's office to pay the fee within the 30 day period, and it turns out the cop had obviously lied to my husband, or was simply dumb, because they charged my husband $91.00. Yes, $91 freaking dollars for a burnt out light bulb! My husband and I didn't even know the bulb was burnt out, so it must have happened that day. What about a warning? Not a $91 ticket, just because you accidentally pull someone over by mistake?

So, stupid Hillsborough County got nearly $100 out of us by abusing their authority. I can't stand people who are supposed to represent justice being unjust.