The Best Three Years

This past Tuesday we celebrated our three year anniversary! I can't believe it.  Three years already.  One of our favorite songs by far is called Anniversary by Tony Toni Tone, check it out.  Anyway, back on track now...

The day was like any other.  Chris dropped me off at school in the morning.  My last class gets out at 1:50p.m. but I had some stuff to do in the library so I told Chris to just pick me up after he got off work... AT 4PM!  Yes he got off one hour early.  So awesome!  We headed home and I allowed him to open gift one of four.

We had about two and a half hours to kill before our dinner reservation so I thought we could watch the movies.  After he opened the first one he pretty much guessed the other three so I just let him open them all.  They are four volumes that go to the full first season of the latest Avengers cartoon series.  Chris first saw this season on netflix and loved it and talked about it a lot so I had to get it.  He loves them!

I thought I did pretty well on gift choice this year.  Again my gift was the kitchen aide so no gift for me but he played the whole dinner himself so that was gift enough.

Yes, my husband is a cartoon watching 28 year old. But I love him dearly.

Chris made a 7 p.m. dinner reservation at Cypress. It was wonderful.  We got all dressed up and since he told them it was our anniversary they put little star confetti on the table it was so nice.

The food was delicious.  Think southern style cuisine.  One of their main dishes was shrimp and grits!  

Dessert was amazing.  I got the dessert special which was strawberry and blueberry shortcake and Chris got a banana cake with macadamia nut ice cream.  Yummy!

Over all the night was awesome.  We returned home and just relaxed and watched a movie.  Way chill.  

I'm Going to brag a bit and say I have the best husband ever.  He is so kind and supportive.  Always willing to help and serve me and he treats me so well.  One of my favorite things he still does is open my car door for me... he is such a gentleman.  I love you Chris.  Life is so wonderful with you and I can't wait for an eternity more of time with you.

Second Week of Freedom

My second week off from school wasn't too eventful.  On Monday we went to see The Avengers.  We have been looking forward to seeing this movie and it did not disappoint.

Yes, we are nerds and where I comic book shirts.

This is Chris's Excited Face.

In way of my garden, SO MUCH has happened.  I constructed the second frame and planted some more.  I felt so handy making the frames I got to use a drill and everything.  Plus I did it all by my self instead of having Chris do it, so I feel pretty accomplished.

This is the first garden and lots is growing!! You can't really see everything but it's there.

This is the second garden and I planted a week and three days ago and all this has grown.

Herbs:

Oregano (sorry you can't see the stick very well)

Tomatoes and Lettuce.  I had to move them from where the herbs were located because when we had some much rain the beginning of this week they needed better sunlight. I'm just not sure what I'm going to do when the tomatoes get bigger because that's a pretty small planter.  We'll see when I get there.

All in All I'm a...

On the Friday of the second week of freedom we drove down to Naples to visit with family.  On Saturday, we attended my brother in law's graduation from law school.  It was so exciting and I just can't believe three years have gone by already!

 Later that evening we had dinner at a restaurant called The Capital Grille with Brian's parents and my sister, dad, and step mom.  Pretty fancy but very good!

Sunday, we attended church up in Cape Coral for my new baby nephew's baby blessing.  He's so cute and already getting so big.  We just stayed for sacrament meeting and then returned back to my brother and sister in law's home and had the most amazing salad bar.

So the two weeks were bliss but alas they have come to a close and I started school once again. Sad Day.

Six Days Time

In six days... this happened three years ago.

Crazy.

The first week... Done

It is the end of my first week of freedom and now moving on toward my second week.  I had a decent week.  I had a bike accident on Tuesday that detained me from physical activities but all is well.  Wednesday, I really didn't do anything but go to Sam's Club.  It was pretty nice not having to do anything but I really wanted to run, but alas my knees were unfit.  Thursday, I was feeling pretty good so I went for a run.  Unfortunately I came back and my knees were hurting.  This was also Chris's first day on the job! He had a pretty chill day and I was able to go and have lunch with him.  He gets off work around 5p.m. sometimes a little after but let me tell ya, WAY better than 6:30p.m. or later.  We then proceeded to go grocery shopping.  On this day though look what was occurring...

My Lettuce is growing!!! It actually started on Wednesday, the DAY AFTER I planted them.  There is a lot more now too.

Friday, I decided to listen to my body for once and opted to not go run.  Instead I started my big garden.

Before

After

I made the frame from two pieces of 4x6x8 wood boards cut in half and then used four "L" braces that I screwed in.  This was the hardest part because the wood was so thick I had some trial and error.  But finally got it all together.  Then I proceeded to dig a hole.  Went down about 6 inches but wait... what did I find hidden under the dirt within minutes of starting?  OH yes a whole cinder block.  So I had to dig that out which was quite the task.  I finally got to the depth I wanted and Chris was home for lunch so I stopped to have lunch with him.  Then I took him back up to work and headed to Home Depot because I needed more compost.  When I was going up to the check out it started to PORE!  I was all nervous because I left the gardening tools outside and we're borrowing them right now.  I waited a little bit and then just ran for it.  Thankfully, the down pore at Home Depot didn't occur at home.  

I started filling up the hole with the frame over it.  I mixed the existing dirt (actually mostly clay which made it hard to dig too) with the compost I bought.  I thought two bags would be good but I used four bags.  I planted corn on the right and carrots on the left.  Our hose is at the front of the house so I had to stand on the other side of the fence and spray it that way.  

Saturday, we went to the temple.  We meant to wake up and leave by 5a.m. however, we didn't hear the alarm go off and woke up at 5:36a.m.  Opps! Oh well, it was a lesson on not having to rush but to just take the day.  So we did.  We got there in time for the 10:30a.m. session.  After the temple we had a packed lunch out underneath a shady tree, which was like 20 degrees cooler.

Chris with his turkey sandwich and myself with a veggie one.  Very yummy! Fruit and carrots and celery were included.

We arrived home around 6p.m. and knowing it was a hot sunny day I wanted to water my plants.  Guess what!

My tomatoes started growing!!! I'm so excited.  Also, my basil is sprouting too.  Today I found my oregano making an appearance as well.

Chris was kind enough to move the hose to the back, except it has a hole it now and we had to duck tape it.  He had fun watering the garden.

I am so grateful for this new skill I'm learning of gardening.  I have been really thinking about (more like worrying) self-reliance and preparedness (i.e. food storage).  It is something I see as very important and if the prophets have counseled for us to work on these things it must be imperative.  I give all my thanks and knowledge of gardening to Brother Tew and his family.  They have the gardening thing down pack and really helped me to know what to do to get started.  I hope that at least half of what I harvest I will be able to can.  When I was all done I knelt by my little plot and said a prayer that it would yelled up the veggies that would help Chris and I with not only just having food but to help out our foot storage.  

I'm keep you updated on how it goes.  I have another frame that I need to make and I'll be digging again this week.  I hope I don't find anymore cinder blocks though!

School's OVER... for the spring

Yes, you heard right.  The Spring Semester is OVER.  Thank goodness.  It's been one crazy, long, stressful semester and it's finally over.

Now, I have two weeks off before school starts again for the summer.  What am I up to, do you ask?  Well, let's start with Saturday, April 28th.  I was suppose to have my volunteer orientation for The Tallahassee Museum but unfortunately it was canceled, without my knowing until I got there. Oh well... but I was able to get some much needed yard work done.  This is the side of our home walking up some steps that go into the garage.  This was FULL of leaves... and those stones were all underneath the leaves around that little tree.  It took a total of 7 yard waste bags!

I also started some compost!! I'm super excited.

Sunday we had the missionaries over, so I made my sister's amazing chicken tortilla soup.  Very yummy and thank you Lindy I shredded the chicken like a pro with my kitchen aid.  

 I also made these really good Pumpkin cookies.  The recipe is vegan friendly and really yummy.  I added chocolate chips tough and happy that I did.  

Monday I went for a bike ride on the St. Mark's Trail and then came home to clean the house.  I'm happy too because I was able to go and have lunch with Chris.  This not having anything to REALLY do is pretty nice.  I also started on part of my garden... 

I'm going to have a lot bigger one but still collecting some things for it.  These two little planters were given to us by our good friends almost a YEAR ago and now I finally got them started.  The tin one is tomatoes and the trea cota one has baby leaf, spinach, and arugula.

Today, I went for another bike ride however when I had a little less than one mile left I had a little accident.  Let's just say I experienced what all LDS missionaries experience... I flipped over the handle bars.  I was going pretty fast and next to the trail there is a recycling center with trucks going in and out of it.  There was one truck waiting to turn and I didn't see another one turning in and I slammed on the brakes and went flying.  Thankfully I was actually at the time just passing a kind man who stopped and helped me up.  The truck driver even got out to check on me.  I'm totally fine and it was most definitely my fault I should have seen the truck coming.  My knees are sore and my hands scratched up. Well, it's the first bike accident of the training.  

Stay tuned for more up dates on my little vacation.  I'm going to be starting the garden soon so I'll have to before and after pictures. Also, Happy May!!