STAY TUNED...

As soon as we are done unpacking I will write an update, just letting you know not to give up!!

Dinner with the President

Thats right. Be proud of that. Mom, thats the daughter you've tried to raise so well. Sherry, that is your daughter-in-law, show it off. I know its a spectacular picture.

So we had our final party we are going to have in Searcy. Kinda sad :( It was a Christmas party and it ended up being a ton of fun. We had a total of 9 people and then 2 showed up later. Chelsie brought chili cheese dip which was gone in about 5 minutes, her roomate Nina brought cookies which were also gone by the end of the night, Shay brought brownies...guess what, also gone by the end of the night haha. A hit! I made an angel food cake, strawberries and whiped cream trifle. It looked pretty fancy by the time I was done with it haha. We played a game of Dirty Santa...college version. Thats right, all gifts were from the dollar store. Now, obviously we weren't expecting anything extravagant, and normally there would be a bunch of different things brought to the party. However, this is Searcy. One dollar store. So everytime something was opened about half the people in the room said "OH! I almost got that!" and laughter then followed. Chad ended up with a set of fishing bobbers...4 of them. Great, great, gift. haha I ended up with the lovely pirate ensemble you see pictured above. Again, extremely useful. Too bad halloween is already over.
Our friend Shay ended up with this mini, mini golf set.

Her boyfriend Barrett (Chads old roomate) got this "gun" which shot about a foot and had barely any velocity too it. Hours of endless enjoyment definitely.

This is our set. Yes, we got lucky.

On Sunday night we went to this "living nativity" thing at the church down the road for us. We ended up waiting an hour before we even started moving - thats how popular this thing is! Crazy. But they had these screens on the side of the building and their own radio station going that had christmas songs and silly songs with larry and moments from old movies, etc. It was pretty entertaining. They gave you hot chocolate and a CD to start when you went through the "gates" of Bethlehem. No joke, it was very well done. The people did a good job, the set design was very planned out, and there were animals everywhere which of course got my attention. They even had 2 camels! That shocked us more than anything ha. It was a fun little memory though :)

Tonight we went to a graduate dinner provided by Harding. Steak, chicken, salad, veggies, mashed potatoes, green beans, rolls, and dessert. Not too bad. We ended up sitting at a table with none other than the President of Harding and the Dean of Bible. Chad, of course, started right off talking to them and the conversation went smoothly the whole night. I talked to them about going to Italy (and mom they knew Tracy and we got to talk about her a lot!) and how that program is just amazing and they should try to get everyone to experience it. There was a devotional, a few people talked, and we got a little folder full of helpful information. Pretty good to end our Harding adventure with that.

I have taken one exam and have my other one on Friday. Besides that i have a budget project due and another outline project to do. Besides that I am going to start packing tomorrow (yes, pray for me to actually do that...) and cleaning because Friday we have to be inspected for check-out...Yikes.

Taxidermy Time

Well not too much has been going on besides school and getting ready for the move. I'm usually pretty organized and like to get a head start on being prepared for stuff but for some reason, I just can't get motivated to just pack everything. Obviously there is a lot of stuff that we can't pack up quite yet, but maybe I'm just thinking we are still using every single thing we own...hm.

Chad and I have been reading a book called His Needs Her Needs - again, one of those things meant more for people married a little longer but it has really been a great book. Today we read this chapter on "activities" and it talks about doing things together that we both enjoy. There was this chart we both had to fill out and rate our enjoyment of a bunch of activities they had written out. You rate your enjoyment of or wish of enjoyment between -3 and 3 and then add them up. Our highest scores were: Amusement Parks, watching baseball, concerts, dining out, flying (as a passenger), watching football, movies, plays, snorkeling, skydiving, tv, watching movies, music, and backrubs!

Just to be funny, here are some of our lowest scores...aerobic exercise (and i wonder why I'm not losing weight?), antique collecting, auto customizing, computer programing, judo, metalwork, rock collecting (that would be an interesting couple who scored high on that), rowing, stamp collecting, and taxidermy. Yep, taxidermy was an activity. Hey honey, want to go stuff this rabbit i just shot? Interesting.

There were also a few things we had never even heard of...ham radio? what is that? pinochle? Anyone heard of these things?

Last piece of news...i am OFFICIALLY Cristy Lynn Burris. I got my social security card in the mail and there it is. My new name. Although it hasn't really hit home completely because I still have to sign all of my papers as Cavender since school still has me down as that. Only a few weeks away!! Maybe we'll be packed by then...

Our first Turkey week

I just want to start off by saying I absolutely love hearing Christmas music everywhere I go. Walmart, radio, student center, random stores, people singing randomly as they walk, and at home. Love it.

Alright so Friday, November 28th started our break and originally we were going to drive to the Ham (Birmingham if you don't know the lingo) but my Aunt, Uncle and cousin (Nancy, Carl, and Lisa) were driving through to pick Steven up so we stuck around to get to see them since we won't be seeing them for Christmas this year. We went to dinner at Coloton's which is like a Logan's sort of place. It was a ton of fun but nearing the end of the night Steven's friend Rachel found a black bug crawling around in her salad. Yes, thats right. ALIVE and crawling all over. Everyone was pretty much done eating after that. Quite an appetite killer. After that Nancy and Carl came over to see our humble abode and then Lisa, Steven, Rachel, Chad and I hung out the rest of the night.

Bright and early the next morning we were up and packing and then around 8:45 Lisa and Steven left for Indiana. We had a lot of packing to do and a few errands to run and then we left for the 7 hour trip to Birmingham. It was a lot of fun as usual and I love having that one-on-one time with my hubby. Provides great time for good conversation and if you know Chad, you know he isn't one of the stereotypical guys you have to pry at to get him to talk, which I never complain about :) We got there late in the afternoon and met at our apartment complex to show my Dad the place because he hadn't seen it yet, but they were unable to show us because it was getting dark. One of those things that someone got sued somewhere, sometime and so now they can't show apartments after dark or when its raining, or even looks like rain. Yep, we learned all this out. So we just looked in the windows and then wen't and ate at Logans....ironic I used that as an example earlier. That night we just sat around and talked and I always love that.

Sunday was church. I cannot wait to go there every week! We went to Cozumel for lunch of course. That night we watched Wall-e for the second time in a week and let me tell you, if you haven't seen it...see it! It is so cute. Another hit! While I'm on this track let me say/ask something. Every movie I've watched if there is a relationship in it, it is automatically linked to my life. If one of those people die - i'm balling. If they get married - i'm smiling while balling. Anyone else do this or is it a personal thing haha Let me know... That night we played a game called Wits and Wagers - you have to guess a numerical answer to a question and then bet on who you think is right. Yeah I wasn't too good and mainly bet on everyone else's answers. I was right maybe once or twice haha

Monday Mom and I drove downtown to go to the Social Security office to try and turn in my information to get my name legally changed but we got there and once they said it would be an hour wait, we turned around and left haha. To follow up on this story, 2 days ago I went to the office here in Searcy and I was in and out in 6 minutes. AND the girl didn't even take my paperwork or look at my license or passport. Sketchy...but quick! Ok so after that we went to Davids Bridal to drop off my wedding shoes to get dyed ($3! and i'm getting red ooh la la) and ran into Hannah Baxter and her posse from church looking at wedding dresses for her wedding in June. ah the memories...That night we played Scottish bridge (Burris family you now know what that is! yay!) and just hung out together.

Tuesday I spent most of my time making my Pumpkin bread. Its one of those recipes that you have to sift every single thing even if it is already pre-sifted haha. No but I love it. We went to Panera Bread for lunch...are you realizing how much I love this place? And then packed up and I made my spinach and artichoke dip that day too. Ask for the recipe if you want it! That night we met Dad at Moe's and got some coffee with the fam and then headed to Memphis.

Wednesday we left Memphis around 10:45 on a 5 hour trip to Missouri! It was a full house and Chad and I stayed across the street at his aunt and uncle Todd and Sarah's house. That night we taught the Burris Bunch to play Scottish Bridge and it was a hit. It was played many times during our visit! Thursday we came to the house and the Thanksgiving day parade was on and people were everywhere; food was cooking and the smells were mouth-watering. I helped Chelsie make the tray with celery and cream cheese, olives, pickles, etc. There were a total of 15 people there and tons of food to feed everyone. EVERYTHING was good. Literally, every single thing I had, i liked, possibly loved and am forever in-love with. There was: Turkey, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole, rolls, cranberry sauce, stuffing/dressing (take your choice of word), and I just know I left something out which is why I meant to take pictures of everything because i know how forgetful I am. There was finally "orange stuff" as it is called which is tapioca pudding and...other things which I have no idea but it is amazing. Later in the day was dessert which consisted of pumpkin pie, pecan pie, mince meat pie, and heavenly hash/ Mississippi mud cake. This Mississippi mud I had never had before, and I really wonder why because it is a combination of my favorite things ever. Chocolate, marshmallows, and cake. AND the marshmallows were doubled! I mean, that is the dessert I would dream up if I made one. Alas, it is already made and now I have found it at last.

After lunch we watched the Titans game on tv and of course they won. We shot a bbgun and my first shot I hit the target (aka a bottle on the yard) dead on. Amazing, right? Yep. Would have been believable that I meant to but when it hit I let out a huge gasp as in "I can't believe that even got near it!" sort of thing so that ruined my cover. I was impressed though and thats all that matters. I watched Chad and Doug toss the football around some. That night we all played Scottish Bridge again (it was requested!) and then later played Pictionary. I was on a team with Chad, Doug, Chelsie and Papa. With Doug and Chelsie being perfect at drawing we won and I found myself wishing I was blessed with those talents haha. My stick figures just don't do justice any longer. Oh well. After THIS game the guys left and me, Chelsie, Mema, and Sherry played Scattegories. OK. Normally, I am decent at this game but of course, this night, I was absolutely awful. The second round I wrote down ONE word. Thats right, ONE. My brain was fried or I was tired or something, who knows. I was relieved when I found out I wasn't the only one "off my game" that night though. On this glorious second round, everyone was reading their answers and on the 3rd to last one, Mema declared her answer proudly. However, we were on the letter "G" and she wrote down "dog" for her answer. This sent us all into a fit of laughter. After the game we all went down to this little park that has a Christmas light drive-thru display. I loved it of course. I LOVE lights. It was so fun :) Good ending to the night.

Friday the guys went to shoot their guns and us girls went to a place called the Tea Room. It is this really cute lunch place that has great food and even better cakes. I got a sandwich and tomato soup and me, Chelsie, and Sherry split a chocolate raspberry slice of cake. We then went to some stores where I wish I had money to spend and then finally back to Mema and Papas house. The guys were there already eating their lunch and after that we packed up and headed back to Memphis. The original plan was to leave on Saturday but a very good friend of Mema and Papas who was the guy who married Doug and Sherry passed away and his funeral was held in Nashville on Saturday so they wanted to get back in order to go to it. When we got back Chad and I went and saw the new James Bond movie (pretty good, not spectacular, but good) with his good friend/best man in the wedding Jeremy. It was good catching up with him.

Saturday Chad and I went out shopping to see if there were any good sales leftover from Black Friday that we could use our last gift cards on. We only bought some snacks for home but it was still fun. That night we hung out with Jeremy, his cousin, and his cousin's girlfriend. We went to this place that has one of those competitions where if you eat their "Bigfoot Burger" (which includes a 4lb burger, sides and all the toppings) you get it free and your name on a place that hangs on the wall. The record is 7 minutes...I don't even eat a regular 1/3lb burger in 7 minutes. That is completely crazy, but props to that guy whoever he is.

Sunday we got to go to Chads church, Highland, for the first time since we've been married. It was great seeing a lot of people we hadn't seen in a while. We ate at a burger place called Huey's - this place serves toothpicks in the burgers and after you are done you take them and put them in your straw and shoot them at the ceiling tiles - there are thousands of toothpicks on the ceiling. Hilarious. We then headed home! Great first Thanksgiving together :)

This week hasn't been anywhere near as exciting. One of our classes got cancelled, 2 of my exams got cancelled...which IS pretty exciting and I'm so thankful for that but other than that it has been figuring out everything we need to do in order to move, graduate, etc. Chad got his cap and gown today! Woo Hoo! I found it exciting. If it were me I would have had it on and pranced around in it but Chad is a guy so it is still sitting in his truck, wrapped up. Oh our differences. :)

Chelsie and I being mad at Chad for some reason... the "grandkids" pictures even though i'm technically not a grandkid

MMM pumpkin pie!

Our tree! Thats right, we have 8 ornaments. It looks awesome haha We have this, a mini tree, and a Christmas tree music box as our decorations.

Homeless for Christmas...

***(just as a reminder, there have been several new posts so scroll dowm to make sure you've read the other recent ones! this is one of the last reminders i'll be sending haha)

We are leaving tomorrow morning to head off on our adventurous Thanksgiving break. Tonight Nancy, Carl, and Lisa (aunt and uncle) are coming into town so we're staying to see them for a little bit. Tomorrow we head out early and drive the 6-7 hour drive to Birmingham yet again. Tuesday we are going to Memphis, and Wednesday we head out to Missouri for Thanksgiving with the Burris Bunch! Details on all this later...

Last weekend we headed to Birmingham to check out stuff with jobs and places to live because if we didn't find somewhere soon we would have absolutely nowhere to go because we have to be out of this apt. by the 23rd and then we pay by the day until the 26th so thats moving time. Graduation is on the 20th so that is exciting, but if we didn't find somewhere to live we'd end up on the streets...haha ok probably not but we'd be with parents and nothing against them, but i'm sure they dont want us hanging around and mooching off of them all the time ha. SO this week we finalized apartment stuff and we have somewhere to live! Technically we will be homeless as of Christmas which will be a funny story to tell the kids one day. It will be like the "when I was young I had to walk to school in the snow barefoot! uphill! bothways!!" that you always hear. Ours, although not quite as horrible as that, will be more like "Well when I was your age, your Dad and I were homeless for our first Christmas together, but our love kept us going..." haha. No but we can move in the 27th and this place is WONDERFUL!! (http://www.eagleridgebham.com/ - check it out!) So that has been the high point this week. The low points have included paying bills and realizing we are actually grown-up now, no playing around anymore...the registrar's office telling Chad that he didn't have enough hours to graduate (yeah, i had a heart attack) and then finding out it was a mistake on the computers part...several tests and projects...etc. BUT we have a place to live. Good :)

OK so I have yet to put any pictures of our apartment up and since we're moving in a month, I guess it would be a decent time to show you since there will be even newer apartment pictures in a month and a half ha. So here they are!

Ok so you walk in the front door and look to the right and this is on your right...

Then to the left of the futon is our main set up. Yes, those picture frames have the original paper in them...

Across from the couch is the TV. Family Feud in case you were wondering.

Dinning Room table and our lovely bamboo!

To the left of the table is a peek into our kitchen

Kitchen pantry, HUGE - i love it and i will miss it a ton because our next one is basically the size of one shelf of this one. This is before we stocked it...ha

Right side of the kitchen...

Left side of the kitchen....

180 to the fridge

Now from the front door if you turn left is our stairs

And that looks into our bathroom at the top

Shower curtain...exciting

And then our room!!

Alright well thats it of the apartment but these are a few new details added recently. These are our new coasters! Chad found them on sale at Linens and Things and it goes perfectly with everything we have!

This is from Bed Bath and Beyond and it is positively spectacular. See the keyring? No, nothing is holding it on. Its magnetic so you just throw your keys on and they magically stick. Those are bills at the top...nowhere near as exciting as the magnent.

And this is us matching in our Auburn gear making coffee for a relaxing evening. So cute haha

More soon! Try to keep up! :)

Christmas in November

OK. I know my posts have been sporadic BUT there are going to be many new ones so make sure you scroll down to see if you've read all the ones below the new ones before you just read the first one! (wow that was a little confusing...just scroll down until you reach the last one you read. there.)

Well Chad is sick :( i know, i know. So sad. This weekend was going to be a lazy one just getting to take care of him but on Friday I got invited to partake in an annual tradition with Chelsie and Sherry to go to an open house of this Christmas shop. I absolutely love Christmas and so this just sounded amazing. I accepted the invitation and yes, left my sick husband behind to fend for himself. Haha no, he's almost better and on antibiotics and told me it was completely fine to go. Don't go passing any harsh judgements on my wife-hood. SO Friday around 3 we all took off towards Memphis (all driving separately). Friday night we ordered some pizza and watched a rather weird movie called Wedding Daze and then Chelsie and I ended up staying up an extra hour after everyone else went to bed talking. This seems to run in both families? ha. Saturday we were planning on leaving around 11 and Chels had offered to curl my hair, so who would turn that down? Hey do you mind if I play with your hair while you relax and make it look great? No, that sounds awful... yeah right. So we got our hair done and left to head to the shop! This place was GREAT! It was a little house that the owners had turned into a shop - decorated Christmas trees everywhere. On the bottom floor were all these expensive decorations -just to give you an idea, we looked at one glass santa that was about 3 inches tall...$90. Yeah. So looking was fun I was just nervous I would end the weekend telling Chad I had to use all our savings on a ceramic snowman i knocked off a Christmas tree. Luckily that didn't happen. There were ornaments, statues of caroling people, shirts, hot chocolate mix, everything. The decorations were so packed together that you didn't have to move to see 10 different arrangements. Sparkles galore. Upstairs was the less-pricey things but just as cute. They also had the different villages and pillows and such. Sherry was SO sweet and bought Chelsie and I both an ornament! I got a snowflake with little snowman heads in the shapes of marshmallows (told you I like those things) at the ends and Chelsie got a candy cane. Sherry didn't get an ornament but she got some wonderful smelling potpourri that looked great too- pine cones and red berries scattered within. Being their open house, they were serving some food and naturally we didn't want to be rude and so we got some. It was turkey and ham, sweet potato casserole, stuffing/dressing (whatever you want to call it), gravy, and rolls. I am not a big fan of sweet potatoes but this casserole was great!! Stuffing is my usually my favorite side dish at this time of year but the casserole was a close second. Maybe even a tie...

Our ornaments!

I came home Saturday about an hour before Chad had to go to work. He usually works from 5-10ish but of course he got put on a party that was suppose to end at midnight. He got home at 1:15. So that was Saturday- very eventful. Today not much happened either. He worked until about 2 and we had some homework to do for tomorrow and we had fun just being together since we had missed each other from friday. Its our 3 month anniversary today! So it was nice just being together.

These are our pumpkins from halloween by the way... a little late but still wanted to share!

Procrastination: My way of doing things

Yes, Yes i know. another long time has gone by and i apologize. I've actually gotten emails asking about it! Glad to know people are enjoying this....well, when i keep up with it anyways-ha. We've been so busy (shocking) and that is why the delay has been so long. I've always had problems with procrastinating...the doctors haven't found a cure yet so I guess I just have to deal.



OK well so this doesn't turn into another novel I'll just sum up and then hopefully be able to keep up on a day-to-day basis (or at least an exciting event-to-exciting event basis. day by day may be a little boring...class, eat, sleep...class, eat,sleep....). 2 weeks ago saturday Chad and Chelsie had entered to play in this soccer tournament for a charity "The Jesus Project". Their team ended up making it to the championship! The next night we had a WONDERFUL time with Steven and Chelsie because they offered to make us dinner! It was a "thank-you" for hosting and cooking things for them. How sweet :) Well sunday night they came over and started cooking...however, when Steven opened the steaks (NY Strips!) they were purple. Now, all the steaks that I have seen un-cooked, granted, not a lot, but none of them has looked quite like this. Steven and Chelsie took it back to the store and exchanged it (they said it seemed like a normal thing for people to bring meat back because it was bad...note to self, do not buy meat from there) and then everyone came back to the apartment and started the adventure. There was so much stuff and I just stood there and watched as they cooked the steaks on the stove, steamed broccoli, cooked rice, seasoned rice, seasoned steak, baked croissants, cut up fresh pineapple, made fresh salad with ranch croutons and cheese, and it was all incredibly good. We had a lot of fun that night just sitting around talking and actually ended up getting Steven's didgeridoo (don't blame me if I spelled that wrong...) and we all tried to play it, tried being the key term in that sentence. It was great though!


The next weekend was our Fall Break meaning we had Friday the 17th off. Better than nothing but still only one day compared to regular colleges many days off. Anyways Thursday after our bible test (don't even ask how that went) we headed off on our 6 1/2 hour ride down beautiful arkansas roads of fields and tractors and boringness. How wonderful. We made the best of it and became rockstars singing at the top of our lungs. Too bad you can't send in tapes to American Idol via cell phone. We totally would have won. We finally got home pretty late and were getting everything ready for bed and I was downstairs talking to mom and if you know us, you know that we usually stay up who knows how long yacking on and on about anything and everything. However, tonight we had already said how tired we were and how we'd just talk about everything another night....well we kept saying that and saying we were going to bed....and kept saying it until about 3:30 until we decided that was late enough haha. Friday Mom and I headed out and got manicures and pedicures! I still think this is just amazing that mom does this every other week, its great! Anyways the lady that she gets hers done with did my feet and nails for the wedding and i loved her and we both got to hang out with her Friday. I think we laughed the entire time - it was hilarious. We met Chad and Dad for lunch at Panera Bread (YAY!!). Speaking of...random, i know, but I had always thought things were pretty healthy there...on the contrary actually. I was looking up how to make one of their sandwiches and found out that a lot of the sandwiches had 20-38 grams of fat...in one sandwich! The soups (even the healthy sounding ones like broccoli cheese) were just as bad. Shocking! Of course, this doesn't change how much I absolutely love this place, but still, I couldn't believe it! Anyways we ate their and then Chad had to leave to go to his INTERVIEW! He came back an hour and a half or two hours later and told us how well it went! They were asking him to come back for a second run and we are planning on when that will be. I am so excited that we actually might end up in Birmingham. I believe in 11th grade or so I told myself that I wanted to live a number of places other than Alabama...and now I'm so excited its a possibility haha. So that was a good boost for the weekend. Friday night Mom, Dad, Chad, Me and Kyle played the board game Settlers. Quite a long game but I ended up winning and so it was worth it ha. The best thing is no one saw it coming and were concentrating on 2 people who were almost winning and then BAM! i win. wonderful. Anyways don't want to become too self-absorbed....

Saturday Mom and I left around 3 to head over to Bethany's house. Mom and her were putting on a "thank-you" dinner (i see a theme forming...) for a lot of people who helped with the wedding. We went early because Mom was making her famous rolls for everyone. I helped chop veggies (zucchini, squash, green peppers, onions) which we later made into kabobs and grilled. We had tenderloin that was soooo tender and everyone loved it. It was a ton of fun as always - the guys built a fire in the yard and at the end of the night all the guys ended up out there and all the girls were inside talking. Very stereotypical huh. I did go out there a few times - we were roasting marshmallows and so there was no way I was going to miss out on that. It is one of my favorite things in life...anyways...we ended up back at home pretty late that night. Sunday was church. Man i love that place - i always feel right at home at that church. So we went to early service (still getting used to the fact we have 2 services) and then for class Mom and Dad teach a Financial Peace class so we got to sit in on that which turned out great because it was about insurance stuff we needed to know and also about things we went over in class we had to skip to go to the interview. That was really great and I know wherever we end up we will definitely be doing that class....we will have no idea what to do otherwise ha. OK so we went out to eat at Cozumel of course and during the meal Chad and I decided why not stay another day and leave on Monday? So we did. Sunday night we played another game of Settlers and then Monday Chad tried to get in for his second interview but they were too busy so we just got to chill out. We went to Panera again (can you tell this is one of my favorite places?) and then left in the afternoon. We went to Memphis and was able to see Chad's parents and Brett for a little bit. I wish we could have stayed longer but we had to get back to school :( Overall though the trip was good and we are waiting to go back!!!

The next weekend my Dad's side of the family was in town because my cousin was in the homecoming musical Oaklahoma. We got to go out to eat with them on Saturday at a local pizza place so it was good to catch up. We went to the musical that night and it was pretty good! I knew a little about it but i had never seen it before. I knew one of the main girls in it so that was fun too. It was about 3 hours long but it was worth it and we had fun.

Chad and I had a date night and went to the new Mcalisters in town - I got some sweetberry chicken sandwich that I wouldn't necessarily recommend...wasn't horrible I just won't be getting it again haha We had another date night when we went up to Little Rock and went to the mall - Chad got some much needed new jeans and a sweater. We got our 6 month ring inspection and cleaning, and we went to Target (forgot the giftcards again Mom). Its been fun just having random date nights :) We're together a lot anyways but going out "on a date" is just fun! Last night Chad asked me out on a date night walk - we went out around 9 and walked around a trail that goes all around searcy. It was cold and we had jackets and flashlights. We carved our name on a tree like people used to do haha but i loved it. On our way back we stopped at Popeye's and got some biscuits and ate them on the way back home! I am just so blessed by my wonderful husband

OK Monday night we hosted an "after-halloween" get-together thing (so we could go buy stuff on sale...are we college students or what?). I got some paper plates, cups, and napkins and then we were going to have the chocolate fountain with stuff to dip in it. I made some "putrid punch" which was just apple cider with "bobbing apples" which was frozen apple cider with food coloring and placed gummy worms all over it and in it. Didn't quite turn out like it was suppose to....looked a little weird, but it was good so i guess it went over well. I also put gummy worms in our ice cubs and we fixed kool-aid and so it looked cool with the worms you could see in the cups. Well the chocolate fountain, of course, didn't work right so we just had this lumpy chocolate sitting in the bottom of it that everyone dipped into...should have known something would go wrong but it turned out ok. We all played SEVERAL rounds of mario-kart on the Wii game system throughout the night. That game is really fun when you have a lot of people. Its even more fun watching other people play it. Hilarious. My mom still trumps all with how hard I've laughed while watching someone else... So i think we had about 9 people total over here. good crowd. I really love hosting things like this...I just love having people over, serving food, playing games - love it.

OOOOOK so that catches you up! Whew! Now i Promise to keep up with things so be checking back on a regular basis from now on. I still have to put up pictures of the apt, wedding picture information, etc. So sorry to get in this lull of no writing but alas, it is over! I will be writing very soon....

Here, There, and Everywhere

birthday, mom, rolls, cookies, target, futon, sad, roadtrip, grape juice, chapel, timeshare, scared, sideways, adrenaline, magic, tigers, terry, 3 hour tour, pressure, sad again, zebras, pigs, ark, huge, 44 oz steak, 9:00, sunshine, british guy, pasta, clothing, late.....and that sums up everything we have done lately. The End.

Ha ok just kidding. I will give some detail for those of you who are more interested. Well there has been so much going on that I literally have not had time to sit and write it all down. One thing after another has just given me more and more to talk about so this may be quite an extensive entry. The 21st of September was my Golden Birthday! Finally a true adult, able to do all the adulty things except rent a car but hopefully I won't really be needing to do that anytime soon. Actually nothing has really changed besides me being able to say I'm 21 ha. My wonderful Mother came to visit the weekend of my birthday which was wonderful news. She got here on Friday and stayed until Sunday. Friday night we wandered WalMart (with all of the arkansas characters from the hills that come out during the weekend) and Mom taught me the good things to have to keep a pantry stocked instead of my week old bread and peanut butter (no, it wasn't really that bad but it was nice to have help to know what things were needed to actually cook). We were there for quite a while and returned home and got to put everything in its place - is it weird that I love doing that? I really do. I love putting everything away in an organized manner. Guess thats a good thing, i just bet Mom and Dad would have never guessed that seeing my room growing up. It was so late after we had everything put away that we just sat in the living room and talked for a little bit -- there was this show on tv, I don't remember what it was but it was the guy that went to a national park and lived with the animals for several years and then got eaten by one of the bears he called his friend....anyways he recorded everything and it was quite humorous. He was running around with these foxes like they were best friends when really they were wild foxes running away from him, and his crazy mind was telling him they were playing together. SO if you ever see that on tv, just watch it for a few minutes and get a good laugh. [OK just as a disclaimer...this post is going to be quite lengthy so go ahead and get comfortable if you aren't already......] Saturday we woke up and started in with the oh so famous Cavender rolls that I had to learn to make in order to consider myself a cook at all. It takes a total of 3 hours to make the rolls because they are completely from scratch - it was a lot of fun. It is funny though, how much I really don't know - like random things you spray on that helps something not get to sticky or putting this in the mixture to prevent so and so...not sure if that made any sense but maybe someone will understand what I'm saying. Basically all that to say im a newbie and am slowly learning so stay tuned for great stories. OK so rolls got finished and looked phenomenal - they were the perfect brown on top, and just so you can get a visual...

I think the total number was around 37? Anyways those are definitely gone and have been for a while. We destroyed them and had probably half of them eaten by the end of the day - and that is no joke. Afterwards we headed to Little Rock to get some things from Target and do a little shopping :) Ended up not getting anything because it was "one of those days" where nothing worked and if you don't understand then you are lying, or I am very jealous ha. After Little Rock we headed back and Mom and I cooked a meal! We made salisbury steaks, broccoli rice and cheese casserole, and already had the rolls. Steven ended up coming over and we all ate to our hearts content. It was a good meal - thank you mom. We sat around and just talked and talked and it was one of those times where everything that was said was just the funniest thing you've ever heard and our faces were red and our jaws were sore. Great birthday celebration! Steven then busted out his french press and we all partook in this new thing we had never tried. Even mom, who hates coffee, had a cup! Although her cup consisted of about a centimeter of coffee, half a cup of creamer, and hot chocolate mix to top it off. Basically it tasted like chocolate creamer but she fell in love with it and was so excited to see she liked coffee. Hilarious. Then came Sunday, and Mom and I ran (yet again) to Wally World and picked up some frozen stuff we had neglected to get on our adventure on friday. It was so fun having her down and being able to show her our mostly set up apartment (and yes - i have pictures now so they will be up soon, stay tuned). It was sad to see her go but it had to be done, I'm sure sitting around while we went to classes for hours wouldn't be too exciting. And I'm sure she was missing all the animals at home :). Sunday was my actual birthday (woo hoo!) but since we has Branson, MO planned for the next weekend we didn't really do anything big. We actually rented Cool Runnings because Chad had never seen it. Let me just say that movie will always be good, and having been to Jamaica made it even better. Chad got me some BEAUTIFUL little hoop earings that have dangling see-through blue spheres that hang down which he gave me on thursday before my mom got there, and ALSO a Cardinals Ankiel jersey which I have wanted for quite a while and that was given to me on our one month anniversary half for that and half for my birthday :)

Alright break time, get up, go to the bathroom, eat some snacks....there is much more to come.

Tuesday we randomly decided to take a trip over to Memphis! We left after classes and had a wonderful dinner of grilled chicken, hash browns, rolls and sparkling grape juice (love love love that stuff!). We then did presents which was so sweet because I wasn't even expecting anything and then moved on to cake (funfetti with chocolate fudge icing...if you haven't had it, go buy it after you finish reading this. it is amazing) which we all ate and loved, of course. The next morning we left around 7:30 to try and get back in time for chapel but we forgot about a tiny detail called traffic which there was a lot of, and then construction back up as well so it set us back a little and we pulled into harding at about 10:07 (chapel starts at 10) so we didn't want to skip because who wants to waste a skip when you are already up? My skips consist of me turning off the snooze and deciding to sleep in an extra hour. Anyways we ran in and made it to chapel and that was our wednesday.

FRIDAY we left about 6:30 to head to Missouri for our "free vacation" we won about a year ago. It is one of those timeshare things but hey, we have time so why not sit through a presentation for a free weekend, right? We got to Branson and went to check in to "Branson Getaways" where they were going to give us all the information about everything included. We were then informed that instead of the Welks Resort (keep this word in mind...resort....) we were being moved to the Howard Johnson (i don't see resort at the end of that....) because they had complaints about dirty rooms. Hard to believe, but hey, nothing we could do about it. The H.J. was actually pretty nice because it was newly renovated so no complaints. We checked in and waited on Mema and Papa to get to branson (they live about 40 minutes away) so we could meet up with them. We went to Steak and Shake (one of Chad's favorite places) and had lunch and then headed out to Silver Dollar City (a.k.a. "Steal-your-dollar city" by the Burris family).'' The weather was perfect, very sunny and not too hot so walking around outside all day didn't bother anyone. We got there around 1 and stayed until about 5. One of the first things we did was this thing called "Grandpa's Mansion". You walked in and there were ghost things all around and there was a room that was completely upside down and then you made your way downstairs and the floors were completely slanted so when you were walking 'upright' your feet were actually very slanted. It was really funny seeing everyone walking around. I actually got pretty disoriented, but that is just my luck. I get that on a normal basis so who knows what my brain was thinking in that room. We walked around and did a ton of rides and I haven't done that in forever so I loved every second. Here is a little f.y.i. about myself....you know how most people scream or squeal or cry on the big rides that go fast and spin you every which direction? Yeah, well i don't do any of those things. I laugh. That's right- as my heart is in my throat and my head is slamming against my harness I am laughing the entire way. Who knows where I got that trait from.... We also went to this saloon show, watched furniture get made, watched baseball bats get made, got to see how peanut brittle is made, and went on the famous ride "Fire in the Hole" which I have heard about for months leading up to this outing. You'll just have to go visit Steal-your-dollar City to find out what its all about. I should get paid for all this advertising I'm doing, although I'm sure they wouldn't appreciate being called Steal-your-dollar City.

Friday night we went to Andy Williams restaurant he has there. It was very classy and had very good food. I got salmon and Chad got shrimp pesto pasta. We had a great time just talking and eating - got to hear a few stories about Mema and Papa growing up and their first few places they lived and about working on the railroad. I love hearing stories like that. After dinner Chad and I headed to our Magic show that was included in our package. It was Kirby VanBurch and his wife and the show was very enjoyable. When we got there, however, we sat in our seats and this other couple came and said we were in their seats....long story short, they got to sit second row but we got to keep our seats so I guess that is ok haha. No we had pretty good seats about 5 rows back or so. The show had tigers, leopards, chickens, and this little duck who wore a bowtie- adorable. He made them appear, disappear, change bodies, etc. After every trick we would sit there and analyze how it was possible, so that means it was a good show if we are bewildered every time. I did figure out one of the tricks, but I won't spoil it for all you magic fanatics. We were pretty worn out after our long day (and I think I mentioned about 5 times that day how I couldn't believe it was just friday, it seemed like we had been there at least 2 days with how much we had done) so we went back to the hotel and just chilled and went to bed.

Saturday we woke up and got ready for our oh-so-exciting timeshare meeting! Yay! The presentation started at 12:30 and was suppose to last for 2 hours. We sat and talked to this guy named Terry for a while about their services and how they are different from other timeshares and all this stuff and then we watched an informational video, etc etc. We got a tour of the property and honestly, all this stuff is pretty cool. If we were about 20 years older and had a lot of money, it would be a definite consideration. However, these people did not realize we could not write a check anywhere near the $12,000 down payment they were asking for. We just laughed at that. Anyways, 3 HOURS after we arrived we were saying we HAD to leave because our next show was at 4:30 and we had to get there early to get the tickets and seats and it was a little bit of a drive from where we were. We finally escaped and headed to the Sight and Sound theater to meet Mema and Papa to watch the production of "Noah". This was absolutely breathtaking. The stage was HUGE and the details of everything was amazing. For the second half of the performance you were inside the ark and they had tons of animals that they loaded onto the ark - zebras, camels, pigs, goats, cows, horses, etc. and they were all live and then they had other animatronic ones in their stalls. Just everything was done with great detail, it was really great. We hadn't eaten all day (since our lovely 2 hour meeting turned into 3...) so we left afterwards and headed to a restaurant called Montana Mikes because in our package we got dinner there, which was a $30 certificate. It was a steakhouse and we ended up splitting a 44 oz. steak. 44 oz.! It was so big we had leftovers for 3 meals after that. That was a lot of fun. We had planned on going to the Branson Landing afterwards which is an outside strip mall but it ended up closing at 9 and we arrived at 8:45 so that was exciting. We walked around then headed back to the hotel.

Sunday we attended church with Mema and Papa and Sarah and Todd (his aunt and uncle) and Aunt Dee (his great aunt). We went to a place called Zio's for lunch, of course I loved it since it was Italian. I got this spinach and artichoke pasta that was really good. We all hung out for a while at Mema and Papa's house and watched some football and ate some jello cookies that Papa made - soo good!. We hit the road around 3:30 and headed back to the Branson Landing planning to stay just a little while but of course I ended up having luck with clothes (random) and so we stayed quite a while...aka we left when things were closing. It was a lot of fun though :)

Whew....alright I know I left some details out but I just wanted to get a post in so everyone knew I was still here. Don't expect it to be this long before the next one. PLEASE add any details I left out in a comment!! ...or just comment ha

***Here is how to comment: Click comment at the bottom of this post and type in your comments in the box. You'll type in the word verification and then at the very bottom you can choose the circle that says Name/URL instead of the one that is already selected and all you have to do is write your name! You don't need a URL so don't worry about it. Then just click Publish Your Comment!!

Life lesson: never leave leftovers unattended...overnight

So I made the crowd-pleasing chicken enchiladas last night for dinner, along with cheese biscuits and green beans, and afterwards decided I didn't feel like cleaning everything up (let me just tell you, it looked like i had cooked for twenty people there were so many things piled on top of each other in that tiny place) so I decided to wait and Chad and I proceeded to watch the Shawshank Redemption for his last night off for a while (watch that movie if you haven't seen it...great movie. not for the kids though...). Anyways after I said my "Ugh I'll just clean it up later" we talked about how its funny that Mom's are always in the kitchen afterwards scrubbing and loading the dishwasher and always say "Let me just clean up before ______". How silly, just put it off....how naive we are.

Well I learned why moms say this. This morning, on our way out the door, I realized I had forgotten to put away the rest of the ENTIRE dish of leftover enchiladas (about 5 or 6) that we had planned on being our meals for the next couple days. So that is strike one, no meals. Strike two came later this afternoon when I walked in from class to the smell of food, and not the good smell of "mmm fresh baked cookies!" or "wow apple pie!" or anything even remotely close. It was more like a "wow your trash really needs to be taken out soon..." smell. Strike two. The third was when i gave in and finally started cleaning up. Trying to rather. I rinsed, I scrubbed, I tried to conquer all of the disgusting smelling crusty leftover food stuck all over everything, finally accomplishing the task about an hour later. There is still one pan sitting on top of the stove that I didn't see and refuse to wash yet. My hands are still recovering.

Ok so while that was a bit stretched as to how bad it was, I really do understand why everyone wants to clean up right after the meal and now I believe I will as well. I want to extend a thank you to my Mom and everyone else who has ever cooked for me. I appreciate your hard work, and I sympathize with all of you who have gone through this same catastrophe.

Cake and coral

The day after our one month I made Chad this cake for after he came home from work because I wanted it to be a surprise haha. I didn't have an actual icing spreader so i used a spoon...the icing i did get was the pre-mixed bag that seemed easy to squeeze and even advertised it on the bag, HOWEVER, after i got done writing the heart my hands were KILLING me and i still had all that to go. The original plan was to color in the baseball with the white...obviously i quickly changed my mind.

Alright we have our underwater pictures! I'm going to put a few up here but i'll put a lot up on the webshots site too!

^There is the stingray we saw!

Well, this is the shark...the little round ^

head is poking out at the bottom. The

picture is so bad because I really was

freaked out....

[as a note...this is the first time i've done pictures on here so thats why they are so crazily placed haha]

One month down...

It's officially our one month anniversary. One month ago right now we were partying at the reception! Our personal finance teacher must have gotten wind of our exciting day because class was cancelled. How sweet of him :). Tonight we are planning on going out to eat - first night out as a married couple just the two of us since we've gotten here. So we'll do that and then we were going to partake in the $3 movies but there isn't anything out even worth that so we are just going to take it easy and rent a movie and have some dessert. Sounds good to me! Chad came downstairs earlier with a gift bag and handed it to me...part anniversary part birthday gift. It was a Cardinals jersey!! We had been looking for ones with Rick Ankiel's name and number (24) because he is my favorite player and hadn't been able to find one so i was quite thrilled. I've already planned on wearing it tomorrow which is exciting because I'll get to sleep in an extra 9 minutes knowing that I wont be trying on ten different outfits haha. Oh the joys of being a girl...

On a random note...bad things come in 3's right? Well i had my third this morning. I have broken glass for 3 days in a row now. First was a glass bottle i accidentally left in the freezer which exploded, second was a glass container which fell out of the refrigerator when i opened the door and shattered everywhere, and then today, as i pulled out the coffee container, it hit one of our glasses on the cupboard which fell and shattered and then some all over the counter (don't worry, not one of our nice glasses!). Good grief. But hopefully this streak has ended!? We can't afford to loose much more....I've already vowed not to pick up our glass carafe for at least 5 years.

5 dryers full

Well so much for daily writing...there has actually been a ton going on, however, almost too much so that finding time to write down everything became a problem. And then i wasn't feeling well so typing was low on my to-do list. However, I am feeling wonderful now, my to-do list consists of laundry (which is currently washing...5 loads. thats right, 5) and homework, and so I figured taking a few minutes on here wouldn't be too bad. At least I'm getting something productive done at the same time. And it's the weekend- who does homework at 7 on a friday night. Alright so LAST weekend, on Sunday night, we had 2 people over, one being my cousin Steven and the other is one of Chad's good friends Peter. Chelsie said she was coming over later but the 4 of us hung out until then. I was trying my hand at cooking again - this time with poppy seed chicken which Chad mentioned he loved. Now not only had I never cooked poppy seed chicken before, I don't think I have ever actually had any. The only thing I knew about it was that you could get in trouble with the cops if you had to take a test after eating poppy seeds...but why the cops would give you a urine test if you didn't even seem remotely tipsy is beyond me. Anyways it seemed like it was going well but the recipe called for 8-10 chicken breasts. Now, if we had 14 people over, maybe. But we had 4. 4 people eating 10 breasts of chicken is ridiculous. So i decided to cut that waaay down but being the genius i am, had already mixed together the regular amount of cream of chicken and cream of mushroom soup. SO i just added chicken until it looked decent (not really knowing what it was suppose to look like in the first place) and then poured it in the 9x13 pan....and it barely covered the bottom. So my expert cooking knowledge told me this wasn't right so i put it in an 8x8 instead...where it was very thick. I just didn't care anymore but then made the "topping" of smashed Ritz crackers, butter, and poppy seeds which didn't cover all of the 8x8 even so i was just thoroughly confused. Of course this was the night people were actually judging my cooking abilities for the first time, of course. OH well, it cooked and i was frantically mixing up the garlic cheese biscuits and sticking them in an over that was about 100 degrees cooler than they were suppose to cook in but couldn't do anything about it because i even had the toaster oven occupied with our baked potatoes (first time for that as well). Whew. Anyways it came out of the oven and was rather soupy at first but set up a little bit, but we served it in bowls since it was runny. And guess what, everyone loved it, the cheese biscuits were gone and they were asking if there were any more. Yess. I thought it was a little salty but everyone else loved it, had seconds, and made compliments! So i guess it was a good night overall. :) After that we went out in our "backyard" which is HUGE, but technically not "ours" because its shared by the entire apartment complexes and Harding intramural fields...but it looks like its ours! So we went out in the back and played bocce in teams - Steven and me, Chad and Peter. Steven and I won of course, ha. [OH and just for those of you who know my mosquito problem...before we went out i COMPLETELY doused myself in bug spray....i received 3 bug bites that night. Unbelievable.] We came in and then taught Steven how to play Settlers which ended up being pretty fun....I won :) Chelsie came in towards the beginning and brought dessert! It was sugar cookie crust with cream cheese and strawberries, bananas, and blueberries on top. SOOO good! So she watched as we played the rest of the game and then afterwards we played this card game called Swap. Basically we coined this game as "uno for dumb people". It's the same as uno except only colors...no numbers. So we all felt like we were in the first grade again and it was hilarious because we were just cracking up at how dumb we felt playing the game....which therefore made us laugh and have fun in the process. So its been an inside joke to keep asking people if they want to come over and play swap. Whew...that was sunday night. Monday is my long day - 2 horrible classes and then art at 4:30 for two hours which has the most uninteresting teacher ever. So after that adventure I came home and then around 7 people started coming over for our second "smovie" night with Steven, Peter, Chelsie and one of her roomates and then one of Chad's roomates Barrett and the girl he's dating Shay. Full house. This time Chad wrote out a menu that had 3 smoothies on it to choose from and then one joke smoothie that had garlic, canola oil and some other stuff in it. He named it after one of the girls there which went over real well haha. So all the smoothies were made and drank and then we decided on the movie Clue and yes, we watched all 3 endings. It was good, nothing i'd beg to see every weekend but it was good. Then people left randomly but everyone was gone around 11:45. Tuesday I made this really good chocolate fudge cake which turned out great but its one of those that you just add water so I want to try it again with milk instead so it tastes a little better. Chelsie hung out at night to keep the streak alive of seeing her haha but then Wednesday is when I wasn't feeling well so no one came over then. But yesterday Chelsie came back over when Chad was at work and fixed me dinner! It was so sweet :) we had chicken fingers and this 4 cheese rice that was really good. She also fixed croissants and we just hung out and ate and talked and then I had a bunch of homework to do so she left and then a little while later Chad came home. Not much besides that has gone on besides all that and school/work. I've been job hunting - applied to 3 places so far so tomorrow I'll be going to more places. Thursday in financial aid we went over this project that we have to do for next week. It consists of budgeting out EVERYTHING...finding out your income (including loans, checks, savings, etc) and all these things to pay with food and school and insurances and cars and every single tiny thing...and we both just sat there overwhelmed and thats the day I was set on finding a job asap. I've been knowing I need to get one, but had a lot of stuff going on to keep my mind off of it - but that sure got me back on track. Hopefully something works out!

To start things off...

Well here it is. I have finally accomplished and actually gone through with writing a blog so that everyone dying to find out what we are up to will actually know what is going on in our lives. We wanted to not only have a record of what we've done but also wanted to share with those friends and family members who we don't get to chat it up with on a daily basis. And we've done it! Now I'm not sure how interesting our lives will actually be starting off (school, homework, work, sleep...and repeat the next day) but I guess we will give it a shot and see if this works out. To start things off, our wedding went so perfect and I am just thankful to each and every person who helped out with it! Those final pictures just got finished today so soon (and very soon) there will be pictures up on here, or if I can't figure out how to do that there will at least be a website to view them! There is a slideshow up already (http://www.amberfordphoto.com/ - click Galleries, and then click our names) which turned out phenomenal so it will be fun looking at the millions of other pictures taken that day. So after the wedding we went to Jamaica which, was absolutely amazing. The water really was as clear as it is in all the postcards and travel channel specials you see. We got to go snorkeling, which was definitely a highlight on the trip. We went twice and on the second one actually got to see a stingray (learned not to get to close from our good friend Steve Irwin) and a shark. Now, given it was a nurse shark, but seeing an 8 foot long shark right below you sleeping isn't the calmest feeling I've ever had. I took my picture and then took off for the boat. Whew. Anyways that was a lot of fun and the people down there are the nicest people. They were so friendly - the waiters, the entertainment crews, the shuttle drivers, everyone. It was so much fun. There are pictures up for that too at http://good-times.webshots.com/album/565560138kQHBXF?vhost=good-times. Wow that was a lot longer website than i thought it was. So we got back to Birmingham from Jamaica Friday, August 15th, packed up everything (which took quite a while...i have a lot of stuff...) on Saturday, went to church and drove to Memphis Sunday, packed Chad's stuff (which still took a little bit) and then drove to Searcy, AR on Monday. Talk about exhausting. Come back from a week of relaxing with no responsibilities to BAM! real life. So from Monday to Monday (yesterday) we've been unpacking and getting stuff arranged to look pretty decent. We actually really love our apartment. It is a 2 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath townhouse. Downstairs is the living room, kitchen, and half bath and upstairs is the 2 bedrooms and bathroom. And by 2 bedrooms I mean our bedroom and our study/computer room. Pictures of it will be up as soon as i finish hanging up a few picture frames and straightening up a few last minute fixes. We did already have a few people over. We invented a new found tradition we plan on starting. "Smovie" night. Smoothies and a movie. Creative, we know. We had some people over and I believe it was a hit. At least I had fun. We made 2 types of smoothies: 1.strawberries, pineapple, and orange juice and 2. strawberries, bananas, orange juice and honey. Chad doesn't like bananas, I didn't want pineapple in mine...and everyone just said they wanted those two. So it worked out. I also made my first meal as a wife haha. The famous Chicken Enchiladas my mom makes - they are amazing. And we just finished all 10 yesterday. Not at one time, we just finished up the leftovers yesterday. Besides that, classes have started which has lowered the morale a little but we're doing good so far. It's fun saying "my husband" to people :) still haven't gotten used to that yet so every time I say it there's a little rush of excitement. Life is so much more fun when you live with you best friend!

Well there it is. The first post ever. Please leave comments so I know what to do and ask questions so I have things to talk about! ha.