Weekend at home

Kyle and I had a wonderful weekend spent here at home. This was the first weekend that we have been here in Marietta, and not spent the entire time working on/painting our house... and it was great! Friday night we went out in Buckhead to hear a band from Athens called Modern Skirts. They had 3 other bands perform before them, but they were by far the best. All the band members were very talented and traded instruments almost every song. We met Chris and a few other couples there and had a really good time!

Modern Skirts:

Chris, Kyle & I:

Saturday we went for a run, then went shopping! We finally found chairs for our kitchen table that were reasonably priced AND we also found a large piece of artwork to go over our desk in the office! So that is very exciting!
Kyle, Chris and Tyson left around 5:00 to drive about 45 minutes north to go camping for the night. They car camped (drive to a camp site & set up a tent) off of a forest service road in North Georgia that Chris found on a fly fishing website. There was a creek, a place to put a tent, and a fire pit. They hung out around the fire, ate Brunswick stew and went to sleep. The most challenging part was fitting Kyle, Chris & Tyson and 5 sleeping bags in a 2 man tent. Kyle put a sweatshirt on Tyson to keep him warm which worked UNTIL Tyson went to mark his territory! ha.
Today we spent lounging around the house, and getting organized. I finally got my PC working properly downstairs which I've been wanting to do for a while! We also have some very good news, we finally found a Japanese place that serves the kind of food that we like! It only took us a year, but we found it! We've figured out that we only like the Japanese restaurants that serve Ginger & Shrimp sauce. If they don't have those, then we don't like the food!
And whats on the agenda for tonight? Smores & watching the Academy Awards! (Our smores were so rich,--Kyle was in charge of the chocolate--we could only eat one each!)
Hope you all had relaxing weekends as well!

Barilla Free Cookbook!

Hey all, just thought I would share this link:
http://www.celebrityitaliantable.com/Pages/Registration.aspx

You can register for free (they don't send you anything!) and download a free cookbook from Barilla with recipes from celebrities! They all look very yummy, and who doesn't like pasta?!? PLUS when you download a version of the cookbook, Barilla donates $1 to charity (America's Second Harvest, a national charity that secures and distributes more than two billion pounds of food products annually), which is a great way to give back! I think when you register you have to say where you heard about this from, so definitely put in Get Married! ENJOY!

Boonetown for Baker fun!

This past weekend, we drove 2 cars up to Boone to spend the weekend with my family. We drove separately so we could officially hand Nick off HIS four-runner! We got to the cabin around 11:00, and I re-used Molly's hand made bow and surprised Nick with a vacuumed out, clean car!

Nick acting REALLY happy:

The next morning we all woke up had a wonderful breakfast, and then all spent the afternoon shopping at the outlets in Blowing Rock. I figured out that I had not been clothes shopping since October, so we thought it was finally time to go again :) Kyle and I found some great deals!
Nick brought 2 friends, Win & Mike, to join in the family fun as well.
Nick, Win, Mike, Kyle & I all went snowboarding Saturday night. We had a great time, and I think I broke the curse of last year! I had no problems getting off of chair lifts OR going down the mountain at high speeds :) Win was making us all hysterical, as he would fly down the mountain and catch an edge ON PURPOSE- fall and then wait for an innocent bystander to come and ask if he was ok. It was hilarious to hear all the people on the chair lift above say "man I think he's really hurt.... he was definitely out of control". It was a fun night for sure!
Sunday we did absolutely nothing. Tara and I actually NEVER got out of our pj's! Since the weather was windy, rainy and cold we stayed inside, played games, took naps, and played with the kiddos. The twins are getting so big it is unbelievable! This is a picture from when Tara & Jamie went to a studio in Raleigh to capture the kids at 10 months old! They are talking so much and making so many funny sounds. Such happy babies!

Okay back to the cabin. Here is Kyle making Natalie laugh:

Nathan loved to look at the doggies outside the window:

Nick, Jamie and Kyle:

Uncle Nick & little Natalie playing! Tyson LOVED the twins and was so gentle with them... I was so proud :)

Sunday night, the college guys headed back to Chapel Hill & State since they didn't have Monday off of school. They drove the 4-Runner and of course we took pictures as they were leaving!

Nick & Win... BFF for Life

The rest of us played Cranium and laughed for about 2 hours straight. Now remember we had literally been in the cabin ALL day at this point!

Here is a preview of what occured:

Crab walk around the whole house with a useless green frog on your stomach... no prob!

At one point, dad asked which color player we were. Mom said "this one is ours, and this one is you guys in our dust". If you know my mom you will find this hilarious, b/c in the 24 years I've known her NOTHING like this has ever come out of her mouth! It was a very fun night, and a great way to end our trip to Boone!
Monday morning we got up, did laundry, cleaned and went our separate ways. I had to work in the car on the way home and unfortunately we couldn't get Kyle's phone to sink up right and make my internet connect. And that is all I will say about Monday.

We had a wonderful weekend, and it always goes by too fast! It was so great to see everyone and the twins. Love you all!

Valentines Day... Pamper Leah Day :)

This year we celebrated Valentines Day early, since Kyle has class on Wednesday and Thursday nights. I don't know how Valentines Day has evolved into this, but somehow it has become Pamper Leah Day... and it's truly a treat :) Every year Kyle surprises me by grocery shopping for all the ingredients, cooking an amazing recipe that we've never done before and then we watch a movie together! One year while we were both living in dorms, he managed to cook chicken wrapped with bacon and our favorite kind of noodle shells on the side!

Last year he cooked Shrimp Scampi over angel hair pasta!
(Sara note the apron!)
This year we went a little healthier. He cooked Shrimp Linguine with mushrooms, onions and tomatoes. It was delicious and had such a great flavor!

Here is our appetizer!

Here he is preparing everything: (modeling the PC chopper!)

Everything cooking away:
And the final outcome!

I am a very lucky girl to have such a wonderful husband, a delicious meal, and beautiful roses! We started watching No Reservations afterwards but both fell asleep during it... a little slow but still it's cute! Hope you all have wonderful Valentines Days!

Leah's officially a VOLVO DRIVER!!!

IT IS TRUE, I am an official owner of a 2005, Silver Volvo s40 T5 with 48,000 miles on it. It is absolutely gorgeous, and I couldn't be any happier with it! We ended up finding one online that was located in Charlotte. Marshal, who is an owner of a 2004, Red s40 T5, went and test drove it for us. After he gave us the OK (except for the tires... they were completely shot) we considered it some more, negotiating with the dealer to include new tires and lower his price, and Molly & Marshal test driving it one more time... we decided this was the one! We signed all the papers that arrived in the mail, shipped them back, Kyle got everything figured out with USAA, and the car was ours! Molly & Marshal were coming down to GA for the Habitat build, so as if they hadn't done enough already, they offered to drive the car down to us. They arrived Friday night, with a huge bow on the hood for me... I couldn't believe it!

A very excited Leah!

The back:The inside (sunroof , leather, free floating console!)

Marsh & I with our matching cars:

The great part about it is that it's still under warranty until 50,000 miles so if there are any problems right away, we can get it fixed for free! We can't thank Molly & Marshal enough for what they did for us. Taking time out of their busy schedules to do all the test drives, and then drive separately down to Georgia spoke wonders for how good of friends they are. You guys are the best and we hope you know we would do the exact same for you!

Also a special thanks to Kyle. There is no way I would have ever found this car, or been able to get it by myself. He worked so hard everyday negotiating with the dealer, figuring out USAA stuff and so much more. Thank you sweetie... I LOVE IT!

The rest of the weekend was awesome, spending time together. Molly designed a Special Buddies cereal box (watch Rob & Big if you want to know) for Marsh & Ky. Not only did it have a fun crossword puzzle with words about their "bromance", but hilarious nutrition facts and more images on the back. You guys are hilarious.

Sunday we went to the battlefield and let the dogs do some swimming in the creek. Tupelo & Tyson absolutely love each other and had a ball all weekend playing. Thanks again guys for making the drive... what a fun weekend!

Habitat for Humanity Day!

A couple weeks ago kyle suggested to some of our friends working for a day on a Habitat for Humanity build. We all thought it was a wonderful idea and jumped on board to do it. When I say "we all" I mean:

Kathleen, Chris, Chuck & Taylor:

and Marshal, Molly, myself, and Kyle!

We got there at 8:00 sharp to sign in and eat some donuts. There was a larger crowd then we thought would be there, and that's because there were numerous houses being built at the same time. Also there were the future owners of the homes, and they spoke a little about themselves and how much it means to them that we are helping. Habitat for Humanity workers split the crowd into 3 groups, so all of us stuck together to help on one house. Once we were divided into houses, we then had to volunteer to work on certain steps. All the guys chose to work on the shingling the roof. They ended up working on it ALL day, but finished it and had some funny stories at the end. They roof definitely wouldn't have gotten done without these guys, and they all did such a great job!

Chris & Marshal:

Here they are coming down for a lunch break!
For lunch Outback provided free burgers for everyone. They were DELICIOUS and we all enjoyed getting the break for lunch to relax and trade stories.

Molly, Kathleen, and I did not want to work on siding, so we volunteered for insulation. They gave us face masks and instructions, and let us get to it. I do have to admit, we were the BEST insulation team in there and got 3 rooms done and took a break before any of the other people finished 1 room! We have a TON of funny stories, but most of them consisted of no one thinking "the 3 blondes" could not do a thing, and we proved them wrong for sure! Behind us in this photo is the insulation we put in the walls, and after we finished that we also did insulation in the ceiling. We finally asked for goggles b/c our eyes were hurting so bad, so I picked out the most hideous glasses I could find to help lighten up the mood :)

Here is the rest of the insulation team. The lady in the bottom row, second from the left is the one who's house we were building!

After we finished insulation, the 3 girls were recruited to do siding. That process was more frustrating/hilarious as we had a "know-it-all" bossing us around then switched to complimenting us 24-7. We only did that for a little while before the guys finished the roof and were ready to go. But atleast we did learn how to insulate, shingle roofs, and side a house! Over all we had a great time and it was a great way to spend our days helping out others in the community. After everyone went home and took showers, they all came over to our house for pizza and hanging out. We all went to bed early and woke up sore!

Finished Office & other little things...

We finally put stuff up on our shelves! They still need some work, but it's nice to have everything organized and off of the floor!Our desk is done! We put the feet on the desk, finished the other side and have ordered our glass for the top. It is very nice and a great size for both of us to sit!
Last weekend Kyle and I had goals to finish painting our hallway upstairs as well! Here Kyle is on a huge ladder putting the tape up.
At one point we used 2 cinder blocks and some wood to hold up one side of the ladder.... REAL SAFE! But atleast it is done now!

I also found the time to do some freelance last week. A friend of my sisters wanted an announcement just like the one I did for Tara. I changed the background a bit and added her babies image. It was fun to do something like that again!

Colorado Trip with the guys

Just wanted to share a couple pictures and stories from my trip to Colorado a couple weeks ago. My buddy, Marshal, invited me to come snowboarding for 3 days with some of his friends so I really had no idea what to expect. We had what turned out to be some great snow and a ton of laughs.

Ready to Rock on our first day at Keystone, which is near Dillon, Colorado.

Here is a shot of the whole group on the backside of Keystone. We had pretty good snow and the temperature was hovering around 0 degrees Fahrenheit. We stopped a couple times to warm up but it didn't stop us from having a really good time.
We spent the night in Dillon and had some great pizza, enjoying not sitting in a car for the ride back to Boulder. The next day we woke up and made the short trip to Vail.... WOW! What an amazing mountain, I can't believe how huge it is.

Here is a shot of me sitting in the powder in one of the back bowls.

Marsh and I riding the lift back to try and find some fresh pow-pow.Who says I'm not artistic?After skiing all day at Vail, we headed back to Boulder, CO. We spent the night at Kurt's and headed back to the mountains to go to Arapahoe Basin.
Me trying to be cool and do a manual:
Sweet pic of Montezuma Bowl that Marsh took at A-Basin:

At the end of the day, Marsh & I decided that we would snowboard Loveland Pass. This is national forest land where people get dropped off at the top of the pass and ski down to where the road crosses and the hitch-hike back up to the top. It offers great riding down through trees (and rocks) without having to buy a lift ticket. This was a cool experience and a great way to end the trip!

Can't wait to go riding again. Thanks again Marsh!