He's off with his other love!

Kyle snapped this shot this afternoon (I got this pic in a text message from him today!) while he was riding down the mountain shredding in this fresh pow pow. He's off snowboarding in Steamboat Springs, CO for Marshal's bachelor party with 10 other guys. They are having a blast! They'll get back Sunday afternoon-- I can't wait to hear all the stories and I'm sure we'll have tons of pictures to post!

Visit with the Turners.

As most of you know my best friend Sara is prego! It's killing me not being in Raleigh and getting to see her stomach grow in person... SO we skyped and she stood up so I could see her belly! Look at how big it's getting!! (Sara's on the right, Joe is on the left adjusting the web cam so I could see the tummy!)
We had a wonderful time talking, and before we knew it an hour had passed! At the end Joe & Sara showed us their effects they can make on the screen and they were HILARIOUS! Here is just one of the many... the cowboy hat:

So good talking to you two :) I hope we can do it again soon!!

Boonetown Snow Trip!

This past weekend we went up for our weekend at the cabin that we are co-owners of in Boone, NC. Nick brought 3 friends (Win, Will, & Eric) from Raleigh, and Kyle and I brought 2 of my girlfriends from work (Lacey & Andrea). We all arrived pretty late Friday night, just in time to talk a little and then head to bed.
Saturday morning we woke up early to stuff down some muffins before we headed out to Sugar Mountain for our ski day! Will, Andrea & Lacey all had to rent their skis so we got on the mountain a little after 9.
We dropped Andrea & Lacey off at the bunny slope and the rest of us headed up to the red lift and had a great time going together. I met up with Andrea & Lacey later on and we all watched the guys do some jumps in the terrain park.
We were having a good time until a guy got a concussion right in front of us by landing wrong from a jump... so we decided to call it a day :)

Here is Ky doing a jump!

Just keeping it real:

The weather was perfect, and although it was VERY crowded we had a great time!

Saturday night we came back, took showers and then headed out to Black Cat Burrito! It's one of our favorite places to go eat in Boone, a little whole in the wall but delicious food! We all came home played some Dominos (Lacey by far received the award for the worst Dominos player ever) and then headed to bed since we were all so exhausted from the long day on the mountain.
Sunday morning we woke up and had a delicious pancake & bacon breakfast cooked by Kyle & Will. We then relaxed for a little, packed up, and headed out to get back home to ATL by a decent time. We drove by the gazebo and campus so the girls could see what I've been telling them about. We had a wonderful weekend, went by too fast as always!

AND we had some snow on the ground when we woke up, but more came when were leaving!

Tyson loved it!

Sleeping Beauty

Kyle and I came home from work today, stuffed down some dinner then went straight to the dining room table to do more work. Ky has a test tomorrow night in class so he's studying hard, and I just have a lot going on at work right now, so we are double laptop-ing it tonight. We hadn't heard from Tyson in a while and this is what we found:

Now the real question is how did he get that pillow right under his head?!

Talking about love....

This past weekend at our Newlywed bible study our lesson was on love languages. Like every other woman out there I have read "The Five Love Languages" How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate by Gary Chapman, but it never really had the same meaning then as it does now. I read it back in high school, before I had met the man I was going to marry... before I had really learned what my love language was. When Kyle and I sat down to do our lesson, it was so easy to pick out what our love languages were and we agreed 100% on eachothers. We had to rate them 1-5 of what priority they are in our lives, which was really interesting to see how different our priorities are... but then to realize what efforts we have to put forth in our marriage to help fill our spouses "love tank".

So what are the 5 love languages, you ask?
1) Quality Time
2) Receiving Gifts
3) Acts of Service
4) Physical Touch
5) Words of Affirmation

The love language that is most important to me is Quality Time. Kyle learned that our weekend travels are not what I count as "quality time"... being stuck in traffic- stressed out in our car on our way to NC is NOT what I count as quality time. There are 2 types: quality conversation and quality activites. Both are very important to me, and I've found if we go weeks without these it's very hard on me. I need time with JUST him to feel fullfilled, not time just being around him with friends or family. Kyle knows this, planning our Wyoming trip JUST US has meant more to me than he realizes.

The love language that is most important to Kyle is Words of Affirmation. I've learned that Kyle truly needs feedback from me, whether that means encouragement, support, love or even the honest truth of how I feel. It helps him feel fullfilled in our relationship when I give him words of affirmation, knowing that I'm listening to whatever he is saying and responding to his needs. The one that came close in second to him was Physical Touch. I can completely turn his entire day around with just a hug or a rub on his back. I am not a very touchy-feely type person so I truly have to put effort forth everyday to show him in this way that I love him.

Kyle and I are the "oldest" in the class...being married the longest (we noticed we've been together 7 years and some people are still under a year!) It's neat to finally be getting to that point in our marriage where we have already learned some of these lessons just from our experiences before it's taught to us in the biblestudy. Before we knew the "official terms" of the love languages, we definitely would have been able to describe what's important to our mate to keep their "love tank full"! What's your love language?

Happy Valentines Day!

This Valentines Day could not have gone any better! Kyle and I had such a relaxing day (partly since he had Lasik the day before). We woke up and went to his check up appointment, then went to the grocery store to pick up some Filets for dinner that night! Kyle and I chose to do the most romantic valentines day activity we could think of.... TAXES! haha we both felt so good after they were done though, I'm serious!
For dinner, Kyle had marinated our filet mignons in teriyaki, and cooked them to absolute perfection on the grill. I had prepared twice baked potatoes earlier for us... which is just heaven in a potato skin if you ask me! We also had a vegetable medly to go with it :) It was DELICIOUS!! Here is Kyle all ready to eat (you can see the blood in Kyle's eyes from the surgery!)We then headed down to Atlantic Station downtown for our Cirque de Soleil show... KOOZA! Man it was so awesome. First of all, it's actually held behind Atlantic Station in TENTS!
It really had a "circus theme" to it, with the circus big top tent, concession stands and outdoor atmosphere. Their set was amazing and every seat was so close to the stage!! The talent was amazing...balancing on chairs, charivari, contortion (CRAZY!), highwire, juggling, solo trapeze, teeterboard, unicycle duo, and the wheel of death! If you want to see some pictures go here.
They had some "clowns" walking around, and some came through our row throwing popcorn all over us... it was hilarious. Kyle and I were in awe of the amazing talent... his favorite was the unicyclist and my favorite was the wheel of death. The experience and environment totally made it for us, what a great Valentines Day we had!!

I can see clearly now...

the pain is gone! I can see all obstacles in my way :) (Kyle and I have been singing this song a lot the past couple days!)
Kyle had lasik this past Friday morning, and it was quite the experience! (I took this picture right before we left!) We arrived at the TLC office around 7:40 am, and watched about 3 other people have the surgery before him! He had his eyes checked one last time, then the numbing drops were put in! They gave him a Valium to help "calm down" some so he wouldn't be as jumpy during the surgery. Before we knew it he was in surgery (I was able to watch the whole thing through a window in one of the walls, and then watch the tv to see all the detailed eye work.) It truly is a crazy surgery with the laser doing almost the entire thing... cutting the flap and then lasering the cornea. He said he could smell the laser burning his eyes though..yuck! When the doctor finished both eyes they had Kyle stand up and read the clock from across the room... Which he did with no problem! (Yeah!)

Then we sat in a darker room for about 15 minutes (he had to keep his eyes closed the whole time), and that's when the numbing drops started wearing off and his eyes started to hurt...pretty bad. They put some more numbing drops in and encouraged him to go right to bed as soon as we got home. Which we did, after stopping at Chick-fil-A for a chocolate milkshake and some chicken minis!
He has to sleep for the next week in these sexy goggles, haha! He woke up from his nap that day feeling great, and being able to see everything clearly. It's so crazy how instantaneous the results were! We took it very easy the rest of the day, but it couldn't have gone better!!! Praise the Lord!
OH and since Kyle was going to need to sleep all day Friday after the surgery, I finally convinced him it was a good idea for curtains in our room :) (I hate light in the mornings it always wakes me up!) I found a pack from World Market that has the big grommets that I love for only $25 total! Because of the molding above the window we actually had to mount it higher than the window... but some how it makes our ceilings look really tall! They don't go all the way to the ground either, which I'm happy about since we have cats and all it would do is collect a lot of hair!

Randomness through the week!

Anybody recognize these glasses? These are what the eye doctor gives you after you have an eye exam when you have to go out in the sun. The reason Kyle had an eye exam is because he just went in for his lasik consultation on Monday and is approved for surgery this Friday! Many of you have been so observant and noticed that he's been wearing glasses for the past couple weeks, that was all in preparation for the exam & surgery! I'll go with him to the doctor for surgery Friday morning, and the surgery should last only 20 minutes! I'll drive him home and then he has to sleep for the rest of the day (they give him sleeping pills!). When he wakes up Saturday he'll be able to see clearly with no contacts or glasses on... WOO HOO!!!

For more doctor news, last Friday I finally headed to the gastroenterologist to figure out my stomach. If you know ANYTHING about me, you know I've always had stomach problems that's why I'm not embarrassed to say this on the blog. I was diagnosed with IBS, given some daily medicine to take and encouraged to go on a diet of just veggies and fiber (I didn't like ANY of the foods on his sheet... great). In all honesty, I was hoping for a cure but that wasn't a possibility :/

Last night I had movie night with my girlfriends from work, Lacey, Andrea and Jen. We went and saw "He's Just Not That Into You", which we all were so excited to see b/c of all the celebrities in it! It was really cute and we all thoroughly enjoyed it!

Sara's Baby Shower!

This past weekend, Kyle and I actually spent apart but we still had great weekends! Friday night I flew out to Raleigh since I had my best friend Sara's baby shower on Saturday. I didn't get in until around 11:30 or so, but work was so hectic on Friday that I'm very thankful I had booked a late flight. Saturday we woke up and cleaned the house and started baking everything for the shower. My mom was so generous to let me host it at her house and help me get everything ready! I hosted it with one of Sara's good friends Emily, another friend from dance!
Unbelievably only 2 people couldn't make it out of 20, so we had a fairly large crowd! We had baked/bought tons of food so it was fun catching up with everyone while we ate some delicious food!
I made favor bags for everyone with some fun favors from my company (I'm not putting the name of my company up b/c I don't want them to get Google alerts when I post their websites or names... I do that on purpose).

We also filled up some favor boxes as presents for people who won the games that Emily had planned:

We played about 3 games with Sara opening up presents in between. Everyone got along so well, and had no problem introducing themselves to people they didn't know! We laughed a ton and had fun celebrating Sara, Joe and the baby!!

We all took a group picture at the end for Sara:

Look at all those gifts!

Natalie & Nathan even came over for a visit at the end:

As an extra present for Sara I designed her some thank you notes, that coordinated with her invitation. I printed everyones return address labels and put them on the envelopes for her, to help make that process a little easier.
Saturday night I was able to spend some quality time with Sara & Joe and see their nursery! It was great talking with her as always! Sunday morning I woke up and met my friend Bret for breakfast at a bagel shop. I hadn't gotten to really visit face to face with him since he's come back from Iraq and we had a wonderful time catching up! It looks like Ky & I have a great hookup now to get some backpacking equipment for our trip since Bret works for Great Outdoor! I then rushed home for church, and after church G-ma & G-pa came over for lunch. THEN I went to the park with Tara & Jamie and then twins, and had a great time taking some really cute pictures of them and playing with them on the slide. They are so big! Nick met us for dinner in Briar Creek before I was dropped off to the airport. What a jam packed weekend, but I got to spend some quality time with EVERYONE and it was absolutely wonderful!

Meanwhile what did Kyle do? Saturday morning he woke up at 5:15 am to carpool with some of the guys from our church to mountain bike 15 miles! He had a wonderful time with all of them! He was able to get some "honey-do-list" items off the list that afternoon then hung out with Chris Sat night by eating La Pa take out and watching a movie. Sunday he went to church, did P90X and cleaned the garage! What a productive but still relaxing weekend he had!

We're approved!!! Wyoming here we come!

Kyle and I have so much going on right now and I promise to update soon, BUT I wanted to share with you the best news of all that we just heard about tonight!! We've been talking about taking a trip out west to go backpacking for a while now, and we finally are going to do it! A couple weeks ago we turned in our "planned route" we would take to hike the Teton Crest Trail in Grand Teton National Park (in Wyoming). It's the second largest mountain in the state, having an elevation ranging from 10,000 to 13,000 feet! We just heard back from the park and our trip is approved!! We were assigned to all the campsites that we were hoping for except one, which still might be available the day of, we'll just have to see!

Kyle waited till I came home to open the envelope... here we are SO pumped:

We will start August 22, and hike 5 days on the trail. The views are amazing, and the wild life is abundant. SO here are the places we'll be staying: 1st night- Granite Middle/S. Fork (hoping to change to Marion Lake though), 2nd night-Alaska Basin, 3rd night-Cascade North Fork, and 4th night-Holly Lake. Here are some pictures from those places, so you can see what we are talking about!
I'm sure we'll write more about it later. We are going to be taking it relatively easy only hiking up to 8 miles a day, but at that altitude I'm sure it will be very difficult! OH and one thing to leave you with..... BEARS... yes bears!!! (click on the picture to read what it says).

We are so excited to experience this together!