Wednesday, March 25, 2009

I'm on my way to Austin!!

This morning Brian and I were making breakfast. He looked out the window and saw a bird attacking a lizard. After the bird was doing his thing Brian went outside to check things out.






The lizard seems fine. So we will see...

Lindsey's wedding is on Friday! I am heading out in just a couple of minutes to the airport. There will be lots of updates to come!!

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

I should be jogging

I am still trying to figure out my work schedule and how to be most effective. The evenings are the best time to be on the phone calling potential students who have asked for more information which means that I normally have the mornings to take care of errands, things around the house, etc. Most mornings I try to go to the gym with Brian or go for a jog around the house. This morning...not interested. I think we all have one of those days where we know we should be no way Jose. My plan instead is to go to the grocery store and to Crate and Barrel to return a chipped glass I purchased on Saturday. Isn't that exciting and healthy!

Brian actually wore green today. I was pretty impressed because he is normally an 'against the grain' type of man. I guess he knew I would be pinching him all day if he didn't.

Mom, Phil and Veeves are still having a blast in NYC with with Lyndz. I got a phone call from Lyndsey letting me know that she and Val were enjoying a Frozen Hot Chocolate at Serendipity...SOOO JEALOUS! I can't wait to see all of the pictures!!

That's all I've got for now!

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Thank you Veeves

Hey thanks for forgetting about me...but then making such a quick turn around! The blog looks great! You are so the bomb! YEAH!!!

Monday, March 09, 2009

Face lift

I keep glancing at my blog hoping that it has received a face lift. I don't know what Veeves has been doing...she doesn't have anything else going on in her life besides helping me out...right?? I thought that she completed everything while I was still in Dallas. Obviously I am wrong!

I wished I had a lot of exciting updates. Work is going very well for both me and Brian. We are both working hard but are enjoying what we are doing. Brian has been continuing to grow his business (Real Estate for those of you who didn't know) which has been such a blessing with the economy and living in Tucson which was hit pretty hard with this recession stuff.

Having weekends off has also been an answer to prayer. Being able to have social time on Friday evening and sleeping in until I wake up on Saturday morning is wonderful. This past Saturday Michelle, Mary and I hosted a Scholarship Workshop at Apollo College. We had 39 people (22 senior high school students) attend to learn more about scholarship opportunities, applying for scholarships and also had an opportnity to learn more about Apollo College and what we have to offer as a medical technicial college.

Oh...I do have so exciting news. I am planning on starting my MBA through DeVry University in April!! I have not finished applying so nothing is set in stone as of yet...but I am planning on completing all of that this week!!

YEAH!! Happy Monday to you.

Saturday, February 28, 2009

The new furniture

We have new furniture! :) One of Brian's wonderful clients gave us a Secretary and a hutch for free for Brian's great job of being an agent...or at least that is what I like to think! Aren't they fabulous! They really help bring the house together!



Sunday, February 15, 2009

Valentine's Day

What a wonderful day! It all began by NOT having to wake up at 3:30 AM to head on over to Starbucks. Brian and I woke up a little after 6 in the morning. He actually got out of bed...I stayed until 7 AM. We had breakfast together (oatmeal and grapefruit that Brain prepared) and then went to the grocery store to pick up 4 lobster tail which we planned on having for dinner that night. We invited Brian's dad (Dave) and Connie over for a nice V-Day dinner. We made clam dip, home-made Clam Chowder, lobster tail and couscous. For dessert we had homemade raspberry chip ice cream (which wasn't fully finished so we added some delicious Bluebell Homemade Vanilla ice cream with fresh strawberries! It was wonderful and a lot of fun to enjoy with family! I never knew I could cook lobster tail but look at me go (with the help of Brian, Dave & Connie)! :) Hope y'all are having a great Sunday taking it easy! Brian and I sure have!

Oh...and a shout out to Valerie for introducing us to Fellowship Church of Christ!

Friday, February 13, 2009

A nice little update

A lot has been happening but nothing so big that I have taken the time to post about. I am really enjoying my new career with Apollo College. It is such a blessing to have a great working environment and a solid team already in place!
I was able to have training in Phoenix last week with all the HS Admission Reps. It was so nice to be able to place faces and names together. The knowledge and feedback was also so extremely helpful.

Last Saturday was a big day for me. It was my last day with Starbucks. I have spent the last 2 and half years working for this company and have enjoyed every moment of it. I cherish the friends that I have made with my manager and co-workers as well as the frequent customers that graced us with their presence every Saturday! Brian is thrilled that I am finally finished and I will actually be able to sleep in on a Saturday morning. I must say it is bitter sweet. I am thankful looking forward to tomorrow morning and knowing that I will be setting my alarm for 3:30 AM. However, knowing that I will not be seeing those familiar faces is sad to me.

Another blessing of closing this chapter in my life is now feeling confident that I can be more involved with the church we have been attending. Fellowship c of c is a quaint church that meets at the YMCA every Sunday morning. There are probably about 60 people that attend and Brian and I really have been enjoying it!

We are still debating whether or not we should be looking for a roommate. We really would rather not but the financial help right now would be VERY beneficial. I am finally selling a lot of our "singlehood" items on Craigslist since we were able to receive so many nice wonderful gifts from the wedding festivities. I will also be making a run over to The Salvation Army for a hefty donation and things that have been packed into the back seat of my car and in the trunk for a week now. Now if we could find someone to just take our non-working refrigerator away from our property that would be wonderful!

That's all I've got for now! Happy Friday and happy day before Valentine's Day!

Friday, January 30, 2009

More cardinal pictures...

She's totally working the camera for Brian!
I better watch out...






Flying feathers

Brian has become very excited about bird seed lately. He bought some cardinal feed that is hanging from a tree in front of his office window. He also has been sprinkling bird seed on the ground so all of the quail and dove eat it up...and occasional bunny too!

This morning he decided to sprinkle some right on the ledge of his window and see if a cardinal would land there...and alas...


I don't know exactly what kind of bird this is...but it looks like a cardinal to me.

The bird is less than a foot away from his camera in these photos. The only thing separating them is the window.

Next project: get a young chicken from the grocery store and hang it from the tree...maybe a hawk or two or five will come up close and personal for a visit!

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

My fabulous husband

When I woke up on Monday morning I could tell it was going to be 'one of those days'. I tried to be in the mind frame of "I am the only person that can change my attitude' and yet little things kept happening that were very frustrating. I got home around 8:30 last night for a long day at work. Brian had made me dinner and had bought we some beautiful purple tulips.


He had also gone to a bird store to buy some seed for the front yard. He has the best view from his office window and sees cardinal, quail, bunnies, hawk or humming birds on a near daily basis. He sprinkled the seed yesterday evening and this morning this is some of what we saw...


There are 11 quail in all but you can only see 9 in the picture. 2 were on the other side of the cactus. We only saw one bunny munching away this morning but there are normally 5-8 every morning in the backyard feasting.

Brian being the boy he is was wishing he had a pellet gun or that a hawk would swoop down and grab the bunny. God bless boys you know...I don't have to get it though! :)

PS: I am loving my job with Apollo College. The team is fabulous and it is nice to be working in a secular job but surrounded by some amazing Christians. What a blessing! Now, I am just having to wait patiently for my own space and my own phone line. Right now I am having to share with the faculty work room or other peoples office spaces once they leave for the day. It will all be settled at some point!

Friday, January 23, 2009

Oh my word I am my mother...

I just noticed something. I sat down to work on my new crossword puzzle book I just bought at Barnes and Noble while watching my Netflix movie that just came in, A Prairie Home Companion. Then it hit me...I am so my mother...or my Aunt JJ...take your pick.

And I thought you might enjoy this Mom/L/V. The introduction to the crossword puzzle book says this:

Take a step back--back in time to the 1960s. Thus, you don't need to know all of the useless trivia that clutter modern crosswords. There aren't any clues that ask about grunge rock, pitchers for the Florida Marlins, or who shot J.R. Instead, you'll be challenged by tough crosswords that require a good vocabulary and knowledge of classical information to solve.
These puzzles are not easy. To give your brain a good workout, you have to use it. And what better or more fun way is there to do that than to spend some time with through-provoking crosswords? So enjoy yourself, and while you're at it, you'll keep yourself sharp.

Could that not sound more like my mother saying that to me...holy moly!

We had such a pretty rainbow out front of our house just now. There were two on top of each other. Of course, the pictures don't do it justice but here you go anyway...


Monday, January 12, 2009

Honeymoon pictures!

Here are some pictures from the honeymoon! If you have facebook you have most likely already seen these. I am still waiting for Brian it share his camera with me so I can upload all of his pictures. We kept his camera with us most of the time so he has better pictures. This is all I have to share right now!


These are a couple of pictures from our balcony. We stayed at Nita Lake Lodge but never saw any lakes around. We later realized that the big blanket of smooth white snow outside our balcony was a frozen lake!



After the first day of snowboarding I thought it would be nice to go hang out in the hot tub for a little while. Of course it is below freezing outside so the hot tubs must be in doors...WRONG!...but after stripping down and getting into the water quickly it felt quite nice! The view was phenomenal! And it really was so relaxing!



These pictures were on our last day of snowboarding. We were on Whistler Mountain about to take the Peak 2 Peak gondola to Blackcomb. Right before this picture was taken we saw a helicopter flying around and then heard a very loud boom! The helicopter had shot something into the mountain next to us to create an avalanche. It was a pretty cool sight!



These are views from inside of the Peak 2 Peak gondola taking us over the Blackcomb. Brian got some better ones with all the snow covered trees blanketing the mountain side.



I am completely frozen in this picture...Brian was nice enough to share his neck warmer thing so I could cover my face!



More pictures from inside the gondola. We were equal to some of the clouds floating between the mountains. That is always a neat sight. Below you can see a bunch of the trees. They are massive though from far up above they look tiny!



Mountains and a lot of snow!











This was taken at Ric's Grille in Whistler Village. It was are last dinner before we left the next morning. The dinner was delicious! And I know you can tell Brian was having a blast...some days I wished he would just smile instead of always making the goofy faces. Oh well...I still love the man!


So hopefully I will get the pictures from Brian's camera within the next day or so!

Friday, January 09, 2009

Do you know who I belong to?

So family...dad brought just about everything I owned from the FB to Tucson over Thanksgiving. I finally went through all the boxes before Christmas and found a sack that had these stuffed animals in them. I don't believe they were mine...do you remember??


Also Lyndsey...I have a box full of old L2L & Kadesh shirts that were yours. Do you want them? If you don't I am going to put them in the donation pile. Just let me know!

Saturday, January 03, 2009

Day #3

I woke up with the same nagging headache. The sky was clear though and I figured I should get up and get going since this was the last day we were going to be able to board. We went out to the slopes at 9 am and didn't get back to the room until 3:30 that afternoon. The gondolas are only open from 8:30 am to 3:00 pm so we pretty much put in a full days work.

We took two gondolas up to arrive at the brand new Peak 2 Peak gondola. It is an 11 minute gondola ride that takes you from the peak of Whistler mountain (what we had skied the last few days) to the peak of Blackcomb mountain. It was phenomenal riding high over all the snow-covered trees and ridges of the mountains. We got a bunch of pictures that we will share later...along with the rest of them!!

While we were riding the gondola up Whistler mountain heading to the Peak 2 Peak we saw a helicopter roaming around. At first I thought some one was hurt and they were looking for a place to land. We got off the gondola and were taking pictures when we heard a very loud BOOM and then saw an avalanche. Apparently this helicopter was out patrolling and looking for potential avalanche problems and shoots something into it to create the fall before it falls on people...I guess...either way it was very neat to see from a far!

I did so much better on the last day than any other. That made we feel pretty good about my time. I did continue to fall but not nearly as much!

Last night for dinner we went to Whistler Village and had a lovely steak dinner. Well actually Brian had the Filet Mignon and I had a delicious Coconut crusted chicken breast! Both meals were divine and a great send off for a great honeymoon!!

We are slowly packing up this morning and will be heading back to Seattle to spend the evening with our sweet friends Pete & Nina!!

As always, I'll keep you posted!

Thursday, January 01, 2009

No ER for you...

No one was been sick or broken in the ER...just wanted to take heed of some of the previous comments! :)

All has been going well. Snowboarding went a little better yesterday than Day #1. My entire body is sore though.

Last night we met up with about 15 of Brian's frat buddies that had come into Canada to wish in the new year. We all met at the Longhorn Saloon and "partied" the night away. I didn't really no anybody but Brian and I enjoyed ourselves and the company.

We left the saloon at 12:10 in the morning and had to wait until 1:40 am for a shuttle. This has definitely been the most frustrating situation of our entire trip...however we did finally make it back to a warm room with a fire going.

Today Brian went snowboarding and I lay in bed with the worst migraine I have ever had. I woke up not feeling well...and though last night in known as a "drink and be merry" night for most...all I had to drink was water and a sip of champagne at midnight. I rarely get headaches and even more rarely a migraine...but this knocked me out all day. I tried walking to starbucks just right down the street with a book to sit, read, and have a Tall Americano...but felt sick just walking down the street. Brian has had a blast snowboarding and going on the runs that I won't go on with him! :) He went on the brand new Peak to Peak gondola twice today. We plan on going on it tomorrow so I can get the experience of going form one mountain to the other (Whistler to Blackcomb).

That is the update for now. More snowboarding and enjoying yourselves tomorrow!!

Yesterday we saw some people with a shovel out in the open area from our balcony. They were moving the snow to make an ice skating rink! I wished we had some ice skating boots to go and fall on my rear some more...I'm just not getting enough of that trying to snowboard! :)

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

I don't have to listen to you!!

This is the blessing of technology. We have free wi-fi in the room...and I know that every stinking one of you will be asking 50 million questions...so I figured I will keep brief updates so you can know...don't worry we aren't spending more time on the computer than with each other.

I only did two runs today but I stayed more on my rear than on my feet...or at least it felt. Brian was a great teacher and I was a very impatient student. I wanted to pull the board off my feet and throw it down the mountain. But I didn't...and finally made it down...Brian did one more run without me per my encouragement. We are both really excited about tomorrow. However...now we are hitting up the hot tub and just taking it easy!!!

PS: Tons of pictures have been taken but we both forgot our camera cords so no pictures until we get back!!

Whistler, Day 01

We were suppose to leave Chelan at 8 am. With most family that sit down to breakfast at 7:45 am and talk more than eat...it's pretty hard to leave on time. Finally at 9 AM we were about to break away and get on the road. The drive from Chelan to Whistler should have taken about 7 hours... 9 and a half hours later we were finally pulling up to the lodge. We did have some weather but nothing that Brian worried about driving through.

The problems started in Vancouver where I guess we were driving through right when everyone else was. Traffic was SO slow. Once we were on 99 heading to Whistler we thought we had made it!! However, there is this thing called the Olympics coming in 2010...so construction is crazy!! Roads were down to one lane and when you have snow and slush and one lane...no one is driving very fast.

Oh well...we got there safely. The lodge is phenomenal!! We got settled into our room. Walked around the village. Went to Can-Ski and got my snowboard!! I bought goggles so now I own my own ski gloves and goggles!!

We are eating breakfast now and will be heading toward to snow here is just a little bit!!

Sunday, December 28, 2008

The honeymoon, Part 2

Most might consider this part 01 but only Valerie, Brian and I can reminisce on Honeymoon, Part 01 two months ago! :) What a wonderful car ride back to Tucson.

Brian and I made it into Seattle on Christmas Day without any major travel problems. We had to circle around the clouds of San Francisco 3 times before we could finally land because of a thunderstorm that had blown through. We didn't have any major delays and were able to get back in the air toward Seattle quite quickly. We landed without any problems thought it was snowing and rainy outside. They had to dig our car out of the snow from all the snowstorms that we heard about on the news. Connie had dropped off the car when she left for Tucson for Christmas with the Tucson clan! What a blessing to have family in both places so we can share cars and places to stay!!

Christmas Day evening we drove to Bremerton, WA where we spent the evening with Nan (grandma Quigley) Uncle Tim, Aunt Tish and cousins Siri & Iain. We had a delicious traditional Scandinavian meal including lefsa, swedish meatballs, boiled potatoes, and lingonberries. Dessert was orange sherbet served in hollowed out oranges...one did have the almond at the bottom! Nan won (she had the almond at the bottom of her sherbet) and received a gift card to Barnes and Noble!

We spent the next day reading books, relaxing on couches, and visiting with each other. Sara, my new mom :), was able to finally make it out of her parking lot in Portland and head over the Bremerton early on the 26th. We were so happy to spend the day with her. During the evening she was here we had a wonderful meal together and played cards all night long. I love playing Hearts and 8, 7, 6 with the Quigleys! We're all a little competitive!!

The morning of the 27th we went to visit Nan for a little while at her new retirement community and then got on the road to head to Lake Chelan. We had heard that there was a snow slide on I-90 where we would need to drive through to get to Chelan so we took a quick detour to the Tacoma Mall (where Brian worked during the summers of college) so we could buy all of our Christmas gifts for the Wick family we were heading to visit.

Once we were on the road again, besides the consistent rain, we didn't have any driving issues. There was rain and some snow through the pass but all was safe and sound. We made good time getting to Chelan and surprised everyone right before dinner!

We opened and sharing more gifts with the Wick family on the 27th and again on the 28th when Dave and Connie were able to make it. They had just flown in from Tucson yesterday where they shared that Tucson saw a little bit of snow two days ago! CRAZY!!!!

It was so much fun getting to spend time with Dan, Berit, Kristina, Grandma and Poppa, and Erik, Angie and Jaxon. This was the first time for Angie, Jaxon and I to all meet each other!! I was so excited to finally meet their faces!!!

We went to church this morning and received a wonderful lesson on Recession-proofing your life!! We went to the casino for brunch...insert sarcastic comment here...

Tomorrow morning we will be leaving to head to Whistler!! We are so stinkin' excited to be snowboarding SO SOON!!!!!!!

We'll keep you posted...

Pictures are to come, I promise!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

life...

We had a Christmas party at our house on Sunday night. Everyone that I work with from Starbucks came over to celebrate the holiday. It was a lot of fun and so nice to finally be able to utilize the space of our house!

Brian is no longer sick. Monday was a slow day for him but after that he was back to working hard.

We leave for our honeymoon is just a few short days! I can't believe that Christmas Day is almost here. 2008 has flown by so quickly. And there are so many things to be thankful for.

I hope you have a blessed Tuesday!

Saturday, December 06, 2008

Brian's sick

I hope that for as long as Brian and I are still living there will be firsts.
First time we held hands
First date
First dance
First kiss...
First projectile vomit as a married couple...or for as long as my memory suites me..ever!

Brian has not felt well all day. He thought he just had a little too much dairy in his tummy from a type of shake he has been making every morning for breakfast since we received the Vita-Veta-Veg-A-Mine! His tummy has been very heavy; slightly gassy. You know how it goes...

Either way, he was suppose to be going to the UA v ASU game tonight and had really good seats too. He stood up slowly from the couch to get ready to leave. Walked straight to the bathroom. Made it to the toilet. Well, and you know the rest!

After the first go around he just stayed on the floor enjoying the cool tile.

After he had his second go around we settled him on the couch with water, gatorade, a blanket and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. He just finished reading the book for the first time.

Poor guy. I hope he feels better quickly!!!