Christmas is coming . . . traditions?

Christmas is one of my favorite holidays. Always has been. It has always been one of my favorite times spent with my family. We have created our share of unique Christmas traditions over the years. Everything from seeing how many puzzles we can do in our days together, to our version of Christmas Eve dinner, and one of my all time favorites "Christmas Crunch".

This year is going to be different. For the first time in my life I won't be having Christmas with my family in Meridian. We will be spending Christmas with Eric's family in Nebraska. While I am excited to spend some time with them and get to know them better, I will miss my family terribly and our funny Christmas traditions.

But this has got me thinking about Eric and I creating some Christmas traditions of our own. This being our first Christmas together I don't really know where to start. I have all my Christmas shopping done and Eric is almost done with his. Shopping together has been fun, interesting, but fun. Eric put up lights on the house, the decorations are put up all over, gifts are wrapped under the tree, so it seems like we are pretty much ready. Only a couple things left to do.

All I have left to ask is what kind of traditions do we want to have in our new family. I realize traditions tend to create themselves so we'll have to see what happens. My question for you is, what is your favorite Christmas Tradition?

Am I the strange one?

I love college football. This is not new news to those who know me well. I look forward to the fall season and weekends full of great games to watch. I have two favorite teams that I cheer for, but am a fan of the game in general so enjoy any good match up.

When Eric and I started dating I was excited to discover that he was a fan as well. I had tried to date guys in the past who weren't sports fans and it just didn't work out. Kind of one of those deal breakers for me I guess. As shallow as that may seem.

Anyway . . . all of the sudden I am trying to decide if my obsession is strange. I find that mine and Eric's dinner table conversations have a tendency to be about football, especially on the weekends! We do spend our weekends checking in on games, scores in general, and watching what we can and then talking about it with folks at church. We even scheduled things right on our honeymoon so that we wouldn't miss the Boise State game that Thursday night. Now I didn't really think about this being strange until yesterday morning when Eric and I were talking on the phone. I found a need to update him on the new BCS rankings and of course complain about how ridiculous I think they are.

I realize that it is good for couples to have things in common, but I am starting to wonder if maybe I am too interested in college football. What wife does this? Shouldn't I be the one complaining that my husband watches too much football? (Not that he does because I watch more than he does, I think) Not normal I think. I know i'm not your typical girl, never have been. But does this one make me a little too strange?

Honeymoon :)

Eric spent a lot of time planning a perfect honeymoon. I love the outdoors, I love New England and I love the fall and I got a combination of all three. He planned a sightseeing trip to see New England's beautiful fall color. The day after our wedding we took an early morning flight to Boston. When we got there we headed to Vermont. That night we stayed in Quechee. I had been there once with my family years ago so it was fun to go back. The next day we had a great breakfast at a very cozy restaurant and then went to a Christmas store which always makes me happy. We then went to see Quechee Gorge. Somehow my family missed this when we were there but it was breathtaking. Sorry none of these pictures do justice to what we saw.

There was a short hike along the gorge where we saw a nice lake and a great view of the bridge.

We then went to visit a maple sugar farm and visited some waterfalls along the way. Eric had located quite a few possible hikes and the two that we picked were no more than 100 feet. One was actally closed which was a little dissapointing, but still it was a beautiful drive and we had a lot of fun.

That night we drove north to Burlington, VT. It was a beautiful drive through the Green Mountains. The next day we drove south along Lake Champlaign and took a ferry accross to New York where we visited Fort Tichonderoga. That has to be one of the most amazing reconstructions of a historic site that I have ever seen. It was awesome, it was freezing too so we didn't stay outside for too long.

We then drove up the New York side of Lake Champlaign and decided to cross into Canada just for fun. That turned into quite an adventure. The US Customs officer was not friendly when we tried to cross back into the US. Long story that I don't feel like sharing at the moment. But we did get back onto American soil and drove back to Burlington on the highway that took us along all the islands of Lake Champlaign. It was a beautiful drive especially at sunset.

The next day we headed east to Woodbury and Stowe. The scenic drive that we had planned had a road closure so the drive took about 3 hours longer than we planned. Beautiful though, it had snowed in the mountains the night before. When we arrived back in Woodbury we visited the Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream Plant. Eric and I love ice cream so it was something that we couldn't miss.

That night we headed to New Hampshire where we stayed in a small resort town in the middle of the White Mountains. The next day we went to the Flume in Franconian Notch. It was spectacular. Once again a freezing day, but once we got hiking it wasn't too bad.

We then took a tram up a mountain where we could get an awesome view of all the surrounding area. You could see Maine, Vermont, New York, and Canada. The only catch was that it turned into winter when we got to the top.

That night we drove to Bangor, Maine. The next morning we went to visit Acadia National Park. Acadia would be an awesome vacation all on it's own. The only change I would make is to visit in the summer as opposed to the fall. We drove the road through the park and to the top of the bald mountains where the wind was NUTS!! I thought that I was going to blow away.

We had lunch in Bar Harbor and then drove to Portland where we had dinner and then to Boston where we spent the night. It was a lot of driving that day. The next day was our last. We had both been to Boston before so we decided to walk the Freedom Trail. I had not gotten to do that before so it was a lot of fun. Once again a cold day and I was tired, but we had fun.

That afternoon we flew home to Chicago and the trip was over and it was time to get back to real life. Have to admit that real life now is better than real life before. I am loving being married :)

I got married!!

So I know this is old news, in fact I have been married over a month now, but it has been a pretty busy month. Anyway, Eric and I were married on October 10th in the Boise, Idaho Temple. It was a whirlwind of a day, but absolutly wonderful!




My mother and sisters helped me out with pretty much all of the planning and organizing because I was so far away. I know they put in a lot of time and effort and it really paid off. Everything turned out beautiful!



Here are a couple photos that my sister in law Kirstin took for us.

Eric's friends and us.

Eric's family and us.



My parents and us.




Just us :)

Thrilled for Fall

Fall is my favorite season. This isn't a secret or even anything new. Anyone who has known me for a really long time will know how much I love the fall. So in celebration of the first full day of Autumn here is my top ten reasons I am excited for it to be fall. We'll do this David Letterman style.

10. Cool crisp air, for someone not from the midwest the break from the humidity is awesome!

9. Get to start wearing my sweats around the house again, frumpy, but so comfy!

8. Sweater weather!! A term coined by me and my best friend in high school to describe the perfect fall weather.

7. Hot apple cider, my favorite!

6. The smell of harvest time, burning fields, totally reminds me of home.

5. Pumpkin anything!! I love pumpkin and this is the season that I can get as much of it as I want.

4. Changing leaves on trees, Eric & I get to go see the fall color in New England this year. I am so excited!

3. My birthday! Not that I am in the mood to get older, but still a reason to celebrate and eat cake.

2. College football . . . I am an addict!! Really it is the greatest thing ever.

1. Cause I am getting married this fall!! Ok so I know that one was lame, but still a HUGE reason I have been waiting for fall to hurry up and get here.

And that is it, I am a total nerd, but I love Fall!!

Making Adjustments

I'm getting married in a few weeks. I know that isn't new news, but still . . . it has everything to do with my thoughts the past few days.

I have been single for quite a while now . . . my whole life really, but been on my own for a long time. In fact been living completely alone (minus Cletus) for several years now. In face I bought my house two years ago so that I would have a place to make my own and settle in.

Now I am suddenly realizing that my years of complete independance are almost over. You would think that I knew this when I agreed to get married, but for some reason it didn't really hit me till just now.

We are moving Eric out of his apartment this next weekend. So for the past couple weeks some of his things have been gradually making their way down to my house where we will be living. But it wasn't till yesterday when I came home for lunch and saw my kitchen full of boxes, his clothes in my closet, and other boxes and some furniture in my house that I really got it. I have to admit to having a mild panic attack (I think I am stressed out about way too many things which is probaly the main cause of the panic attack, but still). I kind of freaked out which is totally not like me.

I love Eric and I am very excited to spend the rest of forever with him; I am just coming to realize what a huge adjustment it will be to have somone else in my life and sharing a home. This whole married life thing is going to be quite the change for me.

Announcing

As pretty much everyone knows I am engaged to marry Eric Roundy.





We will be sealed in the Boise Idaho Temple on Saturday October, 10th. There will be a reception at the LDS Cherry Lane Building in Meridian, Idaho that night from 7-9pm. We will also be hosting an open house in Naperville, IL on October 24th at the LDS 95th St. Building from 6-8pm. Announcements will be on their way shortly, but many people have been asking for details so here they are :)

We are very excited and would love for all of our friends and family to be able to celebrate with us.

Puppy Pancakes

So I found this pretty funny . . . not sure if ya'll will but I'll share just for fun.

Background info, Eric served his mission in Korea, where they eat dogs and he jokes pretty constantly about Cletus being a good source of food storage and just in general about eating Cletus. Mostly he does it cause it always gets a reaction out of me.

So, yesterday morning Eric was making his grandma's buttermilk pancakes for breakfast. And I guess when he was a kid his grandma would always make them in the shape of a cat. Well he made them all just normal round pancakes at first and then in the end he decided to make a Cletus pancake. He actually got the proportions and shape just right. It turned out pretty good. Anyway, I thought HE was going to eat the Cletus pancake cause he always jokes about eating Cletus, but then he goes and puts it on MY plate. So . . . I had Cletus for breakfast yesterday while the real Cletus watched trying to figure out what in the world was going on. He was pretty tasty. :)

Kind of exciting . . .

Eric and I took a quick trip to Nauvoo this weekend to see the pageant and go to the temple. While we were there he proposed so we are now officially engaged. We plan to get married this fall, barring any issues it will be in Boise in October. When we get everything set I will be sure to let folks know. Anyway, we are just excited :)

On the road again . . . please no!!

So I realize that it has been just about forever since I have updated this and I have done a lot of things and been a lot of places so I will try to give you a quick run down of what I have been up to.

First, had a crazy Spring season with work . . . this year seemed much harder than pervious years and I was all over traveling and not sleeping and just working way too much! But all seems to have turned out well and time for me to start getting ready for the fall and winter seasons.

I went on an AWESOME road trip with my girls Molly and Tia to Gulf Shores, Alamaba. We had a condo accross the street from the beach and spent a week in the sun relaxing, not thinking about work, catching up on sleep, and just enjoying hanging out as friends cause we don't seem to get a lot of time for that anymore. We made a stop by Graceland on the way home so I can officially cross that one off my bucket list! It was fun!

Got home from Alabama just in time to head to Idaho the next weekend. Eric came with me, he was brave to agree to this trip. It was quite the trip. I went to the temple for myself and it was wonderful to have my parents, and four of my siblings, three brothers in law and Eric there with me. An hour later my six little brothers and sisters were sealed to my parents which was a very special experience for our family to all be in the temple together. We then packed up and headed up to Donnelly where we had a cabin on the lake for the long weekend. The weather didn't cooperate but I think we all still enjoyed just hanging out together for a few day. I miss my family so it is always fun to go see them. And it was really special to bring Eric with me and have him be a part of all that.

This past weekend we headed out to Nebraska to visit Eric's parent for the 4th of July. They live in Nebraska's official "4th of July City" so it just seemed appropriate for us to visit :) We had a good time and got home late last night.

Now I am back to work for my first full work week in almost a month and just looking forward to staying home this weekend and enjoying time with Cletus and Eric.

My first niece!!

My twin sister Jennifer and her husband Tyson had their first baby girl last night. Her name is Lily Ann Hansen and she is beautiful and in my opinion she looks just like her mother. I am so excited to go home to visit my family in six weeks and get to actually meet her! Baby girls are so much fun!

Plus it is exciting to add another girl to the family. The boys were four up on us and now that lead is cut down to three :) We'll see how long that lasts ;)

Finally some Spring photos

Ok, sorry it has been forever, life is really crazy these days between work, Eric, and you know . . . just life for me in the Spring. Anyway, this past Sunday Eric reminded me that I needed to take photos of my Spring tulips to share with my sister Jennifer, so we took a few pictures and I thought that I would share. Cletus kind of likes them too :)

This is Cletus and I with my flower pots.



A new mix that Diane and I came up with of Blue Muscari, a funky mini daffodil and a faint little pink tulip. We both decided we loved it!



Just the house in bloom. Thanks to Eric for getting the lawn mowed so that it could stop looking abandoned. We had so much rain and I was just so busy it was starting to look a little scary.

It is official!!

As some of you, but maybe not all of you know my family has grown significantly over the past year or so and not just due to three weddings. My parents decided a little over a year ago to take in 6 little brothers and sisters that needed a good home (well there were 5 at the time and the 6th was on his way). Well exactly 13 months to the day that they arrived in our home (yesterday) the adoptions were all finalized, so I officially have 4 more little brothers and 2 more little sisters. They are great kids and I am so excited that they are officially a part of our family.

I finally decided what to do with it . . .

Just in case you don't know me or don't know much about me, I kinda like the outdoors, plants, nice weather, that kind of stuff. So I am just a little bit excited about the coming spring. I am excited to see my yard come to life and to be able to start spending more time outdoors.

Anyway, so there is this spot in my backyard that I have been struggling with what to do with. It is a long narrow bed area that is up against my fence, just an odd spot so I killed the grass there last year and created a bed, but never got it planted with anything. But, I think that I have finally come up with a pallet that I like.

It starts with Solidago 'Fireworks' which is this kind of crazy yellow flowering perennial. Then mixed in the back with that will be the Stachys 'Humello' which I think was the subject of a previous blog post. I really like it if you can't tell. Them mixed in front of those will be these fun Echinacea 'Coconut Lime'. I really just love the form and the color. And planted with those to add that little touch of pink that I seem to really need these days will be Coreopsis 'Heavens Gate' which has dainty bi-color pink flowers.

All of these should combine to create a nice bed for me. I am going for a nice mixed/naturalized look. I am excited about the variety in color and texture. Once I get them planted and they start flowering this summer I will post a few pictures so that ya'll can see how it turns out.

Check this out!!

My cousin Billy runs a website called Avdenture Journey, it is very cool, you can find a link to it further down on my page. But his little brother Joey is doing an awesome expedition and blogging it on his site. He is traversing 20,000 of Asia in an attempt to raise money for a wonderful charity. Check it out http://www.adventurejourney.net/expeditions/20000/

Just Doesn't Make Sense

I have always known that I was just strange, but once again I have proof.

Most of you experienced the dreaded springing forward of daylight savings time this past weekend. It always makes for a rough weekend and it is everything I can do to remember to change the clocks and make sure I get to church on time on the following Sunday. (Thank goodness for cell phones that change automatically)

Anyway, this year, it wasn't bad at all. I was up on Sunday morning, a little later than usual, but that is to be expected when a whole hour of my night just disappears. Still, I had a Sunday morning meeting and had no problem making it to that on time. I was up late Sunday night, but still had no problems getting up on Monday morning, got to work a few minutes early and had a pretty decent Monday.

But this daylight savings thing finally caught up to me this morning. I totally slept in past my alarm. I was almost an hour late to work, and I have been dragging and trying to catch up all day.

With any luck my postponed "daylight savings drag day" will end soon and things will be back to normal tomorrow.

I liked it!!

This past Friday night I went to the special preview night for the Chicago Flower and Garden Show. Work sent me, it was the charity night so you pay a lot more for your ticket and don't have to deal with the crowds. Which is nice cause usually the place is totally crowded.

Anyway, Diane and I were walking the show where there were elaborate displays, tons of color, and some truly creative work. Oddly enough we agreed on what we thought was the most striking bed of the show. As usual for me it was also one of the simplest.



I just thought that this bed was a great example of contrasting textures working together to add interest. There are only three plants here and they are all very common, Algerian Ivy, Huchera (some lime green variety), and Asparagus Fern. So simple, but still so stunning!

Or maybe I just loved it cause it is all GREEN!!

I'm excited for this one . . .

With the arrival of March I am anxious for Spring. I planted a ridiculous amount of bulbs last fall but there is one that I am particularly excited to see in the next month or two when it comes up.

It is called Allium schubertii . . . I love alliums, but this one is a little different, and as normal for me I had to go with the funky one. These are planted in my front flower bed right by the front door. I am counting down the days till I get to see them.

But, alas it is still winter for 3 more weeks and then the Spring weather will probably be slow to come, but still . . . these give me something to be really excited for and something to look forward to. I planted a lot of tulips, hyacinths, muscari, and daffodils too, but I will share those with all of you when they come up in the Spring.

Is it pink or purple?

Quick background here . . . I have one of my full time seasonal color employees that works with me at my office and we collaborate with the two designers on staff a lot. We help eachother a lot by just talking things through and getting eachother's opinions. We work a lot with color and combining colors and just a lot of collaboration.

Anyway, today one of our designers was working on a project and had shown me a plant that I didn't really have any experience with. Well the lady that works for me is a perennial flower guru and knows them all. So they two of them were talking and we were pulling up pictures online and trying to figure out some others plants that would accent this one well in a garden.

The conversation got funny and I realized that anyone listening in would probably think that we were a bunch of loons. We were discussing how pink/purple this flower is. After a long discussion the consensus was it is more pink than a purple but more purple than a pink. Not fuschia, still purple, but a purple with pink tones and not blue tones. I am thinking that I might need to send a request to the people at crayola to ask them to come up with a nifty one to two word name for this color.

If anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them.

By the way, the name of the plant is Stachys officinalis 'Hummelo'.

Non-Existant

Wow . . . I used to be really good about this whole blogging thing. I have been really involved in some private blog forums the past couple months so I have ignored my own. I'm sorry folks. I promise to write something soon and update ya'll as to what is actually going on in my life.

Can't hold my tongue any longer

So I live in Illinois right . . . which is and you know (so long as you at least walk past a news paper or turn on the TV) in the middle of yet another political scandal. Our fabulous (very sarcastic) governor who is only a small part of corrupt Illinois politics has been arressted for allegedly trying to sell our vacant senate seat. Once again, ya'll know know.

Honestly his arrest came as no surprise, he has been a horrible governor. But we the people of the state of Illinois re-elected the man just a few years ago. So we deserve it I guess. I mean, Chicago politics have always been corrupt. The days of Al Capone may be over, but our political system is more honest than it was then. And for the most part I am as guilty as the rest, the city functions, it's clean, crime is down, and the corruption stays mostly under the table so we look past it.

Now, the state government is a totally different story. It has never functioned!! We have the most dysfunctional and self serving state legislature I have ever seen. And to cap it all off a governor that fits right it. (Side note: if you think our beloved president elect managed to be a part of these systems and never got his hands dirty, that is just plain naive or ignorant, sorry to be blunt, but I see it first hand and you don't play with pigs without getting dirty).

So now, we have a governor facing impeachment, a vacant senate seat, the democrats up in arms throwing their own to the wolves, republicans calling for a special election with the hope of seating another republican in the senate, and an appointed senator who has yet to be and will doubtfully be confirmed. Of course the man feels that he has a right to the seat and has gone so far as to say: "We are hoping and praying that they will not be able to deny what the Lord has ordained," Not sure when the Lord started ordaining senators, but this guy thinks that he has. My goodness . . . please NO!! But, he is prepared to sue in the case that he is not seated in the senate. The American way I guess. God bless America!

So what is my point here. People here in Illinois are upset, they are divided, they are embarrassed, and worst of all not being represented fairly on the national level (not that we have been the past two years while our junior senator was too busy running for president to be a senator, but we didn't seem to complain then). Anyway . . . my point is that we deserve every bit of what we have gotten. We look past corruption, we don't pay enough attention to who we elect and why, we are too complacent. It is just easier to keep letting wicked men lead us, than it is to fight to help good people be elected. I know that sounds crazy that good people could actually be involved in politics, but they have to be out there. It isn't enough to decide that things seem ok and just vote for the incumbent, or to just vote along party lines. It is our responsibility and right as citizens of this country to elect leader to represent us.

If anything, this situation along with the election last November have prompted me to not just talk, but to actually get involved. I know that I myself can't change the world, but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't try. We should all do everything in our power to make the world better, even if we don't see any success, we should keep trying and try to bring integrity back to politics, I know it sounds crazy, but we have got to try.

Thanks for listening to my rant :)

Happy New Years!

I don't usually get all that excited about the new year . . . most years it just seems like another month and I just have to remember to change the year when I have to write down the date. But for some reason this year feels different. This year feels like a year of possibility for me and I intend to make the most of it. Not by making resolutions, but just by promising myself to be better and find new ways to enjoy life.

Happy new year to all of my friends and family . . . love you guys!