Where did August go?!

Whoops!! I completely missed the entire month! I have been very busy at work with our auditing season which means a lot of travel during the day and getting home later at night, along with that, Drew and I are trying REALLY hard to stay on track with our half marathon training, so that means at least 4 to 5 days a week of running/working out for an hour, AND on top of that, I'm studying for the CPA exam....again, so my free time is minimal. But anyways, we had a great month of August starting with celebrating our first anniversary on the 6th! We went to a wine tasting, a craft brewery, and our favorite locally grown restaurant that has AMAZING food!

We've also spent a lot of time watching this cutey grow, he is walking now!!! And here he is getting caught going into my purse, like his guilty face?! LOVE HIM!

And two of my good friends from college, Amanda and Jessica, came and visited Drew and I for a long weekend!!It was SO great to see them and show them around where we live. We spent a day at the beach, a day around town, and introduced them to a lot of our friends down here along with enjoying some adult beverages and catching up!! Here is the ONE picture that we managed to take that weekend, we were too busy having fun that we almost didn't take a single picture until their last night here!

Thanks so much for coming girls!!!!

Can't promise that I'll be a better blogger in September, but I'm hoping that come October (when my test is finally over) that I have a little bit more free time!

Pear Salad

Sounds good, right? Well it just adds to reason #890308435 that I have gained weight while living in the south.

I have been lamenting to my coworkers about how I don't like how much weight I've gained and how much my blood pressure increased since living here and how hard it is to avoid bad food in the south. Today we went to a small diner and a coworker suggested that I substitute a pear salad for french fries. Pears, good, salad, great, pear salad, nasty crap! (Thanks, Jim Gaffigan, for that line)

What went wrong, you ask? 

Oh, they forgot to mention the cheddar cheese and dollops of mayo on the pear!!!!! GROSS!!! This is what is considered healthy in the south...lettuce, pears, cheese, and at least a 1/4 cup mayo. There is a cherry on top, so it's ok, right? Good Lord.

I scrapped the mayo and cheese off and just ate the pear...well and the cherry :-)

Day at the Beach

Drew's favorite place to be is at the ocean, who would think after being from a land locked state, I guess we can thank grandpa George and grandma Mar for the for moving to Hawaii! Unfortunately we have hardly been at the beach this summer with all of the trips we took early in the season and Drew's crazy unpredictable work schedule, but we finally made it there last weekend.

It was a gorgeous day and the ocean felt like bath water. It was wonderful! Unfortunately, we enjoyed it too much and got so sun burnt (even though we did apply sunscreen) that we were MISERABLE for the following 3 days. Whoops! Better luck next time!

Here's our one picture from the day eating at a restaurant on the pier:

Wine and Design

This weekend my friend, Emily, came up from Jacksonville, NC and I had a fun-filled, child-free night planned for the both of us. There is a new thing is Goldsboro called Wine and Design. You bring your own bottle of wine, and the place provides the canvas, the paint and the instructor and for about 2 and a half hours they teach you how to paint the portrait for the night.

I am NOT a good artist at all, never have been, coloring inside the lines is tough for me, but I thought this sounded fun and for $25, pretty cheap entertainment....plus there was wine, so that makes it all better, right?

Here is my final masterpiece:

I was pretty proud of myself when I finished, and I wasn't sure if it was just because of the wine I consumed while doing it, but I woke up the next morning and was still pretty proud of it, so on the wall it goes!! 

I hope to do this again sometime soon....any takers?!?!

Also, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my favorite non-twin brother, Conor!!! He turned 19! Happy Birthday Con!

Dumb Traditions

I've always heard that you're supposed to save the top layer of your wedding cake, freeze it, and then eat it on your one year anniversary. So Drew and I did just that, but we had to keep the cake in my parents freezer since there really was no good way to transport it to NC without ruining it. When we were home a few weeks ago, we decided to eat the cake a little early since we don't have any plans on going home until the holidays.

We're not superstitious, so eating the cake around our 10th month anniversary didn't bother us. We're fairly confident that we'll make it to our one year, but we both agreed, along with both of our families that this is one dumb tradition. Once the cake thawed, the frosting basically melted away from the cake and when everyone tried a piece, it tasted truly awful (I hope it was better on our wedding day...I don't think I ate a piece other than the small bite we fed each other). Within 5 minutes everyone had a stomach ache including Darby, the Shepard's family dog, who stole a bite off the counter!!


Anyways, here's to traditions, the old ones, the new ones, the tried ones, the true ones, and....the dumb ones!!!

Love is in the Air

People always say that between the ages of 24-30, your life is filled with weddings. So I was blown away when I realized that Drew and I had no weddings to go to in the Summer of 2012, well now I know why...2013 is making up for it. I have 2 brothers and now a best friend who are all getting married in 2013!!!  And I am so excited to be able to be in all of those wedding parties.

Nate and Britney got engaged first and Britney asked me to be a bridesmaid in this way:

And here is her gorgeous ring!

Then Nick and Kirsten got engaged and she asked me to be in her wedding in this way:

And here is her beautiful ring:

Then, my best friend Rachel got engaged and she asked me, along with her sister, to be her Maid of Honor!!

And this is her stunning ring!!

Since starting this blog earlier in the week, Rachel and Steve set their wedding date for November 2012 which is just 5 months away!! This makes wedding season 2013 a little less eventful, but I can't wait to start all the celebrating earlier!! I'm very fortunate that I will be able to make it back for all the weddings for 6 very important people in my life, exciting times!!

It's Official!!

We're running in the Battleship Half Marathon on November 4th!!! Stay tuned for all of our lovely training struggles and strengths!!