Back in Arkansas

Well most of you know I went home for my sisters graduation. I had a wonderful time. I hadn't seen my family since Christmas so it was nice to be home for awhile. I also got to spend some more time with the Bidwells and Terrys. My flights went really well on the way to Indiana. Deric took me to the airport at about 5:15 a.m on last
Thursday. I was in Indy by 11:30. It was a lot nicer than driving 12 hours to go home!
My sister, Jennifer and my best friend Aimee picked me up at the airport. I was so surprised when I saw Aimee with Jen, they kept a good secret I guess! Well of course I was super excited and I am sure I made a scene at baggage claim when I about plowed them both over!:) It didn't take long for us to get my luggage but when we hit the parking garage, Jen and Aimee had forgotten where they had parked! So it was up and down the walkways and the elevators for Jen and I. Aimee is so scared of elevators so she had to take the stairs! After about 15 minutes of me dragging my luggage around the garage we finally found the car.
First stop on my trip was the mall! I forgotten how much I love shopping with my sister and Aimee. It was so nice to just hang with my girls for awhile. We met the rest of the family at Se Senior for dinner.I had to get my Mexican food in!!



On Friday my mom, Jen and I went to Jen's first dress fitting for the wedding. I can't post a picture..... it would ruin the surprise! We also helped mom pick out her dress.... by the way I am super jealous of it.

On Saturday I went to Nikohl's soccer game... it was a bit windy out that morning. I enjoyed watching her play. She had grown into quite the soccer player.I remember her first season of soccer and it makes me so proud to still be there to watch her play and grow.

As of the rest of the weekend I just hung around home with the family. Saturday night was a lot of fun my brother and his wife and kids came over to visit they have four now. It was the first time I got to meet my new niece she is now 3 months old.



Later that night Aimee and Jaxson ( her son) came over to play. They boys found that they loved the game Jegna and mom's autamon! As you can see they all had to get in it.


Sunday was the best day of them all it was when my big sister,Jen, was now a college graduate! She has been waiting for 5 years to get there and she did it! Not only did she make it to graduation but she did it with honors! She has always been one smart chick (inside joke)! She graduated with 2 majors; a Secondary English Education and Theater Arts degree. I took a lot of pictures of that day but I only posted a few! I am a very proud little sister! I always knew she could do it!


I'll let you in on little secret. When I was about 12 years old I went to Bethel College with a lady I babysat for. Right then and there is when I said I wanted to go to school there because of it's American Sign Language program. Well the years past and Jen made her decision to go there.... I am so bummed even though I was working for my cosmetologist license at the time. I was so upset that she was going to go there because it was MY dream. But I got over it and I was so glad it was my sister's dream also to go to school there. If I had to share a dream with someone there is no one better person than my sister to share it with! ( Mom, stop crying!!!! I mean it!)


At least I got to stand in the front of Bethel College with my Big Sister on a very important day! Love you!!

Spring Is Here!

It started warming up around here weeks ago, but we always have a few days where it gets really cold again. Well, I think all that crazyness is finally over and it is going to stay warm. We have had three weekends in a row of great weather. Last year it warmed up a lot in March, and it was our first spring in the house so we were all excited to get our landscaping done. We planted lots of flowers and bushes, only to have a few cold nights in April wipe everything out. This year we were a little bit smarter and waited until later in the spring to do our landscaping.
Two weeks ago we bought a bunch of bushes and a red Japanese maple for our front flower bed. After digging about 10 holes we had everything planted or transplanted where we wanted it. The picture above is the final result, but we still haven't planted many flowers. In the next couple weeks we will put in a lot more flowers to add some color.You can also see our tree has some leaves on it. It is really starting to look nice. Last year it was okay, but looked kinda funny. This year it looks much nicer.


This next picture is our Crape Myrtle. We bought it last spring and it just sat in our flower bed all year looking like a dead stick. Well this year it was looking quite dead again. After everything else had started blooming and turning green the crape mytle was brown and lifeless. Then, all of the sudden just a few days ago green leaves just started bursting out of the sticks. It looks like it is actually going to do something this year... Exciting!!



This weekend Amanda flew back to Indiana to go to her sister's graduations, so I was living the bachelor life this weekend. I still had the dogs, so I was like a bachelor with two small shi tzu's. It was just me and the dogs this weekend and we had all kinds of fun. Divot usually acts like he hates me most of the time, but I really think we bonded this weekend. He didn't have Amanda to follow around all the time so he actually had to acknowledge me. No blog entry would be complete without a couple pictures of the dogs. Here is Divot having a good time playing with his basketball in the back yard today. Birdie hates getting her picture taken, but I found out that if I stand far enough away and use my zoom lens I can actually get a decent picture of her. She loves being outside on the deck. Most of the time she just stands on the deck and watches Divot run around, and barks at him when he passes.





Well, I will close this blog entry by putting up a couple pictures of out new entertainment center. We got our new TV last fall and our old Wal-Mart furniture wouldn't cut it anymore. We were going to buy one, but most of them are too long and we want to put it in a corner. My boss agreed to build me one, so I drew up some plans and he built it for us. It is really nice because he used solid oak and you usually have to spend a lot of money to get furniture made out of real wood. He finished it a couple weeks ago, so I had the
task of sanding and staining it. It took me about 7 coats of stain to get it that dark, but we thought it turned out pretty well. It definitely makes our living room look a lot better. It is really nice to know somebody who is good and making stuff. He did a great job. Well that is all I have for today.

Deric's 7 Things

Well, I guess I am supposed to come up with seven random facts about me to share with you all. So here we go...

1) I keep a spreadsheet of ever single movie I watch. I include the date and a rating for each movie, along with the number of minutes the movie lasted. This is totally an engineer thing to do, but I just got so tired of trying to remember which movies I had seen and when I had seen them. I have been keeping it since early 2005. Since then I have watched 314 movies. In actual time it totals up to over 22 days of movie watching. The average rating for those movies is right at 7/10. I am thinking about adding a genre column so I can see my avg rating by genre. I also have a Netflix account and have rated 1062 movies on there. It makes me sad that only 314 of them are captured in my spreadsheet.

2) I hate hanging stuff up on walls. It just feels like such a permanent thing to do. I really don't like the feeling of driving nails into an untouched wall. In my apartment at college we didn't have one thing hung up on any of the walls. For the two years we were there we didn't put up any sort of pictures or decorations. In my apartment in Arkansas, I actually did have a couple pictures hung up, but I didn't enjoy doing it. Now at our house there is stuff hanging all over the walls. I am glad Amanda is motivated to put up pictures and things because it looks really nice. However, if it were up to me, the walls would stay completely plain.

3) I have never given the Starbucks corporation a cent of my money. Starbucks is evil. If you go to Starbucks you should feel ashamed of yourself. Starbucks is contributing to obesity in America with their super sweet, calorie filled crap. Their products are so over-priced. Most of their customers probably shouldn't be spending so much money on coffee. I hope we have reached the saturation point with the Starbucks chain. When I first moved here to Arkansas I don't think there were any Starbucks stores in the town where I lived. Now, there are 3 of them within a 4 mile radius of my house. That is insane to me. As money becomes tighter in the economic slow-down, luxury items are going to have to go. Hopefully this will hurt Starbucks financially and cause them to back-pedal a little bit. I will continue to not give them any of my money, and you should do the same. *steps down from soapbox and moves on to number four....

4) I was able to make my wife cry by throwing a sock at her from across the room. Let me repeat that. I threw a sock, just a normal floppy athletic sock, at my wife, who was standing at least 10 feet away, and hit her in the ear with enough force to make her start crying. Yes, struck her powerfully enough to make water drip out of her eyes. There was no rock or any other heavy object in the sock. The sock wasn't even rolled up into a small ball. I just wadded it up and thew it, and somehow it whizzed through the air like a bullet, and hit her square in the side of the head. Don't worry, Amanda was fine.... eventually. I am still amazed to this day of my sock-throwing abilities.

5) I am a lot more organized than my wife. I care so much about having everything in its place, and it really bothers me if things look messy. I don't feel like I can relax in a room where things are out of order. I don't care as much about keeping things really clean. Don't get me wrong, I don't like a layer of dust on stuff, but I can deal if its not spotless. However, I cannot deal with a bunch of clutter. At work everybody comments on how organized my desk is. At the end of every day I put things were they need to go and make sure it is nice and organized for when I come in the next day.

6) I haven't played golf in over 18 months. Ever since I started playing golf in 8th grade it has been a passion of mine. I played as much as I possibly could in high school while on the team. I don't think there was a stretch of more than a few weeks where I didn't play golf. My senior year of high school I actually felt a lot of pressure during golf season. Towards the end I started getting really burnt out and the pressure was really making my game suffer. After our last tournament I took a couple months off, but I started playing again right after that. In high school I got free golf because I was on the team, and in college I worked at a course in the summers so I got free golf there. Then I moved down to Arkansas and I lived at an apartment complex with a golf course so I got free golf. Well, when we moved into our house it ended my free golf. I realized how expensive it was to play golf a lot. That, coupled with the fact that part of my foursome from work moved away, led me to just stop playing. Last summer I didn't even get my clubs out and swing them. Golf has always been such a relaxing experience for me, and it is kinda disappointing that I haven't played. I am sure I will play a few times this year, and hopefully someday find a course where I can become a member and play a lot.

7) I am really cheap. I actually hate spending money. The excitement of buying something new is completely wiped out by the realization that I am losing dollars. When we do buy something big I have to do research for several months before I can actually make the purchase. It took me forever to decide on our new TV, and right after I clicked the button to buy it, I felt total remorse. I don't like going out to eat. Before Amanda came here I would avoid going out to eat as much as possible. I still don't really like eating out, but I am getting better about that. We usually go out to eat once a week. Sometimes we will do twice a week if we really don't feel like cooking on the weekend. In addition to not wanting to spend money, I also don't like having a lot of stuff. Before I buy anything I think about whether it is something I really need, or something I just want. I think about how much space it is going to take up, and if it is worth having to store it. I still feel like we buy too much stuff, and would be happy if we could eliminate some of 'the extra'. Simplification is happiness.

So there are my 7 things. It was actually really hard for me to come up with seven. I am a pretty boring person.

Amanda's 7 Things

So our friend Ashley tagged us so we had to write down 7 random or weird facts about ourselves. Deric will do his later... I had a hard time thinking of some. I guess when you do something the same all the time it doesn't seem so weird. I have been trying to think of 7 things since the start of the week. I should have asked Deric for help but I am sure he would have came up with a long list and would have gotten a little mad at him.LOL So here is goes....


1~ Movies..... Deric loves movies he has watched many. Me on the other hand can't stay awake long enough to finish a movie! Even if I try I can't do it. I don't know if it is because I am laying down on the couch with my blanket or what. I don't however fall asleep at the theater, just at home. We have netflix and Deric probably watching 75% of the movies by himself.
2~ I have to get ready in the same order everyday. It is a must. If I get thrown off it makes me late! I have to first feed and let the dogs out, shower, do hair, eat breakfast, dress for work,then makeup. And all of this while watching the Today Show. I hardly miss a show! If it doesn't happen in the same order it starts my day off poorly.
3~We do our own laundry. When we first got married I would get so mad at Deric because he would never let me do his. Here I was his new wife and wanted to take care of him and he wouldn't let me! He said I would make his clothes smell too girly!! I love downy! After about 3 months I just stopped worrying about taking care of is dirty cloths. Now we have to fight over the washer and dryer!
4~We only eat out on the weekends really... I on the other hand eat out more when I am at work. But if we do eat out I want Mexican. It doesn't matter where I just want it! I could eat it everyday. Pasta is a close second. Half the time after we get Mexican my stomach hurts so bad. But it never fails... I will keep going back to it!
5~ I have sleeping issues. I can not sleep facing Deric. I love to cuddle when it isn't my bed time. It seems like I can't breathe or something when we face each other. My back is always turned away from him when I am asleep. Also the room has to be cold. I love to get under the covers and be warm. There has to be noise. We both agree on this. We have a little fan that runs all night. And I am a cover hog. I love my covers... well the room is cold and I need to keep warm!
6~ I have a sweet tooth. I love my ice cream. I would eat it everyday. But I know I shouldn't! I don't even dish it out. I eat it from the carton. One of these days I am sure it will catch up to me.
7~ I LOVE TO TALK! I could talk to anyone... but I think that comes with my career! It doesn't matter I will start a conversation almost anywhere. In the line at Wal-mart or while I am pumping my gas! Also when I talk on the phone I have to be moving. I walk all through the house not doing anything... just walking. I sit down and I can't talk. At first I thought it is because I stand all day talking. Then I remembered where I got it from..... Thanks MOM!

Deric and I have been working really hard on the house. We have it just about finished up! It only took us over a year to get it how we want it! I thought I would just post a few pictures so our family and friends back home could see our home! We look froward to any visitors that might want to come!! Our door is always open!

"Our Peeps"

So my friend Valarie wants to be really cool and be up on our blog. So I have created this whole blog just for her!

"How I met Valarie"
When I had started my new job at the salon I was pretty slow at first... didn't have to many clients. Well one day I was sitting around in the salon when these girls walked in. The one was wearing a hat... she had a good reason to. Her hair was a mess! She had colored it at home and it was really red. The girl in the hat is Valarie. So I told what I could do for her hair.... which I worked wonders on.... I think. Val had kept coming to me every time she needed her hair done. Well through time we had just gotten closer as friends. I mean I am a pretty cool person I can see why she wanted to hang out with me. :) We had such a good time when she was in my chair! Since then we have became such great friends. She just got married in September and just bought a house. We do a lot on the weekends together with our husbands.
After we got Birdie, Val and Spencer bought a house so they wanted a dog too. Valarie spent a lot of time talking Spencer into it, but he finally gave in and they got Mallie... who is super cute.(Check out her picture) Well Mallie and our dogs quickly became friends. A few weeks after Christmas Valarie heard there was a young lab looking for a great home. Spencer and Valarie had just moved and weren't all the way settled in their new home yet. Spencer was not ready for a new dog.. but Valarie got her way and they brought Gracie home. Now we have play dates with our kids! They all get along and are so happy to see each other. Grace is so good with all the small dogs, she just lets them crawl and bite her. Although when it comes to her bones... she doesn't like to share. When she growls it sounds like she is a cow! It is so funny. She is six times the size of the other three!
Every time we get together as couples we like the dogs to hang out too so they don't get bored at home. Here are some pictures of the last time we got together. These were taken at Valarie and Spencer's house a few weeks ago, Enjoy!
Oh by the way Val! LOVE YA MY BFF ARKANSAS













This is sweet Mallie May



Us trying to get a good picture!


And sweet Grace!

Christmas Time Pictures

Here are some pictures that we took when we were home. We didn't take that many pictures we took more video this year. I really need to get better at taking more pictures now that I think about it!
~ Amanda