January 31

Tonight was cheesy couples game night with my fellow newlyweds/soon-to-be-weds, and let me tell you, this group was FUN! Can you tell they're doing a "fake" action shot for my picture of the day? I know, it's shocking. It looks SO realistic.

We played Balderdash and it was a blast. This is a creative group!!

Oh, and I just had to throw in this sweet little shot I got of Rylan looking at his daddy:

January 30

This is how we spend most of our nights. He's in his chair, on his laptop, I'm on the couch on mine. We're watching some TV show or movie, quietly enjoying each others' company.

Tonight was wonderful - After Jack got home, we went to Outback steakhouse, where I had steak and lobster (I can safely say I canceled out that 10 miles I rode on the bike earlier in the day). Then, we rented our first Blu-Ray movie, The Dark Knight. It was a lovely evening!

January 29

Tonight Christina, Christelle, Rylan and I had a girls night (I know, Rylan's a boy. We were okay with that). Christina and her mom held Rylan, who cooed, smiled, and cuddled. As soon as they handed him off to me, he made this face:

...and screamed his little head off.

Here are a few more pictures from the evening.

I never get pictures of Christelle! I suppose she's probably getting used to being ignored with that kiddo around!

Me and Christina hang out with Rylan.

January 28

I got another half-day off because of the ice, so when I got up this morning, I made us breakfast. Eggs with biscuits and gravy! Mmm!

While we were eating, Jack started picking through the candy hearts on our table (don't worry, guests, I'm about to replace them anyway because they're getting hard), looking at each one until he found one he liked. Then he gave it to me:

January 27

I got sent home early from work today because it was wet and freezing, and my company is really good about taking care of its employees. Even better, Jack was off work too! So I came home at 2 p.m., took a nice long nap, we ordered pizza for dinner, and we've been enjoying staying underneath our blankets and laptops all afternoon. Life is good on an ice day!

Tonight we went outside to check everything out and our sidewalks are all iced-over. That was the extent of the adventuring we did today.

January 26

Before I left for work this morning, I brewed a pot of coffee for Jack and me. We love having coffee together in the mornings, and I was excited to try the new Starbucks Sumatra blend. It was very nice!! Unfortunately, since I was running late, I had to take mine to go, but I got to take it in my favorite new to-go tumbler - the "make-your-own tumbler" from Starbucks. Jack got it for me for Christmas and I have it decorated for Valentine's Day!!

January 25

Today was the day! Jack has been saving for months to be able to buy a Playstation 3, and last night he told me that he was finally ready to buy it. So, today after church, we headed to Best Buy and he got his PS3 and a new game to play on it. He was so excited about it!!
He was so cute, sitting on the floor, setting it up, and then asking me several times during the day whether he could play his new video game again! (Of course, I said yes!)

January 24

Tonight was my boss, Donna's lingerie shower. (Donna is second from the left in this picture) She is getting married in just a few weeks, and we had a fun time visiting, eating, and watching her open gifts. This picture is just the girls in our work group.

January 23

Today, my friend, Sharon, used the word "raucous" in a sentence. I hadn't heard the word before, so we looked it up. We didn't know how to spell it though, so we spent a good 20 minutes trying to figure out how to spell it. After many unsuccessful attempts on dictionary.com, I decided that she made it up, but Eric figured out how it was spelled and we finally found it. I stand corrected.

January 22

Dinner! Remember the eggs that Jack "marked" for me on January 6? One of them was really tasty in my (colorful!) salad tonight!!

And no, Jack did not eat this for dinner. Jack would never eat this. He had corn dogs.

January 21

It's AWANA day!! Today during game time, Keith announced to the kids that "even though it was 60 degrees earlier, the temperature had changed dramatically and it was now snowing!" The kids were so excited, until he told them that he was just kidding.

So we had a Texas snowball fight!! Keith gave each team stacks and stacks of (recycle) paper and had all the kids crumple them up into "snowballs." Then, he put the "snowballs" in the middle, and the game was to have as few "snowballs" as possible left in your team's part of the room. It was a really fun game! Quite a mess, but so much fun!

At the end, we picked up all the snowballs, put them back into our bag, and had a "snowman"-making contest between the teams. This is one of my girls with our "snowman!" I think we did pretty well!!

January 20

What a day. My work gave us a half-day off to watch the inauguration, and like Obama or not, you have to admit that today was a big deal. Not only do we have a new president for the first time in my adult life, but it's a man who wouldn't have even been allowed to drink from the same water fountain as I 60 years ago. A man whose children would not have been allowed to attend the same public school as I 60 years ago. What a legacy to leave.

January 19

I love this girl!! My beautiful friend, Angela, came to town for the weekend, and it's always such a blast hanging out with her! We scrapbooked, we watched an old movie, we talked, we ate, we laughed... I can't imagine a better person to have spent the weekend with!

January 18

Another day with the Kidds and Rylan! This time, Jack got to hold Rylan too...

And (since he was sleeping), he didn't cry when I held him during church and he didn't cry when I held him at Olive Garden either! This was probably because he was sleeping both of those times, but I'll take what I can get! I will say that when Jack made him cry and he he handed him back off to me, he stopped crying! Crazy! Maybe the babies don't hate me any more after all. Or maybe they just hate Jack more...


Angela, however, was a miracle worker! Not a peep from Rylan with Angela! She's quite the "baby-whisperer!"

January 17

Today was scrapbooking day! I loved having these lovely ladies over today - we spent the whole day scrapbooking, chatting, and enjoying some lovely soup and chili! What a wonderful day!

Also, I couldn't believe it, but I finished my entire Honeymoon album (sans journaling and titles) in one afternoon, thanks to the Creative Memories 12x12 Travel Max kit! It made it SO easy and it looks awesome - totally worth the money!

January 16

When we woke up this morning, our "dining room" looked like this:

And now, it looks like this!!

Can you guess where I bought it?

I'm so excited to have a new dining room table, and just in time for a big scrapbooking day tomorrow! Plus, it's just our style, and it fits so well into our house. We're becoming more and more like grown-ups every day!

We "broke it in" right away - we had my parents, Jack's parents, and Natalie over for dinner! It was lovely!

January 15

While of course we would never play at work, somehow this little contraption got put together (by Sharon). We named that painting "Pat" because we're not really sure if it's a male or female. Pat is kind of our running practical joke around the office; he/she ends up in random places, like my office, or on a shelf, or on a wall. It's just kind of something we do... like a scary "Where's Waldo?"

Today Sharon stood him/her up and set up a fancy shooting trick with our toy rifle and a clementine. I work with a strange fun group.

January 14

It's AWANA day! The kids were wild tonight!! It was really quite a roar during game time! But man, I really do love these girls. They're super-sweet.

January 13

Okay, so this was going to be the picture of the day today:

This is all of my work friends at lunch today - we went out to lunch together today to celebrate Joanna's birthday. I love my co-workers!!

But then...
I got a call from my buddy Brittany, a friend from both high school and college. Now that we've both graduated, we don't live near each other anymore (I'm in Dallas and she's in Houston) - so sad! When we get together, we have so much time!!

So, I once wrote this little story about traveling from College Station to Corsicana and back with this girl one night (4 hours of driving total, I think), just because we wanted Braums ice cream after dinner. You see, they don't have it south of there, so we were out of luck when it came to super-cheap, yummy ice cream in College Station. So, naturally, when Brittany came in town for the night, we decided to go to "our place," Braums! Yes, the service is awful, and yes, the stores are less than sanitary, but where else can you get a two-scoop ice cream cone for $1.79!? Nowhere, that's where.

There's another adventure story about it here, but if you're not interested in that, just know that I very much enjoyed my time with Brittany, and trust me, we definitely found some post-collegiate shenanigans to get into.

January 12

Man, this project makes me get really creative sometimes! I can't decide if it's a good thing or a bad thing; on one hand, I am taking more pictures... on the other hand, is a picture of the jar of pickles I ate today really all that valuable? Who knows.

Anyway, today's picture was my dinner - the last few pickles, an orange, and some Fritos and bean dip. Nutritious, yes?

January 11

Today we went to church with some very dear friends, who just had a very sweet baby boy, Rylan. Afterward, had lunch with them at On the Border. Yum!! Just like all the other babies I hold, I made Rylan cry. See how miserable he looks with me? That's a real confidence booster. Oh well... I guess we'll have to wait a little while longer to have some of our own!

January 10

Today, Jack's cousin, Nathan, married the love of his life, Jennifer. We drove to Waco and back today and enjoyed visiting with family while we were there. Here's the whole album of the pictures I took today. This picture is us at the wedding, obviously.

Their first dance was hilarious! They started with a slow dance, then did a choreographed compilation of fun, fast music. It's here if you want to watch the video. Happy honeymooning, Mr. and Mrs. Spencer!!

January 9

Enjoying happy hour at Cristina's with some wonderful co-workers to celebrate Joanna's birthday! I'm not in it because, well, I was taking it.

January 8

I gave Maggie a rawhide bone on Tuesday morning so that she wouldn't be lonely as she made the sad, sad adjustment back to being alone for a few hours a day when we went back to work. Oddly enough, she doesn't chew on it while we're gone (my guess is she sleeps on the couch [where she isn't allowed] when we're gone, instead of playing with toys or chewing on bones). She sure goes after it when we're home though!

January 7

I guess sometimes, it's just a picture of Mandy and Jack at the end of the day.

But I'm wearing my AWANA shirt here because it was our first day back at AWANA! Funny story about game time here.

January 6

Today, I hard-boiled some eggs to put on a salad for dinner, but by the time I was ready to eat, the eggs weren't ready to be eaten. Instead of waiting, I just turned the stove off and left them there to finish cooking.

Later, when we were about to go to bed, Jack took his plate to the kitchen and asked me what I wanted him to do with the eggs. I asked him if he could please mark them and put them back in the fridge.

"Mark them?" he asked, confused.

"Yeah, like with a permanent marker, so I know the difference" I said.

"You can't just break them and find out?" he asked, jokingly, as he grabbed a marker and headed back into the kitchen.

It was quiet for quite a while after that, but I didn't notice because I was busy on my computer. When I finally went into the kitchen, this is what I found:

Jack and I liked the one with the curly hair and the smirk (top left) the best!!

The funniest thing about this was the way he told me about each of them and actually made the faces that the eggs were "making."

"This one has curly hair..." [shows me the curly hair] "...and this one is surprised... this one has a smirk on his face, like this" [does a funny smirk, imitating the smirking egg, making me laugh].

Also, when he put them in the egg carton, he said he was worried that they would "freak the other eggs out," and he positioned them all around the eggs that were left so they could "look" at the raw ones.

I'm not so sure I'm going to be able to break these and eat them.

January 5

About two weeks ago, I was ridiculously excited when I used the last sticky note on my sticky note pad at work. That meant that I got a brand new, crisp pad of sticky notes out of the supply cabinet. It was like Christmas in Disneyland for Mandy. (It doesn't take much, people. It doesn't take much.)

Fast forward to today. While feverishly working on fixing the broadcasts that had Israel inserts in them (this year's Insight for Living Israel tour was canceled today. Grr), I reached over to the broadcast schedule to turn a page, knocking over my freshly-filled cup of morning coffee. In slow motion, I watched as the mug fell, splashing hot coffee all over my desk, mouse, broadcast schedule, and other various desk items. What was I most upset about as I sopped up the warm liquid mess? My post-it notes. My new, beautiful post-it notes are not so new and beautiful any more. And so I mourn today.

January 4

I had time to craft today, so I made 20 "thank you" cards for my friend, who's having a baby in March! They turned out super-cute!!

January 3

Okay, so I think this picture is the best "picture of the day":

But I'm also posting this one because I'm in it, and Jamie wanted to see me too. :)Today we got to hang out with my sweet little neighbor girls (who were the flower girls in my wedding) and we went on a walk to the park with Jack, Maggie, Michelle, and my parents. What a gorgeous day! Too bad tomorrow's supposed to be so cold and icky!

Jack also took down our tree/Christmas decorations today, and he thought I should post a picture of our empty floor after all his hard work:
It was cute how sad he was about taking all the Christmas decorations down today because "it's the longest amount of time before we get to put them up again." Seriously, the man turns into a 6-year-old at Christmas time.

January 2

Jack shows off the receipt from the new dining room table we bought today!! Woohoo! They'll deliver it in just a few weeks!


And later tonight... playing Rummikub with my parents. It was more fun than it looks in this picture!

January 1

Happy New Year! We had champagne in wine glasses at midnight with friends because we don't have champagne glasses. Mostly because champagne is disgusting!