Traffic Jams

Yesterday night there was a little party for the bride and groom to be at Dave and Busters, with lots of their friends and family that were in town. It was fun and Dave and Busters is a pretty cool place. We hadn't been in one before, but I have heard my cousin talk about it many times and I can see why. It was cool. Anyways, it was about 45 minutes away from our place so we left at 10:30 to get home but didn't get back home till midnight!! YIKES! We were stuck in a traffic jam. Not that this was anything new to us, we have gotten use to the nighttime traffic problems (its a pain, but we have gotten use to them) but while we were in this mess we saw TWO other accidents right around us. One was right behind us, just a fender bender it looked like, but they got out of the cars and inspected. Then not but 10 minutes later a car in the lane next to us smashed into the car in front of him. It didn't look back, but they got out and inspected too. It didn't look like there was any damage, but he did hit the other car pretty hard for not much motion. So that was a first, being stuck in traffic because of an accident and seeing two others in the process. I wonder how many other little incidents like that there were if there were 2 right by us. So today, we are both RALLY tired cuz we didn't get to bed till late. Today I have to get the house ready for out houseguests. Keep your fingers crossed that there is no rain tomorrow. Its been in the forecast all week, but it hasn't rained yet. The wedding tomorrow is outside so hopefully the rain will keep holding off till Sunday, or even at least till after the ceremony is over!

Compliments from Strangers

Yesterday we were at the gym, and some random guy (ok we have seen him in there from time to time) was working out behind us and just outta nowhere said, "I bet you guys don't have any junk food at your house" haha. Of course Michaels said, "Not so much" and he told us we were both really fit and everytime he sees us we aren't breathing hard or breaking a sweat. Yay for us. It's nice when people just randomly point out that we are in good shape. Always kinda gives us a boost knowing what we are doing actually is showing. Anyways, I just thought that was kind of cool.

I just got back from the wedding shower. It was a lot of fun. It was the first shower I have ever been too where we were all drinking beer instead of punch. It was a good time :) Here's a picture of the bride-2-be (in the middle) a good friend from high school and me. The three of us have known each other FOREVER. Its funny because we all live in the Dallas area now. Not that I ever see them, but they are close by! :o)

The Eye Before (and After) the Storm!!

Its been nice to have a pretty quiet week after our short wave of visitors. This week is going to slowly get busier and busier as it gets closer to Saturday. Tomorrow I am going with Mary to see a movie and do some dress shopping for a wedding we have on Saturday. Thursday at noon I have a bridal shower for the bride-2-be in downtown Dallas and Thursday night Michael and I are going to a party at Dave and Busters that is being thrown for the bride and groom -2-be by one of my high school friends. Friday,another one of my wonderful high school friends and her sister (Sarah and Christine) are coming to town for the wedding and staying the night with us. Saturday the Bride asked Sarah and I to get to the wedding early to make sure everything gets set up, so we will do that, then have a fun wedding to go to!!! It's gonna be busy. I remember the week before our wedding and how hectic it was. Its hard to believe how long ago that was.

Missing the Gym

Our normal workout routine is 6 days a week (yes, I know, we are insane). We usually do that for 3 months straight and take a week off. It gives our body and our muscles a chance to relax. Usually close to the end of the 3 months we are feeling pretty dragged down, and physically tired and just don't have as much energy. So, it worked out perfectly that would take our week off while my mom and her pal were here, and my cousin and his fiancee. They leave tomorrow and Wednesday its back to the gym and we are both roaring and ready to go, but are glad we still have one more day of resting up.

Today Jeff, Jana and I headed to Downtown Dallas where we went to the Dallas World Aquarium, the 6th Floor Museum and the Spagettii Wharehouse. (Michael met us for dinner) We had a great time. The Aquarium was on my New Years Resolution List of things to do in Dallas before we left, so I'm glad we hit it!! Tomorrow I am going BACK to IKEA and BACK to SOUTHFORK RANCH with Jeff and Jana. Its a good thing I like those two places!! hehe.

Heres a few pictures from today.
Oh by the way, notice my new bangs. I kinda have them pushed back behind my glasses, but you can still tell they are there.They have grown a little since I got them, but I like them better where they are now, then where they were when I had them cut! If you click on the images they will get bigger.

7 Months!?!?!

Wow is it already March 20th?? This past month has FLOWN by! That's a good thing.

I really don't have any huge revelations this month about "Learning to Love it Here."
I will say though, I have at least learned not to hate it here. Still not my favorite place on earth, but we have both adjusted so much since we got here in August. If we had to stay here, I know we could make it work for a little while, but thankfully we don't have to!!

Thats really all I have to say about our 7th month down. Only 5 left to go! WHOO HOO!!

Visitors

My mom and her best friend came to see us Wednesday - Saturday morning. We enjoyed having them around. We did lots of shopping and I took them to Southfork (The ranch the tv show "Dallas" was filmed) It was fun :) Here are a few pictures from Southfork. If you click on the pictures you can see them bigger...




Really besides sitting around and talking, shopping and eating, we didn't do much!! It was a nice relaxing visit. We wished we could have shown them a little bit more around here, but it is just so big you can't fit everything into one visit no matter how long you are here. Oh well, what can you do??

About 30 minutes after they left the sky opened up and it has not been raining, but POURING down ever since. That was about 29 hours ago and isn't showing any signs of stopping anytime soon.

My cousin Jeff and his fiance Jana are coming in town tonight. We had just enough time from when my mom left to be lazy, and clean before we welcome in more guests!! We do enjoy having people visit though, so thats good! :0)

Seriously Nothing Going On

Wow, we have had nothing interesting or worthwhile going on around here. Like I always say though, No news is better then bad news! One of my good buddies from high school who is a good friend of both of ours came in town on Friday. We saw him on Friday and I think I'm gonna see him today to. We are having a steady flow of guests in and out in the next few weeks so that will keep us busy. Should be fun, it has been since January since anyone came to visit. We got tickets to see "James Blunt" in May. We both really like his music and saw he was coming. The tickets were only 30 bucks so we thought, Why not?? :o)

Michael is in the process of making a new server so our webpage will be off and on for the next few days.

Well, that's about all the "nothing" I can make into sentences.

Still No Date

We were hoping to have a date by Monday that they were going to "ship us off." Michaels boss spent last weekn in Copenhagen in meetings & getting things ready for this new design center and other stuff. We were hoping they would settle in on a date and get lots of the nitty gritty details like where Michael will be paid from and stuff like. Well all we got out of it, was that they will decide at the latest, the end of April the date of our move. So looks like we have to sit pretty for a little while longer till we get an exact date. We are actually expecting two dates. The first will be what Michael and Klaus's last day at TI Dallas will be, and what day they will both start at TI Copenhagen. Some of you who read this have met Klaus or heard about him, others probably have not, but I have a feeling his name will pop up a lot in here fom here on out, so I will introduce him!

Klaus was the Danish student who came to Texas Tech and did his thesis research with Texas Instruments over here. The duel degree program Michael was part of goes both ways, there are students from Texas Tech in Denmark and there are students from DTU at Texas Tech. So Klaus was the first Dane to go through the program here, just as Michael was the first American to go through the program over there. He arrived here about a week before we returned from Denmark and he has been here since because he took a job with Texas Instruments after he finished his masters degrees. So, thats Klaus... like I said, I'm sure his name will pop up a lot, and I know a lot of people reading this have met him or at least heard of him, but I know there are lots who don't have a clue as well. By the way, his name rhymes with "House" :)

Beautiful White Tile Floors Suck!

One of my favorite things in this house when we got here was the BEAUTIFUL white marble tiles in the kitchen, bathrooms and hallway. The one in the hallway and guest bathroom don't bother me yet, but the one in the kitchen I am about to strangle! Yes, I said, I am going to strangle my floor. I know thats not possible, but trust me, I can find a way!! I can't keep that stupid thing clean to save my life. I usually sweep it, then vacuum it because I can never get everything picked up with the broom then mop it (Ok I swiffer it) and its soooo pretty and sparkly and looks great, but within the day, hours sometimes even its already a mess. Whether its our shoes that leave marks, or food we may drop on there or ANYTHING it gets filthy sooo fast. And it takes soooo long to get it clean. I actually break out in a sweat while cleaning it. It's disturbing. If we owned this place I would be about ready to dish out the several thousand bucks to change it to save my sanity. I seriously am about ready to call someone in once a week to have them clean it for me!!! ok ok, that's a bit of an exaggeration... but it is a good idea..

Humm *pondering thought of calling a cleaning service to clean tile floors once a week*

The floor in the bathroom isn't so bad, but there are several spots where there is glue from where they attached stuff and it shows up really badly. My hair is also always all over the floor in there and it shows up very clearly. As did Hendrixs. (He use to sleep in the bathroom, but he usually stayed on our shower mat) haha.

Anyways, isn't this tile pretty?? Don't let it fool you.. Its the devil!

Note to self: When we get a house of our own, beautiful white tile IS NOT an option!!

Reflections on Moving

One of my best friends recently accepted a job in Corpus Christi and is getting ready to move in the next week from El Paso clear to the other side of Texas. This is her first big move on her own and her first move as an adult from out of El Paso. As she gets herself ready to go I have been thinking a lot about all the moves I have made and how hard each were in their own different way. I left El Paso at 18 and headed to Lubbock for college. That move was mostly incredibly exciting. I knew a ton of people that would be up there with me in the band. I use to go to band camp every summer at Texas Tech so it almost felt like I was going to an extended band camp! haha. Michael was up there too so of course, that made moving very easy ;o) ! I suppose this move I had to learn how to live on my own, do my own laundry, I had to figure out what I was doing for dinner. Stuff like that. Again, Michael was there and kinda learning to do the same things (even though he was in his hometown, he was living on his own as well) so we learned together. When you think about it, we were 18 when we started dating so its like we grew up together! haha. cute :o) After my 1 year in the dorms I had two more moves within Lubbock which were always fun and had their own challenges. I lived in a single room in the dorms, but moved into an apartment with Mary so had to learn to live with someone else, pay bills and all that fun stuff. Mostly we had a lot of fun!! Then I moved in with Michael. That was a VERY easy move. No rent, no bills, and it was there I learned how to go to school. Michael was a good influence on my education! All of a sudden I was on the Deans and Presidents list every semester. I'm sure that made my mom a little more at ease with me living with my "boyfriend" The BIGGEST move was obviously to Denmark. That was by far the most exciting move, but most difficult at the same time. We were thrown into a country and a culture we had just read about and not experienced yet. We didn't understand the language and their way of live. We were alone and the closest friends we had were in New York, we didn't get to talk to our family or friends much especially on the phone, but wow, the internet was a life saver :) At the time I couldn't imagine a harder move, but oddly, coming home was very difficult and had to experience culture shock in our own country which was strange and very hard to explain. I think, it was hard to come home because we simply weren't ready yet. We had JUST gotten use to and comfortable with life there, we finally got to a point where we really understood the people and the culture and even the language. Plus, who wants to leave a place you can say, "Hey you want to go to Paris this weekend?" and go?? :o) So that move was only ok because we were excited to see everyone again, especially our families. We got REALLY comfortable in Lubbock the past two years. We had everything, my brother, Michaels whole family, a cool little get away to his dads house which was on a lake and Mary and Jason! So moving to Allen, from there, as you all know, wasn't easy. It didn't help that as long as I can remember I have always said, I would NEVER move to Dallas. Isn't it funny how life doesn't always go the way you plan!!??!!?? I do however am starting to realize its a good thing we came here before Denmark because I know we would be sooooooo homesick if we left Lubbock to go to Denmark. This has been a nice transition, we dealt with homesickness here and have been able to make it back there a couple times. By the time we leave from Denmark we will already be use to living away from Lubbock. I'm curious as to how our move over there will be. I anticipate it being much easier this time around because the things that were hard for us to get use to, are the things we learned to love and ended up missing the most. We won't have to go through that weird learning stage of not knowing anything because, we already know so much. This time, we know more people over there. Klaus, who works with Michael and went to Tech with the same program that Michael went to the university in Denmark will be going back at the same time we are and I know he will take care of us if we need it. So now that we have gotten here, settled here, and use to things here, I'm starting to wonder how our move will go and start getting ready for it. It was last year this time we were starting to get ready to move here.

Back to where I started, keep my friend in your thoughts for a safe and easy move! I know it is exciting for her and a new chapter in her life, but I know she will have a difficult time leaving what has been her home for the past 14ish years and especially since she is doing this alone without anyone else right by her side and doesn't know anyone down in Corpus. She's a tough little girl though, and she is just minutes from the beach so when she's feeling down, I bet she can just head to the beach, open up a towel, lay down, listen to the ocean and her thoughts will be soothed. I'm hoping to make it down there in April or May for a visit!

Lots Done Today

I had a very productive morning. I swung by target to get a pair of pants for Michael that he wanted and while I was there found a new swimsuit cuz my other ones are kinda old and I wanted a new one. Last year I noticed when it finally came time to buy one, they were practically all gone. So I found one that I liked and got it. Then headed to get my hair cut and did something crazy... I got bangs!! They are long bangs, but bangs none the less. I dont think I have had bangs since early high school. Thankfully, I'm really happy with them and the lady did a good job. She was really nice and from Vietnam. She talked about how much she loves Allen, then started talking about babies and asked when we were gonna have them. I said, "A few years probably" she laughed and said, "A FEW YEARS??" I responded, ok, maybe a couple years. And she said, "No No... you have baby...next year" It was quite funny. Anyways, so those cute little Asian woman always have those magical powers to make things happen, so if we wind up with a baby on the way for next year, I'm blaming her. :o) After that I headed to the grocery store and got back home all before noon! It was a busy morning! The weather today is beautiful! It's in the 80s and not humid. (yesterday we got some humidity) I can feel spring coming in the air and I love it!! I'm generaly more of a fall/winter person, but I always forget how much I enjoy spring time. Our tree in the front yard is starting to bloom and its pretty!! Hopefully we will be in full blast spring in no time!!