Family

A weekend with sister.

- Melody

1. Driving.
2/3. Dallas.
4. I got a little nostalgic. Jason and had front row seats at a Mavs game here while we were dating. I even spotted the building we parked in. 🙂 One of the best days ever.
5. Shel is the best at finding restaurants. She found this one that was featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives! Maple & Motor!
6. Ready to eat!
7. HA.
8/9. Yum!
10. Kari Jobe and All Sons & Daughters tour! Great night of worship.
11. Nightlife.

So last weekend I spent with my sister in her dormpartment near Dallas. I followed my parents down Friday night and we all helped her build shelves, rearrange furniture, hang things, and make it feel more like home. My parents drove back really late (yikes!) while I stayed back. We stayed up late eating ice cream, watching the Food Network, and yacking. Saturday night we made the 1.5 hour trip out to Grand Prairie for the Where I Find You tour. So. Great. The two of us are always reminded of why we have the calling placed on our lives to be worship leaders when we attend such worship filled concerts. I digress! We stayed up late again eating ice cream and a whoopie pie we bought at Maple & Motor. I made the three hour trip home Sunday and loved on my hubs before diving headfirst into some homework. 🙂

How was your weekend? Any of you at that concert, too?

A Family Hot Dog Day.

- Melody

A couple of weeks ago I went to town with my family to blow off steam and waste time until Jason was through playing ultimate. We sat outside on the mustard yellow plastic benches and enjoyed chili cheese dogs and fries. If you’re ever in Longview, TX sit outside on a steamy summer evening at Hotdog Express! A cute triangular building boasting some seriously outdated decor. Get the hotdog or the Polish sandwich!

PS. They only accept cash!

The day my sister moved back to Commerce for the last time.

- Melody 2 Comments

1. Early morning coffee and my mom’s homemade cinnamon rolls before we head out.
2. Cute sign on the way.
3. First stop-Goodwill!
4. Mom said, “Hey, what’s in that box?”
5. A legitimate Tiffany decanter. A donated wedding gift, no doubt. Yes, it was $8. The initials add character, don’t you think? Can’t wait to see it on Mom and Dad’s bar cart!
6. Cart full of goodies!
7. Sisters.
8. Hanging in Shel’s apartment.
9. Shel’s new roommate. Lewis!

Sorry for the photo overload! We had a packed day moving Shel back in for the last time. 🙂 Next time she comes home, she’ll be done for good! Woohoo!

My life is crazy. Part Two.

- Melody 2 Comments

Wow. This week has been crazy. Four outfits and not a single picture. Tomorrow I’m off to Commerce with the family to help my sister move into her dormpartment, which you can read about here how God fit things together for her! I’m really hoping to get those outfits posted up here next week, but I also thought that at the beginning of this week so we’ll see how this weekend goes. In other news, my entire harddrive was completely full so I transferred about 14,000 pictures to my external one and then 34 GB of music over as well. I tried uploading about 300 pictures from my camera but my version of iPhoto won’t read raw files. Flarp. So now I have tons of pictures of Pepper but can’t figure out how to get them on my computer! (Anyone know of any free programs that’ll read raw files?) Because of this, I tried to update my OS so I could update iPhoto, but since my OS is such an old version I have to buy two new OSs. But, since Apple is so mighty, I can’t just download the middleman OS for $20 from their site anymore. Oh no. I have to buy the disc from Amazon for $100 and THEN buy the newest OS from Apple for $20. Uh. No thank you. So if anyone has a Snow Leopard OS disc laying around… ahem… I’m here.

Also, I haven’t seen my husband all week. The school he works at starts back up on Monday and he has been working, literally, like a dog every day this week. Going in very early, staying really late… Plus on Mondays he leaves soon after he gets home for ultimate frisbee. That coupled with late nights for him and school for me means we are both beat and really fried by the time we actually see each other again. Which is usually as we’re getting into bed. We were hoping for a date night tonight but we both fell asleep when we got home. Then the stress of my tuition cost got to us and we’re just real… tired. So if you would, pray for us to get some alone time and give each other a break!

Thanks for still visiting here even though there hasn’t been any new content in a few days! I promise once I am rested up and refreshed after a weekend with family I’ll get back to this old blog!

The long awaited surprise…

- Melody 4 Comments

First of all, you guys are hilarious. Thanks for texting, posting, and generally being the best. It’s kind of neat to know you guys care enough to check back and see what all this hub-bub has been about. Thanks for sticking it out with me, Awkward McGee. Hope you guys are just as enamored as we are… 🙂

To say I’ve always wanted a dog is an understatement. Most all of my friends growing up had dogs. Beagles, terriers, labs, great danes… My family? We’re cat people. Always have been and always will be. Smoky, Freeway, Ally, Mittens, Buster, Sophie, Pippin, Izzy, Caroline, Penny, Ike, Rusty…

But no cat could fulfill the longing to rub my face in that fur and to scratch those velvety ears. And oh! Those sad, puppy eyes! Hearing claws tap tap tap on our wood floor before that wet nose is pressed to my hand, or to see that happy tail wag when those eyes meet mine! My heart!

We’ve talked about getting a dog since before we were married, so this decision wasn’t a light one. Plus, Jason didn’t initially like the idea of having three pets. (Like we were going to turn in to some crazy pet people. Ha!) So one day I was having a dog moment, and I launched us into the ‘Dog Talk.’ We talked about it again and decided now is as good a time as ever!

I’ve always, always wanted a golden retriever, literally since I was ten. So that’s what we looked for. And on a Tuesday evening, when I was coming really close to my wits end and starting to think it would never happen, I found her. I emailed Byron, the man who had posted the ad, and when I didn’t hear anything after waiting a whole five minutes, I called the number listed. (Type A? Who, me? Okay, yeah. Me.) I made an appointment for the next day to go down and check her out.

My drove down there and made it to the man’s house, but no one was home. My heart was pounding in my ears, my stomach was in knots. This is fake! I wasted all that gas! I didn’t even get Starbucks! Shelby talked me down and made me call the guy. I was semi-relieved when he said he’d be home soon, though I was still convinced he would show up, trap us in his house, and murder us.

When he got home, we took the plunge to walk inside armed with tasers and pepper spray. To our huge relief, there were twelve golden puppies scurrying to meet us. Look at these guys!


 Byron showed us the two girls left and Shel and I took turns holding them. As soon as I picked my girl up she licked all over my face!

Look at that hilariously goofy grin. The goofy grin of a girl in love, I tell ya!

I was so overwhelmed with emotion that I wanted to walk out with her right then and there. He snapped that snazzy green collar on her though and told me to wait.

Wait we did, and today we went back to finally bring her home. Pepper!

I’ll be posting a “day of” post next week along with several photo dumps/fawning posts. I can’t get enough of her!

And that is the end of my very long blog post full of italics and parentheses overuse. 🙂
 
 

The one that birthed me.

- Melody

Yesterday was my dear mother’s birthday. I spent the night Sunday so I could spend all day with my parents, since they both had the day off, and sisters. And like my dad would say, “It’s like olden times!” Sweet mama hasn’t aged a bit! She’s sweet, funny, wheezy, and crazy just like all of us girls she birthed. She’s an incredibly talented artist, an amazing cook, a serious baker, and a one-in-a-million mom. She raised us to be smart, goofy, hilarious, domestic women. Paired with my dad they made the best duo in the history of marriage. I see myself turning into her more and more every day. And I like it.

I love you, Ma! Here’s to a bajillion more years.