Rant for the Day

So I'm driving to work today and a certain news station (which will not be named here) comes on the radio with an "ad" for two stories they'll be covering tonight. The two stories they decided to share were: Why you shouldn't take second helpings on Thanksgiving and Is Facebook envy affecting your happiness. This got me to thinking. My first though being "Really?! That's what the news is covering now?"

 

I have to say I've gotten into the habit of avoiding reading the news because it's either really depressing or the most ridiculous news ever. I'm sorry, but I don't want to hear about my neighbors being shot in the middle of the night and then hear about how Facebook Envy could affect my happiness.

 

Why don't we cover advances in science and medicine, I see tons of posts going around about people who are dying from cancer or who aren't catching things quick enough. I hear the tests for early detection are beyond being even kind of affordable, but why? Why make it harder to live healthier?

 

Or how about we try and restore some faith in humanity and cover more topics of people who are helping out and making it more public as to where you can go to help out, Thanksgiving is coming up, the time to be thankful for what you have (that's NOT materialistic) and to spread that.

 

People should not HAVE to post this:

We should make it more public instead of having a 5 min segment between the depressing and joke news.

 

If you want to know where to help more this holiday season you can follow any of these links:

 

Help The Homeless

 

The Food Bank

 

And help our furry friends and the Humane Society

 

 

Thanks for listening and for any help you do give!

Luck ain't got nothin' on my man

Let me tell you something, Larry is a lucky, lucky man! It's a little like this:

Ha ha, but no seriously. He's told me throughout our whole relationship that he's lucky. Anytime he waits until the last minute to buy the next big thing (if he was ever into the next big thing), or anything along those lines, I'd tell him he better hope he finds it in time, his response is something like "I don't need hope, I'm lucky!" To which I respond with an eye roll and a "yeah, whatever."

It took me a long time to see it, but it's true. The latest proof: Larry works at a job (OMG I know), and for about two years now we've known that job was going away. You see, CVS bought out his company and was slowly eliminating all the departments (since there aren't really any CVS pharmacies out here). Luckily they were offering this pretty nice severance package to those that waited till the end. Me, being a planner and knowing Larry's skills, experience, and education, figured it wouldn't take him long to find a new job and was okay with him waiting till the end. He, however, just said he'd find something with no worries because he's lucky. This brings us to almost two weeks ago when CVS reps came in and said they loved Larry so much they just had to have him on his team. They offered him a job right on the spot to their offices in Chicago, Larry told them we weren't interested in relocating to Chicago, so they told him they'd make it a stay at home job! They are giving him a raise and offering bonuses and everything! So now, starting Jan 1, he officially has a new job, no "job hunting" required and starting sometime in March he'll be doing it from our office here. I mean, this job is almost too-good-to-be-true, but it is! I'm not sure how he does it, I swear he has some sort of magic charisma that works on everyone! I just hope to ride his lucky coattails the rest of my life ;) ha ha

So congratulations to Larry, my babe, the hubs! You done well and I'm so happy for you!
For those wondering (because this has come up) this does NOT affect any baby plans.

Another Wedding to Celebrate

So this past weekend I got to fly into Indiana to celebrate my sister, Ariel's, wedding day. Well really it was her reception, they did the actual wedding part on the 1st of November and, as much as I REALLY wanted to be there for both I could only go out there for one and we decided the reception would be better. It was really pretty the way we got the church decorated; I wish I had real pictures to post of it, but I got caught up on the fun of it that I only have "getting ready" pictures of the church so they aren't as special, but I figure pictures of them were cuter ;)

It was a lot of fun meeting a whole bunch of new "bonus" family members. I swear each year my family gets bigger and bigger, but I'm not complaining one bit.

Some of these pictures are from their engagements and the others are from the temple on the 1st, but it gives you a good gyst of what they look like together. He's so sweet with her, he basically worships the ground she walks on and she is so cute all bride-y. She definitely soaked up the celebrations for them and she looked so pretty in her dress. They definitely work well together and I'm happy to have a new brother-in-law.

I realized this will have been the 6th wedding I was a part of or went to (or was in) in a, like, 15 month period...whew! I'm tuckered out!

So Congratulations to the newlyweds! I hope the transition to the next phase of life goes smoothly for you guys and I'm so happy I could be a part of part of your big day (no that wasn't a typo).

Halloween Post

So I have to say, this year I was REALLY pumped to celebrate Halloween (I think this is a big step in healing!), I made plans a month in advance as to when Larry and I would go get costumes and a pumpkin. I went around stores in late September to look at decorations I wanted, took tons of pictures of all of it, had a craft night planned with Jena to do Halloween crafts and even started making a Pinterest board for Halloween stuff. After seeing how one of our neighbors dressed their doorway up:

You can't tell me that's not cute.
The banner says "Happy Haunting"

I thought I could do something like that, I was SO ready for it this year! And then somewhere along the lines I somehow missed all of it and ran out of time, or something. The furthest I could go with Halloween this year was pathetic:

Pumpkin for work
Soap dispenser for home
Aside from painted nails, this was seriously all I did.

Let's just say when your parents do their house like this:

You suddenly have these high standards for your own. The problem of it all was we planned everything for after our trip and by that time we were so done spending money that we really didn't want to do more of it. I did get my craft night with Jena, but I wasn't able to finish everything so I figured I'd finish it this year and put it up next year (I'm already starting to get ideas for next year).

The good of all this, however, is that I still got to do my favorite part: Watching scary movies while cuddled up to the hubby and handing out candy to Trick-Or-Treaters! So while this year was a bit of a letdown, hopefully I can make up for it next year (or for Christmas!!! Ha ha).

Oh and guess what (I can't believe I forgot to mention this already), but my sister, Ariel, got married! I can't believe it! But I'm so excited for them, and now this week I get to fly out to Indiana to help celebrate at her reception. I'll try and bring back lots of pics! Happy Holidays everyone (Yes, we're already there this year!).

Vacation Pics

I know, I know-took me long enough to post them, but in an effort to catch up here are vaca pics :)

 

These are from The Bahamas part of the trip:

 

The ultimate picture of bliss!

The only good part of this timeshare was the lady took our picture at the Marina

We were told these hut boats sell drinks and snacks at the sandbar when the water is low

Sunset from the ship

All above are from the ship

All these are from the Glass Bottom Boat Tour

Above is from the beach

 

Our drive from Ft. Lauderdale to Orlando was crazy foggy for some reason:

 

And here's from Disney world:


Lines left us with extra time

Magic Kingdom

Epcot

It was the International Food and Wine Festival time

This is entirely made form chocolate. I told Larry if I got
One Christmas wish it was that I wanted this one!

This was the Italy part of the Food & Wine Festival.
I just thought it was really cool to pretend we were this close :)

Hollywood Studios

This was the worst "ride"
If you go, don't do this one!

At Fantasmic. I love Little Mermaid

Fantasmic (couldn't get too many good pics or video)

How we ended each day while waiting for the shuttle :)

Larry just let his hair be the whole trip haha

Animal Kingdom

They had a petting zoo at Animal Kingdom

Best Action shot huh? It was accidental (this was after they put food down)

It was a really fun trip!! :)