In case you were missing me....

This weekend I am off to Portland, where I will, in no particular order:

*Accomplish AT LEAST one thing on The List

*Love on my husband

*See planes, trains, AND automobiles

*Have important educational related meetings

*Giggle like a kid, and possibly embarrass Sean by dancing in public

*Enjoy myself IMMENSELY!

I'll be back Sunday night, with a mound of pictures and words to entertain you with. Have a lovely weekend!

I'll miss you too :)

This makes me happy

I love them!

A tour of the casa (a.k.a. For Grace)

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to our home!

When you walk into the door, this is what you will see:

Turn to your right, and you enter the living room:

The view from the couch:

We have a million books...

Now, continue past the fireplace....

Turn right from the hallway, and enter the guest bedroom (currently a work in progress!):

This room is also known as "the room that holds Stephanie's wardrobe." This is my closet for all of my shoes (husband is building me shelves!), the one next to it holds the clothes!


Leave this room, continue down the hall, and on the left you shall find:

The Really Old Retro Bathroom!


I promise, we have removed the plaid... but the counters are purple and the floors are blue. The walls are peach. It's LOVELY! Look for updates next summer!

Continue down the hall, and to the right you will find our bedroom:



We have a giant bedroom set, and it takes up pretty much the whole room! But it's still nice... note Sean's Batman Easter Basket. It holds spare change when it's on hiatus from it's springtime duty :)

Now, head back down the hall towards the living room, and on your left you will find the dining room (of Thanksgiving fame):


That leads the way into our small, but fantastic kitchen:

This was before we put our stuff away... it's cuter now :)

And now, to the back yard!

The patio and shed (aka future home of my hot tub):

The planter boxes where I will learn to garden:



And our (rather blurry) apple tree:



And THAT, friends, is our house!

Disclaimer: We also have an office, but it's full of half empty boxes, and no one wants to put pictures of their messy house on their blog. So you'll have to check it out on your next visit :)

Why my co-workers refuse to visit my snazzy new house....

So, we're haunted.

It's true. You may think "yeah right, that's crazy talk," but I tell you what. Things are happening.

I have decided that I'm gonna start documenting the "incidents," so that we can keep all of our events straight. Also so that you know what to tell the authorites if we ever go missing.

So far....

-On occasion, when I walk down our hallway, when I get to a certain spot near the bathroom door, I hear the door from the kitchen to the garage slam. That door is dead bolted. This has happened approx. 6 times.

-Sean was sitting on the couch one day, listening to music, and distinctly heard a voice say "Hey" but he was the only one home. He checked. With his handgun.

-Sean was in the shower and saw a shadow pass across the shower curtain, and then something tugged on the curtain. He called me at work to tell me we were officially haunted.

-That night, we were talking in the living room, and I saw someone walk behind my reflection in the window. Sean was standing in front of me, and was not in the reflection.

-I walked into our guest bedroom, and was overwhelmed by the smell of cigarette smoke. We don't smoke, and the room has never smelled like smoke, before or since, with the exception of that one time.

-Last week, I was getting ready for work, and Sean asked me if I was humming. Nope, I don't hum. But apparently someone who lives in our house does....

-The night before Thanksgiving, I painted our hallway and dining room (pictures to come!). I rinsed the paint roller in the bathroom sink and left it there to dry over night. The next morning we get up, make breakfast, walk past the bathroom many many times, no issues. 10 minutes later I go to take a shower, and the paint roller has been rolled up the side of the sink (leaving a distinct paint trail), there is no paint anywhere on the counter, but then the roller has gone across the bathroom floor and into our (hardwood) hallway. There is paint EVERYWHERE, and it was semi-dry. That was super awesome.

-Finally, last night. We are sitting in our living room, watching TV, when we both turn towards the Christmas tree because there is a black... cloud? Orb? floating towards, and then through, the middle of the tree. The ornaments were swaying, as though someone had bumped them, except it was only the ornaments in the spot the "cloud" went through. The rest of the ornaments were not moving at all.


So... here we are. Apparently we're sharing our home with someone else.... Awesome. They're not even paying rent.

Stay tuned for updates!

A Nack Thanksgiving

This year, with it being our first Thanksgiving in the new house, I wanted to go all out and make Thanksgiving dinner. Sean's not a huge fan of turkey, and I hadn't used the new stove yet, but we decided we were gonna go for it!

Tada! Thanksgiving Dinner!

I used a brine recipe I got from my boss, the turkey was delicious, and so easy to do! It was small, perfect for just Sean and I (and our ghost, but that's another post....). Add some stuffing, mashed potatoes (which were terrible), corn, and rolls, and we had a small but wonderful dinner together.


Our meal was finished off with some delicious pies (thanks Dad and Becky!), and my parents, Jace Face, and my aunt and uncle came over. Good times!

All in all, our Thanksgiving experiment turned out really well, but we've decided from here on out, since Sean still isn't a turkey lover (though he did say it was the best he's had), we will be having Thanksgiving Tacos. Or steaks. Probably Tacos :) We also want to start a Nack family tradition of going somewhere to help volunteer on Thanksgiving Day. Excellent idea babe!

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, I feel so blessed to have been able to spend today with Sean and my family. It has been a crazy year, but I have so much to be thankful for and they mean the world to me!

And now, without further ado, CHRISTMAS!!! :) Hoorah!

Twilight, aka The Shiny Vampire Movie

Ok, Twilight...

I asked Sean to go with me, because he teases me mercilessly about my young adult "shiny vampire" books. :) I told him I would be more open to criticism once he had a knowledge base, so he was a trooper and went.

All in all, it wasn't a bad movie. Glowing review, right? But that's how I felt about the book when I read it. Not bad, not amazing, just not bad. I didn't really get what all the fuss was about. I firmly believe all the excellent stuff is to come, and I LOVE the series now.

I appreciate that the movie stayed so true to the book, though it seemed to have a really brisk pace and I felt like a lot of the backstory was left undeveloped. But the acting was great, the casting was RIGHT ON, and I love Edward a little more now. Still Team Jacob all the way, but Edward won me over.

I'm definitely excited for the next one, I think it will be a lot easier to be excited as the plot thickens! And even though he was trying to hide his hysterics half the time, even Sean didn't hate it. He was disappointed the "shiny" turned more into "sparkly" though...... :)

25 Things To Do Before I Turn 26

Ladies and Gentlemen, The List:
Items in red have been accomplished, click on the number to see a recap!

1. Plant tulips along the front of our house
2. Make my running schedule habit
3. Spend an evening out with my brother
4. Get Christmas cards out before Dec 15th!
5. Plant strawberries in our planter boxes
6. Read Jane Austin
7. See a Broadway Across America show in Portland
8. Go to Zoo Lights
9. Get our recipe book organized
10. Run the Eugene Marathon
11. Read our entire 1st bookcase
12. Become one of the top 10 loan officers in the CU
13. Organize the photos on our computer
14. Find an occasion to wear my little black dress
15. Get a new stamp in my passport
16. Go to the beach
17. Attend Yoga 3 times in one week
18. Take a day off, all for me
19. Start working on my bachelors
20. Establish Fancy Fridays
21. Learn one new recipe a month
22. Go to the airport and watch planes
23. Do my wedding memory book
24. Take a vacation with Sean
25. Buy a lemon tree