New Car

I picked out and drove home my new car yesterday! It's a beautiful 2007 white Volvo XC90. It has the V8 so it's pretty fast, which Brian was really excited about. I'm having satellite radio added next week. I decided I could do without the $3k navigation system, but really needed the satellite radio. (I have such simple needs. HaHa!) I'll post some pictures of me by my car this weekend. I felt so grown up. I went to the dealer and picked it out by myself. I had to call Dad once to make sure the price was OK, but I thought I handled the whole thing very nicely, in my humble opinion.
Kelsey & Matt came over to watch Thank you for Smoking last night. What a funny movie! If you like silly (and a bit offensive) movies I highly recommend it. It was fun to have movie night. Brian is always wanting to do it, but somehow it seems hard to find the time.
Our house is still a disaster after bringing home all our Christmas presents! I know what we're doing this weekend! HaHa! I'm hoping Brian will be inspired to use our new leaf blower and get some of the leaves out of the front yard. We just raked and cleaned them all up two weeks ago, but they're back like the plague in the front yard. The back still looks great, though.
I have to decide what to do for dinner tonight. I wish I could start planning my meals out the weekend before so that I would know exactly what I need at the store and not have to worry about dinner all week, but that's just really hard to do. I'm organized, but not that organized!
I had to go to Premier this morning because my gym is closed all week! I couldn't believe it could close for a whole week, but it did. It was fun to see Kels at the gym, and I was thrilled to get a good run in. It had been a week! However, I did manage to lose my new car in the gym's parking lot! I felt like such an idiot; I have to pay more attention! It took an extra ten minutes, but I did find it and was soon on my way home. Whhoooo...it felt a bit like an old person moment, but I'll attribute it to being sleepy! :)
Overall...a very good few days coming off of our Christmastime high!

Christmas 2006!

We're back home from our Christmas celebrations with family and friends. What a wonderful weekend! It was so fun to get to see the Skarbeks even though it was for such a short time. Dan beat us to Houston even though he had a gig the night before. I couldn't believe it! Janet has an awful sciatica nerve problem and was in a lot of pain. She was a trouper though and seemed to have a great time anyway. Ron was super dad and husband taking care of all the Christmas shopping and meals for the family. Brian and I opened lots of awesome gifts, but I think Brian's favorite was the super-powerful leaf blower! He can't wait for next fall now that he's prepared! We enjoyed good food and good times in Houston! Thanks for everything guys!



We headed to Rockwall on Sunday and got there just in time to make it to the candlelight Christmas Eve service at the Methodist Church in Rockwall. It was a pretty service and we got to visit the church for the first time. Kelsey and I opened our customary Christmas Eve pajamas and Dad read the Christmas story complete with swaddling clothes and all! We opened presents the next morning, which took a long time! Mom was worried we didn't have enough gifts since she hadn't been able to do much shopping, but she was wrong! We had more then enough and everyone was really excited about their loot! HaHa! The Skarbeks sent a gift with Brian and I for the six of us to open together. They gave us personalized yellow slickers for all our boating adventures! It was the most thoughtful and entertaining gift! Everyone looked so cute!

The family in our slickers!

Sorry we're so blurry and dark! I'm hoping Mom has a better picture of all of us.

The McCords and Mike Reid came over for Christmas dinner that afternoon and stayed to play a few games of Mexican Train. Somewhere in there the Cowboys lost an ugly, ugly game to the Eagles, but we tried not to dwell on that one! Later we played Apples to Apples and Kelsey beat the heck out of all of us! But Nana was happy to learn the game, and boy, does she love to play games! We had to go home today and resume normal life....but I have awesome memories from a fabulous Christmas 2006!

Just Getting Started

Well, I thought I would get started in the blogging world. I've never done this before, and I'm not sure how long I will keep it up, but I have to start somewhere.

Yesterday was Dad's 51st birthday! We've spent his last few birthdays in the Caribbean, but this year we were all home in Dallas. We decided to take Dad to Nick & Sam's for dinner. Mom and Dad came in from Rockwall and Matt & Kelsey met Brian and me over at our place so we could ride together. What a wonderful dinner! The food was awesome, but the company was even better. We have such a good time when we're all together. It just amazes me that we get along so well and have so much to talk about! We can talk for hours and never seem to run out of things to say. I'm truly blessed to have such a close and fun family! Dad enjoyed his birthday and even got some cool presents out of it; all wine related, which was cool since wine seems to be one of his favorite hobbies these days.

We're going to the Mavs/Clippers game with M&K tonight. Then we're off to Houston for a quick Christmas with Brian's family before we return to Rockwall for Christmas Day with my family. We have two days off of work so we get four days to celebrate! I'm so excited! We're really looking forward to seeing everyone and being with all our family for Christmas. It would be better if Bill and Katie and the boys could be there, but Bill's improving slowly and we should have him back in shape and ready for a visit by Easter! Let's pray that's the case.

Merry Christmas!!