Three's Company.....

There is much to blog about, but I think most everyone is most interested in the new addition to our family-Manny.

Our new black and tan Aussie mix is our new pride and joy. We adopted Manny from the Bainbridge Humane Society. Bainbridge was the third shelter I went to, and when I walked in and saw that little sad face and wagging tail, I knew Manny was our guy. (BTW, Jeremie had originally found a picture of him online, which led me to Bainbridge......I know J will point out that HE found Manny.)

Here is our Little Buddy.



Since Jeremie was on call the day I went Puppy Shopping, he gave me specific criteria to follow with picking out a new pooch. NO shedder, NO "yappy" dog, and NOTHING with the name "chihuahua" or "pit bull". A short "interview with Manny proved that he was a little shy, loved belly rubs, and licking your face. I loaded him up, picked up all things puppy at Wal-Mart, and took him home to his new daddy.

Manny already loved his new home and was "marking his territory" everywhere. Much to our pleasure, none of this marking happened in the house.....

That evening we had dinner at a friends house who have 2 much larger dogs, but they all got along great and by the end of the night, Manny was making him self at home sitting on THEIR dog's beds and eating their dogs food.....

We went bed in complete bliss that we had landed a no barking, no shedding, a good socialite dog. THEN....squealing, barking, whining, crying, and every imaginable noise a dog can make emanated from Manny's crate. He was going nuts. Not knowing how long this would last, my only thought was "this was a big mistake." The good news is that Manny's fit didn't last long and he is now sleeping quietly.

Jeremie absolutely loves his little buddy. Jeremie has actual conversations with him, they go on long walks in the woods together, and even cuddle a little. (Should I be worried?)

I tell Jeremie that the reason he loves Manny so much is that he's just like me, in a dog form: We love to eat, sleep, cuddle, and get lots of attention. We'll keep you all posted on our child often....

Things Got a Little Squirrely.....

This was an email to Meg and Mary, but they got such a kick out of it, they insisted I post it. Pretty good story from a couple weekends ago:

J found a baby squirrel in our wood pile Friday night before our guests arrived. He’s pumped. (Actually, I think he was just trying to get me pumped, b/c a few minutes later he told me he broke a piece of my Vietri china.) He puts the squirrel in a box with a towel and puts the box on the dinner table. That’s right, rodent on the dinner table. Jenn and Bart cautiously asked if we were having roasted squirrel.

Anyway, after dinner, J and Bart decide they want to rig up a pen for the squirrel to play in. So they get our mesh net hamper turn it upside down and DUCK TAPE it to the box. Everyone knows a squirrel can chew through mesh, but the boys didn’t listen to me and Jenn.

The new pen is put in our bedroom. Later, the boys go in there to give him some milk and cut a “trap door” (sounds so McGuyver) and low and behold, Houdini, (what we named the squirrel afterwards) had disappeared. So they shut the door to the bedroom and we hear banging and running like a bull in a china cabinet. Just like the Chevy Chase movie. They are successful and catch the squirrel. Scared the poop out of it. Literally.

Like boys that haven’t learned their lesson, they put him BACK in the box, but reinforce it with more duck tape. Before we all go to bed, we check on Houdini, and as J is looking for him, I see the little rodent run across my closet!!! J pushes me out of the bedroom, shuts the door, and him and Bart go to work again. Successful. (I’m gonna really see how good he is in a greased pig contest one day.) Jenn and I are cracking up.

The boys are disappointed with their rigged up pen and go downstairs. We hear more banging and drilling. They come back with one of my nice blue storage tubs that now has drilled “airholes” in it and a real “trap door”. Houdini is now challenged.

Houdini is also nocturnal. In the middle of the night, I wake up to LOUD scratching, and squirrel barking, if you will. I was ticked, and very afraid that J’s rigged storage tub would not be successful and I was going to wake up to a squirrel in my pajamas later in the evening. Luckily he didn’t get out.

Not so luckily, Houdini didn’t make it through the weekend. We don’t know if he was sick already or what, but bottom line is J and I already killed our first pet.

Don’t think we’re ready for kids.

A Very MARRIED Christmas

Christmas season as newlyweds has been so much fun for us! I LOVE Christmas and couldn't wait to get all my stuff out to decorate. Of course, the first adornment had to be the tree. Which MUST be real. Jeremie believes fake Christmas trees are a sin. So we headed to a plant nursery here in town, where we strategically chose our first tree, I stole some branches for decorating, and off we were, just like Chevy Chase with it tied to the truck.

The living area of our new place is actually on the 2nd floor, so the two of us lugging a very full 7 foot Frasier Fur up the stairs was quite entertaining. I decorated, and Jeremie watched, informing me of places I missed, that looked like they needed an ornament. : ) He actually got in the Christmas spirit and decorated the balcony while giving me a great rendition of Jingle Bell Rock. Here is our work of art.




And here is Jeremie in the Christmas Spirit.



Not really sure where he got the idea to pair a Cabana hat with a Wyatt Earp scarf. He always keeps me entertained.


Jeremie's parents also visited in December, just in time for the Victorian Christmas Night in Thomasville, which is a really charming town about 30 minutes from here. Now these people love Christmas. They shut down the entire downtown and have carriage rides, a live nativity, carolers, fake snow, and of course, lots of food. We had a blast.



BTW, this was the Snow Princess in the rug shop in town.....I hope she's ready to relinquish her place on top of the Rug Mountain, because I think I want to be the Snow Princess next year......beware honey....





The next day we took them to the Tallahassee Car Museum, which should really be called the Hobby Museum, because they had a collection of every topic you'd ever imagine. It was so cool. There was everything from the first Model T off the assembly line to the Batman car used in one of the movies. It was like stepping back in time, literally; they even had a car like the one from Back to the Future!! We had a great time. It was great to have Cate and Mitch at our new home!




Christmas came around quickly, and we headed back to MS. We were able to spend lots of time with our families: breakfast in pajamas at Jeremie's grandparent's and traditional lunch with my family at Grammy and Big Jack's. The next night we had my mom's second annual "Souper Saturday" where I got to see my dad's side of the family. (And load up on about 7 different types of soups..hey, it's Christmas.)

The holidays makes us thankful for our loving families, good health, and God's grace. He's been so good to us, and we look forward to what he leads us to in the new year.

Thanksgiving Menu: Roasted Rebels and Golden Eggs

In the nick of time, we started moving into our new place on a Saturday and left to go home for Thanksgiving on Wednesday night. I would hardly call it "moving", more like "dumping". With twice the stuff, and half the help, moving was quite exhausting. We did con some friends of ours, the Christmas family, to help. We promised them food. Works every time. Don't know what we would've done without them.

Anyway, we managed to scramble up enough clean clothes to visit our families, who hosted the first cooked meal we'd had on real plates in a week. Very nice. I was GREAT to see our families and be back home for a few days.

With our new head coach (Dan the Man), and over-rated Ole Miss season, there was no way we were going to miss the Egg Bowl, clean clothes or not, so we squeezed in a quick trip to Starkville. Mom and Dad joined, which was a lot of fun.

If anyone missed it, the Dawgs MAN HANDLED the Rebels in a 41-27 victory. It was awesome. The cowbells thundered as Mullen assured everyone which " only Mississippi team on the rise" is. We loved it. Go Dawgs.

Hectic, but Happy

Since my last post, we've had quite some changes take place!!!! We went into November fully expecting own our first home for the holidays. To make a long story short, the house we were going to buy fell through, leaving us ONE WEEK to find a new place to live and move. (Someone already had our apartment rented immediately after our lease expired in November.)

This of course caused a famous emotional breakdown, which just happened to occur over a dinner of roast and potatoes. After I burst into tears, Jeremie gave me the reassuring: "the foods really good, honey" look. I assured him I knew the food was good, but I was just frustrated and didn't feel like starting all over again looking for somewhere to live. But we didn't have a choice, so the next day we reluctantly (and bitterly might I add) started looking for rental homes. We refused to live in another apartment; we enjoy the outdoors too much! Jeremie and I rode around town that Saturday rolling in self pity that we had to house hunt again. We were tired, disappointed, and most of all, very grumpy. We were not unhappy with each other, just the situation. (Later, we reminded ourselves that a house is a material thing, we should be counting our blessings, instead of whining...)

Later in the week, we found a couple possibilities, and for the mere fact that we wanted to go home for Thankgiving (which would require us to move that weekend) we decided to settle for a house in the middle of town, and sign a six month lease until we figured out what step to take next. It wasn't our optimal choice, but the alternative was homelessness! Time was ticking away, and we only had a few more days to find something and move. On Thursday, during another close-to-emotional-breakdown at work, I stopped what I was doing, told God I couldn't worry about it anymore, and asked him to just take care of it. About 30 minutes later, a work friend of mine called and we got to talking about our house situation. He told me he had something in mind for us, and said he'd call me back in a few minutes. Next thing I knew, Jeremie was heading out to meet him and the owner of the possible rental. This is what he found us:


Needless to say, we were pretty darn excited. The cabin is on a man's property who owns about 400 surrounding acres. There is a pond, live oaks, and according to Jeremie, most importantly, a "Man Cave" downstairs. We felt relieved and BLESSED. Jeremie pointed out that the situation should remind us of how out of control we are, and how in control God is!

We love being out in the country and having so much room to "play". The picture above is before we moved in, so I have "re-decorated". We like to call it "Lodge Wells"......

In the Mix......

With a few random items, this will be a mixture of a post.

A few weeks ago, we headed to "God's Country" AKA Starkville, for Homecoming. It just happened to be our 5 month anniversary, so it was very strange being back on campus for the first time since the wedding. Passing by the chapel almost brought tears to my eyes. J and I took some time to walk around campus a little while and eat some yummy cookies a the Bakery.

Gameday was actually very chilly and muddy as it had rained the night before. But you can't keep a real Bulldog away; we still set up our tent and tailgated as usual. Between Meg, Mary, Amy and I, of course we didn't go hungry! We had a great time and it was awesome to see our friends.




On a different note, life here in Tally is great. The more we are here, the more we love it. We've met some great friends, found an awesome church, and are also part of a small group that is studying a book called "The Reason for God." It is really great and is opening our eyes to how important is to share our faith with others,the power of prayer, and an awareness of others' needs. The group makes us feel like family, and is really helping us grow.

Tally is a neat town in the fact that it's the capital, but has a small town feel as well. People are very friendly and welcoming. The old live oaks are a beautiful back drop, and if you drive just a few miles out, you're in the country. I was headed to a land auction the other day, and had to stop the car to let these ALBINO deer cross the road. It was crazy!






That being said, we do miss our friends and family very much, so feel free to visit!!!!

Bigger is Better

Whew! I am majorly behind on my posts! Between our jobs, trying to buy a house, and life in general, we've been pretty busy. Work and home buying negotiation wouldn't make for the most excited blog, so I'm devoting this blog to my sweet husband, and all you men out there who really think Bigger is Better.

Since being married, I've noticed that my husband has a "liking" if you will, for oversized stuff.

We'll start with our latest purchase, Jeremie's dream TV. Granted he's researched for a year about what kind he wanted, he finally announced one day after church that we should head to Best Buy to make the "investment". After I quizzed him if he had prayed about this, or if it just had to do a little bit with the start of college football the upcoming weekend, he assured me that he'd saved up and waited long enough. So with a twinkle in his eye like a little kid on Christmas, we bought the Big Boy. Jeremie was literally singing a little chant as we loaded it up in the truck. I have to say, I've now become ADDICTED to HD. We spent about 3 days switching it quickly back and forth from Regular to HD, and you'd think the TV had pulled a rabbit out of a hat, you should have heard the OOOOO'SSSS and AHHHH'SSS. Take a look at the difference.




Jeremie also has a regular laptop, and also a computer that he takes to clients to show them their product, all for an easier viewing experience. : ) Granted, it is nice to watch stuff on, but still cracks me up at what men can come up with.



And last but not least, what I would think is one of Jeremie's HIGHLIGHTS of the year, (besides getting married, ofcourse) is the unveiling of MSU's Jumbotron, which I like to call the TV in the Sky. Of course, since Ole Miss was building one too, we had to make our just a few feet bigger. Ha. It's pretty awesome and sometimes I find myself watching it instead of the field.


My last manly salute to my hubby is from a few weeks ago, when we went to Mississippi. The house we are hoping to buy has a little over an acre, therefore, lots of mowing to do. Jeremie's dad graciously donated their old riding lawnmower to the cause, and J would have nothing else but to go back through Richton on the way back to Tally to pick up his new toy. We arrived in Tally around 9:30 p.m. Not wanting to leave it out on the trailer, J fired it up and drove it off the trailer and THROUGH our apartment parking lot into the storage garage. Note, we pretty much live in the middle of town; it was hilarious. I'm sure our neighbors wondered what the heck was going on and appreciate the loud noise. Judging by the grin on his face, J was already happy with his new man toy.