T-Minus 8 Days and Counting

... And wedding ring-Check.

Kevin and I just picked it up from Zales. It is sparkley.

T-Minus 9 Days and Counting

Here's a wedding update in case anyone is interested (plus that's all I think about these days so what else would I post about).

Dress-Check

This was checked off a while ago.

Veil, Puffy Slip, Tights, Shoes, etc.-Check

I hope I haven't forgotten anything.

Place-Check

And it still has a floor as of today, I checked.

Marriage Licence-Check

Photographer-Check

Cake-Check

Best. Cake. Ever. Be excited, that's all I have to say.

Flowers-Check

Table Decorations-Almost Check

Thanks to PJ and Jen. And I have to say who cares if they're not done yet, the ones that are done are amazing enough to make up for the rest.

Tuxes-Check-ish?

Please, please come in on time and fit!

Screen-...
Moving on

Food-...

Uh oh, I have to go, um, do something.

Because I'm On Break

Hey all,
I am on Thanksgiving break, which means no work for a whole week! (And by "no work" I mean I don't have to go into work but I do have to spend the entire week running around like a madwoman catching up on work and doing as much wedding stuff as possible.) But I feel like I have time to post, though. I had set a goal to do one post a day... Ok, can I do one post a day except yesterday? So check back tomorrow. There will be pictures.

Statistician + Wedding = Bad News

Outtakes and Bloopers

Kevin and I went out and took engagement pictures today with the help of Jen and PJ. (Thanks again you two. You're fantastic.) I can't show you the good ones yet because I might use one of them for the actual invitations and it would ruin the surprise. But I can show you the ones that I'm not going to use. And it's not because they aren't fabulous ... because they are ... oh, they are.

This is how the day started.

Kevin giving me a smooch.


Kevin pretending to be a monkey.




Then Jen told us we had to be serious. So we obeyed.




That lasted until we found a golf ball and I decided that it should be in an engagement picture.




Here's Kevin looking devilishly handsome.

And me wiping dirt off my hand.

Kevin posing for anime.

And me wiping my nose. (Thanks Jen.)

Oh, and appearently Kevin found a mystery spot previously undiscovered in the Arboretum.

Wait ... are we posing for engagement pictures or secret service pictures?

By the end of the day we were pretty hot and worn out.

Me taking a little nap.

Kevin taking a little nap.

Awww! But the most important thing is that we love each other.

Um...Hi!

The guilt of not posting for over a month has gotten to me. So here it is. I don't really have a lot to report so I'm going to go back a while and tell you about my trip to Portland.

So in the end of July/begining of August Kevin and I went to Portland for his cousins wedding. It was also rather convenient that Donele lives there so we got to hang out with her. It was such a fun weekend. On Friday afternoon, when we got there, Donele took us through the gorge. Which is not an outdoor amphitheater that Dave Mathews likes to play at. That's in Seatle. This gorge was a geological gorge with lots of pretty waterfalls. Then on Friday night we went out with his cousins. For those of you who are in my family his cousins aren't like our cousins. He has 6, not 600. We had dinner then went back to the hotel and hung out in the bar. I was actually really worried about meeting his cousins but they were super nice so my worries were for nothing. On Saturday morning Donele and I went to the Saturday market. WOW! It was huge and fantastic. There were vendor stalls set up everywhere containing everything from food to homemade purses. I loved it there. Then I had to hurry back for the wedding. It was so nice. It was at a vineyard at the top of a valley. So pretty. And so hot. I forgot to mention that Portland was having record breaking temperatures while we were there (and before). So all of these activities are accompanied by buckets of sweat. Sunday morning was probably my favorite activity ... no they were all my favorite activities. On Sunday morning Kevin, Donele and I went to the largest bookstore I have ever been in. It was like from a dream, a really good dream. We actually spent about 3 hours wandering around the bookstore, and I don't know about Kevin and Donele but I didn't even see half of the store in that time. It was amazing. Plus they had used books mixed in with the new ones so if there was a book there that you wanted and they had a used copy you could get it for much cheaper. So great. I bought a few books as did Kevin. And he bought me the best reusable bag ever. It has a picture of a squirrel on it. That was our trip. Then we drove home tired and sad to be leaving.

I was so busy and so tired the whole weekend that I didn't take a lot of pictures but here is what I did get.

Here are some waterfall pictures from the gorge.

One with Kevin in front of the waterfall. Or I should say displaying the waterfall

And one with Donele in front of the waterfall.

A random but neat building at the top of a cliff.

And finally the vineyard. Technically it is the view from the vineyard, but it is pretty.

The end. More to come soon, I hope. (Like maybe some pictures of "THE WEDDING NOTEBOOK", eh, Tish.)

My Inner Tish

For the 4th of July Kevin and I were invited to his grandpa's cabin on Waitt's Lake (I think that's how you spell it). It was so beautiful, see the above picture, and just the break I needed. Plus Kevin's mom, dad and brother came up from Twin so we got to see them too.

This is his grandpa's cabin. It was super cute but small. I think there was technically only one bedroom. So Kevin's grandpa, mom and dad slept inside the cabin.


Kevin, his brother and I slept in the worlds largest tent. Seriously. Huge! It worked out nice because it was so ginormous that it actually had two rooms. So I slept in one room and Kevin and Bryan slept in the other.


Oh, and Kevin's grandpa is my hero. Once we got the tent set up he came out carrying this big bag and said "I have a blow up cot for sleeping, but of course it's for Misti because she's a woman." Love him! So this was my bed and poor Kevin and Bryan had to sleep on the cold hard ground.

Plus look at that view out my "window."


So here's the rundown of the weekend: Sleep, eat, relax, eat, swim, relax, eat, sleep ...

Ok, not quite. When we got there on Friday night Kevin, his brother and dad had to do some serious yard cleaning. They mowed the lawn, raked up a bunch of leaves, reattached the boat dock, cleaned off the outdoor tables, Bryan even painted the tables. But when they were done it looked nice and was so comfortable to hang out in. This is the table area with Kevin's mom and grandpa. Who, by the way are the best cooks ever! They cooked us all our food. Yummy!

This is the dock that we were swimming off of, with two random people sitting on the end of it. So, maybe not so random. I think it was actually their dock and we were borrowing it because Kevin's grandpas' dock had been demolished in a storm.

These were our swimmer-floaties. Ok, maybe not the funnest lake toys but they did the job. Plus they were hot pink and hot orange. Does it get better than that?

Here's my sweetie enjoying the wilderness, I think. Is he smiling?

Now the real picture of my sweetie.

Fine, he didn't read the whole time, but a good portion. He finished a whole book in two days.

The best part of the trip was the fireworks show. It turns out that a lot of people who have houses on the lake are uber-rich so we got quite a show. I'm sure it helped that we were next to an indian reservation too. Most of the docks around the lake were shooting off the big fireworks that shoot up in the sky and make that boom that shakes your heart. And each household had about 2 or 3 hundred of them (ok, exageration). We did sit out on the dock for about an hour and a half watching constant fireworks, though. So we had fireworks going off all around us and they were reflected in the lake. Basically, it was amazing. Oh, and at the end someone actually took their fireworks display out on a boat. That was even better, but it could of just been the thrill of wondering when the boat was going to catch fire.

Sunday morning I went and took a picture of the leftovers on the dock next to where we sat. Just to put it into perspective even more, these guys has a pretty pathetic stash compared to all the others.

Like I said before the weekend was brilliant and exactly the vacation I needed

A Date ... And Not The Edible Variety

Just a heads-up for those who haven't asked recently. Kevin and I have decided on Jan. 2nd for our wedding date. Good luck getting here. :) And you better be here!

I Think the Video Says it All!

So, here's some pictures of my beautiful engagement ring!



I know, it's super pretty right?!! I love it!

The End of a Nightmare

What?!! I am so not being overly dramatic in my title. It really was a nightmare. But I finally got my entertainment center sanded. These are my two new rules for sanding. First, don't just use the sandpaper that came with your sander. Go out and buy stripping sandpaper ... like 10 pakages of it. It works about 3 times faster than the stuff that came with your sander. Second, surfaces that face up are easy to sand surfaces that face down are hard to sand, but if you turn your entertainment center on its side or its top everything becomes a surface that faces up. And yes I only learned these rules 4 days ago when I was almost finished.

Anyway, here is the finished product. And by finished I mean just the sanding and I still have to stain and finish it.



Oh, and just in case you forgot what it looked liked originally, I stood up a cupboard door in front to remind you. Ok, fine I'm not done sanding yet, but I got the big part done. Come on!

Ginormous Update

Ok, so work got a little busy there for the last few weeks so I slacked on my blogging. But I did store up all the fun events that I wanted to blog about. These are the three I remember.

I take my car back to the dealership I bought it from to get my oil changed, a) because they have this deal where if I do I get free tires (which I did a few months ago) and b) because it gives me a good exuse to go to Spokane every three months. Anyway a few weekends ago Kevin and I went to Spokane to get my car serviced and just play around. We went to the mall and were walking aroung and he offered to treat me to a mani/pedi. I know, he's super! I had never had a mani or a pedi before so I agreed. It was super nice. I took pictures of my toes and fingers for all to see.

Toes:



As a side note, I started out the trip wearing cute pink mary jane's but realized it has to be a sin to cover up toes after a pedicure so I had to go to the shoe store and buy some new flip-flops. It was such a hard sacrifice.

Fingers:



So that was a fun new experience for me. By the way the manicure lasted about 4 days, but the pedicure lasted ... well ... until 2 days ago when I started gardening (see below).

Next, since Monday was Memorial day, Kevin had a day off work. So he and I decided to go down to Twin Falls and visit his family. His parents have a "cabin" by a river near Hagerman. So we all hung out there for the weekend. Here's a synopsis of the weekend: watch a movie, sleep, watch another movie, eat, watch another movie, sleep, go to bed and sleep some more, wake up, eat breakfast, watch a movie, sleep, ... I think you get the point. Anyway, it was super relaxing and a nice way to unwind after school is out. I hate to say it but I suck at taking pictures so I don't have any pictures to post of that. I'm sorry. I'm working on channneling my inner Tish.

Now, this week. The odd things outside my apartment that somewhat resembled flower gardens finally got to me.



You thought I was joking, didn't you?

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday cleaning them out (there is one on either side of my door). It was a lot of work! But I got it done. This is what they look like now.



You can't really see it but I left a rosebush in there. I hope it survives. It was barely alive because it was being choked out by all the grass and weeds. Oh, and as a side note, every muscle in my body has been aching since then.

That's all my updates for now. I will try and keep up better now that it's summer.

AAAAAARGH!

No time to post.
A week and a half left of school.
Super busy.

Believe it or Not

So I have a few things to catch up on.

First, 2 weeks ago Kevin and I went to the Emerald City Comicon. For those of you who don't speak geek that is the comic book convention that is in Seattle. It was my first comicon. It was super fun. I met an amazing artist, looked in lots of fun booths and saw a lot of super geeks dressed up in costumes (Kevin and I are so dressing up next time we go). We took lots of pictures and I'll refer you to Kevin's blog to see them. I'll just post a picture of the prints and comic books we bought from the amazing artist. Her name is Camilla d'Errico.

She also drew some quick sketches on the backs of our comics.

Second, and this is the "believe it or not" part, yesterday Kevin and I celebrated our one-year dating aniversary. I know, I couldn't believe it either! We went to Lewiston . We walked around downtown and shoped in some of the little shops, which was fun because I haven't actually been through downtown. Then we went out to dinner and a movie. First we ate at Red Lobster. I got wood-grilled salmon with rice and brocolli, oh and by the way Red Lobster serves the best brocolli ever. Kevin ordered steak and lobster, which is his favorite ever. We went and watched Dragonball Evolution, which I think just goest to show we are the perfect geek couple because we both wanted to see it. It was good. Overall it was the best one-year dating aniversary I have ever celebrated. These are the flowers that Kevin bought me, cuz he's so great!

Filler Post

It's been a while since I've posted (I did promise one a week), so I'm writting this filler post for now.
I discovered a great song through Rock Band and I thought I'd share. It is Afterlife by Avenged Sevenfold. If you watch this just take special notice when they show close-ups of the drummer or lead guitarist. They are freaking amazing!

New Project

So, here is my new project. Backstory: A while ago Kevin bought a new t.v. and it was so big that he also had to buy a new t.v. stand for it. And there sat his old one, and sat, and sat. When I moved into my new apartment I decided I wanted a new stand for my t.v. After looking around online for a while I found a bunch that I liked and a bunch that I could afford, but none that I liked and could afford. So Kevin offered me his old one and I took it. Brilliant right?! Well, almost.

Here is the color of the entertainment center.

And, here is the color of the rest of my living room furniture.

And, yes, I am at a point where I want my furniture to match as much as possible. So my solution was to sand, stain and refinish the entertainment center. So right now I am a sandin' fool and if you ever need anything sanded don't call me because it uses more arm muscle than I currently have and it tickles my arms up to my elbows.

Anyway, I will keep you all updated on my entertainment center project.

Blog Update

Ok, so I know it's been a while (and by while I mean a freaking long time) since I updated my blog. I'm sorry. But, I have now made it a goal to keep up with my posts, so expect more than one a decade from now on. I'm shooting for a post a week ... I hope. I don't really feel like a long dissertation on my life right now, though, but I promise the next one will have an update on me.

(That was my way of getting you to check back in soon. My "cliffhanger.")

The comic is a blast from my past. Ok, maybe not too distant past cuz I still find myself "marching" to music.