Thankful Thursday - Jobs

Today I am actually thankful for my job.  Which is really funny considering I have a HUGE deadline coming up and a little stressed out about it. But like my mom says, "It's job security".

For those that don't know, I am a Landscape Architect.  And no, I am not outside working, I don't do manual labor, I do not design pretty back yards, and summer is not our "busy" season.  I sit inside my air conditioned/heated building (depending on the weather obviously) and design stuff on either paper or my computer.  I've been working here for about 3 1/2 years, since I graduated from college.  It's a really good work environment.

The company I work for does a wide variety of things.  We mainly focus on recreational design which includes parks, playgrounds, spraygrounds, ball fields, community pools, and sports complexes.  We also have done lots of land planning which includes the development of Stone Canyon in Owasso, Forest Ridge in Broken Arrow, and Berwick in South Tulsa.

Check out our website to see all the fun things we have done in the past.
Planningdesigngroup.com

Here is a small group of photos of our work.  Like I said, we design it all, then we hire out contractors to build it.  Some of this is actually work I, myself, have created in my mind.

Berwick in South Tulsa

Stone Canyon in Owasso, OK

Bentley Park in Bixby, OK

THE one!!!!

Once you have already found THE One man you want to spend your entire life with, what's next?? The DRESS of course!!! And that's exactly what I found yesterday!! My mom came to Tulsa as well as Megan, Meredith, and Betty, and I had set up 4 appointments in town to search for that perfect dress.

We started off the morning with our first appointment at 10:00 at Alfred Angelo and after trying on about 5 dresses, I narrowed it down to one, but still didn't get that magical feeling. So we headed off to the second store, Alyssa's Bridal, and tried on what seemed like a dozen.  I had already pretty much figured out what style I wanted and what I thought looked the best with my body style, but honestly there aren't tons of dresses out there in that style.  But I put one on that everyone else loved, but I still just didn't feel that wow factor.  It's not that I didn't like the dress, I just didn't love it.

We headed to Subway to grab a quick lunch. All that dress shopping is exhausting.  We headed to Bridal Palace for my third appointment and didn't like it the second we stepped in.  Just a word of advice for anyone wanting to shop there, make sure you have a dress budget of more than $1000 or you won't get the best service.  I'm not the type of person to send thousands on a wedding dress and I was trying to be reasonable. But they didnt' have very good customer service and needlesstosay, I walked out of there empty handed.

Since we didn't spend much time there, we had an hour to kill till the next appointment. So we decided to head on over to store #4, Abelina's Bridal, and see if they could fit me in early.  Luckily, their 3:00 appointment cancelled so they could get me right in.  I did some browsing, and they had a limited selection, but there was one style of dress I was interested in before I came in.  They had that dress and I tried on two others.  The first dress I tried on was very similar to the one I originally liked, but the second I put it on, I couldn't stop smiling.  And I walked out of the dressing room and everyone else's face lit up.  I loved everything about it.  It was exactly what I was looking for, and I had that "moment" I had been looking for.  I reluctantly took it off and tried on the other two, but they just didn't wow me.  So I put dress #1 back on and seriously didn't want to take it off.  Then my mom started crying, then I started crying.  And that was it, I wanted that dress, I wanted to take it home with me and never take it off.

I walked out of the store with a receipt, because sadly it takes 3-4 months to get one in.  But that's just another incentive to get to my goal wedding weight!!! I have 4 months!!! I'm more motivated than ever :)

Wish I could show you all pictures, but again can't have Ricky seeing it, plus I want you all to be surprised next June :)

Quality time with Ellie Kate

Since Ricky has been gone, I have been spending a lot of time with his family and his little sister.  Last weekend Cindi and Ricky both had to work so she asked me if i wanted to sleep over and watch Ellie Saturday.  Of course I said yes, who doesn't like slumber parties haha. So I went over Friday night and Cindi made some delicious food (of course) and we spent some time in the pool.

Some of the delicious food

Burgers and tilapia and grilled veggies!

 Saturday morning I got up and the entire day we played all kinds of things.  I have never watched so many cartoons in my life haha.  But it was a  lot of fun.

Good morning! Having some toast and chocolate milk for breakfast

I asked for some food and this is what I got.  This is too much for my wedding diet haha

Then I had a spot of tea

Last night we were able to have fun again.  My parents came to town this weekend (so me and my mom could go dress shopping, but more on that in the next post) But Ricky's dad had an extra ticket to the TU/OSU football game here in Tulsa so he and my dad were going to the game.  Before the game we met up with them for dinner and then a girls party in my parent's hotel room.  The football game didn't start till 9:00 so we had some time to kill and were trying to entertain a 3 year old.  So we had dance parties, had a nail salon (Nails by Judy), and ate way too many Oreos haha.  We also braved out the thunderstorm that delayed the football game 3 hours.

All of our nails that were done by "Judy". The nail polish was Hannah Montana of course.

Judy doing her magic on Megan's nails.

Judy's wonderful manicure :) 

It was a really fun night, it's always fun to spend time with family and friends.

Thankful Thursday - FALL!!!

Today marks the beginning of my favorite all time season, FALL!!! I am so thankful every year when the weather starts to get cooler and the leaves start to change color.  It's just so beautiful and I seriously get giddy.  Like a child opening presents on Christmas morning giddy.

Reasons I love fall:

• The temperatures (especially after this brutal summer)
• The leaves turn red, yellow, and orange
• Pumpkins! The actual pumpkin as well as the smells of spices and fall
• It means Christmas is right around the corner
• Football season!
• Getting to wear sweaters and jackets
• Drinking a cup of hot coffee on a cold morning
• Carving pumpkins
• OSU Homecoming :) 
• Thanksgiving

Lord, thank you for fall.  I believe we have to endure the hot summer to truly love and enjoy the fall.  And I am thankful for it every year it comes around :) 

Ricky's Birthday Care Package

I can now officially show you all what I put into Ricky's Birthday Care Package since he finally got it.  He actually got it about a week ago, I'm just a little slow on the blog update.  Well I knew from the beginning that I wanted him to have a fun care package, especially sine he wouldn't be able to be home to celebrate.  And where is my new favorite store to buy care package items?? DOLLAR TREE!!! They have large quantity packs of candy, gum, toys, snacks, etc each for $1! I can fill up a whole box for like $15-$20 instead of the $100 I put into the first box.  Anyways, on to the box :)

Here is my decorated box. Birthday candles, cupcake scrapbook paper, and fun pictures :)

These are the fun items I put into the box.  I told him he had to send me a picture wearing the glasses and he already had palns for the silly string haha

Here is all the candy!  A lot of fun stuff that I don't typically send but hopefully he likes :)

Megan wanted to contribute to the box so she brought over this stuff to put in it. 

I really wanted to make cookies and test them out.  So I made them flat in a pan and cut them up into squares and placed them in a ziplock with a piece of bread (to help them from drying out).  He said they were pretty good.  So I call it a success for my first time sending cookies overseas.

Final boxes about to be sent out! 

I was bummed we couldn't celebrate his birthday together.  But I know we'll have LOTS of them to celebrate in the years to come!  

Lovely Little Giveaway: Personalized Hanger from Lila Frances

Check out this amazing giveaway!!! I really want one!

Lovely Little Giveaway: Personalized Hanger from Lila Frances

Labor Day 2011

Holidays are a little rough for me since Ricky can't be here to celebrate, regardless of the holiday.  For Labor Day Cindi (Ricky's mother) invited me over for some pool time and relaxation.  It's so nice to be able to spend time with his family and his little sister :)  It's so exciting that in less than 9 months I'll have a precious 4 year old sister-in-law.

This precious puppy that I really wanted to take home with me!

Ellie playing with the puppies

Margarita, pool, sunshine.....ahhhhh

You know if Cindi makes it, it's going to be all fixed up :)

Here comes Bullet!!!

Saturday marked the season opener for Cowboy football!!! It was one hot day but totally worth it.  We started tailgating by 11 AM with the temp of 96 degrees....and hardly no breeze.....But it was fun anyway.

We made the typical burgers and hotdogs for dinner and had all the fixins and of course had Eileens cookies!

We played some Phase 10

 I went over to another tailgate to see the newest addition to the family! This is little Macy Franks, a Poke fan from the very beginning :)

Trevor's awesome Hawaiian shirt

We had to take a cute picture

And then of course a picture of how we felt about all the heat and sweat.

Go Cowboys!!!

First Down and Ten!

Haha like my football reference? No, this post isn't really about football (even thought the first game of the season is tomorrow!) This post is to honor the fact that I have lost my first 10 pounds! It was quite a struggle getting started and I was getting very frustrated, but I stuck with it and kept going, reminding myself that I was making my body healthier even though the scale wasn't showing it.

I'm sticking with Weight Watchers, because that really works for me.  A couple days a week I also input my food to see how many calories I am consuming to compare them.  Eating out is still a struggle for me, but I'm working on it.  I've also been doing a wide range of workouts.  In the past couple months I've gone from DVD's at home, to kickboxing, to strength training with a group at a gym, to now bootcamp.  I think I have benefited from them all but I've seen the most results on the scale in the strength training group and bootcamp.

So here's to those 10 lbs, may I never see you again! And here's to the next 10!

Thankful Thursday - Army Wives

This week (and the past couple of months) I have been very thankful I have had the opportunity to get to know some other army wives.  Several of these women's husbands are in the same area/company as Ricky so it's beneficial.  If I haven't heard from him in awhile I'll ask one of them to see if they have heard anything.  (So yes honey, if you are reading this, I do keep tabs on you in other ways haha)

These girls are seriously so amazing.  I've mentioned before that it's a huge struggle to not have anyone around you realize what all you are going though and just how undescribable and difficult it can be at times.  Well these ladies sure get it.  Most of them have been through this 2, 3, even 4 times! Man, I simply can't imagine going through a deployment 3 more times! These ladies get it when you tell them you had a breakdown in the bathroom at work or in the middle of the grocery store, how anything and everything can set off your emotions, and how grateful you are when you get that phone call or email.  I am so so so thankful to have them in my life!

A great thing to help us all through this deployment is we have been trying to get together once or twice a month, just to chat, do something fun, and eat some food of course ha.  We've been to Discoveryland, Los Cabos (restaurant not destination), swimming, BBQ's, and the most recent was Purple Glaze followed by Shoguns.

If you have never been to Purple Glaze, you should check it out.  It's basically a place where you get to paint your own pottery.  You pick out whatever it is you would like to paint and then come back in a couple days and pick it up after it has been glazed.

I picked a large star platter that I can use in the future 

After I finished painting it.

The girls and our creations

After I got it back and it had been glazed!