Christmas! :)

We had a wonderful Christmas, how about you? We went to Midnight Mass with my dad and sister on Christmas Eve and they spent the night with us. We had breakfast Christmas morning and then opened our presents to each other. I like to record everything we got/gave each year so I can remember it in the future so feel free to skip over this part! :) We gave Dad a bluray player, Road House on bluray, an electric skillet and his Mom present was a LED worklight (we have a present for everyone that is something Mom would have gotten us and we open those at her grave when we get back to our hometown). My sister A got Dad a nice flashlight, screw driver set and something else I can't remember now. We got A a bluray player, a subscription to Glamour (one year) and Shape (three year), a pajama set & a gift card to Panera. Dad got A a Chi hair iron, a calendar with photos of the family and a gift card to Walmart (Dad gives us money and we buy his presents for him so he doesn't have to stress & we love buying presents so it's win/win). A's mom present was a Crockpot cookbook and the ability to take one of Mom's crockpots back to her apartment. A gave DH two dvds he'd been wanting (Once and Jose & the Pussycats). Dad gave him a beer making kit refill, two PS3 games (Madden, Ratchet & Clank and the dvd series The Middleman. I gave DH the PS3 game Uncharted 2 and the Lost Season 5 Bluray Orientation Kit. DH's Mom present was a Chuckless Drill he'd been wanting and he got a gift card to Red Robin (his favorite restaurant). A gave me an AMAZING Krups Expresso maker that I LOVE. DH got me the Wii Fit Plus, a cute Christmas coffee mug from Starbucks, soft socks & a cast iron skillet as my Mom present. Dad got me Reebok Easy Tone shoes, Pyrex pie pans and a Pyrex baking set. Santa brought DH & me Rock Band for the PS3 and Rock Band Country edition. :) I also got a Starbucks gift card in my stocking and we all had Scratchers tickets in our stockings. :)

After opening presents we headed home to open presents on Mom's grave and then headed to Dad's brother's house for his Christmas party with my awesome cousin K. We were late getting to it due to the icy road (we had a WHITE CHRISTMAS, YAY!!!).

We had a light lunch there, played some Bingo and did the Chinese gift exchange. They have a girl gift exchange and a boy one. I got a gift card to Hobby Lobby and DH got a gift card to Lowe's. Fun stuff! :) We also went downstairs to K's "apartment" to exchange presents with her.
She got us a foot massager and some candy she'd made. We gave her a gift subscription to Glamour and to Shape and a new all-in-one printer. :) My other cousin L also gave us a card that had the movie Miracle on 34th Street in it! :) So sweet! After that we headed to DH's parents' house to do dinner and our gift exchange with them. :) My MIL is one AMAZING cook so we definitely ate well there! ;) We gave them a Bluray player, a Wii game with an extra controller in it (they only had one between the two of them before) and some nice new oven mitts (my MIL's had holes in them and I almost burned myself with them!). We also got them a digital weather station but forgot to bring it so we'll have to bring it next time we go! They gave us a Shamwow, a Snuggie, a handsfree can opener, a bag sealer, a tape measure/level and a Walmart gift card. We also watched 27 Dresses on their new Bluray after the gift exchange. Fun stuff. :)

Sunday we had Christmas with my Mom's side of the family at my uncle T's house. My awesome aunt P & cousin J from TX were there and we never get to see them so that was awesome. :) We got my grandma a huge picture collage frame & a gift card to Walmart to get her photos developed (the family all got together and got her a digital camera last year so she's been taking a lot of pictures, LOL).

My aunt N bought a shot gun to help her feel safe since she lives alone now and my cousin M's fiance J taught her how to shoot it. That was interesting. ;)

It was fun hanging out with my Mom's family again since only see them a few times a year. We had a wonderful Christmas and the best part of all is we didn't go into debt to pay for it! We saved for it all year and had enough money saved up to pay off the credit card this month while still getting almost enough points to get a $50 check mailed to us. :) I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! :)

Mom's grave with her beautiful fall flowers.

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Mom

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Tiger likes travelling. :)

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Tiger loves his aunt! :)

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Our cat chilling in bed while I have to be up & at 'em!

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House?

The first time homebuyer's tax credit has been extended for six months, YAY!!! To add to that blessing, the house we really like was relisted at $10,000 less that it was originally which is right in our price range. :) We talked to our landlord and he's willing to work with us on getting out of the lease so I emailed our lendor to get the approval process started and emailed our realtor to let her know what's going on, as well. I'm so excited & terrified at once!

This month marks the first month DH & I are actively trying to have a baby so that's another exciting & terrifying thing, as well. :)

I'm too flustered right now to think straight so I'll leave this post as it is. Please pray for us! :)

More Houses

DH & I went out with our Realtor today and saw 15 houses in less than four hours, including drive time. It was a little nuts! We found one we actually really like (not the one we were hoping to like though) but we're not completely sure yet. We're thinking of just waiting until next year now. We would like to get the $8,000 tax credit but I don't want to rush into a 30 year, $100,000+ commitment just to get a tax credit. It is definitely a plus but it's also a stressful situation. We applied at a mortgage place to get pre-qualified and will hear back from them Monday. We want an idea of where we stand financially with a lender but not sure we're ready to jump into that body of water just yet! I think a lot of it is also that I don't want to upset our current landlord with trying to break the lease because he's a really awesome landlord (we've lived here for three years, going on four now, without a rent increase) and I don't want to jeopardize that relationship. We're going home tomorrow to see my dad and DH's parents so we'll probably talk it over with my dad and see what he has to say. Prayers would be appreciated, we're pretty confused right now, ha ha!

This past week has been nuts at work. There's only another guy and me working evenings at my job to cover all the xrays and cts for all the ER patients, inpatients and outpatients so that's pretty stressful. On top of that we have some idiot doctors that like to order a ton of useless radiology exams for things that are obviously just the flu so we've been swamped. Every single person that comes into the ER with flu symptoms gets a chest xray and, if we have an especially idiotic doctor working, possibly a triple contrast CT Abdomen & Pelvis or more. It is very frustrating and very exhausting. That's why I don't really update this blog during the work week. I usually come home, take a shower and crash on the couch watching mindless tv with DH until I can drum up the energy to fall into bed. Very stressful. I'm really hoping that with our increased patient load, the HR people will finally allow us to hire another person for evening shift to help even out the load a little more! At least I have a job and job security though, which is a lot more than other people out there so I shouldn't complain too much. This weekend is my four day weekend so I'm pretty excited about that! :)

I should get off here and start getting ready for bed now so I can be awake for tomorrow's visit to see our parents again. :) Goodnight!

House Visit

DH and I went to see the house today and we were disappointed. It is a lovely house but not as pretty as the pictures showed it to be and it needs quite a bit of work. The basement was AMAZING but the rest of the house was not up to par. You would trip over the toilet getting out of the shower and our bed would take up the entire master bedroom. There was some water damage on the ceiling and other cosmetic issues. It is already at the top of our price range so we couldn't afford to undertake all that. We found a house the street back with a little less square feet but appears to be in better shape and is $5,000 less so we're going to see it on Friday. It's also been on the market for about 5 months so we could probably get it for less and it has a larger backyard. :)

DH, my sister & I also went shopping at a store at the mall where my sister works tonight. It was their friends & family day so we got to use the same discount as my sister uses and a ton of things were on sale. My sister is so cute and skinny so everything she tries on looks great. Me, not so much, lol. It did motivate me to work out on the elliptical tonight for 20 minutes. I was also watching Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team4 on CMT so all the pretty, skinny cheerleaders were also motivation, ha ha. My sister was the size I am now (I have lost 30 lbs) less than a year ago and is now 60 lbs less, in less than a year, so I have hope! :)

I am planning on getting up and working out tomorrow morning also so I better get off here and get ready for bed now. The work week awaits tomorrow, ugh. ;)

Lazy Saturday

Today has been wonderful! I didn't get to bed until nearly four this morning (definitely not normal for me) and I made myself get up at 11am so I don't stay up too late tonight so I'm a little tired now. :) My sister came over this morning and we went running together at the park for about an hour and then she had to leave for work.

After she left I made the Amish friendship bread shown in the post below. I'm planning on bringing a loaf to the family Christmas celebration with my mom's side of the family this year and I want to give out bags as Christmas presents. That way everyone knows how delicious it is and is motivated to bake it and pass it on. My cousin gave me a bag and with that bag you make two loaves of bread and have four bags to pass on to others. It says not to refrigerate it but you can freeze it without it causing any problems so that's what I've been doing.

DH and I went to Mass tonight and then we had a meeting after it with the church. Our parish is planning a huge expansion and they are having meetings to explain what is going on and to ask for donations/gifts to help fund it. We started a Catholic school a few years back and expand up a grade every year. We have pre-K through 4th now and will add 5th grade next year and so on and so forth. After we add 5th grade we are out of classrooms so the building expansion will be mainly for the school to add grades 5th through 8th (no plans for a high school at this time), a larger library, art room, science room, cafeteria, etc. We will also be adding a parish hall area and expanding the gathering area for fellowship. It's very exciting but also very expensive! I'm excited for it though, I love our parish.

Tomorrow we go look at the house we found online and love. It's a cute house with a lot of character and is in a great neighborhood closer to friends and work and such. The only bad thing is that it is in city limits so if we do buy it we won't be able to set off fireworks anymore. My husband is CRAZY after fireworks and the 4th of the July so that would be sad. He says it's fine but I think that's because it's October and not July. ;) A lot of things have to fall in to place for this to work out so I'm not holding my breath but I can't help but be excited a little. :)

I'm off to start a new romance novel and then I think DH and I are going to watch some Flash Forward. What a fabulous weekend. :)

Two loaves of delicious Amish friendship bread that I made today.

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My adorable cat on my husband.

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Fresh start

I used to blog on xanga but I haven't been doing very well keeping up with blogs and such there & I decided I wanted a fresh start so I decided to try blogspot. :)

My husband is a full time college student and is in the Naval Reserves. He was Active Duty Navy for 9 years as Enlisted and plans to go back Active Duty as an Officer after graduating college. I work full time at a hospital in Radiology. I do xrays and CT scans and work the evening shift. As I'm sure you can guess, my husband and I do not get a lot of time together. I do work 10 hour shifts though so I have an extra day with him that I wouldn't have if I worked 8 hour days. I like my job but it is stressful. I would much rather be on days and I haven't given up hope that I will one day get there! :)

I have a little sister that lives in the same town as me and is going to graduate school for Accounting. My dad lives about two hours away in the same town as my in-laws (my husband and I met in high school). My mom passed away from metastatic breast cancer on January 16, 2007. It was horrible and sad but we knew she was dying before she passed. The doctors had told her she was terminal so we did get to take TONS of pictures and make as many memories as possible with her before she left us for heaven. My sister and I pray a decade of the Rosary for her (yes, we're Catholic) every month on the 16th to remember her and also on special days like her birthday & Mother's Day, etc.

My husband and I have been married a little over four years and we are thinking about starting a family soon. :) We are trying to get out of debt and not use credit cards anymore also. We have paid off one card and one HUGE car loan (my husband's that he took on before we got married) and starting budgeting consistently with You Need A Budget, aka YNAB. However, we are thinking of taking on another HUGE debt and that would be a HOUSE. :) We are going to look at a house this Sunday that we found online to see if we like it as much as we think we do. If so then we will have to talk to our landlord about getting out of our lease and pursuing that. If the landlord says no then we are stuck until July of next year. We would really like to get in on the tax credit this year though! We would be able to pay off one credit card and have two months living expenses saved up with the $8,000 tax credit. That would just leave us with my Jeep loan and another credit card that has 4.99% interest for the life of the balance. :)

That's a little about me in a short post, now it's off to bed. I'm hoping to keep at this blogging thing on here, it's been very therapeutic for me in the past. :)