BANG!

Picture this, 30+ people are coming over to your house for a Friday night birthday party. You've planned every minute to the hour and run to the grocery store for a last minute purchase before heading home and putting the finishing touches of everything.

You get to the turn for your street (with 72 minutes to spare before guests begin arriving) and BANG! Literally, bang.

























When the accident happened, I was flustered and frustrated. It happened in the middle of a busy road in Helena and I hated being so exposed. Plus, I had carefully planned for this party and it suddenly seemed it wouldn't happen. Thankfully, I knew Jemar was on his way home so I just had to call and get him to hurry and then wait. It turned out that it only took about 20 minutes to give our statements, get checked out by the ambulance (thanks Jemar) and finally for me to walk home. So, as you saw from the pictures, the party did commence and the accident just became a party story.

Since then, I've picked up the rental car and have entered the frustrating world of appraisers, insurance claims and purchasing cars. But more than anything else, I'm missing my car. Journey has been with me for four years and we've had tons of memories.

I've driven it to Destin, Florida twice. She's been in New Orleans enough times to be a temporary resident. She was with me as I drove back and forth between Helena and Cleveland almost on a daily basis. She's made the trip to Kansas City and Waukegan, IL countless times. Beyond the big trips though, the smaller memories are what I'll really miss. Jemar proposed to me as we sat in Journey at Rosedale Park under the Delta stars. Julie and I took her on a trip to the same park and drank champagne to celebrate the end of our first year of teaching. Countless memories happened in Journey, it makes me wonder what the next car will bring.

Would you miss your car if you lost it? Why?

Happy Birthday Jemar (Part 2)!!

Jemar's official birthday celebration took place on Friday, the 23rd. We invited about 30 of our friends over for desserts and cocktails.
In addition to the Alice Chow cake that Jemar is posing with, we also served mini-cheesecakes, lemon bars, puppy chow and finally, chocolate fondue with fresh strawberries and pineapples. Yum!


Drink-wise, we had about 30 different types of beer (our refrigerator is still full) three types of wine and a sparkling punch.

We had lots of fun and ended up playing Encore until midnight. Jemar loved it and brought in 30 with a bang.

Literally. More on that later........

Happy Birthday Jemar! (Part 1)

Today, Earth Day, Jemar celebrated his 30th birthday. What did he want to do? Make one of his favorite dishes - Pork Tenderloin and Bacon with stewed white beans.



(Generally on birthdays, everyone other than the birthday person does all the work. Today, I just sat and watched Project Runway episodes while the birthday boy did all the work. Fabulous!)































The finished product! (Yes, that is wine. Yes, I drank it. And yes, it was delicious :)



The culmination of Jemar's birthday celebration is tomorrow. Stay tuned......

Jemar: Man! Those are some hard kicks. How on earth can you sleep through that?
Janee': I taught elementary school. I'm good at ignoring.

Is it wrong to mock the unborn?

During our scan back in March, I actually jumped when this image came on the screen. Back then it looked like the Bride of Chucky. Today I see an alien.

Jemar says I'm mean. But really, kinda creepy, huh?

Look closely and you can see eyes boring into your soul...

Pretty Baby

Four weeks later, we finally have the images taken at our 20 week ultrasound. Isn't Monkey sweet! Jemar swears the baby has his lips, but I can't tell. That little hand is what I find the most adorable. I'm so excited to hold it in person.

On the gender front we're still undecided. Last week Jemar had a dream that the baby was a girl and has been convinced ever since. However, after seeing this picture again, he thinks its a boy. As for me, when I see this picture I think girl. However, I'm still convinced we're having a boy.

What about you? Boy or girl? Or do you just see a pretty baby? :)

Surprising Mail

My baby shower invitation came in the mail earlier this week. Now I knew it was coming and I know my baby shower is only two weeks away, but when I saw it, my first thought was - "Holy crap, I'm having a baby". It makes me wonder how many more times I'll have this thought in the next four months.....

Anywho, I love the simplicity of the invite. It's neutral and appropriate, without being too "babyish". My mom, sister and Puppy chow (aka Laura) did a great job!

Color Splash!

Almost a year and a half ago, Jemar and I were having a conversation with his sister (Alena) and brother-in-law (Byron). We hadn't found a house yet, but for some reason we were talking about the design of our future house. In at least one of the rooms, I wanted to do dark walls with light colored trim. Alena and Byron both agreed that it would look modern and elegant. Jemar HATED it. "The walls will be too dark. It will look too somber. I wouldn't even like one wall in a dark color".

Fast forward to 2010. We knew we wanted the "nursery" to have shades of green and brown but we weren't sure about the wall colors. We didn't want to use green walls because that's the color of our master bedroom, so we held off painting for a while and instead focused on choosing a crib set.

A while ago, I asked you to vote on your favorite bedding sets? Remember? Well I failed to mention that I have this terrible habit of asking people their opinions and then choosing something completely different. I never plan to do this...........but it frequently happens. My apologies :(

Anywho, I was about to order the sage and brown bedding set that so many of you loved and it just wasn't clicking. So I looked some more and randomly found this bedding set that cost 50% less and was completely different than what we thought we wanted. I saw it, showed it to Jemar and in less than 10 minutes, I had ordered it. YIKES!

(I just realized this is one LONG post. Hang with me. There are pretty pictures at the end....)

When it arrived, I opened it with some trepidation. But I should have had more faith in our combined style, it was absolutely perfect and it looked just like us. With the perfect bedding set in our possession, we had to decide on a paint color.

Jemar wanted tan or cream (so typical) and I wanted chocolate brown. I finally wore him down and we decided on a brown accent wall with the rest of the room bright white. The Saturday before Easter we went to Sherwin Williams and prepared for painting bliss.

We started with the brown accent wall and the more I painted, the more I fell in love. When I finished, I knew I wanted all four walls brown, there was only one thing in my way - Jemar. And so friends, I took advice from My Big Fat Greek Wedding - "The man may be the head of the house but the woman is the neck and the neck can make the head turn any direction she wants". After planting a few seeds and giving him some time to realize he loved the color too, I went back to the store for another gallon of brown paint to complete my vision. 1.5 years later, I feel completely vindicated. The room is fabulous! It says, "Hi, I have style. Oh, and a baby sleeps here too". As for Jemar, last night he told me, "I still love that room. It looks great."

Monkey has a sophisticated place to lay his head, now on to the finishing touches! Let me know what you think.


This is the before picture, back when it was our second guest room.












The bedding! The houndstooth pattern is so fierce in person.












An aerial view of the crib and changing table. That brown just pops against the white trim and carpet.











Finally, the reason the room doesn't look dark even with the brown walls. This (almost) wall of windows brings in so much light.

PS - Don't you love the stuffed monkey my parents bought?

Dumb Dog

Perhaps I'm naive, but I always thought when an animal got hit on the highway, the animal was the biggest casualty. I have since been educated.

On a recent trip to Southaven, a stupid, white dog was in the middle of the highway. I was in the fast lane with a row of cars on my right and a concrete barrier on my left. Which meant I had nowhere to go. I slammed on my brakes and tried to miss the dog (which stupidly stood there and looked at me). Needless to say I most definitely hit it.

I continued driving, feeling a little sad for the dog and never once considering the impact it could have had on my car. I rushed into my meeting, and ran a few errands and never saw my passenger side. Until I was ready to head back down to the Delta and I saw exactly what that stupid dog caused.

Since then, I swear I see at least one dog every time I drive. It's like they're taunting me. And since I don't want anymore damage on "Journey", they win every time.

Dumb dogs.

Favorite Person of the Day?

Please, indulge my vanity for just a little bit.

So, when your body seems to change each day and the body you've know for decades suddenly resembles a stranger's, you get a little self-conscious about your size.

However, at our check-up today, my doctor said the following (and I mean word, for word):

"Well, your weight is just perfect. I mean it's perfect. It's exactly where we want it to be. It's just perfect"

If he had said perfect one more time, I think I would have sang to him.........."Did you ever know that you're my hero? You're everything I would like to be!"

MUST try recipe!

Have you ever been in the middle of cooking and suddenly realized, something amazing was happening? That this creation would be legendary? Why I don't regularly have this feeling, as I was preparing dinner on Tuesday, I knew something special was coming on and I just had to share it with you.

Jemar LOVES chicken enchiladas and I could eat Mexican food every day of the week. So, I'm always looking for the perfect enchiladas recipe. I've tried dozens, but this one, is my clear favorite. It's more time-intensive than most other recipes, but the flavor is worth it. On Tuesday we had friends over for dinner and both the enchiladas and the Mexican corn were big hits.

Pictures of the enchiladas filling are below and of course, the recipe link. Try it and let me know what you think!

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Angelas-Awesome-Enchiladas/Detail.aspx

P.S. - Do you have any amazing Mexican recipes to share?

Happy Easter!

Did you miss us? I apologize for the delay in updating the blog but we've been SO busy!

Since I last wrote, I attended a women's retreat sponsored by our church, my parents visited (for less than 14 hours), we hung curtains in the master bedroom, ordered (and received) our nursery furniture, tried out a new community group through church, had dinner with old friends AND our magnum opus, yesterday, we painted the nursery, assembled the nursery furniture, hung shelves in the master bedroom and essentially cleaned our entire house. We finally finished by midnight and had just enough energy to crawl up the stairs to bed.

I'll post more on the nursery later. The big push to get everything done? Easter dinner!

We hosted 14 people for a potluck style dinner. It was actually a great idea as it cut down on the work, but everyone still got to enjoy a big holiday dinner. Jemar grilled a ham and some great friends brought Cesar salad, crescent rolls, a yummy leg of lamb, candied yams, mac and cheese, chicken drumsticks and to end the evening, lemon pound cake and homemade peanut butter cups. We used paper plates and silverware so clean-up was a breeze. All in all, a great way to spend Easter.

We're so thankful for the friends we've made here in the Delta. Whether they are work friends, church friends or neighbors, they make our lives so much richer.

I hope your Easter was filled with family, friends and a conscious appreciation for the reason behind the holiday.

"Thank you for the cross, Lord. Thank you for the price you paid. Bearing all my sin and shame, in love you came, and gave amazing grace......Worthy is the Lamb!"