Book books books.

There are 3 questions that I have heard repeatedly since moving to Rockport:

"Are you settling in/finding your way around?"

"Do you have a job/when do you start?"

"What are you doing with all your spare time?"

My job starts (eek!!) Monday, which will be the end of my 2 week lazy-fest. I promised myself I'd lay at the beach for days on end, catch up on daytime tv (ok, so ALL I watch is HGTV.) and tear through some much anticipated good reads. I've spent enough time at the beach to have pink legs, a million new freckles, and a bright red bellybutton (it may be dark and lint-y but it still needs sunscreen too!), had just about enough of the tube, and have made it through a few books already.

So I'm digging up an old post topic: book reviews!

Just finished:

I love Emily Giffin. I own everything she's written and was waiting for her newest book Love the One You're With to hit paperback before I invested in it. So the paperback version + a Border's gift card = something new to read. This book, about a girl who cant decide if she is in the perfect relationship or still loves her ex, probably wasn't my favorite ever from Giffin However, true to Giffin's style, it was a light hearted page-turner that was easy and fun. I also liked how some of the main characters lived in Buckhead (Atlanta), which I am familiar with. There were references that I understood and could laugh with (like a few mildly derogatory UGA references). It was a little unnecessary vulgarity in spots and the beginning was slow to unfold, but all in all I enjoyed the book and was pleased with the ending. :)

Currently Reading:

I'd heard stories from Amanda over and over again about how great the Stephanie Plum series is. She probably has almost every one of the books and I'll be hitting her up later for the next few installments. While I'm usually in to chick-lit (not to be confused with chiclets, which is what hubs thought I was saying one day), this book is a little more crime-ier. Regardless, it's been a fun read so far. Set in Trenton, New Jersey, it's a little more edgy than the Buckhead Socialites. I know there are at least 14 Stephanie Plum books, maybe more now, so if I get hooked, I'll have plenty of reading ahead.

Up Next:

Ok, so I've really been reading this book for like a month. I'm determined once I'm done with One for the Money, I'll finish reTHiNK. It's not fiction, which makes it harder for me to get into. However, it's a great book about what student ministry is about and then what it SHOULD be about. About how camps and lock-ins arent working. About how kids are going off to college and 80% of them will never go to church again. About what needs to happen to equip students for a lifetime. Dont let my lackadaisical approach to reading this book make it seem less appealing. Anyone in ministry should have this on their shelf.

Any book that I ever write about is always up for borrowing. I probably have half a dozen books loaned out to people right now and have a few on my bookshelf (not literally... my books are in boxes in a storage shed) that have been loaned to me. I love reading and I love writing and I would one day love to write a book... maybe about a motion-sickness prone college student and her boyfriend taking a trip to Europe with 2 directionally-challenged grandparents.

So in other news, we made an offer on a house here in Rockport yesterday afternoon. We didnt expect to hear anything from the seller, but were surprised at 9 last night with a call from our realtor-friend Bethany. The offer was blown off and the sellers insisted they were not budging from the listed price. We are not interested in paying the listed price and therefore, have decided to keep looking elsewhere. They didnt even make a counter offer. It would seem like after your home has been on the market for a couple of months and you're paying 2 mortgages, that the only offer that comes across should gain more warrant than a flat-out "no". But whatev. We're going to look at another few houses this weekend hopefully and we'll see what comes out of that!

Speaking of homes and such... Glidden is giving away free paint!!!! Seriously! Free!!! Click the link, find the free giveaway, pick a color, plug in your address and voila! Free paint! I ordered Peacock Blue (a fabulous teal color I'd love to use in a laundry room) & Jordan ordered Olivewood (a taupey-olive color good for any room!) Go get your paint!!!!

NW Arkansas Naturals

Last night we were treated to our first Corpus Christi Hooks game. What is it about farm league teams and their need for odd team names? For example, we played the San Antonio Missions. Back in Augusta, the Sally league team is the Augusta GreenJackets. While doing a google search of other odd minor leaguers, I came up with this:

Albuquerque Isotopes

Lehigh Valley IronPigs

Montgomery Biscuits

Greensboro Grasshoppers

How would you like for your hometown mascot to be a biscuit? Or better yet, an Isotope?

Regardless, we had a fun time watching the Hooks play! The game went to 11 innings, and we left after the 9th and found out later those darn Missions won after all.

Corpus Christi is all about their Whataburger. Funny, I'd never even seen a whataburger until coming to Texas (although I've heard there's still one lingering out in Hephzibah somewhere...). Of course, there's a full service Whataburger inside the stadium. But really, who goes to a ballpark and gets ordinary food when there's park food?? After a corn dog AND half a funnel cake, my stomach was screaming at me, "What in the heck was that?!!?!" Hubs had the half pound Nolan Ryan sirloin dog. It cost more than his ticket.

Wow, either my monitor has some dust on it, or my lens needs cleaning BADLY.

Yep, no dust.

First play of the game. The crowd was slim pickins until the game got into swing and then the seats started to fill up. But for a Tuesday night game, they never got that full. We were on the shady side and stayed relatively cool... for South Texas.

Apparently the stadium is located where some old cotton warehouses used to be and is right on the waterfront. (thanks wikipedia!)

Happy Hubs

What else did we do yesterday?? Met with our Mortgage Broker to get a loan approval letter! More on this later!!

Messed Up

I couldnt stay quiet on this matter. It's really got me in a mess.

We all know I love(d) Jon & Kate plus 8. I've blogged on this before. Sure, Kate has bad hair, but I can look past that. I also think she's a victim of bad editing and I dare any of you to say you've never ever not even once talked sternly to your husband. I think she's misunderstood and is a good, structured parent to her children. She professes herself a Christian and does speaking engagements frequently giving her testimony to other women (I know- my sister in law saw her at one of those speaking engagements!). I have read their book Multiple Blessings and it paints an incredible picture of God's grace on their lives. And then Jon (not to be left out of the equation-- there are always 2 parts!) has those horrible earrings which need to go. I think he is also painted the victim by bad editing, and if he really is victimized by his wife, he needs to grow a backbone and take over as the spiritual leader of his household!

I'm incredibly disappointed by last night's J&K+8 episode.

Hence, therefore I will no longer be an avid watcher of their little TV show. I've already deleted my TiVO season pass and taken the show off my facebook favorites. Shame on TLC for continuing to film this family in chaos. But moreso, shame on the Gosselins for thinking that it's still ok to film their family through all their dirty laundry and bad press. The FIRST thing they should have done when ugly things came around was give up the show. They will say to their grave that they do the show for the kids, but I guarantee the kids will live after the show goes off the air. They may not get free trips to Disney or crooked play houses, but neither did I or my sisters and I'd say we turned out pretty ok. (In fact, I learned that my parents worked HARD to provide us vacations and isnt that a wonderful lesson for kids?)

Also, STOP saying your main priority is your kids! Your main priority should be GOD then your marriage and then the kids. Check the Bible- that's the plan. Both in Ephesians (5:22-6:4) AND Colossians (3:18-21), Paul writes that a husband should love his wife like Christ loved us. A marriage is intended to be a real world picture of the love and forgiveness of Christ. Only AFTER Paul speaks on marriage, does he give charges to parents regarding their children. Remember, marriage is a covenant between two people and God. J&K continue to say they will be better parents to their children by not arguing in front of them, but how much MORE will the kids learn about forgiveness and love if J&K can visibly work through their problems and STAY MARRIED?!!!?

It just makes me sick to my stomach to think that this sweet family is going through a divorce. They need some serious prayer time, counseling and turning their priorities back to God and away from their TV show and "things." I dont know what other issues are boiling under the surface or if the publicity really did them in, but I do know that God is so much bigger than such things. I .... I dont know what else to say.

Update: I just read that TLC has stopped production of the show after learning Kate had filed for divorce. They should also pay for counseling (for all 10 of them!) I'm just saying.

Perks

Monday is here again.

This time next week I'll be sitting in a classroom going over hospital policies and the ever-present topics discussed at EVERY general orientation. Things like fire safety, safe lifting practices, incident reporting systems, Code Pink reviews and hours of really fascinating stuff. (sarcasm!)

Maybe if I dont think about next monday, it wont happen...

We were so lucky to get a visit in with our sweet friends Chris, Carey and gestating baby girl Bonser! They just happened to be in the Corpus area celebrating their anniversary and were kind enough to let us in on a dinner. They are such an encouragement to be around and we had such a good time catching up over pasta. I think I did most of the talking... go figure. :)

Look at the beauties I found in the Rhoads' garden! Arent they pretty? Hubs just loves snacking on cherry tomatoes, but I'm not such a tomat fan. So what do you do with a tomat infestation as pretty as this???

You make Salsa!

So we broke out our blender, which I dont think has been used in 3 years (I know, because there was 3 years worth of dust on the box the blender was in!) and whipped up some fresh salsa. And in true PW fashion, I've posted a pictorial walk through. But seriously, it's so easy! You can make this in minutes to be as hot/limey/salty/tomatoey/cilantro-ish as your tastes can handle. You'll be so spoiled by fresh homemade salsa, the restaurant stuff will never satisfy.

First, you need a blender or food processor. Ours is in the dishwasher getting tomato bits off, so there's not a pic of that, but really... we all know what they look like.

Then, the ingredients!

Ok, dont judge. I know I just finished praising these beautiful little tomats. They can go in too, dont worry. Rotel with chiles is just a yummy yum-yum base. I used mild this time, but you can kick in some heat with a medium or even hot variety. This is all about personalization, I tell ya! Easy step: open the can, drain some of the liquid out and drop it in the mixer. I also threw in about 6ish fresh tomats- just rinsed them well and threw them straight in the pot!

Gaaaaaahlic. I only put in 1 big spoonful (so technical, I know.) but again... put in as much as your tastebuds can handle! Fresh gaaaaaahlic is also good here too, but the potted stuff works well too (plus you dont get gaaaaahlic fingers from the potted stuff.)

Onion (stinky stinky). We'll leave it in the bag. I only used half of a small onion because i'm not a super duper onion fan. Hubs would love 2 or 3 onions, but I dont think so. I give this a quick chop up prior to dumping. Pew pew pew stinky. Here's a surprise though, chopping onions does not make me cry. Maybe there's a correlation between this and the fact that I rarely cry anyway.

Limey Limey Lime. Yum. I love lime and coulda shoulda woulda put a whole lime in the salsa, but I only used half a lime. Squeeze the heck out of it into the mixer and toss the leftovers in your garbage disposal for a nice limey odor.

Cilantro. I dont know if I was EVER exposed to cilantro prior to our Texas arrival, but it's everywhere here!!!! I find that people either L-O-V-E cilantro or hate it and I just happen to be somewhere in the middle. I dont like to be overwhelmed with it, so I only added a few handfuls. Just pull the leaves off of the big stems and dump them in.

Hello, Mr. Jalapeno. Be careful with this guy. Use gloves if you wear contact lenses... I wouldnt know anything about touching my eye after de-seeding a jalapeno (it's like a fiery hot poker searing through your brain. Not a good feeling.) I used a whole guy but I got rid of most of the seeds & ribs, which is where alllllllll the heat is. For a little more kick, de-seed only half. Or if you're really into some heat, throw it all in the pot! I also gave this guy a little chop action prior to dumping.

After this, add some salt & pepper (not pictured... just use your imagination.) to taste and blend away! I like soupy salsa, but with a little less blending, you can get chunky too. I love the day 2 refrigerated variety- after the flavors blend and mellow out a little. In fact, I think I'll have some for lunch today. Yum yum yumtastic! This recipe makes about a cup & a halfish. I adapted this recipe from Mendy's, which makes double the amount of salsa! Go be crazy and make your own salsa! Other options to add or change: serrano peppers instead of jalapeno, chipotles for a smoky salsa, garlic/onion powder for a little extra of those flavors, and even tomatillos for green-y salsa!

So where's the finished product you say???

In my tummy :)

PS: after weeks of non-running, I have finally gotten the resolve to hit the pavement again! Hallelujah! My pants were getting tooooooooo tight. More on this later.

A long update and the end of the countdown

So we're finally here and settled in Rockport. It seems like we've already done SO much here and I have so many things to talk about... so this will be a long post. First up, the much-awaited end to the Cowtown Countdown. It was so hard to decide what would be number #1, so we'll just consider it a 3-way tie!

#1 AWH L&D staff

Oh I love my girls. I love love love love love love love love them. I just dont see myself getting to know another group quite so fabulous as this group of gals. There were just too many days that I hated getting up to go in but convinced myself it would be a good day because of who I worked with. My last day there was really really hard, despite having a smiley happy face on. They are just some of the most fab coworkers i've ever had the pleasure of working with and I wish them alllllll the best. 

Cute pregnant friends! Kylie (L) is having a sweet girl and Laura (R) is having a fun boy!! They are just a couple of the dozen pregnant ladies running around our nurses stations!!! You'd think they spiked the water with fertility drugs with as many pregnant girls as we have! (I didnt drink the water...)

Dont let the empty hall fool you.... it looks all peaceful and quiet, but looks can be VERY VERY deceiving. I've heard that since I left, it's been totally chaotic, which isnt surprising! 

Twinkies!!! (Me & Crystal)

I just love these girls! Have I made that clear yet????? L to R: Donna, Amanda, Traci, Sally. 

More friends!!! L to R: Beverly, Susan, Nicki, Rochelle & Lacrecia (who also happens to be pregnant!!!)

#1 The Residents of ED Head Seminary Housing

Oh how I love our neighbors... it breaks my heart to be away from them. They were all the most helpful, fun, caring and loving people and I was so fortunate to live around them the past 3 years. I will miss our frequent visits and dinners out to Zaxbys (among other places...), walking over for a cup of milk or can of green beans. Babysitting the babies and being the delivery nurse for 2 of our new babies!! I knew getting into this whole seminary mess that people would continuously go in and out of our lives and it would only be a matter of time until all of our wonderful neighbors would take jobs somewhere else and move away too. Its a bittersweet thing, to get so close to such wonderful people and then move away (especially since I kind of suck at correspondence.)

The daddies & Jordan. They are lined up according to baby age... Greg (& Eli), Josh (& Jeshua), Joel (& Noah), Shannon (representing gestating baby Lane!!!!) and then Jordan. 

Joel, Stacy & baby Noah! I've blogged about this sweet family a lot!

Amber (who is expecting!!!!!!!) holding sweet 3 week old Noah and Kelli

The Girls. Oh I miss these girls so much already. In fact, I called Mendy (2nd from L) before we even got to Hillsboro to ask for a favor. They've seen Jordan and I through lots of happy times and lots of illness and sad times and have never thought ugly things about my eternally messy apartment. (L to R: Kelli, Mendy, Moi, Stacy, Amber)

The boys doing what they do (and love) best: grilling. I will miss our grill outs and now wish we'd gotten together weekly! 

And who couldnt love this sweet munchkin?!?!? 

And finally...

#1 Shady Oaks Baptist Church

So many people wonder how we, living in Fort Worth, ended up becoming members at a church in Hurst. Here's the quick story: it was november 2006 and a Saturday night and I was stressed because we'd already visited 7 or 8 other churches looking for something as wonderful as West Acres with no avail. We'd gone to a movie (The Holiday) at the Northeast Mall and while waiting on the previews, an advertisement for the church popped up on the screen. I, being frustrated, said "Lets just go there tomorrow." So we did. and it was pretty fantastic. We fell in love with our sunday school class which grew (during our stay) from 3 or 4 regular newlywed couples to 13-14 couples ranging from engaged to married 10+ years . I miss our class. I will miss our post church Sunday lunches. Mostly I will miss our awesome friends. Friends that became our family, when our biological families were so far away from us. 

SOBC

Brian, Shelley, & Sydney. We had a lot in common with these guys from the very get-go. Brian is a seminary grad and Shelley is a NICU nurse at Baylor (BUMC, not AWH). 

Nate & Allison. We L-O-V-E them. When we first met these guys, they were engaged and we were fortunate enough to see them get married and we appreciate that they are as anti-kid as we are (among other things). They're DINKs like us, so we expect them to make their way to South Texas sometime sooooooon. 

Our last Sunday was "Church out of the box" where we had service on the front lawn. It was fun and easy going (despite getting sunburnt). 

Caleb & Meredith Potter; sweet sweet friends (ignore the red tint- we were sitting under a red tent which blew over while we were eating lunch) and i'm so jealous- they're building their first house right now! Like as I'm typing, it's being built! Super fab. We just love these guys- they've been around from the very beginning too and have always been loving on us. Also DINKs and welcome to visit. 

The Stranges and Lyons

Sweet baby Carter. I just want to kiss his little cheeks.

So many of our friends i've mentioned here are so special to me (and Jordan) that my words cant even begin to do justice. Starting over here and leaving my friends behind (and my Georgia friends even further behind) just makes me nervous and sad and nauseous. I can remember the "start over" period coming to seminary, which was really hard for me. I think this transition will be easier, but still bittersweet. 

So what's happened since we've been here???? We've moved into our temporary apartment at Vic & Marsha's. They are the sweetest couple and have been ultra accomodating and hospitable to us since our arrival- and congrats to them on celebrating 40 years of marriage!!! They're in Hawaii right now celebrating their milestone. We had an abundance of help unpacking our truck that we got everything moved into a storage unit in less than 45 minutes. Jordan's installation service was Sunday night and we were loved on and prayed over. Afterwards, we had cake and a pounding (which was awe--some!!!) We got so much food and cash and gift cards, we were overwhelmed with things!!! We have 2 full cabinets of food and 3 boxes of stuff in storage. We got hundreds of dollars in grocery store gift cards and even some nice restaurant gift cards too! Meanwhile on Sunday, Scott & Kim had their baby- a sweet girl named Kathryn who looks just like her big brother. Big congrats to them!!!!!! 

Monday was an unpack & settle day. 

Tuesday was a Corpus day. I took the car into the shop, turned in my new hire paperwork, had some blood drawn and a tb test done and met my new boss and saw the unit. 

Wednesday was Jordan's first youth group and my first (but not last) trip to the beach. 

Thursday was Jordan's birthday!! He has every Thursday off, but would have gotten his birthday off anyway... We looked at houses and I think have settled on something wonderful that we both love. We look at one more this afternoon and then I think we may make an offer....! Anyway, we had lunch with Bethany and dinner with some of the high school youth. Saw a movie, drove to Port A, transferred some prescriptions, watched some tv. It was a nice lazy birthday. I hope he had a great day :)

And so now it's Friday! This time last week, we were loading the truck. It's hard to believe tomorrow will mark a week spent here in Rpt. Crazy!!!!!

--Pause--

Numbers 3, 2 and 1 of the Cowtown Countdown are going to be good. Unfortunately our cable will be shut off in the next 10 minutes which leaves me no time to blog about who i'm going to miss most here in Fort Worth (it's pretty much a 3-way tie!)

I would've blogged last night after I got home from my LAST DAY OF WORK (tear!), until I got in a hit & run!! Some loser totally plowed into the back of my lovely little Jetta and then backed up, turned and fled down a side street. Jerk. Good thing is I got his plate # and I had a witness that followed him and got a good look at his car (it was after 9 & getting dark) & the guy himself. Bad thing is the bumper of my car did it's job for sure- it's in need of some repair work now. So the Fort Worth Police came and looked the tags up and sure enough the idiot has been arrested multiple times.... once for gay male prostitution. 

I got violated in the rear by a gay male prostitute.

Ok ok, I couldnt help that. You knew it was coming, albeit a little inappropriate. (sorry mom.) So instead of packing I'm blogging and then after this, I'll be on the phone with insurance for goodness only knows how long. 

But seriously! Come back in a few days and the countdown that I know you're all looking forward to will come to a resounding finish! Until then, pray for my back and my sanity!!!

Cowtown Countdown #4

Oh Sprinkles Cupcakes, how I love thee...

Sprinkles Cupcakes

I know I've blogged about these delicious goodies before. I also know there's about a half dozen other cities that house Sprinkles cupcakes (and more to come.) I also know that Sprinkles is definitely in Dallas, not Fort Worth and not even Tarrant County. Regardless, I love them. I am a sweet fanatic and I'm certain that if I could learn to tame the tooth, I'd lose 14 lbs faster than fast. Jordan has more of a salty tooth, which sometimes cramps my sweet tooth style. At the top of my sweet tooth choices list right next to ice cream and fresh chocolate chip cookies are sweet cuppin cakes!

I would have, should have made the trek to Sprinkles and Bliss Spa today, but chose otherwise to pack more boxes. blahhhhhhhh. The Key Lime Cupcakes dont reappear until next week anyway.

Cowtown Countdown #5

Maybe I should've done an "8 things I love about DFW" countdown. I know my top 3... but 4 & 5 are going to be a stretch... and probably not as important as even numbers 9 & 10. I guess I should have mapped out all 10 things prior to starting this countdown before I started writing each post. Regardless.

So I involved my hubby dear in my countdown and asked him, "What's one thing you'll miss when we leave Fort Worth?" He quickly responded with, "Not Traffic!!!" And after some probing, he came up with....

The Pro Sports Teams

Now, I must give a disclaimer here: none of the Texas teams are really who we'd pull for. Sure, we like the Rangers, but the Braves are our favs. And Jordan hates the Cowboys. And we dont really watch basketball to get into the Mavericks. And we've never been to a pro hockey game. But after all that, we love going to the games. We've been to more Rangers games than Braves games and enjoy going just to see some good baseball. And the Cowboys frequently (well, at least once per season, either pre-season or regular game) play the 49ers, which is Jordan's favorite team. He's even happy to see a Cowboy game just to be at a pro football game- at which he will always root for the visiting team. The boy enjoys his sports, what can I say? 

Cowtown Countdown #7 & #6

So I worked yesterday and went immediately after work to dinner with Jordan and our friends Brian & Brandi Koch (& Bailey!!). So needless to say after a long day and a nice meal, I wasnt worried with blogging! Therefore, today is two-fer Sunday! (Not as catchy as Two-fer Tuesday, is it?). 

Tex-Mex

Ok, Ok. I KNOW tex-mex lives in places outside of the metroplex. I get it. I can tell you one thing though, it doesnt live in Augusta, Georgia (sorry Monterrey, you suck.). I look forward to some decent mexican places in Rockport and I've even already eaten at one, but there's just nothing better than some of the mexican places here in Fort Worth. Even last night, we ate at Joe T's, which may not be the tastiest of the bunch, but you cant beat the patio. It's like being in another land completely. 

Yum. I could eat Tex Mex everyDAY. 

Seriously. 

Fort Worth Botanic Gardens

Talk about being in another land completely. I love this place. It's another spot that I rarely visited in comparison to the time we spent here, but it's still wonderful. I took pictures for my mama here that she has framed over her fireplace. I played frisbee with Cas & Duane out in the grass. I got pictures of sweet baby Noah while he was still in his mama's belly. 

See how pretty?? This place is magical and beautiful and interesting and lovely and bad for feet in heels. I wouldve convinced my sister to have her magical wedding here (she's not getting married anytime soon, I'm just a freak like that), but now maybe the beach is a better option.