I just have to say that I LOVE Christmas. It is totally my favorite holiday and probably for all the wrong reasons too. I love decorating the house with glitter and tradition. I love making cookies and other delectable treats. I love going to holiday parties, getting all dressed up and chatting the night away with family and friends. I especially love how they play O Come All Ye Faithful and the church I grew up at during the midnight service, it's very dramatic there. They have an organ, choir and the entire church stands and sings together in candle light. One year I balled like a baby during the entire song. It was kind of embarrassing when it was over and everyone could see my tear streaked face when it the lights resumed.
This year is a bit different that the years past because this is the first year that Jason and I have been married during Christmas. Now we face the challenge of blending our favorite traditions and even making new ones. For example, tradition that Jason views as very important is decorating the tree with ornaments that he has received from his childhood. This seems alright but I haven't included the fact that he has some very odd ornaments that he insists go on the tree, like a golden framed picture of Elvis and a very ugly, seemingly demonic figure of a monkey in a clown outfit. I recently purchased a bunch of coordinating ornaments in green and silver. I'm wondering if my...uh hem...our tree is going to be as coordinated as I hoped.

My Tummy is Full

Since it is Thanksgiving I thought that it would be appropriate to blog a little, especially since I promised that I would write once a week and that never happened. This was Jason and my first Thanksgiving as a married couple. I think that it has been smart on our part to only commit to one family per holiday because it makes everything much more relaxing that way. I could easily see holidays getting out of hand, trying to eat two meals and accommodate both families. Then I think about Vicky who has 4 families to attend to and it makes me dizzy...and very full imagining eating that much turkey.

We had a very delicious dinner which was prepared by my mom and grandmother, both are excellent cooks. Jason kept saying, "Thesh ish sho goood," as he stuffed his mouth with mashed potatos and turkey. He had three heaping plates. After dinner we watched "Fred Clause" and tried to nap off some of the tryptophan we ingested.

It was a pretty good day and we even started it with a new tradition of going out to coffee before heading over to the family's house. It was nice to see my grandparents again since we don't often. We made plans to play Pinochle at Christmas which makes me happy. Jason and I have sort of become addicted to the game. It's really fun once you get going and are used to the terminology.

Me again

So, the last month has been fairly uneventful but I believe an overview is necessary nonetheless. We figured out that Arnie, one of our bunnies is definitely a boy...you do the math...poor Penelope. Two things that cute should not be doing that...it's just wrong. Jason bought an XBOX at a garage sale and is very excited about it. He figured out that he can buy games for very cheap at pawn shops. The draw back? Well, for example, last night we were hanging out when he decided that he wanted to play more of his game that he bought earlier that day (only 3.99! Cool, huh?) . I soon fell asleep out of pure boredom and he continued to play. When I woke up this morning he said, "Guess what time I fell asleep last night, 330 am!". Um...yea. I fear that a curse has fallen over me...the husband-addicted to video games-curse. Heavy sigh! Something might end up happening to the XBOX...something very bad.
School is going well. I applied for a nurse apprentice position at St. Alphonsus. I can't get my hopes up because there is only one position and will most likely be 50 applicants or so. Yikes. But, if you find yourself thinking of me in your day, please pray that I will get it! It would be an amazing opportunity that I would learn a lot from. I'm also looking forward to graduation. I will be graduating with my AS in Nursing in May, YES!! I will have my BS about a year later. But the good news is that I will be able to work as an RN in a hospital starting in May, cool huh? Jason is working hard in school as well and will be graduating soon after me...that is if he stops playing XBOX :) I am hoping to get a job soon so that we can have a little extra income. We would really love to go to Vegas for our anniversary in December. I know, can you believe that we have almost been married for a year! Wow. I can't!

Update

So, my life has taken an unexpected turn in the last week. I was all set for taking a semester off, working full time and being...well, extra domestic. I was excited and had accepted the fact that school was going to be at least 6 months away. Then, out of the blue, I got an email from my department telling me that I would be able to take the class that I need THIS semester. That means that both Jason and I are in full blown school this semester and you would think that this would be stressful (I did) but we love it. Granted, this is only the first week but I have a feeling that we will continue to enjoy ourselves.

I am so thankful for this opportunity! God is good. Confusing at times, but good :-) We had our first clinical rotation this week and I am already learning a ton. I should be a 100% REAL nursie this May so watch out should you be hospitalized for some reason :-) The only draw back is that the clinical is in Caldwell and starts at 6:00 in the morning. That's about an hour drive from my house for those of you who don't live in the Boise area. Um...yea.

For your enjoyment I posted some pics of Arnie and Penelope, our bunnies that were a b-day gift from Jason. Aren't they cute?! They are even cuter in real life.

It's just been awhile

Hello people,

While talkng to my lovely sister-in-law today, she suggested that I start a blog. She has an absolutely precious blog where she displays adorable pics of her new house and latest artistic accomplishments. Then I realized that I didn't have to start a blog because I already have a blog. It's just been awhile.

So, therefore, I ask your forgiveness. Thank you (I assume you just said "I forgive you").

As promised here are some pics of our honeymoon and wedding. They are precious and looking at them brings back priceless memories. I can't thank my mom enough for putting so much hard work and long hours into my special day.

Ok, the honeymoon ones aren't working. Argh! I will do those ones later when I can figure out what is going on :-)

New day!

So, this whole blog thing is brand new to me. New as in, I've never actually had a blog, not in that I've never heard of them. A guy in my class the other day admitted to never hearing about blogs. Wow, that's all I have to say.

This blog is mostly about me and my new life with my husband Jason. The intention behind it is to give its readers (family, friends, ect.) a more frequent update on our new lives as a married couple. You know how it goes when people first get married, they sort of disappear for awhile and it's like, no one knows where they went or what has happened to them. So, this is my effort to prevent all of the usual not-knowingness of recently married Monica and Jason.

I just have to say that being married is far better than I could have ever dreamed. I have a wonderful husband who loves me very much and every day is like an adventure. I love discovering new things about married life like how in the world do I make time to do A, B and C. It's a challenge, maybe that's why I like it. I also love finding new recipes to make for my hubby. As we all know, the boy consumes like 10,ooo calories per day, this has made my life interesting :-) Again, another challenge. How do I feed the human garbage disposal?

We are really enjoying our cute little North End apartment. It is nestled back into the foothills away from noise and surrounded by the peaceful sounds of nature. Seriously, there are crickets and a terraced water fountain right outside our door! It's very relaxing. We were just given a little BBQ by the Mom and Dad W. It's just the perfects size, so we have been enjoying sitting out on our balcony and grilling hot dogs. Thanks guys!

Well, I think that's about it. I will post some pics of our honey moon for those of you who have not seen any yet. Wedding pics are soon to come as soon as we get our stuff back from the photographer.

Love...

MW