Gatlinburg

Finally!! I've been saying forever how I was going to post pictures of the ring and the proposal but life kind of got away from me. We had a fabulous time in Gatlinburg. He totally surprised me with my ring and the formal proposal.

Also, I ordered my wedding dress. I can't post pics because you know who is a reader. But it's gorgeous and I am so excited to wear it.

The Big Day

So we finally settled on a date - August 29. Yikes!!! That's only 4 months away. Lots of factors to think about - jobs, family, and football. That's right I said football. We had to plan the wedding around Ole Miss football. We have season tickets as does his sister's family. It's crazy I know. But we're getting married at his family's church in small town MS. We're going to keep it small (hopefully).

Good News

The General has made it home safely from Iraq!!!

I've been so consumed with spending time with him and his family that this is the first time I've been able to even get to a computer. And to top that...the weekend before he came home my apartment flooded. So I've been just a little bit busy. But I'll be back to blogging this week hopefully. I've missed reading updates.

I am way behind

So I've been trying to sit down and post for the last few days and every time I think I have a few minutes something else happens. It's been a crazy busy few weeks since moving to Mississippi. Last weekend I traveled back to Memphis to be in a friend's wedding. It was so great to see everyone!! Here's a picture of me and my friend and one of all the bridesmaids' shoes after the ceremony. Good Times~

I also was able to finish the wedding quilt - finally. It turned out really great. Here's a picture of the bride with her new quilt.

What else am I missing? Things otherwise are good. Work seems to be improving. And The General will be home SOON - less than 3 weeks!!!

The Sound of Silence

It's practically deafening...but maybe it's just me. I moved to Mississippi almost 2 weeks ago. I started my new job on Monday. Now I knew there would be a period of adjustment but I never imagined it would be this hard. I've been working for the same company for the past 6 years and have held several positions within the company within a couple of different departments. The main difference is that I've always been in the city where the organization is headquartered. Now I'm in a satellite office. And I'm an outsider. On Monday I met with my new boss and moved into my new cubicle (which is less than half the size of my previous one but that's not the point). Throughout the past few days not one person has come up and introduced themselves to me. NOT ONE! Unless I initiate a conversation it's like I'm invisible. It's pretty depressing - to say the least. I can only hope that it will get better.

Just Over a Month

This deployment is almost over! The General should be back in my arms in just over a month - I'm crazy with excitement. I know he's so ready to leave Iraq and be home. It's been a really tough time. But it won't be much longer now. In just a short couple of weeks he will be returning to the states to do all the post-deployment stuff somewhere up North. The month of March cannot go quickly enough for all of us!!!

And I start my new job tomorrow. It's been so strange this past week to not be working. I've been trying to find my way around town and get Peyton adjusted to living in an apartment (which is not exactly working out all that well). But now I'm pretty bored. At least I know I'll be super busy with work for the next month and this time will fly.

I miss my house

I went from this....

to this...

Oh how I miss the spacious rooms and huge backyard. I miss everything about my house. After 5 years of living there I am so sad to have left. But life has to move forward. So now I'm living in an apartment about half the size of the house. And poor Peyton misses the house too....especially the backyard. He needs to run around and play outside. But we can make this apartment a nice place to stay for the next 6 months. By that time, The General will be back and we'll figure out where to go from here.

Bigger than my body ... but just barely

So we're finally here! The new apartment is TINY TINY TINY - so it's a tight fit with me, the dog, and the cat. It's been an eventful weekend getting moved.

Looking back on 2008

So in all the madness of moving and packing, I decided to take a quick peek at some of the events of 2008.

1. Taz - I can't believe that my beloved cat has been gone for over a year now. When she passed in February 2008 I thought I would never recover.

2. Salem - my quirky cat has also had an eventful year. She lost her companion Taz and gained an enemy in Peyton.

3. Peyton - never would I have thought that I would be a dog person (I've always loved cats). But 8 months after picking him up for the first time, I'm still as in love as ever.

4. The General - all I can say is "wow" - you coming into my life has been such an amazing blessing and I thank God for you every day

5. Everything else - with everything that has happened, I continue to be amazed at the glory and goodness of God. Without going into too much detail, I left a job early in 2008 to return to a company where things have evolved into an awesome opportunity. I am blessed with a wonderful family, great friends, and so many other things. I'm learning every day how important it is to give everything to God and to wait for Him.

Posts About Peyton

There's a new man in my life

• Aug 5, 2008

I've been a little busy lately. I got a new puppy this week - his name is Peyton and he's adorable! And he's a handful too. This is my first puppy so I'm trying to learn how to train him.

Growing into a little man

• Aug 20, 2008

My sweet puppy Peyton is growing like a weed. He's 8 weeks old now and weighs 11 pounds. While I love him to death, we are having some issues. He's a biter (which is expected in puppies I know) so we're working on that. And when I say he bites I mean he will take your hand off!!! I thought my biggest concern would be house training but that is going very well.

However, this fierce puppy is deathly afraid of the vacuum cleaner! This is all you could see this past weekend when I was cleaning the house. He eventually fell asleep there

And while we enjoy going outside in the backyard, he always keeps his eyes on me to make sure that I'm still out there with him. We're working our way up to the front yard. There are scary cars and too many other things. He's afraid of most things outside but he rules inside the house!! (only when the vacuum cleaner is safely put away in the closet)

The Future Is Here

So I'm finally going to bring the posts from my other blog here and consolidate. Here's one of my first posts from last Summer. Looking back all I can think is "how great is our God?"

The Future Is Here

• Jun 2, 2008

So I've made a decision - well not really a decision but I've come up with a plan. I am moving - getting out of Memphis. It's funny when you realize that there's nothing keeping you in place. For the last couple of years I've been talking about moving but there's always been something keeping me here. A boyfriend or school or a job. Well I'm tired of waiting around for life to happen. I've come up with a list of places to start looking and I'm going to start researching those places and asking around. Hopefully by the Fall I will have narrowed down the list to just a few. By this time next year I should be all packed up and ready to go.

Woo Hoo Yeah

So the couple and I have come to an agreement and they are going to rent my house!!!! (since you can't see me I will tell you that I'm totally doing the happy dance right now)

And the best thing is that they are going to move in the week after I move out so I'm not going to have to worry about paying a mortgage and rent for an apartment. Today life is pretty good. Maybe by the end of their year lease the housing market will have improved!

In other news - tomorrow is YARD SALE DAY!!! I'm so excited about getting rid of stuff. It's amazing what has collected in my house in the last 5 years. I'm such a pack rat. And I've decided that whatever doesn't sell tomorrow is going straight to Goodwill. Nothing is going back in the house. Right now my house looks like there was a tornado but hopefully after tomorrow it will look a little better. I'm about 50% packed up - only 2 weeks to go before moving day - yikes ~ better get busy....

One Sick Puppy

Someday when I have children I will remember this time. I spent a few hours last night in the Pet ER. My sweet puppy has gotten some sort of trachea infection and kennel cough. Needless to say he just about scared me to death waking me up in the middle of the night with a hacking cough. It started yesterday when I got home from work. He started coughing and I thought maybe he had swallowed something. After a few minutes I started to worry and considered how I would be able to administer CPR or the Heimlich maneuver to him. After about 15 minutes he stopped and seemed ok. So I figured that whatever it was had been swallowed. Flash forward to 2:30 AM - he starts coughing uncontrollably. I decide that it's now serious enough to warrant a visit to the ER. $250 later they tell me he's fine. OUCH!!!

All I can say is...unless you are going to actually get shots, never go to the pet store when it's "low-cost vaccination day." We didn't know anything about it and wandered in last week to buy a new toy. So there were all kinds of unvaccinated dogs all waiting to make my sweet vaccinated puppy sick. Such is the risk we take ~ however if I ever see that sign in the window again I'm going to turn around and go home.

The other man in my life

Not only do I have the most wonderful husband-to-be, I also have a pretty awesome dog. His name is Peyton and he's almost 8 months old. He's a handful!

And here's a pic of both of my men.

Another favorite thing

This past summer two of my best friends both announced they were getting married. I was trying to think of a unique wedding gift. So I came up with the idea of making them quilts. I've never quilted a day in my life but I figured it would be a good creative outlet. My grandmother used to quilt and my boss makes quilts for coworkers when they have babies.

Here are some pics of my first attempt at quilting.

The colors in the pictures are not great. The idea was to use the favorite color of both the bride and the groom. For this quilt, the bride's favorite color is purple and the groom's favorite color is black. At first I was hesitant to use black but I think it turned out quite nicely.

On the back I had their names embroidered along with the wedding date. As a first quilt I'm happy with the result and it only took me about 3 weeks of working on it in the evenings after work and some on the weekend. I learned a lot of lessons along the way and hope to put my skills to work. I've already started working on the quilt for the other wedding but got sidetracked. The next wedding is in less than 6 weeks and I'm not sure it's going to be finished in time.

I took time to make The General his Christmas present. I LOVE the way it turned out. We decided it would be best if he didn't take it to Iraq with him so I have it with me until he returns in April. If I could take it with me to work I would - but that might be strange. I love having it with me though.

My favorite soldier

I never would have thought that I would want to marry into the Army. But here we are - thinking about rings and planning a wedding. Honestly, there have been times in the last couple of years that I thought that I would never marry (military or otherwise). Then the General came back into my life. Then things got complicated. The General was married to a work colleague of mine (they've been divorced now for a couple of years). While they were married, we would occasionally hang out as couples (me with my then boyfriend). It was difficult getting to know much about him because he was deployed right after they got married. Shortly before their divorce, they moved a few hours away. After the divorce, I remained in contact with the girl and occasionally would get an email from The General. Flash forward a couple years....The General is once again deployed to Iraq. I start getting emails from him and we start talking more and more. Then his birthday comes up and I decide to send him a care package (probably the best thing I could have ever done). 

From there we started emailing each other non-stop. It's definitely a non-conventional courtship, but it works for us. Without the luxury of phone calls or in-person visits, we have to rely on emails and letters. It's amazing how personal they can be.  The General was able to come home for leave during the beginning of January for 15 days. Those were the happiest days of my life. We were able to spend some quality time together and I am so grateful. Of course it made it harder to put him on a plane back to Iraq but I know he will be back in the states sometime in the beginning of April. That's when we can make it all official. I'm so excited.

Let the journey begin ...