I Clicked There

This is just something i found funny today. I admit it, i'm a sucker for commercials and adds some times. There are sooo many times i crave and covet things i see on tv. Its terrible. And if there's something i find half interesting that has a web site, i'll check it out. We've all seen the Zappos.com commercials right? The *puppet* ala Muppets style workers taking call center orders for the site. They were funny, so i had to look at the site. Their ploy to use humor with puppets worked on me. I'm not in buying mode right now, that comes and goes every few months or so, i was just waisting time this afternoon online so i checked it out. Honestly, I don't like to buy shoes online too often because i want to know how they fit before i buy them.
Then i stumbled on the this towards the bottom of the page:

You may have to click on the picture to see what i have circled in red here. Something you don't usually see, it says Don't Ever Click Here. What would you do if you saw that? Duh. You can't NOT click there. So i did it. And i got Rick Roll'd. It sent me to the funniest thing i had seen all day. So, now you can go to Zappos and check it out for yourself. But if you don't want to, you can just click where i said *don't ever click here* and it'll take you to where Zappos sent me.
I'll be blogging again this next week. We had our anniversary this last Sunday, and today we went through the Star Trek exhibit at the Aerospace Museum. We weren't supposed to take pictures of that, but i'm a rule breaker :) So those posts will come soon.

Chicken Pasta Salad

A few months ago Husband and i made a trip over to Idaho/Utah for a week. We spent a few days visiting my family in Preston ID, then we went south to visit friends and some of Husbands family in Utah. While we were visiting his aunt's house, they were having a birthday dinner for his cousin Marie. The dinner was great. Fresh homemade rolls out of the over, a fruit salad, and the most yummy Chicken Pasta Salad i have had in a very long time. It was one of Marie's favorites, which is why she had it for her dinner, and a few days before the 4th of July i was able to get the recipe. *i hope she doesn't mind i'm sharing this with everyone, its just so good i had to share... :]
I've made it twice since getting the recipe because Husband likes it so much. Which is weird, because it has mayonnaise in it and he knows it. He hates mayo.

Chicken Pasta Salad

12oz. bow-tie pasta
12 oz. spiral pasta
2 c. grapes
3 chicken breasts cooked and cubes (or you can use canned chicken...it makes it a lot easier)
3 green onions
1 pkg. crasins
1 small can cashews
1 c. mayo
1 bottle Kraft cole slaw dressing (it has to be Kraft)

Mix first 5 ingredients together. Just before serving add the crasins and cashews. Mix the mayo and dressing together then stir all together.


This is a large recipe. When i make this, i have to cute the recipe in half because this makes A LOT for 2 people, and even then, we have leftovers. The next day we just add a little more of the cole slaw dressing to get it back to consistency.

Enjoy!

My small Dilemma

Yea for Husband and I, our 2nd anniversary is coming up in less then 2 weeks :) Its amazing how fast its gone by. Last year Husband actually had to work (duty on base for 24 hours), and i'm looking forward to spending the actual day with him this year. It was about this time last year that he returned home from a 6 month stay in NC for school with the Coast Guard, so we've finally got a whole year together. He's the love of my life that will go into forever and by far my best friend, and i know i love him more every day. He's more then i could ever ask for. Blah blah, cheesy stuff you probably don't want to read right now. You get the picture though. We are cheesy like that when we're together, arguments about who loves who most and all that. It spills over into the blog sometimes, so i'm sorry. I'm pretty positive i'll get more into all that declarations of love stuff on our actual anniversary, so i'll spare you all until then.

But yes, its coming up fast and we've been talking about *gifts* :) He likes to buy me gifts for some reason. Sweet as heck, and i know i've said this before on here, but i'm pretty sure we would be broke if i let him buy me everything i want. He's slowly getting it into his head that when i say i like/want something, that he's not expected to get it. Usually. But birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays are great for presents still.

I've been dying to get a KitchenAid stand mixer for forever, and every time one of the gifting holidays come around Husband offers to get it for me.... But i've told him no every time. Crazy right? I want it, but i can't justify getting it yet. There are other things for around the house we can get can get for a lot less money.

So, no KitchenAid. For now.

One of the rooms i would like to fix up in our house is our bedroom though. Our room is a mess. Basically a mix-match of furniture and clothes all over the place. Its a little depressing and embarrassing to tell the truth. I try to keep the door closed when people come over so people don't see, but inevitable Husband goes in there for some reason and leaves the door wide open. Ghaaa! Seriously? I hang my head in shame every time and have to run up the stairs to close it without drawing attention to myself so people don't notice and try to peak in before i get to the door. We don't have a dresser, just the closets. There's the little tv in there, my 1st TV/VCR combo i got my junior year of HS that i use when husband has to stay the night at work. The queen sized bed. Nothing fancy there: a new mattress set, and the usual basic metal frame. I have the metal headboard i bought when i was in college for $7 at Kmart (on clearance) set up with the bed too, but i really want to make my padded headboard for it in a dark taupe micro-suede. SOON. I have artwork, lamps, and the duvet i want for the room already. And then there's the bedside tables.... yuck. I had 1 when i was single that was ok....but leaves a lot to be desired. i think i found it for $10 at Wal-mart originally to go beside my futon in my 1st apartment. The other one is this weird unfinished tiny little shelf table i've always used to improvise with so we both have something. I want new matching bedside tables though. Since moving in last November, i've gotten Husband to hang up his clothes 2 times. When i do laundry, i'll separate and lay all his clothes out ready for hangers. Hangers are torture to me, and to him apparently because he usually picks up his piles of clothes, including his underwear, and throws them on the floor so he can climb into bed. He says he wants drawers though. So, i've decided i want this:
Its nightstand sized, and there are drawers he can shove his clothes in, at least a few of them, and i like how they look. They would go great with everything i already have and plan to do with the room. And bonus, they're $70 each right now. If you've ever shopped for nightstands, you'll know thats a great price. So, this is on my list of potential gifts. I know, nightstands as an anniversary gift....not really romantic. I'm kind of practical, or something. But i don't care.

My other choice for a gift is this:

The Come Unto Me statue of Christ. I'm in love with it. It's beautiful. I've always wanted the Christus statue for my home, but i think i would love this one more. And right now, its on sale (like 70% off).

So that's it. Those are the 2 things i want for our anniversary. Stuff to decorate my house with. But i can't pick. Which would you pick?? I'm sure i'll get some See's candy as well, or flowers, because that's what anniversary's are for :) Husband has no idea what he wants so i'll have to think of something super special for him. He never wants anything, so he's pretty easy to make happy....if i can think of something. That's the hard part.

Blog Traffic

Do you guys remember this post? It was the one i posted with the invite for all of Husband's family that were going to North Carolina to come Parasailing with us while we were there over Memorial Day weekend. Just a short little invite, family specific, with a picture of some random people parasailing at the top. It was the one post i've made on here that wasn't really meant for drawing the general public of random readers to worry about reading....But for some strange reason, it's the one post that's drawing the most traffic to the blog.

Its been going on for weeks. I've been watching the Live traffic feed, and i think its safe to say that over 95% (if not more) of the random readers land on that page first. WHY? I changed the Title of the post from "Parasailing" to "Come Parasailing" hoping that might change the draw for people to land on it, like maybe they would get the clue that its not a post about the parasailing experience itself.... No go. So, i decided to just add the disclaimer in red at the top to redirect everyone.

But that still leaves the *WHY?*. Why is everyone landing on the blog for that post? I've Googled, Yahoo'ed, and Binged "Parasailing", and the blog doesn't pop up on any of the searches, so that leaves me with no idea what the draw is. There's nothing interesting about this particular entry. I've considered just deleting it, but i haven't obviously. I don't have a reason to dissuade anyone from reading about us (unless i start getting some crazies leaving weird comments, but that hasn't happened so i'm not too worried yet). So i guess, to any of you readers that may have stumbled onto the blog because of my "Parasailing" invite post, i would more then appreciate a hint for why you stopped by because i really want to know :)

By Aircraft?

Have you ever seen one of these signs? They have them here in California, but i can't remember if i've seen them anywhere else.
My real question is:

How does this work??

We drive down the highways enough, and i've never once seen any type of "Aircraft" flying overhead keeping tabs on our speed. Trust me, every time i see the sign i do search the skies. Are they lying to us to scare us into driving the speed limit? Or are they really hiding in their patrol cars off in the bushes in wait for us to not take them seriously? i'm sure if i Googled it, i would find out how it really works, but to be honest i think i find it more interesting to speculate what's really going on....but then again, i do want to know. What do you think?

Garage Sale Finds of the Summer

Last week on Saturday was a great day, and we were both home (amazingly husband didn't have to work) so i suggested we hit the garage sales for something fun to do. And, shock of all shocks, he agreed without me having to twist his arm. He wanted to go get a paper and see where any were, but i figured all we had to do would be to drive around and we'd find a few. He didn't believe me so i looked up a few online to make him feel better, but in the end we only got to one of the places on the list because there were tons of signs all up and down the neighborhood. I ended up finding a bed frame for cheep, and we had fun going through strangers crazy stuff. Our find of the day, besides the bed frame?

Yes, Titanic The Board Game. We didn't know if we should be disturbed or if we should think it was funny. The object of the game:

"Gossip with other passengers, receive telegrams and collect all five pieces of your personal property to advance from the Second Class to the First Class section of the ship. But watch out, you might get put back in steerage or, worse yet, never make it to your lifeboat in time..."

Who knew there was such a thing? It really was so outrageous, we had to buy it. It was $1 we still don't regret spending. Its missing a few pieces, but i've found a site online to buy them, so i'm not too worried about it.

Other then that, things are going. I've been putting off doing the decorating of our house for after the beach vacation so we could save money, but now that its over i can start doing the things i've been planning. Things like curtains, artwork on the walls, table runners and candle holders, accessories and decorations, that padded headboard i've been wanting to do for forever, and the extra bedroom.

I've been on the hunt for a bed frame for our extra queen size bed, and i'm so glad i've finally found one. When we got our new mattress set for our bed to replace the one i had before we got married, we were short on bed frames. So we had an extra bedroom with a mattress sitting on the floor, and it might be just me, but I'm not a fan of offering guests we have over to sleep on a mattress on the floor. i just feel guilty doing it. We have 2 different sets of guest coming to stay this week, so that's my immediate stress for the week, getting that room put together (for the most part) so everyone is comfortable.

But that leaves the one full size mattress, minus its box-spring, sitting on the floor in the other extra bedroom...i don't have any idea what to do with that one. I want to make it usable and presentable without spending hundreds of dollars, so i'm going to put this out there: any suggestions??? i'm open to suggestions. I know i won't be able to do it this week, but eventually.

And then for my room, i plan on finally doing the padded headboard. Yea! I've picked out the material, and Husband has approved, so its going to happen soon. I'm just going through tutorials and pictures online to figure out which way i'm going to do it.
Other then that, Husband and i have been going to movies when we can. I love summer movie season, there are more movies to see then we have time for. I took Husband out for his first taste of Greek food last week. He said it was better then he thought it would be. Seriously. I'm a huge fan of Greek food (i blame the White House Grill if Post Falls for getting me hooked, and great mom's like my friend Rachel's for making such great food all the time), so if he likes it i can have it more often here. Victory for me for that one.
So yeah, basically staying happy still, staying busy, having fun with husband when i can, and trying to stay cool in the Cali heat. Not too much to complain about really :)

Outer Banks

Vacation in Outer Banks, NC was everything i hoped it would be. WONDERFUL. Playing in the ocean, sand castles, parasailing, a new kite, family, little kids and babies, sun burns, great food...even just the initial act of getting out of the car the first time when we got there and smelling the ocean air...wow. My eyes roll back in joy just thinking about it.
We've been planning this vacation for over a year. Husbands mom, Liz, loves the Outer Banks and i think she's genius. It turned out great, and was worth all the months of stress talking husband into it (he was convinced we wouldn't be able to afford it).
The huge house we stayed in was on Hatteras Island. I don't think i realized that the "Outer Banks" was a string of islands (sandbars) before a few weeks before we left. I don't know what i thought it was before then, but it was a big realization. Now i know why Nicholas Sparks writes so many books that take place there. Our friend Jeremy dropped us off at the airport in Sacramento and we flew into Norfolk VA on Saturday night and drove down from there. We hung out at the airport for a few hours trying to figure out flights and the rental car situation for husbands brother Jacob and his wife because their flight was delayed, so we got to the house around 3:30 am Sunday morning. But since we were still on west coast time mentally we weren't completely dead tired.
Sunday i finally got to meet husbands entire family. It was the first time the whole family had been together in 7 years, so it was a big deal for us all to be there together. I knew i married into a great family, but this trip reminded me how wonderful they really are. I couldn't ask for better in-laws. And the extended family (a few aunts & uncles and cousins) that rented another house down the street, were just as fun getting to know too.
We spent Sunday, not at church because it was so far away, but enjoying the beauty of the beautiful beach and playing in the ocean. Getting sunburned. Our house was right on the beach so we got to see an amazing view. Husband was able to take some great pictures up on the deck one night.
Everyone took turns making dinner every night. I can't think of a night where there wasn't great food. Husband and i made taco salad on our night. I will be posting the recipe for that soon because it seemed to go over fairly well.
There was an awesome Frozen Custard place that everyone stopped at. There were over 30 of us that walked in, and amazingly we didn't scare them into closing early.
The Parasailing turned out to be as great as i hoped it would be. We ended up with 12 of us all together that went, and we got a great deal on it. With so many of us they were going to take us up to 800 ft of rope at the 400 ft price, but the tuesday we set it all up for, they didn't show up. They had double booked, and they felt so bad for making us take the ferry to Ocracoke so early in the morning that they set us up for Thursday for 1/2 the price. It turned out to be a prettier day i thought, and it really was tons of fun. It wasn't half as scary as husband thought it would be, and we've decided the best way to describe is was that we now know how it feels to be a kite.
We took the chance to take tons of family picture. Husband had fun spending time with his brothers and all the guys playing games, and i enjoyed getting to know the sisters-in-law. The kids were so fun too. One of husbands nephews found me so many great shells on the beach, it was soo cute.
Overall, the vacation was a success. I can't wait until we can go back to the beach again!

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