Birthday Weekend

**WARNING: Very long post ahead!**

I logged into my Gmail account yesterday morning and had 88 new e-mails! Yikes! It was exciting and overwhelming at the same time. Of course, I hadn't logged into my e-mail all weekend and it was my birthday, so that explains most of the e-mails: Facebook notifying me someone wrote Happy Birthday on my wall. Regardless, it is still fun to feel popular.

So, speaking of my birthday, I just had the best birthday weekend ever!! It was so fun! Kory did an awesome job. This was my Golden birthday--turned 24 on the 24th, so the stakes were high :)

Friday night I got home from work to find a bouquet of roses on the table, surrounded by a delicious supper Kory had cooked for me! It was one of my very favorites--Alice Springs Chicken. It's a dish from Outback that Kory makes, but I actually like his version better. He made it in my brand new skillet/frying pan...not sure which it is because I'm not sure what the difference is. haha Anyhow, I'm pumped because I had a really crummy old one and this new pan is awesome!

We had mini eclairs for dessert which were incredible. I had an eclair our first day in Paris that was seriously the best dessert I've ever had in my life. These mini's were a pretty good replica! After dinner we rented The Invention of Lying. I didn't love it--basically the whole premise of the movie is that God/religion is the lie upon which all other lies are founded. There were funny moments, but it's not something I'd recommend.

Saturday morning, I got to sleep in and then Kory gave me my next gift. It was this super cool soccer ball. Although I loved it, I was a little confused about why I got that as a gift...he told me to look at the features on the back of the box and this note was attached:
In case you can't read it, it says, "Do you think the beaches at Bandon are nice enough to kick this around today?"

So we took a surprise trip to Bandon for the day! Bandon is a cute little tourist town over on the coast that I have been wanting to visit for a while now. The weather was so great! Everyone warned him that it would be cold and cloudy and rainy/windy, but it was sunny and almost warm. It was a beautiful day--especially to be January. I got REALLY sick on the way to Bandon. I think it was just car sickness but I have NEVER felt that bad in my entire life. I kept making Kory pull over so I could get out and walk around/see if I could rid myself of this sickness. When we arrived in Bandon, I started to feel a bit better until I got a whiff of all the fresh seafood and that made me even more nauseous! Kory had a delicious lunch:
and this was my gourmet meal:

Luckily the 7Up and crackers did the trick and I started feeling much better. We walked down to the water and then saw some huge waves crashing in the distance. We went off in search of the huge waves and found this awesome beach!

We had so much fun playing on the jetty, walking on the beach, climbing rocks and running away from the tide.

(There are a lot more pictures on my Facebook)

After we left the beach, we went back into town to look in some of the shops and see the sights. We spent quite a while in this cute little bookstore where I found this HILARIOUS book:

Even though I enjoy Twilight, this book made me laugh so much! I would have bought it but I already have several books I have started and not finished, so I don't need to add another one to the pile.

We also got some yummy fudge and went to sit down by the water to eat it and soak up some sunshine. We headed to Coos Bay next since we had dinner reservations there. It was closer than we realized, so we had some extra time to hang out there by the ocean as well. We went to Coos Bay one time last fall, and we found one of my all time favorites spots there. There is a place with hundreds of sea lions and seals that are laying on rocks, swimming around, playing with each other and being very entertaining. I just love watching them!! Supposedly you can see whales there too, but we haven't spotted any yet.

Dinner was at Benetti's, a fancy little Italian place in Coos Bay. We were feeling adventurous since it was a special occasion, so we both tried escargot! It was covered in garlic, so it wasn't that bad. I have never even seen it before, but this was definitely not what I was expecting. You put it on bread, so you really can't taste the snails at all, mostly because of the garlic. However, at one point I bit down on something crunchy (shell??) and I about lost it. If you aren't aware, I am not an adventurous eater and I have a very sensitive stomach (read: I throw up/gag really easily). Kory begged me not to cause a scene in this very nice restaurant, so it took everything within me to keep my calm on the outside while internally really wanting to throw up and gag and make disgusting sounds. I thought I did great--Kory said I did decent.

You got a free dessert for your birthday and we knew this because there had already been two birthdays that evening. Kory scored me a free dessert minus the singing, so that was great! It was SOO good! I wish I could remember what it was called...but just trust me, it was awesome.

We drove back to Myrtle Creek after dinner. Sunday morning we got up and went to church together. We only had a few kids in class so we treated them all to donuts. I got all the donut holes they had in the shop for my b-day! :) So yummy! The kids sang Happy Birthday to me...a bit rough sounding but very sweet. The preacher also decided the entire congregation should sing to me before services were over, so that was a good time :) It's great to be loved though, so I appreciate it.

I got my final gifts when we got home from lunch. I got a pair of Toms shoes from Kory and a new iPod Nano from my parents! I love them both and am so excited to use them :) I had a pretty lazy day on my actual birthday. We laid around and watched Food Network, Extreme Makeover, Man vs. Wild and What Women Want. So I ate and watched TV/Movies all afternoon and evening. That is my kind of day! Kabie cuddled with me on the couch during Extreme Makeover, which is a huge deal. We're trying to teach her to love people and to enjoy being held/cuddling, so it's exciting when she will do it and not run away from you. I like to think that was her birthday gift to me.

SO...if anyone actually made it through this entire post, you can see that I had a magnificent day! I'm excited about 24. I actually feel like a young adult--not a college student anymore. Not that anything in my life will really change, but I do feel older now!

Random Updates

I had two opportunities to make friends last weekend! Saturday morning Kory and I went to the county-wide gathering for Youth Ministers. There were quite a few people there who were in their 20's and are working in the area in youth ministry. I see definite friend potential there! The group will meet once per month so hopefully I can start building some relationships with a couple of the girls I saw there.

I also went to a Scentsy party at my supervisor's daughter's house. It was fun and I enjoyed the girls there, but they were all best friends from high school and weren't really my group of friends. They're almost all single moms and we just really didn't have much in common. I'm glad I went to the party but it was not really a success as far as establishing new friendships.

We took the teens inner tubing on Monday, but as soon as we arrived at the tubing hill, a tree fell over and knocked down the power line. I mean, we had been there like 5 minutes and we watched it spark and fly off the telephone line. So, they shut the tube hill down because you would slide down the hill right to the place the power line was sagging. I was SO bummed that we weren't going to get to inner tube! The teens found a sled buried in the snow and used it to slide down one of the side hills. They also had a snow fight, built a snow man and just played in the snow for a while. We had a great time even though we didn't get to tube as planned. There was a jump built at the bottom of the hill we were sledding on, so I video taped all the teens flying off the sled and slamming into the nearby hill. haha So maybe I'm not responsible enough to be a sponsor...I just made sure to zoom in on them as they were writhing in agony and pain.

Kory and I are going to begin attending the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace Seminar at our church starting in February. The church is paying for us to attend, so we'll be doing that every Monday for 2-3 months. I'm also going to start leading a Bible Study for our teens that want to go deeper in Scripture every Sunday night, so things are going to be quite busy for us.

Oh yeah--and I get to go to Seattle with the youth group for a Spring Break Mission Trip which I am REALLY excited about! I loved Spring Break campaigns in college and am pumped to be able to go on one again!

Exercising, Anniversaries and Football!

Like most people, I'm on this "getting in better shape kick" and I went running this weekend. Kory and I went together on Saturday, but he kicked my tail. His long legs make him much faster than me, in addition to the fact that I am WAY out of shape and couldn't make it very far at all. I went running again yesterday afternoon to try and get this habit going. I did MUCH better, but of course was by myself so no one could see that.

After running two days in a row, doing lunges and crunches in my living room and wearing high heels yesterday, my legs are KILLING me! I'm so sore and I have shin splints, which are extremely painful! Now I really want to keep running so I can work the soreness out and get in shape. The main problem is that it's always dark outside my work hours. I might get Kory to run with me tonight so it won't be so scary. Otherwise, I might just run laps around our apartment parking lot! haha He can just look out the window every once in a while to make sure I'm still going and haven't been abducted. (If you don't know, I'm really scared of the dark. Like a little kid but maybe worse. I hate it, even in my apartment when I'm alone...because how do I know I'm really alone??)

I was thinking today that if I am this sore after working out for 20-30 min for 2 days, I can't even begin to imagine how sore the people on The Biggest Loser are when the show first starts!! Those workouts are crazy intense--I bet they can hardly move and then they have to keep working out so hard-core! Plus they have so much weight to carry around and might not have worked out for years and years. I'm so impressed by them!

Last night, Kory and I went to dinner for our 2 year dating anniversary. There is a casino about 20 minutes from where we live and they have a really awesome, fancy restaurant we'd never been to before. The food was delicious!! It's pretty pricey, but the atmosphere and delicious food make it well worth it. We were the only people in the place too so we got great service and lots of attention! Tonight we're going back to the casino to see a comedian. We wanted to do dinner and a show on the same night, but the restaurant is only open on weekends and the comedian is only on Mondays, so we're having an extended celebration. We were SO full after dinner that we had no room for dessert last night. We'll go back and have dessert tonight before going to the show.

I did quite a bit of cooking this weekend. On Saturday, I got this wave of ambition and wanted to cook, so I have to take advantage of it when that feeling comes--it's not very often! I made Fettuccine Alfredo, African Peanut Soup and Pot Roast. The soup is for a staff luncheon at work that I'm co-hosting tomorrow. We have a staff luncheon each month and this month our theme is "New Year, New Recipes". Everyone is bringing a dish they have never made before, so this could be really fun or quite a disaster! haha The soup turned out well, but the peanut butter taste just overpowers everything else. It's still good, but I just wish you could taste the other stuff more and not just the peanut butter.

I hope that I won't have to cook this week because I can just reheat all the food that I have already cooked. I made the Pot Roast in the crock pot and it was delicious! It's only the second time I've used the crock pot, but I love it! When we got home from church Sunday and could smell the roast cooking, it was an awesome moment! Very nostalgic.

We're so excited the Cowboys won!! What a fun game to watch. Kory had some of my soup for dinner, which he claims was drugged, and he was asleep for the entire game--and the game started at 5:00 p.m. here! It was pretty funny though. As soon as he finished the soup, his eyelids were droopy and he was really fighting to stay awake. There aren't a lot of Cowboys fans here, but we can always log onto Facebook and get to share our Cowboys excitement with our Texas friends!

My Resolution

So I already told you about some spiritual disciplines I'm trying to improve on this year, but I have finally figured out what my Resolution will be for this year. It might take me a full year, so I am going to attempt to get started soon.

2010 is the year I will finally...make some friends here! I am passed the 6 month mark of living here, so I'm settled in with a job and apartment and routine for my life now. I have finally come to the realization that friends aren't going to just drop into my life. I'm going to have to make some effort. I really miss my friends from NM/TX but I can't keep living across the country only keeping in contact with them and not having friends here.

Believe me, I have a ton of excuses for why I can't make friends here: I live in a really small town; there are hardly any people my age around here; I work full-time with a lot of old people; young adults who have ambition/values/character typically get out of this town and move to Portland or Eugene; I live in one town and work in another which complicates things; I'm tired after working all day and want to just go home and relax/hang out with Kory...the list could go on and on. The problem is that I'm genuinely not happy without friends here. I plan to be here for a while, so I need to quit thinking of this as a temporary place I live. I am here to stay for a few years, at least.

Don't get me wrong, it isn't that I don't like the people currently in my life in Oregon. There are people at church and work that I enjoy being with, but the fact is there is no one who I meet with outside of work or church to build a relationship with or just hang out. I am currently trying to brainstorm ways I can meet friends.

If you have seen I Love You, Man then you understand the sort of predicament I am in! Instead of man dates, I'm guess I'm just trying to pick chicks up and go on friend dates :)

Any suggestions for how I can meet friends?!? The main problem I have is that I don't know where to go to even look for people to be-friend. Do I just walk through the grocery store and when I see someone I think I'd like, use a pick-up line and ask for her number?

I'm feeling quite lost. I've never had to seek out friends before. I guess it's always come naturally to me because I was in school and surrounded by people my own age. Friendships were pretty much handed to you in college and I graduated high school with the same people I started Kindergarten with 13 years before. So, here I am, opening myself up to rejection. I have a couple ideas for people I want to be friends with, so I'll report back to you on the friend search as it develops.

Football and Resolutions

National Championship tonight! Hook 'em Horns!! It starts at 5 on the West Coast, so I will have to rush out of work and get home so I don't miss too much of it.

It is now illegal to talk on your cell phone while driving in Oregon unless you use a wireless hands-free device. I still haven't got one...I probably need to get on that. I think it's a great law, but it's seriously annoying to me as someone who enjoys talking on the phone in the car. Yes I know it's dangerous and I would NEVER want to put my life or someone else's in danger...so I guess it's good they passed a law to make people like me be more careful.

I am not going to Lubbock for Master Follies this year...and I'm very sad about that. Two years in a row now! :( I can't believe I haven't been back since I have been out of college. Oh well--I suppose this is the price I pay for living in cool, far-away places. I care way less about seeing the shows than I do about seeing people.

We're taking the youth group inner tubing in a couple weeks and I am SO excited about it! I am not sure why, but I am beyond pumped. I know it will be fun, but I might be getting my hopes up a little too much. I do love playing in the snow and we haven't got ANY here, so maybe that is part of it. I never would have thought that Southeast NM and West Texas would get more snow than somewhere this far north. It's probably because we're so close to the coast I guess. I will get to wear some of my new super warm clothes to play in the snow too, so that is exciting.

The holidays continue for Kory and I! We have Christmas, New Years, 2 year anniversary, my birthday and Valentine's Day all within 8 weeks of each other.

Ty got me My Spanish Coach for the DS for Christmas and it's awesome! I feel like I'm learning a lot and it's pretty fun. My favorite is this game where you get to whack gophers on the head if they say the Spanish word you're looking for.

I think we're all aware that most of the time when we tell someone we are praying for them or we will pray for them, we actually don't. Ok, well I'll just speak for myself...I don't actually spend much time in prayer after saying that. I am really trying to work on that. I have good intentions when I say it--it's not that I want to lie and make them think I care when I really don't. I just forget about it and never remember it again to follow through with the prayers. So, two people have asked for my prayers this week, and I have prayed for both of them several times. So far, so good!

I'm also trying to read the Bible through this year and I have read every day so far (you only read 6 days a week). I realize we're barely a week into January, but I'm celebrating the small victories. I rarely make New Years Resolutions, but this year I decided this was a great time to start making some spiritual improvements in my life. If you feel bold enough, I would appreciate you asking me about these resolutions from time to time to keep me accountable. I will do the same for you if you'll tell me what improvements you're trying to make this year!