Posted by: abi | March 9, 2010

working wife…

A lot of days I feel like I don’t get a lot done, but am too tired to want to do any of it after working all day.  Some days I don’t even have much energy to come up with anything for dinner and say “how about pancakes?” for dinner.  But today was one of those (somewhat rare) days where I actually felt like I got a decent amount done.

I got up and put away some clothes that I had washed the night before.  We had a pretty slow morning at work, so I looked up the recipe I was going to use for dinner on my blackberry and then came home and got it ready during my lunch break (I love living so close to my job that I can come home, eat, and still have time to do other things too!).  At lunch, I talked to husband and he said he needed to go to Walmart to get some drinks and supplies for the office – which translates to “we have to go to Walmart tonight” since he still can’t lift much because of his hip.  Fun.

When I got home from work, I put dinner in the oven, changed and then went for a walk while Andy was at PT.  It was such a nice day out today.  I got done walking and took dinner out of the oven.  We ate and chilled for a few minutes while watching the news (yep we’re exciting like that).  Went to Walmart and loaded in the cart 3 cases of water and 10 boxes of soda = very heavy cart that I had to push = upper body workout, yep definitely all about multi-tasking today.  When I asked husband why someone else at his office (someone who doesn’t have a broken hip maybe?) wasn’t getting all of the drinks, he said that he was the only one in the office anymore who had a card and authorization to purchase (since several of his co-workers have left recently).  Lucky us.  But he did say he would get some volunteers to help him unload it all at work tomorrow.  I grabbed some fruit that was on sale at Walmart and came home and did the dishes and had some fresh pineapple for dessert.  Yum.

Cleaning/laundry
Dinner waiting on husband
Exercise
Helping with Red Cross stuff


and now am watching LOST.  Good day.

Posted by: abi | March 5, 2010

thankful friday…

things I’m thankful for today….

  1. we’re both happy it’s Friday…amazing how much happier we wake up knowing we have the weekend to look forward to…yay!
  2. my blackberry: I love it for so many reasons, but recently was thankful for how much it helps me while going grocery shopping – I type in my list on it throughout the week (so I don’t forget things or forget to take the list I’ve worked on…I’ve definitely done that before!) and then use the calculator on it to keep a running total so I stick to my budget.
  3. our new car and getting better gas mileage now that husband is back to work.
  4. how happy Andy is to be back to work!  He really does enjoy his job (how many of us can say that?) and is so much happier and less frustrated now that he is able to work than he was for the months he had to be out of work.
  5. Sonic happy hour in the MORNING – on my way to work!  Andy pointed out the sign to me last week about how Sonic was starting to do a morning happy hour….so I made it a point to swing by there before work once….or twice already this week.
  6. my new women’s Bible study group…I had really been missing a group like this and am loving the new friends and fellowship as we pray with each other and study the Bible.
Posted by: abi | March 3, 2010

homemade tomato sauce….

I saw this really good looking tomato sauce (that also looked super easy) on smitten kitchen last week and decided to try making it for dinner last night.

tomato sauce with butter and onion

It was delicious!  (well Andy said that it was a little bland and could use some spices…I really liked it as it was though)

Tomato Sauce with Butter and Onions
Adapted from Marcela Hazan’s Essentials of Italian Cooking

Serves 4 as a main course; makes enough sauce to lightly coat most of a pound of spaghetti

28 ounces (800 grams) whole peeled tomatoes from a can (San Marzano, if you can find them)*
5 tablespoons (70 grams) unsalted butter
1 medium-sized yellow onion, peeled and halved
Salt to taste

Put the tomatoes, onion and butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Bring the sauce to a simmer then lower the heat to keep the sauce at a slow, steady simmer for about 45 minutes, or until droplets of fat float free of the tomatoes. Stir occasionally, crushing the tomatoes against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon. Remove from heat, discard the onion, add salt to taste (you might find, as I did, that your tomatoes came salted and that you didn’t need to add more) and keep warm while you prepare your pasta.

Serve with spaghetti, with or without grated parmesan cheese to pass.

Posted by: abi | February 28, 2010

nice relaxing weekend….

This was the first weekend in a while that we didn’t have much going on…Andy was quite happy to have nothing on the agenda except for taking several naps!  I didn’t mind too much either – good to have a break every now and then.

On Saturday we slept in then leisurely got up and got going.  We went and signed our new apartment lease for 6 months since we think that there is a good possibility that we may need to be moving sometime this summer.  We would rather be on

the safe side and go with the 6 mo. lease even if we don’t end up needing to move, then to have to try and get out of a year long lease if we do (it’s all still unknown, so we’ll let you know more details when we know anything definite).  Then we got some Sonic drinks and wandered around town a little before getting Andy a haircut.  Andy is getting around more and more easily these days and starting to walk around the house without his cane.  He is still doing physical therapy 2x per week and working on walking and strengthening his hip.

We came home and made some pizza and watched The Hangover – it wasn’t a great movie, but it was free (I had a free redbox code)….it was funny in that slapstick way I don’t usually like, but it was ok and Andy watched the whole movie so that was a plus!  The plot was like a trainwreck – you just had to keep watching to see how much further they would take the ridiculousness.

Today we went to church, lunch and then came home and chilled for a bit.  I did some more accident paperwork and filing (it’s still a never-ending job) and a little cleaning.  Andy came out grocery shopping with me, but even with him along, we stuck to our list and spent a few cents under the amount I planned to spend (and all this was at Walmart where we usually find more that we “need” besides groceries) – score!

And that was our exciting weekend.  This week and weekend will be a little busier for both of us, but not too bad.

Posted by: abi | February 21, 2010

this weekend…

…was gorgeous (weather-wise) and a lot of fun!

It was soo nice outside this weekend!  Sunny and 60 degrees!  Finally no snow or rain….hopefully spring is on its way.  On Saturday, Andy’s sister and step-sister came down to visit.  We had lunch and then wandered around our little downtown area (well, the girls did – Andy went home after lunch and took his Saturday afternoon nap).  We had a good time shopping and bought some art and jewelry by local artisans at a fun coffee shop, some chico bags at the recycled goods store, and taste-tested and bought some wine at our wine bar.  Then we came back, had dinner with Andy, and the sister-in-laws headed home.  We were so glad they were able to come visit and glad we had such a pretty day to enjoy together.

Today we heard a really good Presbyterian missions guy speak at church about being a “real church” – he was one of the best missions speakers I’ve heard in a long time – maybe ever.  Then we went out to lunch with some new friends from church and enjoyed getting to know them better.  After lunch we had to head straight to Bragg to go to lead a Red Cross Youth activity – we were taking the youth to deliver cookies to the patients at the military hospital on base.  We had a good turnout of the youth and most of them brought homemade cookies to deliver – they did an awesome job and it was neat to see them enjoying serving others so much.  Andy said he was reminded of why he loves working with the American Red Cross today.

To top off a great weekend, we made a quick trip to Target on the way home.  (I love Target, but don’t have one here in our little town)

Hope everyone else had a good weekend and enjoyed some nice weather (finally!)

Posted by: abi | February 21, 2010

last weekend…

…was snowy and adventure-filled.

We had planned on going to Georgia to see Andy’s mother and grandmother, but weren’t sure when we heard about the bad storm hitting Georgia and traveling north on Friday night just as we would be going south.  We texted back and forth all day at work trying to decide whether or not we should still go.  We really wanted to since we hadn’t been down to see them in a long time and had the long weekend off to go.  When I got home from work on Friday night, we listened to the news one more time and decided we’d be ok driving in what the weatherman said would be a “northern wet snow” – no ice.  After all, my family up in Baltimore had been getting snow 3 feet deep!  Our inch or two would be nothing.  So we started out….and the snow got heavier and heavier.  The roads weren’t icy but it wasn’t that great driving with the wind and snow.  We stopped for dinner and took this picture:

It was still ok since we both felt fairly comfortable driving in snow and were just taking it slow.  But there were a lot of people who didn’t know how to drive in it.  We saw cars in the ditches for miles.  And by then we were getting tired and not making any progress so we stopped in Charlotte (it would normally take us about 2 1/2 hours to get to Charlotte…this time it took 4 1/2) and got a hotel room for the night.

Things looked a lot better in the morning and we started out on a big highway that was nice and plowed.  The rest of the snow we saw melted all day long and all of the roads were fine.  Andy had been doing a great job driving in the morning, but the trucks and the busy-ness of the highway started getting to him and he let me drive the rest of the way.  We got to his mother’s house after lunch and were glad to finally make it – the driving was a bit stressful and wore me out.

We had a great visit with his mother and grandmother and even got to see Andy’s cousin, Mark, (who Andy hadn’t seen in years) and meet his wife, Jen, and their son Connor.  We were so glad we made it down there for a quick visit, despite the crazy weather!  Thanks to Andy’s family for having us visit and everything you both did to make it a great time!

Posted by: abi | February 11, 2010

happy valentine’s day…

I got myself an early Valentine’s Day present.  This fun shirt:

I got it in the mail a few days ago and really like it.  The best part is that this isn’t only for me, but it also gives the gift of a pair of (much needed) shoes and a shirt to an orphan in Ethiopia.  I heard about this site and all that they are doing and wanted to show my little bit of support.  These shirts were only sold for a limited time before Valentine’s day, but it looks like they are going to be having a few other shirts for sale soon and it’s a great site to check out.

Hope everyone has a good weekend and a nice Valentine’s Day.  It is a long weekend for us (we’re off on Monday for President’s Day) and we’re looking forward to it.  We’re going to be spending it the weekend with some people we love and haven’t seen in way too long.

Posted by: abi | February 3, 2010

it’s been 3 months….

…since Andy’s accident on Nov. 3rd.  And yesterday he finally went back into the office for work, driving the 45 min. drive alone.  He had no problems driving and said everything felt fine being back in the office.  We’re both really happy and looking forward to him starting back full-time next week (this week he is doing part time still to get used to being in the office and make sure his leg can tolerate everything).

(and I kinda like having my space back in the mornings to get ready after he leaves for work….I’ve missed my slow waking up time with no one around!)

It’s been a long 3 months, but it’s starting to feel like life is getting back to normal for us.

Posted by: abi | January 31, 2010

andy’s appt. and the snow…

Andy’s appointment on Thursday at Duke went well.  They took more x-rays and the doctor gave Andy the go ahead to take off the air cast he had been wearing since the foot was healing up.  And this also meant that the doctor said it was ok for Andy to start driving again!  We were both really excited about this since it means that Andy will be able to start going in to work again soon.  The doctor also talked to us a little about Andy’s hip and said that it was healing as expected and we’d still have to wait and see…but things are looking good.  Andy will be walking with a cane and doing more PT for 6 more weeks at least.  So it was a good visit and I drove part of the way home and then Andy drove a little bit too down a familiar straight road.  He drove around a little more on Friday to get used to things again and said that it felt good.  He had been working with the PT a lot on moving his ankle and putting more pressure on it, which he said had been helping him to feel comfortable with being able to accelerate and brake and all.

This weekend the big storm hit North Carolina…but we were lucky enough to be south of most of the snow.  We only got an inch or so and some ice.  Things are still pretty shut down around here since people are nervous to drive with the ice and church was cancelled.  So we spent the weekend inside and I got caught up on a lot of cleaning/organizing that I had been needing to get to for a while.  Andy did venture outside and cleared off the cars a little bit for us.  He was out there before I realized it and navigated the ice ok.  It was nice of him to make sure the car was cleaned off for me since I’ll be heading to work tomorrow and hate the snow!  He was supposed to be trying to head into work tomorrow too, but his boss already called and told him not to worry about trying to drive in for the first time with the ice.  Here’s a picture I got of Andy when I realized he was outside:

Hope everyone had a good weekend!

Posted by: abi | January 27, 2010

not much news…yet…

It took me quite a while to get over being sick….I am finally feeling better. I got some antibiotics towards the weekend to get over everything.

On Saturday, we had a CPR class scheduled for the youth. It was a long day and I still wasn’t feeling great so I just dropped Andy off and he completed his CPR recertification with the youth. And that was pretty much our weekend…long day in Fayetteville on Saturday and resting and recovering.

Andy is doing really well in therapy and is using a cane almost all of the time to get around. His PT also thinks his foot is pretty much healed and she has him stretching it and walking a little without the aircast. We have a doctor’s appointment at Duke tomorrow and we are hoping for good news that things are healing well…and that he will be cleared to start driving again! We are both really ready for him to be able to get around on his own and get more back to “normal”.

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