December Happenings....

A lot has happened in the month of December... first things first.... we had a party with our small group the first weekend of December. Then the next weekend, December 13th we headed to Marion, AR for Curtis & Jessica's wedding. This is Zach's best friend from college and he was honored to be a groomsman in the wedding. We were able to go up on Thursday so that Zach could spend some much needed time with the boys. Friday night was the rehearsal dinner at The Cedars there in Marion.

Mark, Curtis, Andy and Zach at the rehearsal dinner.

Jess and Curtis during story time.

Zach's parents were servers at the rehearsal dinner... they were also glad to be a part of the big day. Curtis is like a 4th son to them.

Zach & I, these pictures are hard to come by. ;)

Then Saturday was the big day for the wedding... it was a beatiful occasion made to be like a day in a Tuscan village. Jessica looked beautiful... as you can see.

I wasn't sitting very close at the wedding... here they exchange their vows.

The classic pic of Zach and Curtis

Jessica and me... she towers over me, as do most people.

The beautiful bride's cake... blue was her color.

This is what Curtis' truck will look like someday... currently being restored.

And our Christmas card pic... I definitely waited to the last minute to take a Christmas pic. It's not very often that I get a pic of Zach in a tux though, so I felt it was definitely appropriate.

The get-a-way car... Jessica's dad's hot rod.

The boys were allowed to touch the car... so we put a sign in the back window.

Don't these boys look like they are up to no good?!?

Curtis and Jess being pelted with bird seed. It was everywhere... the guy who cleaned it up wasn't very happy. ;-)

And finally... off to Mexico with some Mountain Dew cans in tow.

Came home from the wedding and I had four days of work left until the New Year. A much needed vacay. The week after the wedding... Zach and I celebrated 3 years of marriage on December 17th. To celebrate, Zach and had a fabulous dinner at Trader Vic's and stayed a swanky boutique Hotel Palomar. My sister hooked us up with a great deal because the company she works for owns the hotel. It was an amazing night... no presents exchanged just a wonderful night on the town. ;-)

Me and the Rickshaw at Trader Vic's

Outside the doors at Trader Vic's. We had an amazing dinner... practically private dining. I even tried a Mai Tai because they are known for originating that drink. ;-)

The is the tree that was in the hotel lobby. It was huge and real and sprayed red. It faked me out for sure, but it was beautiful.

Our room... which we were upgraded to.... I want a bed like this so bad.

The sitting area in the room... can't say that we used it, but it looked pretty.

There was even a goldfish in our room. Throughout the night I keep hearing little bubbles... it was the fish. How perfect for a swanky hotel.

And one of the best parts of the stay... a personalized note with complimentary fruit and Fiji water. I'm sure glad that they gave this to us, so we wouldn't have to break into the mini bar. After our stay at the hotel, we made a day of Christmas shopping on our anniversary. It had to get done sometime and it was perfect because I had the day off. I ended the day with a trip to the doctor... the crud had overcome me and I got it taken care of. ;-) It was a very HAPPY 3 YEAR ANNIVERSARY!

And I must end this post with some of our Christmas decor...
Kinda blurry, but all of our ornaments are red, silver or white. Love it!


I had to show Bailey's perch... it's her favorite place because she can see well out the front window all the way to the back window. She loves it being able to watch the squirrels.
My little tree at the entry way with two of my penguins.

And finally, my newest penguin. I got him at the little store down the street from Zach's house in Marion. Love it!

I went to a books and brunch at Shevawn's house last weekend, then Zach and I went to the PowerFM Christmas party last Saturday night. Last Sunday, we celebrated Christmas with my family. And we just returned from our final Christmas celebration yesterday. We spent three days in Marion with Zach's family. Good times had by all! We are glad to be home, but we are thankful to have been able to spend time with family during the holidays. Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas! Looking forward to a great 2009!

A recap...

The past week and a half has been crazy busy around the Shirley household. Let's start with last Friday... since Zach had that evening off, we arranged for our twice annual Dave & Buster's night with our friends. The small group minus two couples, plus my friend, Kristin and her boyfriend, Luke all went out to eat and play games. There were 12 in all... the largest group that I have treated with my blue card. I'm so thankful for these wonderful friends and I'm also very thankful for the means to be able to treat them to a special night.

Shevawn & Sarah (with Baby Girl Kirksey) playing Skee-Ball.

Zach beating everyone else at Daytona racing.

Holly, me, Sarah and Shevawn... (I feel like I stand out in this pic, oh well.)


I think that Angela actually beat all the boys in this race... GO ANGELA!

A good time was had by all and we'll do it again in the spring hopefully!


So then a week went by... I was crazy busy at work last week with getting the financials ready and getting the auditors what they needed. I still made time to workout twice last week which I was thankful for. Then Saturday morning, the girls made a day of shopping, movies and fun... it all started with this....


We went to the Chi Omega Christmas Market at the Dallas Convention Center and spent about 4 hours shopping. I would compare it to Canton, but there wasn't as much homemade stuff there as there is at Canton. There were lots of Boutiques on display as well as more Christmas stuff than you can imagine. I had a hard time thinking of stuff that would be good for other people because I am best at shopping off a list, but I did get a few stocking stuffers. I also came away with this really cute lunch bag and a couple of ornaments for our tree. All in all - a very good experience that I would go to again. So we left the market at 2pm... so that we could make it to our afternoon matinee for this movie....


A great book I might add, but the movie left me a little bit dissatisfied. I have to give them credit the writers had to adapt a 500 page book to fit into 120 minute movie. They took a few liberties in doing so and I would say that they left out some pivotal relationships that were in the book, but overall it was good. They matched the characters very well, except for Eric who I never pictured to be Asian, but that's ok. I would recommend the movie, but not without having first read the book. Always read the books before any movie made after a book!

After spending the day, shopping and going to the movie... we came back to the McSpadden's house to have a night of "Wii are Thankful!" Thanks to the McSpadden's, we had a great non-Thanksgiving meal of Fajitas with all the fixings. We played the Wii to our hearts content (especially the game noted above, Rayman Raving Rabbids 2) and we also flipped the very sad Tech vs OU game. A great end to a very long day. So worth it! Now it's time to begin the Christmas decorating and pie making. So in order to get in that mood, we made a fire on Sunday afternoon. The first fire of the season. As you can tell Bailey enjoyed the warmth while sitting on her pillow. We're holding out turning the heat on in this house, so until we do the fires in the fireplace will keep us warm. ;)


Along with Christmas decorating, projects always come in the Shirley household. The latest project is redoing the landing at the top of the stairs. Back in the summer, Zach found flooring that was being clearanced that matched our downstairs perfectly, so he bought everything that they had. Here was the landing when we first moved in...

Here's the work in process to make it very pretty. We will stain the stair tread to match the flooring. We'll also install a facing on the stair and paint it white... this will eventually be done to the whole staircase, but we have to start small and we also have to save our pennies. It's gonna look so nice when it's done. And once that is finished we'll start on the next project, tiling the guest bathroom and laundry room. More posts about that once the project is started.Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving! Eat lots of Turkey!

October come and gone...

On the weekend of October 18th, Zach and I went on our first camping trip together. The McSpadden's and the Hindman's arranged for a small group camping trip at Lake Ray Roberts State Park. We went up on Friday night and everything was already set up for us. Mark and Jason had set up the tents on Thursday and claimed a great spot for us. The site that we were at was a walk-in site, so we had to carry all our stuffs in. There was no water or electric hookup there in the walk-in site, but we had everything we needed. It was the first time for me to ever go camping where I had to sleep in a tent on the ground. Overall, it was a great experience and I would do it again in a heart beat. ;)


The camping crew: Angela, Jason, Issac, Tyson, Helen, Sarah, Mark, Shevawn, Myko, Zach me, and Bailey.Our main campsite


Our tent provided by The McSpaddens: Keith & Kim that is. Thanks!


Bailey's spot most of the weekend.


Myko's spot most of the weekend.



Helen had a blast.
Tyson & Mark trying to decide how to attack the bee bait below.


There were so many bees we set this little trap, but we didn't set it far enough away from our campsite. They just kept trying to attack our food.

The sunset over Lake Ray Roberts!


And when we got home, we crashed... a nice hot shower and a 3 hour nap followed a great weekend of camping!


On Friday, Halloween... the accounting department decided to have a slumber party. It was had to get everyone to participate... but here's some who did.
We decided that if you didn't want to wear your pjs to work, you could just wear crazy slippers. So this is what we got... it was a good day. After work, I did some volunteer time at PowerFM answering the phones during share-a-thon. Then I came home and dressed Bailey up for Halloween to hand out candy to the kiddos.

This is what Bailey wore most of the night... her lucky tshirt from Old Navy.


I put her dragon costumer on her and she just stood there as still as a statue for about 5 minutes. It was pure torture for her, so I didn't make her wear it. But she looked so darn cute!

This year was the first year to pass out candy at our house... it was a good turnout. We probably had about 40-50 kids. A lot more than other people have had. Happy Halloween... now on to a month of Thanksgivings!