First Day of Work...

He wouldn't let me get a full frontal, so this is J in a hurry (yeah right) to get out the door for his first day at work. Which turned out to be an exciting day of running from Building A to Building B to Building C and back again to fill out all sorts of paperwork.

But hey, it was more exciting that my day of running, walking, catching up on a little So You Think You Can Dance, and reading People magazine. I need a job.

Everything is OK.

We made it! Spent all day Thursday packing, cleaning, packing, and cleaning, and then hopped in the car (not without a quick trip to Red Robin -Yum!-) and headed west. And south. And believe me, we're south.

We of course needed to say goodbye to our house, and I left a lot of tears on the carpet for the carpet cleaners to get out. But once I got my crybaby tears out, we were ready for bigger and better things (or smaller, and more Air Force-y things, at least).



And as we were walking out to our car for the last time from our house, Colorado said goodbye to us.



NOW, we're on the road. I slept for the first portion (the expressway portion) and was woken up around 4:30am to drive my leg of the trip. The Kansas/Oklahoma, "We don't believe in highways" leg. It was long. But less boring than I thought it was (Thank you Jim Dale).

As we crossed into our now home state, we pulled out the must-have accessory...



Yes, mine is a homemade cowboy hat. J took my sunhat and safety pinned the sides up. You know you are jealous.

After J woke up, the drive was very quick. And then we were home. In Oklahoma. It's still weird to me. At least OK gave us a nice warm welcome. A 104 degree warm welcome.

So we made it! Stay tuned this week for a house tour... and maybe a few pictures of Calvin getting comfortable in our new home.

Kids Make Me Cry.

Look at these faces. Now imagine Gib (left) crying and telling you he "doesn't want Mallory and Jon to move to Oklahoma." And then Roxi (right) joins in the tear fest.

Who knew moving was this hard.

White Chocolate + Strawberry = Delicious

As you know, we are moving in two days (here is my advance apology for the lack of posts in the next week or so). We are working really hard to get rid of all the food in our refrigerator. And by that, I mean, eat all the food in our refrigerator. So, I made white chocolate covered strawberries.

It was easy, and delicious. I just followed the instructions on the bag of white chips to melt them.



And then I rolled the strawberries in there. And covered em up nice and good.



And then I served them to my friends. Now I want more.

Gray's Peak

We climbed a mountain. A 14,270 foot mountain. Actually, the highest point on the Continental Divide.

Those in the know call these kinds of peaks "14ers," as in 14,000 feet (or higher). There are 53 in total in Colorado. We have wanted to do one since we moved here. We attempted once, but both of us got sick the day before we hiked to base camp, so we missed the summit.

But we did it this time. With the company of our good friends Michael and Bob. The four of us made it to the tippy top, and all the way back down. All we needed was a little Gatorade, lots of water, and some delish trail mix.

So check it out. It was an awesome hike up. And when I say awesome, I say that because it is definitely something I can draw on when my marathon gets tough. It was hard. Steep. High. Quick. And all with little oxygen.



My though on why it is called "Gray's Peak" is because we were literally walking on rocks. Gray rocks. For a good portion of the hike.



We got to the top in just under 3 hours.





No, the clouds were not low that day. We were just very high.



And I won. I was KingQueen of the Mountain.



The hike back down would have been enjoyable had I'd held off on the liter of water and bottle of Gatorade at the top. But at least it was beautiful. (The red in this next picture is the first half of the trail. The easy half.)



On the way back down we found a mountain goat, some friends helped each other down, and we posed for a picture. It all kind of blurred together for me. I guess thats what a too-full bladder will do for you.









And so that is Grays. We're a little sore today, and were a lot tired last night, but it was worth it. Or so we think. Humans are crazy.

Busy, busy, busy!

First I would like to apologize for being somewhat absent on the blog this week. We've had a very busy week.

As you already know, Monday J commissioned into the AF. Afterwards, We went out to celebrate with some friends at our favorite pub in Fort Collins.

Then Tuesday, we went to WaterWorld, which is the largest (or so I'm told) water park in the US. Also, its top five in water conservation. And when its 101 degrees outside, all that water is wonderful.

Wednesday we went tubing down the Cache Le Poudre river. It was maybe a little too rapid-y for relaxing tubing, but it was definitely fun. We came out of it alive, which is saying something, as almost everyone had at least one gash in their body (but not me! or J!). It was so beautiful in the river canyon, perfect way to convince us we're crazy for moving to Oklahoma.

Yesterday was a bit more of a practical day. We had our car weighed at the Port of Entry so we get paid for everything we move to Oklahoma. Then J golfed and I shopped. Got a great new office chair (for $25, thank you T.J. Maxx).

On top of all that, I'm still training pretty hard, and we are working on getting ready for our big move! But we do have some exciting plans to climb a 14er (or a 14,000 foot mountain peak to those NOT in the know) this weekend, so get ready for pictures of that Monday!



Oh, did I mention we went to the zoo Sunday? Yes, we are trying to do everything we possibly can before we move and start real life.

I'm MARRIED!

To a 2nd Lieutenant in the United States Air Force!

You may think this is old news, but I promise, it is not. Today, my darling husband commissioned into the USAF. I could not be more proud of my LT.

It was a short and simple ceremony, and though I wish we could have had family there, it was wonderful.

















I'm so proud of my J. In his three short years of ROTC, he has earned countless awards, including the Commanders Excellence Award; he has been in command of half of his student detachment, and he has made me proud everyday at the life he has chosen to help, lead, and serve others.

House Tour!

And yes, I say "house" not "home." Unfortunately, I never got around to making this video until we had already taken all the charm and warmth out of our home. You see, we're moving in two weeks, so all the pictures are down from the walls and stored in our office. We have patched and painted the holes. It's as if we never lived here at all.

BUT all our furniture is still here, and I know lots of you are curious about the place we call home, so without further ado, our house:



And so there you have it! Once again, please forgive the lack of personality we've got going on right now. And sorry about the video quality. It was shot on my old Sony Cybershot. What do you think? Want to come over for dinner?

Colorado Sky

Since we are getting ready to move to Oklahoma (two weeks from today! And we finally have a house!) I decided to share some of the amazing pictures of the sky I have been taking the last few weeks. Note that none of these pictures have been edited, and I promise, I am not that good of a photographer. That is just the amazing Colorado sky.

(Okay, this one is from a few months ago, but still, amazing!)

I know after this post and this post, you may be getting sick of all the "We love Colorado" posts, but I just had to share these amazing pictures. What do you think? Awesome sky? It's definitely one of the things I think I am going to miss the most about Colorado.

A Place to Dine: Part II

Finally. I know I talked about this table a while ago, promising pictures of the finished project. Well, I have learned two things from this post.

First, never promise a post of a project until it is done. This took quite a bit longer than expected, due to weather, polyurethane issues, and life. Next time I promise a post for the next day/week, I will already have the project done.

Second, finishing wood takes a REALLY long time. Especially when its cottonwood season in Colorado. And its hot. And you can never tell when its going to start raining.

But, its done, and its moved in to our house. We even had dinner on it last night, but more about that later. First, lets do the grand reveal.

You remember the original table we got for free when we bought our chairs? If not, I'll jog your memory.



We gave it quite the makeover. But, before I show it to you, you have to make me a few promises. First, don't judge us for our chairs. They were J's and they were cheap. I am working on painting them all white right now. Second, I know we don't have any artwork in there. We did. I promise. A big black and white picture of a canal in Amsterdam. But we're moving. So don't hate. Third, we don't like the legs of the table either. We're working on it. Okay, so you promise? Check it out.

First, we gave it a coat of wood conditioner:



Next, we stained it about a million times (okay, maybe only 3 or 4) with Minwax Ebony:



Last, we poly-ed the heck out of that thing:



And then it was ready for eating:



And if you want a close up of that pretty wood grain:



Oh, and in case you wanted a close up of those beautiful flowers I got for my anniversary:



We will just pretend that luck had nothing to do with the fact that J picked out flowers JUST LIKE my bouquet from a year ago.



Oh, and wondering what our first dinner was on our brand new old table??



Anyway, what do you think??? It's taken us forever, which means I am SO excited to share this with ya'll, but that also means you cannot say anything bad about it. Isn't it beautiful?? Anyone else have some awesome furniture makeovers you want to share?

Independence Day

First of all, I hope everyone had a very wonderful Fourth of July. It's one of my favorite holidays, so we had a great day (even though the rain and 55 degree weather -what??- meant we missed the fireworks).

I thought in honor of our nations Independence Day, I would share a recent project I did for Duke to gain some independence. You see, right now he uses a crate. He sleeps there, he hangs out there while mom and dad leave the house, and sometimes he is "sent to his room" when he's bad. (Yes, I know this is not good training when concerning a crate, but we didn't start sending him there until he was older and already loved his crate.)

Well, when we move to Oklahoma, we're not sure if there will be anywhere in our house for his crate to go. This poses somewhat of a problem, as he considers his crate his very own room. So I had to come up with something else that could be just as special.

Duke was using Jon's old comforter for a bed. It was gross. It was old. It was ugly. So I did a simple slip cover for it. I even got a little fancy and put a zipper on one end so we can take the comforter out when cleaning. And, I made it pretty. Ready for this?



He was really excited to roll all over it to make sure everyone knew it was all his. Believe me, after that, I don't think anyone really wants to get too close to it. Which reminds me, we need to take Duke to get a bath...



So what do you think? It was an easy, 30 minute project on my sewing machine, but it made a world of difference. What do you do with your dog crate? Stick it in a closet? Only bring it out when you're going somewhere for a while? Don't even bother with one? Let me know, because I am open too any idea that will let us keep his crate, but hide it from public viewing.