A little late..

HAPPY THANKSGIVING! I know that it's already Tuesday, but better late than never. I had an exhuasting holiday weekend filled with work, work, and more work all while the hubby had 4 days off! Major bummer since I didn't get to spend the hoiday with my family back in Minnesota OR my husband! Better luck next year I suppose.

We both were having a really bad day last Friday, but he amazingly found a way to turn it all around. When I got home from work he had all the candles lit in our livingroom, kitchen, and dining room, with a bottle of wine sitting out on the table along side the two holiday wine glasses that he bought me a few weeks ago. He proceeded to let me vent about my bad day while giving me a foot massage. Then he took me out for a late dinner and gave me a back rub while we watched a movie before bed. He is so good to me :)

With all that work, it meant no time for black friday shopping either. On the other hand, I was a little bit terrified of going shopping by myself out in California. Out here it's a matter of life and death trying to get through the doors (literally, one security guard was trampled to death last year!). Looks like it'll be a more relaxed year anyways so I'm excited. My latest search this year is for the Clint Eastwood 35 year 35 movie collection for Bryan. It's the only thing he said he wanted, but if you've seen this thing, it's priced at almost $200!!!! Even on Ebay it's not cheap! If I can find it under $130 I'll be exstatic.

Next on my list of things to do is to decorate the apartment before I leave (which is in 8 days!) and spend as much time with my husband as I can! Hope everyone found some great deals if they went black friday shopping. Can't wait to see everyone in about a week and a half. Love and miss you all!

It's a good news and bad news kinda week!

It's gotten a little chilly here, but nothing below 50 degrees. It's makes me giggle a little bit when I see that St. Cloud has a high of 18!!! It really hit me this morning that I'm leaving here in like two weeks! I have four more days left of work. The good news is that it means more money coming in. The bad news is that of those four shifts: 2 of them are 9 hr shifts and one of them is on Thanksgiving day-who does that :(. Bryan has most of this week off and then he goes back to working the night shift next week. Bad news is that means that I won't be getting to see much of him during my week off. Good news, he's going to have Friday and Saturday off next week, and I have time this week and next week to finish all of my papers and tests before finals week!

Next semester is already proving to be a complete disaster. Out of the two classes that I needed to graduate, I was only able to get into one. The good news is that it's my senior capstone, the bad news is that if I only take that one class then I won't even be considered as part time so I have to take another pointless class if I want to still get my financial aid. Crappy!

I found out that one of my really good high school friends is flying out to Cali to come spend a little time with me and the hubby out here and then she is going to drive with me back to MN. The bad news is that she recently lost her phone and so now I can't get ahold of her since she only checks her facebook like once a week or less.

Another good news is that I've been looking for a place for Bryan and I to rent for when he get's out and then I plan to join him later. I found this amazing 3 bedroom, two story house to rent in Topeka for only $590 a month! The bad news is that I don't know if they'll be willing to hold it until Bryan moves in in January! Please say a prayer or two that that one works out. It's exactly what we're looking for!

Lastly, Bryan and I have finally set a date for our re-wedding in Kansas next year on June 4, 2011. We're excited to have all of our friends and family together and to do all of the fun wedding things most normal people do. The good news is that I have tons of help from great people helping me out, the bad news is that I don't know exactly how we're going to cut enough costs to pay for it completely by ourselves. This should be interesting.

Hopefully I've had enough good and bad news to off set any of your bad news for the week :P Remember to think about the positives in your life, they make the negatives seem slightly more insignificant.

Sweet life

Told you it would be awhile til my next post. Life has been sunny and cooperating (for a change) here in Fallbrook. Work has been going pretty well, although I have had to call in sick the past couple of days which didn't make them very happy. I'm on day #6 of battling my strep throat, ugh! I've been on a fairly liquid diet for the past week almost and it sucks! On the plus side I think I've lost a few pounds :) Always looking on the bright side of things.

The 235th Marine Birthday Ball was a blast! It was held at the Herrah's casino in Valley Center, CA. There were free kegs so the guys were pretty much set for the entire evening. The ceremony didn't seem quite as long as I thought it was going to be. I decided to wear my same black dress from the previous dine-in since this was going to be with a completely new unit. I did my own hair and called it good. The food was great and the birthday cake was AMAZING! After drinking, gambling, and gas to and from the event, we made it out of there only spending $15 so I was veeerrryyyy happy!

I've learned something amazing about my husband recently, he loves Barns and Noble and Pier 1!!! Oh my gosh there is a God! Lol! He bought me this adorable tea light holder with three penguines stacked on top of each other and two wine glasses with two ribbons of red glass swirled down the sides. After that we went to the mall to go shopping for me! He took me out for dinner in Oceanside, then to the liquor store and picked up two bottles of my favorite wine. We came home, rented some redbox movies, drank wine, and ate ice cream until we fell asleep. Needless to say, this man knows how to make me EXTREMELY happy! (See they can be taught :P jk).

One bummer to this past weekend was that I was supposed to be in MN for my girlfriends bridal showers (one of which I was supposed to co-host!) but I wasn't able to get the time off of work. Although on top of it all, I ended up getting sick with strep so I couldn't work and wouldn't have been able to go to the showers either after all. To top it off I found out that MN has started to get snow!!! ICK!

But with all of this wedding talk floating around my head I decided that I had better kick my butt into gear and start finally officially planning my re-wedding for this next summer. The date has been set for June 4th 2011 (4 days before our 1 yr anniversary) at his aunt Sherian's in Auburn, KS. It'll be a short wedding with a relaxed reception following. We just want everyone to come and have a good time and have it be more like a family bbq than a formal event. Lucky for me, Bryan's sister has so graciously offered to help me out with all of the planning on the KS end of things. It takes a huge load off of my shoulders and helps me focus on the other little details that I need to start hankering down. Invites should be sent out around the middle of April next year. I'm so excited and can't wait to finally meet everyone and have both families together for the first time!

Thanks for sticking in there and reading all the way through this one. Kinda blah I know, but hey, now your up to speed :) Hope everyone is staying warm and remember rule #32 Enjoy the little things!

One long year & one rough week

I don't know about you but I just cannot get over the fact that it's already November and I'm hearing Chrismas music!!! For the first time in my life, I have been blessed to be able to skip the beginning of the fearful fall/winter weather and am still enjoying 90 degree days here in sunny California (yes, this is the part where I'm sure everyone would like to throw mushy fruit at me).

It's been a rough past couple of weeks. Last Tuesday on October 26th marked the one year anniversary of the terrible accident that happened back in Afghanistan for Bryan's previous HMLA-169 unit. He lost his best friend, Greg Fleury, along with 3 others that were important to him. He's tried to recall the event for me numerous times but he can only get so far in the story before he just can't deal with it anymore. It kills me to see him in pain or hurting and know that I can do nothing about it. To celebrate the lives of the 4 men, a bunch of the 169 Vipers (their units name) got together and had dinner at Fleury's favorite restaurant, Olive Garden. Many of them that day remembered Greg by pouring themselves one of his favorite drinks, the "Fleury Cocktail", which consists of Cranberry Juice and Raspberry Vodka. Bryan and I had ours and they were bitter sweet in every way.

At dinner everyone shared a lot of laughs, a few tears, and the bond that glued each of them together was stronger than ever. This bond that they form and share between them, I have come to realize, is something that exceeds what one may share with a best friend or even your closest family member. It can't be broken by outside influences and it lasts forever. It's almost scary to see and know to what lengths they would go for each other.

In 8 days this bond will be even stronger as the entire HMLA 267 unit gets dressed up for the Marine Corps Birthday Ball. This is the big one that everyone usually goes all out for every year. I'm almost more nervous for this one because it's a whole new unit and I will know even less people! This time it's at a casino in northern San Diego, but I'm not sure if the casino is prepared for what's going to hit them! These guys get absolutely CRRAAAAAAZZZYYY!!! I went dress shopping last week and found one that I liked, but after a few conversations with some of the seasoned wives, I've realized that I'm going to have to go a bit more formal for this than originally planned. Tomorrow I'm off to go dress shopping (by myself as usual) and hopefully I'll find something that'll work :)

Another reason why I haven't posted in so long is because I FINALLY got a job! I know that I'm only going to be out here for another month or so, but it's definitely worth it. I'm now a coffee barista at the Starbucks across the street from our apartment. It's ridiculously busy and I've only been doing drinks for a week now but I can make you the best frapuccino you've ever had! The best part is that I get paid every week and I get tips! It's nothing too crazy, but hey it's always better than nothing.

I'm sure it will be a little bit before I post again as I'm playing catch up with school. Since I started my job I've kinda been slacking in the educational department, oops! That and Bryan and I are going to be doing lots of touristy sight seeing in the next couple of weeks trying to spend as much time together as we can before I have to head back to MN. It's getting harder and harder to think about having to leave him again. I can't wait for the day when our long distance relationship is finally over and we can live like a some-what normal married couple. I hope that everyone is having a great week and that they have someone special to cuddle up to to stay warm back in MN. Love and miss you all!