Let's Go

No really, let's go.

My bag is packed.

I have my ticket.

I just need to get through this work day and to the airport on time.

I have been so blessed to see almost all of my favorite people these past two weeks.

Now to end what was probably the worst year to date on a (hopefully) high note!

Grocery Shopping

Pretty sure Mom had a blast taking Marshall and me to Walmart and United with her.

We started the trip by me giving Marshall a piggy back ride to the car. He's about 6 inches taller than me, so it looked pretty ridiculous.

At Walmart we basically danced our way through the aisles. Mom just acted like she didn't notice.

While Marshall returned the cart I started to move the car to a closer spot for Mom (she was still in the store), so I had Marshall hop in while I was slow rolling at about 5mph.

When leaving United I went around to get in the front seat but Marshall decided to call shotgun and shove me out of the way. I tried to hold my ground and our scuffle ended up setting off the car alarm. Mom couldn't stop laughing long enough to let us in. Thanks mom.

When we weren't dancing and acting a fool I was constantly looping arms with him and hugging him. I think I'm driving him crazy, but there's nothing he can do about it. :)

A Love Like Allie & Noah

Is what I have with Donut Stop.

Extreme? Maybe. A little OTT? Ummm, have you met me? Then you shouldn't be surprised.

No, I don't literally write DS love letters, because that would be crazy. But I do miss it. Shipley's just doesn't compare. Part of that whole situation is the fact that no matter how early I go I can never get a fresh cherry donut. WTF Shipley's? Plus the flavor is a little off.

Whatever. The last three times I came home this year I wasn't able to schedule a donut date. But with the Christmas break, the time has finally come!
I had a wonderful reunion dinner with a few of my bests: Ashley, Kayla, & Kara. Followed by a sleepover at Kara's. Then a late morning donut date. Late because she sleeps forever. FOREVER!


Oh how I've missed you.

I told Kara that my trip to DS was like two lovers reuniting after being apart for a year, so it was likely to get NC17 up in there, so she should probably avert her eyes. Luckily Kara's been a BFF since HS so she doesn't judge when I say crazy things.

Also, how can she judge when having me take pictures like this:

And Can someone please explain to me why I look almost identical to my 16yr old dl picture?


**side note: went to the Sunray grocery store with Mom and she introduced me to someone she knew. The lady asked me if I was 17. Flattered, but no, I'm 25. Hopefully I'll look young forever!

She also recorded me singing my cherry donut a love song. Can you blame me? Look at those beauties.
It was A Thousand Years by Christina Perri with just a few alterations to the lyrics. The video is on fb, but I can't get it to save so I can post it here. But you are seriously missing out.

We also had some delicious donut holes. This are like little circles of heaven.

I can't wait for my next Donut Stop date with the girls later this week!

I Love Blizzards!

This kind:

Not that kind:

I only got one kind of blizzard this week, and unfortunately it wasn't from DQ.

Obviously it doesn't look too crazy And I really don't think it was. But it was crazy enough for my Dad to be called out to work (no, not to fix roofs), the highways to close, and us to be stuck in Sunray.

Stuck in Sunray isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's just that I've been in town since Friday and I haven't gotten to see my grandparents or Dad yet.

Dad said it was still too icy for me to hit the highways today, but Marsh and I plan to head to Dalhart around lunch tomorrow. If it's still too icy, then I'll throw him on my back Edward style and make a dash for it.

Yeah, I might be able to get about a block like that so I guess we'll have to take turns.

"I've Got Skills"

Not me. Please, that would be a lie.

That's what Dad would always say when Andrew and I would play basketball with him when we were little.
Pretty sure Dad always won. Always.

One of my fave memories that Andrew and I used to tease Dad about is when Dad was doing some fancy dribbling saying "I've got skills" and then he tripped.

For the last few years (probably more than a few, but I can't remember) Dad hosts a basketball night every wednesday and anyone can come play as long as they pay a dollar. He had invited me before, but I always passed because I don't have basketball coordination.

This holiday break I decided would be a good time to finally go, and I thought Marshall would have fun.

We were there for three hours and I only got to play one game. You have to shoot to make the team, and I couldn't make the 3 pointer my first 3 rounds of trying.

Being Larry's daughter did get me offers to join the team, but I didn't feel right about not earning it. Well, I finally earned my spot after the fourth game was over. During my game I managed to get the ball 3 times, panick all three times, get an elbow to the face, and have a 7th grade steal the ball from me. Yeah, still not cut out for the game.

After everyone left I played 21 with Dad and beat him. Probably for the first time ever.

Then Marsh wanted to play 1-on-1. It got a little rough. He basically connected his elbow with every part of my body: nose, chest, ribs, etc. Yeah, he beat me...literally. Maybe he was taking out his agression since I pointed out our matching outfits of black shorts and white v-neck tee's. We were so adorbs. :)

Waking Up A Teenager

is impossible!

It would probably be easier to raise someone from the dead than to wake up Marshall.

Last time I was here and was given the responsibility of waking him up he reassured me that it's not that difficult and that he'll get up at the set time. Yeah, that totes didn't happen!

I gave it another go this Sunday so we could go to church.

I tried the usual, shaking him, talking non stop, shoving his body into the bed so it kinda bounced him. I even ran and jumped on the side of the bed because Marsh moved closer to the wall because he thought I couldn't reach him then???

I then asked him if he wanted me to put ice on him. He wasn't too keen on that idea. What? I was just trying to be nice in case he liked that.

My final attempt was to plug in my ipod and sing to him until Earthquake came on. At that point I decided to have a 1 person flash mob. Wait, that's not really a flash mom due to the lack of mob right? But it was kinda flash since it wasn't planned and I dispersed when it was over.

Anyway, I was dancing in his room for a good 2min before he rolled over and looked at me like I was crazy. My response? "What, I'm just flash mobbing."

That did the trick. He ended up taking over the ipod and showed me which song he uses to wake up.

And with that, I cracked the code and will hopefully be more successful next time.

The Night Was Lit

11/11/11 - Energizer Light the Night 11k.

Kari, R, and I ran this together. Well, not together together since they are a tad faster than I am...but we rode together.

The race was pretty cool since it was at night and we all had these goofy head lights we are to wear. I accidentally had mine on upside down, whatever.

This was one of the first cold nights in Houston, so we decided to switch into our race shirts since they had long sleeves. We went to line up so we could do the warm up lead by the Energizer Bunny, but he didn't come out, so R started warming up even though we had about 45min until the start. He wanted his heart rate to already be at workout level when he started. I'm not sure if that was a good idea, but he was all about it.

When it was about 10min to race time Kari and I started warming up. Everyone was pretty spread out, so I started warming up my hips with some leg swings. When I took my leg back for the 5th one, i kicked a kid. Yeah, I'm the worst person in the world. I wasn't looking behind me because there had been space and I was doing then one after another, so I don't know why her mom walked her into my foot. I apologized and she looked scared to death.

Kari and Me before the race.

The Start time came and went without us starting. I was starting to get a little irritated because I was ready to get this over with! My legs had been giving me trouble, so the faster I got going, the faster I got going home! 15min after it was supposed to start they brought out the Energizer Bunny to lead a warm up. I yelled "Are you serious right now?" really loud and everyone around me turned and stared. That was kinda awkward, but seriously? It's not my fault that people didn't show up to the 4 other packet pickup times so they are holding us down now!

Anyway, once we got started I was able to get my endorphins flowing and I relaxed. It was cool to see all of the lights on peoples heads, and the bunny ears too. I didn't like that the course was two loops, and the same course we had ran our Monster Mash 15k on (three loops. kill me.). But I would def do it again.

It ended up being a pretty good run with my time being 1:01:04.

Toast Masters: The Jes Way

As previously mentioned, I joined because my manager thought it would be good for all of us.

I'm not really into making up fake speeches to practice for fun. I already did that, it's called college.

Anyway...My plan is to basically be a member forever with giving minimal speeches. I will do this by always volunteering for tasks each week and participating in table topics (when they don't ask lame questions about politics) so they feel like I'm giving speeches since they always see me in the front.

Good plan, right?

Oh, you don't think so. Well, it's working pretty good so far!

The first time I volunteered to be an evaluator we had a lot of no shows, so I was the only one. I won "Best Evaluator" by default. When they announced the awards, I did my best Taylor Swift shock face, then  accepted by saying something cheesy that I already forgot.

Source

This week I was the evaluator again, and had some competition. This time we voted and I won "Best" again. When it was announced, I promptly raised the roof, accepted with a handshake and a thank you to the group, then when I got back to my seat I dropped it on the table with a "boom." When Stacy and I left Toast Masters I told her that I probably looked like a sore winner. Oops. I'm really not, I just do that stuff for mine and Stacy's amusement. I probably won't win again.

I'll Be Seeing You

I dreamt about Andrew for the first time since he died.

I knew this would happen eventually and was scared because my dreams are vivid and usually feel real.

I was in the living room and I just knew he was there. He had some kid with him that he was trying to help with something. I kept hugging him and touching him every time he passed by and he kept looking at me like I was weird. In the dream I knew that he was going to die and that I couldn't change it or tell anyone, so I kept trying to figure out the date so I would know how much time I had left with him. I couldn't find it on my phone, I couldn't find a paper, and no one would tell me. So I just tried to stay calm and kept hugging him every chance I got.

This was my last dream of the night and it was still happening when my alarm went off, so I kept snoozing it for about an hour so I would have more time with Andrew. It really sucked when I finally woke up to realize that it had already happened and that I won't see him on earth again.

Andrew, Dad, Me. The last time I saw Andrew. March 2011.

Sometimes I forget it happened and I catch myself thinking about what to get him for his birthday next week and for Christmas and how fun it will be to have the whole family together at Christmas just like last year...only to realize the truth. He's gone, and he's not coming back. He has left this emptiness, this hole, inside of me that I think will always be there. When it gets too hard, I just try to think about how I don't have to worry about him anymore. I don't have to dread getting the call, because I already got it.

Cuteness of Christmas Past

OMG! Best present ever!

Because I effing love sheets!

Toast Masters - So You Can Be A Successful Wedding Crasher

Or according to Stacy that's why she wanted to join.

Source

Our boss suggested that we all join toastmasters as part of our career development. Errr....great! So Stacy, Marg, and I got ourselves to a meeting stat.

I'm going to be honest, as always, I was very skeptical when we showed up the first time. There were a handful of members: mostly men, and Dad age (by that I mean that were as old, or older, than my dad). It was kind of like nerd club. Whatevs. If you know me, you know I'll make the best of it. Everyone takes it so seriously that I can barely stand it! At the end each of the visitors had to share their thoughts and feelings on the meeting and club so far. Naturally, when it came to be my turn I was serious with a side of cheese ball. I said something about how I enjoyed the structure and the varied speech topics and even managed to work in the word of the day. I can't remember what it was, but it was a word that is already part of my vocabulary. P.S. What's up with that? When you have a word of the day that you are encouraged to use when you speak at the meeting, shouldn't it be challenging? I thought that maybe it was an off week and didn't hold it against them too much.

At our second meeting the Governor of Texas Toastmasters was there. (Seriously, they have a Governor? I know, I thought the same thing. He acted so official as if was literally the Governor of something more important.) When we were doing introductions a visitor announced that he would be joining that day. Totally stole my thunder because I was going to make my announcement at the end. So instead I worked it into my introduction that if things go well, then I might be interested in joining as well. I can't have them thinking they already have me on lock!

At the end when we have to go around and let the visitors give feedback I announced that "I would love to see this group exclusively* (clap, clap - yes, that was the word of the day) and am ready to join today." The members seemed pleased, not only is membership growing, but I had totally got on board with WOD. Yay! Right? WRONG! The governor pretty much slapped me in the face when he interjected that (in official governor voice) "Actually, we must vote in order for new members to join." Seriously? Yes, seriously. Do I really mind a vote? No. What I did mind is that when the guy in the beginning said he was joining the governor remained silent. Is this because he is a guy in his mid to late 30's? Is this because he could tell he too took this club wayyyy too seriously? Is this age discrimination because I'm in my mid 20s, super cute, cracked a few jokes, and was cheesy with my WOD usage? I think so. Whatevs. I got "yay-ed" in anyway. Suck on that, goves!

*Seriously? Exclusively is the WOD? Can you give me a freaking challenge here? Teach me how to duggie, don't teach me how to two step! (You already know that I took over WOD just like Hitler took over Russia)

Stacy & Margie decided to copy me join that day too. The chapter president told us that the treasurer would contact us that week about signing paperwork and paying dues.....except then he didn't! I seriously was beginning to think that they took another vote after we left and "nay-ed" us out! Paranoia def set in. Maybe it was my cheese ballness, maybe it was Stacy giving a 5 second response during table topics (you are supposed to talk for at least 1.5 min, but she apparently didn't listen to the instructions, oh my dear, sweet, Stacy.)

I will end the suspense now: they brought forms for us to fill out at the next meeting. Honestly, I think they might regret letting us join now...after watching me cheese ball it up a smidge, Stacy's hilarious answers, and both of us bringing the humor. They had no idea what they were in for! I understand it's serious and shiz, but they really need to lighten up, and we are helping them do just that!