Being Thankful for My Health...

I'm never one to really consciously be thankful for being healthy. I know I know I should be, and believe me from now on I will make more of an effort. This past week is the sickest I think I have ever been (not even being dramatic...I know that's hard to believe coming from me :) )... So I am thankful that I am feeling better I wouldn't say I'm feeling healthy yet, but I am at least feeling a little better, and I'm thankful that no one around me has gotten sick (yet!)...

God, Thank you for using this week to demonstrate to me how important health is and what a gift it is that you give to us. Thank you for giving me examples of health this week in protecting those around me from getting sick. Lord thank you for who you are in my life and in the lives of those around me...

And the crowd goes wild...

Since Chris won't give his reinterpretation of this story on Emily's blog I'm gonna step in and give my "Apul" version. I was sitting down in the stands during half time of the BRD (blue ridge district) Tournament Championship basketball game between Byrd and LB when all of a sudden a hush falls over the gym. "What could be going on?", I ask myself. Then I turn my attention down to the court and there is little Sam Dowdy with his little basketball "shootin hoops". Then all at once he runs down towards the other end where the student sections are, and the ENTIRE crowd chants "coast to coast, coast to coast, coast to coast". He looks at the LB students they go crazy, he looks at the Byrd students they go nuts...He throws the ball up approx. 3 feet in the air and I'm not kidding when I say this people, the crowd goes freakin WILD!!! And when I mean crowd I mean EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN THE GYM!!! The next chant from the students section was "he's a freshman, he's a freshman, he's a freshman" hahaha I was lovin it. But, I do have to say the best part of the whole scene was at the end when Chris got boo'ed because he picked Sam up when the teams were running back onto the court. Love it!

Okay, Okay 25 things...

I've been tagged by approx. a million people to write down 25 random things about myself on the ever popular facebook, but because I think writing notes on facebook is kind of weird, I'll do this on here and for some reason that will make it less weird. Also, don't feel obligated to waste your time reading this...I wouldn't.

1. The most embarrassing thing to ever happen to me occurred last spring on the way to the DMB concert when I literally backed my car out of the garage with the door still down ...that wasn't an expensive mistake...

2. My favorite time of the whole day is when I get to cuddle up beside Brad in bed. Not only do I love this time because it makes me warm in our 64 degree house, but because it makes being married feel real to me.

3. My favorite holiday is Thanksgiving.

4. I want nothing more than to answer God's call for my life when I graduate, but I'm having a really hard time figuring out what that is.

5. I drive around with the gas light on in my car probably 60% of the time. It doesn't bother me, for some odd reason I'm confident I'll never run out of gas.

6. I'm scared of death, I mean really really scared of it...I know its dumb because I know without a doubt where I'm going when I die, but I'm scared. Probably because of the unknown...I'm scared of clowns too...

7. I have a huge family and I love it.

8. I LOVE bubble baths

9. HGTV is my favorite channel I love to watch it and say "Hey Brad, look one day when we have money I'll make our house look like that!"

10. I want my own boat.

11. Smith Mountain Lake is my favorite place in the entire world.

12. My little brother is one of my best friends.

13. If I could live in any state I would pick Georgia...or maybe South Carolina...Charleston sounds nice...

14. I'm a list maker, and everything must be crossed off before it goes in the trash...well actually the recycling, not the trash :)

15. I actually like the 45 minute drive from Roanoke to Blacksburg 3 days a week.

16. I love coming home to someone who is excited to see me, and by someone I mean Lucy :)

17. I love reading.

18. I can't wait to be a Virginia Tech Alumni, I just like the sound of it. And on a side note i LOVE Virginia Tech, like seriously love affair people!!

19. I know middle schoolers are supposed to be annoying, but I love the time I spend "student teaching" at the middle school.

20. I terribly miss playing soccer and volleyball, and think I might want to coach someday, maybe.

21. I can run longer, farther, and harder when I am listening to worship music...AND I've just recently developed this love for running, I used to hate it...run for fun, who does that anyway?

22. I want to complete a half marathon one day, and maybe eventually even a marathon...we will see, we will see...

23. When we first got the news about Haley and Riley being added to our family I hoped for boys so I could still be the only girl, but now I love having two little girls around that want to be just like me, and I don't mind sharing the limelight anymore...most of the time...

24. I'm having a hard time thinking of 25 random things about me, I don't like these kinds of things, I could easily come up with 25 random things about Brad though...

25. I love my new life as Mrs. Collins...still sounds weird to me when someone calls me that, isn't that my mother in law's name??

Linz!!

Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday dear beautiful Lindsey
Happy Birthday to YYYOOOUUU!!!

Lindsey has been my best friend since High School, and today is her 22nd birthday. She has had a lot of laughs with me and shed a lot of tears with me. We have been there when each other started to drive (Linzer and Fannie), when we got our hearts broken, when we went off to college, and when we got married. I cannot imagine my life without her in it! She is a wonderful friend and someone that I genuinely look up to! Love ya Linz...

Love Dare

I have been reading the book "Love Dare", and it has been UH-MAZING! It just absolutely jam packed with good stuff! Let me explain to you how it works...There are fourty days worth of readings and each day has a challenge after it for you to complete the next day. The goal of the book is to teach you how to love your spouse more effectively. So far I am only on day 5, and for me it has been life changing...just ask Brad how much easier I am to live with :)....Every day when I read it I am convicted of something new, or I gain insight on better ways to love.

I would encourage ANY married couple whether you've been married for 1 month or 60 years to read it, and I feel confident it would improve your marriage. I DARE you!

Taubman

For quite some time I have been unsure how I felt about the new art museum downtown. Part of me feels like its out of place with the other buildings, but I love old buildings and the feel that they give. The other part of me tries to appreciate that it actually is a beautiful building, its just different. So, when I found out that we could go for free today, I was excited. I'm not an art person, but I wanted to see what all of this money was spent on, and to be honest I wasn't very impressed. The building looks huge from the outside, but the inside of the building is VERY small. There was not very much in the museum, and some of it was just weird (the tattoo room for example). Two rooms that I did enjoy were the room with the purse display...I LOVE purses, so of course that room was interesting to me, unfortunately it was the smallest room in the building. I also really liked the contemporary art display, there were lots of neat things in that room. This sculpture was in that room, and this is the most real looking sculpture of a human I've ever seen. There were small veins, the coloring on the skin was just right, the toes and fingers were so realistic, it truly was fantastic!

Right about now you're probably thinking, oh my gosh how did she take that picture! But don't worry although I am a little rebel, it wasn't against the rules to take pictures...as long as your flash was off and you were not in a temporary exhibit (Side note...a staff member was on me faster than I could pull my camera out of the case to inform me that I needed to turn my flash off...those guys took their job very seriously, and actually they cracked me up walking around there)

And now, not completely unrelated from art, but kind of...Thursday Jan. 15th was Brad's Dad's 53rd birthday, and I made a cake! I have really started to enjoy baking and decorating cakes, even when they don't turn out looking that great, they always taste pretty good :) Here's the cake I made for Alan...

Celebration of Six Months

So it seems like just yesterday Brad and I were saying "I Do", but it wasn't it was six months ago from Monday. Wow! I know that's not really a long time, but it seriously seems impossible to me that we've been married for half of a year now! Okay, so anyway about this celebration...
My grandparents offered for us to go to Waterfront (the place we had our reception) to eat dinner on them because everyone knows we're poor... So we made reservations, got dressed up and we drove down for our "date". This might be a good time to mention that whenever I go down there to eat I feel very uncomfortable for two reasons: one during the wedding planning the manager of the club got very snippy with me and my "Grandbud" had to take care of that problem with I'm sure a few choice words and a call to Ron Willard (who owns like all of the lake), and two you're not allowed to wear jeans to the Waterfront which I think is so dumb, so most people wear in between slacks, but I don't have in betweens only jeans and dress pants so I'm ALWAYS overdressed. But luckily for me this night the manager wasn't there and Brad and I looked pretty darn good so I didn't even care that we were in fact WAY overdressed!! We had a really nice dinner, trust me people the food is to DIE for, and we finally got to talk to each other and spend time together on a week night, unheard of! Anyway, here are some pictures
...and let's be serious we all know the real celebration started when we got home :)