It's Official! I Will Be an Aunt Tomorrow! :-)

YAY!!! My lovely brother-in-law and sister-in-law decided to get induced tomorrow morning! This is wonderful for a bunch of reasons for them, but it means so much to me, because I will get to be there for everything :-) My lovely bosses let me take off tomorrow and Monday so I will get to spend some quality time with my family! I cannot wait! Seriously. I'm going crazy!

Shaney and I are leaving for Erie after work today . . . it's going to be a late night, but soooooooooo worth it!! Pray that we get there safely!

Oh my gosh! I am freaking out!! I can't even imagine what I will be like when I am the one having the baby (not for several years. . . sorry mom).

AhHhhhHH!! I cannot wait to be the best aunt I can be to their baby!

We Lost . . But It's OK! :-)

So we had our final soccer playoff game last night for the championship! Unfortunately we lost by 2 (the last point was right at the end when our goalie came out to try to get some more offense going), but you know what?! It's ok! The other team was one of the most sportsman-like teams and it was a good, fair game. Also, we did not have ANY subs (2 of our players got hurt at the end of this season :-( with an ACL tear and the other with a hammy injury) and the other team had one girl and one guy sub. And we were just not clicking. The new season starts Tuesday though!

After the game, we hung around for a while to watch Michael Phelps continue on his trek to craziness! So the question is : is he THAT good, to win with his eyes closed?! The answer: pretty much! When he was swimming the 200m fly, his goggles kept filling up with water and he even said, "To be honest, I was having trouble seeing the walls." 8 Golds, here we come!

And one last thing real quick . . . . update on my sister-in-law, Sommer!

Last I heard, she is doing well! She is 4cm dilated (as of Monday), and having some back pains. But Dan, my lovely brother-in-law calls me this morning: "Staci! Did you hear?!" . . . so then I begin to freak out! Oh my gosh! Is she having her baby?! Should I start packing?! But I say, "hear what?!" and he says, "She is having contractions an hour a part." . . ha! So obviously I am still excited, but I was thinking this was it! She was having her baby now. So silly Dan got me all excited this morning, but it was still great to hear from him! Sommer and Bry are ready and it is just a waiting game! I can't wait! :-)

CRUIZZZZZZZZEEEE!!!

What she said.

Our Relaxing, But Buggy Evening

Shaney and I got home yesterday after work and were so excited to see each other! We exchanged cards right away! Shane always feels bad because I write so much, and he is a man of few words, so he tried to write as much as he could, and it was so great! He made me cry.

We then opened all the wonderful cards and the package from my mommy and daddy! Thank you to everyone! It was so nice!

These (above) are the cuppies I made for us. They are peanut butter cup brownie cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting! Yumm! I made Shane stay in the computer room (such a hard feat, I know. . .) while I got everything together for our romantic dinner. Everything went awesome except that I kinda burnt the main thing of our meal (our steaks) . . . ugh . . . that's what happens when you try to do a million things at once! It still tasted good, just a little "crispy"! I also made cheesy potato casserole. Some orange cream soda for our drinkies and our cake from our wedding (thanks to my mommy and daddy for shipping it to us so we could enjoy it on our first anniversary). So I lit lots of candles all around the deck, brought out our "lighted tree", and played a mix of love songs. Unfortunately. . . it didn't last too long, because the mosquitos were TERRIBLE!!! And I already have about 20 bites from doing yard work on Sunday, so we decided to take the party into the house and watch some Olympics while we ate.

And . . . . this is what Shaney got me for our first anniversary . . . . .

Juuuuuuuuuuuuuusssst kidding! This is my uncle's car that he let me ride in last time we were home in Erie. My grandma sent this picture to me, and so I took a pic of the pic!

Overall it was a wonderful anniversary! We had so many great times our first year and are looking forward to many more!

One Exciting Week!! Ahh!

Ok, so first off . . . my hubby and I are celebrating our first wedding anniversary today!! Yay! We made it! :-P Here is a pic from my phone of what he surprised me with this morning . . . . (he is so sweet!)



We have a nice, relaxing evening planned for tonight. I do not want to give too much away, because some of it is still a surprise for Shane, but look back tomorrow or later tonight for some pictures of the evening!

Ok . . . now on to some other things . . . .

Last night we were watching the Olympics. We were especially excited for the men's 4X100 freestyle swim. Although, after finding out it would not be on until around 11:30pm, I quickly gave Shane a good night kiss and passed out. I did, however, get woken up to shouts and screams (from the tv and Shane) shortly around that time. I did unfortunately miss the race, but I got to see everyone celebrating and it was awesome! The French were so sure they were going to win and even said we will "smash" them (the US). The U.S. barely beat the French (by .08 seconds to be exact), but hey, who's counting seconds?! We're counting gold!


And . . . . oh my gosh! Sommer, my sister-in-law, went to the doctors this morning! She is 4cm dilated! She said she could have her and Bry's little girl any time now . . . today, tomorrow, this week! I did read online though, and they said it could even be longer than that. But I am getting so excited! My first niece and the first "grand baby" of the fam! Ahh!! :-)

Our King's Dominion Anniversary!

Well, Shaney and I's one year anniversary as husband and wife is technically tomorrow (8.11.08), but we started the celebrations early and went to King's Dominion in Virginia on Saturday! We decided that this was a good choice for us to celebrate because in our first year of marriage . . . we've had lots of ups and downs (rollar coaster ride) . . .a lot more downs than ups . . . just kidding!! We just love rollar coasters! Actually, our first year of marriage couldn't have been better! I can't even remember a time that we got in a fight!

Ugh. . . so Shane talked me out of bringing my camera into the park (I was scared if we went on a water ride it would get broken, or it would fling off on another ride) . . . which I desparately regretted later when I saw a bunch of other people with cameras and video cameras and it was TOTALLY killing me not to have it. :-( There were so many good photo ops, but this was the last pic (above) taken before we headed off for a day of fun!

Memorable moments, comments, & tips:

• Lines were incredibly long (we didn't ride much because of that :-( ). . . . which is totally understandable . . . I mean that is part of an amusement park experience . . . but what grinds our gears is that there were so many open seats on the rides!!!! When we were getting ready to go on the Dominator (the new ride this year . . after which we waited for a good 2 hours or so . . ), there were 6 seats wide open with no one in them!! They didn't even ask people if there were 2 riders or whatever to sit there!!
• Souvenir cup! This is a pretty good deal if you drink a lot! It's $8, but you can pay $4 extra to get "bottomless refills" the rest of the day (you have to wear a wristband). I think we got a total of 5 or 6 drinks . . so $2 a drink (it's a big cup) isn't bad at all! Especially considering all the other drinks in the park are $3+. . . even the drinks in the vending machines are $3.50 . . . for a 20oz pop, water, or powerade!! Crazy ripoff!!
  
• As for rides . . . my top picks . . in order. . . #1 --> Volcano! probably one of the best rollar coasters I have ever rode on. The smoothest ride ever and such a fun ride! They also video tape your entire ride and you can see it when you get off! It was funny! #2 --> Drop Tower! I don't know why, but I love these kinds of rides! It's so suspenseful and I love being so high up and getting that feeling in your stomach! #3 ---> Tornado! This is a water ride . . . but the first drop is so steep and so fun! The line is ridiculously long though . . . #4 --> the dominator! this is new this year at KD, and honestly . . . I wasn't that impressed. Maybe because the hype was so big?! . . . it was ok but my head got banged around a lot.
• And oh my gosh have wooden rollar coasters ALWAYS hurt that bad?!?! Or is it because I am older now?! Wow. . . . I just about got my head snapped off, my knees kept clanking together and Shane and I kept squishing each other. I got an instant headache that lasted the rest of the day and I just could not wait until the ride ended. I really can't believe that I used to love wooden rollar coasters! They are so painful!
  
• The food --> delicious ! But it is hard to have food not taste good to me . . . unless it is "rich" food or seafood . . . blah! But we had pizza, pop (all day long w/our bottomless refills), loaded funnel cake (strawberries), . . and I think that was it. But it was all good.
• We decided to leave around 8pm or so . . . . that's right. We are an old, married couple now. That was late for us! :-P
  

picture taken by our Toyota Highlander

Overall, it was a fun experience. No matter what I do or where I go, I always have fun when I am with Shane. Yay!! Happy 1st Anniversary! :-) And many more!!!

We (and I) Did It!

Yay! We had one of our playoff games yesterday @10pm (ugh!)! And guess what?!!? We WON!! Yay! It was a close game . . . 8-7 i think?! We have the final playoff game on Tuesday at 9:10pm. If we win, we get a t-shirt!

So. . . highlights of the game:

• No yellow cards for me! not even any fouls! :-) I was sooooooooooo proud of myself!! Especially because the one girl that was playing dirty last game was playing like that this game too and pushing when I had already kicked the ball like 10 seconds ago . . . and running into people from behind . . because I guess that is how she plays defense. . . ugh. . but I controlled myself and it felt so good.


• I scored a goal! So . . . I have never played soccer . . . . didn't grow up with it . . never played in high school or college (besides intramurals) so I do not have the fancy footwork or ball control at all! But somehow I managed to get a goal . . . I will admit, it was a sad looking goal, but a goal nonetheless!


• My hubby just amazes me at soccer. He has such great speed, such awesome ball control, and such great shots! He makes everything look so easy! I don't know how many goals he scored, but it was a lot!


• Bonding with our team . . . after the game we always sit on the couch and take off our shoes and socks and shin guards and just talk about the game. I love everyone on our team! They are just so fun and so great to play with!


• Umm . . . we won!! But you already knew that.

So I don't have any pics from our game (bummer. . . I know). . . . but because the game wasn't until 10pm, I decided to start on the final Harry Potter book (I have been waiting . . . mostly because I just don't want it to be all over) and I got to page 2 and this happened:

My lovely kitty Nina wanted to read with me. Aww!

So yeah . . . . I had a great night last night and was so happy and so proud and I hope I can continue playing the way I did! Because it felt sooooo much better than last game.

Water Spout in Erie!

Here is an awesome shot of a water spout that spouted today in Erie, PA! I am pretty sure this was taken by my dad . . (dad?) because he sent it to me and it looks like it is right across from his work! Yikes! Great pic though!

My Dream World . . . .

In case you were wondering what my dream world would be like . . . Hershey's has come pretty close to getting it right.



Butterflies, sun, swinging, diving into an endless pool of chocolate, riding in a convertible with my hubby, pretty flowers, and cute little bunnies!

The Time Has Come . . .

Well . . . I thought last night would be first day back at soccer after my minor scuffle . . time for me to have my character tested yet again . . . but the team never showed up for the playoff game. Bummer. . . . and complete bummer because the game wat at 9:10PM and it takes a good twenty minutes just to drive there (so 40 mins of driving for nothing . . ugh).

But tomorrow (@10pm . . what the heck is with these late night games?!) we are supposed to play the team that I got in a scuffle with . . . ugh. Whoever wins this game will move on to the "final" game. So stay tuned to see if we win and to see if I can get through the game without any "issues".

We play indoor now, but here are some random pictures of my lovely hubby playing outdoors:

(him warming up & the storm rolling in)