What's Up?

I have a bunch of stuff running through my head right now and I don't know what to write down! I guess I'll start off with the biggie: Neal and I celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary on Saturday! Well, I guess we actually celebrated on Friday because we were too busy on Saturday, but our anniversary was Saturday. Seventeen years ago we were married in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. It was supposed to be a beautiful outdoors ceremony on the beach, but unfortunately it rained and it was cold! We were able to have the rehearsal outdoors, but we ended up having the ceremony in the hotel conference room. It was still beautiful, and different, and I loved it!

Friday night we went out to dinner at a Japanese steak house. Just the two of us. It was nice. Then, we did the most romantic thing.....we went shopping for a new microwave! Oh yeah, we're soooo romantic! Oh, we did something even better than that though. Before we went to the restaurant, I had to drop off a prescription at CVS. When we passed the card section I heard Neal mutter "oh, cards." I said "what was that?" He said he hadn't gotten me a card yet. Well, I could have gotten all offended and said "you must not love me!" But I knew something he didn't know...I hadn't gotten him a card either. So, after I dropped off the prescription we swung back by the card section and I told him to pick out a card he liked for me and I would pick out a card I liked for him and then we'd swap them. We looked through the cards and laughed and shared a few, and then we each found one that we thought was perfect. Then we stood in the middle of the aisle and traded. I stood there crying while I read the most beautiful card, and he thought the card I picked out was just wonderful, too. Then we hugged and kissed in the aisle. Then we put our cards back and left. LOL!!! It was hilarious! The only down side is that I won't have that card to look at 30 years from now, but the memory will be priceless!

So, why did we have to look for a microwave, you ask? On Thursday I was thawing some sausage and all of a sudden my microwave stopped running and started humming and it said "F6" in the message box. I tried unplugging it and plugging it back, but to no avail. Neal checked out the manual and made a phone call, but found out it would be cheaper to buy a new one. Now here comes the frustrating part. Did you know it's virtually impossible to find an over the stove microwave in stock in the store? They have to order it! Best Buy told us they wouldn't have it in until March 28th! HUH??? Fortunately some friends of ours had an extra sitting in their house and we're borrowing it until the one one we ordered from Home Depot comes in (same microwave as Best Buy...same price...7 to 10 days).

Saturday Ben had his first basketball game in the playoffs. His team came in last place in the regular season, and the first team we played was the 2nd place team. They'd only lost one game....until Saturday! That's right people...our little red team won the game! By one (O-N-E) point! What an exciting game!!! Now we play #1 team on Thursday. Ben said "they haven't lost any games -- yet!" That's my boy!

Beth had Word of Life Teens Involved on Saturday. Word of Life is a youth program that we have at our church, and Teens Involved is a competition of area teens. They have singing, drama, instrumentals, puppets, creative writing, etc. It was an all day event. Beth was in our youth choir and she wrote a gospel tract and entered it. Now she'll be going to regional competition in April for both choir and her tract. Fortunately, it is also at our church, so we don't have far to drive. Some of the churches will be coming from several hours away.

Saturday night my in-laws invited us over for dinner. It was nice to have two dinners prepared for our anniversary! She made steak, salad, fried potatoes, and other yummy goodness. We had a nice visit. Neal's younger sister, Jessica was in town, so his entire family was there.

Sunday we had a great morning at church. Our pastor is back from India, safe and sound. We had communion Sunday morning, so that was nice. Sunday afternoon I took a nap and when I woke up Jessica was playing the Wii with the kids. She stayed a few hours and we had a good visit.

That's about it. I'm getting ready to head home. We've got to wash the dog tonight and I need to give my two guys hair cuts!

Have a great week!