Flowers

I woke up to my favorite flowers. I am a lucky woman!

11 Years

Many years ago a dear friend suggested that Michael and I would make a good pair. I am continually grateful to her as Michael is an amazing man - smart, kind-hearted, funny, creative, hard-working, and loving. Every day we do this thing called life together and I can't imagine walking the path without him. We have had ups and downs, but we always know we will make it as we are in it together. I love you Michael and look forward to celebrating 11 years together today, but also each day with you!

52 Week Photo Project: Week 46

My love surprised me with a rose out of the blue.  I am a lucky girl.

Silenced By the Night

Love & 52 Week Photo Project: Week 31

M + D

Today is an anniversary of sorts - 10 years ago I moved from Ohio to Colorado to be with an amazing man that I love even more today than that snowy day in 2003. It was the best move ever.

* photo - I took up at Hays Falls when we were there recently. 

A Good Relationship

From TinyBuddha's FB status today: 
"Good relationships don't just happen. They take time, patience, and two people who truly want to be together." ~Unknown

A good life lesson and one I have learned over the years - good relationships just don't happen. I think we like to think that when you love someone - the relationship will just be magically connected together by love and make it a good relationship, but it takes more than love. It does need love - a lot of it, but time, patience and wanting to be together is really key too. I love spending time with Michael. He works from home so a lot of our time is spent together and when we aren't together - I miss him fiercely!  

Cheyenne!

When Michael and I were in Denver a few weeks ago, we discussed on the way home what we should do for our anniversary. We really want to get away for the weekend so started to think of places that wouldn't cost too much and we could get to and enjoy in just a short weekend.

Well you think anniversary - so cozy cabins in the woods, nice hotel with room service in the city or some other romantic getaway - right? We wanted it a little more low key then that so we really toss around several ideas...one being Salt Lake City as I have never been and it is just the same distance basically as Denver. We could also have some of our favorite pizza while there as they have a Godfathers.

We couldn't decide plus we had another thing to factor in...work. As much as we like getting away Michael has his own business and sometimes work comes before going away and taking vacations. I totally understand and we do other things to create downtime and celebrate special moments. We don't need to get away to celebrate 10 years anything we do - will capture the relationship and the love we have for each other.

So that night in bed Michael was almost asleep while I was reading and he woke up with a start and said CHEYENNE  While most people would look at this man and give him an odd look, I shouted - YES! Cheyenne doesn't exactly bring up romantic getaway thoughts for anyone....but us I am sure.

See after we decided I was moving here, I was scared to cross the passes on my own. He suggested we meet in Cheyenne so he could guide me into Colorado so I wouldn't have to go over the major passes. We stayed in Cheyenne for a couple nights as I arrived there with a flat tire. It was a really good weekend - seeing each other after being away from each other for several months. Knowing our life together was taking a new turn to being together full time and not having to suffer through the distance from Ohio to Colorado and not seeing each other daily.

For us Cheyenne would be the perfect place to celebrate 10 years. As it turns out we weren't be able to go, but we are marking it on our calendars and hoping we can go in May which will celebrate that weekend's anniversary.

As I said above we have captured our relationship and love we have for each other in other ways. Just being together and being able to celebrate 10 years together makes me feel incredibly blessed.

10 Years Together

Most couples have a song that means something to them...that is their song.  I think we also have a movie. I am going to suggest that tonight we watch our movie...Serendipity.

I think it really fits us too. Michael and my life touched in places even before we knew each other. When I was a teenager, I would do Bible Camp in Woodland Park, Colorado. It was one of the reasons I wanted to move to Colorado - because I fell in love with the awesome beauty of the mountains. Michael's family visited Woodland Park often when he was young as his Grandfather had a cabin up in the mountains there. So we were near to each other - but not know each other yet. 

Another moment happened almost a year before he and I started talking to each other.  I lived in Cleveland, Ohio at the time, but had a group of friends from the Kansas City, MO area from when I lived in Topeka, KS.  One of the people in that group of friends was dating Michael in a long distant relationship. When I would visit, she talked about him, but I never knew him.  At one time when he was dating her, that group of friends went to Denver for a weekend getaway. One of the friends in the group was man I was interested in. He and I were talking about me visiting - doing the long distant thing and then maybe eventually moving to KC.  During that weekend away, I called him while he there and was talking him when Michael arrived to his room. He had taken another friend to hair salon.  We were just a few steps away from knowing each other. 

The woman Michael was dating is a friend of mine as I said. After they stopped dating, she suggested that he contact me as she felt we would be a good fit.  So he waited almost 6 months before he ended up emailing me. I was captivated from that first email - I knew there was something special with him. Might be silly sounding to some people that an email would spark enough connection that made me write him back and pursue getting to know this man better, but  I am so thankful I did...as 10 years today we are still going strong. 

Michael is smart, funny, kind, compassionate, hard-working, creative, talented and has endless qualities that I  cherish daily as well as new ones I discover even now.  We have made some priceless memories over the years. I feel extremely thankful to spend every day with him - even when it is just daily life we are moving through  It is each moment that counts and each moment with him counts more then I could have ever imagined. I feel extremely blessed to have taken each step of this journey with him and love him deeply and passionately as I did way back then. I look forward to celebrating 10 years with him and look forward to spending the coming years together too. 

Michael, your love has brought new colors to my world! Thank you! I love you! Happy Anniversary!

Feels Like Home

On February 1 Michael and I will celebrate 10 years together. This is our song. Just feel extremely blessed to with such an amazing man and sharing this journey with him for the last 10 years and the years ahead.

Poetry Dates

When Michael picked up poemcrazy by Susan Wooldridge, he fell down the rabbit hole like I did after reading it. He immediately started playing with words to capture moments he was seeing.  He suggested we do poetry dates. We made a list of places to go to that would inspire words to create poetry.

After making a list of these places, I cut them into strips of paper and stuffed all of them in a jar.  We will pick a strip of paper from the jar each week to go to and do poetry dates. This first week's pick was Habitat for Humanity Restore.

I snapped photos along the way to help us remember.  It was an outing that surpassed my expectations. It was completely inspiring and enjoyable. I really can't wait until our next date.  I think it was perfect for Michael too - to unplug from work and play creatively.

Each item in the Restore has a story and it was so delightful to look at them and create stories for them. To see beyond just an item sitting on a shelf.  It was perfect for our first date.

Here are some photos I snapped and poetry I am sure will come later.....

old brick tiles

figurines

typeset

I pretty much was swooning over the typeset. There were 2 boxes this one was 18 point and the other was much smaller. Both surprisingly intact. I mean missing some letters, but quite a lot more then I have ever seen in a set.

antique dresser with top row of wicker knobs

pottery

vintage Singer sewing machine

Sunset in Sioux City

photo by Michael McGruder

Something you can't get in Colorado is Godfather's Pizza. It is Michael's favorite pizza.  I grew up with Godfather's Pizza in Omaha.  So I really like it too.  It was the place to go after football games in high school so I associate Godfather's with some good memories from my youth. 

When we travel we always look to see if we will be through towns with Godfather's Pizza.  On the way to my sister's right about dinner time we were going through Sioux City which had a Godfather's so we stopped and grabbed a pizza and then went and parked on a country road and watched the sunset.  It was a beautiful sunset to watch with my love while we had pizza.  Maybe kind of silly but these kind of things make the best memories.  I know I will remember our whole day as it was a trip through Nebraska - all the back roads. Seeing lots of little towns and pretty country.  Not just flat boring interstate.  We had great conversations and  just enjoyed our time together. 

Now looking forward to time with my sister and her family and my parents too as they decided to come down and see Michael and I too! 

Life in Points

* We have been traveling quite a bit - just day trips or a few days here and there. But soon we will be taking a longer trip. We will be going to see my sister and her family. After a few days with her, we will go do a work project and then after the work is done, we will spend the weekend with Tammy as we will be in her neck of the woods. We see her again in November. She will be spending Thanksgiving with us.

* I have my follow up for my doctor coming up this week - for the sciatica. He did a treatment of cortisone that lasted 10 hours. Then he prescribed a pill that was for 5 days, but my doctor and my pharmacist were really at odds with each other on the drug. After taking this drug and seeing how I reacted, he will know better how to treat me. The drug worked great except for upsetting my stomach just a little bit which was the pharmacist concern. But the positive of the drug it brought my pain down to zero on a pain scale and the most it would go up to is a 3. It still even almost a week after it has been done hasn't brought my pain back up to where it was before (a 7 was pretty much my daily consistent pain level).

* Yesterday we did yard work. Both of us are not fans of it.  I have bad allergies that really just cause me to be miserable because I would love to have some of a garden, but just can't keep up with it. And it isn't fair for it to fall to Michael when he dislikes yard work.  This was icky yard work we had to do yesterday - pulling weeds. We have rock landscaping, but weeds come up in them and with my sciatica being as bad as it has been there has been no way I could do it before now.  It was hard to do it yesterday. Michael  ended up doing the backbreaking stuff. We had put it off until we couldn't any longer.

* The first of February is our anniversary, but the 1st of every month for the last 9 years Michael says Happy Anniversary.  We laughed that our morning was spent doing yard work - fun fun! But really I am thankful that we can have of course lots of fun together, but also make things we don't like doing go a little faster and better by doing them together.  We can laugh and have fun even when pulling weeds.

* We were out of town recently and when we arrived back in town we decided to get some errands out of the way before heading home. One thing was to go to the library as I figured I had some book waiting for me. I came with a HUGE pile.  Michael shouted from the car on my way out of the library carrying the huge pile of books that I didn't need to check whole library out. The lady in front of me got a chuckle. But the sad thing is that huge pile of books I only have like 3 left to read as I am going through a book a day still.  I got through the Anita Blake series. All caught up again...I had been 3 books behind, but reread the entire series.

Geeky Soul Mates

The proof that we are soulmates from Emanuele Colombo on Vimeo.

Cute video and reminds me of Michael and I.

This is Home

I have been on a Narnia movie kick lately and I love the music from all 3 movies.  This one the artist talks about how when he wrote this song for the movie he kept in mind when his father read the books to him when he was young. I thought that was cool that he enjoyed the books and then did a song for the movies. The books are great....I should read them again. I haven't read them since I was a little girl.

Anyway....beautiful song. This is home - just makes me so grateful for Michael and that this is home with him.

Amazing Life

A friend wrote me saying I have been quiet again so she was worried something was wrong. And in fact it is completely the opposite. I am doing really good. I am feeling a peace that I have felt in a long time. I really feel like I am doing good and on the path I need to be/want to be. I have been side tracked by some things I needed to help Michael with but I am just glad I can help him as he has so much on his plate right now. And I know that I will make time for the things I need too.

Michael and I took our change jar in and cashed it in - we had $100. We decided to use that money for us - for a few date nights. Here in Grand Junction on Tuesday's the Avalon theater has what is called Dinner and a Movie. If you have dinner in one of the downtown restaurants and bring the receipt to the movie theater, they will give you 2 free admissions. A few weeks ago Michael and I went to the Rockslide and then went to the movie after. The movie was Serenity. We are Serenity fans. Seeing the movie with other Serenity fans was so fun! I loved it! The whole evening was SO MUCH FUN! We have been talking about it since. North by Northwest is going to be playing February 8th and it is one of my favorite movies. And so we are going to go see that too.

On top of date nights, we had a chance to go to Durango this past weekend. Leaving Friday and coming home on Sunday. So a quick trip but really nice. Michael has been working really hard and this weekend he didn't do work or check work things at all. It was really nice just to have a weekend for us. We just relaxed, talking, walking around and enjoying each other's company which was perfect for the weekend before we celebrate 8 years together. Today Michael and I celebrate 8 years of being together. Wow! We both are very blessed to have been on this journey together. He is an amazing man that I have no words to capture how much I love him and how much he means to me. But each day I feel joy in my heart of being with him. And happy to celebrate 8 years with him.

Amazing life and amazing journey!

Christmas Lights

Michael and I went to look at lights tonight. Last year there weren't that many lights here. But this year everyone decorated it seemed like. So it was a lot of fun.

Our tradition is stopping and getting Starbucks, bringing the ipod loaded with Christmas music and drive around. It my favorite holiday tradition with Michael. And I know he feels the same.

There were lots of limos out going through the neighborhoods. We have a couple neighborhoods that almost every house decorates so its like a tour. But just to explain our town isn't huge. It is not like we are a big city. So seeing limos going around through the neighborhoods looking at the lights was...just well odd to me. But I am sure it is fun to do it that way - getting friends together and enjoying the lights together. And not having to drive.

One street there were several houses in a row that had a ton of lights. But the house right before those houses just had this one little light in the window when we passed. And I had Michael back up and look. Because I could tell it was a word but I couldn't read it as we passed. It was an arrow with the word DITTO under it. It was very funny.

We have friends that go around and give awards to people that just leave them at the door with a little gift of chocolates. And I have no doubt that the DITTO would have won an award from them. Because I would have loved to leave them one too.

It was a wonderful night. And I am so glad Michael and I were able to take some time to keep our tradition.

Enhance

I like taking care of Michael. I mean he takes care of me too. So why wouldn't I want to take care of him too? We have things we do that enhances each others lives. I am about to go out of town so I would like to have some of the things I do for him be a little easier. I know he can take care of himself...cook, clean and do laundry. But I like that I can help him out when I know he will be so busy with work.

So I made breakfast burritos, French bread pizzas, garlic toast and several dishes that are all frozen in individual servings for easy defrosting and reheating. I made sure things are washed and ironed. Obviously with me being gone almost 3 weeks he will have to do some more washing and ironing but at least he will be good for a while. And the house is completely clean.

Hopefully I will have made his life a little easier while I am gone. As I said I know he is going to be busy with work and I want things to be easier.

Boyfriend

There is this scene in Sex in the City Movie (first one) where Mr. Big and Carrie are looking at apartments. And one of the people showing them an apartment calls Mr. Big Carrie's husband and she quickly corrects the person by saying he is my boyfriend. And Mr. Big said, "Aren't I a little old to be a boyfriend?" And Carrie say she will start calling him her Manfriend. Mr. Big didn't find that amusing either.

Anyway - I go through a similar thing as Mr. Big - it sounds so corny to me to call Michael my boyfriend. We are in our 40's - so not boy and girl but man and woman just not in the marriage sense. But yes in the dictionary definition of the word Michael is my boyfriend. Occasionally I will say significant other but you know that just doesn't flow very easily either. I really would like to come up with a different word then boyfriend.

I just called Michael my Manfriend and he looked at me like I was very strange. He should know that by now. So I think Manfriend is out. So any suggestions would be helpful.

Gamer Girl

Once in a land far far away (meaning the 90's), I played Tetris and another Tetris like game on Nintendo. I then moved to Sim City on the computer. But since then I haven't really played games like that.

Last summer while visiting my sisters they kept asking me join some games on Facebook so at least they had more friends/neighbors there. I did join a few but never played. And then around the end of September, I received yet another request to be neighbors with someone else. But knew my sisters were playing that game too. So I joined thinking I would only set it up and then be neighbors with those who needed neighbors. But...I started playing. And playing more. It didn't help that Michael was out of town when that request came in so playing a game is a great way to pass insomnia time since I don't sleep much while he is gone.

By the time he came home, I was really into Farmville. I didn't tell him at first about it. And I thought he would notice but he didn't until coming and seeing me play. He then joined because he said to me that just seeing me interested in a computer game made him happy. He loves games and plays many Facebook games and has just other computer games too.

I am really laid back about the game. I don't play it to compete with others. I play it because I like just the game overall. Until recently Farmville only went to level 70. And I reached it and wasn't sure what to be doing with it even though I still liked it. But they increased levels and added features again to make it more interesting for those of us in the higher levels.

At about the time I reached level 70, I saw an article about FrontierVille. It is a game put out by the same people that do Farmville. I really didn't think anything much about the game UNTIL I read that they were comparing it to Little House on the Prairie and I loved the books and TV series so I signed up immediately. I still don't like it as much as I like Farmville but playing these games has gave Michael and I yet another common interests. And he likes that I am now his Gamer Girl.