Christmas Has Been Called

Although Parker called Christmas officially on my birthday, I think it's only been a few days now that it's really felt like the wintery, blissful time that is the Christmas season. Lights have gone up, the trees are out, the weather is definitely crisp and cold in the evenings, and when I take a walk outside I can see and smell the smoke coming out of neighborhood chimneys. It's glorious, really. And to think that the reason for which Christmas was intended is for so much more than presents and lights, as great as those are. 

Christmas has different tasks for me this year than years previously, since Parker has a house now! Soon, the decorations will be coming out and he'll be getting a real tree. I've already started using my holiday-themed candles when I'm at the house to help the cause, and he bought a baby Christmas tree which we named Wall-E. It's such a perfect house for all the cozy aspects of Christmas!

Today when I went to the house, my mom came over for a nice glass of Dr. Pepper and to chat for a bit (also, she repaired a pesky light fixture that no one else could figure out, so that was extremely helpful and awesome). She noticed as we were talking that we had a visitor in the backyard, which turned out to be a pretty and friendly dog. We went outside to introduce ourselves, and the dog was very happy just trotting in the grass and sniffing around, but we convinced her to leave (although keeping her crossed my mind). 

After that, we talked some more about the first night that Parker was moving in. That night I was fastening some cute outlet covers (it's amazing to me at this point in my life just how excited I am about outlet covers; they just pull a room together), accidentally moved a wire and after a zap- poof- the lights were out. We had to call Mr. Dave Way to the scene where he heroically (to us) proceeded to fix the damage while marveling and saying, "What retards!" to the electrical setup of said outlet. The funny thing was, right after he left, we had a problem with the plumbing...sigh. But it's all good, because Casa de Parker (the official name for the house is yet to be decided- suggestions? Mine so far is the Blue Bayou) is wonderful, and you don't need to be afraid to use the light switch or the bathroom because both work fine now. 

Did I mention how strange to me it is to be so interested in all matters home and garden? I'm feeling very domesticated, but awesome at the same time because we're pretty much doing everything ourselves and it's a nice sense of accomplishment to look around and know that it's our own hard work that has made the house a home. Although, where painting is concerned, we did have help from great friends, and it looks great! The previous owner seemed to just adore yellow- yellow kitchen, yellow living room, yellow hallway- but now it seems a lot warmer which two shades of chocolate and a light blue. I love it.

Pictures should be coming soon!

~VL~

20

It's my birthday! I'm officially out of the teens and into that mysterious decade known as the 20s...and I think I like it. Last night my friends and I gathered at Chef Rick's for my birthday dinner, and it was fabulous! I walked in and there was a long table set up with flowers, candles, balloons, and "Happy 20th Birthday, Veralynn!" printed on the menus. Chef Rick sent out some scrumptious coconut shrimp appetizers for us and soon after there were a moments of happy silence as we all began eating. Brittany and Gabby had never had Chef Rick's before so I was excited to see what they thought of my favorite restaurant- the reviews were all positive! 

There were definitely a couple highlights of the evening for me. I think my favorite part of the night was when everyone was singing to me- it was just so happy to hear their voices and see them smiling and just thank God that we're all friends. Later on, Parker came by after he got off work and- dun dun dun- he held Adelaide! This is something that's been in the works for a while but now he can say that he's held a baby and she survived. I just thought the whole thing was adorable, even if Parker looked way less than thrilled. To top things off, Mikey and his lady friend bought me Domo car dice and a Domo energy drink! It was just too much awesomeness in one sitting.

After Chef Rick's, I met Tanya, Ashley, Brittany, and Gabby over at Starbucks for warm drinks and the Christmas atmosphere (yay!). We proceeded to talk about all kinds of things, laugh about even more things, and eventually piled into Tanya's car once Starbucks closed. I left at midnight and drove home, climbed into my cozy bed and chatted with my man on Facebook. Just as we said goodnight and I started to fall asleep, my phone buzzed twice with two different Facebook statuses from Tanya and Ashley saying that Tanya's car battery had died in the 'Bucks parking lot! (Remember this is after one in the morning...) So I called Parker, picked him up (where he promptly told me my Domo dice were illegally displayed from my rearview mirror. Poor Domo, he didn't know!), and we drove to Betteravia where we tried to revive Tanya's car, to no avail. Parker then used his connections to get SMPD to help, and they did-with success! After saying goodnight to Parker one more time, I drove home and sat outside for a little bit in hopes of seeing a meteor or two...and I did see some! It was a lovely end to the evening, but my actual birthday is just starting! We'll see how that goes! :)

~VL~