2010, and looking towards the future!

I love the "year in review" blog that Naomi did at Rockstar Diaries.

I decided I wanted to do one, although I'm sure mine won't be as eloquent or detailed as hers. 

Not much happened in January, other than the fact that I worked until midnight on new years eve. Lame. But, we had had a rough year in 2009, and Jamie and I both had extremely high hopes that this year would be better. 

In February, we went to Olive Garden (an old fave) for Valentine's Day.

In March, my cousin's son Jackson was born, and I had my bridal shower!

 We celebrated Jamie's 26th birthday in april, and I finished block I, which felt like a miracle.

May was the big one. I had my bachelorette party on the 15th, and became Mrs. Rutan on the 29th!

We celebrated with our honeymoon in June, and my parents got the latest member of our family, Dexter, who has grown a lot, and become so special to all of us!

Baby Dexter

Dexter now
 In July I chopped 7 inches off my hair, Jamie and I took an impromptu camping trip, and we lost his Nan.

In August, we took a "one last hurrah" trip to Chicago, and school started again.

In September, Jamie and I sang at his cousin Bradley's wedding, and worked to adjust to our crazy schedules.

We celebrated Halloween in October, (and by celebrated, I mean passed out candy.)

November held my 22nd birthday, for which I was called onstage at my favorite bar and serenaded, and also my very first visit to the ER. 

And in December, we celebrated our first married Christmas. 

It's been a year to remember. Granted, it's been hard, trying to juggle school and work, but there have been so many blessings. I am looking forward to next year, and praying that it is just as good. 

I wish the same for all of you, 

and I hope you have a happy new year!

♥

Trying to make dreams come true...

I want to go to Africa.

On a missions trip.

And I'm determined to make it happen.

I have always had a strong desire to go on a mission trip.

When I was in high school, and was debating colleges, 

I knew that if I ended up at a christian college,

The only thing I would have any desire to major in would be missions.

For better or worse, I didn't end up at a Christian college or majoring in missions,

but it is a passion that I still have, deep down.

I think taking on our new Compassion child, Emmanuel, has lit a fire under that desire.

Other married women my age have baby fever.

I have Africa fever. 

Look at this handsome little 3 year old face.

There are millions like him, and if I could help even a few more, 

it would be worth it. 

So, I've decided I don't just want to dream about it anymore.

So, I talked to Jamie last night, 

and we are going to try and find the best route to doing a 2-4 week trip to Africa in the summer of 2012.

I have looked at many organizations that allow you to take trips with them.

Jamie thinks we should look into finding a church to sponsor us.

In all honesty, we are flying blind, we don't know much about this.

But I trust that we can make it happen.

I want this so bad. 

I don't want the craziness of our lives to interfere.

And I want to go to Africa, and make a difference.

♥

Christmas of 2010, continued...

I had a really great Christmas with my husband and family, 

even if I did have to work. I love Christmas.

I have been asking Jamie for a new reptile pet, preferably an iguana, for several months.

He has been adamantly against it. But..

 was okay with a fake one, that I found in my stocking Christmas morning.

 Minnie spent the morning cuddling with daddy,

 and getting a bone!

Emma just wanted to play with the wrapping stuff.

 Jamie got me this awesome cookbook!

We went to my parents after having Christmas together,

 And Jamie wore the sweater that I got for him!

 I got another place setting of my dishes!

 We then went to the Heidlebaugh family Christmas. 

 The adults did a white elephant exchange,

and Jamie won us a George Forman, which he was SUPER pumped about,

 and my mommy and I actually took a decent picture together. 

My husband got me this amazing and awesome camera

 I had my old one since i was 16, so it was time for an upgrade.

My new camera takes great close ups, 

like this one of my rings.

And I felt much better upon seeing my grandpa christmas eve. 

The rehab hospital has taken him back, and he is making great strides.

he is regaining strength in his right hand, and his speech is slowly but surely coming back. 

His Christmas present was a visit from my grandma and Daisy May, his lovable and completely spoiled dachshund.

How was your Christmas? I hope everyone had a wonderful time with family and friends, and made many memories they could look back on. 

♥

The Christmas of 2010

In reference to my last post...I'm trying.

Anyway, this past saturday, Jamie and I hosted the Rutan/Buckley Christmas.

It went really well, 

which I didn't really expect in all honesty. 

Last year I cried after they left.

seriously.

But, this year things went much better.

(and the big glass of wine I had right before everyone got there may have helped. Just saying.)

We had 5 more people this year than last.

It was crazy.

I made the ham, homemade mashed potatoes, fresh green beans, little smokies appetizers, and christmas punch.

It all tasted great, I was really proud of myself. 

 We had 15 people, and this is what we had to do to our great room to fit them all in for dinner.

 Shawn and Tami told everyone to wear red so we could take a family picture. This is how Shawn and Jamie dressed (completely coincidentally). You can tell they are brothers. 

 Richie brought his 14 week old puppy, who was the same size as my fully grown Minnie. 

The puppy also pooped behind our Christmas tree.

Fully potty trained, my butt.

 semi-decent family picture. 

 Shawn and Tami got all of the men matching hat's and scarves, and the women matching scarves and gloves. The pictures turned out pretty cute.

Jamie and i in front of our tree. Love him.

I guess I should finally just blog about this.

My grandpa Blankenship has been in the hospital for almost 2 weeks.

It's just been a lot to process, I haven't felt like writing about it.

Long story short, his blood thinner made his blood too thin, which caused bleeding on his brain, which made him disoriented and confused.

They took him off the blood thinner, and drilled 4 holes in his head to drain the blood.

He was on the mend, and then because he was no longer on the blood thinner, his blood got too thick, and he had a stroke. 

The stroke affected his speech. He recognizes everyone, and can smile, but his brain is not telling his mouth what to say. It could be months before it comes back, it could be never.

This has been a nightmare for my family.

The last major sickness in the family was my dad, and he died 3 minutes later.

I know this is on all of their minds, all the time.

It's on mine. My grandpa is the closest link I have to my dad.

My grandma and uncles have essentially been taking turns living at the hospital. One of them stays all night with him every single night. 

My grandma is exhausted. They have been married 58 years. This is an unbelievable strain on her. 

She is very stressed about Christmas. Christmas and family gatherings are of utmost importance to her, and she is determined to still have Christmas.  So, to help her out, I went over last night, and we held up our annual tradition of making Christmas mice. 

I spent my entire evening over there yesterday, and we worked on them.

Or really, I worked on them while she dozed on the couch, but it was all the same to me, she's exhausted. 

They are my favorite Christmas treat to make, and they taste amazing. 

If you're interested, you just melt almond bark in a double broiler, dip a stemmed cherry in it, then lay it on it's side on wax paper. Stick a chocolate kiss to the front, get sliced almonds for ears, and then use red gel icing for eyes.

She is taking some of the mice to my grandpa today. 

Hope he likes them, they were always his favorite too.

I'm going to go spend the morning with him tomorrow. 

What a way to spend Christmas, huh?

In a hospital bed, unable to speak.

♥

In a Funk.

Haven't felt much like blogging lately.

I know I shouldn't be, but I've been feeling lonely.

With Jamie on mandatory overtime, I LITERALLY don't see him Monday through Friday, except for around an hour a day, about 2 days a week. 

I hate it. I spend every evening either at work or at home alone, until I can't keep my eyes open on the couch.

I haven't seen Amanda or Emily since school let out, which is hard. 

I hadn't realized how much I had grown to depend on them.

My old friends I never see anymore. 

Everyone has more important things going on in their lives.

I have such a hard time getting to know someone on a deep level.

It's not easy for me to open up, and show people my true self,

and everyone that I've ever been able to get close to (other than Jamie) leave soon after.

It never fails.

Jamie asked me one time "Why do we chase away friends?"

He was only half joking.

As soon as we get really excited about someone being in our lives, they are gone.

I know I should stay positive, and think about all of the people who love and support me.

But right now, I just want someone to talk to,

and to see my husband.

Everyone deserves to be in a funk sometimes, right?

Buh. 

I give up on trying to be positive for a little while.

♥

Asparagus Carbonara

It's been a while since I've done a recipe post.  

I think my last one was homemade ravioli that ended in disaster, here.

I haven't had much time to cook, but now that school is done for the semester, I am going to try and go back to my one recipe a week attempt.

This week was...

Asparagus Carbonara!

I got the recipe from a Rachel Ray magazine.

Ingredients:

2 eggs

2/3 cup grated parmesan cheese

3/4 pound spaghetti

1 bunch asparagus, halved lengthwise and cut crosswise into 2 inch pieces

2 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil

5 slices bacon, coarsely chopped

3 cloves garlic

1/4 cup dry whit wine

Salt and Pepper

Hint:

I didn't use the whole bunch of asparagus, because it was HUGE. And, I found it much easier to cut it into 2 inch pieces first, and then cut it in half lengthwise.

Also, I used turkey bacon instead of pork bacon.

Easier to chop, and significantly healthier.

And make sure you put your water on to boil during the chopping, because otherwise you have to wait on it. (yep, did that.)

Step #1: In a large bowl, beat together the eggs and cheese. 

Cook pasta until al dente, adding the asparagus during the last minute of cooking.

And make sure you break your pasta in half. I made this mistake (again) and burned some of the noodles before i could get it pushed down in the water.

The asparagus is hard to mix in. 

Add the hot pasta and asparagus mixture, and toss to coat.

Step #2: In a large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat.  Add the bacon and cook until crisp. Stir in the garlic.  Add the wine and cook until slightly reduced, about 1 minute.

Stir the bacon mixture into the pasta, adding enough hot water to moisten; season with salt and pepper.

And...

voila!!

It tasted awesome! 

Jamie and I ate it for lunch and dinner for 2 days straight!

I'm so glad to be cooking again!

♥

Everyday Adventure, and Random Thursday Thoughts...

Our Washer broke last week.  

Seeing that it is 20 years old, and we bought it at a garage sale,

I'm not shocked.

But, I had already not done laundry for 2 weeks, because of the craziness of work and final projects.

So, our lovely little washer, decided to break the day I was going to do laundry.

Thanks for that.

Well, while we've been trying to figure out what to do about it.

I ran out of clothes. 

and Jamie ran out of clothes.

And we were out of clean towels. 

and using our last pair of clean sheets. 

So yesterday morning, I got fed up, and decided that we should go to the laundromat, and then buy a new washer this week. So, we took an everyday adventure to the laundromat!

You may think I'm kidding about the volume of laundry, but I have proof.  This is every dirty article of clothing in the house, and we took it all to the laundromat with us. 

It was ridiculous. 

When we got there, I had to run and pick up laundry detergent, because of course we forgot it. 

And then we put all the laundry in.

We took up ALL of these industrial washers, including the giant one on the end, PLUS one more, and an equal amount of dryers.

Again, ridiculous.

By the time we were done, Jamie had only 30 minutes to leave for work, which he was super grouchy about.  We ended up having an argument about his attitude, which he called and apologized about. 

Crazy morning.

________________________

I know in the blogging world, randomness is usually saved for "Totally Random Tuesday" (as can be seen here and here.) But, I'm an individual, and decided to do it today. Plus, I don't want to wait until Tuesday to share my thoughts. 

_________________________

Got my parent's Christmas Card today, and they used on of my wedding pictures on it! I thought it was really cute.

I love that Dex is on their card, when they teased me about my furry kids. haha

_________________________

Minnie has it made this winter.  Last year, Jamie had to shovel her a big flat spot for her to potty in, every time it snowed, so she doesn't drown in the snow.

This year, he took our screen off before the first big snow (not like we will be using it this winter) and made Minnie a "potty hut."

All we have to do is keep the "entrance" clear, and she's good to go.

She said "Thanks, Dad!" by licking him in the face 80 times.

Oh wait.

That's normal. 

Well, either way, I know she appreciates it. 

_________________________

I hate mandatory overtime. 

(That's such a stupid concept to me anyway. How can you REQUIRE someone to work overtime?)

Thanks SDI, for stealing my husband again, just when I was excited school was out so I could see him more.

But no.

He now has to work 3PM to 3AM until the end of the year.

Awesome. Back to falling asleep alone.

Grrrr.

So, because I haven't seen him at all this week, I took Asia Wok (the best Chinese food in town) out to him last night, and we ate dinner together! 

It was awesome.

I tried on his hard hat, and safety glasses. I think I'm going to start wearing them daily. Not. 

_________________________

Monday (yes, the day after that big snow) I was still required to drive to the east side of indy, to go to a meeting at my school for student teaching, because IPS only closes if it's a weather emergency. 

What should have taken me 30 minutes took me an hour and ten. 

When I got there, the meeting lasted 20 minutes, so we went upstairs to meet our mentor teachers, and mine was gone, on her first sick day in four years. Awesome. 

So, I drove home (it only took me 50 minutes that time).  What a lame morning. 

But, I did get to see the school, and get oriented with it. 

I will be in a fifth/sixth combined math classroom.

Oh man.

Talk about a challenge. 

Sixth graders and math.

But, I'm kind of excited about it, at the same time. It's going to be something new and fun.

Just wish I could meet my teacher, so I could stop worrying about that.

_________________________

My Ball State roommate Sarah got engaged this weekend!!

She and Jared have been together 6 years, (so it's about time!) 

She called me the other night to tell me about it, she is on cloud nine!

I am so excited and happy for her, he's a great guy. 

She told me her mom has already made a list of venues, lol.

And, I am going bridesmaid dress shopping with the lovely Amanda, for Amanda and Joe's wedding next year!

We are all going over Christmas break.

So Excited!!!

They are seriously the cutest couple ever, and I am so excited to be a part of their day!

_________________________

Well, I'm out of here.

Have to go clean my house. 

Yay....

♥