Snowball (part 2)

Saturday morning we decided to take a walk to see the other buildings on the property. Across the road from our house, was a barn and two restored log cabins from the 1870's. They also rent the cabins.

Steven, on the porch of the first cabin

hanging out in the old barn...


the barn Mr. Scarecrow


a sign that hangs on the outside of the barn

After our short walk, we decided to take a drive to do a bit more exploring. We discovered the dead ends of a couple of gravel roads, at which people were actually living...and people think WE live in the boondocks? I'm pretty sure our house is nothing compared to the end of a gravel road, on a mountain, outside of Snowball, Arkansas!

After enjoying the scenery for a while, we headed into Marshall to grab some groceries for dinner that night. We also stopped for lunch...at a Mexican restaurant. Imagine that? :o)

That afternoon, we went for another walk. This one was quite a bit longer than the first! We decided to go up the trail, past the first cabin and the barn. We found a hiking trail off to the side and followed it up into the woods. There, we came across this cool old house!

We also saw an elk track! I think that was Steven's favorite part of the entire trip!

That walk/hike ended with me being exhausted! Steven took a picture of me resting on a big rock before we headed back, but I'll spare you! It's kind of scary! haha
I'm not sure exactly how far we hiked, but it was at least 3 or 4 miles, most of it up hill. Oh, and did I mention my husband isn't one of these always-stay-on-the-path hikers? Well, he's not. This resulted in me getting whacked in the face/arm/leg with a branch or two, almost stepping in horse poo, almost slipping on my rear while climbing over rocks, etc. It was definitely an interesting "walk"! When we got back to the house, my sweet husband suggested we go for another drive, so that we could enjoy some scenery and I could sit down for a while. :-)

This time we discovered the end of another gravel road...and a SCHOOL BUS tow truck! Oh yeah, now that's custom!

When we returned to the house from our second drive, I set to work in the kitchen to bake Steven a belated birthday cake. (Note to self: next year call Courtney!) While the cake tasted fine, it certainly wasn't our beloved Courtney Cake.

Steven enjoyed a massive piece of the cake...


After our mini birthday celebration, we headed into Marshall to see a movie...



at the drive-in! We saw Four Christmases, which was cute. Marshall has the only drive-in movie in Arkansas that is open all year.

Merry Christmas from the Andersons!

UPDATE: Please note that our Christmas card this year was a collage of images of my attempts to get good Christmas photos of our five pets. We do not have 20+ animals, even though it may seem like it at times.

Also, I need to mention that the names on the card are not in order of the last row of photos. Oops! L-R they are, Biscuit, Emerald, Roush, Minnie Pearl, and Poncho.

Snowball, Arkansas

Last Friday, Steven and I headed out for a relaxing weekend away to celebrate our first wedding anniversary. When we planned our honeymoon we were torn between renting a cabin in the Ozark Mountains and going to Nashville. In the end, we decided on Nashville because...well, because I got 2nd row seats to see Andy Griggs! haha We had a ton of fun though! We did something different and fun every single day we were there. However, we weren't anxious to rush back into a big city this year. Actually, Jonesboro is getting too big for us day-by-day. So, we decided for our first anniversary we would go with our second choice for our honeymoon.

After doing some research on the Internet, I came across a huge listing of getaway rentals in Arkansas. We finally agreed on a beautiful old farm house in Snowball, Arkansas.

Where is Snowball?
Right here...

It is far enough out that we got zero phone service at the house we rented. Imagine that! A weekend without a cell phone ringing? Oh, it was marvelous!

(Ok, ok...I admit it. I did check my e-mail/facebook/texts when we drove into Marshall on Saturday. )

Anyway, this is what we saw when we arrived on Friday night.

And the outside during the day

Here are some photos of the inside of the house.

This is the living room, where you enter from the front door.


We spent a lot of the weekend reading here, next to the fireplace in the living room.

Above is the second bedroom. This room is just off the left of living room. It has two full beds, a door that opens to the screened-in back porch, and a door that opens to the front porch (the solid green door seen in the picture of the outside of the house).

This is the kitchen. The door in the back of the first photo goes to the bathroom.


The main bedroom. This one was hard to get a picture of because of the shape of the room. It isn't as small of a room as it looks in the picture though. There was a queen size bed with plenty of room to walk around, with room to store shoes, suitcases, etc. on the sides. It is off the left side of the kitchen.


The pretty back porch

Ok, it's really late so I will post more about our trip later.

My Power Outage Checklist

Here are a few things that I did/should have done just in case the power goes out. You would think that I would have thought about this stuff BEFORE my husband left town this afternoon.

1. Plug in phone.
2. Pray the phone gets a full charge before the power goes out. This is especially important to stupid people like me that have no car charger.
3. Get the kerosene heater out of the shed. Yeah, this is one of those things I should have thought about before he left. Let's hope I don't have to figure out how to do it myself.
4. Buy kerosene. Yeah, another one of those things I should have thought about before he left.
5. Put anything work related that I may need tomorrow on my jumpdrive. This one I did! If the power goes out here before my order finishes processing, at least I have a back up IF I can get somewhere else to send it off.
6. Charge our iPods. -This one I did, but only because we have one iPod in the iHome radio in the kitchen at all times, and it automatically charges them. Hey, I'll need some music!
7. EAT - Definitely did this. :-)
   
8. Order pizza - I didn't do this one. Should have. Pizza is better cold anyway, so it would be a good thing to have on hand that I wouldn't have to worry about heating up.

And another thought....because I am the wife of a lineman, I think that I should have seniority over anyone else when it comes to the order power is restored. :-) I know, I know...it doesn't work that way. It depends on how the lines run/fall...but I can try!


Anyway, let's just hope we wake up in the morning with electricity! Please, please, please...

Back to square one...

After enjoying a few months of actually being married, we are pretty much back to where we started. Steven's crew, being one of the best at this company, has gotten moved to another job. Apparently this is going to be a more difficult job, and the people in charge didn't want just anyone to be doing it. I guess it is a compliment to the guys, but it's a pain to me. Now Steven will be leaving on Sunday or Monday mornings and returning on Thursday nights again. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted. On the bright side, he's going to be staying in Batesville, so he won't be too far away...just too far to drive everyday because he'll have to drive another 30 minutes or so each morning to the other side of Batesville to the job site.

Looking for a book to read?

Escape by Carolyn Jessop

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is an amazing book! I definitely recommend it to everyone. This book gives you a true look at what the world of polygamy is really like. Honestly, it is difficult to read at times. Parts of this book made me very, very angry.


View all my reviews.

Our First Wedding Anniversary

Yesterday marked our first wedding anniversary and Steven's 25th birthday! Woohoo!

After church, we went out to eat with my parents, Whitney, and Adam. Then we went back to my parents' house to cut our cake. For some reason, my computer decided not to rotate most of my photos when they were uploaded, and blogger doesn't give you that option, SO these are the only ones I'm posting here. I'm just too lazy to mess with it. The others are posted and rotated on Facebook though. Hint: there was a bit of cake smashing present....and drink pouring...

If you want to see the rest of the photos, click here. (You don't have to have facebook to view the album.)

Jennica's Wedding

Another overdue post...

One of my longtime best friends got married last month. Jennica and Kris tied the knot at Harding University in Searcy. It was beautiful! Thankfully, I got the chance to go down the night before with Lauren, Jessica, and Allison to hang out with Jenn and some of her Harding friends before the big day. We had a lot of fun hanging out, eating (of course!) and watching a bunch of goofy youtube videos.
The next morning, our pal Brent came into town a bit early, so we (Lauren, Jessica, and myself) kidnapped him for some shopping and lunch before the wedding.
After the wedding, Steven and I went out to eat with Mom & Dad before heading home.

The Groom's Cake...
this is the cake I got to destroy...er, um, serve :-)



Pretty flowers...



BFF's!
Lauren, Allison, Jennica, me, and Jessica....

Carving Pumpkins!

Yes, these are from way back in October! Oh, well. Late is better than never.

I discovered that my husband is pretty talented in the pumpkin carving area...

My early anniversary gift!

What could it be?

I got an iPhone! Steven went out and looked at them Friday morning, and we went that night to pick it up. Yes, I'm already obsessed and in love! Don't worry, he didn't get totally left out. He got to keep my BlackBerry.

I'm back with Thirteen Thirsday!

I've been such a bad blogger! Life has just been insanely crazy lately, and I haven't had the time to sit down and type out an entry. I have LOTS to blog about though! Over Christmas break, expect blogging overload from me. Hehe, I still have photos from Halloween to post! Anyway, here is my 13 Thursday list....

13 Things I'm Happy About Today

1. This semester is almost over! I wasn't sure if I'd survive it for a while.

2. My husband is home every night now! It was definitely an adjustment (the mess in our house says so!), but we are loving it.

3. I have no class tomorrow. Yippee! I do however, have to take 3 online quizzes and an online test this weekend. Ick.

4. I finally got the instructor for my online class to go back and correct grading mistakes on my last quiz. (I made 20/20, but some of the questions were wrong, so it said I made 17/20.)

5. Tonight is the Christmas parade! I really, really hope we get to go. If we do, this will be the first time Steven and I have been to the parade together.

6. I am slowly but steadily getting caught up on photo editing. I think I might actually have everything finished in time for Christmas gifts.

7. I have a lot of my Christmas shopping done. I'm not finished, but definitely making good progress.

8. Our anniversary trip is only 2 weeks away! I can not wait. I so need a break!

9. I actually made it to class on time today. I didn't think I would because I woke up late.

10. I am completely finished with 1 of my 5 classes this semester.

11. The wedding album I ordered came in today!

12. My husband has finally agreed to let me buy an automatic litter box! Woohoo! Now if only I can convince myself to part with the money...

13. The weekend has arrived...finally. :-)

Christmas season is here!

Do you know how I know that? No, it's not because Hobby Lobby says so.

I know it is officially time to start decorating and celebrating because I saw this commercial this morning.

Jenn's Shower

While my husband is snoring in the other room on this rainy day, I shall do a bit of catch-up blogging.

Jennica and I met in Ms. Beard's class in the second grade. We were seated at the same table together (along with our dear friend, Lauren) and quickly became buddies. We are now seniors in college, and I'm not sure what I would do with out her! She's one of those girls that is smart, beautiful, and quiet according to some that don't know her very well. I, however, know different. Jennica is hilarious. (Who else would think of buying a loaf of bread to take to the movies?) She is also my partner in crime when it comes to commentating movies. If you are one of those people that detests people talking during a movie, don't go with Jennica and me. We cannot keep our random, funny thoughts about the movie to ourselves. She also has a very big heart and would do anything for a friend. Anyway, I say all of this to get to the point that in less than two weeks she will be getting married to Kris! They are a great fit. I can hardly wait for the wedding!

At the beginning of November, Jennica drove in from Searcy so that we could have a brunch bridal shower for her. The 5 original members (Jennica, Lauren, Allison, Jessica, and myself) of our group, "the girls" were able to get together at the shower, and I was SO happy to get to visit with everyone.

Thirteen Thursday

I have almost completely fallen off the blogging wagon. Life has gotten too, too busy lately. With at least one photo session a week, plus insane amounts of projects for school, I barely have time to breathe. I'm back though, at least for today.

Here are thirteen things that I have realized/learned with my husband being home more.

1. The day he bought the XBOX360 was not one of my good judgment days.
2. I actually enjoy cooking. I just don't enjoy cooking at 8 o'clock at night when I am exhausted.
3. I'm going to have to start buying milk by the gallon. :-(
4. My husband's habit of eating things out of the container isn't so bad after all. Less dishes!
5. Finding things to cook that we both like is not going to be an easy task.
6. Apparently pulling 1 pair of pants out of the dryer and leaving the dryer door open the rest of day for others to dig out their clothes is an acceptable form of doing laundry.
7. A married couple should have no fewer than 2 televisions.
8. A full size bed is not big enough for two people, a cat, and a dog.
9. Cats often prefer the person that likes them the least.
   
10. I suspect my dogs are getting fat not because I feed them too much (as my husband accused), but because the treat jar empties a lot faster when he is home. Hmmm...
11. I need a bigger washing machine.
12. We need a real dining room table.
13. Regardless of what he says, Steven likes the cat.

It's official!

We're a true married couple now! For the first time in our 10.5 months of marriage, we live together! Woohoo!

When I got home from work on Thursday, Steven was already there. That's certainly not what I am used to. We took a picture to mark the occasion. :o)

Steven has changed companies once again, but this time it is bringing him closer to home. He is going to be working in Searcy and driving back and forth everyday. It still hasn't really sunken in with me though. Right now it just feels like a long weekend. He is off this week, except Wednesday, and he will be gone hunting on Thursday and Friday, so this week will still kind of be the same.

It's going to be very odd with him coming home every night. The last time we spent a whole week together? Oh, that would be our honeymoon. Two weeks from now, we will either be settling into a routine or in jail for trying to kill each other. Wish us luck. :0)