AWESOME Giveaway!

HELLO, what is WRONG with me!?!?  My fantastically fabulous bloggy soulmate/bestie is having an AWESOME giveaway and it ends today and ANOTHER way for me to enter is to blog about it and I HAVE. NOT. YET.!!!  What the what is WRONG with me!!?!?!  Wait.  Don't answer that.  ANYWAYS, head on over to the hilarious genious that is Miss Kriss and enter her giveaway (but maybe not too much because I want to win, mmmk?)

What's that?  You want to know what you'll win?  It's not important ... you won't like it anyway. 

In fact, pay it no mind and just leave the winning up to me.

It'll be fine.

 Shhhhh.

  Alright it's ...

a FABULOUS Thomas Paul Tree tote from All Modern!  I mean, not that fabulous.  You don't need it.  Don't you think I need it more?  Being that I was sad the other day? (totally just played the "pity me" card, not okay ... is it too late to retract that statement?)  Okay, okay, go participate away.  Just mail me the bag when you win, mmmmmk?

Holy schmoly two posts in one day.  I don't know what to do with myself.  Don't know JUST what to do with myself ... (if you can name the movie that song came from you get 10 points and you ROCK)

GOOD LUCK LADIES!!!

CPK, A Little P-Diddy and My MOH ...

Thank you all for your sweet words of encouragement and my sweet friends for your emails/calls/texts. I'm really fine, just wanted to share a little of what was on my heart with all of you yesterday (I know you were all shocked and probably a little frightened when you didn't find a post dripping with sarcasm but don't you worry my pets, I can only hold it in for a day or two, then it comes bursting forth like a lion after one of those zebras on that dang Planet Earth I hate ... or maybe like gas from one of my former patients at the hiney-doctor's office ...). But really, from my heart, thank you for your prayers/thoughts/comments. You ladies really enrich my day!

Right, so back to the sarcasm. Actually this one probably won't be TOO saturated with my normal humor. Last night my MOH came over with P (she has about 642 nicknames, but I LOVE calling her Diddy. Get it? P-Diddy? Hopefully you did, that's not to complex girls) and a CPK Margarita Pizza in tow. Paired with my left over wine from the Valentine's Girl's Night, American Idol and our personal entertainment (being Koda trying to do EVERYTHING he could to steal one of Diddy's toys, lick her feet/face/hands/anything he could get near and sniff the heck out of her) we had ourselves a nice little evening ...

(I mean, HOW could this little muffin not make ANYONE feel better?)

And OMG she's clapping for herself now (and crawling but I didn't get video of that) so enjoy (and pardon my incessant baby talk, she was in my lap, I couldn't help it ...) this stinkin' adorableness ...

I am also currently listening to the musical genious that is Micheal Jackson, which automatically makes my day better. There is an all Micheal station online on AOL Radio which I listened to non-stop right after he died. I loved him. Like more than a person should. And literally cried like I knew the man when he died. I didn't. But I thought I did. AND I'm sporting THIS headband that I got at Dollar General yesterday (I really have a problem with this store ... and I don't know why ... because the majority of it is tacky ... but SOME THINGS aren't LIKE my headband ...) for $1.79!!!  LOVE to find some deals ...

(See I'm really ...)

(REALLY excited about it ...)

Okay loverlies.  That's all I've got.  Happy IAF (It's Almost Friday) Day!!!

Disappointed ...

Haven't we all been there?  I don't know if any of you are like me, but I have this curse.  No, I'm serious.  Any time I look forward to ANYTHING it almost always. never. (can you use those two words consecutively, cause I'm gonna ...) follows. through.  Seriously.  This is why I try and not plan anything until a few days out.  Because if I give myself time to be excited about it, SOMETHING happens to make it ... not happen.  My husband doesn't believe me, he thinks I make this up, but that's neither here nor there. 

Well, there's a little bit of disppointment going on with me right now (don't worry, no biggie, I'm pretty sure I'm just being a big baby but if I can't whine to y'all then who CAN I whine to?) and it's making my soul a little saddened.  And whenever my soul is saddened, the best thing I can think to do is turn to the Author and Finisher of our faith.  Because ...

"The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning (even THIS morning); great is your faithfulness.  "The LORD is my portion", says my soul, "therefore I will hope in Him."  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who SEEKS Him. 

Lamentations 3:22-25

And here are a few quotes that pick me up when I'm "in my disappointed funk" ...

When you suffer and lose, that does not mean you are being disobedient to God. In fact, it might mean you're right in the center of His will. The path of obedience is often marked by times of suffering and loss.   ~Charles (Chuck) Swindoll

Faith is often strengthened right at the place of disappointment.  ~Rodney McBride

The Christian life is not a constant high. I have my moments of deep discouragement. I have to go to God in prayer with tears in my eyes, and say, "O God, forgive me," or "Help me."  ~Billy Graham (LOVE me some Billy!)

If I look at myself, I am depressed. If I look at those around me, I am often disappointed. If I look at my circumstances, I am discouraged. But if I look at Jesus, I am constantly, consistently, and eternally fulfilled!  ~Anonymous

And as I was typing this, a song from the Women of Faith Conference I went to last year came on and these lyrics are exactly my prayer (and really are most of the time, because let's face it, we're all broken and need to be rescued)

"I need you Jesus,

to come to my rescue

Where else can I go?

There's no other name by,

which I am saved

Capture me with grace,

I will follow you."

And when I need a visual reminder of the OPPOSITE of disappointment, I just pull up a few of these and turn that frown upside down.

{P.S.  Dear long hair and skinnyness, please come back.  Thank you.}

Little Stinker ...

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this.  But I. LOVE. animals.  Like more than a person should.  I am actually pretty sure I like animals more than I do most people.  I am that person that cries when I drive down the street and see an animal that has been hit, while simultaneously yelling at the "hypothetical person" that hit the animal, calling them all kinds of names while screaming WHAT kind of person just hits an animal and keeps going!?!?  I swerve to miss hitting squirrels, which someday will more than likely lead to me hitting another car.  I will swing my car across multiple lanes if I see a stray cat/dog/racoon that I need to rescue and either find it's owner or try to convince my mister that we need to be.  I talk to my fish.  I even rescue earth worms from frying on the concrete in the summer.  Yes, I'm serious.  I return them to the dirt.  By using a stick to pick them up of course, don't get me wrong, I care about them, but they're still a little gross.  I used to work at a doctors office where we had a big flat-screen TV for the patients to watch while they wait.  It was a butt doctor's office.  You know, a gastroentrologists?  Oh the stories I have, but I'm pretty sure it's against Hippa for me to divulge.  If I ever meet any of you in person I'd be happy to fill your ears.  You might laugh.  A LOT.  My friends and family sure have.  Anyways, back to the TV.  We couldn't get cable so we had to play DVDs.  Apparently they thought it was a good idea to watch Planet Earth.  Which, in theory, is a great series.  Well, I worked at the front desk.  And if the TV is on I can't HELP but watch.  And so I did.  Now, I don't know if any of you've ever watched Planet Earth, but it's all about the circle of life.  Which is beautiful, I get it.  But there are parts of that circle that I'd be happy to never be included in.  Like the hunting and killing of sweet, cuddly little animals.  I KNOW a lion needs to eat a zebra and that it will chase it's calf, but I DON'T NEED TO SEE IT!!!  Goodness KNOWS I don't need to see it!!!  And I KNOW a shark will prey on a baby whale when it gets seperated from its herd, but Lord HELP me I DON'T NEED TO SEE IT!!!  Our poor patients would come to the front desk to check in (already having abdominal issues and not being in the bestest of moods) and I would look up and say "Hello, which (sob, hiccup) doctor (sob, sob, sob) are you here (sob, hiccup, sob, honking nose blowing) to see?"  And they would look at me with a "What's wrong with the emo front desk girl?" kind-of-a look.  Until finally I had to ask my office manager if we could watch some happy-go-lucky chick flicks because the violent daily killings were making me depressed.  And I'm pretty sure giving our patients even more gas than they already came in with.  So regarding my love for animals, y'all get the idea.  Well there's a stray kitty that me and my boss feed at my work.  I call him Sammy.  Because I don't know if he's a girl or a boy and Sammy goes both ways.  Here is mr. (or miss, but for some reason all animals are boys to me) Sammy ...

Sweet little muffin sits outside next to the bushes around 4:30, when I usually come to get his bowl.  I took this picture through the window because the MINUTE I come out the door he shoots off like a rocket and hides in the closest to the set of the bushes that I put his bowl in.  I SO wish he'd let me pet him, and maybe catch him so I could get him neutered so he'll stop making stray baby kitties find him a permenant home and won't have to worry about him every night it's either cold/raining/windy/misting outside.  Wondering if he's warm enough or has a place to sleep or made it to his food bowl that day.  However, on Friday (the snow day) some of the guys at work came in for a few hours.  During those few hours I get a few emails saying "Um, Katie, I think you're feeding the wrong kind of kitty ..." along with pictures attached of ...

Heading STRAIGHT for the kitty's food!  Little STINKER.  How cute is he by the way?  I have named him Pepe (you know, le Pew?) and if I was sure he wasn't going to raise his tail and engulf me in a permanent stink, I would probably go looking for this little guy.  However, I DO know that I am feeding Sammy, because I've stayed behind to watch him eat his little bowl of food after work ... from my car of course, because he's skiddish.  However, you better BELIEVE that I squat down, pull up the blinds in front of his little bush where I put his food bowl, and check to make sure there isn't a little stinker waiting in those bushes to snatch the kitty food and cover me with a new, permanently pungent perfume ... but the little guy is welcome to trot around in the parking lot all he wants.  I think he's darling.  In a stinky kind of way.  Just call me Dr. Doolittle.

What A Weekend ...

Happy late Valentine's Day ladies (and gent)!!!  Holy weekend.  We really didn't have too eventful of a weekend (and, of course, I didn't take pictures ... well, with people in them anyways ...) but it feels like, with the snow and Valentines Day, that it's been a "long time no blog" kind-of-a-feel ... SO that being said.  Let's get caught up, shall we?  Friday night (after the Great Snow of Texas 2010 ... seriously I feel like I might be telling my grandkids about how long ago, there was ONE day that Texas got 10 inches of snow.  And they will look at me like I've lost it and never believe me.  Unless they write about it in the Texas History books, which considering as much snow as we got, would not be surprising ...) me and the mister did a whole lotta nada.  Which was nice.  We snuggled up in our jammies and enjoyed being "snowed in" (even though the snow was starting to melt and look slushy on the roads, like I said before, doesn't. happen. in Texas, we hold on as long as we can ...)     The next morning, my mommasita called me and asked if I would like to meet her for a mani/pedi & Starbucks.  Translation "Would you like me to TREAT you to a mani/pedi & Starbucks."  DOUBLE SCORE:  Time with my favorite lady on the PLANET AND treated to a (DESPERATELY NEEDED) mani/pedi while toting my daily fix in hand?  Um, no thought necessary, yes please!  You will all be pleased to hear that I STILL am acrylic-less.  Even though my hands have a bit of "chew wear and tear" they aren't as bad as they have been in the past.  AND I found the coolest grey/brown/goes-with-everything OPI color and I. LOVE. IT.

(Isn't it so pretty?  It's called "You Don't Know Jacquis")

I also got my eyebrows waxed.  Apparently I need to avoid waxing.  For.ev.er.  But don't worry, this time I wasn't worried about losing a brow.  I was worried about the WAX that the sweet little Vietnamese lady GOT IN MY BANGS!  Are you KIDDING me!?!?  I pushed them back several times to avoid said happening.  But then, the inevitable happened.  And I felt her trying to pull it out of my hair.  And that's when the panic attack happened (internally of course) and I thought "I have wax in my bangs.  I have to go home.  I don't have time, I have errands to run, Valentines to deliver.  I am going to have to deliver my Valentines looking like Cameron Diaz in "Something About Mary".  Awesome.  But.  I sucked it up.  And then.  I proceeded to run 500 errands.  In my VS sweats.  A scarf.  My "Something About Mary" bangs ... and flip flops.  YES.  Flip flops.  Faux paux of the century.  Not flip flops, per se, but flip flops when the HIGH is 41 degrees.  With sweats.  And a scarf.  But I had no choice!  I'd just had a pedicure!  Didn't everyone KNOW that?!?  And don't worry.  By the end of the day I was one nasty look away from hanging a sign around my neck that said "I just had a pedicure, I don't NORMALLY wear flip flops in 40 degree weather, DON'T JUDGE ME!!!"

My next errand including running to deliver flowers to my grandma's for Valentine's Day.  I went to my Mamo's first because I was closer to her house.  After I dropped her flowers off she asked if I would do her a favor and drop off a birthday card to a ladies luncheon that she couldn't attend because she wasn't feeling well.  Because I "looked so cute" ... Um, Mamo?  Looking cute is the opposite end of the spectrum of what I look like right about now.  Do I need to explain to you all again?  VS sweats, a scarf, NO MAKE UP, day-old washed hair w/ "Something About Mary" bangs ... and the flip-flop faux-paux ... But she insisted that I looked adorable (her pain medicine must've been kicking in) and asked me to run on over.  I obliged her and show up to a house FULL of adorable little ladies and their husbands.  I ring the doorbell and one of them, Marci, opens the door and raves about how cute (she must be on pain meds too) I look and that she didn't recognize me because of my bangs (i.e. code for head-to-toe faux paux) and proceeds to WHISK me into this house-full of my Mamo's precious, very well-dressed friends and ... ask me ... to have ... cake.  At the head of the table.  With the birthday girl.  WHO'S, by the way, nieces, nephews, grandkids, kids their dogs, their friends dogs and everyone that she has known in her life I think were there ... I can only imagine they are all thinking "What cat dragged THAT in and WHY DOES SHE HAVE ON FLIP FLOPS?!?!  Not to mention, what's in her bangs?"  Thankfully they were all as hospitable as they could be and I hurried out of there as FAST as possible.

That night, my mister got invited to play poker and I got the "best wife ever" award and told him to go have fun and play.  The night before Valentine's Day.  I'm not bitter.  No seriously this time I'm REALLY not.  He had a great time and I got to go to Taco Diner and eat this ...

With THIS cute girl ...

(Miss Kelly of Fabulous K ...)

(I stole this from your FB page K, I hope you're okay with that ... I'm sure you are, being Fabulous and all)  Kelly and I had a FANTASTIC time chatting and drinking Mango Margaritas (mmmm) and THEN heading over to see Valentine's Day (fitting, right?) which was adorable.  Kinda Love Actually-esque.  Even though I liked Love Actually better, it had that kind of feel.

Sunday my mister and I served communion at church, went to lunch at La Madeline (because I LOVES it) and then I proceeded to lay around in my pj's with my Koda Bear all. day. long.  My mister and I didn't get to celebrate our heart day until about 10:30pm due to my mister having some ... issues ... with ... his truck ... being stuck ... in a LOT of mud.  Needless to say he got stuck at 5pm and didn't get home until 10:00-ish.  And even though he was frustrated and freezing after a HUGE ordeal, he came home with these ...

Man.  I'm spoiled.  And until he came home to keep me company, I had this little (big) guy standing in ...

(Pardon the awesome iPhone quality picture ...)

Is he not the CUTEST?  And I don't think it's just cause I'm biased.  Seriously.  Look at that snuggle bug.  I hope you all had GREAT Valentine's weekends!

Snow Night!

We decided about about 10 o'clock last night, when there wasn't a SOUL outside and all was peaceful with the world, to take Koda out to disrupt the peace and bound around in the snow. And boy did he bound and BOY did we laugh. It was obvious the camera HAD to come out. And I hope you enjoy the results ...

Please pardon the crazy eyes on Koda. That was the only editing option I had, either crazy eyes or bright, shining lights of heaven REFLECTING in his eyes, making him look ... posessed. So I chose the edited-eye look. We are BOTH off of work today. Everything is closed. And rightfully so. We got close to 10 INCHES here yesterday! I don't know if any of you knows much about Texas. But that just. doesn't. happen. IF we get snow, it melts, while still in the air, and hits the grown immediately turning to rain. Now we have trouble with ice, that's for sure. But not 10 inches of snow. And I am pretty sure the general feeling of everyone in Texas is PURE joy. At least that's what it is at the Fulmer household. PLUS we have an excuse to stay in our jammies ALL DAY and not do a dang THING! Oh, and remember how I talked about my "snowed-in" menu yesterday. Well apparently I didn't believe the hype because I didn't get a DANG thing and now our choices are the contents of our fridge and pantry which include the following: Diet Coke, wine, spinach dip, salsa, ketchup, coffee creamer, two bags of half-eaten tortilla chips, Splenda and a crap TON of Valentine's candy. I mean, don't get me wrong, this is a movie-watching party in the making, BUT at 9am, when all I want is Starbucks, it's not so helpful. As MUCH as I want to eat spinach dip for breakfast ... I equally DON'T. So my mister may or may not know he's about to drive me to Starbucks :) I hope you all enjoyed pictures of our "Snow Night"!  Have a WONDERFUL weekend loverlies!!!

Valentine's Girl's Night At Casa De Fulmer And Snow Snow SNOW!

Um, PS, it's snowing in DALLAS.  Yes, you read that right.  SNOWING.  And what call does DFW make?  When they FREAK OUT a single drop of sleet falls from the sky, close all school districts, start "Sleet Watch 2010" and RUSH to the store to stock up on necessities.  You know, toliet paper, canned goods, flashlights.  Which, by the way, if I'm preparing to hold up in my house for a few days.  And be "snowed in".  The last thing I'm buying is CANNED GOODS.  Heck, I'm buying everything Little Debbie makes, Diet Coke, icing and frozen pizzas.  What kinda fun is a perpetual lock-in if you can't have slumber party-like food!?!?  Anyways, moving right along.  What do they do?  Don't close a dang thing.  No schools, no businesses, no NOTHIN'.  Figures.  It IS beautiful here though.  Big, fluffy flakes falling from (HELLO alliteration) the sky ...

Now.  Onto last night.  I had a Valentine's Girl's Night at my house.  It was a smaller one, which I ended up LOVING.  I wasn't running around my house like a nut.  Screaming one or two word sentences to everyone while mustering a smile and trying to move onto the next one, and at the end of the night feeling like I didn't talk to a SOUL.  We laughed, ate, drank, played a game or two and partied til about 11:30pm!  Thankfully, I'm not really that tired.  Thank all you girls that came, you all made my night!!!

(This later had ice and wine bottles in it - first time I've used this wedding gift, ha!)

 

(L to R:  Ashley, Kelly of Fab K (my only friend there w/ a blog!  shame on the rest of you girls!), my MOH, me, Alysia and Laura ... this was after my mom, MIL, Silly and Cousin Natalie left ...)

Thank you ladies for the FUN evening!  I can't WAIT until the next one!!!