Today Tate and I celebrate our seven year anniversary.  

On the morning of July 14, 2001, I woke up very early, unable to go back to sleep due to the anticipation of this long awaited day.  I went down to the hotel lobby to have breakfast.  My dad happened to be in the lobby, so he and I ate breakfast together.  Sitting there with just my dad before my big day is one of my favorite memories from the day.

Later that morning, I saw my grandpa.  He asked me if I knew that July 14th was also my grandmother’s birthday, she’d passed away when I was just a young child.  I hadn’t known that our wedding date was also her birthday, making the day that much more special. 

When the doors of the church opened, Tate looked like he was going to cry.  I’ve asked him many times since if it was because of my breathtaking beauty or his nerves…of course, he always answers correctly.  It was all I could do not to ugly cry as I walked down the aisle.

At our reception, I told the DJ that I did not want to hear any music by AC/DC or Rush, two of my most detested bands.  It didn’t matter if one of the reception guests requested to hear one of their songs, he was supposed to tell them that he’d add it to his list but then never get to it.  He respected my wishes.  Smart DJ.

We served a buffet dinner, which sadly I barely remember.  I know I ate, I know that we had prime rib, but I don’t even recall if it was good.  So sad to not even remember the food.  I love reminiscing about food.  What’s even more sad though, is that I only got one bite of wedding cake.  I told Tate prior to the wedding that if he smeared cake in my face, he’d pay dearly.  Tate respected my wishes.  Smart Tate.

We decided that getting a limo to drive us to our hotel where we’d spend our wedding night would be silly.  To save money, my mom drove us to our hotel.  I remember laughing as she dropped us off, knowing what we were getting ready to go do for the VERY FIRST TIME.  *ahem* 

Tate carried me over the threshold.  Thinking about that makes my heart flutter. 

A wedding is just one day out of a marriage, but ours was a WONDERFUL day to BEGIN our marriage.  I had no doubt in my mind that I was making the right choice.  I still have no doubt that Tate is my one and only. 

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So remember how I’ve been begging for a camera?  And then I told you last week that all that soul sucking begging paid off and then never told you how it paid off? 

Yeah, well sorry ’bout that.  Well my new Canon 450D/Rebel XSi arrived via UPS yesterday afternoon amidst much jumping up and down and gleeful shouting.  Here was me, all day yesterday…”Was that the UPS truck!!!” as I ran to the window only to see NO SIGN of the UPS truck.  “Oh I better not shower, what if the UPS man comes while I’m showering??”  “No vacuuming today!  I might not hear the doorbell when the UPS man shows up!”  “Carson BE QUIET!!!  I can’t listen for the UPS man!”  “Did you hear that?  Did it sound like a UPS truck, Carson??”

So needless to say, I got very little done yesterday waiting and waiting and waiting.  It was torture!  But I’m guessing you’re sitting at your computer saying, “GET TO HOW YOU GOT THE CAMERA ALREADY!”

Jeez, I was getting to it.  Patience.

One of my wonderful readers, Trish,  emailed me recently and told me that she works for a company who sells cameras at wholesale price.  She offered to let me choose a Nikon d60 or the Canon XSi for free for 30 days.  After 30 days I could either box it back up and return the camera OR buy the camera at wholesale cost.  Her exact words to me were “I know it’s not as cool as Canon contacting you directly…”

Shut up!  Oh it’s as cool alright!  Since it’s not a free forever camera and I’m not expected to write a review, I’m not even in violation of my BlogHer ads agreement! I, of course, accepted the offer and am now in a mad frenzy to prove to my skeptical husband that we NEED to buy this camera.  He’s convinced that we won’t be able to capture any better pictures with the XSi than we can with our S5IS point and shoot. 

I have 30 days to prove him wrong…and YOU can help!  Send me your best camera tricks, tips, settings, WHATEVER so that I can become a photography wizard.  HALP!  I CAN HAS NO CAMRA SKILLZ.

[pictures deleted] 

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Yesterday’s post straight out of 1950 where I play the perky, but sometimes discontent housewife got me thinking about our roles as women these days.

Somehow my train of thought led me to start thinking about the wedding of a friend, actually the wedding where I met Tate, where my girlfriend’s part of the vows included saying that she promised to love, honor, and obey her husband.  I remember being utterly shocked.  Obey??  Really?  It was 1998, not 1898. 

After the wedding, (not right after, more like a year or two after) I asked her why they included the word “obey” in her vows.  She said she hadn’t even realized that and joked that really it should have been her husband who promised to obey because we all knew who REALLY wore the pants in that family.

I’m just going to go ahead and throw this out there that this was a Baptist wedding.  Me not being Baptist, I have no idea if this is common practice, or if it’s common amongst different types of Baptists and not others. I also have no idea if other religions include this in their vows, though I’m certain it’s not just a Baptist thing.   My Methodist wedding vows did not include the word “obey,” which is a good thing because I wouldn’t have been cool with saying that.

In my opinion, I cannot fathom vowing to obey anyone.   Conversely, I wouldn’t want someone to vow to obey me.   (Well, okay, I sorta would.)  It seems very outdated and has been outdated since the last century.  I am aware, though I don’t fully understand that the “obey” part of the vows is not only said, but also adhered to for some.  Saying that is in no way meant to be judgmental, but since it is not a part of my reality, it’s hard for me to comprehend. 

I’m curious if your vows include the word “obey?”  If so, what did you think about it?

I know this topic has the possibility of starting a firestorm in the comments because we may be discussing faith based, personal issues, so I just ask that whatever your opinion, please respect other’s viewpoints.

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There is a sinister force at work here in my home.  Of this, I’m certain, because there is CLEARLY no other explanation.   I still just can’t wrap my brain around what happened.

Sunday morning started out as a regular morning, nothing seemed immediately amiss.  The first thing I noticed were the bits of food on the seat of the high chair.  Then I saw schmeers of food all over every nook and cranny of the high chair.   And then I saw corn and crackers and dried up cheese surrounding the floor around the high chair.

“How EVER could this mess have gotten there??”  I thought to myself.

I was utterly confused.  Here’s the thing…Saturday afternoon I left the children with Tate so that I could go see Sex and the City*, get a pedicure, and go out to dinner with some friends.  Oh how wonderful it was to be responsibility free for an entire afternoon AND evening, especially since I’ve been a little overwhelmed lately.  I felt comfortable leaving for SUCH a long time, knowing how well Tate would care for the children AND the house.

As I’m standing there looking at the VERY DIRTY high chair, I try to think about how on Earth this could have happened!  This whole situation was so mind boggling!  Surely, SURELY! Tate saw this enormous mess when he retrieved Ella from her high chair the night before.  I mean, who in their right mind wouldn’t clean up such an GLARINGLY OBVIOUS mess?  Certainly NOT Tate!  Of course, he’d clean it up!   DUH!  There HAD to be some other explanation.

So how could the high chair be that dirty? **taps fingers on the counter** 

With a furrowed brow and my head cocked to one side, I wondered ALOUD, “Hmmm.  I WONDER why this high chair is SO DIRTY??  I KNOW Tate wouldn’t have left SUCH a filthy mess.  Did a pack of ravenous toddlers run through our house last night while we were sleeping, leaving a trail of peanut butter and schmutz?  HOW could this have happened?  HMMMM?  I’m SO bewildered.”

Apparently the sinister force at work in home leaving messes in high chairs also possessed Tate.  He wasn’t able to help me brainstorm this VERY SERIOUS problem, but instead just gave me the evil eye.

*Please go see Sex and the City!  I want to talk about it!  I’ll wait right here for you to get back.

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Thanks to Neil from Citizen of the Month for this week’s Haiku Friday theme…Write like the opposite sex.  Mine is full of cliches and stereotypes!  Enjoy! 

E.S.P.N. time
Sit back, relax, *SEX*, drink beer
Is my wife talking?

Damn!  “Pick up my socks!”
All she does *SEX* is nag me
I’ll just ignore her

*SEX* I’m sure hungry
Maybe if I whine enough
Wife will bring me snacks

I work HARD all day
Can’t the kids play somewhere else?
I sure am horny

Look at Wife folding
*SEX* laundry.  I should grope her!
What?!  What did I do?!

Oh great.  Now she’s pissed.
Can’t I get some affection?
She used to be fun.

*SEX* Women’s soccer!
They should take their clothes off *SEX*
Why’s Wife mad again?????

To play along for Haiku Friday, follow these steps:
1. Write your own haiku on your blog. You can do one or many, all following a theme or just random. What’s a haiku, you ask? Click here.

2. Sign the Mister Linky below with your name and the link to your haiku post (the specific post URL, not your generic blog URL). We will delete your link if it doesn’t go to a haiku. If you need help with this, contact Christina or myself. REMEMBER…ONLY sign Mr. Linky if you have a HAIKU POST.

3. Pick up a Haiku Friday button to display on the post or in your sidebar by clicking the button above.

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Saturday brought beautiful weather to New Town, IN, perfect for heading to a farm auction.  If you’ve never been to an auction you are truly missing out.  But this isn’t about the auction itself, it’s about using our stupid navigation system to get there.

I (probably should) take some of the responsibility in the resulting clusterf*ck.  First of all, I waited until we were in the car to ask Tate if he knew where we were going.  HUGE mistake.  I know from prior experience that we should have the route secured prior to departure.  Secondly, when he said that we’d just use the navigation system to tell us how to get there, I didn’t immediately say, “ah hell no.  We need to look at a real MAP.”  HEE-YUGE mistake.  When the navigation system seemed to be sending us on a route I wouldn’t have thought of myself, I didn’t immediately stop the insanity right then and there. 

**head explodes**

Let me back up just a bit to explain my extreme irritation with our navigation system.  It works splendidly if you merely want to go somewhere using our nation’s interstate system.  When used for in town navigation, though, it tends to choose odd routes and sometimes it gets confused and tells you you’re driving off road even when you know for damn sure that you are INDEED driving on a road.   It has also told me to make a u-turn to get back on the correct route, right after it’s told me to turn, like I’m the idiot, or something.

These “quirks” don’t deter Tate from his LOVE of the navigation system, though.   To him, the navigation system is infallible.

Here’s what the route to the auction looked liked…

What should have taken 15 minutes or so, took about 45 minutes.

What should have been a fun family outing, instead is probably going to lead to years of therapy and anti-anxiety meds.

What should have been a leisurely drive, filled with talk of the tractors and combines we’d get to see, was instead filled with angry accusations and heavy sighs. “Well if SOMEONE would have looked at a map BEFORE we left, we wouldn’t be in this position!”  “You have NO sense of direction!!!”  ***HEAVY. SIGH.***

After about 20 minutes of following the navigation system, Tate and I both realized that the route it had chosen was definitely the LONG, LONG way. But since we didn’t know where we were and didn’t have one of those old school PAPER maps with us, we still had to follow the route. That damn navigation system had us by the balls.

We easily self-navigated our way home and agreed that in the future we’d FINALLY learn from our mistakes and look at a real, bona fide paper map before leaving the house.  Also, we decided to go ahead and start a “future therapy” fund, just in case.

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List of things I accomplished before 9:10 AM…

Nursed the baby, grew a banana tree, harvested it and fed one to the baby, checked and answered several emails, dressed the baby, dressed the boy, reminded a certain person of our quest to leave the house by 9:10, changed two poopy diapers, showered myself, invented a shower lock, patented the lock, marketed it, and began to reap the profits, brushed my teeth, flossed, put on make-up, dried my hair, put on clothes (including pantyhose), reminded a certain person AGAIN of our quest to leave the house by 9:10, realized I had no time to eat breakfast, planned in my head the meals to be made for the day, laundry to be completed, and bills that needed paying, packed a travel bag for the kids filled with snacks, toys, diapers, wipes, and burp cloths, came up with a few viable solutions for world hunger, got two children into their coats and buckled into their car seats, wrote this blog post in my head, seethed with anger.*  9:10

List of things accomplished by a certain person who shall remain nameless…

Got up and hour after me, complained about the baby being fussy and loud, did some work from home on the Internet, “made” breakfast for himself and the boy that included pouring cereal and milk into a bowl, patted himself on the back for making breakfast, rolled his eyes at repeated reminders of our looming departure, asked what time we were leaving, showered, got himself a road sody, marveled at his amazing ability to get ready by 9:10, wondered outloud to himself why his wife was “sportin’ a ‘tude.”

*Certain accomplishments were embellished for EFFECT.

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