Something a little special...(& Merry Christmas!)

This last Sunday Kyle and I made the trek to the thriving metropolis of Republic, Kansas to celebrate Christmas with the Hurley side of my family.  I feel like we have fewer and fewer chances anymore now that we are older to get together and see everyone, so it was a special treat that all of my cousins were there except for two (we definitely missed having Amanda and Brandon there, but a day trip from Salt Lake City might be a bit out of the question!).  It was really nice to be able to catch up with everyone on their lives and get to spend some quality time with my grandparents.  I am starting to realize that the older they get, the more special the time is I get to spend with them.  It's hard to see them get older, especially when I think back on all of the memories of them when I was younger.

My grandparents had a special Christmas present for Kyle's and I's first Christmas.  When Grandma told me it was something "breakable" so she did not want to send it in the mail, I don't think I have been so excited for a Christmas present in a really long time!  See, growing up, my mom had this stained glass nativity set she put out every year that my grandma herself made.  I LOVE my mom's nativity set; it is so pretty and so special knowing that my grandma made it.  My grandma became severely ill a couple of years ago and even though she has since recovered, she never has been able to take back up her stained glass making.  I kind of just assumed that I would have to inherit my mom's set if I ever wanted one of my grandmother's stained glass nativity scenes.  Well, to my surprise I found out that grandma has a nativity set stashed away for each of the grandkids (to give out after we each get married) and that was our special Christmas gift this year from my grandparents!  This is probably one of my favorite Christmas presents ever!  I already have it set-up in the kitchen in a safe place so the dogs can't break anything.  Here's a picture:



Tomorrow is my last day of work for the week before the holiday.  I did finally get my Christmas shopping done on Monday.  Nothing like waiting until the last minute!  I've decided this year that Christmas is just one day that is more about the time we spend with the special people in our lives and less about the things that we give and get.  I get everything wrapped tonight before we hit the road tomorrow, but at least it got done! 

Let's hope the weather cooperates for our travels to Wichita tomorrow.  I can't wait to see more friends and family over the holiday weekend.  In the mean time, Merry Christmas to everyone!!

Fa La La La La....

Last night I met up with a few of my favorite ladies for some cheese and chocolate at The Melting Pot.  On Monday nights they have a ladies night special that is a pretty good deal and made for a good excuse to get together right before the holidays!  I can't believe that Christmas is so close so it was nice to have some time to slow down and catch up with the girls before the craziness of the holidays take over (and before Liz leaves us for Iowa!).  It's these get togethers that remind me that I have such a great group of friends, the amazing cheese and chocolate were definitely a close second to the great company and conversation.

Besides spending time with some of my favorite people, I'm trying to figure out my Christmas shopping and what I am going to get people this year.  I am still struggling to get in the "spirit" to go shopping (though I've been in the Christmas spirit to decorate, bake and such); I am having a hard time coming up with just the right thing to get for those I'm buying for, especially my husband!  I'm hoping a wave of creativity will come over me in the next day or so, so I can get my shopping done started.

I am looking forward to getting to spend some time with family over the holiday.  Unfortunately, our plans to possibly trek out to the mountains fell through but that's okay because we'll get to see our two favorite Colorado residents while they're in Mulvane.  After a day or two at the in-laws we are going to spend some quality time with my family.  It will be nice to not have to travel as much this year (and hopefully we won't be driving through post-blizzard conditions like we did last year!). 

Wish me luck on my Christmas present shopping, this could be interesting :).

Baby it's cold outside....

Ahhh....it's that time of year again!!!  I'm one of "those" people with a freakish love of Christmas.  When I was growing up I had my own little tree for my room that I could decorate and every year I would have that tree in my room, along with lights that I hung from the ceiling all the way around my room. 

Last year in our tiny 900 sq. foot house I had 3 (yes...3) trees; the big tree in the dining room, the medium tree in the front room so Kyle could hang his hunting decorations and a little fiber optic tree in the kitchen.  I resisted the urge to hang lights around the outside of the house (Kyle isn't going to be so lucky this year, though I'm going to ease into it, one strand along the front).

This year I have cut back to two trees instead of three.  I have found other ways though to "enhance" our holiday spirit.  This involved two trips to Michaels and one to Hobby Lobby to hunt for more holiday decorations (as if I didn't already have enough).  I found some cute red and green blocks that spell out JOY and NOEL.  I also got some country-esque garland (I wouldn't want to distract from the hunting theme in our living room) to put on top of the entertainment center.  I also broke down and bought some new decorations for the tree.  I reasoned that after 5 years of decorating the tree the same way it was time for a change, though I didn't go crazy.  All of the new decorations for the tree only cost us $6, so I would say I got a pretty good deal (thank you Michael's!).

Usually along with decorating I get pretty excited to go Christmas shopping to buy present for friends and family.  One of my favorite things is seeing them get excited about the gifts that I/we give them.  For some reason this year I am having a really hard time getting motivated to get my shopping done.  I think part of it has something to do with not wanting to spend the money this year (lame, I know).  The other part I think is not wanting to have to deal with the mall...and crowds....and lines.  Maybe this is the year I should venture into the world of online shopping.  I need to figure it out soon though, because Christmas will be here before we know it!

In the mean time I will continue to listen to my Christmas music on Pandora (Kenny G, I heart you), enjoy the Christmas decorations and try to motivate myself to get my Christmas shopping done!

Give Thanks

In the spirit of the Thanksgiving holiday, I tried to take some time to think of all of the things that I have to be thankful for.

• My husband.  In the five short months that we have been married, we have already been through a lot (not so fun honeymoon and dealing with me being sick).  Kyle has been by my side through everything and I can't imagine having a better partner to go through this journey with.  
• My friends.  I am so blessed to have such a great group of friends!  They are there for me no matter what, standing beside me on my wedding day, meeting me for coffee to catch up, giving much needed advice, the list goes on.  I don't know where I would be without those ladies.
• My family.  I am very fortunate to have the best parents in the world.  They love me no matter what and have supported me through everything.  I would not be the person that I am without them nor would I be where I am.  I also have the best in-laws a girl could ask for, they are so supportive of Kyle and I and have helped us to get to where we are.  
• My job.  I am very grateful this holiday season to have a great job.  I have been with my new company for six months and couldn't be happier.  I work with a wonderful group of people and I get to perform work that is challenging and I am constantly learning something new. 
• My health.  Even though I have struggled with my health over the last five months, I am still grateful that I am generally healthy.  My disease is not life-threatening and I am currently at a stage where it is under better control than it has been since the wedding. 

There are so many other things I could add to this list (extended family, the pups, a roof over our heads, etc).  It's nice to take a step back every once in a while and remember all the things in life we have to be thankful for.  I hope everyone else had a wonderful Thanksgiving! 

What do I want to be when I grow up?

Thursday, I had the chance to speak in front of my niece's careers class about my "career".  What an adult word...."career".  I kind of thought I still just had a job :).  I guess that whole going to college thing and picking a major would eventually lead to a career.  I'm not going to lie, it was a bit intimidating standing in front of a group of 13 year olds explaining why I liked accounting.  Even more difficult was trying to explain what accounting is and what an accountant does to teenagers who are just learning what a checking account is and how to work one. I would like to say that I left them on the edge of their seats, excited about becoming an accountant :).  In reality, I think I was lucky they were all still awake by the time I was done!  I forget how un-interested we are at that age.  Having to think about what you want to be when you grown seems like such a far away concept at 13.  Of course, at 26 I still don't think I know what I want to be when I "grow up".  I know that I like what I am doing in my current job, I love the people that I work with, but this is definitely not what I want to do long-term.  Of course, I have no idea what I DO want to do.  I keep hoping that it will just fall into my lap :).

In other news, I can't believe that Thanksgiving is already this coming week!  Kyle and I are planning to make the trek to western Kansas to get together with his dad's side of the family.  I made a deal with him to not drag him to 15 family functions over the holidays, so we are just going to be doing one family get together for turkey day.  I will be a little sad not to see as much family over the holidays, but I am looking forward not having to spend so much time on the road traveling.  We will have the opportunity to relax and spend more quality time with family, which really is what the holidays are all about.

Last night a couple of my favorite ladies came over to our house for a cooking extravaganza!  Rachelle found this fabulous butternut squash lasagna recipe in the KC Star that she had been dying to try, so we decided to take on the task.  Boy was the recipe involved!  It ended up taking us almost 2 1/2 hours from start to finish to get the lasagna completed.  I couldn't imagine trying to make this by myself, but it was a recipe that was completely worth it!  And to top it off it was so much fun to be able to make a big production from start to finish with some wonderful ladies.  My soul felt "full" after last night, sometimes you just need those nights in with friends full of laughter, fun and good food.  We also made some pumpkin bread pudding that was pretty good (it would have been fabulous had I remembered to add the brown sugar....whoops!!). 

I'm looking forward to a short 2 day week! 

What's a girl to do....

I find myself this Friday night in a very unfamiliar situation, and I'm not quite sure what to do with myself!  Kyle has taken both of our puppies (which I thought I would be okay with, but am now reconsidering my thoughts on this) and has trekked out to western Kansas for the weekend for a boys hunting extravaganza.  I am officially home alone for the weekend without any plans! 

At first, I was super excited at the idea of having a weekend completely to myself, without any plans.  There are so many things that I thought I would want to accomplish (Thank you notes, clean the house, organize my closet, thank you notes, thank you notes).  Let's just say my motivation to accomplish lots has wained :)...and now I'm starting to feel as if I could get bored!  Ugh, what's a girl to do!  If I get bored enough, I may be tempted to go shopping....which is dangerous.  I'm thinking new boots, a new skirt (because I discovered on Monday that none of my skirts I own fit), and anything else I can find on sale :).  Kyle should have never left me home alone this weekend :).

In other news, I have to say I am definitely ready to start coming off of my prednisone.  When I first started taking it, I didn't feel a lot of the side effects that come with taking the drug.  That has changed over the last couple of weeks.  I am constantly hungry!  This is not good for keeping off all of the weight that I have lost through this whole sickness over the last few months.  Not that I lost the weight in a healthy way (20 pounds in 15 days) but I do notice I feel better not carrying around so much weight and I would like to keep off as much of the weight as possible.  I am trying to start to get back to normal activity, but I am still only able to manage about 30 - 40 minutes of light activity (slow to moderate walking with very light weights).  In addition, I'm still on a somewhat limited diet (low fiber - which limits the healthy foods that I can eat - no whole grains and I still am limited on which fruits/veggies I can have).  I am slowly adding back foods each day, but it's a slow process.  I miss wheat bread, salads, broccoli, popcorn, those sorts of things!  Who would have thought.

I started to try to download our photographers wedding photos to my computer, and it didn't like it.  I got the blue screen of death.  I am going to have to wait until I get a new computer to download my pictures :(.  I've got my eye on a new Mac desktop computer.  I have so many friends that rave about their macs that I think I'm going to become a convert.  I'll have to wait though until after Christmas though, I need to save, save, save and I think it's going to take about that long without stretching our budget.  It'll be worth it though!

Well, I've been able to pass some time tonight.  Happy weekend!

Fall back!

Who's excited about Daylight Savings time ending this weekend and getting an extra hour of sleep on Sunday.......this girl!  Not that one hour is going to make a world of difference, but I will gladly take any extra hour of sleep I can get.  Damn this prednisone for waking me up in the middle of the night....every night.

Besides looking forward to the gloriousness that is the weekend, things have been relatively quiet in the McGuire household.  This last weekend we ventured to Manhattan to watch the Wildcats struggle against the Cowboys.  Even though the game could have gone better, we had such a good time with all of our friends and family.  Abby and Travis made the trek all the way from Colorado, the in-laws came up for the weekend, and my parents were up for the game as well.  We also got to catch up with lots of friends that we don't get to see enough (and a certain little baby G who's getting bigger and bigger!).  All in all such a good weekend!

On other random thoughts, I have been really trying hard to plan out meals for the week ahead of time and then buying all of the groceries that I need on Sunday for the week.  I am now two weeks into this venture and so far it seems to be working.  However, I feel like I am starting to run out of recipe ideas already!  I am a bit limited in the types of foods I can eat (no whole grains, no raw fruits or vegetables, limited low fiber cooked veggies) which limits the recipe options, but I am continually on the hunt for more recipe ideas that are quick and easy that make for good leftovers during the week.  Suggestions are always welcome :).

This was a quick blog update.  I'm hoping to finally download some wedding pics this weekend!!  I'll try to post some soon.