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25 Things about Me

You can thank Meg for this boring post!

These are in no particular order.

1. I thank God every day that I married the perfect man for me.

2. I am painfully shy. Matt was seriously shocked I used the blog. I have to be fairly comfortable with the majority of a people in a room to even say a thing.

3. I absolutely love the ocean. It is one of my favorite places to be.

4. College took me 5 years and several summers, because I could never decide on a major. The sad part is now I would choose a totally different major.

5. I never really wanted a career, being a stay at home mom was the ideal job to me.

6. I used to dream of playing in the NBA. I figured if Muggsy Bogues could do it so could I.

7. I do not like to do my hair. I hardly ever do much to it and do not really use any products. So, the pictures you saw last Wednesday, my hair stylist did that and my hair will probably not ever look like that again and I don’t care.

8. I love coffee and could not imagine starting my day any other way.

9. I don’t really care to go see a movie and I pretty much never want to see a movie more than once.

10. Bridges over water seriously freak me out!

11. I find it very satisfying to eat food I have grown myself.

12. I would own many more animals if we had more space and if Matt would let me.

13. Close-minded people seriously annoy me.

14. I think there are better ways to argue your point then attack the other person. Not that I am all that good at arguing my point, but I don’t see how attacking someone would make them see my point.

15. I am not much of a morning person and I am definitely not a night owl. What can I say, I love my sleep!

16. I seriously thought I might die when at my first retail job they told me I had to greet customers that came to my register. Now I am thankful for that job because it helped me in so many ways.

17. I never thought I would want or use a blackberry, but now that I have one I am so addicted.

18. I cheer for the Cardinals and the Cowboys. Most people just know me as a Cowboys fan because that is all I would admit too, but I have cheered for the Cardinals at a Cardinals/Cowboys game and almost got myself into a fight with a Cowboys fan, luckily my college roommate saved my butt because I didn’t stand a chance. I am not very good at being a one team person. In fact, I usually have multiple favorite teams. (Also, I feel extremely guilty for all these years of pretending to not be a fan of the Cardinals, sorry guys.)

19. If none of my teams are playing, I will always cheer for the underdog.

20. I wish I could sing, but I am absolutely horrible.

21. My desk is almost always messy, which drives my husband nuts.

22. I don’t shower every day. I also don’t think it is necessary for the majority of Americans.

23. I used to think I couldn’t get through the day if I didn’t have a Dr. Pepper, now I hardly ever drink pop.

24. I am a big time procrastinator. I even wrote a paper in college on procrastination. Of course, I wrote it the night before it was due.

25. I now love to cook, but when I first got married I hardly knew how to boil noodles.

That took me way too long, Thanks Meg!

(I will post the t-shirt guessing game results tomorrow, so please guess if you haven’t already.)

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Guessing Game

I have been teasing Matt about how many t-shirts he owned lately. He always just brushed it off saying that it wasn’t REALLY that many. Well he finally broke down and counted all his t-shirts. He was shocked by the number. I decided it would be fun to have all our blog readers guess on how many t-shirts you think Matt owns. There is no prize, well maybe a t-shirt or two!

Not all t-shirts are shown

Start guessing!

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Friday Update – 01.09.09

Adoption Update:  We have now been waiting 44 weeks or just over 10 months.  There have been no referrals for the last three weeks, things should pick up again here soon.

Running:  I am happy to say I have been running very consistently and it is going very well.  I also started cycling for exercise again, I was just cycling around town to do errands which wasn’t ever that far.

Gardening:  My winter garden is growing like crazy right now.  I harvested some radishes, a turnip, and lettuce this week for a salad.  They were all delicious!  I should have some snow peas and carrots soon.  Onions and garlic are growing but those won’t be harvested for a couple more months.

I just received my seeds for my spring garden.  I am actually happy that it appears we will be here and not traveling when I first plant the spring garden, it should be nice and established by the time we travel.  We are picking up the peach tree and grape vines I ordered tomorrow, hopefully this is the peach tree that lives!

Life:  We have been very busy just doing day to day stuff.  The beginning of the year is always extra busy with the business so that is our main focus right now.  Abby is doing well, her parents are very tired though!  Being an Aunt so far is easy, looking forward to more quality time with her.

Here is Matt’s favorite picture of Abby so far:

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Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!!!

It seems the years are getting shorter. Every year christmas seems to sneak up on us. Looks like christmas will be a nice Arizona winter, 72° and sunny. Ohh wait, just woke up and now its Arizona chilly. 50° and pouring rain.

The 2008 recap:

Early 2008
• Factor 1 (matt’s design firm) Moved out of the house, and into offices (Wahoo!).
• Sent off our adoption dossier to our agency and then to Ethiopia
• We are officially on the waiting list for Siblings!
• We hired on our first employee at Factor 1

Mid 2008
Stuff happened, just nothing we can remember. Even looking back at the blog, lots of fluff posts, and conversations on waiting. lame.
• Drove out to colorado to spend time in the mountains with Matt’s family in July
• Matt went on his first epic mountain biking trip to Moab & Durango with the guys. Nothing says awesome like biking 20 miles a day at 10k feet elevation.

Late 2008
• Still waiting. Lots of waiting. But it seems we are near the top of our adoption waiting list, so things are rolling along, and looks like we will be parents in 2009. Finally.
• The gardens super-quadrupled in size. We are now growing lettuce, peas, carrots, onions, peppers, and more. Potatoes and grapes will be happening soon.
• The usual holidays happened. Great thanksgiving with Stephanie’s family.

We are looking forward to 2009 like you wouldnt believe.

Love,
Matt & Stephanie
mattandstephaniesblog.com

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Friday Update – 12.19.08

Adoption Update:  We made it through week 41, how many more?  There were 10 referrals this week, seven boys and three girls.  Congratulations to all the happy families!  Our agency is closed until January 5, so no more referrals until after the new year.  We did not know about this closure until this month, so if anyone picked a referral date in that time period, please feel free to pick a new date.  We were re-fingerprinted last Saturday and USCIS is not very busy right now.  We were taken right back for our fingerprints, so much nicer than the last time.  Everyone say a prayer that my prints don’t get kicked back by the FBI, I had really dry fingers and she had a difficult time getting a good print.  I was obsessively putting on lotion last week to remedy the problem but to no avail and this week I didn’t obsess and no dry fingers.

Running Update:  I finally started running again!  I have to say it is so much nicer taking up running this time of year.  I can already run further and longer than I could when I stopped.  The temps being well below 90 sure make a difference!  Now I just need to start doing those push-ups again.

Gardening:  My garden is doing really well.  The snow peas have finally started to bloom and I have plenty of lettuce for salads.  I haven’t had to worry about a frost yet and Matt is helping me build a cover for the garden this weekend for that rare occasion we get below 32°.

Life:  We made lots of cookies on Sunday with my family and have been busy handing them out to neighbors ever since.  Michelle and I also made cookies on Tuesday.  She did a great job decorating them:

 

I also was able to meet Paul B. today!  He is a wonderful baby!  I had a very nice time chatting with Sandi and Bill about Ethiopia and their trip.  I cannot wait to travel!

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friday update. matt edition

“woah halloween is fun. candy is good!” was what we heard tonight from one cute kid while handing out candy. 

This is the matt edition of the friday update. so it’s probably not as in depth as stephanie would be.

Adoption

same deal as the usual. no sibling referals this week. I think how it feels for us, and i feel bad for who ever is number 1 on the sibling list. they have been waiting a long time, and I hope they are matched with a sibling group soon!

Work outs

Stephanie has been doing lots of walking, and is still rocking on her push ups. Me, i kind of work on them. I have lost some motivation. not sure why, i do like the results so far. I’ve been back cycling on the road bike in wee hours of the dark mornings (with headlights!) a lot this week. I guess my road bike and i just need a relationship break. We are friends again. 

 

The garden is coming along. Maybe next week some pics may be needed. Things are still alive, and sprouting a bit more. 

Grass is coming in nicely for the winter rye

 

we carved some mean pumpkins with Steph’s parents & steph’s bro & wife. the results:

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Friday Update – 10/24/08

Adoption Update: No referrals again this week. Hopefully we see some next week. I finally scheduled our travel vaccination appointment, some people wait until they get a referral, but I didn’t want to have to do it so close to when we travel, I think we will be pretty busy preparing for Tom and Jerry once we get our referral and don’t want to have anything extra to worry about.

Push-Ups: I finally am graduating from week 3! I am starting to feel the improvement.

Gardening: A few of my seedlings died this week, but I have lots of new stuff sprouting. I would take pictures, but they are so tiny it would be hard to see.

Other than that nothing too exciting has been happening. The weather has stayed very tolerable, only getting to the upper 80s or low 90s, the mornings are a very cool mid 60s. I have been spending lots of time outside, riding my bike places and just loving this time of year.

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new blog toys

I made a few blog updates tonight as requested by my beautiful wife. 

  1. Comment Gravatars (little photos next to comment authors)
    Sign up for your gravatar here
  2. Smileys. (this one pains me, but Steph really wanted them) 
  3. Comment luv – Shows you last blog post – from your blog
  4. I’m working on comment previews, but for some reason its giving me trouble. 
thats all. More toys to come in the future I am sure. 
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Friday Update 10/10/08

Adoption Update:  Three referrals this week, two infant girls and one infant boys.  Congratulations to the happy families!  Please pray for the sibling line to get some movement.  I heard that the couple at the top of the line has been waiting since mid-November last year, they must be going nuts.  I hope they get their referral soon.  The wait is hard not only because you are waiting for the joy of getting to bring your children home, but also because as an adoptive parent you know there is two sides of this child’s story and on one side there is heartbreak.  Missy did a great post on this subject this week, please take time to check it out.

Running Update:  I ran again this week!  Hurray for some consistency.

Push-ups:  I am definitely being more consistent with these.  I am going to be buff by the time we get to travel.

I actually did not have a very exciting week so not much else to get you caught up on.  It was cool, then hot, now it is supposed to cool down again.  At any rate the mornings have been absolutely fabulous.  Almost beginning to feel like fall!  I was able to ride my bike around town again to run errands and it was so nice.  I missed it this summer.

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Friday Update – 9/19/08 (late edition)

Adoption Update: No referrals this week. I am really needing to see some siblings referred so I can feel some movement.

Push-ups: We started back on our push-up program this week! We had to start over at week two, but I don’t care, I am just glad we did them.

Running: I did not run this week, but I did start walking again and the weather was much more tolerable.

Gardening:

I started some of my seeds early this week:

Matt and I started working on the new garden beds today:

It was getting a little warm out so we had to come in and cool off for a while and we’ll head back out this evening to hopefully get some more work done.

A big thanks to my cute hubby! You have done so much hard work for me this week and it is very much appreciated.