For the two of you that read this

I had a mix up with google accounts...something about my e-mail being on a different account as my blog, so I kept kicking myself off of one when I opened another. I have no idea.


Long story short, I moved my blog to make my life easier. So, my blog is now at www.cedarchicablog.blogspot.com.

Just wanted to make sure that all two of you don't miss all of the exciting events of my life. :)

"Babysitter" of the year

This past weekend I stayed with my friend (and youth group member), Zoe, while her parents went away to visit family in Tennessee. I went to her house straight form work on Friday. When I got there, Zoe had grilled some chicken and made a delicious salad. Then she gave me a foot bath and scrub. Talk about being pampered! This is the kind of "babysitting" I can really get into! Ha!


I already shared about how we went to the fair on Saturday in my last post. On Sunday, Zoe got up early to go play on the worship team and I met up with her at church for the second service.


After church we decided to go for a walk to enjoy the beautiful fall day. We took Charlie (Zoe's ADORABLE black lab) and walked down the road to the railroad tracks.

New Hampshire is so pretty in the fall.

Zoe's road.

After our walk, we dragged lounge chairs into the sun. Zoe did homework while I read a novel. It was nice being away from home for the weekend because I took the time to just relax rather than working on all of the little projects I have to do at home.

I don't know what's up with my left eye. It doesn't want to open. Weird.

That night we had small group at the Dundore's, and when we got home decided to get pizza and watch a movie.

SO GOOD!

The next day was Columbus Day so Zoe didn't have school, but I had to go to work. To say that I was jealous would be an understatement. :) I managed to leave about an hour early and booked it "home." We managed to squeeze in a hike up a pretty easy trail near Zoe's house.

Before the hike- with Charlie.
(Please ignore my stumpy legs...they look all deformed...not sure what's up with that.)

At the top. What a gorgeous view!

Charlie was having a good time, too. Doesn't he look thrilled!?

(I cannot even begin to tell you how proud of myself I am for these collages. haha.)
We had a lot of fun.

After we got home, we at left over pizza from Sunday night and watched a little bit more of a movie. At one point we had this conversation:

Me: "Zoe, what time is it!?!"

Zoe: "Um... 7:58."

Me: "Oh my."

Yeah, I'm a grandma. Needless to say, bedtime was around 9:30 that night, which is the earliest I've gone to bed in years.

Monday morning we both had to get up and go for the day, which took the sting off of going to work a little bit. :)

Ready for school and work.

That night when we got home we decided we wanted a good dinner since it was our last night. So we headed down here:

And picked up maple bourbon and teriyaki steak tips and some scrumptious desserts.

Zoe contemplating her dessert choices.

We got home, grilled up the steaks, made some salad, and dinner was ready to go!

(Disclaimer: I really do have other clothes...and I wash this sweatshirt a lot! This was the sweatshirt I packed for the weekend and changed into IMMEDIATELY when I got home from church/work/etc. It shows up a lot over the last few posts.)

Peanut butter crunch bars. I'm sure these things have about 10,000 calories each, but it was our last night, so it was fine. And, we only ate half. Ha!

Then we spent the rest of the evening doing this:

Zoe playing the piano and singing and me, sitting on the comfy chair and listening.

I had such a great long weekend with Zoe and hope that her parents go out of town again soon so we can do it again!

Two for One

Here I go again attempting to resurrect the blog. So I decided to recap the past two weekends.

Last weekend I had one of the youth group girls, Jayme, over to make Whoopie Pies to send to Winona who had the gall to leave New Hampshire and go to college in New York. Jayme and I had a great time talking and laughing and cooking and creating.

Jayme discovered a hole in the bag of powdered sugar.

And I made the icing.

The final product. Yummmmm.

Today Zoe, Chris, Lance and I decided to go to the Sandwich Fair. It was a beautiful and chilly (high of 55) fall day in New Hampshire. We went on some swinging ride that spins you around and tips you upside down. It was SO fun and my lungs got quite a workout from screaming. Then Zoe and I went on a hang gliding ride.

Next we were off to eat. After corn dogs, hamburgers, and french fries, we made our way over to check out the cows, sheep, goats, chickens, and rabbits.

Then we found these guys...

Chip, Chris and Zoe

I told them to look at me...apparently Chris missed the memo. We had been talking to Chip's brother, Dale, for quite some time but when we took these pictures Dale was out pulling a sled through an obstacle course in some sort of maneuvering competition. These oxen were such gentle giants and really cute.

After hanging with the animals it was time for more nourishment (or empty calories...)

By this time we had seen what we came to see, ridden what we came to ride, and eaten what we came to eat, so we walked back to our car parked down the road in a field. We tried to put my camera on my car and take a picture of ourselves, but it was windy and the wind kept blowing the camera over, so this is what we got...

My finger, my car, Zoe and Lance and Chris in the background.

And...
...a blurry picture of Chris, Lance and Zoe.

So we decided to just hold the camera and we got this:

A lovely shot of me (what is up with my arm?), Zoe, Lance, Chris, the mountains and a motor home that was one of the only vehicles left in the parking field. Nice.

It was a really fun day. I am now back at Zoe's and we are snuggled up in the house watching a movie. The weekend is off to a great start!

Catching up- May

So, I just got on here in a desperate attempt to revive my log and realized that I wrote this post and never published it...so I'm doing it now. Better late than never!

So somehow it has been forever again since I have blogged. Oh my. Life took off and I got busy! Apparently I didn't take any pictures in April, so I'm not really sure what I did, other than work on my Master's. I finished my second class in April and started my third class the first week of May.

The first weekend in May my sister, Bethany, and our friends Corianne and Sue and I all went away for the weekend to Bar Harbor, Maine. We stayed in the most adorable Bed and Breakfast ever, the Saltair Inn. We shopped around, ate ice cream, walked around on the beach, and before driving home, we drove up Cadillac Mountain and hiked around at the top.

Corianne, Sue and me (I was wearing my boots to walk around on the beach and to stand in the water- hence the strange outfit. Ha!)

In March I started helping with my church's youth group. May 21st-22nd we went to Camp Berea for a work weekend. On Friday night we had a bonfire on the beach and sat around singing songs, talking and laughing.

Zoe, Me, Winona- I love these girls!

Making s'mores. Yum!

The next morning, after a late night filled with talking and laughing. Winona was our official hair braider.

Then we got to work...

Hannah, Winona, Zoe

Renee and Shadd

The next weekend there was more fun! My friend Julie came up from Maryland to hang out for Memorial Day weekend. We all met up at our friend Tiffany and Ryan's house to celebrate M's 3rd birthday. So cute, and so fun catching up with friends.

Ryan and M (opening Corduroy from Aunt Erin)

Tiffany, M, and Ryan

The next day we all met up for ice cream at Jordan's before Julie went back to Maryland.

Julie, Tiffany, Me

So those were the highlights from May- at least what I can remember. After a long, cold and lonely winter it was a fun month!

This is why we're friends

This is an e-mail conversation I had with my friend Julie today...

Subject: A vocabulary lesson

Me: moron- (n)- one who mails their master's program DVD back to netflix instead of the movie watched during a study break.

Julie's response: AWESOME - (adj) - what people who mail their master's program DVD back to netflix are.

I knew I liked her.

Week in Review

This past week was pretty busy. Let's recap...with bulleted points! Who doesn't love bulleted points? :)

*About two weeks ago we had a really big windstorm (dubbed a snowicane by the news). We had winds up to 70 mph. We woke up in the morning and saw this:

That tree had taken down the swing set my dad made and did quite a bit of damage to our cars. My car had $3,000 of damage. Thank goodness for insurance! The gave me one of these as a rental:

That would be a brand new Cadillac SRX. I told them to take their time fixing my car. So I've been driving that car all week.

*On Monday I was on my way home from work and got a phone call from my dad telling me that my mom was in the hospital because of her myasthenia gravis. She had had the drooping eyes and double vision, but this week it flared up and she was having trouble swallowing, talking and breathing. I was really far away from the hospital they were at, so they told me not to come. I was pretty concerned, but after I prayed and committed her to the Lord, I went home and used my nervous energy to organize and clean out the whole refrigerator. It's what I do. Mom was in the hospital until Thursday afternoon. She is doing better, but still gets tired really easily.

*This past week at work I was organizing things at work and came across the WB Mason catalog. It reminded me of my old Open Court Language Arts curriculum I used while teaching and made me miss teaching SOOOO much. I REALLY need to be a teacher again soon!

*The theme of this past weekend was Robert Pattinson...not intentionally. HA! I have been reading the Harry Potter books (as I can around my Master's work...ugh). I finished Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, so my family watched the movie on Friday night and RPattz played Cedric Diggory.

Then my friend, Angela, and I went to the movies and saw Remember Me this weekend...and there he was again! Ha ha!

It was so fun to go to the movies this weekend. I was always going out and doing things all the time when I lived in Ohio, but haven't so much since I moved to New Hampshire. I miss it and need to do more things like this more often. The rest of the weekend consisted of Master's work. Fun!

*I have decided since I have just begun my last year in my 20's (yikes!) I want to start my 30's strong. I've also had a really rough year and want to make some changes. SOOOOOO... goal #1: Spend time in God's word every day. This should be a given, but it's been a struggle for me this year, so this is my goal for this week. When I am consistently in God's word it makes such a difference in EVERYTHING. I got a new Bible for my birthday, the Inductive Study Bible, so I'm excited about diving in and studying! I'll update next week and see how I'm doing.

Dave and Laurie's Wedding

So on January 28th I hopped on a plane and flew out to Ohio for D & L's wedding. I got in on Thursday night realllly late. My sister picked me up at the airport and drove me to my cousin Kim's house. Everyone was asleep, so I just went to bed and was woken up in the morning by her 3 adorable girls and their adorable new puppy.

That afternoon we headed on over to the Franklin Park Conservatory for the rehearsal. Kim's girls were the adorable flower girls.

That night we had the rehearsal dinner at a local Chinese restaurant. It was nice because the wedding wasn't until Saturday, so we could eat without having to worry about wearing fancy dresses the next day! HA!




On Saturday I went and got my nails done with the other bridesmaids, Laurie, and her mom. Then I went with Kim and Chris to Jordan's soccer game. She scored her second goal ever in her soccer career. I decided then and there that I will be a crazy mom one day. As I watched her score her goal I got all choked up and I swear my heart just swelled up and about burst. I was so proud of her!

That evening we headed over to Laurie's mom's house to watch Dave and Laurie open gifts and to watch their wedding slide show that Kim made.

After that we drove over to D & L's new house so my mom could give them the quilt she made for their wedding. (That lady is way too craft for her own good).

This is Laurie saying, "You MADE this?"

My mom was making the wedding cakes and gets realllly nervous if anyone gets too close to them. So that night, after mom had gone to bed, Kim and I had some fun. We didn't show these to mom until after the wedding. She still freaked out just a little bit.

The next day was the wedding. A long awaited day in the Miller household. My brother is finally breaking the "Miller curse!" Perhaps there is hope for me yet! :)

I went back to Laurie's mom's house (after stopping to get some Starbucks...oh Ohio, how I love that you have Starbucks allllll over the place. I have missed you!)

The in was back to Kim's to get ready and to help these adorable ladies get ready:

Then it was wedding time!

Dave and Dad

Dad, Me, Mom

The ceremony was beautiful. There is a big Chihuly glass display at the Conservatory, so we explored and took some pictures.

Me and Kim

Adorable flower girl cousins

The new Miller family (Mom blinked)

The new Mr. & Mrs. Miller

Caroline caught the bouquet and was VERY excited. I certainly hope I don't have to wait until this six year old gets married before I do! :)

I'm not sure I could open my mouth any wider if I tried!

The amazing cake my mom made. Told you she was crafty.

So one of my favorite moments of the night was when I was helping my 8 year old cousin, Lizzy, through the buffet line. We got to the big salad bowl and I asked her,

"Lizzy, would you like some salad?"

She answered enthusiastically,

"Oh, yes!"

Then proceeded to pick six croutons off of the salad and place them on her plate!

When we were eating I couldn't help but ask her,

"So Lizzy, how is your salad?"

She opened her eyes wide, nodded and said,

"Delicious!"

As she popped another crouton into her mouth. :)

And finally, I really like my hair so I wanted to put a pic of it on here so I could remember it.

Okay, that was two pics. Oh well! The wedding was absolutely beautiful and I am so happy for my brother and new sister!