Crystal's 26th Birthday Weekend & Sunday Baseball at War Memorial

For the weekend following Crystal's birthday, we decided to take a trip to visit all of our friends in Raleighwood for a couple days of fun and relaxation. We (Crystal, Mary and I) got to Mary & Heidi's place around 7:00pm. Kate had made dinner reservations for us at FireBird's at 8:30, so we spent some time hanging out and trying out the WiiFIT.

Somebody put their legs on backwards.

Thanks for paying attention Kate!

Somehow I got them to behave long enough to get a good picture.

Aint's she purdy!

After throwing back a couple cold Miller Lite's courtesy of Heidi (thanks for picking those up, I still owe you!!!), we were off to dinner. The ride there was quite adventurous. Let's just say, it involved pissing off around 150 - 175 of Raleigh's finest law abiding drivers. Hey, we were running late...what would you do in a situation like that???

Here are some highlights from dinner:

The loaf looked like a butt...

You can't take us nowhere.

After dinner, and an enjoyable evening of ruining the romantic dinners of those around us, we headed back to the apartment for some American Idol practice.

Mary looks like a little girl singing in church. Heidi looks like that wine just kicked in.

We hit the sack early, but not after something really strange, gross, but somehow awesome happened. You will have to ask those involved about the details (Myself, Heidi & Mary), but it caused the guests to leave with shirts wrapped around their heads.

Saturday morning, Crystal went to go and get her hair did while Mary, Heidi and I sat out by the pool and waited for her to get back. After she returned, looking awefully georgious with her new bangs I might add, we got ready to go to Landon & Claudia's get together before heading out to the Brad Paisley concert.

Crystal & Claudia.

L-Boogie & Scootles.
Nice shades Chauncey.

After a good time at The LaSmith's new casa, we headed off to Alltel Pavilion to see Brad Paisly (read: NOT Jewel). The highlight of the evening for me was when Jewel got booed off of the stage while yodelling. The lowlight was when I was urinated on in the Men's restroom.

Poltergeist...freaky.

Much betta. Look at them sexy bangs!

After the show, we hit Wendy's and headed back to the apartment. Rich and I tried to stay up and party, but he fell over and I decided to goto bed since I had a game the next day.

Here are some pic's of my first game at War Memorial Stadium in 10 years. We pulled out a 9-4 victory over the Indians.

In the outfield.

Rick on 2nd, arms fully accessorized.

Base-on-Balls, then a quick swipe of second.

I don't have the speed that I used to, luckily, the catcher didn't have the arm that he used to.


All in all, it was a great weekend. Thanks so much to Heide & Kate for letting us stay with you guys!


Happy 26th Birthday Angel!

Treated Like a Queen

My birthday was last Wednesday (July 16th), and although this post is a little late, I couldn’t help to note how special it was. I won’t go into every detail about how my day unfolded, but I want to share how absolutely blessed I am to have the friends and family I have. I am especially thankful for my wonderful husband for melting my heart on my birthday. From breakfast, to flowers, to a very thoughtful gift, and a surprise dinner at a fancy restaurant, I can’t thank him enough for making me feel like a queen. I’ve told him thank you a million times, but I don’t think all those will truly express how grateful I am for having someone like him in my life…not because of what he did on that particular day, but because he makes me feel like that every day. Baby, I love you with all my heart and I am so happy with how my life is unfolding with you :) I can’t wait to return the favor on August 12th!

Getting ready to head out to dinner.

Kisses for the man that makes my life complete :)

Me and my 1st born!

My beautiful bouquet of flowers!

Crazy weekend and other news...

This weekend started out quite eventful! On Saturday we decided to bring over some of the neighbor's puppies to play with Frank. Their labs had a litter of nine puppies so we thought it would be fun to see how Frank would interact with them (partly because we thought it would be cute, and partly because we want another dog). He did better than we thought. He was very curious and tried to play with them but knew they were small and was very gentle. They were scared of him at first because of his snorting but later one got brave and tried to play. After a while Frank decided he wasn't interested in playing...instead he tried to mark his territory by peeing everywhere the puppies had been lying. I think he hosed down our lawn mower twice because one of the little girls decided to seek shade underneath it.

Later that day Steve was finishing mowing the back yard when he ran over a Yellow Jacket's nest and they came swarming after him. He got stung 5 times. Once in the hand, once in the ankle, and 3 times in the leg. The last sting was on his inner thigh...he had come running in the house yelling for me to help him find the stingers and when he sat down he got stung again. The yellow jacket had flown into his shorts and decided to get him one more time. After that Steve promptly removed his pants and the little hellion fell to the floor to meet his untimely death. Normally, the sight of a grown man dancing around the floor trying to get a yellow jacket out of his pants would be slightly funny to me, however I know Steve's allergies and was very worried I was going to be taking him to the emergency room later that evening. Last time he got stung by a yellow jacket it took a week for the swelling to go down. This time, he had been stung 5 times...there was no telling how his body was going to react...especially since he is allergic to Benadryl and can't take anything like that. His legs and hand began to swell immediately and it was just yesterday (Monday) that the swelling began to go down. Below is a picture of his hand...this was taken before it started looking like it belonged to a 500 pound fat man.

Sunday morning we left early to go camping with Steve's family at Philpott Lake. I was worried Steve was going to be miserable with all of his stings and he was for a bit, but getting into the water actually soothed some of his pain. We had a wonderfully relaxing day on Sunday, then part of the day Monday. We got a little sun burnt, but it was worth it :) We got to take it easy for a few days. We were both really looking forward to this trip because it was the closest we were going to get to going to the beach all summer, and it was the last vacation we have planned for the summer. Although it was a short one, we enjoyed being able to do nothing but reading, riding around in the boat and enjoying the sun!

We got home yesterday around 5ish so we could enjoy the rest of our evening at home with our little Frankie! Although we liked camping, there's nothing like being home after being away for a night...or a few nights. The best part of yesterday though was that Steve was finally able to REALLY feel the baby move. I've been feeling her move for a few weeks now and Steve has felt her one time but it was very faint. Last night we were lying in bed and I was about to nod off when I started feeling her move around a lot. Steve put his hand on my belly and she kicked...hard! I've never felt her kick like that before so it was an amazing experience we both got to feel for the first time. She's been very active, but has never kicked like that. I loved it! Anyways, here's an updated picture I took of the growing belly :)

22 weeks and growing!

Poor momma with all her puppies! She looked so pitiful.

The two little girls we brought over to play with Frankie. Look how adorable they are!

You can barely see his knuckles on the hand that got stung. I liked calling him "grubby fingers" since he enjoys calling me "tubby."

Steve and one of his brothers (Matt)

Robin, Mark, Matt & Tyler enjoying the lake.

Me and Katie enjoying a swim.

Tyler tubing by himself!

Tyler and Katie tubing. Steve tried so hard to throw them off and finally succeeded! This picture was taken right before they went flying in the air.

Steve's First Post

Well, I figured that I'd better put my 2 cents in on this blog. Can't let the Wifee do all the talking. Since it's a Friday morning, my brain is toast, I have meetings from 9:00am until 4:00pm, and I have nothing interesting to talk or gripe about...here are some random musings. Enjoy!

This right here, is the best $700 I have EVER spent. 37 miles per gallon beats the hell out of the Bronco's 12. I've been driving this hot rod for 16 months and 11,000 miles without a hiccup. Sure, it's ugly, slow, uncomfortable and the driver side window doesn't work (makes drive thru's interesting), but it's a small price to pay for 85 horsepower of sheer pleasure.

Here are our Kitties, Sox and The Bandit. Sox is on the left, The Bandit is on the right. They are brother's that were born on the Fryar's farm. Their mother was a pregnant stray that was hit by a car. When Elaine found the Mother, she noticed that she had already had the kittens, and the hunt was on for them. A couple of days later, Crystal found the little guys (and girl) holed up in the freezer house. Long story short, they came to live with us because they didn't get along with the other cats on the farm. Their little sister Smokey was unfortunately hit by a car.

I used to not like cats, until these boogers came around. They enjoy long days of sleeping, killing stuff, and waiting around for us to get home so that we can shake their food bowl. Food must taste better after we shake the bowl...don't ask me.

I don't want to leave Frankenstein out, so I'll write about him another day. For now, I have to get ready for some meetings. This weekend Crystal and I will be camping with my family. We should have some good pictures to post.

Until then...

What is a Pharmacist?

I would like to vent a bit about a local pharmacist I saw last night. According to the US Department of Labor,

"Pharmacists distribute prescription drugs to individuals. They also advise their patients, as well as physicians and other health practitioners, on the selection, dosages, interactions, and side effects of medications. Pharmacists monitor the health and progress of patients to ensure the safe and effective use of medication."

If this is what a Pharmacist is trained to do, then why was it that the pharmacist I saw last night couldn't tell me the difference between Robitussin, Robitussin DM, and Robitussin night time...Obviously I can read the label and tell the difference, but all of the medical lingo doesn't mean crap to me. I wanted it in layman's terms which he could not offer. All he preceded to do was pick up the bottles and show me that each brand has a different active ingredients. Well duh! What I wanted to know was what exactly were these active ingredients, how would they affect me, how it would affect my baby, etc. What's worse than that is the fact that he couldn't tell me which drugs were safest for pregnant women. If he is supposed to be able to advise patients and physicians on what drugs a person should/should not take, shouldn't he have known all of these answers?

I'm not criticizing others in this profession...just the particular one I spoke with last night. I'm pretty sure this drug store found a high joe schmoe off the streets to put on a white lab coat and cover their pharmacist's shift last night with all of the "ums" and "I don't knows" I got as answers. I don't think I will be going back to them for help.

Sorry for the venting, but it pissed me off!

New York

Steve and I just got back from a very awesome but tiring trip to New York City. Although I did enjoy our trip, I found out very quickly that NY is not a very friendly city for pregnant women! I knew I was going to be doing a lot of walking, but hardly expected NOT to be able to find a public restroom for the million times I had to pee. The BEST part of the trip was feeling our little girl move for the first time...I think she was trying to tell me something when she basically kicked my bladder as I was walking up 6 flights of steps to get to the observation deck of the Empire State building. I'm glad I took the stairs though :) The WORST part of the trip was getting sick on the last day. Steve and I had to cut our site seeing short when I thought I was going to faint after a day of walking...I barely made it back to the subway. The flight home the next day only made things worse. Now I am taking some antibiotics to get rid of my "bacterial infection" and inner ear infection :( I am starting to feel much better now but am keeping Steve up all night with my constant coughing. Sorry baby!


Here are a few of my favorite pics from our trip...

Before the Yankees-Red Sox game on July 4th. Go Sox!!! (They won 6-4)

Sorry Phil & Mary but you are pulling for the wrong team!

Me & Mary somewhere in Central Park.

A rooftop view of the apartment we stayed in with Phil & Mary. Look at that big belly :)