New Year, New Blog-Part I

Don’t worry. I know you’re panicking about the title of this blog and you may think I’m going to make big changes and take away the wonderful musings that you became so addicted to reading during 2009. All it means is this is my first new blog post of 2010. Now that we’ve averted that crisis, I have many new updates and very little space so I’ll get right to it.

First things first, here’s a little year-end wrap up about the conclusion of 2009. William and I spent our first Christmas as non-singles in Amarillo with my family. It snowed all day on the 23rd as we were driving into town so we arrived in Amarillo to a white Christmas. It continued to snow throughout the night and we had an even more beautiful and white Christmas Eve morning

After trying out several different highly recommended Dallas hair stylists (**FYI, I have not gone off on a completely unrelated tangent…just keep reading and it will all make sense**) I realized that there is no one in the metroplex area who I trust to highlight my hair anymore, at least not anyone I can afford. I was tired of paying for “full highlights” and coming home to find a few randomly placed yellow stripes in the under layers of my hair and I was also tired of paying twice as much as it costs me at home for a job that is half (and that’s generous) as good. SO, Christmas Eve morning, William and I jumped in the 4-wheel drive 4-runner and braved the ice to take me to get my haircut at Bob’s. Bob has been doing my mom’s hair for 30+ years and mine most of my life, when I wasn’t being bratty and demanding that I couldn’t get my haircut by mom’s stylist because I was afraid I would inevitably end up with “mom hair.” I walked in, sat down and told him I wanted to color my hair, and to do his best to match my roots. He warned me that it would be drastic, I told him to do it. It marked the first day of my life spent as a non-blonde.

That evening, we all piled in the car and headed to Plainview, the town where I grew up and my mom is still the church organist and handbell director, for Christmas Eve services. We all slept most of the way but I woke up about 20 miles from Plainview, where the icy roads were particularly perilous, and counted 16 cars in the ditch in the remaining miles to the edge of town. The ride home was a little slow as well, as the roads were getting worse as the temperatures dropped.

Christmas day with the family was wonderful! We woke up, had breakfast, and took our time opening up presents and sorting through stocking. The family was much too generous and we all walked away with a few more fun un-necessities. William got me an engraved iPod shuffle for our first Christmas (and we also got each other a new TV for our bedroom as our big first Christmas gift to ourselves!)

Due to the eventfulness of the Holiday season this year, I’ve decided to cut the length of my post and make this into a 2 part blog. Check back soon for the rest of the story of Christmas and all the excitement of our New Year (including dinner parties for 12, lawnmower fires, and possibly a pic of the new brown do if I can find my camera charger).

Tis the Season

Although I have been denying the "readiness" for the Christmas season since the consumer market started pushing it on us in October, it seems the season is here in full swing and since it's actually December, I've decided to embrace it.

I spent the Sunday after Thanksgiving decorating a house that is my very own (well, mine and William's) for the first time. I got to do what I wanted…to an extent. See, my mom so graciously donated 3 huge Rubbermaid tubs filled with garlands, holly berries, Christmas ornaments, lights, wreaths etc, so I did what I wanted, using what had been given to me. I did, however, splurge on some new festive PB candles (thank you for all the wedding gifts that have allowed me to milk those gift cards for 7 months!), a few table runners and a tree skirt.

Since we have officially received our first snow, I decided it was time to bring my Christmas spirit to my blog world…so here goes!

Evidence that it actually did snow in Dallas…some build up in our backyard that lasted about 2 hours…



My dining room table arrangement


My Willow Tree Navitiy (one of my favorites and entirely gifted from my friends in Plainview at our wedding shower!)


The Buffet Arrangement (thank you mom for the red globes!)


The top of the entertainment center. I was bummed that the lights in this didn't work but too lazy to re-srting them. Also, the nativity here was a gift from William's bosses and was hand carved in Bethlehem from olive wood found outside of Jerusalem. I thought that was very cool!


Another little garland arrangement on the bookshelves


And finally...the tree. This isn't a great pic b/c the lights aren't on. Also, we were given a bunch of red and gold ornaments to use while we build up our own collection...but I think it turned out pretty nice for just using what we had been given!


I still need to do some work on the outside of the house and that might get accomplished this weekend, if my sweet husband can help me a little bit (hint, hint!!)

Our First Thanksgiving

William and I spent our first Thanksgiving as married folks with his family in Tyler and at the farm in Pittsburgh. We had a great time celebrating with family and I enjoyed learning a few new family traditions from William's side.

For example, William's mom's family had a tradition of having a glass of "Cold Duck" to kick off the thanksgiving feasting. Here's Meredith and I with ours (fyi, Cold Duck is a sparkling wine that was believed to be an expensive thanksgiving treat until Will's mom discovered it was $2.50 a bottle)



William's mom made a "California-style stuffing" using water chesnuts and mushrooms, which was delicious! She asked me if I knew how to make gravy, so that was my assignment for the meal prep! Here's me making gravy (although you can't really see the gravy...just my face!)


Here's the family sitting down for dinner (minus Jamal who was taking the picture)


I also contributed a couple of pies to the meal (and, was very proud that I even made my pie crusts from scratch! Thanks Mom!) They were a big hit with the Moharer and Spencer families throughout the weekend!

We left Tyler on Thursday evening and headed to the Spencer farm in Pittsburg. We spent the rest of the weekend hanging out at the farm with Williams Dad, Aunt, 4 cousins, their 6 kiddos (all under age 10) and 8 dogs!! It was definitely a full house and there were plenty of funny stories and good times had. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures at the farm, so I can only tell you that we had a blast!!

Saturday, we packed up and headed back to Dallas to meet my family at Cowboys Stadium for the Tech vs. Baylor football game. Since my mom and dad went to Tech and my bro and I went to Baylor, it's a fun family rivalry that we've started to attend pretty regularly. William was a trooper and came to cheer on the Bears/Raiders despite having gotten up at 4am for three days in a row to go duck hunting! He did NOT, however, wear the green BU shirt I laid out for him. Instead, he wore neutral gray (see pic below)


Even though the Raiders got us in the end, it was a great game and the Bears made a good showing in Arlington. The Bears have played it down to the wire against Tech the past couple years...I think next year's our year to finally get the win. Here's a pic of our house divided...


I know this probably won't become a regular thing, but it was amazing to get in a little bit of time with all the families that William and I represent over this quick holiday weekend. We love them all and have such a great time with each of them. It was a great kick off to the holiday season and to celebrating as a Spencer! Love to all that helped make our first Thanksgiving a great one!

Who Needs Babies....

When you've got a snuggler like this!

Yes, that's Berkley asleep on her back snuggled up next to William and covered with a blanket. Pretty cute, and funny. She would have a hard road to adjustment if she wasn't our "only child."

Tweetly, Deedily Dee

Not too long ago, the words “tweet” and “twitter” were associated with things such as birds, Jackson 5 songs, the sound a whistle makes…etc, but most people today, when asked to do a word association with “tweet” would say the first thing that comes to mind is the popular social networking site Twitter.

I was recently pushed onto the bandwagon of creating a twitter account by someone in my company. We are trying to create a following on twitter for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Texas vs. the Nation Challenge (@TexasvsNation, if you’d like to willing jump on our wagon). I was scolded for not having a twitter account and supporting my company and the game that we are all so proud to be a part of. (I guess giving my time, talents and efforts to working for the game and moving to El Paso, Texas for months at a time wasn’t enough to show my devotion to my job, but the twitter account was the final proof of my loyalty.)

I’m surprised to report that I’m not completely addicted to tweeting, twittering twitting… whatever it’s called. I’ve been a member for a few weeks and I think I’m having take-it-or-leave-it emotions towards the site. I have found some interest in following some of my favorite speakers/preachers (@MattChandler74, @JohnPiper, @villagechurchtx) as well as following reports about my favorite sports teams (@BaylorAthletics, @ESPN_Big12)…but as far as following the average person, I really don’t find it that interesting. I also don’t think there’s anything exciting enough in my day-to-day activity to post updates very frequently. I try and do a few updates a week, especially if I’m traveling , but I can’t think of anything that interesting to post every two hours.

If you don’t have a twitter account, I suggest trying it out for yourself. I don’t want to form your opinions for you…if you were a member and following me (@tjspencer09) I guess right now, you’d probably see this message:

@tjspencer09 just posted a pretty boring update on my blog about twitter…

Weekend Wrap Up

This weekend was Halloween...not one of my favorite holidays but it was going to be a pretty good one this year because William and I were signed up to volunteer at our church's Trunk-or-treat festival. We were on the "entertainment" committee and were in charge of running a game station. Unsatisfied with any of the proposed games, William of course decided we would bring own out for the kiddos to play. Tie-one-on was such a hit among the kids at our wedding reception, we thought that the church visitors would enjoy it as well.

Throughout last week, I found myself fighting off a cough that kept getting deeper and meaner and congestion that did the same. By Friday morning, I was feeling really crummy and finally headed into the doctor for some help. After a chest x-ray, flu test (again) and multiple comments about the "concern" the doctor had for the sounds coming from my chest, I was diagnosed with bronchitis, a relief compared to the speculations of flu and pneumonia that he was throwing around when I first went in. After getting a cortisone shot and prescription for a z-pak, he asked me what my plans were for the weekend. He quickly canceled my volunteer plans telling me that not only would I probably be contagious, I would also have about a 90% chance of catching the flu again if I was around that many kids with my immune system weakened by the bronchitis.

I was bummed as I dressed William up in his funny trucker costume and sent him to man our game station solo, but the weekend did have a saving factor.

No one ended up needing our company season tickets for the Cowboy game this weekend, and since Cowboys Stadium is basically a glamorous, indoor sports bar, (and due to the miraculous effects of steroid shots and Z-Pak's) I decided I would bear the burden and go to the game. My brother, sister-in-law and their brother in-law went with me and we had a blast exploring our new access to the field level club and watching the Cowboys kick Seattle.

William and I wrapped up the weekend with some couch time catching up on the episodes of Flashforward we had missed and eating pizza...my favorite Sunday night activities.

Miscellaneous Cooking

I know my posts haven't been very personal lately, but this is just too good not to share. Have you ever gotten home from work and started staring blankly into the refrigerator wondering what on earth you can make for dinner with the large amount of frozen chicken breasts you bought from Sam's, 2 lemons, some eggs, garlic and frozen veggies?? This is almost a daily struggle for me and I usually end up going to the store to purchase some ingredients for a yummy sounding recipe I've been wanting to try...

I always thought, what if I could just list the ingredients I have at home and then find a recipe that is just as delicious sounding without making another trip to the store?? Bingo. Recipematcher.com.

Type in everything you find in your pantry/kitchen, identify what you want your main ingredient to be (i.e. Chicken Breasts for a main dish or mixed frozen veggies for a side) and BOOM...over 100 (depending on your variety of supplies in stock) recipes pop up for you to try.

I'm trying out the Smothered Bacon Chicken tonight... I'll let you know how it goes.

http://www.recipematcher.com/