Let's talk about boy roommates.

I have this roommate that doesn't seem to be leaving anytime soon.  For the most part, I am okay with this, except for a little issue that came up last week. 

One thing you have to know about my boy roommate and myself is that when we go to church we are looking for one thing.  Jesus.  Wait.  No.  2 things.

Donuts.

There had better be a red and white box with a delicious assortment sitting on that table when we walk in, or we start using curse words.

Jokes.  Sorta.

9 times out of 10, when there are donuts, there is not a donut to my liking, and by "to my  liking" I mean one that I will eat and not be mad about it.  I don't go for the glazed or the chocolate or the fritter.

But sweet Moses if there is a cinnamon cake donut in that box, I will absolutely tackle the lady with the walker and clothesline the preggo to get to it.  Cinnamon cake donut...you were always my first love.

So you can imagine our excitement when we were asked, in our new Sunday school class, to bring donuts last Sunday morning.  We were ready to show this class how it's done- 2 dozen: 1 glazed, 1 assorted and DONT put one of those nasty cherry with sprinkle donuts in there.  We're not rookies.

On the same Sunday, I was asked to grace the church bookstore with my expertise (sarcasm font) and come early to volunteer (but seriously, it's one of my favorite places to be), so I had to leave the donut recruitment to my boy roommate.  It's a touch and go situation, but I had some faith that he could handle it.

I had one request.  Get the order of perfection for the entire class, but bring me a cinnamon cake donut. 

So he met me at the front of the bookstore before class with boxes in hand.  I grabbed some coffee from the coffee bar inside the store, and we were happy as clams walking down those halls.  My mouth was watering.  I thought of all of the mornings I sat with Goggle at her house in Pagosa Springs, CO eating donuts and drinking coffee (she started me young).  Flip, my life was literally flashing before my eyes and I was okay with going as long as I got to eat the donut first!

And that donut was better than I ever could have fathomed.  But let me tell you why boy roommates are the most awesome of all that is awesome. 

He. got. me. two.

Is there ANYTHING that could make a Monday better than A CINNAMON CAKE DONUT?!?!
Answer: no.

So after class we headed out to go to the service, and I had to take a pit stop.  After church, I was thinking of how much I love that book store and which books I want need and how much I love our church and how much I love my man and how much I was going to love on those Iraqi kids we were planning to play with all week and mostly I was thinking, at the time, about that donut.

And I noticed my boy roommate did not have the bag that held my precious nugget anymore.

So I asked..."Um.  Where's my other donut?"

"I ate it while you were in the bathroom".

And that is why boy roommates are sometimes not awesome and donut clauses should be in your prenup.

NAHBS which stands for Holy Cow That's A Lot of Bikes or Wow my wife is awesome for going to this with me but not awesome enough to edit all of my pictures

That steel blue color made me crazy.  I love it so much.

36er

I thought they were selling coffee.  Jokes on me.

The North America Handmade Bicycle Show was in Austin this year.  Let's be real, it was awesome.

 Umm, yes I will take one Starry Night Bicycle please.  Kthanks.

Vanilla Cycles.  My favorite booth!  D, why didn't I buy some of their rain boots?!?!

 

and to top it off, D got to meet Gary Fisher.

If you ask me who Gary Fisher is, it might be a lot like this.

The Sultan of Swat!

The Colosus of Clout!

THE GREAT BAMBINO!

And in return, D has agreed to go to the national quilters of America 4 day convention with me.

Jokes.  I just tried to think of something really miserable.

No offense to all my quilting peeps.

I have had too much coffee.

High five for bikes.

She's back!

You guys, remember when our dating hot spot / favorite coffee house hang out burned down?

She's back and we finally made it over there on our bikes to check it out.

Agora, you look the same!  

Except you don't have the sketchy 2nd story outdoor area anymore, which is probably better!  You still have the steep as you know what stairs!  

You still have the Greek faces that creep me out if I stare at them for too long and the best jukebox in the city!
You still have all the hipsters and the trendsters on their fixies with the jeans and the glasses and the neon.

We are so thrilled to see you back in action.

Agora, you complete us.

Why is it that when I tried to title this post, all I could think of were George Strait Lyrics about divorce?

Today, my world slipped away.

Once upon a time, I was a single wild stallion (as Devin described me) and Devin had a big fat crush on me.  My blog, my version.  Anyway, his like turned to love but not without the key 3rd factor in our relationship.  Wait, God is our 3rd factor.  Ok, his like turned to love but not without the key 4th factor in our relationship.  Cafe Agora.

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Cafe Agora is a 2 story house turned coffee shop Greek mythology wonderland located in the heart of Montrose.  They serve the. best. coffee in the. best. coffee mugs and they let me drop a quarter in the juke box until the sun comes up.  Devin and I spent many a night when we were dating at Cafe Agora asking questions, talking about life, and in my case, trying to talk myself out of how much I loved him.  I'm a sucker for a man who buys my coffee and doesn't mind a few bad dance moves.

Agora holds such a precious place in my heart.  The place I fell in love with my man.  The place I learned so much about him.  The place we took OV06 after the rodeo.  The place we met to plan our engagement pictures.  The place that apparently lit one too many candles.

On Sunday night, Agora went up in flames. 

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I feel like my coffee lovin' heart was ripped out of my chest and danced on.  First the very place Devin dropped to one knee and asked me to be his wife was hit and destroyed by Hurricane Ike and now our Max is a pile of ashes.

Pray for our marriage as the signs don't seem to be in our favor, but also (& slightly more important), pray for me to find a new favorite coffee place that plays their music a little too loud and will serve me a cold beer between brews.

Laws of the Land that is our abode

If you haven't caught on, we are pretty serious people.

 and we've created some very strict rules in our matrimony.  

These include but are not limited to:

1.  When I am carrying a hammer, screwdriver, pliers, chainsaw through the house, if Devin sees me (key words, y'all), I have to explain what I am doing with said tool.  Unless he isn't home.  Muahaha.

2.  Devin does not do laundry.  This is due to my insecurity that he will shrink the one Anthropologie item that I own.  So, he no touch.

3.  When we got married, we had a queen spring bed.  Long story short, for my safety, we bought a massive tempur-pedic king size bed.  And now, Devin sumo wrestles boa constrictors sleeps on a queen size portion of said bed with fluffy bunny cloud pillows, and I get a twin size portion with cardboard pillows.  I am working on amending this rule, but I prefer this to the trampoline we had before.

4.  Devin only has to come with me to the ER once a year.  This brings me to rule number 5

5.  I avoid the bread knife

6.  Devin always drives.  Partially because I hate to drive, partially because I like to avoid him laughing at me when I am trying to park.  Partially because I enjoy the adrenaline rush that comes with riding with him.  Every. time.

7.  In the event that we are both starving without access to food in the very near future, we do not speak to each other.  It's better this way.

8.  Devin wakes me up every morning (except Saturdays when I all of the sudden can spring alive at 5am to go torture myself on a run).  He also tends to put me to bed.  This typically involves prying the book out of my hand that I am still holding up.

9.  If my lamp is on and I fall asleep, he has to turn it off.  I expect some argumentative comments on this one.


10. Saying something negative about myself in front of him automatically results in push ups.  This goes for him, too.  10 per offense. 

11.  If one of us ever even thinks the words "Maybe we should get a minivan", that is reason enough to leave.  This is a serious rule in our house.

12.  Once a rule is on the blog, it's a real live rule.

10.5.10

Dear Husband,

Has it been a year and a half? Time flies when your life is a constant dance party with your best friend in ze world. Best year and a half of my friggin’ life.

Thank you for your forgiveness and for giving me constant grace so I can try to get better at communicating with you. I totally sucked at that last week. I swear I cannot wrap my mind around the amount of patience you have for me.

This weekend, when the big cheese tried to ruin my life, you totally upped your game and made it one of the best weekends in our matrimonial history. Thank you for your support when I want to walk STORM out of there. Thank you for your flexibility. Thank you for remembering I am a spa addict (a total understatement). Thank you for being patient. Thank you for understanding. Most importantly, thank you for the vodka cranberry you had waiting for me.

Bottoms up,

Wife

Lovefest 2010 Part 2

The campsite had a brand new bath house where I took the coldest shower of my life.  So cold my body was convulsing and gasping.  I had to be clean for zip-lining.  Or if not for zip-lining, I had to be clean for others.  Actually, I figured out that I didn't because one of our guides smelled like he rolled in hot wet garbage and then laid in the sun to dry.  But, I mean, he was really nice.

40 feet up swinging between those gorgeous trees I saw at the campsite.

I thought DC would really like this- something he's never done, something fun, something outdoors.  Turns out he liked their rope swing way more than he liked the zip lining.

Pay no attention to the fact that I sound like a grizzly man with a sinus infection.  Or that I had to ask what he landed on because I wasn't really watching...

After DC dried off, we headed here for the best BBQ you will ever taste.  When we got there around 2, there was an hour wait, so we brought some beers in and enjoyed the live music.  Then we chowed.

We headed into the ATX to check in to our hotel and rest before dinner.  The iPhone got us lost and we walked about 6 blocks the wrong way.  I was in heels.  Not fun.

We ended up having to take a pedicab to get to the restaurant in time.  Ironic?

On Easter Sunday, we went to San Marcos where I went to college to eat at one of my favorite places.  It was a beautiful day- everyone was dressed up for church and the wildflowers were EVERYWHERE.

Of course I didn't get a picture of them.  Not one bluebonnet.

Lovefest 2010 Part 1

DC and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary on Easter Sunday, so we took advantage of our long weekend and got the heck out of dodge.  I took the liberty of planning the entire thing without him having any idea of what we were doing...which means...I get to cross it off of my list.

We headed West, past Austin, and ended up here to set up camp.

We threw on our Chacos (man it's good to wear flip flops and sandals and shorts again) for some exploring.

I was a smidge obsessed with these trees.  Amazing.  For anyone who loves all things Lord of the Rings / Harry Potter / not Twilight / movies with massive trees, this was heaven.  I felt like a hobbit.  I promise I'm not one of those weirdos with airbrushed unicorn tshirts though.

When the sun started to set, we started building our fire.

We didn't bring lighter fluid.  Don't judge us for being hard core.

I asked DC how he knew how to do that.

He said, "Bear Grylls".

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Well, too bad we didn't have a camera crew with us to help us light our fire with their gasoline and torch.

So, I stepped in with my Camp Fire Girls knowledge.  Don't laugh, I'm legit.  And I got that dadgum fire started while D started cooking dinner.  And then he got so excited about it, he rushed over, tripped, and stepped on the fire putting it out.

You can't make this stuff up, people.

We finally got our fire ablaze.  Good thing.  It got rather cold that night.  So cold that DC literally put me in another sleeping bag in the wee hours of the morning like a papoose.

DC let me sleep in- our tent is actually quite comfortable when it's cool.  We've camped in the heat and by 6am I am running around the woods screaming "IM SO HOT" and "DONT TOUCH ME" and "WHO SAYS THIS IS A TWO PERSON TENT BECAUSE IT IS NOTTTTTTUH!"

I woke up and found him doing this.

Coffee was on before I got up.  Just like home.

Turkey breakfast sausage and eggs...

Breakfast was served.  Holy cow.  Delicious.

It was right when I finished my breakfast burrito that I asked for a time check and we realized we had about an hour to pack up, clean up, and get on the road for part 2, so we did what I always do when there is a time crunch.  We got distracted, took more pictures, I stepped on something sharp, and we watched some cardinals.  Duh.