Ice Storm

Last night Ryan and I went ice skating... on our sidewalk.

When I heard we were getting an "ice storm," I pictured some snow with a little black ice here and there. What I didn't picture was a sheet of thick ice covering EVERYTHING!! Picture a big bucket of water being dumped on Columbus and all of it freezing and therefore forming a slippery, cold layer over everything. I had never seen anything like it. When Ryan went out to work yesterday morning he couldn't even open his door because the whole thing, along with the handle, was covered in a solid layer of ice. From our doorstep to the car... I was sure I needed those crazy spiky boots that people wear to climb Everest just to make it two steps outside.

Anyway, it wasn't until we were driving home from the gym last night that we thought to take pictures, so we just have to deal with the shadows, glares, and blurriness.

See how it's not just the icicles at the bottom, but the whole thing that is covered!?!

See the "rain" at the top of this picture? It's actually ice--not sleet or hail or snow, just ice that forms a solid layer when it hits the ground.. or people! I had to scrape myself off!

The bushes, the trees, the curb, the parking lot....

Our car--and this is what's still left after a day of rain and melting!

The rest of January...

Last week I paid a little visit to Utah and had a ton of fun! Some of the highlights were visiting with family and friends, dinners at Cafe Rio and Paradise Bakery, watching the Bachelor with a big group of girls (so much more fun than by yourself!), watching BYU beat SDSU, running errands with my mom during the day, etc. etc...... Oh yeah, and having my final post-op appointment and GETTING MY BRACES OFF (the real reason for the trip)!!!!

It's funny because I really didn't mind the whole braces thing. In fact, I liked it for the time being because the rubber bands really helped my jaw feel "in place" and was in no rush to get them off. That being said, as soon as the date was set for my braces to come off, it couldn't come soon enough!! But now that they are off, it feels great and my jaw really feels like it has improved so much in just the last week! It's amazing!

Not to seem vain, but I've got a close-up or two to post here just so you don't all remember me forever as the girl with the bruised, swollen, brace-face (because that's how I still picture myself). :) Although, I kind of look funny in them... but whatever... you get the point.

On another note, we had our first visitor! My mom needed to go to Cleveland soon, so she booked her trip out here at the same time I flew back so that we could travel together. She stayed here for a couple nights and then Ryan and I drove her up to Cleveland this weekend and had lunch with my Grandpa a Becky, and then swung by to visit at my Grandma's for a few minutes to say hello before heading back to Columbus. I haven't actually been back to Cleveland since my wedding reception about a year and a half ago, so despite it being quick, it was a fun visit!

Our apartment is now complete.

The dartboard was hung up and we immediately started a running game of darts. Current scores:

Ryan: 1686 points

Britt: 1562 points

124 points isn't that much of a difference when you get a few triple 20's. The competition gets pretty fierce!

Non-Adventure

I just realized the word "NON" is a big part of my life these days:

Stay-at-home-NON-mom; NON-adveture.... my life is somewhat NON-exciting these days, I guess.

Anywho...

So yesterday I spent ALL.DAY.LONG in my bedroom. It wasn't really my fault though. I have no car. It's too cold/far to walk anywhere. The apartment is already clean. Dinner was already made. Our bedroom is the warmest room in our cold apartment. And the list goes on and on and NON. Whoops... I mean on. So I spent it reading, watching t.v., making grocery lists so the concerned commenters on my last post can be at peace knowing that we do in fact eat, etc. etc. etc.

To be honest, as boring as that sounds, I was perfectly fine all day. The morning went by fast, the afternoon a little slower, but nonetheless fine. It wasn't until Ryan walked through the door when he got home from work and announced that he was going to take a shower before dinner that I realized I had been home alone all day and had absolutely no interaction with any other human being since 7am and that I was for sure NOT fine anymore. At that instant, even one more minute I had to spend by myself was a matter of life or death, really. Or so it seemed.

Ryan got a somewhat concerned look on his face and while I know he was genuinely concerned about my mental state and overall well-being at that moment, I'm sure he was also genuinely concerned about the fact that I needed 100% of his attention for the rest of the evening and that BYU's basketball game against UNLV, another ranked team, was just a few hours from tipoff. Conundrum, I know. Even I understand his concerns....

You can all see where this post is inevitably headed right now, right? Yep. The hard truth of the fact that I still REALLY need a job. (Speaking of jobs, guess how many I applied for yesterday? Zero. Do you want to know WHY I applied for zero jobs? Because I already applied for EVERY job I found in all of my searches to date, is why.)

Anyway, I am happy to report that Ryan took a shorter shower than normal, we enjoyed lovely conversation over our spaghetti dinner, then went shopping (for cars!), and finished up the evening watching the BYU Basketball game and the People's Choice Awards during commercials. Win-win. (pun not intended).

So continuing on with my non-adventure...

I had every intention of waking up early (as I have been doing every day) and working out (as I have not been doing every day). So, I woke up, got up, fueled up, geared up, and then pumped up (you still with me?) and in what was going to be my "welcome back to running!" moment of glory where I swing open my door and burst into a super easy 5 mile run (this was the "adventure" I've been alluding to), everything went wrong. My ipod died and it started snowing. And, well, that was pretty much it, but that was enough to stop me since one of my top concerns these days is slipping and re-breaking my jaw. Then I decided to resort to my at-home personal trainer, Jillian, but A) of all, I didn't want to upset the neighbor below me, and B) of all, our xbox that is our DVD player is probably the exciting new toy to the family in Lansing, Michigan that shared our moving van with us. So that's obviously not an option.

.... which brings me to this long, boring, overly-detailed, picture-less post (which you should not be upset about if you read the whole thing because I warned you that it was a NON-adventure)... because I have nothing else to do. Maybe I should stand beside freeway off-ramps holding up signs listing my talents and asking for jobs that way (cool story, huh?). I hear it's all the rage here in Columbus these days. Except given my lack of service-related talents, I don't know what my sign would say.... "stay-at-home-non-mom friend and/or babysitter and/or HR professional for hire?"

Of milk and hangers...

What do milk and hangers have in common, you ask?

Let me tell you. They both disappear 'round here.

All I know is that when I came home from Wal-Mart yesterday I had a half-gallon of milk and this morning when I went to put it on my Banana Nut Cheerios with cut-up banana slices, I didn't. Normally I would just get something else and not worry about it, but I woke up today and the first thought in my head was "I need a job... and a car" followed by "I really want Banana Nut Cheerios with cut-up banana slices. And milk on top!"

Okay, so not really the milk part but that was because it was already implied. And while I'm being honest, I didn't really mean the job part either because sometimes it is just nice to sleep in and watch t.v. and catch up on blogs and be lazy while someone else goes to work to pay your bills. (kidding!).

So anyway, I'm sure I will find it (read: smell it) in a few days behind some table or something. Or maybe it got packed away into some storage boxes in our garage since we were doing that yesterday. Hmmm.....

(Speaking of bananas, does anyone else have to sing the Gwen Stefani song to spell that word? I don't even like that song at all, but I will inevitably spell bannanas, banannas, or banaanas if I don't sing b-a-n-a-n-a-s (it's just one of those words I struggle with).... and I have a hard time believing I am the only one who does this).

Meanwhile, onto hangers....

Hangers baffle me because there are NEVER enough! Even when I go to buy a new pack of hangers, after doing a few loads of laundry they are all gone again. And it's not like I bring home bags of new clothes everyday! This morning though was really weird because I went to go hang up some of Ryan's shirts I washed, but there were NO empty hangers in his closet. So my question then was, where did the hanger go that he got his shirt off of this morning, because the shirt he wore to work was one that I hung on a hanger last night?!?

Well, there you have it. Deep thoughts and a glimpse into the life of a stay-at-home-non-mom.

And the moral of this blog post is: I really need a day job.

{PROOF: There is no milk in our refrigerator.}

Candy bars and MARS

On the last Sunday in our Draper ward, a lady came up to us and was asking about Ryan's new job. When she found out his new company was MARS, she stated with confidence, "You're going to get fat. You will. Next time I see you, you will be fat." Awesome. Thanks for being so sure about that. But when Ryan came home with his "welcome to the company" gift bag last night, I began to question whether she might just be right. :)

(Sorry for the awful lighting... we only have one lamp and a kitchen light in our apartment right now)

Given that we're still a bit sugared-out from the holidays and recovering from our sugar comas, I'm sure this will last a while, so we'll save some for when everyone comes to visit us! ;) Hint, hint...

So much to discover!

We made it! And like the sign says, we have so much to discover. At least the sign didn't say that Ohio was the "crossroads of America" like the other 5 state signs that we saw along the way. We started out our drive at 5:30 a.m. with super thick fog in the dark canyons going through Park City, then with some snow blowing across the open plains blinding us in the very beginning of Wyoming. Thankfully that was no indication of what the rest of the trip was like. We had perfect weather through the rest of Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, and into Ohio. Not a speck of rain or snow. The thought of driving across the midwest during the middle of winter was the scariest part of the move to me, and my prayers were answered!

We love our apartment, we love our location, we love how close we are to any store we would need and to downtown Columbus. We love how Ryan learned a new route that shortened his commute from 55 minutes to 35 minutes and that he thoroughly enjoyed his first day of work yesterday.

I'm still not quite over the "missing Utah and our family and friends there" phase yet... but I know it will come sooner than later as I learn the area, meet new people, and find a new job. Yay for change and new challenges and growing and so much good stuff that we have yet to discover!