Setting Sail for the Motherland

Yep, we are setting sail this weekend. If you can't tell by our last name, the Motherland is referring to, none other than, Ireland.

Yep, we are in need of a vacation! Who isn't?! After a long year of ups and downs, many good and many not so good, we are taking a week to become adventurer's! We've got nothing but plane tickets and a car rental, and a couple of Wal-Mart backpacks. Yes my friends, and adventure it will be!!

We got an awesome new camera for christmas, which will be nice an loaded up for our return! I'll be sure to snap a few of us sleepin in the car. With no reservations anywhere, I'm sure it's bound to happen at least one night! But pray that it doesn't!

In honor of the 250th anniversary of Guinness, we thought, what a perfect way to spend our 2nd anniversary. We also thought we would honor our favorite stout, and all of our wonderful wedding guests, by having a pint for everyone! Well........ we'll try, since we will be the only ones there to actually consume the 200 pints of Guinness, we'll try our best. We've been practicing!

We'll be back in a week! Erin Go Bragh!

Turn up your Hamm Radios...

Really? 55 in the left lane?

Thank you so much for all those people out there that drive the actual speed limit here in the Chicagoland area. If I only had the courtesy to do the same.

I also applaud all of you that drive 55, even in the left lane. Although, I must also protest. There are some of us out there, that are not on our cell phones working while driving in the car. I would actually like to use the left lane for passing, and traveling a little faster, so that I can get to the office in a timely fashion to begin my work day. Those of you that choose to begin your work day in the car, please proceed to the right lanes of the tollway, where the slower traffic is. I'm tired of seeing you swerve in and out of your lane, because you are not paying attention. You are slowing down those of us that ARE paying attention.

I know it's no excuse that I was running late this morning (even though I make my own hours...) But sometimes you just have to get things off your chest... So attention all of you that fall into the categories above. Along with all of those that are doing their makeup in the car, messing with their GPS, out of towners (yes, you are very frustrating to Chicago drivers), and UPS trucks. Get out of the way please!! I don't care how slow you want to drive, just please GET OUT OF THE LEFT LANE!!

And thanks! I'll be leaving around 530pm today, if you all want to make a note of it. :)

A gift becomes a nightmare, nightmare comes true, and the truth becomes our dream..

I’ve always been quite unique. I like what I like. I like special things, yet I like them plain. You see?

A week short of our 1^st 6 months dating, Marty got down on one knee, in his kitchen (as I was swearing at the wine bottle because I couldn’t get it open) and said something that I’ll never forget. I can’t forget something I didn’t hear right? As Marty I’m sure was saying, probably the most romantic thing he could ever say, I, 1- was swearing at the wine bottle 2- then asking him what he was doing on the floor 3- looking up and seeing his sister Maureen crying (why, I wasn’t sure) and 4- was hearing Marty’s mother, Mary, saying “He’s doing it right now? Frank, is he doing it right now?”

Seriously, I all of the sudden thought I was on an episode of Seinfeld and the Castanza’s were over for dinner…. But for as much as I would like to admit that it was lovely, I couldn’t hear what he said, and much time later, when I finally admitted I couldn’t hear what he had said, he couldn’t remember.. So hunny, I'm sorry I didn't get to hear what you had probably been going over in your head for weeks, and so thoughtfully prepared!!!!

But! My saying yes, had nothing to do with anything he would have said right then. I knew from the beginning we were going to get married. So amidst the confusion, he handed me the bag I was looking for (it was the doggies b-day and I asked him to get her a new collar on his way home) and dangling from the end of the new collar (black velvet with a cute little bow, good job Marty!) was my ring. At first I thought, “oh how cute, you found a collar with a pearl on it” But then after looking up at the Castanza’s and Mo crying in the background, I realized he was proposing, and that it was a ring for me! The perfect pearl I always wanted, surrounded by petals of diamonds. How crazy. I knew that ‘the one’ was truly going to be the one that actually listened when I hinted at wanting something other than a diamond. And here I had my perfect pearl gracing the center of my husbands eternal symbol of love and affection. The Perfect Pearl.

The perfect pearl that plagued me with nightmares for many months to come..... Each one bringing to life the fear of the pearl (with no prongs!) missing, and my never ending search for it’s safety. Everytime I awoke, I would run to the where my ring was placed, and check to make sure it was still there. Until one day, all became reality. Of all days, February 14^th of this year, we were throwing a couples Valentines day dinner, and I had just settled into the table, after hours of cooking and preparing. Finally, my first time to sit down and enjoy the company, and what do I find? A pearl’less’ ring… My nightmares had become reality. What made it worse? The thought that I had just prepared a 4 course dinner for 10 couples and then proceeded to throw hunks of ‘white’cheese, no less at our dogs for being such good sports. Oh heavens, it could have been anywhere…

Several days later, after much cleaning, a very unhappy couple we were. We made some phone calls and found that the pearl could easily be replaced. We were ok with that, but sadden that it wouldn't be 'the one' and we were also told that in the future, I should not where my ring everyday..

Thankfully, low and behold a few days later, after grabbing the last towel on the shelf in my bathroom ( which I had folded and put away just minutes before guests arrived for Valentines day), I hear this rolling sound. Just as if someone was rolling a quarter across a table. I turn back to see my pearl roll across the shelf, and without even realizing it, in my head I go “Dear Lord, please give me the patience I need today. I watched my husband put up this shelf, using a level, and yet something is rolling across this poor shelf. I know that there are more important things in life, than shelves being level, so please God, today, I need to be reminded of that” haha, then after a small chuckle I realize, It’s my pearl! I quickly recanted “Dear Lord! Thank you so much for my husband that can’t put up a level shelf!!! AMEN!”

I love you so much hunny!!!

Rainbow Falls

Rainbow Falls

Yep, that’s where it all began. No, the Rainbows weren’t falling out of the sky.. And no, we weren’t at a waterfall with a rainbow bursting through the sunlight. It was actually… the local pool…
I know, sounds strange. Even more so, it was the concession stand at the local pool, Rainbow Falls. And no, it didn’t happen while standing in line (you could probably come up with some romantic story in your own head about falling in love in line for some nachos.. “While turning from the nacho line, one innocent chip began it’s freefall to the ground. She reached to save it, they both fumbled for the rescue, their hands touched, their eyes met!!!”) blah blah, not so.
I actually first saw him when my new manager (yes we both worked there) was handing me my nifty red (and incredibly over-sized) polo, just a few days after my 14th birthday. He had a big cheese stained the front if his shirt, and the guy next too him was throwing ice at another poor innocent girl, who was trying to take an order from a customer. Was this what I was about to get into? Sure mom! I’ll get a summer job! Wow, think of all the money I could make! Little did I know, the concession stand vet’s were going to do everything they could to sabotage you while you are trying to take orders…. I think on my first day, I too, had a big huge permanent cheese stain on the front of my ‘new’ shirt, a rip in the collar, and one of my hair clips was lost in the jalapeno jar… oops!
But yes, my future husband was apart of the shenanigan’s, and funny, now we had matching nacho cheese stains..
Little did I know, that the fun of the next few summers, was laying the ground work for what ended up in marriage, 11 years later…

To answer some questions: No, we haven’t been together that long. No, we never dated in High School. Yes, we lost touch for many years (Marty’s 2 years older than I), No, Marty wasn’t the sole instigator in us young girls being tortured in the concession stand (Hi Sprinkles!) Yes, I thought my husband was the most adorable thing on earth back then. No, I never told him that. And No! I never, on God’s green earth, would have imagined that 11 years later I would be marring him. WooWhoo!

So Rainbow Falls.. What a wonderful place.. After sometime, it turned out to be a great place! And I’ve made some incredible, everlasting friends and memories. Sprinkles you ask? Well, that’s just what our niece calls him (she couldn’t ever remember that it was Spencer, not sprinkles). He kind of made me miserable for a while. I tried so hard to ‘look good’ when going to work, for the chance that Marty would be there, but Sprinkles was quick to wipe cheese in my hair, or ‘accidently’ spill the jalapeno juice on me so I smelled just peachy. But in his defense, we turned out to be pretty good friends. As the years passed, I left the concessions, and moved to the lifeguard stand. With 2 little shouts from my whistle, ‘Sprinkles’ was on his way out to me, Laffy Taffy’s in hand. He always new that’s what I wanted.

At our wedding reception, we had all of the tables labeled with all the different places in our town, that have been a big part of our lives growing up, instead of labeling with the traditional number. So of course, it seemed fitting that our head table, had none other than “Rainbow Falls” cast upon it. And of course, a year earlier when I had finally ran into Marty, after 6 years, he somehow made it into my cellphone under the name “Rainbow Falls” It’s been like that for 3 years now, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to change it. ‘Marty’ would call and I would look at it and say “Who?” Oh, and did I mention that Rainbow Falls shares a parking lot with the church we got married in? Which is also 3 blocks down the street from the house we bought? Hmmmm.

So thank you Rainbow Falls. Thank you for my $5.25/hour. Thank you for the daily cheese stains. Thank you for the free pizza’s. And don’t forget all those wonderful Choco Taco’s. Thank you for the memories and the friends. And most of all, Thank you for letting my wonderful husband, see past the fashionable cheese stains, the jalapeno perfume, and hot dog water lotion. He might not have fallen in love with me 11 years later, with out his Rainbow Falls goggles...