Nick is on his one week of break before summer quarter starts so for his turn to leave the house and be away from the spouse and enjoy guy time, he’s making the most of it by camping for 3 days. He’s done this a couple of times with his guy friends and I’m still not used to it. I have always shared a bed with someone and being alone in bed is not something I look forward to. The only great part about this is that I get so much space. I can finally sleep diagonally without anyone complaining about how I take so much space.

I hope he has fun on his trip. I guess to make myself feel better, I’ll just imagine Nick sleeping in a tent while it’s cold and yucky outside. And here I will be in my Temperpedic bed under the warm covers.

Goodnight world! Goodnight Nick my love! Haha!

Nick: Babe, you’re ready to have a baby.

Me: What?? Why do you say that?

Nick: You’ve been talking about it for a while now.

Me: And that means I’m ready?

Nick: You are. I just know you are.

Uh oh.

St. Helens

This weekend, Nick will surprise me with an adventure we both have never done before. I am excited for what he has planned. I have to remember to keep in mind that whatever happens, I will try to not be whiny and to just enjoy whatever my husband has planned for our adventure together.

I told him I will try to be the best outdoorsy wife I can ever be. I say this because I am a city girl. The outdoors for me is the beach and water. I would kayak, ride the rapids and surf. But the mountains, yeah they’re God’s beautiful creation, but I like to be on horizontal ground. But that’s just me. I know I will learn to love it more and more. I just have to do it frequently.

Two things that are a must to bring: 1) Hiking Shoes and 2) Camera

I’m excited!

PS. For those that missed the photo of our anniversary spread last night, here’s a link http://twitpic.com/1lo37q

Update: Added the photo for a sneak peak on what we did. Will post more photos soon.

One day, to surprise me, Nick came home with chicken wings.  Uncooked chicken wings.

Nick: Hey babe! I have a surprise for you!

He gave me the plastic bag he was holding and then I looked inside. I saw some uncooked chicken wings.

Me: Uh…ok. Chicken wings.

Nick: But I thought you loved chicken wings.

Me: Yeah! The cooked ones!

Nick: Well they’re you’re favorite. I was grocery shopping and I thought I’d get them for you.

Tanya: Ohhhhkayyyy.

Nick: Come on love, I thought you’d like it.

Tanya: I do but a good surprise too is that when I get food, I don’t have to cook it.

Nick: I’m sorry love. I just thought you’d like it.

Tanya: I do like it. It’s just… it’s just that it’s the first time someone has given me uncooked food as a surprise. That’s all.

Nick: Ok. Next time I’ll remember to bring home cooked chicken wings.

I guess this is what makes my husband charming.  HAHA!  Yes it’s sweet that he bought me chicken wings but I think he forgot the part about who’s going to end up cooking it.  Which happened to be me of course and I was happy I did.

I got the recipe from allrecipes.com and adjusted it by adding 2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar to balance out the flavors. I wanted something easy to make so I used that recipe.

Establishing Shot

Medium Shot

Close Up

It turned out so good, Nick ate half of what I baked in one sitting.  His surprise ended up to be a good surprise for the two of us.

The other night though, it was the sweetest words I have ever heard from a stranger.

Two nights ago, Nick was really sick. He was in the bathroom a million times, he had food coming out on both ends and it was not a pretty sight. It was the first time I ever saw him sick like this.  Before I got home from work I already bought him Pepto Bismol and it didn’t seem to work. So he asked me to go to the store and get him some Sprite and saltines. Never heard about Sprite or any kind of soda to make someones stomach feel better but because Nick said that his mom made him drink pop under this circumstances and it worked, I couldn’t argue with him. (did some research and found that the carbonated water makes the stomach acids settle).

I went to the grocery store, picked up the pop and saltines then walked to the cashier to pay for my stuff.  A lady was paying for her groceries when I got to the express line. I noticed that she probably just came from work with the clothes she was wearing and rode her bike home since she was wearing biking shoes, then just picked up some things before going home.

I placed the pop and saltines down, she took a quick glance at them and smiled.  I smiled back then looked away because I wasn’t really in the mood to have a small conversation about how cold it was that night.  And I was too worried about Nick to even stay an extra minute just to talk.  She probably even saw my not so happy face.

But as she was putting her receipt in her wallet, she looked at the pop and saltines, then at me and said,  ”You know what? I look at these and just want to say, I hope you feel better.” It took my by surprise. I was surprised at her thoughtfulness and kindness.  My attitude suddenly changed.  I said,”Awwww thank you! that’s so sweet of you!  It’s for my husband though. He’s really sick right now.” She replied and said,”Awwww I hope he feels better.  I just know how he feels. I’ve gone through what he’s going through a million times, and it is horrible.  I also always take pop and saltines when my stomach is not feeling well.  Please give my love to your husband.  I know you both don’t know me but please tell him, someone hopes that he feels better soon.”

Wow.

I went home and told Nick about the lady at the store.  He said that that was such a sweet thing for a stranger to say.  I thought the same.  He drank the pop, ate some saltines and was better in just 10 minutes.  I know the stuff I got at the store made Nick feel better but the kind words of the lady made Nick feeling better extra special.

She made me think of how often I say kind words to another person.  To my officemates, friends, husband or even the person sitting next to me on the bus.  I may have done it a couple of times but I feel like I don’t do it often enough.  Sometimes we don’t feel like it because we had a bad day.  I look back now and remember the lady actually looked pretty tired, she was sweaty and seemed to be in a hurry too.  I was even right about her riding her bike home since I saw her cycle away from the store when she left.  I don’t think I get to say kind words to another person when I’m tired. But with that quick conversation that I had, I think we should always be ready with kind words. With just a few, it opens up something in us.  There’s a feeling of relief in knowing that we are not alone through our struggles.

I’m going to do what she did to me. I could be tired, sweaty and in a hurry like she was, but I will try.  You think you can do it too?

Nick’s going crazy with the paper that he has to submit on Friday. So there isn’t much husband and wife time together. So to lessen the stress and make him happy, I made some really good linguini with white clam sauce.

It was soooo good. The wine, I’m sure, was the one that made it that good. The sad thing now is that after buying that bottle of white wine, and using only a spoonfulls of it, it just might go to waste since there are no white wine drinkers in this house. So tomorrow I have to figure out what else I can make with white wine before it turns into vinegar. If you have any suggestions I would much appreciate that.

I guess I’ll try and look something up online and see if there are anything else I can make with white wine. For now, all I can do is wait ’til Nick gets done with his homework and maybe we could sneak in a little quality time together.

I turned 28 on the 3rd. Had a wonderful lunch at work. With great food, wine and gifts. I felt loved. It didn’t end there, I had an amazing dinner with Nick and friends at Bizzaro. It was so funny when we they brought out the desserts. The waiter was singing happy birthday like a drunken guy. It was so funny. He acted so drunk that words weren’t coming out of his mouth, just the tune of the birthday song. I was laughing and enjoyed it a lot. You guys have to check out the video on their website to see what I’m talking about.

I had linguini with clams. Oh it was heaven! I’ll post some photos after this post. To make you all jealous of course. ha!

The good news is, I passed the knowledge test to get my student driver’s permit. You will see me on the roads pretty soon my dearies. So be prepared.

For an extra birthday gift, my wonderful husband got me a Blackberry Curve. It is like being on crack! I love the phone! Nick got a Samsung touch screen phone but I think he’s going to return it and exchange it with a Blackberry. Oh yeah!

Hope you guys had a wonderful weekend. Superbowl last night was pretty fun. Go Saints!

As we were leaving the house to go to the laundromat, Nick started laughing at what I was wearing. He said I looked funny. He said I looked like someone who wants it to be summer so bad.

Subconsciously it’s probably true.

I guess he wants everyone to know that I love him. But don’t they all know that already?

I wore the shirt after my workout today and when I got back to work, my coworker gave me a funny look.  Yeah… I’ll shut up now.

I’m glad I got to use my Nooka Watch today.  It’s waterproof and very light.  So I was able to check the time while I was on the treadmill. Making sure that I did my crazy workout in 30 minutes then back to work.

I still haven’t figured out how to use the timer though. That way I can time my reps during workout.