Happy Birthday Mason!

Well, as usual, I'm late on the draw. On April 24th Mason turned 1 year old! He had a fun party with family and a few close friends. Unfortunately I was not able to make the party since I was in town the week before. However, today's technology allowed me to be there to watch him eat his cake and open his presents...God Bless Skype :) Judging by the look of his face, I think he enjoyed his cake.

Here are some pictures that I took while I was up visiting for Shane and Rebekah's wedding. I was amazed at how much he had grown and matured since the last time I saw him at Christmas! They grow too fast!

Opening the present from Aunt Lauren and Uncle Garin (he got to open it early while we were there).

This picture just made me laugh. I'm not sure how I caught this look, but I just have to smile when I see it!!

Play time with Daddy. He had some kind of fascination with taking hats/sunglasses off of your head and putting them back on.

Me and my Mason man. I could squeeze him silly :)

Eating sticks in the yard. He sure did have fun playing in the grass that day!

Hanging out with his beautiful mommy.

Giving his favorite stuff animal a ride on the car. He likes to suck his thumb when he holds his doggie. It was hilarious, as soon as he had his dog in hand, the thumb went straight to his mouth.

Mason's favorite time of day...Tractor time with Granddaddy. That boy sure does love his Grandaddy!

Playing in his book basket...except he had emptied it of books by this point. He loves to "read" books and turn the pages...that is the first place he crawls to when he put down in his room.

A golf cart cup holder + keys = hours of entertainment

The cup holder had a hole in the bottom of it. When he dropped the keys in it, sometimes it they came out and sometimes they didn't, based on how they fell in the holder. When they didn't come out he would look under it trying to figure it all out. I seriously watch him do this for about an hour. I think we have a little engineer on our hands :) I'm not bias or anything.

My little hick man.

Well of course I have like 500 more pictures, but these are some of the highlights. He's just too cute! Can't wait until he comes to visit me this summer!

Also, HAPPY BIRTHDAY Mary Winn! Not to be overshadowed by her adorable son, MW celebrated her birthday the day after Mason's on the 25th.

Introducing Mr. and Mrs. Shane Kirkpatrick

A couple of weekends ago we went back up to NC to see Garin's brother Shane get married (on April 10th, to be exact!). It was a beautiful wedding and his new bride, Rebekah, looked gorgeous! Here are some of the pictures I took at the reception. I was video taping the ceremony so I didn't get any pictures on my camera of that :(

Shane and Rebekah being introduced at the Reception

The First Dance

Cake feeding. Note the beautiful cake made by Mrs. Barbra Bunker (Garin's aunt...she made our wedding cake too!), the cake was as delish as it was beautiful!

An almost complete picture of the Kirkpatrick kids. Megsie's new husband, Eli, is currently serving our country in Iraq, so the picture will be complete when he returns. We missed you Eli!

The handsome and beautiful, father and mother of the Groom (Garin's parents)

The Groomsmen's handy work.

Happy Honeymoon newlyweds!

Congratulations Shane and Rebekah! Thank you for allowing us to be a part of your beautiful day! We are so excited to see how God is going to work in and through your marriage. Welcome to the family Rebekah, can't wait for more girl time with you!! Come visit us in Florida soon :)

Visit from the Byrum Extrodinaires!

Before we headed back to NC we were so fortunate to have our good friends Aaron and Kristin Byrum come down to Pensacola to visit us (the Byrum's are AMAZING photographers, check out their awesome work here). It was awesome to get to hang out with them and show them our neck of the woods in FL. Aaron and Garin have been friends since Middle School and were roommates in college, and it always seems to me that Garin comes a little more alive whenever Aaron is around. So of course our time with the Byrums was filled with lots of laughs as well as some late nights spent talking about life and playing monopoly!

As with most of our visitors, we took A and K to see the Blue Angels' practice airshow down at the Pensacola Naval Base. I'm not sure they were too excited when we drug them out of bed early in the morning to go down there (unfortunately you have to get there early to keep a parking spot!), but I think they ended up liking it in the end. And if I haven't mentioned it before, this place is CRAZY about their Blue Angels - you will see blue planes stuck up all around the city. So really, if you come to Pensacola and don't get to see the Blue Angels fly, then you have missed out on a big part of the Pensacola culture. Oh and you have to go to the Air Museum as well, its worth a walk through at least. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera on me at this time, so I didn't get any pictures :(

Since they were so inspired to become pilots after the airshow, we took them up to Whiting Field where Garin does his training. After showing them around, Garin strapped them into one of the planes he used to fly and let them dream about their flight into the danger zone ;)

The professional photogs told us the lighting was perfect for a photo shoot, so Garin got to model his flight suit in front of the T-34. Of course they were right, the lighting really did make for some pretty cool shots. Here's one I snapped with my little camera (isn't my pilot such a hottie?!)

On another day we made the trek out to Destin, FL to spend the day at the beach and do some outlet shopping (but of course!). It was one of the most beautiful days I have seen at the beach. The temps were around 75 degrees and there was a gentle breeze. It was warm enough to wear a bathing suit but not hot enough to make you sweat (like it usually is!). The sand was like sugar and the water was as clear as I've ever seen it. ABSOLUTELY PERFECT! I felt like we were in the Caribbean, not FL!

We ended the day at Destin eating at the Lucky Snapper. They have great cheese biscuits...when you don't have to wait forever for them. All in all it was a great day in Destin...I wish all beach days could be that nice!

Unfortunately the end of A and K's visit came MUCH too quickly. Not that we had too much else to show them round these parts, but we always enjoy our time with them and hate when it ends :( Thanks for making the trek down here to see us, Aaron and Kristen! We loved it!

Hopefully the Byrums are the first of many visitors we will have this summer! Everyone is invited, so please take advantage of our location while we are here!! We're open and taking reservations!!

So much to post...for once!

Well after months of nothing really to post about I finally have quite a few! I might just have to spread them out a bit so that I don't overwhelm you all at once :)

As for a quick update on us, we just got back from a vacation up to NC to see family and to witness Shane and Rebekah's wedding (of course that is one of my posts!). Its always good to go home and visit our family and friends!

I start back to work on Wednesday of this week and Garin FINALLY starts up his Advanced Helo training on Thursday. Of course he is a little apprehensive, but he has been very diligent in studying while he has been off, so I'm sure he will do great. This is his 4th and final phase before he gets his wings (which officially makes him a military pilot). Right now his estimated date of winging is November 10th of this year. Of course A LOT of things can happen to change that date, but that gives you an idea of how much longer he will be in training. Thus, its looking like we will be Christmasing in a new part of America this year! I'll keep you posted as we find out where that will be!

2 down, 18 to go

Garin has officially been in the Coast Guard for 2 years now. Crazy, huh?! So far we have been through: 2 months of Boot Camp in Cape May, NJ; 2 months as an enlisted seaman at Small Boat Station, Emerald Isle, NC; 4 months in Officer Candidate School in New London, CT; and 1 year and some change in Naval Aviation Flight Training in Pensacola, FL. Whew, lots of transition!

Right now Garin is in between the Primary and Advanced phase. He should be starting up Advanced (which will be his Helicopter training) at the end of April; this phase should take between 6-8 months. So, right now it is looking like we will be making our move to our new duty station at the end of this year. We have no idea where that will be, but we should be staying there for about 4 years, so we'll finally get to "settle" down somewhere!

Congrats on reaching the 2 year mark, sweetheart! You make me a proud wife :)

Something Old, Something New

Due to the excess time on our hands of late, Garin and I have taken to refurbishing some old furniture and building some new furniture for our guest room. We are fortunate to have some pretty cool thrift shops around this area and I have found some pretty neat pieces of furniture there. The one you see below is one that I saw in the back of a thrift shop and it really "called" to me and so Garin agreed to help me bring it back to life.

So this is the before picture: And this is the after picture:

Yeah, so it might not look so good in these pictures, but I was pleased with how it turned out. I did a "shabby-chic" type finish on it to give it an antiqued look. Garin did a pretty good over haul on the structure, so it should be good to go for years to come! Oh and the other day I actually saw almost this exact piece in an antique shop (and I had done a MUCH better finishing job on mine than this one had), it was selling for $199...I bought mine for $45 and spent about $30 on the overhaul. Looks like I made a good buy :)

Next, we needed a head-board for our guest room bed. So, I told Garin what I was wanting and then he built it for me (its so nice to have such a handyman for a husband!). I did the same shabby-chic finish on it even though its not exactly an antique. I hope to find an older side table that strikes my interest so that we can redo it and make a complete bedroom set (and one day when we move into a more permanent dwelling I'm gonna actually paint the walls to compliment my finds/designs...cause its kinda hard to see them with the white walls behind)!

As you can see, the guest room is ready to go now and is ready to receive visitors! Please make sure you book your stay soon so before we run out of vacancy :)

Denver!!!

Last week Garin and I ventured out to the Wild West to surf some powder and to see one of my old college roomies. We left P-cola early on Wednesday morning and arrived in Denver around noon. Since Lauren and Andy were at work we took a trip to downtown Denver and wondered around until we found the flagship REI (the first one in America!). It was in this really cool old train station and was HUGE!! After we hung out with Lauren and Andy on Wednesday night we headed out to the mountains on Thursday morning. We took the advice of this nice guy at REI and took the scenic route over the hills and it was BEAUTIFUL! Below is a drive by shooting that I took in a valley surrounded by the beautiful Rockies:
Thursday afternoon we arrived in Avon, a cute little ski town at the base of Beaver Creek Ski Resort. We took in the beautiful mountains and hung out in the hot tub getting ready for a day of skiing (Garin) and snowboarding (Lauren) on Friday. Friday morning we got up bright and early and headed out to carve it up at Copper Mountain (they had a great buy one get one free deal if you bought 10 gals of gas at a Shell Station...and thankfully Lauren G hooked us up with a receipt she had!). Copper Base: check out the half pipe to the right...I accidentally was one of the first down it on this day. I was trying to cut over to get back to this lift and realized too late that I couldn't get over there without taking the pipe. So I popped some double corks and ended it with a McTwist Deluxe...I think I scored like a 48 or something... haha riiiiiight.

My trusty steed - you can't tell it, but it sparkles, that's my favorite part. I got made fun of quite a few times for my step-in bindings by the lift peeps, they're supposedly old school. But I like them! I heard they are unsafe so I might have to downgrade to the strap ins ;(

My hot ski bunny. We was best buddies and stayed together all day :)

Wow, those goggles look REALLY big...but they sure did make it a bunch easier to see while it was snowing and they sure did keep my face from freezing!!

After a great day of skiing on Friday, Lauren and Andy met us up in the mountains for a sleep over! It was just like college again :) haha. After falling asleep while watching the Olympic opening ceremonies we all got up early on Sat morning and hit the slopes at Beaver Creek.

Me and Dr. Gainor

Fellow boarders

It was really cool going with L and A because they challenged me to try some things I've never tried before on my board (I usually just go down the mountain). Andy introduced us to the "beginners" terrain park where we went over some "tables" and I even did some jumps and got some air!! All of the pictures from that are on L and A's camera so hopefully they can send me some or post them on their blog. At one point I was getting pretty confident in my new found boarding abilities and tried a rail...it was one of those that starts off parallel to the ground and then has an angled drop down...I made it down the straight part but the angled part did me in! Before I knew it my board fell off the end and I fell down with one leg on either side of the rail...needless to say, I put quite a nice bruise on my tail end! But as Andy said, if you don't come back with a few bruises you haven't had a good day! I wasn't as adventuresome on the rails after that spill! However, I did get brave enough to venture off the combed trails into the trees where the powder was about 2 foot deep! Man if you fall back there, which I did quite frequently, you basically had to grab one of the nearby trees to pull yourself up because the powder was so deep...it was awesome! We found some other ungroomed, untreed, areas to do some powder boarding...so different from regular boarding, but AWESOME! Man, I'm so jealous of L and A for being so close to the mountains (well, in the winter, I think I'll stick with my beach for the summer!).

How beautiful is this?! Fortunately I took this picture early in the morning because the clouds rolled in around lunch time (as Andy predicted) and the snowed started falling pretty thickly! There were times when I couldn't see well enough to tell if I was going across the mountain or down it (I could have fallen off the side of the mountain and not known it)! As you'll see in the next picture, the snow made the roads pretty crazy, all those trucks were having to stop put on chains!

The plan was to head back to Denver on Sat night but it sure was a treacherous trip! By the time we left it had been snowing pretty hard for the past 4 or 5 hours so even though the roads had been salted and plowed they still weren't in the best condition. We went the "longer" way to bypass the normal ski traffic and although there wasn't much traffic on that route, I did A LOT of praying as we went over the mountains on snowy roads with no guard rails!! Whew, I was praising God when we got back to L and A's house!

We woke up on Sunday to about 3 inches of fresh snow...beautiful! We went to church and then came back and just did a Sunday chill. In the late afternoon Garin and I borrowed L and A's sleds and went across the road to the neighborhood sledding hill to act like the "southerners who never see snow" that we are. It was pretty fun :)

On Monday L and A had to work so G and I decided to make a trek down to see Pike's Peak. Unfortunately when we got there the road wasn't opened all the way to the top so we decided not to drive up. Instead, in the spirit of the current times, we went and toured the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, CO. It wasn't as cool as I thought it would be, but it was neat to think about the many awesome athletes who had trained there. Man there are some CRAZY Olympic Sports...like trampolining. I mean, if I'd known that was an Olympic sport I would have been more diligent practicing it out in my backyard as a child!! I'll have to brush up on my Olympic "sports" when I have children so that I can encourage them get there foot into one of those obscure sports that no one aspires to ;)

We got to hang out with L and A one last time on Monday night and then we headed out EARLY on Tuesday morning to fly back to ol' P-cola. It was awesome to get to see them (hadn't seen them in about 2 years). Gotta love those friends that you haven't see in forever but then just pick back up without skipping a beat. Thanks SO much Lauren and Andy for letting us come vacation with you. Ya'll were awesome hosts! Lauren, you amaze me with the fact that you can work a 10 hour day at the hospital and then come home and fix a delicious dinner and be that great wife! I'm so thankful to have both of you as friends, ya'll bring me so much joy :)

Well that was our vacation. I think I just made up for not posting in forever...I packed it all into one ;) haha. Peace out!