How Romantic

So, our Valentine's ended up being pretty romantical.

Even though we both said we weren't going to do anything, I came home to a lovely arrangement of flowers and a card, and I pulled a card and the Mumford & Sons CD out of my purse for Austin.

Hydrangeas and Tulips, oh my.

But then, then he gave me the most romantic gift of all.

A trip to Home Depot to order our new storm door for the front of the house.

That man sure knows the way to my heart.

(Seriously though, I have wanted this since we moved in.)

Photos in 7-10 business days when it gets here!

Navy jobs and such

I just realized that I haven't blogged at all regarding Austin's next job rotation! Austin's time with the Arleigh Burke will be up this summer - can you believe it will have been 2 years already? I can't. So we have been dealing with open billets, etc. for a while now.

It has been sort of a crazy couple of months, and for a few days (right after we found out we were expecting) we thought that the Navy was going to send us to Hawaii. On July 1st. As in 1 day after Baby G is due. Ha! That would have been fun, but something finally clicked into place and it looks like we will get to stay right here in Hampton roads for the next two years!

Yay for not having to sell a house in this market, getting to have Baby G have some time around family and close friends, not having to say goodbye to all our Arleigh Burke friends just yet, and for just shore duty in general (for you non-Navy folks, shore duty - naval service at land bases). 


Now, as they say, nothing is for certain until the ink is dry on the orders, and sometimes not even then, but it looks as though Austin will be taking his turn as the Supply Officer (SUPPO) for the Gladiators VFA-106.

That's right, Austin is headed over to the Brown Shoe Navy (the aviation side) for a little while. He is pretty excited. Especially after hearing that sometimes the squadron flies to Arizona for lunch and then back. 


All in a day's work, right?

Why I love my husband

Reason #3,521

He got me this for Christmas!

A Canon Rebel T1i

Swoon. He got me a whole kit package deal that came with an extra lens and all sorts of jank that I have no idea how to use yet. You may remember that I have wanted one of these for for-ev-er.

But, now that Baby Gage is on the way, he finally agreed it was about time to invest in something nice. I need to practice with it, of course, but I am so excited to learn all the ins and outs of my new toy.

...now if only I could get home from work in time to use some natural light, maybe my skills would grow a little quicker...

Thanks Babe!

p.s. continuing the tradition of being the awesome wife that I am, Austin got an Xbox Kinect and a super fancy electric razor for Christmas. Something fun and something practical...like he will have time to shave when this baby arrives. Ha!

Flagship Celebrity

Last Saturday, Austin and I went out to support the Supply department of the Arleigh Burke in a Chili Cook-off! Our team's theme was an NFL tailgate and low and behold when The Flagship came out we saw this photo on the FRONT PAGE!

Isn't he adorable?

You can see the full story here, and his photo on the homepage linked above.

Italy Day 1 - Rome!

Thanks to the invention of Facebook (shout out to Zuckerburg) not all of the photos included in these recaps will be mine. But, my friends are gracious in their loaning so that I might tell a story.

We landed in Rome at 8:30 am Rome time after a 9 hour flight across the Atlantic, complete with freezing temperatures, crying babies, plenty of Unisom to go around and airplane food. Needless to say after a combined 8 hours of sleep between the six of us, we were raring to go!

In reality, we were all pretty hyped at the point of landing. The exhaustion would set in later.

Based on some research that I had done previous to our trip, we decided we would take the Leonardo Expressway from the airport to Rome's central train station and then hop on the Metro to our hotel. It would be cheap and easy to navigate, plus a taxi for a 45 minute ride from the airport? for 6 people and luggage? Who would want to do that? Oy. Oh, how little we knew.

Yay for Haley and her bendy tripod.

Rome! So excited!

Truth be told, the Leonardo Express was actually a great ride. We got comfy seats and got to see a lot of the 'suburbs' of Rome. Nothing better to welcome you to a new country than Saturday morning rituals of underwear clad men on their balconies. 

All the trouble started when we got to the Metro. It was easy enough to figure out where we should be going, get our tickets and head to the platform. But then we continued heading, and continued, and continued. We felt like we were journeying to the center of the earth. Up some stairs, down some stairs, rinse, repeat. You get the idea. Needless to say that with luggage in tow, we were very ready to be at our hotel by the time we finally got to the train.

We navigated the rest of the way and arrived at the beautiful Hotel Giulio Cesare. After a quick freshening up and meeting with the rest of our group, hey Jess and Adam! We hit the streets.

First order on the agenda was food. We were all starving and delirious, so we let the Herndon's lead the way, since they had beaten us there by a day and had a solid 8 hours of sleep. each.

Hey look! Vespas! Ciao.

We found a place that none of us remember the name of, but it was close to the Vatican, had menus in English, and said "pizzeria" out front. Done and done.

We had delicious pizza, that would become known as "cracker pizza" for the rest of the trip, a couple of cappuccinos, and we were raring to go hit the sites.

Yum, yum, double yum.

We jumped on the metro again, a much more enjoyable experience without the luggage, and headed to the Coliseum. 

When you come out of the metro station, up the escalators even, this is immediately what you see:

Seriously Rome? You are officially bringin' it.

And, the rest of our day in Rome was "ruin"ed. Ha. Get it? Haha. We said that all day. Clearly, we were still delirious. We allowed ourselves to get talked into joining a tour group to skip the lines and see the inside of the Coliseum, along with some other beautiful sites.

Austin was super pumped about this photo

This is part of the old palace grounds. Like Caesar's Palace. 

No, not that one. The actual Caesar's palace.

Austin really wanted to be a Roman soldier all day

On to the Pantheon

Rome is dirty. Just kidding, we love you Rome! 

But, we also loved our hand sanitizer.

Obligatory party shot inside the Pantheon... When in Rome...

After the pantheon, we decided it was time for dinner. No one has pictures of it to my knowledge because we all scarfed down dinner so fast the cameras didn't stand a chance. It wasn't one of our most memorable meals, but I had ravioli in butter and sage sauce. Butter y'all. Paula Deen would have been so proud.

After dinner we headed to the Trevi Fountain. Behold:

We were hot and tired and really wanted to jump inside the fountain.

As the sun began to set, we knew there was just one more thing we wanted to see in Rome - the Spanish Steps. So, we set out and found them.

The boys ran to the top, and we chilled for a bit before being lured to the top by promises of gelato. Then we straggled back to the hotel for showers and sweet, sweet sleep.

On to Florence!

Hanging on the Barge

Remember how Austin takes me to all the nicest places?

Well, with the Burke going into the yards all of the people have been moved to a cozy little barge to live on until the ship is returned to the the sea. They haven't hooked up any TVs or anything so when Austin had duty on Sunday, he was bored. Besides standing watch there was little for him to do.

So, I rescued him with Uno.

Saturday will probably look strangely similar to this.

The glamor of life at sea.

Ensign no more

On Friday July 30th we were lucky enough to attend the promotion ceremony of one Ensign Lieutenant (junior grade) Gage.

This is Austin passing the honor of being the "Bull" Ensign onto our friend Cameron

Wait - this comes with a pay raise?

 This is Austin's outgoing boss, who has taught him so much! 
We will miss you Suppo!

Even though Austin claims you only have to show up and not steal anything for two years to get this promotion, we are still proud of him. Love you babe.

Is he wearing manpris?

A few weeks back we finally got to utilize Austin's anniversary present and go to the John Mayer concert! Woo!

Please ignore the flat hair. It was 200* outside. kthanks.

Upside: Love us some John Mayer.
Downside: It was approximately as hot as the surface of the sun.
Upside: They serve cold adult beverages there.
Downside: They are $10 each.

Apparently we didn't mind.

We hung out for a while, met up with some of our friends for a cooling beverage and headed to our seats. John came out, the lights came up and Austin's first reaction - "Is he wearing manpris?"

Not only did John rock some plaid manpris, but he also rocked navy blue Sperry's. He dressed for the beach, people.

He also made some funny faces

The concert was full of great music and great people to judge (I am looking at you, parents drinking mexican beer who brought their one year old baby girl to a loud rock concert and got seats right up in front of the speakers clearly way past her bedtime when it was 200 degrees outside after the sun went down).

We had a blast.

My Hunky Husband

Warning: this post may induce gagging in the faint of heart.

Isn't he dreamy?

Everyone who knows us knows one thing for sure - we love to tease one another. Giving each other a hard time is one of our favorite past times. You want to hear some snarky comments? Come hang out with us. You may have even gathered that from the tone of some posts on this very blog. But, when it comes down to it we don't really fight all that much.

Now, this is not to say that we don't have our squabbles from time to time, but the amount of knock down drag out fights we have had in almost ten years together {holy crap how did that happen?} can probably be counted on one hand. Maybe on two fingers. 

Last night, as we were in the car on our way to a wetting down, {where no one got thrown into the water, btw...a tradition I think is highly overlooked} we started talking about arguments, in general. We talked about how there have been a few men who have shown up at the ship, at night, when they are not on watch or duty, to sleep. It's sort of like the 'sleep on the couch' resolution - to the extreme. 

It's an unwritten rule in our relationship that we don't do things like that. No one has ever huffed off to go sleep in the guest room, or on the couch, and definitely not on the ship. 

Austin commented, "You know, you never really stay mad at me for very long."

To which, I shrugged. I don't hold grudges. I know that no matter what, at the end of the night, we are going to go up to bed. Together. And even if we haven't verbalized an apology, one of us will reach a foot out, or throw an arm over the other's side - and all will be well.

Sometimes that foot touch says more than "I'm sorry" ever could.

Besides, he's too cute to stay mad at, am I right?

Adventures in Automobiles

I am so behind on blogging. To make up for it, I have a hilarity inducing story.

Over the weekend of the 4th of July, Austin and I decided to hit up D.C. with some of our oldest friends. We had to wait until Saturday evening to leave for a few reasons.

1. Our car inspections expired in June and we hadn't gotten them done yet (Whoops. Come on ya'll, I have been in Georgia for two years where no one cared about annual car inspections.)
2. We had to pick up my pesky little sister from her ridiculously long globe trotting 30 day trip to Europe.

So, we got the car inspections done, picked up my pesky sis and were on our way. Please note that while the Civic failed inspection the Jeep passed with flying colors.

As we got such a late start we decided we would stop and grab some food so that our friends would not have to wait for us to arrive before eating. We stopped at a McDonald's in Dale City (Potomac Mills area). we loaded up with our Dollar Menu finds and headed back to the car - only for it to not start.

Clearly, this can't really be happening. We just had the car checked out this morning! Let's sit here and stay calm husband, and we will try it again.

Meanwhile husband is beginning to turn into the Incredible Hulk. (You won't like me when I'm angry...)

Austin chomps down his McDouble in approximately 2 bites, and tries again. Still no luck.

He swallows a fistful of fries, and his pride, and stomps across the parking lot to a man climbing into a very sporty Saab to ask for a jump. The man, being a nice and normal human being, of course agrees to try.

Fast forward twenty minutes while this poor man's nutritious meal is getting cold, we have had several failed attempts, and suddenly the engine turns over. Phew. Thank you so much, best of luck, happy 4th! etc etc.

Now, husband, knowing at least a normal amount for a man his age about car mechanics, knows that an alternator charges your car's battery. After such a lengthy jump attempt, we decide he had better sit in neutral with his foot on the gas for a bit to allow the alternator to work it's magic.

After 20 more minutes, we decide, we can probably let off the gas to shift into drive.

And it kills.

Insert photo of angry swearing husband I was too afraid to take at the time, but realllly wanted to, here. Oh, wait - I have a substitute.

Being the resourceful Girl Scout Gold Award winner that I am, I took a look at our surroundings. What is that I see over yonder? Is that a Kmart? Do those still exist? and since they clearly do since this one is staring back at me, do they sell car batteries? Please God.

We traipse down the hill to the Big K, well, I traipsed, repeating things like, We will totally laugh about this later, can't we just laugh about it now? and Austin stomped, on a mission, replying, This is not a laughing matter.


Ok, ok, geeze. We ran through the store, looking for the automotive section. I could have found it off the bat if it were a Target, or even if hard pressed in a Wal-Mart, but a Kmart? I am not familiar with this layout.

We finally found it and lo and behold they have car batteries. ThankyoubabyJesus.

After purchasing said battery and a wrench to install it with, we (read: Austin) carried that heavy thing back up the hill to the McDonald's parking lot. There, in the shadow of the Play Place neon lights, setting off minimal amounts of sparks, we installed our new car battery.

The car started right up, and we bought ice cream cones to celebrate.

In a strange twist of fate - I swear, you can't make this up - a young couple right across the parking lot was getting a jump as we left. We passed on word that K-Mart does indeed sell car batteries should they need one and suggested that ice cream would fix any residual feelings of distress.

As we pulled away from them and their good Samaritan, Austin started laughing.

Anniversary Trip

Way back when, like three weeks ago, I blogged about our upcoming wedding anniversary, that has now passed. Thanks to all of our sweet friends who sent us a little not or dropped us a line - we love you guys!

In that post, i also talked about gifts. Paper gifts. Well, good news! We did not get each other the same thing!

Here is what I got Austin:

John Mayer tickets!

He loves him some soulful ballads by one Mr. John Mayer. I thought that this was a genius idea, until I bought the ticket and the only option for delivery was paperless. 

Paper less? as in without paper? Which is the whole reason that I needed this specific gift in the first place? Youhavegottabefrigginkiddingme. Luckily, by using a little ingenuity (read: google) I found this site. Tres handy. And, he LOVED his present. He will love it even more after we go to the concert I am sure.

On the other hand he got me LOTS of paper. 

Paper in the form of reservation confirmations, paper in the form of tickets and badges and paper in the form of maps. All bearing this happy little logo.

He had everything planned for a glorious weekend in historic Colonial Williamsburg. We stayed on the grounds in the Williamsburg Lodge

In a room that looked sort of like this:

and we walked around here:

and we ate here:

by honest to goodness candlelight

We had drinks and coffee out on the town and overall had an amazing day.

But what trip to Williamsburg could end without a trip to the outlets? So we hit them up too where I may or may not have walked away with some J.Crew and Coach finds...

Thank you, thank you, thank you to my wonderful husband for planning such an awesome anniversary.

I love you babe. Here's to many more <3