The Fogles do KC

We made it to Kansas City!

Monday morning at 7:30am, we left Waco with the Civic packed to the brim.  We drove through Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and then Missouri before finally reaching KC at about 5:30pm.  The trip went well, although it took us about an hour and a half longer than we thought it would, so we were getting a little nervous that we weren't going to make it to the apartment before the office closed at 6pm. Luckily, though, we made it no problem.

The past few days have been a whirlwind of trips to Target, Bed Bath and Beyond, Goodwill, and random people's apartments to get stuff that they advertised on Craig's List. I'll have to post more details sometime about how we went about getting Dan's apartment ready for as cheap as we could...but for today, I'll just show you some pictures of his bachelor pad that he'll be living in for the next seven months.

Oh by the way...I didn't clean up at all before taking these...so ignore all the extraneous random stuff such as suitcases and vacuums!

Here's the living room, which is where you come into when you walk in the front door. The couch is from Craig's List and was a great deal! It's really nice and comfortable.

Here's the kitchen (and front door) if you are standing in the middle of the living room. 

You also go to the bedroom through the living room.  Here's a picture of half of it.  Obviously, Dan was unpacked within a half hour of arriving. Also, have you noticed the decoration theme for his bachelor pad? Apparently it's "flags." I can't make fun; I was with him when he bought them and helped put them all up.

And the other half. Notice the nice futon he's laying on as he talks on the phone (Hi Mom!).

We've been doing a lot of shopping, and I'm pretty sure this was Dan's favorite purchase so far. Can you tell what it is? 

Did you guess.... a shower curtain? That's right! Admittedly, we bought it since it was on clearance, but so far it's made me smile every time I've walked into the bathroom!

And finally, here's the view out the back door (in the living room; you couldn't see it from where I took the picture of the living room but it's there.) Yes, he has a back door and a patio. It's amazing. I'm really jealous and I'm not even going to show Sammie these pictures because I know she'll be completely jealous and want to move in with her dad - which we all know is NOT going to happen.

So that's it! It's so nice. Small but perfect for Dan for the rest of the year.  And if you're wondering how we got all the furniture here..well...here's a clue:

Oh yeah, we totally rented a big van. I got a lot of honks as I drove this guy, that's for sure. 

I fly back to Waco on Saturday, so we are hoping to just spend the next few days hanging out and maybe exploring the city a little more. Dan starts work on Tuesday, so wish him luck! We'll keep you posted. :) 

The Semester's Finally Over!

Well hello there friends...

You may be wondering where we've been the past few weeks. Well, finals is the answer to that question. This semester ended with a bang as we both had a lot of studying to do as well as a lot of other stuff for school and work that all came at once.

Dan had several finals, plus presentations, including a presentation to a real company in town! He is so legit. And good news is that he did well in all his classes this semester, at least according to the grades he's gotten so far, so he will be chugging right along next semester with a supposedly even harder semester.

I had two finals, which you would think wouldn't be that bad, but it was. When you work at the same time and then also have other research, clients, etc. no matter how many tests you have it becomes difficult to study. I have no idea what grades I got yet, but I think I did fine...

which means...

I get my Masters!! YEAH!! I will have a Masters of Science in Clinical Psychology, which is just about the coolest thing ever, until I get my doctorate at least. So feel free to ask me all your psychology-related questions because now I can officially claim that I know what I'm talking about. Well...sort of, anyway.

And I know someone will ask this, so I'll just go ahead and remind everyone that no, this is not the final stop for me. It's just a little step on the way to my final doctoral degree. And I'm exactly halfway done with that degree. I have 1.5 years left of classes and then 1 year of internship, plus dissertation somewhere in there, to go.

So now we are officially done with school for the semester. I have two more days of work, and we both have a couple more meetings and such, but we're basically done. And in four days Dan and I will be traveling to Ohio, and we are so excited to see everyone, and hopefully see some snow too!

A Weekend in NYC

First of all, Happy Thanksgiving! We will be celebrating with friends in Waco this year. We are so thankful for all of our family and friends that we get to share the holidays with. I hope you all have a restful, blessed Thanksgiving.

I went to New York last weekend for the conference. It was actually pretty fun - I got to talk to a lot of people about my research, and learn some new things about therapy too!

Here is a picture right in Times Square. See the big Kodak sign on the left side? Underneath that was the entrance to the hotel where the conference was. We were right in the middle of things!

The first night, we went to a hot dog stand and then got pizza - we wanted to get the full New York City experience.

The next day, Saturday, I presented my poster. Here is a more-than-slightly-awkward picture of me in front of it, before everyone else got in there.

And that was it! One more night in the big city and then it was back to Waco. Goodbye, New York!

Columbus Marathon 2009 - Complete!

We had a great weekend at home, including Rachel and Ryan's wedding, time with family, and seeing the beautiful fall trees that I haven't really gotten to experience in three years! But I want to take this post and just give you all my marathon recap. So feel free to read carefully (Scott) or skim through this (everyone else), depending on your level of interest...

Saturday night, we had pasta and bread for dinner at Dan's parents' house. We ate kind of early, around 6:30, and then went back to my dad's where we were staying. I got all ready for Sunday morning, laid out my clothes, packed my backpack, and set my alarm for 5:30! I also drank approximately 17 glasses of water during this hour because I hadn't been doing the best job of staying hydrated all day. I read for a little bit and about 9:30, decided to try to go to bed. I had some trouble falling asleep but it wasn't too bad, and I think by 10:30 I was passed out. I woke up a couple of times to go to the bathroom (hmmm, probably why I shouldn't drink so much water right before bed, but oh well) and each time got nervous that I wasn't going to wake up for my alarm. But I was tired and so I fell back asleep, and next thing I know my alarm went off! I jumped out of bed and got ready in about 8 minutes. Julie was already downstairs making breakfast. I grabbed a Gatorade for the car ride and we were off! We drove to her apartment parking lot and met Diana, Ashley, Nan, and Morgan. We piled in one car and were off downtown.

We parked in the Nationwide parking lot and got to get ready in the locker room there. It was so nice and so warm. I ate my Clif Bar, attached my bib, put on the Vaseline...you know, all the fun stuff before a big race! We finally went outside and it was cold! I think it was in the 30's and it warmed up to the 40's or 50's during the rest of the race. I thought this would be way too cold for me but it felt sooo perfect! Training in Texas's heat and humidity has its advantages, because I felt so great in the cool weather. Anyway, as soon as we got into the big group of runners waiting to start, we all warmed up because we were packed in like sardines. Apparently 14,000 people ran the marathon and we were all packed into like two blocks of downtown Columbus. The race was supposed to start at 7:30 but we just inched forward for about 15 minutes. Actually, we officially crossed the start line at 7:44. And we were off!

It was really crowded at first and so we were having a hard time staying together. We were constantly having to dart in between people and around others in order to keep a good pace and stay together. But the crowd thinned out after the first mile or two, and we were able to stay together pretty easily. We saw some of the front runners of the race looping back for their mile 7 when we were on mile 2 - wow! They were probably running faster than my sprint, and they were on mile 7 of the marathon. But we still were passing lots of people so it didn't ruin my confidence. :)

We saw Dan and the rest of his family at mile 2! They cheered us on. Mom and Grandma were there too but somehow we missed them. It was still decently crowded at this point so I guess none of us were looking in the right direction at the right time. We saw them all again when we looped back around though at mile 7. We were running about a 10:20 pace at this point and I felt good. I was getting water or Gatorade at every stop so I wouldn't get dehydrated. I only took a sip or two each time but it helped. We also started taking Gu breaks at around mile 6. I think I had three Gu's throughout the marathon. I would have liked to have had at least one more but my stomach said no way.

Julie decided to take a Port-A-Potty break at around mile 7 or 8. We all slowed down but kept running so that she could catch up to us. I got really nervous that she wasn't going to find us - I think it was my big sister conscience kicking in! It probably took her like 10 minutes to catch up but she finally did! We started running faster again and then did the same thing later when other people had to take breaks. At around mile 15 I started getting ready for it to get hard. We were all having so much fun running, and we were talking, laughing, even singing! I remembered my last marathon and how much harder the last eight miles were than the first 18. But we just kept running and I kept feeling good! It never really got to that point, even in miles 20-26 I kept feeling like the mile markers were coming pretty fast. The last marathon, they seemed to take forever to appear at this point, but here it really didn't feel like it at all.

We had people cheering for us almost every couple miles; it was amazing! The Fogles and Julie's roommate, Megan, were probably our biggest supporters - we saw each of them I think four different times throughout the course! Donna and Carl also cheered and brought signs that had all of our names on them, and we saw them several times too. Ashley's family was there, my cousin Josh was there, my dad was there twice and Diane was there at the finish, and my mom and Grandma, and Nancy... Nan and Diana also knew a lot of spectators and they cheered for us too. Basically, just about every mile someone was there for us. It made it SO fun! We were constantly watching to find someone we knew and then we got extra bursts of energy when we saw them.

There were also lots of bands playing, and random people cheering us on, and lots of cute dogs out on the course. We saw a little kid in his driveway playing his drum set for us. There was some lady playing a trumpet. We ran by Governor Strickland and Diana yelled "Hi Ted!" to him. When we went by Anthony Thomas' house, they were handing out buckeyes. I thought I would throw up if I even got close to one, so I didn't take one, but Diana luckily grabbed me an extra one and I ate it on the plane ride home.

At about mile 20, Ashley decided to put on her MP3 player and run a little faster because she was feeling pretty good. Julie and I were running together at this point, and we somehow got a little ahead of Nan, Morgan, and Diana. We didn't really want to slow down but they were right behind us for a mile or two. Then we looked back and they were gone! We had somehow gotten ahead of them, so we decided that rather than stopping and waiting for them, we would just go out on our own and even pick up the pace a little. If we had stopped at that point, I really don't think I would have been able to start running again. My legs were like concrete, but concrete machines that were on autopilot and just kept running. Also, I was completely amazed that I hadn't walked so far and I didn't want to break the streak now since we were within a couple miles of the finish. I still can't believe I did that. On my training runs, I even stopped and walked on 6 mile runs. But yet here I was running the entire marathon. Who even knows, I guess it was the combination of being so energized and ready as well as the weather.

So we kept going! At about mile 24 I started feeling like I was going to throw up. But I just kept going. It was a weird feeling of, oh well, I might throw up, but who even cares, I just need to keep going. Julie was still singing at this point, so she was feeling fine, but I sort of stopped and zoned out to try to my nausea under control. I even skipped the last few Gatorade stops because I didn't think I could put anything else in my stomach. I think we passed probably 100 people in these last two miles. I guess we were speeding up when everyone else was giving out. At about mile 25.75 the finish line "tunnel" began! SO many people were crowded around and cheering for us. They had loud music playing and an announcer giving the names of everyone as they crossed the finish line. Julie and I sprinted down the end. We passed several people right at the end too and finished together in 4:33:11! That's a 10:24 pace. Ashley had finished about 10 minutes ahead of us and she was waiting for us at the finish line. We got our blankets and medals and then waited for Nan and Diana and Morgan. My teeth started chattering right away, I was freezing! Luckily I never did throw up. I ate a half of a banana and drank some water and began feeling better. We ended up by taking some pictures and then we all went back to the locker room, showered, and went out to lunch.

What a crazy surreal feeling of running 26.2 miles. I was pretty sore on the plane back to Waco. Dan had to walk in front of me on all the stairs so that I could lean on him. I had the most trouble with ramps...for some reason, my legs would not work right on a downhill ramp. My legs also kept giving out randomly - needless to say we walked very slowly through the airports. I wore my medal the whole time and got lots of congratulations. On the flight to Houston, there were three other marathon runners wearing their shirts and/or medals. We all congratulated each other and shared our experiences - I felt like I was part of some club or something. Overall, this marathon was really just about perfect. Although my time was slower than my first one, I expected that, and I'm so proud that we ran the whole thing! I also had so much fun with everyone we ran with, and all our spectators.

If you are interested in seeing pictures, go to marathonfoto.com, select the Columbus marathon, and type in my last name and bib number (1321). I know some people took pictures but I don't have any of those yet so unfortunately none for the blog yet! I will post them if I get some.

Today I woke up and I was pretty sore, but mostly just really tired. I went to work and wondered why I decided it was a good idea to work a full day today. I seriously was so tired I almost felt sick. At lunch time, I grabbed a pillow and blanket, shut the door to my office, turned out the lights, and PASSED OUT. I slept for the entire hour. The kind of sleep where you wake up and you have no idea where you are or what's going on. (Or maybe that feeling just came from the fact that I was sleeping on the floor of my office...) But that helped a lot because the afternoon felt much better. Everyone teased me for sleeping on the floor but I really don't think I would have made it the rest of the day if I hadn't done that!

Marathon #2, complete!

Weekend in Beaver Creek

Hey....that picture doesn't look like Waco!

That's because it's not! We spent the weekend in Beaver Creek, Colorado, for our friends Matthew and Camden's wedding.

We've been good friends with Matthew and Camden for about two years now, ever since we moved to Waco. Dan lived with Matthew for a while before we got married, and they've taken wine tasting together and spent quite a bit of time talking about Ohio State football, dogs, and beer. Camden and I are in the same program, although she's way farther than I am - she's graduating in December! And she is starting work at the Counseling Center with me right when they get back from their honeymoon. So clearly we were really excited to see them finally get married.

Let's be honest though, we were also really excited to spend the weekend in Beaver Creek. And we weren't disappointed. This place was ridiculous. It was so beautiful and so perfect it was almost scary. We decided it was kind of a cross between Disney World (think Fort Wilderness) and Pleasantville. We traveled up with friends and spent the weekend relaxing, eating and drinking, hiking, and of course attending the wedding. We stayed at the Beaver Creek Lodge, along with most of the wedding party and guests. (Shout out to Priceline for our great deal on the room in this hotel!)

On Friday night, there was a s'more party at the firepits in the Beaver Creek village. We had gourmet marshmallows (think homemade with flavors such as toffee and creme-de-menthe) and hot chocolate.

Here are Dan and I along with Jim, Cassie, Lauren, and Adam right before the wedding.

Here are Camden and Matthew, along with some of the wedding party, as they're taking pictures.

Neither one of us is actually looking at the camera, but I still like this picture! It's outside at the reception. There was a really pretty deck with a great view, so we stood out there and chatted during the cocktail hour.
Here we are with the bride and groom!
Beaver Creek was celebrating Oktoberfest while we were there, so on Sunday, we went out to the village and spent some time listening to German music, admiring everyone's steins, and eating bratwurst and potato salad.

I want to go back. Dan wants to go back during snowboarding season. I would be pretty content just to go back and do some more intense hiking or mountain biking. Either way, it was a great vacation, and it will probably tide us over for a couple years until we can build back up the bank account and take another one! :)

First Half of July in Cliffs Notes

July 1 - My birthday! Day off, spent with family and friends, and relaxing...pretty much perfect, really.

July 2-3 - School and lots of it. Finishing up Summer 1 session.

July 4 - Cookout but no fireworks...it was still 100 degrees out at 9:00pm so we decided to skip it. Plus...we're kind of lame like that.

July 5 - I start at the Counseling Center, get my own big office, find out I work with really cool people, and I'm really just so excited about this year. I'll start seeing clients next week - yikes!

July 6-7 - School and lots of it. Oh yeah, and heat too. Lots of that. Dan starts Finance, Business Law, and Economics. I start Social and Organizational Psychology.

July 8- Mom, Mark and Julie come! Sammie is overjoyed at her new armadillo and rabbit, and of course her best friend Julie. Sammie does not let Julie, the armadillo, or the rabbit out of her sight for the next few days.

July 9 - We all go to the Mayborn Museum, try to go to dinner at George's with Sean, Faith, and Calah, wait an hour and then they tell us they really don't think they'll be able to seat us, so eat dinner at Ninfa's and resolve to hold a grudge against George's.

July 10 - Show them around my new work and introduce them to coworkers. Dan introduced Mark to the Gut Pack, head to Salado and walk around, get really hot, go to Austin and settle in for the weekend

July 11 - walk around Austin, see UT campus, Capitol building, get really hot and go back to hotel. While everyone else rests, I drag Mom to go shopping at Crate and Barrel and Whole Foods and make good use of my birthday money. That night we went to see Esther's Follies, which was the highlight of the weekend for me - GO if you're ever in Austin!

July 12 - Brunch at the Oasis, with the most amazing view I've ever seen. Outlet shopping in the afternoon, as well as a trip to Ikea. Drive back to Waco. Cry on the way home because I get sad when my family leaves. :(

Here's a picture of the view from the deck of the Oasis - this is Lake Travis, in Austin:

July 13-15 School. Heat. Work.

Cyclone Corral

Yesterday, Dan and I met up with fourteen of his former colleagues and their families and we traveled 45 minutes outside of Waco to go to Cyclone, Texas. Never heard of it? Well, neither had I before last night...and we passed about eight other towns that I'd never heard of either on our way to get there. But we ended up at a destination that is one of the best-kept secrets by all the Central Texas locals... Cyclone Corral!

In Texas, the way to tell if a restaurant is any good is to pay attention to the parking lot. Unpaved? Good sign. Full of trucks as far as the eye can see, with maybe a few motorcycles thrown in? Yep, you're probably at a good place for some authentic Texas barbecue.

Cyclone Corral is a BBQ "restaurant." I use the term loosely because it's not what you might think of as a normal restaurant. It's only open Thursday through Saturday, and only for six months out of the year. It's all open air, so although there is a roof you're still basically outside. There are plenty of big tables, so even if you go with a group of 16, like we did, you still sit together.

And the food... The food is all served all-you-can-eat family style...for $12 a person! What this means is they brought plate after plate of ribs, brisket, and sausage, and bowl after bowl of potato salad, coleslaw, baked beans, and corn on the cob. It was just amazing. I rarely eat red meat, maybe once every couple of months, but I loved this dinner!
We had a lot of fun spending time with the Rapoport crew, enjoying the summer weather, and eating good food. And of course, enjoying the decorations...

Back in the Midwest for a Week

I just got back this morning from a week up north. It was great - lots of time with friends and family, shopping, good food...

I spent the first few days with Andrea and Kyle in Chicago - well, Lincoln Park. We walked around by the beach (yes, there are really beautiful, clean beaches! I had no idea!), shopped at really cute boutiques, and I got to see some friends from college who I haven't seen forever! It was great and made me wish I lived closer to everybody up there. We had so much fun I forgot to take pictures...so you'll just have to believe me that I was there.
Julie drove down then and we got to spend some quality sister time together. We walked up and down Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago pretty much all day Thursday - my feet were absolutely killing me by the end of the day. But we recovered with some Chicago style pizza at Lou Malnati's...luckily, because we pretty much had to run the 20 blocks or so to the Oriental Theater to see the Broadway version of Legally Blonde. (We were running a little late)

The next day, we drove back up to Grand Rapids, Michigan, so Julie could graduate from college!
We spent the next three days with our family and it was wonderful. I hadn't seen anyone except my dad since Christmas, so it was really nice to get to spend time with them.

Oh and the best part? I came back home to find a dozen roses waiting for me, along with a husband who is officially DONE with teaching - yeah!!

May Break

I don't really have a whole lot to write about. I'm enjoying my break from school - two more weeks until my intense summer class begins! Dan has five days left of high school...which still doesn't feel quite real. I don't think he'll really believe it until about a week after he's gone. Then in two weeks, he too will be starting intense summer classes at Baylor.

In the meantime, I'll be traveling a little - to Chicago and Michigan, mostly for my sister's graduation but also to see Andrea and other friends! And I'm hoping to get in at least a little bit of shopping... I'll be gone this Tuesday through next Monday.

While I'm gone, Dan and Sammie will be holding down the fort as Dan completes his last week of teaching. There's a "party-size" Stouffer's lasagna and a frozen supreme pizza in the freezer, so at least we know they won't starve. Who am I kidding -  he's going to like that better than most of my culinary creations! He also got to rent "Quantum of Solace" on Netflix ... so I think he'll be alright. :) 

We've been on an Oscar movie watching spree lately  - the last three movies we've gotten have been Slumdog Millionaire, Benjamin Button, and The Reader. I liked them all, but the order I listed them in is the order I would recommend them in. The first two are close - it was hard to decide which was better. The Reader, on the other hand, was good but a little graphic so I'd just be aware of what you're getting into if you want to rent it. 

Enjoy your week. :) See lots of you soon!

Adventures in Fredericksburg: The Enchanted Rock

Dan and I climbed the Enchanted Rock on Tuesday, during the few brief hours of our entire trip that it wasn't raining. According to the Texas Parks and Wildlife website, the Enchanted Rock is "a huge, pink granite exfoliation dome, that rises 425 feet above ground, 1825 feet above sea level, and covers 640 acres. It is one of the largest batholiths (underground rock formation uncovered by erosion) in the United States." The hike up is a little over half a mile, so not far, but it was pretty steep! We were both out of breath by the time we made it to the top.

We're Back from Fredericksburg!

Dan and I slipped away from real life for the last four days and are just now settling back home in Waco. We packed our tennis shoes and picnic backpack, dropped Sammie off at her farm, and headed about 3.5 hours Southwest to Hill Country - Fredericksburg, Texas.

It was amazing. The weather - well, not amazing. Cloudy, chilly, with an outright downpour for the better half of our stay. But we still got to do everything we wanted to, including all the outdoor stuff, and we also got to make great use of our fireplace because of the weather.

I know you're scratching your head right now... a fireplace? What kind of hotel were you staying at...in Texas, no less? Well, actually we stayed at the Corner Cottage Bed and Breakfast and honestly, that was the best decision we could have made - this place is what made our trip so wonderful.

Monday afternoon, we pulled up to this house...

...And were shown our "room," the Garden Room. We had our own private entrance and everything!

The door opened up into the main room room, which had a bed, couch, TV, and fireplace:

Next to that was a little kitchen area, which had these freshly-baked cookies waiting for us (from a secret recipe, no less!) The kitchen was also stocked with coffee, pop, apple cider, tea, hot chocolate, wine...you name it.

You then walked from the kitchen area into an enormous bathroom.

So I didn't quite capture the entire bathroom with this photograph, but you can get a good feel for the antique-y type decor combined with all things flowers (after all, it is the Garden Room)!

One funny thing that happened was that we knew there would be a huge Jacuzzi tub from the website. What we didn't anticipate, however, was the lack of a shower! I guess I just never thought about it, even though it was not mentioned anywhere when the website told about all the accomodations! So we spent the last four days taking baths. They even had a silver pail to help you wash your hair.

Here we are at breakfast this morning, with our hostess, Marsha:

She was the one who tended to our every need and served us breakfast every morning at 9:00am sharp. (Okay, more 9:00-ish than sharp, but who's complaining?) Every morning, Dan and I would share a table with the people who were staying in the other two guest rooms. We ate butter pecan french toast, ham and cheese breakfast casserole, fruit and yogurt plates, pancakes, pear crisp, and plenty of other things - and keep in mind, we only had three breakfasts there! The breakfasts were so big and delicious that we did not buy one lunch the entire trip - we only needed occasional apples and granola bars that we'd brought with us.

Here's an action shot of Marsha, cooking away. Great kitchen, isn't it?

Oh, we did plenty of other things in Fredericksburg besides lounging around at Corner Cottage...climbed big rocks, tasted lots of wine, and shopped til we dropped. And I'll share those in later posts. But for now I will just leave you with the fact that I want to go back, like, right now. Anyone wanna come with?

Guess how I made over $100 this week?

Even better, guess how I made over $100 this week with things we had lying around the house?

The answer - Amazon Marketplace!

I have used Amazon Marketplace to sell textbooks at the end of a semester before, and I've been able to make a decent amount from it. However, now that I'm in grad school, I should maybe keep some of the books I'm buying. I was so tempted to sell some when we got home from Christmas break, but I managed to keep myself in check and instead looked to see what else we had that might sell.

I looked at our movies, CDs, and books. All you have to do is go to Amazon.com, type in the title, and then look at the prices it's selling for under the "New and Used" heading. Most CDs and older books were selling for a dollar or so each, which is a great deal for buyers, but not so much worth it for me. (Although I'm sure it could add up and it would be a great way to get rid of your clutter and give it to people who really want it!)

DVDs were almost all at least $5, though, and I had a few books that were worth around $10. And...here's the kicker... we had a DVD of "To Sir, With Love" that was worth over $60! Who knew that they discontinued it? I got it for Dan a couple years ago for his birthday, but we'd only watched it once or twice and so it was collecting dust on our shelf. Can you believe people are paying $60-$150 for a DVD I paid $10 for? You better believe we put it up for sale.

The cool thing is that it is SO EASY to sell your stuff. As long as you have an Amazon account, you just have to go to the item you want to sell, click on the button that says "Sell yours here," and basically name your price. Then they will list it for you. I pretty much routinely put in a price that is just a little bit below the lowest price currently listed, with the hopes that a buyer would choose mine first.

Then Amazon emails you when it's sold, and you just have to go to the post office and ship it. They deposit the money into your bank account, minus a commission and plus a shipping credit (which basically end up cancelling each other out). I put 5 DVDs and 3 books up for sale on Sunday, and this morning sold the last book - with a total earnings of $112. Of course it really helped that we had that one DVD worth so much, but still, all the $5 and $10 sales add up really quickly.

There is a lot of debate about whether Amazon Marketplace or Ebay is better. If you google that, you can see the arguments on both sides. In my opinion, Amazon Marketplace is a lot easier and takes all of the messiness out of selling online. However, if I had items besides books and DVDs, I'd probably list them on Ebay. I've done both and really, I think they both serve their purpose and you won't be unhappy either way.

We're going to put the money toward our trip to Fredericksburg. By the way, this is the B&B we're staying at if you're interested. :)

Top 6 Pictures

Leah and Matt's wedding photographer put their pictures online, and they are absolutely amazing. (His name is Reece Booth, and his website is http://www.reecephotography.com/.) I thought I'd share a few of my favorites...there are of course hundreds of others that might be a little more representative of the entire event...but this is my blog, and therefore, I pick and choose as I like.

So here are the Top 6 Photos of the Event:

#6. Yay for a good picture of me with the bride!

#5. Yes, the photographer thought this was worthy of putting on his website, so I figured I'd immortalize it on mine as well. If you can't tell, this is my thigh with the bruise from my fall two nights before. He has a picture of Frank (the arm slice) up as well, but I figured you've all seen enough of that...

#4. I have no idea what is going on in this picture, but it makes me laugh every time I look at it. I need to find out what song was playing at this moment, because we all seem to be really enjoying it

#3. I love this picture because Dan is giving his toast, and you can see how much everyone is enjoying it/ captivated by it. I guess all those days he spends trying to hold high school students' attention have paid off in some great public speaking skills!

#2. This is during my toast - and look they were laughing at what I was saying! Woohoo!

And finally, the number one picture of the evening.... This picture is amazing on several accounts. First of all, Dan is apparently practicing his modeling career. Secondly, I think I must be confused by the fact that Dan is practicing his modeling... Leah is the only one of us who is aware of the photographer. And Matt, well, he's just chillin'. Dan said that Matt's just sitting there thinking to himself "Hey! I'm married!" over and over again. Either way...this is priceless.