4/27/2011...one year later.

O' and one more thing about today. Today is a very humbling day for us. One year ago today Jody and I were in a very small closet. It started out a sunny and pretty day on April 27, 2011. Nothing seemed wrong. However, the day before James Spann had been warning everyone in Alabama that it was going to be a day to go down in history. He was right. Jody and I were both at work. He came home early and I left work early. There had been talk ALL day of the storms that were heading our way. The atmosphere and everything "weather related" made the perfect cocktail for the ultimate tornado to hit Tuscaloosa...they were right. When I got home from work I tried to talk Jody into going to a friends house to get in their basement. We didnt have time. I remember watching TV and hearing the sirens. I never saw the tornado on TV. As soon as I heard the sirens, I began cleaning out our hallway closet and getting the cushions from the couch. There were paint cans and tools in the closet I knew I had to get out, I didnt want them to fall on our heads. I got in the closet with me dog, Baxter. My friend Katie called me and I will  never forget what she said to me. "Brooke, I just saw it...get in your closet NOW." We hung up. About that time Jody got in the closet. I knew it was bad. Before, he never took cover. When he came into the closet he said, "I just saw it on TV, it's bad." He saw the tornado on Tv ripping our town apart. He, in that moment, never showed fear...but I knew. He also never took cover from a storm. When he got into the closet I knew it was bad. The power was out so I was on the phone with my mom. She was telling me a F-4 tornado was on the ground on 15th Street. 15th Street was my address. We were only on the phone for a minute before I lost my signal. I can only imagine the fear my mom must have felt. She has told me since then that she thought she lost me. I can remember being in that closet and Jody and I not saying a word. We didn't know what to say. I will never forget his face in that moment. All I could feel was my heart racing and my ears popping due to pressure changes. I could hear sirens and debris hitting the house. I put my fingers in my ears because I didnt want to hear it. Before I knew it, it was over. I have never felt more alive. We went outside to find neighbors roaming the streets. We were all okay. Little did we know...less that half a mile away, people were trapped and devastated. I finally got in touch with my mom and let her know we were okay. It was very hard to use a phone after the tornado. EVERYONE was on the phone and it was hard to get through. I have never heard her sound happier. We had people calling us 24/7 to make sure we were okay. It was amazing. The next couple of days were amazing. The national guard was in town. They were on every corner, it was like a war zone. I know that may sound weird but, I have never seen anything like what happened after the tornado. A town came together like I have never seen. People came from nowhere...people who had nothing were helping other people. People who had just lost everything were passing out bottles of water and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. People who lost nothing were pulling together everything they could do without to give to the people who lost everything. People were cleaning out pantry's and closets and not wanting anything for it. People were donating time. People were donating a shoulder to lean on. I think that is what most people wanted. It didn't matter who you knew or what you had, people just needed people and support. I had a woman hug me and cry on my shoulder for giving her a PB&J. That was humbling. It's the small things in times like this that matter. I, for one, will never forget this day. I will always look back and know what one can do for another. I will always pray for the ones that lost someone that day. I learned a lot. One thing I know for sure is Tuscaloosa is a great place and the people there are grand. T-Town never down.

Peace,Love, and Bikinis...Ooooo La-La!

Missed us? I havent blogged since Easter and I apologize for that. Please forgive me, I'm a super busy girl! We haven't really been doing much, we did have a housewarming party and it was GREAT! We were thrilled to see all of our family and friends, and so happy they got to see our new home! We got lots of fabulous gift cards in which we will be building our privacy fence with, THANK GOD! Looks like we may be throwing a new vacuum in there too...since mine decided to BLOW UP today. ugh. stupid vacuum. I have also started to work out again since it IS the beginning of BiKiNi season (my favorite*) AND we are only weeks away from our trip to Jamaica :) I have to be in tip top shape! I don't like to work out but I try to mix it us and keep it fun. Here are some pics of the Par-tay!

I was freaking out a little during the party since I decided to have BLACK and white cupcakes with 3 year olds running around. NOT a good idea. Black cupcakes=black handprints on walls. O' and black teeth which was a hilarious joke to play on our guests. BAHAHA! j/k I didn't think the black cupcakes through...they were pretty though :) ***see that little 3 year old eyeing those cupcakes? He got them. <3 him though :)***

I made Anti-pasto Kabobs,Caprese Kabobs, Fruit Kabobs,Chicken Salad/Piminto Cheese Sandwhiches, chips and salsa, lemon water, and lemonade with fruit in it...YUMMY!

*Back to my bikinis...I still have my first bikini EVER...like from when I was 6 months... here it is! Sooooo stinkin cute! Now I have a million bikinis which is an on going argument Jody and I have. He says I have a "problem" because I have so many and continue to buy more. I DON'T CARE! I love them!!! I want a million more! Maybe I should go on "My Strange Addiction"...I would def. be the most normal person EVER on that show.

PEACE, LOVE, and BIKINIS!

A very Mulchy Easter...?

HAPPY EASTER!!! What a very strange day for me. Let me just tell you how I spent this Easter. First, we woke up and went to K-Mart (RANDOM STORE ALERT)!!! We needed some mulch and I was not in the mood for Hell-Mart, I mean Wal-Mart. I was ready to mulch the yard and get all of the stupid pine straw out of our landscaping.  Sooooo that, my friend, is exactly what we did. (And by we, I mean I). Jody had plans to play golf at 2:00, so he helped for about 30 minutes. I am almost positive that I am allergic to pine straw. I'm also positive I saw a black widow...scary!!! I can NOT start a project and not finish it in the same day, it really bothers me. I was determined to finish it with or without Jody. THAT is EXACTLY what I did. After four ginormous bags of mulch I ran out. I left to go eat with the fam-jam, which was Ah-Mazing, watch the kids hunt Easter eggs (which I also tried to get in on the game since there were apparently "prize eggs" with $money$ in them), chit-chat, and then go back to K-Mart for 4 more bags. When I got home mom called and said the fam-jam was coming to visit to see the new digs. Paw-Paw decided he was going to take all 12 bags of pine straw with him so he could put if over the tomatoes he planted in case of a "late frost". Thank goodness he took them, they didn't look to hot sitting on the curb in front of the casa. After they left I finished this project. FINALLY! Who knew this would be an all day affair? Now, I have a nicely manicured yard, a rash, and possibly a black widow spider bite on my arm. BUT the yard looks nice and that's all that matters! O' yeah and I even trimmed the hedges...with kitchen scissors. Use what you got right?! Whatevs. I hope you all had an equally amusing Easter!

The Simple Life...of being 75 at age 26.

Well we totally moved from the city to the country! As strange as it may sound to some of you,I am loving this whole country thing. Yesterday Jody and I went and bought a hosepipe and washed our cars in the front yard, little things like this is what I missed when we lived in the apartment. Needless to say we have sparkling cars and over watered plants.  Lately, we have grilled the past 3 out of 3 nights. Seems like our new favorite activity is sitting on the patio at the house and grilling. Friday we did at least have a couple of friends over to grill with us. Next thing you know we will  be getting up at 3 in the morning and going to Jack's then to Wal-Mart"s" to get the afternoon meal and a paper. Who knows? We might just take a trip down the road to the senior center. I should really learn how to play Bridge before then! We also stopped by the local produce stand on the side of the road, where the sweetest little old man was selling tomatoes, onions, okra, bell peppers, etc. I seriously begged Jody to stop because that little man was waving at every single person who drove by and we were having kabobs that night sooooo...I felt like we should get our tomato,onion, and pepper from him. So after ten times of asking Jody if we could stop, we finally did. We got a tomato,pepper, and onion for two dollars!!! I'm never buying produce anywhere else! OMG I really am 75. We really need a vacay. BUT...in a couple of months we will be on a private jet plane (where I am going to  need to sit in the cock-pit to make sure the pilots are not asleep or drunk) to an all inclusive resort in JAMAICA! Wooooo-whooooo! I swear, I am going to lay on the beach, get served drinks all day, be brought food on a silver platter, waved with big palm leaves by Jody, go to beach parties and or romantical beach dinners at night, and leave my cell phone at HOME! Think I'm joking? I'm not...that's how we roll. We are counting down the days for sure! Until next time...

 This is us now...                                                     This is apparently how we act...haha! :)

O' and one more visual...THIS is where we are goingggggg! YESSSSSS!

Well, we are all moved in...now what?

Whoop, Whoop! Raise the roof!!! We finally moved into our brand new house! Who knew b uying a house was such a process? It took a WHOLE month?!?  We are super dooper excited and almost have everything unpacked. Right now we are waiting on our new sectional and dining room suite to arrive, and after that our house will be somewhat complete. We have a huge game room/library upstairs. This is where we will be playing the X-Box Kinect (that Jody is yet to agree to buy me, BUT he doesnt know that I am about to buy it my DANG self!) Sometimes a girl just wants to dance!!! Also, I am going to need a Ms. Pacman old school arcade game, and a karaoke machine. Also, upstairs has 3 bedrooms, one of which is already a guest bedroom, and the other two are empty. Right now my plans for those are to leave one empty for the baby that we will have in 20 years, and the other is a potential office/Pinterest room. There is also a full bath upstairs. Downstairs we have the master bedroom, master bathroom, my dream closet, living room, dining room, kitchen, half bath, and garage. I would post pictures of the inside BUT we will be having a House Warming Party in April (that I will be mailing out invitaions for soon) and it needs to be a surprise!!! However, above is a picture of the outside. Lately, Jody went out of town to the GM conference in New Orleans.This made me sad :( BUT my besties came over to play! So it wasnt as bad as it could have been. See you all in April at the housewarming party...and if I dont...you might want to sleep with one eye open!

I might punch an appraiser...if I knew who he was!

Wellllllll, obviously we didnt get to close this weekend like we were hoping. The appraiser didnt put THE WHOLE ZIP CODE ON THE APPRAISAL so now he has to fix that, send it back to the processer, who will in turn send it back to USDA, who will then give the go ahead OR make me one really sad girl...again. This should seriously be the LAST thing keeping us from closing on Monday or Tuesday. Rant over. On a better note, we got our sectional ordered, bought some more random stuff for the house, and the final walk-through went great. Everything is pretty much packed up, and ready to go! I will update as sooooonnnn as we hear from the processor on MONDAY!. blah blah blah!!!!!  

Inspection Day!

Today was inspection day for the house. Everything went really good! We stayed with the inspector the whole time, it took a whopping FOUR hours to complete! He was seriously thorough, which we appreciate! He did find a few minor things; a venting problem in the master bath, the "flashing" on the roof needs to be re-done (it was "improper"), an outlet had opposite polarities (wow, I sound really smart),a window needs to be replaced, and I think that was about it. It is a brand new house so we didn't expect many things to be wrong. Overall, we were happy we had the inspection and it was money well spent! Our builder will be fixing all of these things before we move in, of course! Also, today we found out that our closing date may get pushed back to the 29th because the stupid appraisal man hasn't sent the appraisal back yet. If he knew how ready we are to move in, he would send it in. Maybe, I'll call him...if I had his number. We cant wait until we move in and have our housewarming party so all of our family and friends get to come visit and check out the new digs!