Books of 2009

As my friends and family know I am an avid reader.  For the past few years I've been keeping track of all the books I read each year - Goodreads has made this super easy too.  Since I've had this blog I've been posting my top 10 books of the year - these are my top picks of what I've read in the past year.  This year I read 78 books, which is hard for me to believe!  So here are my top 10 - 5 each in Fiction and Non-Fiction and in alphabetical order by the author's name.

Fiction  
The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister
After You by Julie Buxbaum
Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen
Mouse Guard: Winter 1152 by David Petersen
The Promised World by Lisa Tucker

Non-Fiction
Cherries in Winter by Suzan Colon
Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper
Columbine by Dave Cullen
The Compassionate Carnivore by Catherine Friend
Wesley the Owl by Stacey O'Brien

Sandy and Roxy Christmas video

We took a video of Sandy & Roxy playing with their Christmas toys on our camera.  You will see that at the end Roxy accidentally throws her toy into the Christmas tree!  If you have the sound on you'll realize we had the TV on the whole time, but oh well - it's a cute video of the cats playing!

Christmas 2009

Last year I was really sick from before Thanksgiving until the New Year, so this year I was determined to enjoy every minute of Christmas!  Chad & I have established Christmas Eve as our day to celebrate Christmas - we always go to the Christmas Eve service at church, out to eat and then we drive around and look at Christmas lights.  On Christmas Day this year we celebrated with Chad's family at his grandmother's house.  Then on the day after Christmas we celebrated with my family and some family friends too.  Here are pictures from all of our Christmas celebrations and I am so thankful that I was healthy this year and really enjoyed Christmas 2009!

Athenaeum Girl's Night

My friend Nicole and I went to see Athenaeum at Amos' Southend for a Girl's Night and for our Christmas get together.  Athenaeum is one of my all time favorite bands and even though they're not together anymore they usually play one or two shows a year.  To make it even better Amos' is now smoke free - which makes the concert even better!  It just blows my mind that a band like Athenaeum can't make it in the music industry, but there is so much garbage on MTV - they are so incredibly talented.  It was a great show - they played for 2 hours!

Friends Christmas Party

Every year we get together with our closest friends and have a Christmas party.  We also do an ornament exchange game.  This year Melanie & Dave hosted since the renovation on their house is finally done!  We always have a good time and it's become one of our Christmas traditions.

Mint Hill Staff Christmas Party

Last year I was sick on the day of the Mint Hill Staff Christmas Party, so this year I was very excited to be able to go.  Donna hosted the party and we had lots of fun eating, playing Sneaky Santa gift exchange and revealing our Secret Santas.  Here are some pictures from the party.

Decorating for Christmas

Here are some pictures of me & Chad decorating our Christmas tree and our house decorations.  I love Christmas and really enjoy decorating and getting ready for the holidays!

New Sandy pictures

Here's Sandy sleeping on the bed - so cute!

Sandy on my sweater - this is why even clean clothes have fur on them!

Sandy sleeping in between all the Christmas decoration boxes.

Partylite Show

At the beginning of November I had a Partylite show.  I've had multiple Partylite shows - especially since my Mom used to be a consultant.  I really like Partylite candles and earned LOTS of free stuff from my party.  Thanks to all my friends who came and ordered lots of stuff too!  Here are some pictures from the party.

Wrightsville Beach Flotilla 2009

While we were in Wilmington for Thanksgiving this year we were also able to see the Wrightsville Beach Holiday Flotilla.  The flotilla is always the Saturday after Thanksgiving and is basically a boat parade at night with the boats decorated for the Holidays.  There is also a craft fair that day as well.  We had a great view of the flotilla from our room at Summer Sands!  Here are some pictures from the flotilla:

Thanksgiving 2009 in Wilmington

This year we went to Wilmington for Thanksgiving.  We had our Thanksgiving meal with my Dad and Nana.  We were also able to see the Holiday Flotilla at Wrightsville Beach too.  Here are some pictures from our Thanksgiving trip:

Leis for the cats

My Mom made mini leis for the cats since she made ones for me & Chad when we were in Hawaii.  I asked her to not make them a closed circle so we could just drape them over the cats.  I was surprised at how well the cats tolerated modeling their leis!

David Crowder Band

We had the opportunity to see the David Crowder Band on Nov. 18th.  In my opinion they are one of the most talented and original bands around!  They put on an awesome show.  Here are some of the pictures we took.

My Little Star

I got my cat Star for my 17th birthday from my then-boyfriend Stephen.  We got her from the Union Co. humane society.  She stayed with my parents after I moved out and got married and then Fielding took her when my parent's sold their house.  She is now 13 years old, which is hard to believe!  She is more frail and sickly now, but here's a picture of us together again.  I'm trying to find another picture from when she was just a kitten to post with this one, but I can't find it right now.  So, here's my little Star at 13 years old!

Wilmington trip Oct. 2009

My Mom came to NC at the end of October for my Grandmother's birthday.  Chad & I went to Wilmington for Halloween weekend to spend time with them and to celebrate my Grandmother's birthday.  We were also able to go to N. Topsail Beach to see where my Dad works now.  Here are pictures from that weekend.

Carving our Pumpkin!

Here are the pictures of us carving our pumpkin.  We decided to carve a sea turtle in the pumpkin to celebrate our Hawaii vacation this year!

Synchronized steps

Here are Roxy (top) & Sandy (bottom) hanging out on the steps and looking out the window.  They both love to look out the windows and be in the sunshine.

Kaitlyn's Going Away Party

My best friend Nicole's youngest sister Kaitlyn has been offered a modeling contract!  So, her family threw her a going away party at a bar in midtown.  Here is a picture of me & Nicole.

Here's a picture of me & Chad.

Here's Kaitlyn-the-model & Nicole.

Here's a view of downtown Charlotte.

Going to the Pumpkin Patch

We always get our Halloween pumpkins at Hodges Farm.  This year we only got one pumpkin to carve because we would be in Wilmington on Halloween.  Here are some pictures of our visit to the pumpkin patch.

Favorite Sleeping Spots

Roxy is always looking for a new spot to sleep and she also loves sleeping on blankets, so the perfect combo is our blanket basket.  Here she is in her new spot!

Sandy's favorite spot to sleep is on a cushion underneath our church pew.  Here she is curled up in her favorite spot!

U2 concert!!!

The next weekend after we got back from Hawaii was the U2 concert in Raleigh, NC. I don't know if we'll ever have the opportunity to see U2 in concert again and it was such an incredible show. We normally don't buy t-shirts at big concerts like this because they are so expensive and you've already paid for the tickets and parking, etc., but for U2 we did! And I can honestly say it was worth every penny we spent on tickets, parking ($20!!!) and the t-shirts because they are such an iconic band. We had a great time and thankfully because of our new camera we were actually able to take some pictures of the band too!

Meeting Roy Williams!!!

On the way home from Hawaii we had a layover in San Francisco, CA. When we got to our terminal there was nowhere to sit, so we're looking for somewhere to put our bags and sit until we board. When we put our bags down Chad saw Roy Williams standing a few feet away! At first he didn't want to draw attention to him so he just went over and said hello and got his autograph. But then we saw other people asking for pictures, so we decided to ask for a picture too! He was so nice and gracious about it - and thankfully I was wearing my Carolina sweatshirt too! That made the trip even better.

Hawaiian Vacation

This year for my 30th birthday we were fortunate enough to be able to celebrate it with my Mom and her husband Mike in Hawaii. What better way to ring in such a milestone birthday! Thankfully we were able to stay with my Mom & Mike for the majority of our trip and that helped us save lots of money (THANKS!!!), plus Mike knows so much about the islands that he was an amazing tour guide for us! We spent the first few days on the island of Oahu then the majority of our trip on the Big Island. We were able to drive around the entire Big Island and see all the various scenery that Hawaii has to offer.

My absolute favorite part of the trip was snorkeling! It was so amazing to see so many fish and sea turtles just swimming around and the water was so clear and beautiful. We also had the opportunity to try stand-up paddle boarding for the first time and both Chad & I never fell in once! It was an amazing trip and thankfully we had our new camera to capture all that we experienced there. The next few posts are some slideshows of our pictures from our trip.

Hawaii pics part I

We spent the first 2 days of our Hawaii vacation in Waikiki Beach on Oahu. We rented a car and drove up to the North Shore area to see some of the famous surf breaks like Pipeline and Waimea Bay. We also stopped at the Pearl Harbor memorial and ate lunch at Hard Rock Cafe in Honolulu. We were also able to walk to the Waikiki Aquarium from our hotel. We crammed as much as we could into that one full day!

Hawaii pics part II

The majority of our time in Hawaii was spent in Hilo on the Big Island where my Mom & Mike live. Our first stop was Rainbow falls, then we went to the volcano on my birthday, lava fields and visited some libraries. We were fortunate to be able to drive around the whole Big Island. On our way to Kona we saw sea turtles at Puna lu'u black sand beach and saw Southpoint the southernmost point in the US. Hawaii has such varied geography and it was very interesting to get to see the whole island.

Hawaii pics part III

I really enjoyed the Kona side of the Big Island. We were able to stay with some friends of my Mom & Mike's - Ed & Mariko. We went to the City of Refuge, the best snorkeling at Kahalu'u beach park, exploring downtown Kona and of course stopping by the Kona library. On the way back to Hilo we completed our drive around the Big Island and stopped at a Hilton hotel to see their animal exhibits, we saw the huge Parker cattle ranch, Waipio Valley, Laupahoehoe Point where the 1946 tsunami wiped out a school and Akaka Falls.

Hawaii pics part IV

Our last few days we spent in Hilo - we visited some more libraries, went to the Hilo Zoo and downtown Hilo. We also did more snorkeling, stand up paddle boarding and kayaking too. Then we flew back to Honolulu and spent one last night in Waikiki Beach before flying back home. We had such a great time and got to experience so many cool things! Here is our last batch of pictures.

Cat close-ups

We got a new camera for our upcoming Hawaii vacation and so I had to test it out on the cats.

Here's Sandy

Roxy's close up

Roxy's full shot

Labor Day Weekend

My Dad came up over Labor Day weekend to celebrate our birthdays. Chad & I are going to Hawaii for my birthday this year, so this was the only weekend in September that we could celebrate with my Dad - we actually fly out on my Dad's birthday. We went to the Matthews Alive festival (or Stumptown festival as I knew it growing up) on Sunday and then went to dinner at Outback to celebrate our September birthdays.

Here's a slideshow of pictures from the weekend.

Braden's First Birthday!

Our friends Becca & Jason's son Braden turned 1 in July. I just can't believe how quickly that year went by! Here's a picture of Braden's Firetruck cake that their neighbor made & decorated.

Here is Becca & Braden about to start opening gifts.

Here is Becca, Jason & Braden opening gifts.

More pics from Braden's First Birthday

Here are our friends Paul, Kelly & Jackson.

Here is Chad & Jessica at the party.

Braden's bear cake

Here's a close-up of Braden's little bear cakes (their neighbor made these for them!) - this is what all the kids got to eat at the party.

Here is Braden with his own bear cake and #1 candle.

Here is Braden thoroughly enjoying his bear cake!

Other animals at our house

We recently put up a hummingbird feeder on our front porch and I was lucky enough to capture this picture of one coming to eat! It's not the best picture, but those guys are so fast it's hard to get a picture fast enough. Hopefully I'll be able to get some better pictures in the future.


This is a garden spider that's got it's web at the front of our neighborhood. It's funny because I was just telling Chad how long it had been since I'd seen one of these spiders and then a few days later when I was out walking I saw this one. And Chad said that he's seen one at his parent's house too. When Hurricane Hugo came through Charlotte my family was living in Matthews and there was a lot of damage in our neighborhood, but we had a garden spider in our yard that survived the hurricane, so I always think these spiders are really cool.

Lounge cats

Here's a picture of Sandy & Roxy lounging in the living room. Right after I took this picture I was petting Roxy and she sat up, looked straight at me, then turned her head and looked right at the cabinet where we keep the treats. And she did this like 3 times in a row as if to say, "I would like some treats please"! So, of course because I am a well-trained cat person I got up and got her some treats!

Flowers & Butterflies

The Lantana that we planted behind our house is a magnet for butterflies. I was able to get a picture of this one after a few tries!

Watching the Birds

Sandy & Roxy love to watch the birds at the feeder outside our front window. Here is Sandy completely enthralled by the birds!

July 2009 Birthday Dinner

We always get together with my family for birthdays - July is my brother Fielding and Chad's birthdays and September is me and my Dad's birthdays. My Dad came up from Wilmington for the July birthday dinner and we ate at Outback! Here are some pictures from the July birthday dinner.

Chad's Birthday

Chad's birthday was July 24th and we had a very relaxing weekend celebrating his birthday! Here is a picture of his gifts from me:

A close-up of the cake.

Here's Chad displaying his gifts from me - a Handyman Life is Good t-shirt

and Seasons 2 & 3 of Survivorman.

Chad's Birthday Dinner

For Chad's birthday we went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory with our friends Dave & Melanie. They surprised both of us by paying for our dinner too, which was VERY nice of them! Here's a picture of me & Chad outside Cheesecake Factory.

Here's Dave & Melanie.

And here are the four of us!

4th of July weekend

We had a very relaxing and fun 4th of July weekend this year.  It was so nice that it fell so that we had a 3 day weekend!  On Friday we celebrated our friend Paul's birthday a little early with a small party and their house.  On Saturday (the 4th) we went to the Harrisburg parade where we met up with Paul & Kelly and Becca.  It's really nice that we live close enough to walk from our house to the parade route!  Later that evening our friends Melanie & Dave and Adam came over for a cookout and then we went to the Harrisburg park for food, music and fireworks.  I am so impressed with Harrisburg's fireworks - for such a small town they really go all out!  I've created a slide show of all the pictures from this weekend!

No Doubt Concert!!!

This year for our anniversary I asked Chad for tickets to go see No Doubt for my gift. I have always like No Doubt and this is the 3rd time I've seen them and the 2nd with Chad. When we were on our honeymoon in Prince Edward Island we bought their newest CD at the time Return of Saturn and listened to it all the time. Then that same year we saw them on their Return of Saturn tour too. So, No Doubt has kind of been part of our marriage and I was very excited that they were touring again. I've added some pictures that I borrowed from Flickr - as you can see this person had MUCH better seats than us!

Here's a picture of Gwen Stefani - still in awesome shape at 40 years old!

Here's a picture of the whole band at the end of the show.

Chad's family reunion in Blairsville, GA

Garden update

This is our first year doing a vegetable garden. So far we've only gotten 2 squash and 1 zucchini and some of our plants are starting to look rough. I'm not sure what we're doing wrong, but our tomato plants look really good and have lots of tomatoes that we're just waiting for them to ripen. Hopefully we'll get some more veggies from it this summer and we're already working on planning out next year's garden!

Here are the flowers we planted at our house - we planted 2 yellow and 2 purple Lantana, but for some reason on the yellow ones are blooming right now.

A different kind of mail

Every year we have birds build their nest in our paperbox. This year we've had 2 nests of baby birds so far! I'm pretty sure it's bluebirds because this year I've seen the parents more. Here's a picture of the babies in their nest.

May 09 Cat pictures

Here are Roxy and Sandy being sweet and cuddling together.

Here are both cats laying on Chad!

The Shiele Museum

I wanted to do something fun the weekend before my surgery to keep my mind off it. We originally wanted to go to the NC Zoo in Asheboro, but it rained off and on the whole weekend, so we didn't want to take that chance. In the end we decided to go to the Shiele Museum since they have both outdoor and indoor exhibits. Here are some of the animals in the reproduction of an 18th Century Farmhouse.

The sheep had recently been shorn - they do it as a live exhibit the old fashioned way with shears, but obviously we missed that.

Chad & Jessica at the Shiele Museum

Here is Chad in front of the replica of an 18th Century Farmhouse.

Here is Jessica on the nature trail.

Here is a picture of both of us on the nature trail.

Wild Animals at the Shiele Museum

While we walked the nature trail at the Shiele Museum we saw a bunch of turtles at the pond.

We also saw lots of squirrels running around in the trees.