Laid Back Week

This week started out with a BANG as our kitchen floors were finally installed!! HOORAY!! We’re down to only about 50sqft of concrete floor left in our house (in the living room)…we’re waiting on the insurance company STILL to get back to us, but who cares!! We can cook without standing on concrete and that makes me one happy chef!

Additional excitement for the week was that I was able to visit the school I will be working at this year and meet some of the staff and check out my cool room!! The best part of all was that I even got my own nameplate on the first day – you could have sworn they handed me the publisher’s clearing house my smile was so big. However, upon admiring my sign when walking back into my room from lunch, I noticed it read “Mrs. Shehaden” – so CLOSE!!! The good news is I should get a correct one before school starts.

The rest of our week was pretty laid back…it FINALLY rained a morning or two…and we took the time to sleep in to the sound of pitter-pattering on the roof.
I was able to find a new route to Fulton that is absolutely gorgeous, full of rolling hills, old barns, prairies full of livestock and horses (even a few colts). So as long as I can avoid getting stuck behind a school bus or slow poke driver, I will be able to enjoy a nice country drive to and from work. AND we got some new sofa pillows too!! Wahoo!
Today, we went to church where we were able to meet some more new people…our ward is quite the place to be this summer it seems. Next week we’ll have a potluck and really get to know of folks. I got to sing with the primary children again – I just adore them!! The first song we sang was “Do as I’m Doing” (a simon-says like song)…so I chose a little boy who was being REALLY reverent to lead it. When I asked him what he wanted us to do he said, “Well, it’s kind of silly. It’s going to be like the motion you make when you make a pit fart noise, etc.” Even the leaders couldn’t help but laugh!!
Well – here’s to another week full of fun with the Shehadehs and hopefully some cooler weather : )

Southern Comfort

Well...Within a month of living in our new home and sadly still without kitchen floors, we had visitors!! Mom, Papa and Eli came to CoMo for a weekend visit : )
Friday, we met them in St. Louis for some yummy BBQ at Pappy's Smokehouse - yumola! We had ribs, and pulled pork and deep fried corn on the cob...and Adam found him some good ole sausage too!

On Saturday, we did some sightseeing in downtown Fulton (itty bitty town nearby where i'll be working this year) at a little treasure Winston Churchill museum there. It is in the basement of a GORGEOUS church building, and is well worth seeing. Mr. Churchill was not only a great hero, but quite a humorous one!

After that, we decided to go check out Adam's new stomping grounds, Mizzou, where we wanted to show the family these really cool, old columns they have there. When we talked about going earlier in the day, Adam informed us that they were actual artifacts from the parthenon, so we were ready to take on the 100+ heat to score some sweet pictures. On the way from the museum to the campus, Adam had fallen asleep, and we circled the campus 3 times looking for those darn columns with no luck. Adam awoke on the 3rd round and told us he knew right where they were..so pulled over and began the what was supposed to be a 5 minute walk to the columns. Well, they weren't exactly at the first place we went, so we tried point 2 and 3 before the group became weary and irritated from the wild goose chase in the heat. So, as we began our 4th try to find the historical monuments, Adam said, "Well, I guess it's okay if we don't find them...they're not really from the Parthenon." ..... I think all of our glares would have furned him if we were part of a Looney Toon show - haha So, we headed back to the car, sweaty and hot. However, on our way out of campus to home, we did catch a glimpse of the columns through a clearing between 2 buildings. Fun Fact: they are from the original campus which completely burned down some 150 years ago : )

Later that night, after we had showered and forgiven Adam, we headed to Shakespeare's Pizza - "The best pizza in Columbia" so say the locals. While the pizza was good, I think the Spiderman pin ball machine took the prize for the night! We all had a blast playing on it -- turns out Papa is a pinball playin' fool! He bragged of the glory days in his youth when he could play a whole day on 2 quarters...and ladies and gents he did not disappoint! On his only turn, he took on 3 balls at once, played for like 10 minutes, well surpassed the rest of our measely scores and won a free game! IMPRESSIVE!
On Sunday, I got to lead the primary children for songtime -- that was fun! They are very funny and love singing. I decided to teach them a song that talks about how children all over the world say "Thank You" to Heavenly Father at night. They thought the German phrase "Wir Danken Dir" was histerical!! So much fun!!
After church, we returned home, to see Mom and Papa hard at work putting our new grill together for us...we love Adam's grilled chicken and they couldn't stand to visit without eating any!! But before the chicken, we decided to catch a movie for Papa's birthday. When we got home, we ate some yummy chicken and BIRTHDAY cake! YAY! Then we said our goodbyes : (
It was a great visit!!

Shehadeh big adventure in the Midwest thus far : )

Well we made it to the Heartland of the USA : ) While we feel like we’re starting to get a grip on living way up here in the hills – you know we no longer need a GPS to get most places – we still miss having our friends over for dinner and hanging out with our awesome family. I can’t believe we’ve been in Missouri for 2 weeks now! Although all the furniture’s in the house and all the boxes are unpacked, it doesn’t feel like we’ve been here that long. In an attempt to feel like we’ve been productive with our time and not lazy (watching 40+ episodes of Ugly Betty all day long) - Who said that?!, I asked Adam on our walk last night to help me recall what all we’ve done thus far...

1.BOUGHT A FRIDGE

So we needed a refrigerator, but it seems all of the stainless-steel-look fridges (I love magnests too much to get a stainless steel) in Columbia were not in stock and at least a 5 day wait. BOO!! Eating out is fun when you don’t HAVE to do it, but when you can’t get a cold drink without visiting the curb store – life is no fun. So, after visiting home depot, sears, best buy, and lowes (and actually purchasing a fridge from them), we stopped off at another locally owned place around the corner just to check out their stock…everything was WAY overpriced, and just as Adam told the salesman they were out of our league he pulled up a “hidden treasure” stored in the back…that could be delivered in 2 days and was way cheaper! Here’s the BEST part – he was from Monroe, LA!!

2.LICENSE & REGISTRATION
Check out Adam’s picture…the lady asked him to slide his glasses down a bit, which led him to give that divinere smile : )

Actually, the lady who helped us told us all about her wild times in Monroe, LA where her daddy sent her to college to get away from her no good boyfriend at the time...haha I wonder if she knows the refrigerator salesman : )

3.SETTLING IN & GOING WITH THE FLOW
So I got the house looking all cute...

… and Adam got the TV and computer set up. We even got some new furniture! Adam found this AWESOME deal on a nice computer desk on craigslist…and the guy offered to deliver it – thank goodness. It was quite a heavy bugger…but Adam got it all set up and in perfect position with the help of my new favorite invention: SLIDERS!

Next, it was time to go look for some bedroom furniture…so I threw in a load of laundry we headed off to the local flea market. After 20 minutes, Adam’s shopping energy ran low and we headed back to the house. When I got out of the car, I noticed a lot of water on the garage floor (here comes the “going with the flow” part). As soon as we opened the door to the house…we walked into a 1/2 inch of water on the laundry floor and a soaked kitchen and ¼ of our living room (right where the new HEAVY desk was set up –lol). Thank you draining hose on the washing machine! Oops!! I feel like the cute little couple on the LOWES commercials : ) (i've also had a few painting mishaps -- go figure!)

(click on the pic to go to the video)

The good news is that house insurance covers accidents! So we’ve become accustomed to concrete in the kitchen and are going to have new floors in our new house!

We were also welcomed to town by the Columbia welcoming people who gave us all kinds of fun gift certificates and “go green” shopping bags; were extremely late to the church the first Sunday because we couldn’t find the building : ) ; checked out the local farmer’s market; got a sofa and loveseat!; have probably made it to LOWES banned list for returning so many things : ) ; went to see the final Harry Potter; and we even enjoyed a fun few games of bowling!

So, I guess we have gotten a lot done!
Missing y'all from Missouri

Memorial Day Weekend

Before we get to memorial day, a little over a week ago, Adam graduated from LSU!!!
Aunt Donna & Uncle Clifton came over before the ceremony, then we were off to a couple of hours of speeches and clapping for all the graduates!! Check out the video to see Adam cross the stage...notice the lovely way they pronounced his name - so funny! We had ice cream, brownie sundaes to celebrate afterwards!!!

So... in light of his graduation, we decided to have party at our place...more specifically a BBQ. My whole family from New Orleans came up - which was sooo fun....and the first time they'd been up to visit, so it was a special day for many reasons!! Imade a yummy cake in the shape of a graduation hat with some twizzlers for the tassle. Adam grilled chicken and corn and pork - it was divine!!

We ate our hearts out and had a little fun with presents and played our new favorite card game - Golf!!!

THE LUAU!!!

A lady who attends my mom's church is Samoan and lived in Hawaii for much of her life. She and her family helped put on a traditional Luau!! It was so much fun!! We roasted two pigs and ate our guts out! After which, we learned to hula and sang enjoyed some traditional song and dances native to Samoa.

HOWEVER...funny story....before all of that, MOM and I went to the building earlier in the day to help set up. It. Was. HOT. We sweated buckets putting up cute decorations around the stage area outside the church. Well, when we returned 2 hours later, all our decorations were on the lawn!! But it was okay b/c we ended up having to move the dancing inside due to the weather!!

<-- Here we are before the rain!!!!

<-- Here we are learning the Hukilau

This is the lady who put it all on dancing with her dad as the chief's daughter!! So fun!

Happy Mother's Day

Sweet & Silly

Crazy about Mercury

So about 3 weeks ago exactly, I got a call from Adam about a dog he found on the Internet. I immediately went into lecture mode about how much responsibility dogs are and reminded him about the fact that we have cats and so on and so forth. His response was, "just take a loot at her." And a few hours later, well...I'll let the pictures do the talking:

Mercury is a Siberian Husky with a red and white coat and mezmorizing blue eyes.

As you can see, she and Adam became instatnt friends and she's fitting right in at home:

She is such a good dog - well trained and she loves people. Here's some footage of her and Adam playing together...we're in love! Oh - and P.S. at the time of the video, her name was ALASKA, but we felt that wasn't creative enouhg, so now she's Mercury.

Easter Break

This Easter Break was great!! First, we spent Easter Sunday at Nanny's where we played in the sun AND played our annual Russell volleyball match - girls v guys. Unfortunately, we got beat - next year we'll get'em!!

Easter Morning

"I GOT IT!!!"

The Champs and the Losers

(notice mom's backwards "L" - haha)

COOLING OFF

HOUSTON!!!!

Then Adam and I took off for the weekend to visit some friends of ours - Joseph and Kallan Rotolo and their precious dog Pearl. Houston was really fun! Who knew a bayou flowed right through the city? We went for a pretty walk along it one day ane we went to IKEA and we went to the Wall of Water. In short, in was a great trip! And they cooked us some yummy steaks and waffles : )

Wall of Water

Dandelion Fountain - the water blew out when the wind blew - so cool!!

We went to an old plantation and garden home : )