Twenty-Seven

Tanner and I each turned 27 recently. The kids I babysit inform me that this is "wow, really old."

I use anti-wrinkle cream. And eye cream. Twice a day.

I regularly use denture cleaning tablets (for my mouth guard).

I drink Sleepy Time tea.

I fall asleep almost every night on the couch between 9:30 pm-10 pm. For Tanner, 8:30 pm and 9:00 pm.

I go on bird watching tours.

I wear socks with Crocs.

I wear Crocs.

Anyways. We are both a year older. That is great, and I am very thankful for all the blessings and the struggles we received in our 27th year on this earth. They brought joy, thankfulness, refinement and growth.

I lost my job. I found a new job. We celebrated a year of marriage. We found a church in Weatherford to attend. We made new friends and watched others drift away. I lost my cat, Striker. We both worked long, hard hours and many weekends. Tanner's Grandpa, Bud Haynes, passed away. We enjoyed Christmas celebrations at both of our parents' homes. We bought a house.

Through it all, God was faithful to us and worked in His perfect will, through valleys and mountains, to continue us on a path of loving Him, each other and the people around us.

To the test the integrity of our ever-degrading, nearly middle-aged teeth before we're forced to wear dentures or gum stewed prunes, Tanner and I each chose to celebrate our birthdays with impressive carnivorous displays.

For Tanner's 27th in January, we, along with some good friends, went to Texas De Brazil in Forth Worth. It's a Brazilian-style churrascaria where they bring meat (beef, pork, lamb) to your table and shave off portions for you. They also have a killer salad bar, which was my favorite part.

At Texas De Brazil

Carter and Brandon

Jenni and Ryan

Adam and Tanner

After dinner, we went dancing in the Stockyards. Jenni and Ryan drove up from Beeville and stayed with us at the Hyatt Place in the "historic Fort Worth Stockyards." It was a great time, with added atmosphere due to the FW Stock Show and Rodeo going on.

Out on the town

For my birthday, this weekend, Tanner and I went to downtown FW to enjoy one of my FAVORITE fares, boiled crawfish! We got 2 lbs a piece, nice and spicy, and all the boiled taters and corn that come with it. We also had some delicious crawfish fondue and bread, all courtesy of Razzoos Cajun Cafe. I loooove when it's crawfish season.

At Razzoo's

Sunday night, Tanner made me dinner! He whipped up some huge ribeyes, mac and cheese, wedge salad and french bread, and got me a nice bottle of wine, too.

By the time the weekend wrapped up, I was full of thankfulness.

And protein.

And birthday donuts.

And brownies.

And I ran 12 miles.

Really, I did.

The end.

Making Tracks

I love doing things with the dogs. About this time last year, I made it my special-day birthday request to Tanner that he come with me and the pups on a long walk down the Mineral Wells State Trailway. My 27th birthday isn't until this weekend, and I'll probably see if I can make the trek a tradition this year, but last weekend we also took the dogs to this trail. The weather was just too nice to resist on Sunday, and Tanner knew he'd be stuck inside the shop (at work) setting up jobs for the rest of the afternoon.

Birthday walk, March 2010

Birthday walk, March 2010: Digger against the world

The trail begins in Weatherford (because I'm egocentric) and runs 20 miles westward through the countryside and Lake Mineral Wells State Park before ending in downtown Mineral Wells. We haven't made it that far, but we continue to explore the trail, which used to be WMW & NW railway. In it's heyday, the tracks took thousands of passengers to Mineral Wells to experience the town's mineral springs. That all hit the fan in the early 1900s, and the railway was purchased by Texas & Pacific, then merged with the Missouri Pacific and eventually the Union Pacific. Around 1990, it was purchased by Mineral Wells and then abandoned. In 1998, it was opened as the trailway it is today!

On the trail

And it's an awesome trailway. (Really, it is. I just need to take some pictures during the spring/summer!) It starts in Weatherford at Cartwright Park and goes through 10 miles of cattle and horse pastures, hay patches and ponds before it reaches the cute little town of Garner. My dad, Tanner and I have biked this portion of the trail, and I often drive to the trail head in Garner to walk the dogs because the Garner-eastward portion of the trail is on of my favorite. There is also a cute cafe/general store in Garner where you can get something to eat or buy 4 jugs of Gatorade, like Tanner does after we're done walking.

The trailhead in Weatherford

Last weekend, we walked a portion of the trail we'd never traveled before. We started in Garner and headed west. This portion of the trail hugged Maddux Road, which you could see from the trail most of the time. That ended up not being a big deal because it was a rural road with little traffic and lots of ranchland.


The first adventure along the was was a shanty house on the right where we heard 5 large dogs barking from about 40 feet away. That was a little freaky until we realized they were behind a wire panel that, thankfully, held, despite them all five of them jumping on it at once.

The second adventure what a black and white spotted pit bull that started following us at the trailhead and walked with us all 2 1/2 miles out and 2 1/2 miles back. We saw him for the first little while but didn't realize he was still with us until about mile 1 1/2, which kind of spooked us. Most of the time he trailed far behind and would pop into sight every once and awhile. It kind of reminded me of the movie The Hills Have Eyes. He was pretty cute, and I didn't mind him being there until on the way back, he tried to, ahem, do doggy business with Digger, who is getting a little old and stiff and who at that point, was so tuckered out that all he could do was growl and kinda sorta try to turn behind to bite the other dog. Flexibility, agility and speed are not his strongest suits at this point, which diverted a dog fight. But still, I was very offended for him and felt for his wounded pride. Tanner scared the other dog off, and for Digger's sake, we all agreed we'd never speak of it again.


Third adventure was three additional big dogs running through a field lookin' like they were up to no good. They never ended up bothering us, but after our luck with bears, we erred on the safe side and started gathering the largest sticks we could find. I ended up using mine as a walking stick, which got Tanner thinking about fashioning a walking stick with a spear mounted on the end.

That's safe.

The main adventure was "Dry Creek," which ended up not being totally dry. There was a cliff-encircled pond fed by the creek, which ran through a dry gap of rocks and puddles, which we were able to hop across between pond and the creek upstream.


It was a great day, and we were happy to discover that this portion of the trail was less traveled. Aside from the burgeoning dog population, we only saw one couple bicycling. We're not antisocial. It's just nice to let the dogs run loose and not have to worry about people freaking out. They're nice, but they're just so big that they scare people. Oh, and Happy likes to bark at kids. I missed that part of his human socialization. Oops. The dogs had a great time, and as cheesy as it sounds, it's a great feelings to be able to watch dogs experience pure, unrestrained joy... Minus the humping.


I run a lot on various portions of this trail, but Tanner and I have about 8 miles yet to explore, and my neighbor has invited me to go trail riding (horseback) in Mineral Wells State Park itself.

Here's a pretty cool video on the park and trail with a troooo Takes-sus park RAYger, David Owens. Oh, and the signs on the trail say NO going faster than a walk on horseback. If I ever get in trouble for running my horses, I'll site this video.



Side note on the now abandoned, infamous (for its supposed hauntings) Baker Hotel (mentioned in the video), which was a famous resort spa centered around the mineral baths: During the early 1930s, it drew celebrities like Lawrence Welk, Clark Gable, Greta Garbo, JFK, Marilyn Monroe and supposedly Bonnie and Clyde to the dinky lil' town of Mineral Wells .

Singing in Public

Have you ever been to a piano bar? I have. Twice. And that was all the experience I needed to realize that they are very fun and also potentially very embarrassing. If you are shy and hate people looking at you, let alone laughing at you, do not go. You will spend the whole time shivering in a corner, hoping and praying to the real God that the piano gods do not ensnare you in their terrible plots heartless cruelty.

Actually, you should be safe as long as your "friends" do not conspire to drag you to the front and make you fodder for a piano-wielding comic.

Luckily, I am not shy and I do not have annoying "friends." So, I was able to enjoy my piano bar experience just the way I like to - singing loud and obnoxiously from the "privacy" of my own table.

A while ago, Tanner and I met up with one of my best friends Jenni and her husband, Dr. Ryan Daniels. They were in town because Ryan had a veterinary conference to attend. Also, Jenni and her sister, Michelle, and her mom, Mrs. Dickson, all have their birthdays close to the same time. It was a mass-celebration thing, with a little hamster anatomy and canine dentistry thrown.

We met up with the Dicksons/Daniels to crash their birthday dinner and ended up getting roped into going to Pete's Piano Bar in downtown Fort Worth. It took all of 13 seconds to persuade us. Getting to stay in a swanky downtown hotel with Jenni and Ryan sealed the deal.

Michelle with her beautiful little boy, Hayden, at dinner

At a dueling piano bar, two really good pianists, who were destined to be rockstars but mistakenly ended up at Pete's, take all kinds of requests and wage in mock competitions with a correspondingly illogical running point tallies. It sounds dumb, but it's actually really fun. People write all kinds of song requests on little slips of paper. Some are just awesome, or really bad, song requests, while some are song requests that involve a person in attendance - usually a bachelorette or bachelor or birthday girl or unsuspecting and confused older, tipsy aunt who thought she was going to a country Western bar. The poor smuck has to go up to the front and sit on a stool and be sung about, or sing along or do any number of other silly things. It's very funny for the people watching. And most of the people up front don't seem to mind either. It doesn't hurt that they have cocktails. So how do you get your song selected from all the other requests? There is cash money attached to the song requests. DUH.

At Pete's

The best part of piano bars is that awesomely good and bad, new and old, are played and its totally accepted to sing along as loud as possible at the top of your lungs, even though SOME people, ahem, singing along have no talent/are tone deaf/sing like Cameron Diaz in My Best Friend's Wedding but without the cute, blonde, skinny factor.

I've decided that despite not having any musical talent and being arguably the worst singer in the world, I am going to become a piano bar performer. At one point, the bar got into a University of Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech (they were included for pity) battle with fans of all the schools vying to get their fight songs played. The cash was literally cascading over the pianos.

At Pete's, one "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" and one "Build Me Up Buttercup" later

So, you can find me Friday nights playing the in the waiting area at the Applebees in Weatherford.

The Truth Lies Somewhere in the Middle

The Story of My Birthday, Version 1
In the yellow tint of the bathroom light, she leaned familiarly toward the mirror and drew a steady line of charcoal black along the soft edge of her eyelid, pausing only to take additional care while navigating over the small, wrinkly bump of a chicken pock scar.

"You look beautiful," he said, cupping a warm hand on each side of her hips while leaning on her back and over her shoulder to look at their joined reflection in the mirror. "Imperfections and all," she read in his eyes.

The warm hum of conversation and the bubble of laughter welcomed them in from the cool and quiet of the small town square. She loved them both--the cafe and its patrons like a group of old friends, a shared joke, a heartfelt toast at the end of a night warm with too many beers; and the empty town square lit with street lamps, sweet and simple like a quiet, anointed moment of solitude and peace.

Walking over the worn wood floors to their table, his hand on her back guiding her and her upper body leaning slightly into the solidness of his side, she closed her eyes for just a moment and breathed deep. She felt as if she were floating over those soft, scuffed, love-worn floors.

He turned his head to her and smiled, "Happy birthday."


The Story of My Birthday, Version 2
"Why the heck won't my eyeliner EVER go oooon straaaaight," she complained, dragging out the last two works as she pressed her hands to her cheeks and dragged them down to her jaw in exasperation.

"What are you even talking about?" he asked, poking his head in the doorway. "It looks nice."

"This stupid chicken pock scar, it makes the line all wobbly and it looks dumb."

"No it doesn't. It looks good. I'm going to start the truck."

In a final act of frustration, she contorted her face in the mirror, mocking herself, and went into the bedroom to change.

The outfit was so much more "to-die-for" in her mind. Standing before the mirror, she realized the dress was lower cut than she had remembered, two sizes too small, and clingy in all the WRONG areas. She swapped her granny panties for underwear covering less acreage, but even the skimpy number left tell-tale signs of too many evenings with a spoon and a pint carton of pistachio ice cream. The strings on the underwear cut into the blubber on her hips, dividing each one into a jiggly mountain separated by a deep chasm. She decided to ditch the dress.

He walked in to find her standing in her underwear and socks in the middle of the room with her mind blanked by deep thought.

"You're not ready?" he asked.

"Just gimme a second."

He retreated to the living room, and she, defeated, squirmed back into the dress. She considered ditching the underwear all together, but grabbed a long cardigan instead. "That'd just be weird," she murmured.

"Do these boots look strange?" she asked as she met him in the living room. "Should I push them down or pull them up? Do they look too clunky? Or maybe they're too casual? Is it hot in here? What's the heater set on? I'm burning up."

"I think they look good both ways," he answered, getting up, kissing her, and putting his arm around her as he guided her toward the door. "You really do look really nice."

The restaurant was full of people talking and laughing, and the atmosphere was bright and cheerful. As they waited for the the hostess to gather their menus, she began anticipating the rich, satisfying food she'd soon be eating. "I'm going to get an appetizer AND desert," she thought. "And wine. Lots of wine."

They started through the bar toward the back section of the restaurant. She walked in front of her husband, the chunky wooden heels of her boots softly thunking on the wood floors of the restaurant. The bar and restaurant were separated by a stone wall with a wood framed opening as a walk-through. From the bar into the restaurant, the wood floors sloped slightly downward. And apparently, some one had polished the $*!# out 'em. Because, as she walked through the opening and took a sharp left toward their table, her polished wooden heels slid across the polished wood floors like a greased whale on a Slip 'N' Slide.

It happened fast and hard. Her legs flew out and up to the right, and the entire surface area of her massive left thigh slammed into the ground with an ugly, reverberating THUD. Tables rattled, ice clinked in glasses, and pictures trembled on the wall as if a freight train bearing straight for hell had flown by just feet from thin walls of the quaint, unsuspecting cafe. Quicker than she could ever have imagined possible, propelled by the powerful and inspiring force of shame and humiliation, she sprang back to her feet in an awkward, tactless, and unladylike convulsion of splayed legs, grunting, and sheer panic.

"Don't say anything, please. Let this moment pass," she whispered in denial as she jerked away from her husband and the hostess and attempted to elegantly resume her original course to their table.

"Oh my GAWWWD, are you oKAY?????????" the waifer-esque hostess screeched, pressing her bony hand against her chest.

"Umm, yes. I'm fine. Just a little embarrassed," she answered, the pain shooting through her quivering thigh. A colossal, knotty, eggplant of a bruise was already rising.

"Oh don't WORRY. No one saw you FALL like that," the hostess blurted loudly as the party wound its way through the tables packed with gawking patrons.

"Thanks," she replied curtly. She grabbed her menu and plopped in her seat, wincing.

The bobble-head smiled and bounced away, leaving them at their table. She looked at him for the first time since her Richter-scale rocking collision with the earth. His eyes were warm and understanding. "Are you OK?" he asked softly and with a smile.

"Yeah," she replied with closed eyes and a succinct nod of her head. "Thank God I wore underwear."

He smiled, "Happy birthday."

Erin Haynes. Twenty-six on March 6, 2010, and still a fool.

What is Love?

What is love?

If your first response isn't to bob your head and sing to yourself, "Baby don't hurt me," then you obviously weren't a teenager during the late nineties munching on Twizzlers and Sour Patch Kids while slurping a Diet Dr. Pepper and watching Night at the Roxbury.

Love is, however, something more than a bad club song immortalized in an equally bad Saturday Night Live skit movie spinoff.

Love is this:

I, Tanner, choose you, Erin, to be my wife.
I promise to treasure you and take care of you,
to remain faithful to you no matter the circumstances,
to guide and protect you,
to be trustworthy and honest,
and to show you unwavering love and patient forgiveness as Christ has shown me.
All that I am and all that I have is yours, because in God’s eyes we are one until death.

I love Valentine's Day. (I told you I had some back-blogging to do, and I meant it, dern it.) It will forever be a reminder of the love I share with my husband. It will be a day that small gifts, like

roses,


foot cream (and foot rubs), chocolates, cards,



and quiet nights cozied on the couch with a glass of wine,

will remind me of BIG gifts like

the night I was told that I was a one-and-only, a treasure, a woman to be desired; and all the days and nights that came and are to come as a result of a declaration, a question, a ring, and a promise.

Valentine's Day gets a bad wrap: "It's a ploy by greeting card companies and chocolate manufacturers to suck the ever-living daylight out of your emaciated pocket book." Yeah, they (the Man) have found ways to capitalize off of Valentine's Day, but the holiday has its roots in something beautiful and pure: L-O-V-E. Not the cheap kind of mass-produced love that you can buy, but real love. One popular explanation behind the origin of Valentine's is that a third-century priest gave his life to protect and honor the covenant of marriage. That's beautiful. And while we're supposed to show love all year round, I treasure the chance to spend a day purposefully being reminded of all the ways I've been loved, and all the opportunities I have to love others.

Even if you didn't get engaged on Valentine's Day like I did, why not make it a day to remind you and your spouse of how great it is to be given the gift of love. You can do this in many ways: gifts, a romantic night out, or simply a kind word of appreciation. Whatever gives you a moment of shared joy, laughter, appreciation, and happiness.

For Tanner and I, what makes us happy and romantic is apparently breaking the tails off of mud-sucking shellfish, eating their tail flesh, and then sucking their heads.

Like I said, whatever floats your boat.

I'm linking up with Tuesday's Unwrapped @ Chatting at the Sky (a place for your soul to breath).

From the Date Night Archives: Horseback Picnic, Part Two

If you missed Part One of this enchanting tail (haha, like a horse's tail, get it? cheeseball), you can read it here. Or, ya know, just scroll down a lil bit.

This whole idea for a romantic horseback picnic originated with a wicker picnic basket I received at my bridal shower in Katy. So, really, this whole resulting mess of a date can entirely be blamed on the Gwaltneys. It's one of those old-fashioned looking wicker baskets, lined with fabric and closed with a metal clasp. For some reason, I always imagined a perfect picnic would include homemade fried chicken, potato salad, and pie, all wrapped in wax paper and tucked away in such a daahhling basket as the one I was now a proud owner of. But, then again, I think my brain is all a muck with cliches because my mental picnic also involves a parasol and Laurie putting combs in my hair before I tell him I'm going to marry Fred Vaughn. Anyways... none of the above manifested in the reality of this date. And because the picnic basket came already packed with assorted cheeses, crackers, wine, and other goodies, that was gonna work juuuussst fine. Sorry, Laurie. Next time, chicken fry.

Tanner and I (well, mostly I) had been talking about this picnic for a while, but actually decided to do it on the spur of the moment one boring evening when we realized that it would be winter pretty soon and picnics are not so fun when it's 38 degrees. We were hoping to time the actual picnic for sunset, cuz duh that's soooo romantic, so we rushed outside to get the horses ready. Things seemed destined for perfection, because instead of running around the pasture in a infuriating game of "catch me if you can," the horses waited patiently while we haltered them and tacked up. I stuffed my saddle bag full of multiple blanket choices and an assortment of gloves, sweater, vest, and jacket options; ya know, in case the plates shifted and we were thrown into alternating hemispheres at random. I rolled up a pallet, mounted up, had Tanner tie on the picnic basket, and we headed off down the road.

That, is when I realized that with every step Stetson took, that precious (and surprisingly heavy) picnic basket was going to whack me not so gently in the leg. That is when I began wondering if wicker crosshatch motifs imprinted in the skin might come in fashion. That is when I realized Stetson and I could go no faster than a walk, to prevent my shin from breaking in half. And, that is when I realized that Pepper and Tanner were doing everything BUT walking at a leisurely pace.

You see, the last time Tanner rode Pepper, Britney Spears was dating Justin Timberlake. Despite the fact that Pepper has thrown us both, breaking my pelvis and nearly dislocating Tanner's shoulder, Tanner just kinds hops on him with that foolish fearless male attitude and heads off down the kaliche road. Did I mention it's a road made of hard, jaggedy little rocks? Did I also mention that Pepper seemed to not recall how to steer or maintain a consistent speed? Hand holding as we piddled down lovers lane was apparently not an option. Instead, as we headed down the road toward our neighbor's pasture, I was left in a cloud of kaliche dust, as Tanner and Pepper waged an epic battle of man vs. animal. They zigged, and zagged, and circled, and gallopped, and backed, and side stepped, and all the while, Tanner artfully painted the dimming sky with his colorful expressions -- none of which I will repeat here. I sensed the romance dwindling as Tanner's face, red with frustration, led our mismatched party through the pasture like a beacon. Me plunking along on my antisocial, Eeyore of a horse, who was trying repeatedly to yank the reins out of my hands so he could snatch grass, and Tanner and Pepper rapidly burning a trail trail straight to.... well, ya know.

So we trespassed down to our neighbor's pond (well, they told us about a year ago that we were welcome to ride there, and we decided to belatedly take them up on it), because I thought that would be a romantic spot. We all made it there in one piece, unpacked out gear, and hobbled the horses (which involves tying their front two legs together so they can only take tiny little steps).

It was looking like things might calm down. Tanner had exercised the limits of his vocabulary, and was starting to cool off. So we plopped down at our spot and opened up our treasure trove of goodies. After taking turns screaming at the dogs, begging them to stay out of the pond, and then after they didn't listen, employing mixed martial arts techniques to keep them from tracking muck all over our blanket, we uncorked the wine and started eating.

That's when I realized that we were not the only lovers who found this particular picnic spot enticing. We were joined by hoards of mosquito lovers, and apparently all of their resulting offspring. While biting into an olive, I notice a dingy halo hovering above Tanner's head.
"Ummm.... Tanner. Is that a thought cloud?"
"What?"
"Are there a bunch of mosquitos circling my head?"
"No."
"Well.... there's like a whole mosquito situation thing going on above your head."
"Hrmp."

Although he claimed he was not being bitten, the little bug cloud stayed perched above his head, and only his head, for the rest of the evening.

As it turned out. We perfectly timed unpacking the picnic basket with the sun setting. It was a beautiful sunset. Magestic. Awe-inspiring.

And it lasted about 2 minutes.

Then, it was pretty much dark. I mean, we could see, but barely. I could see just enough to witness Pepper's head pop up in the air, ears alert, eyes buggin', nostrils flared, etc. Who knows what he saw, or thought he saw, or might have heard. But he was gone in a flash. Stirrups flapping at his side and tail in the air, he took off like, well, like he always does. This time, though, he was three-legged.

If you've never seen a horse run with hobbles on, it's a morbid combination of hilarious and terrifying. Their two front legs become one, and they paw forward in an awkward plop, with the hind following behind. And since horses carry most of their weight on their front end, when you give them one leg to balance on as they run, it's a lumbering, frightful spectacle to say the least. And Pepper wasn't just hopping along, I mean he was booking it, clodding up and down uneven terrain in the dark, teetering on the verge of falling and breaking his neck. And of course, Stetson had no choice but to follow suit. I'm not sure why, but Tanner retrieved the horses, brought them back closer to our picnic site, and sat back down, hoping to continue our picnic in the dark. Of course, they thundered off again a few minutes later, running even deeper into the farthest corners of our neighbors' property.

So, in the dark, we stuffed our faces with the last of the hummus, gathered up all our junk in our arms (including my wardrobe options), and trekked through the hay looking for our trustworthy mounts.

On the way home, Pepper exerted the last of his engery, again going about a million miles a minute down the trail. There was a fleeting moment, between Tanner running Pepper in circles, when we crossed paths and shared a kiss. And maybe that's why, after it all, when we had returned home and I had ungrafted the seat of my pants from my skin, I started planning our next horseback picnic.

From the Date Night Archives: Horseback Picnic, Part One

Tanner and I have two horses, Stetson and Pepper. They live on the 2 or so acres that surround our rental home.

This is Stetson. He spends most of his time eating, chasing Pepper away from his food (Stetson considers all food to be his food), rolling in the dirt, ignoring the curious neighboring horses who hang their heads over the fence, sticking his head through the gate into our back yard to eat our lawn, coughing up phlegm and spiting it on my shoes (he's allergic to dust, pollen, bugs, other horses, air, exercise, and happiness), grumbling and neighing at me every time I come out of the house (day or night) to try and get me to feed him, and figuring out how to open gates and jump over barriers to get into the feed room.
He grumpy. He's cantankerous. He's middle-aged. But he's also incredibly smart. He's the kind of grumbly old guy who you shake your head at, and pretend to be mad at -- but secretly, you kind of like that he's an ole grouch.

Photo by Alana Harrison

This is Pepper. He spends most of his time trying to eat Stetson's left over scraps, chewing with his mouth open and spewing grain in a 10 foot radius, sniffing and nibbling your clothes, trying to play over the fence with the curious neighbor horses, sticking his head through the gate to try and sniff and nibble the dogs, running away from us when we come out of the barn on a cold night with his blanket, coming up to the fence for a pat every time I come out of the house (day or night), and figuring out the most circuitous route to his hay in avoidance of Stetson.
He's sweet, curious, and jumpy. He's a silly teenager. He spends a lot of time trying to decide, "Am I afraid of that? Or interested in it?" He makes me laugh as one minute he's snuggling, and the next he's running away kicking up dust.

Every once and while, we'll interrupt the glamorous every day lives of these horses, and put a saddle on them. That was our plan when we dreamed-up a romantic horseback ride and picnic. I was pretty excited. I mean, MAN, this was going to be roMANtic! I was already story-boarding in my head the Harlequin romance I was going to pen based on our sunset ride and horderves. The original plot involved the aforementioned sunset, a leisurely horseback stroll during which Tanner and I intertwined fingers and blew kisses, cheese and crackers and other goodies fed to each other on a cozy blanket as our horses munched grass and our dogs gazed at butterflies looping through the air, and a bunch of other mooshy "chocolate-bearing-cowboy take me away" scenarios.

The finialized, post-reality-edited story line... yeah, a leetle different.

More to come.

Date Night! Newlyweds Leave the Nest.

The thing about my office is, there's only three of us there. Because it's an intimate group, the work environment is pretty laid back. For example, we bring our dogs to the office. The casual circumstances also mean I don't dress up for work -- AT ALL. My daily attire usually consists of jeans, a top, sweatshirt, Crocs/flip flops, and a ponytail.

For some reason, after returning from my single-life reunion the other weekend, I woke up Monday and got all dressed up. I had purchased some new sweaters at Kohls before I left for the weekend in College Station, and I'm one of those people who wants to wear the new clothes I buy the very next day. So, I got all gussied up: new belted sweater, skinny jeans tucked into some black boots, and my nice black wool winter coat. I even straightened my hair and wore it down. I had no reason to look decent, just felt like it. (Maybe I was inspired by all the single girls in College Station, who still take the time to make themselves look presentable!) I even thought as I was going out the door, "Man, why am I wasting this cute outfit today? I should have saved it for a day when I had a doctor appointment, or something, so at least someone would see it!"

As it turned out, the outfit was not wasted. Tanner called me at work, and told me he had been missing me. We were both gone all weekend, and the week before he had been working until 9 or 10 each night. My sweet guy then asked me if I'd like to go out to dinner at one of our favorite local Italian joints in Weatherford, Pastafina. I was so happy. 1) It's always good to feel like you've been missed, and to know someone thinks about you when you're not there. 2) It's great to have something special to look forward to during the work day. 3) My cute outfit would be appreciated. 4) I love carbs.

The thoughtfulness didn't end there. When I got home, Tanner surprised me with flowers! What a guy. We had a great night, just chatting and eating and being together. Who says the romance has to die when you get married?

A happy newlywed, glowing over flowers and a dinner date!

Mr. Thoughful himself.