Steph's Creative Life: Week #2 Ending and Catch Up, plus AWARDS!

I feel like I’m playing catch up now. My hubby came home on Saturday afternoon after his week away in NJ, and I really didn’t feel like spending more time with my computer. I enjoyed my weekend with him, and now I have a lot of bloggy stuff to catch up on!

Week #2, Full Day #5 – I hadn’t slept well all week, mainly because I would put off going to bed until I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore since the bed was very lonely and empty. Friday morning I finally crashed. I didn’t get out of bed until 11:30am that day! Needless to say, I didn’t get that much accomplished on Friday before heading out to dinner with my parents, grandmother and uncle. After dinner we went to my grandmother and uncle’s house to play Wii games. That was pretty much the extent of my day.

Week #2, Homecoming! – Hubby came home Saturday afternoon at around 2:15pm. It was so nice to finally get a hug, and he even brought me a surprise:

The last time he came back, I also got flowers. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of those. He always knows how to make me smile. :)

After he unpacked, we ended up getting pizza (I know, bad me – I was hungry and didn’t want what we had here, so pizza won the hunger battle…) and just spent time together watching TV and relaxing. :) It was a very nice day.

Sunday – We slept in that morning, relaxed a little in the afternoon, then went shopping for a few things and had my parents come over in the evening. My dad and hubby put our new grill together, Char-Broil Commercial Series 4-Burner LP Grill which took a lot longer than expected, and we tested it out – grilled chicken with light BBQ sauce, veggie kabobs marinated in soy sauce, ham for my mom, and low-cal cucumber salad with cantaloupe for dessert – yummy! It was the first time I ever used a grill, and of course it got late, so I had to grill in the dark! I had some light from the rear yard spotlight, but I will definitely not be trying to grill in the dark again. Everything came out awesome and delicious! The chicken was cooked perfectly, the veggies were done just right, and now I have grilled ham to try later in the week for a leftover dinner. Clean up is a little time consuming, but the grill is great and may just become my new favorite way of cooking this summer! :) (Picture from Lowe's website - this is our grill)

I also found out on Sunday that I received my first TWO blog awards! The first is this (love it!):

The Rules:
•Thank the blogger who awarded it to you.
•Sum up your blogging philosophy, motivation, and experience using five (5) words.
•Pass it on to 10 other blogs which you feel have real substance.

I’d like to thank NYC Island Gal for this award – I was honored to receive it, thank you so much!!! If you haven’t seen her blog yet, please check it out, she has a beautiful blog, a great spirit, and is working her way from island life to NYC!

My blogging philosophy – not really sure what that would be…I began this blog to write about my life, share my creativity, and connect with other people. I’m still unsure of a lot of blogging stuff, but I’m working on it, and hope to continue this for a long time. I guess I just like sharing and talking…sometimes maybe too much! But I was supposed to only use 5 words, so I guess this would be them – creativity, sharing, friendship, fun, and slim (for the experience part). So now I pass this on to these bloggers:

Hope you all enjoy this award!

My next one was not specifically given directly to me, per say…but I will certainly take JoJo up on this!

She “broke the rules” a little by passing it on to all her followers instead of just the seven required, and as I am a follower of hers, I will certainly take it! :) The rules for this award are to list seven facts about myself and to pass this on to seven other beautiful bloggers.

I was terrified of dogs when I was little, didn’t matter how big or small. This all started when the little mini poodle down the street used to chase me on my big wheel (remember those?? mine was a Smurf one!), and knocked me off one day. Yes, a mini poodle knocked me off my big wheel… I am better with dogs now, small dogs are totally fine, big ones are ok for the most part, but sometimes they strike the fear in me a little again. I would even love to have a Pembroke Welsh Corgi someday, if I ever got a dog.
Sticking to the fear issue – I am also terrified of birds! Seagulls are the worst! I’m not sure how that started, but to this day, I dodge the birds on the boardwalk and freak out whenever one flies near. I know there’s a picture of me when I was about 3 or so with a bird sitting on my head at the shore – maybe that’s when it all began…
I loved high school, and miss it a lot sometimes. I hated college. For most people it’s the other way around.
I used to have an iguana, a hamster, guinea pigs, hermit crabs and a betta fish. Not necessarily all at once, but I’ve owned all of the above at some point in my life.
I used to play the clarinet. I wasn’t the best in the concert band, but I played from 4th grade to 12th grade. Haven’t touched it since…sometimes I wish I would have continued.
I played an island girl in my high school’s production of “South Pacific” when I was a sophomore. I have red hair, and they cast me as an island girl…then wanted me to die my hair black! The director would not allow wigs, and I was not about to turn goth, so they hid my hair with lots of flowers. There’s a pic of that somewhere too, but I’m not in possession of it right now. Hello! Where was your brain when you casted?!?
I used to love camping when I was little. A lot of my fond memories of my grandparents are from when I went camping with them. I slowly grew out of my love for camping, but when I was little I liked it a lot.

Now I pass this on to these lovely bloggers:

I hope everyone enjoys their awards, and sorry for the long post, but now I feel all caught up and should be able to continue with my regular stuff now! Have a great week!