butterfly kisses

I can't remember how old I was the first time we sang it.

All I remember was that we would sing it every Father's Day, my dad and I.
Butterfly Kisses.

I also remember thinking it was our song. I remember people at church always asking when we would sing it again, and telling me how beautifully I sang. I remember loving every moment of being on stage with my dad, because he and my mom were the best singers I knew.
Dad has always been a passionate, animated, and loving man. His presence on stage and as a speaker have always blown me away.
And he definitely spoiled me.
He used to tell me that my shoulder blades were the stubs left behind from my angel wings.
I believed him.

That songs still gives me goosebumps, and brings tears to my eyes. I can hear my dad singing it, and I would give anything to have a recording of that first time, when I was so little.

I remember the way our church smelled, and the way it felt to be in there before everyone else, practicing together. I remember the bliss of being young, living only in happiness and play.
When the bridge of the song would come up, right before the beginning of the verse "Sweet 16 today", there was a little section that echoed "spread your wings and fly."
When I was young, I would flap my little arms and go down the steps to sit in the front row, and dad would finish the song alone. Since the next part was about being 16 and then getting married, it didn't really apply to me.

But I remember that first time I was able to stay for the whole song. Boy oh boy, it was a big step.
I felt really grown up, and I also felt a little scared and sad. I think dad did too, because it was making us both cry.

When Dusty and I got engaged in the Powerscourt gardens in Enniskerry, Ireland, my family was waiting inside, safe from the wind and rain.
They were watching through the windows.

Powerscourt Estate Gardens

The proposal begins...

Coming in from the wind and rain and with the elation of the moment, I came into a warm embrace from dad.

He leaned down and whispered, "There are two things I know for sure. You were sent here from heaven, and you'll always be daddy's little girl."

Crying as I write this, it was one of the most special moments of my life. Years and years of memories and happy father-daughter dates and sweet moments were wrapped up in that moment.

One year and two days later, Dusty and I got married.

My dad spoke beautiful words in the ceremony and at the reception, loving on us and blessing us.

He walked me down the aisle...in the same church he married my mother, in the same church we had sang Butterfly Kisses so many times before.

"Walk me down the aisle daddy, it's just about time!"

Such a beautiful moment, one which I could not contain my tears from.
As soon as those big doors opened, I was lost. Dad had to keep pulling my arm back, trying to have me slow down and enjoy the moment. My face was distorted in tears, and all I could keep thinking was, "I have to hurry or I won't get through this!"

At the reception, we walked out to the dance floor to dance to our lifelong theme song.
"Butterfly Kisses" played, and we cried, and he was sweet and wonderful. I love my daddy.
I'm so glad we danced to this song, because I never would have made through singing it.

I love my family.

I am so thankful for a mom and dad that have raised me in the ways of the Lord, to love and to laugh and to experience and learn all that I can.

I'm so thankful for my humor and silliness that I have inherited from parents who love to laugh.

Singing at Johnny Fox's pub in Ireland.

Dad's 60th birthday party!

I am thankful for the many, many memories of travel and adventure and story-telling and laughter and family and friends and so much more.

While I don't have current access to our many childhood pictures or photos of dad and I when I was a little girl, I have all of those memories locked up tight in my reservoir.

When Dusty and I started dating, I would save his texts and notes, and mom would always call that my love bank.
I think the development of words of affirmation as my love language began from my parents constant output of positive encouragement and edification to who I was.
I have all of those tucked away in a special place inside of me.
When I was in High School, my dad would tuck little sticky notes inside of my lunch box. "You rock!" and "You're beautiful" and "Have a groovy day" and so many more little nuggets of love.
I owe so much to my loving family. The more and more days that go by, the more I realize that I have been raised by two wonderful people, by God's design.

Thank you, to both of you.
And thanks to you dad, as today we celebrate you as a father. Thanks for raising a beautiful family with our beautiful mother, and for continuing to love us and pray for us together.
We are so lucky.

In love,
Cait

Mahna Mahna

IT'S TIME.

Well, it's not time but it's THE day.

Do doo, be-do-do...mahna mahna...do do-do do!

This is my theme song for today as I go about my business.
And by business, I mean sitting and drinking coffee while my eyes go blurry at a computer screen.

We both were up quite late last night, but I think everyone will be redonkulously impressed with how talented I am at packing.
(Granted, it's summer, so all my clothes are now dresses and shorts rather than pants and sweaters...)
But I'm chalking it up to talent. Pure talent.

Just in case you guys don't know how I pack, it's a very serious activity. It takes me several hours, and I try on many outfits and match jewelry and sometimes just sit down and stare blankly in the mirror until I decide to start packing again.
I'm very easily distracted.
When I find an outfit I really like, I run down the stairs to get Dusty's approval. Even if the outfit is a pair of jean shorts and a frilly top, I always expect this reaction:

He has it down pat.
Doesn't even really need to say anything, being speechless is always good. Or saying "fine" like Richard Gere, when Julia Roberts tries on the wedding dress in Runaway Bride. Classic.

So.
Moving on to a more pressing matter. If you don't already know this about me, then...well, it may be a deal breaker for us. I guess we'll see.
I'm a cat lover.
Yeah, I'm one of those. More than that, I'm an animal lover. But it really comes down to cats, for me. I love them, and they love me, and it's been that way ever since I had that big fat weird and loyal calico cat when I was little. I still miss that silly little (big) feline.

I've said it before, I'll say it again.
Kittens are the closest things we can have to Pokemon.

Remember when I said I was 5/8 nerd?
Still true.

The point is, I feel guilty and stressed leaving Luna at home alone. I always feel sad leaving her sitting in the window. She is a very cute watchgirl, though.
Except that's she's broken 3 1/2 panels off of our blinds.
Dedication to her post? Who knows.

We have some friends that are going to check in on her while we're gone, so that makes me feel better.
I think I'm just talking to myself now, more than anything.

Interesting facts for today:

--Thus far, I have still been unable to persuade our local Starbucks to ask "The Usual?" when I walk in.
Not that I've tried to actually persuade, because it's something I need them to figure out on their own. Otherwise it's cheating. I think they recognize me, but it's becoming a little disheartening.
--I went to the tanning salon two weeks ago, and went back yesterday and the same girl was there that I first checked in with two weeks ago. She remembered how much I spent, what bed I was in, and asked how my husband was.
Get with the program, Starbucks.
--I'm really beginning to pray that my dreams aren't prophetic. That would be horrible. Although it wouldn't be all bad...if they are prophetic, that means Dusty and I adopt a really adorable Asian child.
The down side is that we'd have to raise her in the midst of the zombie apocalypse.
--I am currently listening to the best mix of relaxing music ever invented.
The irony is that currently the girl is saying "I can't sleep" over and over and over.

Relax Yo'self 101:
1. Godless Brother In Love by Iron & Wine
2. Can't Help Falling In Love by Ingrid Michaelson
3. Turning Page by Sleeping At Last
4. Torch Song by Priscilla Ahn
5. Love Will Take You by Angus & Julia Stone
6. Heart's Content by Brandi Carlile
7. Flightless Bird, American Mouth - Wedding Version by Iron & Wine
8. Sparks by Coldplay
9. Oh Dear by Brandi Carlile
10. Posion & Wine by The Civil Wars
11. You Belong to Me by Carla Bruni
12. U.F.O. by Coldplay
13. Piazza, New York Catcher by Belle & Sebastian
14. Sleep by Azure Ray
15. Over the Rainbow by Harry Nilsson

--When I'm bored, I make awesome mixes.

Okay. I can't vamp anymore.
I'M SO EXCITED.
It's so hard being in this quiet office and trying to keep my cool.
When all I wanna do is The Ross.
Dusty and I did this for about 7 straight minutes the other day.

It's too much!
We leave for the airport in 6 hours!!

Now I've gotta go make a list of all of the things we CANNOT FORGET.
Things like bridesmaid dresses and birthday presents and underwear.

Maybe I'll sneak Luna onto the plane, too.

I CAN ALREADY TASTE THE MEXICAN FOOD.

In love,
Cait

what day is it?

Last night, I had a dream that I saw Conrad Grayson from Revenge at a restaurant.

I was with about 30 other people for a big dinner party, and I frantically began to ask someone to follow me over there so I could discreetly ask for a picture with him, and maybe get his autograph.
Before I knew it, the 30 people I was with revealed themselves to be enormous idiots, unable to even walk straight, let alone take a picture with my iPhone.
They were crowding Grayson, walking in front of the picture, taking pictures of themselves instead of us...the list goes on and on.
Grayson was getting extremely annoyed with me, and I was about to die from embarrassment and frustration.

Now, while this wasn't a zombie dream, it was probably the most stressful dream I've ever had.
Absurd.

Funnily enough, the one thought I kept thinking was: "If I don't get this picture, I'll never be able to show it to them!!"
"Them" meaning my husband, my brother and sister-in-law, and any other friends that watch the show.
I was seriously upset.
I did happen to send a quick blurry photo to my dad via text, and he was pretty excited for me. Even though in real life, he's never watched the show.

It's so strange how often I'm absolutely convinced that my dream is real, and wake up really upset that whatever I've gained in my dream didn't magically come with me.
At least my dream dad will believe me.

Just wanted you to see and hear what I'm like in the middle of a nightmare.
Just ask Dusty.


We actually had a stellar Wednesday. Is stellar my new word? I've been using it a lot. So yeah.
Greek salad, pork, creamy dark chocolate pie with raspberries, coffee and 3 games of Dominion with friends made for a really nice mid-week break.
It's the general opinion that the infamous "hump day" shall now be our designated game night. I'm game! Pun intended!
Our friends also enjoyed Dominion so much that they whipped out their laptop and bought the big box set right then and there. So things are gonna get wild and crazy with our Dominion sets!

Speaking of interesting days of the week, I've been waking up every day this week like, "AH I can't believe it's Friday!"
Then, "Oh wait. It's Tuesday. Dang."

But today I can say, "It's STILL not Friday!!!"

So happy Thursday, everyone.

In love,
Cait

WE LEAVE TOMORROW

fireflies

Here come real stars to fill the upper skies,
And here on earth come emulating flies, 
That though they never equal stars in size, 
(And they were never really stars at heart) 
Achieve at times a very star-like start. 
Only, of course, they can't sustain the part. 

-Robert Frost

I came across this little poem by Mr. Frost, called "Fireflies in the Garden."

Isn't is charming?

Fireflies are wonderful. They're kind of magical, and bring about a lot of sweet feelings and memories.

I can remember going to Missouri for our family reunions and catching fireflies by the jar full! 

Sometimes we'd forget about them or fill the jar too full or forget to let them breathe, and they would die...further proof that young children shouldn't really have pets of any kind. 

But nevertheless, we loved and respected the little flickering bugs. They're the stars of the earth. 

The appearance of the first firefly this year honestly startled me. I hadn't even thought about seeing fireflies out here. This will be our first summer out here, and we keep getting more and more pleasant surprises!

The weather has been rainy and beautiful, the grasses and trees are glittered with lightning bugs, and we're surrounded by friends and snow cones and fun times. 

This was last night:

Last night was lovely. I went for a run, Dusty made chicken for dinner (lemon and dill, sooo yummy), and I had the whole night to work on my to-do list!

We MAY or may not have gone and gotten frozen yogurt and then impulse-bought food from Taco Bell AND McDonald's, but we neither confirm or deny those events.

The truth is, if you get something sweet, you've gotta get something salty to follow it up.

Don't blame me, blame the human body. And science. And maybe American obesity.

TWO DAYS from now, I'll be sitting here at work counting down the hours until I can leave for the airport :)

We have a fun night planned tonight with friends, to have a relaxing dinner and a game or two.

Then it'll be cleaning and packing, full-throttle!

I'll leave you with one of my favorite parts from The Princess and The Frog:

Let the fireflies lead the way!

See you soon!

In love,

Cait

things i love

One of my best friends is getting married in less than 2 weeks.
Ah!
It's actually the main reason we're going home. We're really excited that we were able to extend the trip to see our loved ones as well, and spend time at home.
It's hard to believe we're only 3 1/2 days away from flying out!

I was in our apartment last night, working on some things that I'm making for Lauren for her wedding.
We were texting and reminiscing...

The first picture of us.

It's hard to believe that's us.
When we met freshman year of college, we were both 3 hops and a skip away from being total messes.
We clung to each other like bees to honey. Or more like Taco Bell to a freshman girl's waistline.
We had a lot of the same things going (or not going) for us: long-distance boyfriend, being a freshman, not having many (if any) friends, new to choir...
I think Lauren and I were able to fill in the gaps of where the other person struggled the most.
We were there for each other.

I started out as a Music major, so all of my classes were at 8am.
ABSURDITY.
I was never on time. I slept through a lot of them...but worst of all, I would go to my classes in the clothes I slept in, and then go back to bed after they were through.
It was embarrassing.
And Lauren helped me out of that funk. She was so much more outgoing than I was!
I always knew she was coming when I heard that fast-paced pitter-patter of her feet running down my dorm hall. We became inseparable.
She was my first adult friend, one that I met and loved and clicked with right away. We were our own little love story.
That first time we said "you're my best friend" was as dramatic as a proposal. We were both nervous, shy, and ecstatic when the other person returned our sentiments. Haha!
This is the moment right after we said those fateful words:

It's a horrific picture, we know. Probably one of the most awkward pictures we've ever taken.
Unless you count these:

We had a game we played, where we'd yell out something and have to imitate that in the picture. It could be anything.
"Lesbian dinosaur", "Constipated hippo", "Seductive man," "Rogue fairy"...the list goes on and on.
She was a pro.

Sometimes it's hard to think about too much, because I honestly miss those days a lot.
There's nothing like being married, and I wouldn't trade that for the world. But there's something about the community that exists in college that you never really have again. Being down the hall from your best friend, living in an apartment with a group of girls, always within hands reach of a late-night escapade.

In the midst of it, we thought our lives were pretty boring. Lauren and I would always complain that we weren't living life, or seizing the day, or going on adventures, or whatever.
But looking back, our lives were fantastic, and hilarious, and ridiculous. We could have been our own TV show. "How I Met Your Mother" or "Friends" status.
The fun adventures, the cheesy inside jokes, the road trips, the parties, the apartment troubles, the "coming of age" stories, the shopping, the boy troubles, the silly fights.

There are so many moments I look back on.
Freshman year, we would try so hard to have a "thing"...to have a hobby, or something to define us.
I can't tell you how many times we went to Target. Sometimes just to hang out. Sometimes for inspiration.

This is when we bought new Tennis rackets at Target. We went all out. Got all dressed up for our new daily Tennis routine!
We. Never. Played.
Not once.
On that night, the Tennis courts were closed. So naturally, we took a bunch of pictures in our new gear with our new rackets.
That would never be used again.

But, that's just what we did. We bought puzzles, crafts, plants, you-name-its. We were constantly in search of new projects to take on. We were searching for who we wanted to be, and what we really wanted to do with our lives.
It was kind of wonderful.


One time, Lauren had to attend a play for a class.
She asked me if I would go, so we headed out to what would become known as the aforementioned "coming of age" type of story.
This is us:

As soon as we walked into the theater building, we felt different. There was something oddly unsettling about going to a play by ourselves, surrounded by adults and fancy old ladies.
Were we adults?
It was like someone handed us two bright shining badges that declared us officially done with childhood.
We sat down in our seats and sat up straight, looking around and smiling at all of the sophistication around us.
As soon as the play started, we were wide-eyed and open-mouthed.
This was a real play. Gritty, real, and emotional. It was dramatic. It was worldly. There was cussing and loud yelling, and no musical numbers to whisk us away.
As strange as it sounds, I think that honestly was a turning point in our lives, in our maturity, and in our friendship. We promised to take advantage of this theater that was so close to us, and to see the inexpensive yet powerful plays that they had each month.

(We never went again.)

We had a lot of fun adventures. We were in choir together, so we traveled around each weekend to different churches for concerts. We also went on choir tour together, all the way to San Francisco and back.
We also ended up in student leadership together, and she even got to be partners with Dusty our senior year!

We frequented Disneyland, as well as San Diego and occasionally the beach.
(We had a really bad experience at the beach early on, and I think it haunted us throughout the rest of our college year. I'd tell it to you, but it's probably best that I don't, to avoid any hurt feelings or mean words. We just refer to it dramatically as "the worst day of our lives".)

We were constantly shopping, eating, getting our nails done, eating, and going to Starbucks.
We actually had a legitimate "regular" Starbucks we went to...so much so, that the adorable lady that worked there began to ask, "The usual?"
I don't know about you, but everyone else on the planet wants to be asked that. If you didn't before, now you do. Because it's in our nature to want to be noticed, and respected as regular patrons.
It's in our nature to want to belong somewhere.
Somewhere like Starbucks.
So, we had a very real dream realized. It was bliss.

That Starbucks is gone now, and it still hurts to talk about.

I was also able to go to Brawley several times, which is Lauren's hometown. Honestly one of my favorite places. I think because it reminds me so much of my hometown of Casa Grande. They're basically the same place, only Brawley is smaller and closer to Mexico.
I fell in love with her stories and her family. I loved going there over a weekend to just hang out, sleep in and drink her mom's coffee.
I remember a very specific instance where her mom came to visit us at CBU, and we went out to dinner. I remember feeling so happy that I had a friend, and I remember Lauren and I telling her mom how we never, ever fought. We were in the honeymoon stage of our friendship, you could say.
While we definitely didn't stay conflict-free forever, our friendship never stopped getting better.

I think one of the biggest gifts was the friendship that was able to develop between Dusty and Lauren. Against all odds, they managed to form their own special bond apart from me. And together, they were my favorite.
It was more than I could have hoped for. And I'm so thankful to both of them.

We went through a lot those crazy 3 1/2 years.
She graduated a semester early and moved to Connecticut, so we ended up saying our goodbyes at Dusty and I's wedding, over Christmas break our senior year.

Suffice it to say, we came a long way from this:

To this:

Well, maybe we haven't changed all that much.

The moral of the story is....you know that whole "Count Your Blessings" thing?
Well, it was true for Andy Griffith, and it's still true today. For me and for you.
You just waste time if you're not enjoying the present.
I would love to travel back to some of the best days, and pay more attention to some of the best moments.

Especially here in law school, I worry that a lot of wives are sitting by, waiting for their "real" lives to start...but the truth is, no matter what part of life you're in, that is your life. And it's passing you by. You're in it, right now.
To quote P.S. I Love You...

Holly: "...I see people buying bigger apartments and having babies...
I get so afraid sometimes that our life's never gonna start."

Gerry: "We're already in our life. It's already started, this is it.
You have to stop waitin', baby."







I have a hundred "Lauren" stories up my sleeve. We had an incredible few years together.
And now it's her turn to get married, and I'm so proud to call her my friend! I'm so happy for her.
And I'm so glad we had each other when we did. Sometimes, the timing is perfect. For us, it was.
Perfect and ridiculous.
Not sure what I would have done without her :)
I thought she was great when I first met her. But to see the woman she has become is pretty stellar. She has changed so much, in all of the best ways.
And she never gave up on me and our friendship.
I'm so happy for her happiness, and for all of the adventures she's going to have with her new love!

To avoid being too sentimental, I'll leave it at that.
Just a few chapters from the Caitlin and Lauren saga.
:)

In love,
Cait

3 days until Arizona!!

four!

Four days from now, it will be the day that we leave for Arizona.

For some reason, I've been having incredibly realistic yet absolutely horrible and irrational stress dreams.
Some of these dreams have included but are not limited to:

1. Plus One being shot on stage, one by one, as my best friend and I stand watching in the front row.
2. Trying to survive the Zombie Apocalypse with the cast of LOST, and my grandma.
3. Getting to Arizona and sleeping for most of the trip, wasting time, being stranded, having no Mexican food, and getting sick.
4. Getting home and finding that my niece has a dangerous skin disease, which is slowly turning her into a lizard.

I don't necessarily believe that dreams really mean anything of giant consequence, unless the Lord sent these dreams to me for some specific reason....and in that case, so far all that has been accomplished is me waking up extremely upset.
Luckily for Dusty, I only had to wake him up once, for the Zombie dream.
I've obviously watched too many scary movies, because this dream was the Leonardo DiCaprio of dreams.

There was scary mood music, plot twists, betrayals, gruesome deaths and a large snake. Oh, and zombies.

I should confess that this is not the first zombie dream I've had. I had a string of them earlier this year, thanks to The Walking Dead.

I'm not sure why I started watching it, but I watched it alone, and even though I had it on mute 87% of the time, I still had nightmares pretty much every night.
Word to the wise, don't watch this show. None of you would like it.

In this week's dream, my little zombie-surviving group somehow decided that a house in the middle of a swamp would be a good hideout. My grandma was cooking for us all and seemed completely unbothered by the fact that we were fighting off zombies.
However, Jack and Sawyer kept fighting, and I kept running into zombies trying to get into the house.
It was just such a mess. You'd think people would try and get along, in survival-mode during the zombie apocalypse.
The slow-motion scenes didn't help. I'd go out onto the back porch, and turn around slowly cause I heard a noise. Nothing was there. Then I'd turn around a second later, and a zombie would be in my face.
Everyone knows zombies move slowly, and there's no way he could have snuck up on me in a sticky swamp.
Lies.

I think this dream was a product of the coffee I had at dinner that night. I can't really do caffeine at night anymore, at least not a lot of it.
I realized this a few years ago. I was at home (at my parent's house), and couldn't go to sleep. I kept hearing noises and the dogs were barking. They suddenly stopped, and I thought (naturally) that they must have been killed by intruders.
I then built a pillow/blanket fort on top of me, and wedged myself between my bed and the wall.
Obviously, I was now safe from the dog-killing strangers that were breaking into the house.
They'd never find me now!

When I woke up the next morning, I realized that I had a serious problem. So I really only have myself to blame for that giant mug of coffee and my consequential zombie dream.

Every time I think about my "night terrors", I think of this episode of Gilmore Girls:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQXveDY4GA4

All of this to say, I am really, really excited to be going home to Arizona. Really.
Not even the worst of dreams could deter me!
I think I'm feeling stress and anxiety because it's been a long time since we've been home, and it's really strange feeling like our apartment here in Virginia is more home than Arizona is. I feel displaced. Like an odd outsider in my own past life.
Plus it's just stressful, knowing that we only have a short amount of time with everyone, and only so many things we can do while we're there. Egads.
And as I've said before, I feel like time shouldn't be passing in other places. I don't like missing out on things, and I wish we could be everywhere at once!
So this week is going to be a little hectic as we make sure everything is in place for us to make our journey home to the desert.
NO more caffeine at night, no more zombies, and lots more cleaning and packing. :)

I can't wait to take a bite out of Little Sombreros, Mi Amigo Ricardo's, Si Senor...and anywhere else that has real Mexicans making real Mexican food.

Pray that this week goes by fast!
(But that next week goes by veeerrryyy slowly). :)

In love,
Cait

can't stop

This is our engagement session with our friend Mike.
He told me to be sexy. I had no idea how.
He said that the key to being sexy is to pretend you're about to say the F word.

Sometimes, I laugh out loud at myself.
It's not because I think I'm really funny (I occasionally think I'm pretty funny) but I'm just really easily entertained, and sometimes when that perfect thing comes to mind, I can hardly contain my glee at my own cleverness.

When we were in Charlotte last weekend, we went into a very high-end department store, Neiman Marcus.
They carry all of the fanciest brand names. I mean, the store name is in cursive, and it's just really obvious that it's not a place where Dusty and I shop.
We went around admiring the merchandise, and I could have sworn a few hefty men came cautiously in our direction just to make sure we weren't trying to steal anything.

Back off my wal-mart cardigan, dude, it's a fun color and it fits nice.

As we made our way back to the fancy menswear, Dusty began to drool over a ridiculously gorgeous pinstripe suit. I nodded my approval, sneaking a peak at the $4,000 price tag on just the jacket.
A well-dressed (duh) grey-haired man approached us, asking if we needed any assistance. We told him we were just looking.
He went back to another store worker, and whispered, "Eh, just a couple of Jimmy Jons."

Now.

I don't know what that's supposed to mean. My fancy-pants radar was going off, signaling that I should be offended. But that radar is broken (I bought it at a discount) and all that resulted was a fit of giggles.
It had us both cracking up, trying to imagine what they must think of us.

We then developed a string of Jimmy Jon scenarios.

Me: "Most of my pants I bought for less than $10...and that's why I'm a Jimmy Jon."
Dusty: "9 of my socks have holes in them, and that's why I'm a Jimmy Jon!"
Me: "Well, I use safety pins to keep my dress intact. Pretty sure that makes me a Jimmy Jon."
Dusty: "Our favorite restaurant is Olive Garden. That, ladies and gentlemen, makes us Jimmy Jons."
Me: "Ha! I use my panty-hose as a pasta drainer...and that's why I'm a Jimmy Jon."
Dusty: "I buy all my groceries from the bum next door...and that's why I'm a Jimmy Jon!"
Me: "Ack, our entire downstairs is courtesy of thrift stores and Craigslist. We are so Jimmy Jons."

For the record, some of these are true, and some of them are not. I won't say which are which.
I wish I could remember some of the ones we actually said that day, because we were in stitches, we were so pleased with ourselves. Suffice it to say, we're not too upset about being Jimmy Jons.

Yesterday, I was having a conversation with my friend Becky about fitness. We were talking about getting in shape, and how important it is to keep a tight core, and feel the burn, and bladda yadda work-out jargon.

One of the items of conversation became arms. I think it's especially important to women to have toned arms. The last thing you want is for your under-arm to do a flash-dance in the middle of you waving to the next-door neighbor.
We all want sexy-toned arms.
So I said, "Oh ya. It's a must. Especially in the summertime...I mean...when I put on my bridesmaid dress last night, I just kept my arms spread-eagle so there wouldn't be any unwanted skin gathering."
We had a good laugh.
I told Dusty about this conversation, because I thought it was really funny.

After work that night, we stopped by the grocery store to pick up some things for a barbecue we were going to. We grabbed some beans, hamburger/hot dog buns, and then headed down the chip aisle.
A very dangerous place!
I immediately spotted the Puff Cheetos, because I love those, and have been craving them since...the last time I ate them, and realized I never wanted to stop.

This was last year. Proof of our long-standing affair.

After we checked out, I asked Dusty if I could go ahead and open the Cheetos in the car.
He said no!
I was upset.

Dusty: "You need to have self control."
Me: Rolling my eyes, "I don't want any of that."
Dusty looks at me critically. We start to walk out the sliding doors.
Dusty: "Oh really? So, what? You just wanna be spread-eagle for the rest of your life?"

Funniest thing he's ever said to me. Except for one other thing, which I can't blog about, because it's super inappropriate.
But I thought I might pee my pants. I had to pause in the parking lot and compose myself.

The moral of the story is, when I think something is really funny, I can't. stop. laughing.
And going on a rant of hilarity is one of my favorite things to do, and I absolutely love that I have so many people in my life that allow me to be ridiculous.
Love you guys :)

Dusty, ya Jimmy Jon, I love ya.

In lots of love,
Cait