The Best Laid Plans...

...of mice and men often go awry.

I love to blog. Even more so, I love hearing from friends and family that they follow my blog. So why is it that the past few months I've posted all of what? Two times? Fail.

I make plans to post....just hasn't happened much lately.

So Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and Happy Birthday to Brad and Happy Birthday to my mom. Bam! We're caught up.

Even if it was almost an entire month ago, I can't not post pictures of Christmas. It was our first Christmas in our new house...

And it was my mom and Riley's first year to have Christmas at their new house. A long time dream come true for my mom. She turned her house into something that belongs in a magazine. (I say "she" but Riley certainly did his fair share, too.)

My mom's Christmas village

The little fishing village...how cool is this?

And the cherry on top was that we were all there.

Hailey, Cody, and Liam drove down from Oklahoma...

Lori, Mike, and Shiner flew in from Florida...

Aunt Kelli and Joel joined us, too...

And of course, us and the pup...

We even got in a little time with the Gonzales clan...

It was a fantastic Christmas with family...

The boys did the dishes...Merry Christmas to me!

Aren't they adorable? A little impromptu dancing...

An "A" for effort on the bow, honey

Brad brought his favorite pjs

This face just kills me...so stinkin cute!

A little smooch for Stella

Cousins

I was so grateful that things worked out the way they did this year. It's always hard to get to see everyone around the holidays but we got pretty lucky. We spent the weekend before Christmas visiting Grandma and Grandpa Beneke then Ma Ma Bingham. My dad and Carmen drove down the Monday before just so we could have dinner together and enjoy a mini Christmas. We spent Christmas weekend at my Mom and Riley's house. Then Debby, Dennis, and Stephanie stopped by on their way through town and we were able to enjoy dinner and another mini Christmas with them. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of any of this which I'm kicking myself for...but we'll always have the memories.

It was nice reminiscing about where we were just one year before...

We celebrated Brad's birthday with a bunch of friends on the 30th and had them all over to our place again the following night to ring in the New Year. I have no pictures to show of this. But believe me, it happened.

And I woke up New Year's Day with a viral sinus infection which knocked me on my butt for almost two weeks. But that's not an exciting story.

What is an exciting story is that I'm working again. I started the middle of December and I'm only contracted through the Super Bowl but so far I'm loving it. It's with a sports marketing consulting agency and I'm working on a program for Verizon. It's Verizon's first year as an official Super Bowl sponsor and I'm working with a small team to plan their events leading up to the big game. The parties and dinners, the athlete appearances, the schnazzy give-aways...it's old hat for some people but I still find it thrilling to be a part of. We'll see what the future holds.

With that said, life is about to get crazy busy until after Super Bowl Sunday. Who know's if there will be another post until after February 6th. But at least I'm telling you now, right? Who knows, maybe Bradley will grace us with his "presence" and do a little posting on our behalf. I wouldn't hold my breath though.

Until next time...

Giving Thanks...Better Late Than Never

You know when life just gets really slow and boring and there's really not a lot to talk about? Well, that's what has happened to me...thus the reason for no blog updates lately. Just nothing to talk about.

Not buying it? I wouldn't either.

Let's get caught up, shall we? Is it sad I had to look through my camera just to remember what all has happened lately? What a blur...and not because copious amounts of wine were involved.

We spent Thanksgiving in Oklahoma this year and it was wonderful. Brad and I are going to try this thing were we actually enjoy the holidays with our families. This means slowing down and not driving to six different locations throughout Oklahoma and Texas. It'll be a tradeoff each year. So far, I think it's a great plan.

Back to Thanksgiving...time for pictures!

My lovely mother in law and darling sister in law

(Don't we look cute in our gray and black?)

Making Bourbon Sweet Potatoes

(don't mind that pitcher of mimosas sitting there)

My Handsome Helper

Time to eat!

Let's not forget the "kiddie" table

Stella was in the giving spirit. She was giving Charley hell when it came to sharing toys.

The Aftermath of Thanksgiving Dinner

The following Saturday was BEDLAM! And we were pumped. This was a huge game for both OSU and OU and there was only one way to get the day started off right...Orange Pancakes. If you haven't had them, you're missing out. They are a staple in the Bingham household on gameday. That and mimosas...we had to keep the orange theme going.

Fellow tailgaters heading north on I35

We got lucky this year for Bedlam and had a night game. Which meant an entire day full of tailgating.

Brats, burgers, chicken...she did it all. Delish!

A little Jenga action...always entertaining.

Let's take a moment to stop and look at that last picture once more. You may notice this:

I have no words.

The game was certainly exciting but the outcome was not exactly what we were hoping for...so we're going to skip that part.

The following morning we met my parents and grandparents for a beautiful (and tasty) brunch at Bellini's in Oklahoma City.

From left: Baby Liam, Hailey, Grandmother, Granddad, Carmen, Dad, Brad, me, Mom, and Riley

We spent the afternoon catching up with my grandparents, Dad, and Carmen before hitting the road back Dallas. We had a big Monday ahead of us. The day had finally arrived and we were closing on our new house. After 98 days in hotels, we were about to be in our very own place...

TheLaska....Part Three

Time to wrap up our amazing trip to Alaska...

5/15/2006

I'm back on a plane leaving the greatest trip ever! My days are all mixed up because we haven't actually slept yet (except for a few minutes on the flight from Anchorage to LA) plus we had a pretty busy day yesterday. Scott and Mindi made us eggs and french toast for breakfast then we packed up lunches and drove out to some "moderate" hiking trail. Moderate according to whom? It ended up being somewhat difficult and we might have made it to the top if it weren't for the 30 pound bag we were lugging and the mosquitos that were the size of small birds! Instead, we hiked back down and had a picnic at Kincaid Park with Mt. McKinley as our backdrop. We did a little more hiking and called it a day.

Since it was Mother's Day we figured we'd better find something good for our moms so we went shopping in downtown Anchorage. We found some great souvenirs and cute gifts then made our way back to the house.

After getting cleaned up and resting a bit, we all started dinner. It turned out to be delicious!! Grilled salmon, corn on the cob, a tasty salad - yum! We played CatchPhrase before heading to the airport for our flight that left at midnight. I wish we could have stayed a few more days but now it's time to start thinking about my next adventures. Moving, the big interview, the cruise, and then Italy! I'll worry about catching up on sleep later.

Goodbye, Alaska!

**I think if I could re-live any month of my life (with the exception of the month I married Brad, I would do that over in a heartbeat) the month we went to Alaska would have to be it. Not only was our trip to Alaska incredible, but three days after that I went on a cruise through the Caribbean with my dad, stepmom, and sister for a week. THEN a few days after that vacation I flew to Italy for a couple of weeks with my mom's side of the family. May of 2006 was certainly a whirlwind adventure filled with wonderful memories....if only I'd started blogging earlier.

TheLaska...Part Two

Back to our Alaskan Adventure....if you didn't read the post yesterday you may find yourself a tad lost, so get on it.

5/14/2006

Where to start?! The past two days are days I hope I NEVER forget. We got up Thursday morning, ate a little breakfast, and drove about an hour and half to Talkeetna. It was this tiny little town with no more than five or six streets. We went to Talkeetna Air Travel (or something close) and they told us we could go ahead and go on up. So Brad, Stephanie, Scott, myself, and another couple get in this seven passenger plane with our pilot, Bill. We finally take off and the first part of the flight we were flying over Musket (I think) and we could spot a few houses. There were three rivers that came down from the glacier we were headed towards. There were just enough clouds out so we could just barely make out Mount McKinley but other than that it was gorgeous!

When we arrived at the base of the mountain the snow was pure white and every so often we could see glacial pools that were electric blue. They didn't even look real! I didn't really grasp how big this glacier was and how high we were until Bill pointed out these climbers who were camping out in the middle of the glacier. They looked like ants, no - smaller. The crevices that looked like divets in the snow were actually one hundred or more feet deep!

We landed on the glacier and were able to get out and walk around. I still can't comprehend the magnitude of this thing. What looked like one mile away was actually five. We took some pictures and got back in our plane. I sat in the back on the way home so I could see out both sides. Just stunning.

The plane got stuck in the snow

After our plane ride, we found a local pizza place, ate dinner and headed on back. Scott, Brad's uncle, ended up having to work at the hospital so we just came back and crashed (which was good since I woke up at 5:45 am the next morning).

Our third day was again, incredible. The four of us (Brad, Stephanie, Scott, and myself) drove to Seward, which was about a two hour drive through the most beautiful scenery I've ever seen! Mountains covered in snow, lakes that looked like mirrors; it truly looked like something out of a movie. When we got to Seward, the first thing we did was visit The Alaskan Sea Life Center. We saw sea lions, fish, giant crabs, puffin birds, and a lot of other interesting creatures.

After The Sea Life Center, we headed over to the Kenai Fjords Tours to check in and look at all of the boats. The town had about 3,000 people; it just seemed like this perfect little fishing village. We started out our trip sitting on the top deck at the back of the boat. It didn't take long for us to get inside to thaw out. The first part of the trip was relatively uneventful. The scenery was incredible but all we really saw were a few mountain goats. The boat dropped everyone off for lunch at a cabin on Fox Island. We had a really great salmon meal then walked around the beach.

After getting back on the boat, things got exciting! We joked all day about wanting to see whales not thinking it would actually happen. From what we were told, it was too early in the season for that. First we saw several doll porpoises but that was nothing compared to the pod of orca we saw swimming in a cove. The captain stopped the boat and we watched the pod for a while. A few minutes later two humpback whales came along, too! We had whales to the left, right AND in front of us. Then one of the humpbacks jumps out of the water like he knew we were there and he wanted to put on a show. It was unbelievable! Something you'd only see on the Discovery Channel.

A little later we saw a large group of sea lions all laying out on a big rock. They didn't even seem real. We saw two or three big groups of sea lions throughout the ride. On the way back to Seward, there were a few more mountain goats, several bald eagles, and a couple glaciers. When we were pulling into the harbor, a large sea lion that had a big fish in its mouth was taunting all of the seagulls. He'd jump out of the water and fling the fish around while the seagulls were dive bombing him to get a piece. It was the perfect ending to the perfect day.

Oh! I completely forgot what kicked the whole day off! We woke up to a moose wandering around the backyard! It was awesome! I'm out there in my pajamas, a towel on my head at 6:15 in the morning taking pictures of a moose. He ended up jumping the fence and went strolling down the middle of the street. We knew it was going to be the best day after that and it was.

Unfortunately, Scott got called back into work so after dinner we went to the hospital to take him some spaghetti. He let us sit in the helicopter he flies which was amazing. By the end of the evening, we were spent. We went back to the house and crashed...again.