Valentines Day

So for Valentines day Matt decided to treat me by taking me to Fontill Castle in Doylestown Pennsylvania. Its a castle that a man named Henry Mercer built in late 1800's. Its a beautiful concrete castle, with so much artifacts and history in it.
I had a lot of fun and if you know anything about me I am a huge history buff (especially ancient history and anthropology) so I was just in awe of his private collection that he was able to have during the course of his life time, especially when getting things from the other side of the world was not feasible for most people in his generation.

Now when I said that Matt treated me, he REALLY treated me because history and museums are just NOT his thing. He sacraficed his leisurely day in order to drive up 4 hours and down 4 hours all the while being in a great mood and not complaining at all that he was going to drive me to place to explore a topic that he has absolutely no interest in.

I had so much fun and definitley recommend it to people who are history buffs and love castles.



The front of the FontHill castle



Inside one of my favorite rooms, his library. He had over 6000 books over his lifetime, written in 15 different languages where he could only read 5 of fluently. (Yeah- only 5. He was an underachiever apparently)


Note the TV in the background was not a part of his collection


Side view of the castlle from the balcony of his bedroom.



And just compensation for my husband: Sonic. Look at his happy face. I LOVE HIM!!!




I love road trips with my hubby.

Christmas time

Sorry that I have been MIA. I just don't see the point of posting if there aren't pictures.

But then again I am horrible with taking my camera everywhere.

As far as updates go, Please pray for my mother. She has decided to close her store because her business has been so bad. The recession is preventing people from spending their money and its affecting small private owned business such as my mother's. We have no idea what she is planning to do for income afterwards so prayer would be much appreciated.

But we know that the Lord will provide as long as we seek Him first and there is much comfort coming from that.

Here are some pictures from the holidays:

Look at my parents, aren't they cute? They decided to wear matching outfits.

Bathroom

Today history was made: the first African American president was elected into the most powerful office position in the free world.

But I still choose to blog about my new bathroom today.

HA

Here are the before pictures. There were so many little things I could've fixed beforehand but why bother when we knew that we were going to be changing EVERYTHING about it anyways?

Before






Yes, navy blue toilet seat. EWWWWWWWWW Barf in my mouth

When demolition was going on inside I was screaming, "Yes!! BURN IT ALL!!!"

Our shower and vanity

My pride and joy in the bathroom. Granite sink.

Jacuzzi tub

I never have to massage Matt again...

Our stone ceramic floor.
Ahhhhhh....

Next project:
Upstairs bathroom (there is a leak apparently in the pipes so its has to be gutted as well)
and carpets in the bedrooms..
and FINALLY THE KITCHEN!!! (Julie off to fantasty dream land now)

I love the Fall

The weather has finally started to get cold!

For those of you who do not know I LOVE the cold weather. It makes me all happy and giddy inside. Maybe its because I have so many happy memories associated with the cold weather. And also being a romantic at heart I love how romantic the cold weather can be. Couple days ago my husband blessed me with starting a fire in the fireplace and I curled right up next to it with a good novel. Ahhh...heaven. Well close to heaven for me.

I imagine my house in heaven to contain that HUGE library that Belle was introduced to in Beauty and the Beast. (You ladies know what I'm talking about)

Can I also share another tidbit? My husband wrote a cute Haiku poem for me yesterday. I mean it turned out more of a comical value than a romantic one but it warms my heart how much my husband is making the effort to step out of his mold to be romantic to me! Of course I gobble it all up.

I love Thanksgiving. I love Christmas. I love this time of year!

Also I bought some new clothing and can't wait to get it in the mail. I found this great website that sells clothing cheaply but there are some catch to it like paying for shipping cuz it ships from hong Kong.

Here are some of the things that I purchased. If you want to know if the matieral is worth the price I paid for it just ask! (Hopefully it will arrive next week)

Summer 2008

So the summer of 2008 was a busy one for the Smiths. Among weddings, anniversary, birthdays, family gatherings, etc. it was a blessed time. I think there were maybe like 3 weekends total all summer where Matt and I had NOTHING to do- which can be a good thing and a bad thing. Oh yeah did I mention a mock olympics? (Think adults covered in dish wash soap and a big water slide)No pictures of those unfortunately. God is so kind to us and even though I am struggling with a complaining heart these days, writing blogs like this help to remind me of His goodness and kindness.

So ready for a throw up of pictures? I have been pretty bad about taking my camera with me to places but this is what I have of summer 2008. I am trying to be better about the Fall. It starts with just a random pictures of some people from nyc coming down for a wedding/slash my birthday. Poor girlies just collapsed as soon as they arrived to MD!


My wonderful mom during my birthday dinner.
Emmm Kar bee- its a korean BBQ. Probably one of my favorite meals to eat besides sushi.

One of the events that I do at work is the annual Staff picnic. This year was so much fun! The greatest compliment that you can get as a event planner is that your event was the most fun they have ever had...by kids! One of my pastors came up to me and said that his son said "Dad it's impossible to have any more fun next year then I did this year!" (Be still my heart)
Katherine (my co-worker) and one of my other co-worker's son. Soo cute! Katherine is probably one of the most godliest women I know and have the honor of encountering with on a daily basis. When I grow up I want to be just like her! (Too bad she is younger than me-what does that say about me?)



Matt took me to a butterfly exhibition at Brookside gardens. It was sooo beautiful! There were HUNDREDS of butterflies everywhere and I absolutely loved it. Even Matt was entertained. We wished that we could've stayed in there for hours on end, but unfortunately it was a jungle-temperature in the exhibition so we only stayed for oh..one hour. =D


Please excuse Matt's clothing- we went right after his Brazilian Jujitsu class
Then on September 16th, we celebrated our two year anniversary! I can't believe how fast the time goes. God has been so kind to us and continues to bless us and our marriage. Its the best thing I have ever done with my life so far and I am so blessed to be married to this man! We celebrated by going to where else? One of our favorite sushi places in MD called Sushi Sono in Columbia. It was also where we had our first AND second date..hehe.


First thing, I suck at picture taking. Really I do if you don't know by now. Probably because my practice comes only through taking pictures of my husband or food. I really need lessons- so I apologize for the blurriness!

This past weekend we went up to nyc for a wedding, my wonderful friend Yvonne got married. She was probably one of the most elegant brides I have ever seen.
The happy couple. They came into the reception walking to "We are the champions song" while the groom held a WWF champion belt and the bride doing a motion of "bring it on" sort of attitude. I love them!! By the way, is there a correlation with a Taiwanese wedding and the color pink? This is yet another Taiwanese wedding that I went to where everything was pink. Just wondering...

Some girlies from Remnant Westside church. Man.. brings back goooooddd memories.

Our gracious hosts. James was kind enough to let us stay at his place (his building has some SNL celebrities living there plus US weekly Editor in chief) and Mizy kept buying us food! The cupcakes from Magnolia bakery was...INSANE. *droolllll Can't wait until their wedding!
Upcoming posts, once our jacuzzi comes in our contractor will start on our bathroom renovation! We are super excited, we are pretty much gutting everything and making it new. Finally one of our house projects are going to get done. I will DEFINITELY be taking pictures of before and after. But then again I might not be interested in posting up the before since its gross...

Getting old and the Great American Detox Diet

Hope everyone had a good weekend!
Matt, my sister Cindy and I went to Bethany Beach in Delaware this past weekend for a last, summer beach event and had a blast. Matt's company rented out a 7 bedroom beach house right on the beach, and it was wonderful. We went out to the beach, went Jet skiing and ate LOTS of food of course.

I am hoping that my sister will send some pictures so I could show you the pictures of the biggest crabs I have ever seen. Since last year I have been allergic to crabs and now i cannot eat them anymore. =(
Whenever I eat them I have the worst stomach cramps and some other unmentionable body functions. These crabs might have been worth the pain but we were planning to travel home that night so I figured it wouldn't be so wise to be that sick when planning to sit in the car for 3 hours.

Matt's boss has his own boat and 3 jet skiis that he allows his guests to use freely so my sister was out on the jet skii literally for like HOURS (glad to know that she had so much fun!)

Now after a month of HORRIBLE eating, and Matt starting to train again for Brazilian Jiujitsu, we have to start eating healthy again. I have been reading this book called the Great American Detox diet. Its written by Alex Jamieson, the wife of the guy who did SuperSize Me.

She is a vegan chef who apparently was able to get him back in shape within a matter of 8 weeks using her recipes. Before I have started to eat a little more like how she suggests and I could feel the difference in my body. I stopped craving nasty, oily foods and would even start to have reactions when I would eat them.
Now i start to get headaches if I eat something too salty and feel uncomfortable if I don't eat enough fruits and vegetables.

So with a little encouragement Matt have decided to not go Full blast vegan, but geared towards more vegetarian. So if anything we will have meat like probably 3 times a week, and then the rest of the protein will come from beans and tofu.

Ever since I turned 25 I feel like my body has been falling apart slowly. I really need to invest in taking care of it so I am in tip top shape when I am in my 50s. I would hate to retire and then physically be in a condition where I can't do anything!

Some recipes (at least the ones that we like) i will post to share.

Coming updates

Sorry i seriously need to update. There have been alot of stuff going on and in the midst of enjoying novels, Olympics, Matt getting sick and working, working, working.

I have some pictures to post soon I promise. Also get this: we are attempting to be vegetarian!