the tree

We initially chose our condo for it's good location on the second floor and the nice "greenery" it had on the balcony. Well, that greenery decided to make it's way into our house. Literally.

It's caused several problems, the first of which has created our SQUIRREL NINJA. Yes, squirrel. Every single morning, there is a squirrel that comes to the very tip of a branch closest to our balcony--he puffs up, and starts making these heinous squeaking sounds and both cats run out as if this dang squirrel is summoning them. They all three then have these ridiculous stare-downs until I finally get scared and run out, grab my cats, and scream at the squirrel before it attacks my head. He is a very aggressive squirrel. Beanie (Charlie) thinks he is the squirrel ninja, and provokes an attack from Mr. Squirrel and hisses at him and leans on the railing trying to get closer to him, so we gave him the new moniker of SQUIRREL NINJA. He thinks he is one tough kitty, and one of these days I tell JR, that squirrel is going to run in our house and murder our kitties. I myself am afraid of this squirrel. SQUIRREL NINJA doesn't know what he's up against...

The other problem it has caused has been to stir up JR's famous OCD. He says the tree is blocking his view of the outside world (i.e. the street) and the leaves building on our balcony are ruining his days. So, I called our building management and asked to have them call the property to which the tree belongs to have them cut down this tree that is growing/falling into our house. That was two days ago-----

This was last night:



We now have a TREE NINJA! JR could not wait for them to cut down the tree, so he went to mom's, got a saw and decided to cut off limb by limb on his own. crazzzzzzy. I'm not sure I've laughed this hard in awhile, my fiance has no patience for such matters! What makes me laugh the hardest is knowing that if it were me, I'm so lazy, I'd let that tree into our bedroom before I'd actually go saw down a tree myself :) Nonetheless, the tree is chopped and we can now see Blackburn once again, ahhhhhh roadside. So beautiful :)

thanksgiving numero uno

We will be heading up to the OK for our first Thanksgiving of the year!! yesssssssss! We are having to do it a little early to make sure everyone in the family can make it! I'm okay with early, because this allows me to start our holiday's even sooner! (Boomer Sooner)


Thanks to Lauren, she has informed me that 103.7 KVIL has officially started their non-stop Christmas music! I love everything from Halloween on, Halloween being my least favorite of the bunch...Thanksgiving is full of food, family, and sleeping. My three favorite things :)


JR still hasn't let us put the tree up, but I think I'll make him cave soon, it's time. I'm working on him one day at a time! Although, this 80 degree weather coming up really isn't helping my case much :/


** On a special sidenote, I may get a chance to babysit Baby Luke, our new newphew...and I am so excited to hold him, and love him, and kiss him!!

We hope you all have a great weekend! and we wish you a Happy Early Thanksgiving!!

a little delayed

Sorry about the late Halloween post! I got side-tracked...JR's costume was an old 70's Central High football coach, complete with the "packaged" shorts, and I was a schoolgirl :) naughty, naughty!

I even got JR to dance!! In the 6 years that I have now known him, I have never never seen him break it down, it was awesome!! He has Billy Madison moves :)
















We had burgers at our house first and invited The Neaves' over and Lauren & Clint! Lauren and Ricardo came as pirates, well Ricardo was more of a gay pirate!



Lauren and Clint were Wimbledon stars!!



The girl pic:



The boy pic:



We went to Tribeca for the costume party, and the best costumes there were by far the pervert coach and the gay pirate, hahahaha!



We also found some other interesting costumes at the party! Like Where's Waldo?!



a Blues Brother!

and a dirty ol' Santa!



and what would a good Halloween party be without some dancing!!!!!!!!!!!!!



and just a little bit more of JR dancing, enjoy!!!

i feel cheated

I come to you full of embarrassment and shame. In reference to my previous post about the presidential sighting, I've been fooled.

As Lauren sits next to me and assures me that it was a "semi-presidential" sighting I am regretfully updating our blog to inform you that it was the VP of the USA.

That's it. Dad broke the news to me, and Lauren made the pain a little more real by breaking out into a full-out hateful laugh. fine, fine, fine. You all win. She is forcing me to breakdown and post this update and confess my mistake. I am upset and feel cheated by the US govt. Why make such a big deal for a guy that can't even hunt well?

Even I can hunt better than Cheney.

To make this all the more real and disgusting, Lauren made me put on an "I was there" t-shirt with Bush/Cheney on it. I feel dirty.

we have our differences, but....

I am putting my political views at bay, strictly and temporarily for the sake of this post. JR and I saw President Bush last night, and I almost peed myself. I don't get real "stirred" up if you will, at the sight of him on TV, nor do I waste my time debating him. It's just too messy these days. To each their own...

However, I feel compelled to share a rather intense sighting on our part and one I'm sure our Republican friends shall appreciate.

Scene 1: I am in the works (months of internet researching/debating how much $$ I want to spend on a phone, more specifically a new Blackberry) so JR and I went to the Cingular/AT&T store right by our house. On our way home, after me not choosing to buy last night, ofcourse, we decide to stop by Arlington Hall (our wedding location) to see if the pavillion in which we will exchange marital vows is completed. It's not. Bummer, they have 7 months to go before I need that space. I'm okay. We start noticing there are several helicopters with those light-beam things hovering over Arlington Hall, which was packed with security as well and full of cars so we pass on thru and find a sneaky corner to park in.

Scene 2: You see, Dallas is like the big brother to Lawton. They both share an unusually high crime rate...so it's not unusual to see some cops/helicopters every once in awhile, so we decided to make an evening out of it and watch the show. We thought they were chasing down some crazy. By this point they had completely stopped all traffic at Lemmon and all of Turtle Creek Blvd. had been shut down and police barricades had set up at every light. JR was for SURE that a celebrity was coming through...I pointed out to him that there are celebrities here everyday and no one really cares. This was BIG! I knew it. I had an inkling it was the President, but JR didn't believe me. Dallas doesn't stop traffic for ANYTHING!!

Scene 3: About 10 minutes later, cars honking, people yelling (short tempers), sure enough the whole area gets completely quiet except for the loud hum of hovering copters. 1, 2, 3, 4---------30! Police motorcycles pass thru all at even distance apart (very coordinated-looking) then atleast 10 huge black Suburbans, like the ones in all the movies you see, then the 2 presidential bullet-proof limousines with the presidential seal on the side!!! You could even see in!!! AHHHHHHHH!!! It's the President of the United States!! It took probably 6-7 minutes for the whole convoy to pass through! One block from our house! The President! Oh my! I don't even agree with 98.7% of his policies!! Wow! We were hugging, and laughing, as if he'd come to see us! There were some other young couples out all snuggled up doing the same thing we were, haha!



Scene 4: Some people were clapping, some yelling obscenities (fair enough) but overall it was the biggest spectacle I've ever seen, and rumor has it that he was in town to see his new house in OUR NEIGHBORHOOD! The President of the United States might live in OUR NEIGHBORHOOD! I feel special and important. This won't change my vote though. I stand strong.

Regardless of our opposing views, as a welcome gift to the neighborhood I may even buy him this for Christmas:

trick or treat

Hope you all have a safe and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!




xoxo
JR and Nat

please enjoy

The Edwards family I've known for almost 20 years now, wow. Lauren, the oldest of the bunch has been a life-long friend of mine, and certainly one of my dearest. You know how every family has their "talented" kid, the one that can out-draw, sing, color, stitch the other siblings...well, that mold doesn't quite fit The Edwards Fam! They are ALL equally talented, and not just your average talent! All of them--Lauren, Laine, and the twins, Jillian and Cole!

Amazing singers! Each one of them! and ofcourse their parents Dave and Sandra! I couldn't carry a tune, never could really, but upon entering their house there was always someone playing the piano, singing in the shower, or playing the guitar! You would suddenly feel like you were part of a musical :) a really good one! ha!

Everyone's grown now, with the twins now in college (weird, Lauren and I used play with them when they were still in their cribs) and two of them now have Myspace pages with their music! All written by them! Incredible! It's music that makes you realize how beautiful life is! Such beautiful music, and so proud of them now being Myspace "artists"! Hey, that's big!! Lauren told me Jill has done some stuff at Baylor and was even included on a Baylor new-artist CD!! How awesome!!

Just had to brag about a beautiful family with an amazing singing talent! Please, enjoy!! I promise you will LOVE!

Here's Jillian's:

http://www.myspace.com/jillianedwardsmusic















and Laine's:

http://www.myspace.com/laineedwards

mind racing

I'm that rare breed of people that truly does not enjoy taking any sort of medication aside from the average cold meds. I was "diagnosed" with ADD my freshman year in college, and to be very honest, I thought they were wrong :) It was a long process of psychiatric evaluations, tests, and "talks" about any difficulties I have in paying attention............I tested with ADD. My parents do nothing half-way :) I had to do it all. Done.

Years go by, and I am now in my "career" per say, and I thought I was having a really bad case of forgetting. I will leave faxes unsent in the machine, my coffee in the kitchen---you name it, I'll forget it. I will literally "forget" everything!! It is horrible and I'm sure irritating to others :)

JR finally convinced me to try my ADD medication again, and it has worked wonders! ADD does not allow you to complete tasks without being easily subjected to other surrounding activities. You will leave your whole life unfinished because something better caught your attention, ha! Very frustrating! I succumbed to my ADD, and will see how the next month goes with it! Heck, I may conquer the world!!

The mix of my ADD medication and my new love for coffee has left me like this:

Keep Austin Weird

Wild weekend! Although that's nothing out of the ordinary for us, we headed south this time instead of north! It did feel good to get a change of scenery though...

The photoshoot went well, hectic, but good! We got there Friday around three, we toured the Hanger Hotel (location of the shoot) and I was straight into hair & makeup! It was shot literally in an old hanger/turned hotel that is straight out of the 40's! My shots were on an old plane and in the diner, but we def want to make a wknd out of it just to stay at this awesome hotel! I only shot for an hour or so, because we were trying to beat the sunset because another girl had to shoot right after me! It was quite frantic, but JR got to watch my first shoot from the second floor balcony that overlooks the runway! I'll have to approve the shots, before they make it to dad :/

We decided to head to Austin afterwards to enjoy the wknd with Ashley, who has a cute house down there! She was an amazing host, and was so gracious to allow us to take over her room for the wknd! We went out Friday night, and I got to see Laura, one of my dearest friends from college whom I have not seen in two years!! It was an emotional night of reuniting, and so so fun!


On Saturday, Ash took us for a tour of Austin, to see all of the beautiful nature! We love anything outdoors! We first went to Mt. Bonnell to get a view of Lake Austin!




We then headed over to The Green Belt for JR to see, since I'd been before, I wanted him to get a look!


Saturday night Ashley had to babysit, and Laura had a law party so JR and I took advantage and had a date night in Austin, TX!! Now, Texas is known for a lot of wonderful things, but my favorite is the TX BBQ!! Dinner was at The County Line on Lake Austin and I got the biggest plate of ribs I have ever seen in my whole life!! They were as big as my head! Simply divine! We gorged ourselves then headed back after our sinful meal...

The only thing I was uncomfortable with was all the burnt orange around, not to mention my car stuck out like a sore thumb with my OU license plate :) We got a few friendly hand gestures!! We almost wore our OU hats, but we figured we didn't want to go out in Austin, TX of all places...I choose life.

the first one!!

I have been given the fortunate experience of being 1 of 6 girls chosen to model for a calendar for The Bombshells for the 2009 year!!! and we shoot tomorrow!!! I still can't believe it!!!!!!!!!! ahhhhhh!

The story is random, ofcourse. One of the main models, Julienne, who has done the calendar the last two years, contacted me to see if I would be interested in meeting with her and Scott Slocum (the owner of The Bombshells, and Aeromarketing Group). We had the meeting a few weeks ago and he offered me a spot to shoot for the 2009 calendar!!



Bombshells was originally started as a marketing tool used to help showcase old warplanes, and photography of. It later grew, and Scott is continuing to grow the company with his chosen models. His plans are to do more shows with the models, magazines, and meet-and-greets! The Bomshells now include merchandise such as calendars obviously, posters, and other memorabilia! It's so exciting to be a part of something that I can model in only being 5'3!! Us short girls are limited to print!

I'm sure you're wondering JR's view on all of this, and he has been SO supportive and is very excited about this opportunity! JR has met Scott and ofcourse asked him the usual "JR 20 questions", because they're dealing with his soon-to-be wife!! haha! We are both heading down to Fredriksberg, TX tomorrow for my evening shoot :) He's coming along for the ride!! I also have to thank my dad who has been great, and is letting me miss a little bitty bit of work to go do this!! and mom, who is always my number one fan!

It seems kind of early I know, to be shooting something for 2009 but they are planning to take this to the national market, so it has to be ready by February!! There are 5 shows I think planned for next year too!!

Scott came by our house last night to do some last minute wardrobe, and then JR was a great sport and came to do some last minute shopping with me last night and even took me for a sushi dinner date afterwards :) Even though he's not the biggest fan, ha! I have the sweetest man in the whole world!! Thank you babe, I couldn't do it without you!!

We might be able to take some pictures while we're down there!! I'm sure you all are tired of blog-reading with no pics :) Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!

xoxo
JR and Nat

addiction

Coffee on the brain. I come from a long line of coffee drinkers. I'm surprised they haven't named a coffee after my parents, The Heffesse Brew.

I have previously scoffed at those tied down to the java fix (i.e. mom, dad, Ronnie, Joe....) why? why do you need this drink everyday to live?

I know now. It is exactly 10:35 am, 7 minutes after my first sip, and I just now feel like my day is starting. This morning, I tried to avoid the java and indulge myself with a nice big Dallas Cowboys glass of OJ with ice, just how I like it. I slept thru the first 2 whole hours of work today!!

new addiction: starbucks dark roast. good morning.

webster's

Look up slacker in the dictionary, and you'll find me. After my highly-boisterous claim of working out everyday and training for whatever half-marathon I end up choosing, I failed myself. I have failed us all.

After my hair appt last night, I got home and JR was being productive as usual and I got home and immediately started eating. That's where I first went wrong. After 5 minutes of my moaning and groaning about how tired/sore/lazy/pathetic I was, JR told me it was okay if we skipped a day.

Motivated Nat-0 Lazy Nat-1

game on.

9-5'er

I never thought I'd be a 9-5'er, well an 8-5'er to be more specific. The exact duration of me living the corporate life is unknown--I will see where the wind takes me. In the meantime, I stumbled upon this clever invention, rather ridiculous really, but I thought it would be a nice laugh for anyone that spends their Monday-Friday in an office. If I were boss one day, I would put one in every office :)



Then I'd make us all do a marathon together. Just a half, really.



Ladies and gentlemen: I present the absurd, The Walkstation.





A combo workstation/treadmill. Are we that lazy that we can't go to work THEN go to the gym?? I am.

lacking fitness

Yesterday was officially our first day back to the gym. See, Gold's Gym is sneaky...they fill their grand ol' gym with lights, millions of machines, great music and even a movie theater!! It's the neatest gym I've ever seen but what they don't tell you when you sign up is how much pain all of these fine things will cause you.

I thought I was semi-prepared for a good workout. Lies.

JR and Scott ran off straight for the movie theater, ofcourse, so I set up shop at the treadmill to see how much "running/shuffling" I could do...one mile. One measly mile, with a two minute break. Pathetic on all levels, but moreso for the fact that the half-marathon training STARTS at 3 miles. These people must be crazy. I then opted for something a little less invasive and hard, so I went back to the elliptical for a nice, smooth mile "walk" on that machine. After a few ab workouts I was good to go! I went and found the boys and Scott told me he saw one of his friends upstairs (Scott always knows someone, everywhere we go) and that he was about to start a dance class.....hmmmm provocative.

I think to myself, well! I've danced my whole life, this will be easy and fun. My whole evening was full of lies. I don't lie to you, I hate it and am not good at it, but I somehow manage to blatantly lie to myself all the time when it comes to my physical state of laziness. Continuing----I walk into the class and there's about 30 other people in there, so I figured I could blend in nicely, maybe stand in the front, "wow" everyone with my killer dance moves. After about 7 minutes, I was in the very back corner.

HARD, HARD, HARD. This was an entire hour I believe to end your life. I saw my life flash before my eyes, a couple of times. I should have done my research, you see. What I later find out in water break number 34, that the name of the class is Body Jam: a high-intensity dance training made to compensate for 1-2 hours of intense cardiovascular workouts. Ummmmm, yes. Flipping ridiculous. I was spinning, falling, jumping, swaying, hip-popping, you name it. Everytime JR would walk by he would laugh a little...he said he loved watching me though :)

I'm rather "sloth-like", I am a creature born to lay around, eat alot, and not exert myself in any way physically. JR calls me his little sloth, Lauren you're probably laughing right now! Too much coffee and I turn into this maniac and workout for 2 hours!! I have never done that. May not ever again. I am ailing today. My bones feel as though they are made out of metal...

In closing: control coffee intake

sigh of relief

GREAT NEWS!!! Dad went to the cardiologist today to do another stress test to measure any abnormalities they may find and he came out with a clean bill of health and was told to come back in a year!!! We are all so relieved and thankful that he is healthy and that he can enjoy his normal routine (in no particular order) of family, food, traveling, and poker!

i have a lot to say today

So, every few months or so I get this very random burst of personal-productiveness and it has no real bearing to any event in my life other than that my laziness eventually bores me and I feel as though I must redeem myself and do something I normally would not do.



perfect example: getting braces. I woke up one day and decided I needed braces. (i.e. random burst of personal productiveness)



Now for my current future feat of productiveness, I introduce to you:

No, your eyes are not seeing lies. I am going to attempt the White Rock HALF-marathon. 13 miles folks. Thirteen miles of death. I am not a runner. again, I am not a runner. I couldn't run to save my life or yours for that matter. I would rather accept defeat, than attempt to move my limbs at such a pace.

Insert today. I woke up today, had a few cups of coffee and all of a sudden I feel like I can save the world. I think I'm under the influence of java b/c I am never this motivated. Ever. Feels like an out-of-body experience. It may subside tomorrow, but I figure that for as long as I'm coffee'd up I can maintain this enthusiasm to better my life/running skills.

(It also helps, that my best friend Ryan runs these silly things and basically threatens my life if I don't atleast try.)

There, you have it. My random burst of personal productiveness. What's yours?

sweet heavens

my ipod works again. i was starting to panic. i cannot workout sans ipod. physically cannot move in such an aggresive physical manner without music. britney's "gimme more" seems to do the trick. welcome back to life my ipod. hope you're ready to make me skinny...we have work to do.

he's 27!!

JR is officially old :)

Late twenties, pushin' thirty, old fart...and some others that his friends have given him, but shall remain private due to the family nature of this site!

He had a wonderful, relaxing birthday!! I'm sorry I have no pictures (slacking, major) but I can give you a brief synopsis of the weekend's activities.

This is how high-class we are: enjoy.

Friday night, after work, I told JR I'd treat him to a birthday dinner at Ponder, which many of you know is one of our favorite places to eat. Problem is, a few miles down the highway is Dairy Queen. Not just your average DQ, but most likely the most spectacular DQ in the world. No lie, the burgers there are my number 2, behind Meers. I know, you're gasping right now. They are that good. We couldn't decide if we wanted Ponder or a delicious burger from DQ. We were actually debating between a restaurant and a DQ....DQ it was. We couldn't help ourselves, and decided to make it a classy birthday dinner in JR's truck :) we're romantic and fancy like that!!

Saturday, JR went hunting with Ronnie while I slept the whole morning thru, standard. We laid around the house most of Saturday then got ready and went up to The City to Bass Pro where JR got a new fishing rod for the reel Joe bought him awhile back!! Then for the good part....

Dinner at Mickey Mantle's. Sweet sweet goodness of the world. I personally had one of the best steaks in the whole entire world. It was just right. Salted to perfection. Meaty, juicy and divine. All of us stuffed ourselves and left with big smiles and tummies to match!! oh man. so good.

Sunday, Nancy made the famous rib meal for lunch and certainly last but not least I finally got to meet Baby Luke. He is precious and perfect and is so aware of his surroundings. He doesn't just look at you, he studies you and tries to figure you out. Smart, smart baby. Never cries, and is perfectly content all snuggled up in your arms. He's my first 'newborn', so I'm learning with him. He's going to show me the way :) big kisses to him...We've made tentative plans for us all to head up to Weatherford soon for us all to be together one wknd!! can't wait!

okay, that's alot of writing and no pictures! sorry! Thank you all for the birthday wishes JR got! He had a great birthday!! Happy Fall week!

this is JR week!

only 5 more days until JR's 27th birthday!!

truth

Fairy Tale:

One day, long, long ago, there was this woman who surprisingly,
did not whine, nag or bitch........





















But this was a long time ago.....

and it was just ONE day.

The End