What is it with men and details?

Ok. So let me preface this by saying that I have a wonderful husband. He is sweet, compassionate, loving, tender, and let's not forget....he's a hottie. With all of that said, I must proceed to what he is not.

Detail oriented.

Jamie's boss asked him to go on a men's weekend retreat. His boss graciously offered to pay for Jamie's entire trip, which was very nice. So Jamie agreed to go.

He comes home and tells me about the retreat. Here is our conversation.

Me: "Oh, that sounds like fun, where is it?"

Jamie: "I don't know, but I think in North Carolina"

Me: "Well, what are you going to be doing?"

Jamie: "I don't know, but I think playing golf and fishing"

Me: "How fun! Where are you going to be staying"

Jamie: "I don't know."

Me: "Oh ok. But you might want to find some of these things out before you leave."

Jamie: "Ok."

Now we are going to fast forward to when Jamie is packing and getting ready to leave. It is 10:30 the night before he is leaving.....

Jamie: (getting all of his clothes together, brings in two towels to pack)

Me: "Why are you taking towels?"

Jamie: "I think we have to, it's a community bath house or something like that."

Me: "Well, do you think you have to take bedding also, since you think it is a cabin?"

Jamie: "I don't know.....I didn't even think about that."

Me: "Well, we might want to find that out before you leaving in the morning!"

Sure enough. He did have to pack his bedding. It continues....

While he is on the road he calls....

Jamie: "Hey babe. What's going on?"

Me: "Not much. Where are you?"

Jamie: "Chatanooga"

Me: "Chatanooga!!! Why are you in Chatanooga? That's not on the way to North Carolina!!"

Jamie: "Oh, I think we are going to Georgia."

Sometimes I wonder about that man.......

Wife of the year?

So this past weekend we had an adventure at our house.

One of the puppies came up missing. Jamie woke up in the middle of the night to find Maggie (momma dog) barking. He went out to check on her and found that one of the little ones was gone. So he searched around our house at 3:00 in the morning in nothing but his boxers and a t-shirt. I, of course, was oblivious to all of this. Because at 3:00 in the morning it would take a small explosion next to my head to wake me.

Saturday morning we wake up and J. tells me of the nights adventures. So we go out to check on the dogs and discover that there is another one missing. We now have seven instead of nine. We didn't really know what to do and I must say that we were a little worried about adopting, you know, a baby when we can't keep up with puppies.

We finally saw Maggie coming out of this little patch of brush and trees next to our house. So, we followed her back in. Sure enough....she had moved one of the puppies. But one was still missing. So J. went back in the brush and found this old hollowed out stump. In order to get back to this area you have to first get on your knees and then crawl on your belly. Now, we all know that I am not going to do this, so of course my 6 foot 2 husband takes on the job. He crawls under there and rescues the little guy.

When we brought the lost puppy back to the dog house, Maggie WAS NOT happy. As soon as J. set him down, Maggie picked him back up and carried him back to the hole. So we decide, that we might as well help her move all of them. So we carried each puppy back into the hallowed out crawl space.

Now, Jamie has a little bit of a problem with his knees. Sometimes one of them tends to "fall out of place". Sounds lovely I know. So as he was putting the last puppy in, he went to turn and his knee fell out of place. Great. Now what am I supposed to do? We are in the middle of the woods, with a rotweiller (yeah, I don't know how to spell that) and her now 8 puppies. Did I mention that J. is 6 foot 2 and lets just say a little over 250 pounds?

Seriously, all I could think was "I'm going to have to take him to the hospital and I haven't even brushed my teeth."

If there was such an award as the "Compassionate Wife Award", I feel like I should totally be nominated.

So I went into the house and got a bottle of water and Tylenol. After all, if Tylenol can't fix it then what else will? The whole time I was walking back into the house, I was fuming. My thoughts "I told him to go to the Doctor about this knee 4 months ago and he wined because he doesn't want to have surgery. Serves him right". My fellow friends....Jamie is so lucky to have me for a wife.

I went back into the woods bearing these gifts to find Jamie very pale and nauseas. He was in a lot of pain. So what do I do? Stand there and look at him of course.

Finally, he got his knee to pop back into place. The sound was something I would rather not hear again. But after he got it "fixed" he was fine. He was able to get up and walk himself out of the woods. Which was quite a relief to me.

I went and got him an ice pack and after he had laid down, you know like 5 minutes after this had happened, I proceeded to tell him that "If you don't go to the Doctor about this knee, I am going to be very upset". This should make anyone want to go to the Dr. I mean, who wanteth the wrath of Marcie? Needless to say that is not what sweet J. needed to hear. Once again...wife of the year right here in the flesh.

Jamie recovered quickly and now is back to normal. We did, however, send the puppies to their rightful owner. We came home from church on Sunday and there was another one missing. Now there are seven puppies total. We called Maggie's owner and he came and got all of them. I was a little sad, but I know this is the best thing for them and obviously Jamie too.

Just so we all know, when faced with high pressure, painful situations with my husband. I will think of myself. everytime. Anyone care to nominate me for wife of the year?

It is quit possible that it has gone too far.....

For those of you who don't know, my in-laws live right next door to us. It has been an adventure! We love them dearly and are excited to share things with them. I especially like to share my mother-in-laws food. Well, I guess I don't really share that, just eat it.

So a little while ago I was out sweeping the front porch off, trying to find any excuse to be outside enjoying this wonderful weather. My father-in-law came down with a huge plate of food for Maggie (the momma dog with the nine puppies who took residence in our dog house). Well, as he was leaving he said...

"Why don't ya'll come up for dinner tonight....we are having Mama Sue and Papaw over also (Jamie's grandparents)."

me: "Sure, we'd love to"

father-in-law: "We maybe can play cards afterwards"

me: "Well, that sounds like fun.....but we can't stay too long because the basketball tournaments are on tonight."

Yes...that actually came out of my mouth. What happened to me that I would rather sit and watch a basketball game than throw down on a mean game of Rook? I have lost my mind. I tell you whose fault this is....it's Jamie's. He had to go and bring me that bracket home. Now...all I can think about it winning.

A little side note- I was a cheerleader in high school and college...and couldn't tell you until three weeks ago what an offensive foul was. Seriously people, it has gone too far.

On a Serious Note....

I have been thinking a lot lately (scary I know) about simplicity and solitude. My question has been "Is it really possibly to have a simple life and to find moments of silence and solitude in this crazy hustle and bustle world?"

Now, this question does go deeper. What is the point of desiring simplicity? Should we desire a simple life just because it is simple? Should we even desire it at all? What if that is "just not our personality"?

What are the practical applications of a "simple life"? What do we do when we are desiring solitude but we have demands that must be met?

These are all questions I have been pondering for the last week. I feel that my life has been a little hectic. I have been just floating through my days, busying myself with things that aren't of lasting importance. Now, I realize that the mundane tasks of our lives have to be done. I guess what I am really asking is why does the world disagree with simplicity and solitude? Even in Christian circles? Isn't this what we should be desiring?

Any thoughts or practical applications?

Add: The picture at the top is from our last trip to Guatemala. It always reminds me that I need to slow down and really think about my life and how I am living it. The Guatemalan life style is so simple. I really desire that. (Not to be Guatemalan, but the lifestyle!) So that is the reason for the picture.

I am Winning!

Ok, so I realized that it's been a week since I last posted. I am sorry. Here is what has been happening in my life this week......

My friend had an almost ten pound baby. Not by C-Section. God bless her. She is, what my husband called, "a stud".

I had a yucky sinus infection. Coughing, sneezing, and snot galore made me a sight to see. Lucky Jamie. Still blowing my nose hourly. Thank the Lord for Tylenol P.M. It really has been my best friend this week. If non animate objects can be your friend that is. I feel that they can and I totally think drugs that make me sleepy qualify.

We still have nine puppies that we are taking care of. We went from 2 dogs to 12. No my adding is not wrong, we are taking care of the momma dog also. Just an hour ago we got them all out of the dog house for the first time. The are so cute and already getting so big!

Jamie, bless his little heart, is working in our bathroom. We moved into our house last August. Our master bathroom has yet to be tiled. So with a little nudging (or nagging) from me, he has begun the project. Tile is being laid as we speak (or as I type). Hallelujah.

The biggest news in the Autry house currently though is that I AM WINNING. Now, if you don't know me, I am a little bit competitive. I don't know how I acquired this trait considering I was not involved in sports in High School or college. But give me a board game and I will throw down. Victory or death is my motto on a game of Cranium, or any other game for that matter. So Jamie came home and the guys at his work all filled out brackets for the NCAA basketball tournaments going on. I talked him into bringing me one home. This was his first mistake. I filled out my brackets with no research, no previous knowledge of what teams should be picked. But, I am blowing them all out of the water. As of right now I am leading by four points. That means four picks. I just wanted all of the blogging world to know (or all 5 people who read my blog), that I AM WINNING. Thank you very much.

Here We Go Again

Some of you might remember reading about all the dogs that we used to have at the double wide. Well, I fear that I might have spoken too soon about us being at a happy dog number.

Yesterday, our dog Rosco became a proud father.

It all began two months ago. There is a sweet little (she's actually huge) dog down the road named Maggie. Rosco noticed Maggie and began to follow her around. He is a very friendly dog, so we really didn't think that much of it. Then....he was in a frenzy. He would stay gone days on end. He wouldn't eat, he wouldn't come home, he laid outside of Maggie's house and would howl for hours. Oh the things we do for love.

Then, just as quickly as it began, it was sadly over. Rosco was back to his normal doggy self. We were, of course, glad to welcome him back home. No more trips in the middle of the night to get Rosco away from the neighbors house sounded great to us. And so all was well with the world again.

Now, we are not dumb people. We knew that there was a chance the Maggie would be pregnant. We just kept our fingers crossed that maybe it wasn't so. Hey...it's not always easy in the human world, maybe the same goes in the canine kingdom as well. But to our dismay she was indeed pregnant.

Jamie feels a slight bit of bitterness towards Rosco. He says that Rosco is "showing him up" by getting Maggie pregnant. I try to remind him that Rosco, is in fact, a dog and that it is perfectly normal to achieve pregnancy with NINE puppies on the first try.

That's right I said nine.

Guess where sweet little (huge) Maggie picked to be her shelter for her to give birth to her nine puppies? Yep. You guessed it....our house. We have a big dog house in the side yard and last night we came home to a house full. My theory is being proved over and over and over and over again. There is a sign which is only visible to the canine eye. This sign flashes over our house and says that we will indeed take care of any dog and whatever amount of puppies she has.

So here we go again. I sound like I am disappointed in all of this, but I must tell you, I have been outside checking on those sweet little things about 15 times today. Jamie and his crazy, animal loving family has rubbed of on me. I even asked Maggie's owner to let the puppies stay here a few more weeks before he moves them to his house. I, people, am a picture of craziness.

Anyone need a puppy?

It's a Sad Day

I went to put on my favorite pants, that I wear all the time. Well, I had a hard time (cough, cough, sniffle, sniffle) getting them buttoned.

Needless to say, I am a person of few words today.

I think I heard "Taps" playing in the background.

I gotta go wallow in self pity and figure out how to get my pants to button. And eat that chocolate chip cookie that's calling my name. (Do you think that could be part of the problem?)

PARTEEE!!

Hi! Thanks for stopping by my blog. I'm new to this bloggity blog world, so I wasn't even sure until yesterday what a "Mr. Linky" was. But I figured it out, took the plunge and now people are stopping by my blog. Yipee!

So here at this party put on your dancin' shoes, because that is what I like to do at parties ( and at home when no one is watching!) This one time I was cleaning, my TV was off and the sun was shining in my window, so I could see my reflection in the TV. WELL, when I clean I have the music blaring! So I had my vacuum in hand, dancing away, looking at myself in the TV reflection, when all of the sudden..... WAM. I had stubbed my toe on the ottoman.OUCH. I really should have been focusing less on trying to dance like Britney and more on my household chores.

This little blog was started to chronicle my husband and my journey to be parents. We have been struggling through infertility for the past two years and have just taken the plunge into adoption. We are thrilled. We are in the beginning stages, so we have a long road in front of us, but are putting on our running shoes!

There are crazy things that happen in our lives, so I also write about all those, shall we say, eventful occasions.

Anyway, thanks for stopping by. I can't promise you'll leave here enlightened, but you might get entertained by my crazy rantings!

Random Thoughts and I mean RAN DOM

1. What exactly are chicken fingers?

2. If it weren't for Old Navy, I would be naked.

3. Why does my dog think that rolling in poop actually makes him smell better?

4. Banana Nut Crunch Cereal should be called magic in a box.

5. Anyone want to give a stab at how waffle fries came about?

6. I feel like conditioner really is better.

7. I really should concentrate on the road when driving instead of thinking these things.

8. I should not be allowed to have house plants.

9. Contacts really are amazing.

10. Why was an octagon chosen as the universal sign to stop?

11. I would like to give the guy a high five who named that planet Uranus. Seriously. That's funny.