"Big Boy Trip" Weekend.

Ryan had his first "big boy" trip without his parents this weekend. He had so much fun and liked the doggie and kitties WAY more than the "gerbils." Pippin (who is 12 years old) is one tired Jack Russell!! Ryan has some kind of energy!! He loved exploring the conservation lot behind the house! He saw a spider and lizards. We went to Lowry Park Zoo on Saturday which was SO much fun!! The stingray touch pool was amazing! We fed them and they sounded like pigs eating! Ryan's favorite critters were the poison dart frogs!! We were so glad that Dana and Clint let us get him for the weekend and we are so glad they had a great weekend together. They got us some wonderful books on marriage and relationship building, which will be very helpful. Time is flying by and things have been stressful!! I'm starting to see Chicken People and Aliens!!! Keep praying for us!!

CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE

Love, Shannon and Robert

Friday

We have a busy day planned tomorrow. We are getting our marriage license, taking my ring to get cast, running by Scott's house (Robert's brother), then going to pick up Ryan (Dana's 3 year old) at Ft Myers. We are so excited about having him for the weekend while Dana and Clint are in Sanibel Island. He is so excited about coming to see the "gerbils," which are actually mini hamsters, the cats and Pippin (my Jack Russell.) The "gerbils" are at the top of his list, though. Thank goodness, because tonight we noticed that they are very different (in the rear area), so Ryan is #1 on the list for baby gerbils!!!! YEAH!!! Dana told him I was having a bad day and he got on the phone today and said, "Aunt Shannie, It's a good day!!! I'm packing to come see you!!" How can you beat that??? Children can change a challenging day into a blessing with just a few words!!! It's been one of those weeks (actually a couple of weeks) where I have seriously thought Candid Camera was following me and people were playing pranks on me. Not so!! It's all real!! One day I'm going to write a book about the weird crap I hear. Aliens, chicken suits, Brits taking over the world, RN's working at TJMaxx, that's just the stuff lately. Anyway, keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we draw nearer to the big day and trying to get everything smoothed out and done.

Love,
Shannon and Robert

We Win!!

Well Last night was the Tampa Bay Rays game eHarmony invited us to. There were so many couples there from all different age groups. They also gave us Ray Dollars (Can only be spent at the field) so our drinks and food were paid for. What a game. We were a little worried when the Red Sox homered in the first inning, but it turned out no to be much of a problem as we just kept scoring. We also saw that the Cubs, unfortunately, lost last night. We still hope to see the Rays & Cubs in the World Series (That would be waaay too much fun!).

Love,
Shannon & Robert

I Ain't Skeered: Part II The Way KC's Camera Saw It!

Here goes!! Enjoy!! As you can tell, we did!!

Click On the Pics for a Larger View

Love, Shannon and the wildest bunch of women on the planet!!!

I Ain't Skeered

Here are some pics from Saturdays Excursions.

Click On the Pics for a Larger View

See, I Ain't Skeered! More to come soon.
Love,
Shannon & Robert

My Big Shower

I'm going to try to find the words to express my feelings about this weekend (the shower, boys' get together, and girls' night out) but I'm tired and don't have a thesaurus so be patient with me. I'm in shock and in awe of the generosity of all of my friends, family, co-workers, and future in-laws. I am in constant awareness of how expensive EVERYTHING is and how making ends meet is getting more and more challenging. I am a giver. As a nurse, you have to be. Taking care of people and giving of my time, love, energy, etc comes very natural to me. On the other hand, receiving is something I have always struggled with. I worry about how people do without and inconvenience themselves to give to me. I feel so blessed at the generosity of everyone in wanting to celebrate with Robert and me! This is overwhelming!!! We are the most fortunate two people in the world! We have found each other, and have found so many wonderful friends that it is hard to express our feelings. The shower was absolutely beautiful. All of our family and friends worked so hard to make this so much more than a shower!! It was a celebration of US!!! We are forever indebted to Dana, who is so talented and creative that she can take a clubhouse and turn it into paradise. Jeanne, Laura, Cher, and Dee have been working on this forever!! Dee let us have a lot of decorations she had, which added amazing touches!! Everyone at the shower pitched in to set up, clean up, and help out!! WHAT TEAMWORK!!! The food was amazing!! Robert kept Nicole and Rian so the girls could go out dancing!! We had so much fun and I love how willing he was to take care of them!! The guys ate here and played Madden 09 football. We girls went to Stumps Supper Club, Howl at the Moon, then Stumps again. We danced and laughed and sweated our butts off!! Dana, Laura, Jeanne and Cher provided "accessories" for everyone to wear and it was so cute and tasteful!! I was SO afraid of some of the batchelorette stuff that I have seen with weiners and tacky stuff, but we looked like princesses, and one Elvis(KC!!) We all made it home safely and at a respectable hour (between midnight and 1am) and no woman was left behind! Lots of pictures were taken! It was so awesome to get all the people in my life together, so they could see how wonderful everyone is!! Robert and I are going through gifts and looking at all the great stuff we have received!! We used some of our gift cards tonight!! That is so much fun!! Thanks again to EVERYONE!!!

We love y'all!!!
Shannon and Robert!

The Clubhouse after Dana got done with it! Amazing!!

One Month And Five Days to Go!!

MAN!!! This has been one busy and productive weekend. We went to Treasure Island Saturday to order the cake and run some errands! We are getting our cake from the Publix 1 mile up the street from the beach house and we are their FIRST wedding cake (they opened one week ago.) The cake is going to be so cute and UNIQUE, just like our wedding. We checked out parking, (see parking info to the left), and went to Gators at John's Pass. It was really good, just too much Gator stuff!! (GO FIGURE!!) We went to Robert's condo and worked for a few hours cleaning carpets. We've been trying to get his stuff integrated into here. That is very tough for 2 people our age to decide what is a "gotta keep" and what is a "gotta go." I have also been thinning out my stuff to be fair. We are cleaning and getting prepared for my shower this weekend and for family to come into town. It is going to be a lot of fun. Today we spent cleaning, mowing, and getting stuff ready. Pippin is getting along quite well with the cats, well actually with one cat (Katie, the oldest one.) She rubs on Pippin and flips over on her side to play. She even did the kitty head butt thing they do, and Pippin shook her head as if to say "What the hell??" This AMAZES me!!! None of our Jack Russel's have ever tolerated cats. I think she's too old and blind to give a crap, although she'll try to sneak a nip in here and there. Well, I smell like a billy goat from sweating all day, so I'm going to take a bath before the neighbors complain!
Love,
Shannon

Work Shower

Well, I had my first bridal shower today. We had a shower/eating/meeting. It was AWESOME!! I have the most wonderful friends and co-workers in the world! My bridesmaids Jeanne and Laura busted their butts!! Everyone brought food to work, and it was a feast. I honestly considered binging and purging, but it was too good, so I just stuffed myself! I ALMOST had another shrimp incident! (For those of you who don't know, I am allergic to seafood, and swell into a monster whenever I eat it! It's not pretty!) There was an amazing pasta salad, and low and behold, it had shrimp and crab (but it turned out to be krab *fish pressed to look like crab* which I didn't have a reaction to!) I saw the shrimp and avoided them. Jeanne yelled at me "spit it out! Spit it out now!" but it was too good! I didn't get any seafood, so the small bite of pasta didn't hurt me. I generally have this happen on any *special* occasion ie. funerals, weddings, reunions. It's just something I do! Let me tell you HOSPICE PEOPLE CAN COOK!! My co-workers got us a camcorder, which is so wonderful, and a gift card. My bridesmaids got me a black teddy (basically a string!) that has black feathers on the boobs. KC ( one of the craziest co-workers I have ever had, but she looks deceptively innocent) got me a card and picture of Bill and Hillary Clinton since Robert and I will be sharing their wedding anniversary. I hope we are happier than they are, because I think they secretly despise eachother! Diane B got us a beautiful wedding frame, and Dee P gave us money. We got lots of wonderful cards, which I can't wait to put into my wedding scrapbook. Our hospice pastor Dick said the sweetest blessing and prayer for us. I can honestly say that I am blessed to have a work "family" like hospice. Like any family there are times when we want to kill eachother, but all in all, I wouldn't trade it for the world! I even feel that way after my Christmas time off was denied. Thanks so much for all y'all are doing for us! We are so blessed!

Love,
Shannon and Robert