I talk about Miss Lana a lot. I love that kid! However, I don’t talk much about Phil. Not because there isn’t anything to say but because I say it to him and it feels silly (he makes fun of me) to post mushy stuff about him.

Gonna do it anyway!

I met Phil online many moons ago when we used to play the same game online. I don’t think dating sites existed back then but gaming did. We’ve been together (in person) since ’03. I met his friends and his family & fell in love with his friends’ family (lol).

He’s not a very romantic type of guy but when he does something, it’s thoughtful – he means it. For example, there are usually no flowers on our anniversary because he forgets BUT what he does know is when we met, what I was talking about, what I was wearing, how my hair smelled and the music that we were listening to; to him that’s our anniversary. That’s when I might get flowers. A random Tuesday afternoon is more likely to bring me flowers than our anniversary. If he brings home flowers, it most definitely isn’t a bouquet; I prefer plants to cut flowers bunched up together. I find all flowers beautiful but a plant will last longer. Unfortunately, I can’t keep them alive anymore. I don’t know what happened between my time in Tampa and Austin but somewhere along the move to Texas, I lost my green thumb. If Phil brings home potted flowers, he knows they’re going to struggle to survive, he knows how hard I’ll work to keep them alive and if he’s going to spend his gaming money on plants that might not be here in a couple of weeks — well, to me that says love. & I do love getting plants. :) and I promise I do my best to remember to water them!

I’ve mentioned before that we were house hunting, right? We started last year and took a break — because let me tell you, when it becomes a chore.. you just need to take a step back. We picked our search back up a few months ago and found a house. A house with too many rooms and everything I didn’t want. There’s an HOA but it turned out to not be a crazy one. The house is a cut & paste/cookie cutter house, which I hate. And it’s too new. What do I like about it? It’s a corner house, which I love. It’s in a cul de sac, which is important to us because no one will be speeding by while Lana rides her bike. It also has a huge back yard for our dogs and Lana to run around and play in. The neighborhood also scored really well in the crime department. The neighbors all have little ones around Lana’s age and it’s walking distance to the grocery store and little shops along the way. Why would our realtor show us a house we wouldn’t like and with features we didn’t care for? Because I found the house online and asked her to show it to us. I didn’t know there was an HOA or that every house on the block was identical (no joke), but I did know that the yard was a kids dream and the rooms would eventually be filled with kids. The yard is naked and big, it’s a blank canvas waiting for creative design. The rooms need a fresh coat of paint which will come soon enough. But this house, as much as I dislike it, has everything that’s important to us. Everything that other houses didn’t have. Little by little we started expanding our search and were less and less picky. Not my dream house but our first and it’s better than I thought we’d get.

My ADD is getting the best of me. This post isn’t about the house; it’s about my husband and how amazing he is.

My husband decided to close on the house on June 10th, on Lana’s half birthday (hey, when you have a single child, you celebrate everything), and we would move in on June 11th… which is our anniversary. In Phil’s words “I bought you a house for our wedding anniversary :) Who’s da man?!!”

He’s “da man” :) and when he remembers what June 11th is — I play the lotto :)

This post took over a month to write. I’ve been SO busy packing and going through our storage & donating what I can part with to make our move lighter, faster & easier. I’ve been helping (camping off and on) at a ranch that doesn’t have cell service so uploading photos or posts wasn’t possible. I’m home now so expect more posts!

Also, I’m testing out WordAds (or was it AdWords?) so bear with me while I figure out if this is really what I want on my journal.