All That Jazz

Brendan and I are heading to Fort Worth this weekend to see the musical Chicago! His sweet sister Natalie and brother-in-law Tom gave us the tickets as a Christmas present, and the four of us are going to the matinée show on Sunday afternoon. Brendan and I are huge musical lovers, so we're really looking forward to the show. Also, it'll be nice to get out of Abilene since we've had so much family in town the last few weeks. I love spending time with Natalie and Tom, and I can't tell you how excited I am to do some shopping at a real mall.

Musicals are also very special to us. Some couples share concerts, sporting events, or restaurants; we share musicals. Chicago will be the fourth musical we've seen since we've been together (the dinky ones that come to Abilene don't count), and each one corresponds to a unique point in our relationship.

Les Miserables - We saw Les Miz in June 2006 in Dallas for our three-month dating anniversary.

RENT- In March 2007, we saw RENT in Fort Worth to celebrate our one-year dating anniversary.

Wicked - We saw Wicked in Dallas in April 2007, and Brendan proposed three days later. He sneakily got the ring from his sister then, too!

And now Chicago will be our first musical as a married couple. It also happens to correspond nicely with our two-month wedding anniversary!

Forcing Creativity

In an assignment for my American Autobiography class, I'm supposed to write a five-page Creative Non-Fiction piece (a.k.a. autobiography) of an event that has shaped my life. Against my will, I've decided to write about my grandfather's death almost two years ago. I was hesitant at first to pick that event because a woman writing about the death of a family member felt so overdone. Honestly, I tried to pick another topic, I really did, but this one just kept coming back to me. This is my first-ever foray into creative writing at the college level (I wrote tortured love poems in middle school, but who didn't?), and quite frankly I'm scared. I don't want to mess this up, especially a topic so close to my heart that it's still painful to talk about.

But here I am, poring over the first draft of what I hope will be a meaningful piece to me. When I'm finished, I want to give it to my grandmother. I want her to know that he's just as much a part of my life now as he was back then.

In Your Pants

A friend introduced me to this hilarious video blog (or vlog, if you will) made by two unusually-funny brothers. One brother rightly asserts that every book title would be better if we added "in your pants" to the end.

So, I went around my home library and selected a few titles that benefit from the "in your pants" rule.


Their Eyes Were Watching God in your pants

Journey Into New Worlds in your pants

Into the Wild in your pants

The Gendered Pulpit in your pants

To Kill A Mockingbird in your pants

Holes in your pants

Little Women in your pants


I suggest you do the same to your own bookshelves; you'll be amazed at the (inappropriate) hilarity you'll find.

Five Things I'm Thankful For

1. Brendan James Voss
2. Fat Tuesday
3. My brother
4. The friends I've made at grad school
5. Highland Church

Duplex, Sweet Duplex

Since Brendan and I moved in, we've worked hard on giving our place a total face-lift, and I think we succeeded. Here (finally!) are some pictures of our little home.



Here's our lovely living room. I'm an estate sale junkie, so almost all of the furniture in this room came from estate sales. I like to think of it as pre-owned...



More living room. And for the record, Brendan arranged the lovely display of candle holders in the back left corner all by himself, but if you asked him about it, he'd tell you he just "put them there."



And here's the entryway. Can you tell what time it was when I took the picture?



Time for the bathroom. I really love our shower curtain, and I officially apologize for the crooked picture!



And now we're on to the kitchen! Here's our (very) little kitchen table.



Just a random shot of the counter.



I just love our cute little cabinet. Can you tell I like fake fruit?



I thought this one looked cool, so I had to throw it in.



Our guest bedroom is still under construction, but here's a little taste. The little blue pillow is my favorite.



Ta da! Here's our bedroom and our new mattress. The mattress is higher than normal because it's a pillow top, so I have to give a little leap to get up on the bed. But it's a small price to pay for fluffy wonderfulness.



One last picture, I promise. We celebrated our one month-iversary at Road House with some yummy steaks!

Thanks... I Think

The other day, I was thinking out loud to Brendan as to whether or not I was weird enough to be an English major. His response? "Well, I think you're weird enough."

Gee. Thanks.

Time For A Camp Out

Our new mattress is coming tomorrow! It's a big, fluffy, glorious Euro Top. We ordered it at Haverty's earlier this week, and it's being delivered tomorrow morning. There's a great big blank space in our bedroom because we've already moved our old bed into the Guest Room (it's officially no longer the Junk Room!). Brendan and I have been sleeping in the other room for the last day or two because we just wanted to get the old bed moved and out of the way. Sleeping in the Guest Room kind of feels like a camp out when you were a little kid, you know, where you'd rather sleep on the floor of your bedroom on a sleeping bag instead of in your own bed. I am beyond ready for a new mattress because I've had our current one since college, which was a hand-me-down from someone else. I'll post official duplex pictures once the new bed is in place and we get the Guest Room all prettied up.

We saw the Harlem Globetrotters last night at Moody for Brendan's birthday, which was really fun! I had never seen them before. Needless to say they beat the Generals, but I was hoping for a few more antics. :)