How’s it going? I’m just sitting here hanging with the Wife. Unfortunately, the Wife is watching the Bachelor.  Double unfortunately, I apparently need my “brain” to do “work” and therefore can’t drink copious amounts of motor oil and call it a night. So in lieu of that I will distract myself by posting about our sweet digs for our anniversary.

I had actually stayed here at the Umstead when (…..gag, they just cheerleadered the Bachelor’s name…) I had come to North Carolina to interview. I was very impressed with the hotel and decided that Wife should be able to participate.   Pictures for your eyes’ enjoyment!

Free bubbly. Pretty sure it’s Cristal.  That’s a drink right?

Readers, this place is ridonkulous. You should try it. The doorman even remembered our names when we left for dinner.  Makes me wish I would have told him my name was Max Power or something like that. Sigh.

Anyway after the amazing dinner, I unveiled my present to her. I had been working on this for two years! TWO YEARS. Yes I procrastinate.  Now readers I don’t mean to brag but after the first ten seconds, Wife was in tears. I’m pretty sure it was just because she was staring at a finished product.   And now you get it too! Holla at your boy. Love you Wife!

Wedding Video from Steve Cramer on Vimeo.

I find myself asking, has it really been two years already? We’ve experienced some ups and downs; the downs have made us closer and stronger and the ups have dominated.

My love, appreciation and friendship for Husband grows every day. He is a wonderful provider, comedian, supporter, friend, surprise bed maker and scrambled egg chef.

Without further adieu and over sappiness, I feel extremely fortunate and blessed to have such a loving, silly and one-of-a-kind relationship with this man:

We began the morning off with the Cramer family tradition of  popcorn wreaths with the nephews. Try explaining to four boys under the age of 8 why they can’t eat the stuff while they make it…yes, we gave in and let them eat as much as they wanted. Aw, they joy of being an Aunt & Uncle.

We then headed downtown to the outdoor ice skating rink. Everyone had SO much fun! The air was crisp, the lights were on and the music was playing…it was the perfect way to kick-off our EVEning. We missed Brad, Yvette & Brody but can’t wait to see them tomorrow!

After ice skating, we headed over to Chesapeake Energy for some pseudo Temple Square Lights. They used LEDs and Brad, I now believe you, there really is a difference. The blues and magentas were magnificent and it wasn’t even fully dark!

We ended the evening with our traditional program. Dad always tells the nativity while the nephews help place pieces of the nativity. Mom & Dad surprised us this year with our own hand carved & hand painted nativity set made by THEM! Among other things, we rounded out the evening with the Cramer family tradition of opening our PJ’s. Thanks Janet & Joe…I’m still drooling over my “classic” set!

Trey and Braden built a “chimney” to climb through and then slept under the table in the playroom. They were so excited for Santa’s arrival.

Here are some pics of the fun we had before Christmas:

Games of Hide ‘n Seek:

As a “thank you” for helping move into their new house, Benj’s family bought Guitar Hero World Tour (essentially Guitar Hero Rock Band) for Nana’s House.

Yes, I know I’m a day early, but tomorrow is just going to be too crazy because we JET SET TO OKLAHOMA! I’m just a tid bit excited. For our final day, I thought I would choose some of my favorite pictures from our Christmas card photo shoot. In the end, Steven got to choose the winning picture. I went along with it because we’ll have so many formal pictures for years to come.

Thank you all for bearing with us through these 12 days. We wish you the joyest and safest Christmas this season!

Photos compliments of these two love birds:

My ANTM pose

Look! We're Reindeer

And the winner…

Last night, Husband and I scored free tickets to a Duke Basketball game. The Cameron Stadium is so neat; it’s totally old school architecutre and only seats 9,300! To put that into perspective, the Marriott Center seats 22,700.

There’s really no “out-of-bounds” the students can barely extend their arms and touch the players when they’re passing the ball in.

Taunting the UNC Asheville player throwing the ball in.

I have to give mad props to the student body. They have so many fun rituals. Steven and I were dying laughing; it also helped that the little 6 year old boy next to us was following along like his life depended on it.

We had way too much fun and hope to catch another game this season. Go Blue Devils!

I have always known how ridiculously talented, smart, charming, funny, thoughtful and good looking he is. Yes, the red hair does it for me. Like I said, I’ve always known these things, but when he receives his much deserved accolades from his peers and especially work, I can’t wipe the proud “Mama/Wife Bear” grin off my face.

You see, aside from being chosen as a “Top Gun” in his program and kicking trash on the technical aspects of work, Steven has been awarded THE BEST PRESENTER.

Several months ago, all of the ASEs (associate systems engineers) & ASRs (associate sales representatives) had to enter a presentation contest. There were several rounds of weeding out presenters and with each step the audience grew more grand and esteemed. Well, amidst the work stress of interviewing and personal trials we’ve been experiencing, Steven blew the final competition away in front of the Vice President of World Wide Sales Enablement of Cisco and ALL of the managers. Yes, he even beat Santa Claus (the other guy brought in a Santa for part of his presentation).

Husband, I always knew you were a rock star, it’s just nice that everyone else is realizing it too. Love you.

There were a few things my Grandma Bowman loved: jewelry, shoes, Nordstrom, See’s Candy and books.

I’ve inherited quite a few of her loves.

I remember every Christmas she would give us a BIG bag filled with beautiful books; she was very particular on her authors and illustrators. It was always neat looking at the books, but come on, they were books.

My parents have now started a new tradition where every Christmas Eve they give us one of the books back to add to our own collection. Almost all of the books are either autographed or have a personal note from my Grandma. Her insight to the gift was much beyond those Christmases when the books were originally given.

I spotted the inspiration in the Pottery Barn catalog. I love how it turned out, but think I’ll add a few presents to it next year.

Thanks Janet & Joe for putting something under our tree. We can’t wait to open them!