willandadri.com

we’ve been busy folks lately and wanted to make sure we took time to post our stories, as well as all of the photos that document will’s journey over the past week.  we’ve been to the beach for will’s b-day, we’ve picked up lori from the airport, and we’ve spent the week at duke hospital in durham, and come home to get will on the road to recovery.  below is a photo collage of the past week.  we’ll get back to the written documentation as soon as time permits.

4/23

sometimes its a lot easier to understand what exactly chiari and syringomyelia are if you have some visuals to look at.  dr. lipton graciously detailed these scans of will’s most recent mri files so that we could all more easily understand exactly what we were working with here.

still amazes me how complex the human body is, and how all of this is normally perfectly functioning in most people. 

let’s all pray that the syrinx is able to dissipate itself very shortly after the surgery is performed.

its going to be interesting to see how our blogging develops with us both sharing our own individual sides of the same story.  mine always comes with photos.  i have the camera, so i take the rights to posting.  no, seriously though will did confirm he’d like me to take pictures of his chiari journey.  you know me, any chance to take photos and i am all over it.

will has said everything i wanted to say regarding the surgery and the processes we’ve been through thus far.  the only thing i would like to add is how proud of him i am.  its not every day that someone can accept, handle, and cope with the stressors of impending “brain” surgery with grace and dignity, but will has done just that.  i’ve always been proud of him, but this trial in our life has reminded me how lucky i am to be married to such an amazing human being. 

loving you.

so amazingly thankful for every friday night.  will had to work a little late, so i called him and had him meet me for dinner.  it was good to get out of the house and wind down the work week.  we planned to get up a tad early on saturday so we could head down town to wake forest’s herb festival before striking out to cary for the great grapes wine event.  we found a lot of great things to add to our garden and can’t wait to see all of our plants in full bloom this summer. 

the wine festival was a great relaxing time.  we sampled tons of different wines from many different vineyards and by the end of the day had classified ourselves as wine snobs.  regardless, we still had a great time sipping a bottle by the pond and enjoying our picnic basket.  the sun was out and there was live music, what more could you want? 

sunday was relaxing.  after church we planted our new peonies and got the grass cut.  will caught us up on laundry, since i am the new master of the john deere.  amelia decided she’d play along for some photos while we watched the sunset on another perfect weekend.  this time next week – we’ll be watching the sunset on the ocean!

we were on the go like wild fire this past weekend.  friday night we headed out to do some mattress shopping.  with will’s upcoming surgery we thought it really made sense for us to go ahead and purchase the king sized bed we’ve been dreaming of.  we went to haverty’s and tested out about 30 different styles and brands.  we felt a little like goldilocks, but felt we really narrowed down exactly what we were looking for by being thorough.  after looking at haverty’s for about an hour we decided it was time for some dinner so we headed to waraji.  we always love waraji’s sushi and were not disappointed by this visit.

saturday morning we woke up early and headed to the farmers market.  we picked up some heirloom tomato plants (3 different kinds, one purple, one green, and one pink), some thai basil, some organic honey, some red pepper sauce, and some lime cookies.  we then got our traditional wake forest coffees and hit the road to furniture land south in high point.  back when mom and dad were looking for furniture for their new house, i went with them to this massive location where you can find furniture for up to 70% off retail.  i figured this would be a good spot for us to go look for beds.  we arrived at about noon and headed to the clearance center.  we tested out all of their mattresses and found one we really liked for $200 less than haverty’s price.  after we selected that we headed to the regular store to look at their bed selections.  with 4 floors of furniture spread over two buildings they have just about everything you could imagine.  we worked with an associate who informed me that they were able to order the bed of my dreams, but it was not on the sales floor.

you see, i have wanted a particular bed frame since 2007.  i found the picture online and book marked it to occasionally look at it and drool over it (knowing i could never get it because it was too costly.)  however, i figured we would just give it a shot and see how much it costs, after all everything is discounted!  the sales associate drew us out some maps and told us she would call will’s cell when she got the pricing on that bed.  we wandered around for hours, not really finding exactly what we wanted – and did see a similar bed that we liked, but it was nine thousand dollars!  gulp!  it was shortly after this that we ran back into the sales associate who said she tried to call us, but left a vm. (when we got home we heard her message on our home machine.)  she informed us that the bed i wanted was 60% off the retail price!  we were so shocked we told her we would continue to look around, but i confirmed with will that he loved it as much as i did and we thought it was a go.  we were so dumbfounded we thought for sure she made a mistake, so we reconfirmed that it was king size and it was for the entire bed, not just the head board etc.  she chuckled and confirmed it was for the entire king size bed. 

so, after going to the show room and looking at the quality construction of their other pieces, getting warranty information, and hearing how each piece is hand carved and constructed, we decided to place our order.  i was still in shock, and think i still will be until the bed actually gets here!  now we just have to decide how we want the furniture laid out so we know where this goes when it gets delivered.

we made it home around 9pm on saturday night and headed out to walk the doggies and do some relaxing before we needed to get up at 5:40 the next morning to get ready for sunrise service at church.  it was the first easter that i did not dye eggs, and i started regretting not doing this around that time.  however, with no dye and no energy no eggs were easterized this year.

wake up time came early on sunday morning and i popped out of bed like a bunny ready to get gussied up for sunday service.  we were only 1 minute late for the 7am service, which we were both proud of, since we are famous for being late to everything.  the service was small and intimate as we gathered around the 6′ wooden cross on the side of the church.  pastor matthew called for us to take stones (we’d previously been asked to gather) and lay them at the base of the cross as a symbol of something that we needed to push/roll aside in our journey with Christ.  will and i both found the service very moving and were super happy we’d woken up so early.  after the service dave prepared a delicious pancake breakfast and we chatted with everyone before heading out to greensboro.

when we made it to greensboro we checked out some plants at lowes and tried to make a plan to re-organize our front flower beds.  we’d had dwarf nandina bushes in our front beds since we moved in, and they were never our favorite.  not finding anything we liked at their lowes we decided we’d head to our own store after we got back to wf.  later on we headed to print works bistro at the proximity hotel for an amazing easter lunch.  we tried escargot for the first time, and i finally found something that will does not like!  he made the most terrible face and threatened me with vomit if i made him eat one more bite.  we decided he could never be on “no reservations” or “the amazing race” since he had such an aversion.  however, i found them to be a lot like clams and mussels and i consumed the entire app myself.  after lunch we headed outside to rest on their patio and admire all of their beautiful plantings.   once we’d hung out in the sun long enough we decided to make our way back to wf.

we got home, changed clothes, and headed to our lowes to look for nandina replacements.  we found 27 plants we thought we needed to take home and promptly filled up the jetta and headed home.  i began digging up bushes and before we both knew it we had an entirely new looking front plant bed.  bye bye nandina!  we both really love the look of the new plant bed, and now we just need to get it mulched and we will be good to go!

march is full of birthdays.  we’ve got the following on the books:

beth

mom

lori

mike

maris

as a family we all try to get together some time in march to celebrate all of these b-days in regular over the top party fashion.  last year we held this event at barnhill lane, and this year we were off to alabama court.  maris turned 50 this year, so we had lots of celebrating to do!  we had a surprise party for her at the chinese restaurant in roanoke and then had a sunday celebration after granny’s church that allowed for celebration all the way through will’s bday in april!

mom and dad are really settling into their new place and have installed a new driveway, entirely remodeled the basement with an office for dad and a walk in cedar closet for mom, and repainted just about everything in the house!  the place is really coming together!  their latest project entails a complete redo of the front yard to level it out and allow for some rock retaining walls and plant beds to be installed.  can’t wait to see it fully finished!

we spent some good times in “club alabama” formerly known as “the man cave” on the lower level of 71 alabama court.  will worked to get dad’s surround sound working and we all sung our hearts out and lori graced us all with her dancing prowess.  we were in awe at her rendition of “ima be” by the black eyed peas.  if you see her soon, get her to show you what she can do.

lori arrived last thursday and greeted us just in time for a yelp elite event at the busy bee in downtown raleigh.  we had a great time and met some new friends and shared dinner with them.  after dinner i scurried those little party hounds out to the car and they both cried out that they had to have krispy kreme donuts for dessert!  so, off to kk we went!  featured donut of the month was banana, and somehow i let lori talk me into this.  i decided it was just not my thang.  banana and donut = icky.

we were all excited to spend time with ellie on sunday.  most of us had never met her before, so it was a great deal of fun to torture her with flashing cameras and baby talk babble.  i am sure she is permanently scarred for life now.  this family just loves a baby, and it’s been ten years since james was born, so we are all long overdue for some “oochie coochie cooing”.

this posting also contains my newest obsession of photos.  i’ve recently decided that cherry blossoms could be one of the most beautiful things around.  enjoy.

we had quite an adventurous ride home on sunday night since there was a line of severe thunderstorms stretching from charlotte to va, right on the path we were driving.  i offered to drive, and had no idea what i was in for.  i fought to keep the car on the road and ended up taking us on a 1 hour detour of the covered bank drive through off the I-40 ramp in high point to avoid certain disaster.  with constant interruption to the radio to alert us to storms in guilford county, we knew we’d better stay put.  however after our delay, we made it home safe and sound and ready to see another day.

saturday was a perfect day.  stars aligned – waters parted – birds singing kinda day.

we headed out (after an early morning carpet cleaning appointment) to the farmer’s market in down town wake forest and will’s twice monthly haircut.  the farmer’s market was brimming with farm fresh eggs, various jellies and jams, freshly baked breads, assorted types of goat cheeses, and some crafts.  we trotted around the market and zoned in on a basil plant to add to our garden on the back deck and picked up a sampling of three types of goat cheese for our breakfast.

we mosied on down to the coffee shop with our goat cheese in hand to score some bagels and coffee.  we cozied up at the coffee shop and enjoyed the various flavors of curry, paprika garlic, and honey lavender goat cheese on our bagels.  the walls of the coffee shop are lined this week with photographs from Kelly Newton.  She has a very captivating series of portraits that really inspired me to print out my india photos and get that gallery hung up soon.  one day i need to check into seeing what i need to do to get some prints of my own shown in the coffee shop.

after breakfast we headed down to various stores and shopped around to see what was new.  we purchased some candles on sale and then headed up to twisted vine for some wine tasting.  we found a white wine we liked and got three more reds by the time we headed back down the stairs.  after wine we headed to harvest moon, which is an eclectic store in an old house in wake forest.  the exterior is coated with plants and we fell in love with the jasmine on the front porch.  after shopping we headed to blue fins bistro to try out a bite for lunch.  i was craving caprese salad but was too lazy to make my own, so i lucked out with a blt (which is the closest thing you can find to caprese salad in wf).  on our way back out of heritage we stopped at wine 101 for yet another wine tasting of the day.  we lucked out and learned a great deal about sustainable wine making and enjoyed the fruits of other people’s labor!

after lunch we headed to the mall to pick up my new glasses.  they are just a newer version of what sits on my face every day, but they have blue insets in them as opposed to the current version’s green.  we got side tracked at c&b and ended up with new glasses and plates since so much stemware has been swept into the trashcan in the past few weeks.  those glasses were too fragile!  after fighting the mall traffic we headed back home so i could land some photos of the cherry trees at our front entrance to the neighborhood.  they are the complete embodiment of spring.  the bright pink flowers against the bluest blue sky really summed up the entire day.  the weather was perfect and my allergies were not suffering too terribly just yet.  we were foot loose and fancy free.  when we got back home we created a cheers beverage to officially welcome in spring.  we mixed up a made from scratch margarita with freshly squeezed lime and orange juice with some patron and cointreau.  (skinny girl is on to something here.)

after we watched the sunset we just lazily relaxed in our lounge chairs on the back deck while will attempted to read his new book and i browsed several magazines and catalogues.  i found it quite funny that i would not shut up and kept pestering him about every half a page to tell him some story or show him something in the magazines/catalogues.  he played along like a good sport and humored me each time i broke his concentration.  he is too perfectly adorable for putting up with me. 

at about 9pm we decided we were hungry and wanted to venture down town for some ribs at the pit.  we drove all the way down there and found a 1.5 hour wait!  their ribs are great, but we were starving!  we decided to keep on driving and find something else.  racking our brains we ended up at spize cafe.  we’d wanted to try it for sometime and floated in right before they closed at 9:30.  we were in love with this version of asian fondue, it was like two of our favorite things rolled into one!  we really enjoyed all of the food, the service, and i fell in love with the utensil arsenal they give you to fight for your fondue!  too fun!

can’t wait to see what else this spring has in store!  if it is at all like saturday was, bring it on!

it is always great to have life growing before you.  we love spring and the blooms and baby birds that come with it.  it has to be the  most amazing time of year.

we purchased a seed tray two weeks ago to see if we could get back to the good ole days when we used to have a deck covered in plants like we did when we lived in harrisonburg.  seed packets were picked up at lowes and we filled the little seed pods right up to the brim and watered them and put the lid on.  we checked on them the first day and saw no movement, so we went on about our lives.  sun rose and set, and again no action.  husband thought they could use some water, so he watered them last tuesday night.  then, just when you thought nothing was gonna happen, i checked on them thursday evening.  we were amazed to see little seedlings popping out by the dozens!  we quickly covered them back up so as to not disturb this growing process.

the weekend came and we decided it would be a good time to get these little seedlings planted.  to plant we needed pots, so we headed out to home goods.  i found a ton of planters at home goods and carried them all home and lined the deck.  will was able to sit on the deck and help me scoop (cup by cup) the dirt into the planters so that we could get the baby plants into their new homes.  in may we should have a pretty amazing feast of mesclun greens, radishes, red and golden beets, and carrots. 

while we were out we scored another tray for tomatoes.  now we are on a mission to find some decent heirloom seeds so we can grow some fancy little tomatoes and basil and make a summer’s worth of caprese anytime we want!

some wonderful people treated us to dinner at the melting pot on saturday night so that we could try to take our minds of the medical drama going on in our house right now.  below is a photo of us before we headed to dinner.  thanks people – you know who you are, and we really appreciate all you do for us – love you.