#1 Husband

This post, initially, was going to focus solely on the progress of our little squarefoot garden in the backyard. Nate took some pictures, emailed them to me, and I told him I would post them. However, as I went through my usual getting ready rituals this morning, I kept noticing things, things that are not out of the ordinary at my house, things that I often look over in a rush, things that make me wonder in awe about my husband.

First, I went into the bathroom and saw written on the mirror "Toothpaste Date" with a dry-erase marker. A day or two ago, in passing, I mentioned that I would like to keep track of how long it takes us to go through a tube of toothpaste, so we know how many tubes we need for our home storage. Nate, knowing I would forget, as I always do, wrote a sweet little reminder note. This was not the first time he's done this.

Then, as I'm brushing my teeth, I notice how nice and clean my sink and faucets are. Why are they so sparkling? Because Saturday morning we were in the bathroom and I said with quiet laugh, "Geez, our sinks get dusty so quickly." Later that day I left for a baby shower. When I got back, my husband had cleaned the bathroom, including windexing the mirrors.

When I'm clean and ready, I make my way downstairs, like I do every morning, and get my lunch out of the fridge. My lunch that Nate (who wakes up at 4:30 am every day) has lovingly prepared for me, sandwich, applesauce, string cheese, granola bars, and he throws in pop tarts that I can take to work and make for breakfast, if I don't have time at home (which I usually don't). He does this for me every single day.

As I turn to leave the kitchen, I glance out the sliding glass door into the backyard, where I see that our garden, his garden I should say, has been freshly watered that morning, like every other morning. The garden is flourishing, Nate has cared for it well, and yesterday we picked and ate a very delicious zucchini.


The first few sprouts, almost two months ago....

Nate picked his first zucchini! That giant bushy/shrubbery type picture frame is our garden.

So, there you go. I posted about the garden. But mostly, I just think my husband is wonderful Sometimes I wonder why he puts up with me. He is the most observant, thoughtful, unselfish man I have ever met. Kindness is just his habit, and I think he deserves a round of applause.

One Hour Photo

Nate and I were going through some unpacked boxes. Yes, there are still boxes to unpack, don't judge me, we only moved two months ago. I don't remember what we were looking for, but what we FOUND was way better. Three rolls of film! Old school, ghetto, kodak film. So.....we went and got them developed because neither of us could remember where they came from. Are you on the edge of your seats? It was our honeymoon camera! What is ever funnier than that is that fact that there are about 5 pictures of our honeymoon and the rest of that film had pictures from our first Christmas. Obviously, we weren't big into photography our first year of marriage. So, three years later, we share our honeymoon pics with you.







Our own memories and these pictures are all we have to document that week. I find that pretty funny.

Cruise Pics Part II

More pictures of us!

Formal Night! There were two. If you look back in older blog posts, you'll notice I'm wearing the same formal.....thanks to Beth V. for lending me her prom dress for the second formal night :)

OK THIS WAS PRETTY COOL. If you look below, you'll see many photos, mostly small and black and white. These are the pictures they took of us as we got on the ship the first day, every person who got on the cruise. There were hundreds! See? In the very center of the picture? It's me and Nate, superstars!! They made the picture of the two of us in color, and HUGE. It was probably 11 by 15 inches.
Melissa was breaking the rules taking pictures of the pictures, so she had to do it quick, (we didn't want to pay the $40 to buy it, but we had to document the stardom!!). Anyway, this guy thought she was taking pictures of him. This picture is classic!
Nate and Brad, very serious about giant chess.

Yes, I am the same size as my mother who had nine children and my 6-month pregnant sister. Sigh.
They had an American Idol type event that lasted for three nights, and Mel won the whole stinking thing. Hooray!

Cruise Pictures!

We got back last Saturday from our Mexican Riviera cruise on the Holland America cruise line. It was fabulous! My parents and my sister Melissa and her husband Brad were with us, and we all really enjoyed the vacation and each other's company. I had some first time experiences on this trip, like seeing a bullfight (quite gruesome) and going four wheeling. Here are a few pictures, for the whole trip, you can click on the picasa link. Also, we're going to add more as soon as we get the pictures from Mel and Brad and my parents, so stay tuned.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mandykolbaba/HollandAmericaCruiseApril2008

We promised our friend Colin Moses that we would go to PiPi's while we were in Puerto Vallarta. The pina coladas were incredible! The guacamole was superb! The taxi driver that took us there was a jerk!
This is the bullfight. Sorry if blood makes you queasy, but it was really surprising how gory it was. There were four matadores and four dead bulls when we left. Very interesting cultural experience. Some of these dudes were super theatrical!
That is the first matador. That is the bull's ear in his hand, he cuts it off after it dies and then walks around showing everyone. We thought this guy looked like our friend Cosme, so we took lots of pictures.
Ok, this is Brad holding a cup in his shorts. Why? Because the four of us volunteered to play the pool games on the ship during the activity time. We did the transfer the orange down the line with your neck game, the runwith a pool noodle between you legs game, a game with a hula hoop, a belly-flop competition, (six month pregnant Melissa opted out of that one) and a swimming race. The favorite game was when the boys had to hold this cup in their shorts while the other team members got a rag and had to squeeze ice cold water into the cup, the first team to fill the cup won. We won :)
This was the largest shrimp we had seen. Pictures don't do it justice. The food was great the whole time.
What we looked like before four wheeling.
My hilarious parents. These pictures are even better than the scooter pictures from the Disney Cruise. (In front of the "Hell" mural with my dad making his best scowling face).
The most humiliating pose I made while Nate had the camera out. Worth documenting. What was I thinking?
Nate revving up to speed through the water. We got soaked. Hence the swimsuit attire.
This is my mother finishing up the largest margarita I've ever seen. We told her to make her best drunk face, maybe people won't know it was virgin, and therefore just a sugar high.
This was one of the many days we won the "daily trivia competition." We won an umbrella, a luggage tag, and a key chain. Go Anderson family champions!!!
This event was in Mazatlan, called Salsa and Salsa. First they taught us to make 7 kinds of salsa then they taught us how to salsa dance! Nate was the star of the show, of course, entertaining all the participants with his grooving hips. This was super fun!

My Altima's gone!

Nate and I sold our Altima. It was pretty ridiculous for the two of us to have three cars, even though it was only for a few weeks. We got our asking price for it, so that was nice, but we loved this car and we were sad to see it go. This is our memorial:


You were a good car, but we look forward to life without a car payment. So long!

We're Home!!!

It's amazing how even unpacking isn't a chore when you are this happy about where you are putting your stuff.

The Secret's Out

It's official, we are moving back to Phoenix! I know you'll all miss the Barstow stories, but we are thrilled to be going back to our house, and being near friends and family again. I don't have any fun new pictures, but in view of the fact that this post's feature is moving back, I will reminisce.

























And the real reason we are going home: Double sinks!!