Christmas is in Full Swing at the Stevens'

Yup, last night we went and bought our first Christmas tree. It was so much fun to pick out decorations and then to get home, put it up and decorate it how we wanted to. We also have stockings with our names on them. Jenee is so smart, she used glue to write the names and glitter to make them look pretty. Sable also looks pretty, this morning I noticed that somehow she has a nice coating of glitter also.

Here is our first Christmas Tree!

Jenee is putting up garland


Some of the kids in the extended family

Our Christmas Stockings, I am hoping for something BIG! Com'on Santa!

Stay tuned for more pics over the next couple of days!

What Happened on Our Anniversary?

For a couple of weeks now I have been thinking about what to do for our first year anniversary. Traditionally the first anniversary is meant to be a paper anniversary. That was easy, I figured I would get tickets (paper) to the Dallas Mavericks basketball game and then take her somewhere fancy. Well that idea got canned because the Mav’s were playing an away game. The next idea was to take her to a symphony, or an opera or a play or something. Again and again each idea was nixed for one reason or another. So I figured I would have to rely on my amazing charm and charisma *cough* and come up with an original plan. So this is how it went down.

I dropped Jenee off at Dallas Baptist University for the last day of her week long course. Once I had dropped her off I went into overdrive to get everything ready. First things first, I stopped at Target to get supplies. Cake mix and flowers. Jenee doesn’t believe in expensive flowers unless it’s the Gardenias and if that’s the case I can ‘go crazy’.

I got home and then booked a hotel in Ft. Worth for the night. I stumbled upon the Hilton when there the night before and checked it out while Jenee wasn’t watching. So much sneakiness. I made the cake and then did a couple of loads of washing. I think I make a good househusband sometimes…

So why the cake? Well, traditionally you are meant to eat the top layer of your cake when you have your first year anniversary except our cake didn’t make it to our 1 week anniversary, it was so good that we decided to eat it while it was still good, no point wasting good cake. So I decided that we should still have cake on our anniversary so I made Jenee’s favorite, white cake with white icing, which also resembles our wedding cake. Perhaps one thing I did underestimate was how hard it really is to the little black squiggly decorations that we had on our cake. My attempt, well, you can see it below…

So, I was ready by about 1pm and spent the rest of the cold, rainy day on the couch with Linda and Joe relaxing and napping. I was at DBU at 5pm to surprise Jenee with flowers (white roses) and then I took her to dinner. We went to Bobby Valentines, a sports restaurant, and for those of you about to baulk at the choice, I chose this place because this is where Jenee took me for dinner after one of the first dates we ever had. As luck would have it, we even sat in the very same booth that we shared all those years ago.

After dinner we headed into Ft. Worth for the next part of the evening. Jenee had no idea where we were staying and I wasn’t about to tell her, she had to wait. This of course is absolute torture for her and she kept on asking me questions, trying to get a clue. We pulled up to the Hilton and she was very surprised and excited. After checking in, we went to our room and settled in for one more surprise. I told Jenee to close her eyes and when she opened them there was our cake and a bottle of champagne from the wedding that we had saved. It was just so much fun to string her along and see her surprised by what had been planned.

The next morning, we met up with Linda and Joe and Cory for a hearty breakfast at Old South, the bestest pancake house in the world. So there you have it, we had a wonderful anniversary and I have a wonderful wife!

1 Year Already!

I can hardly believe it. Jenee and I have been married for a whole year! 365 days! In hindsight, it seems to have gone extremely fast, it feels like a month ago we were having Thanksgiving at the Masri’s with Mum and Dad and all our friends and family and now here we are, and old(er) married couple.

So what are some of the shared highlights for one year? Lets see…

• WE GOT MARRIED!
• A trip to White Fish and Big Mountain, Montana
• A trip to Angel Fire, Red River and Taos, New Mexico
• (1 trip to the Taos Emergency Room)
• 8 trips to Texas
• A trip to Denver, Colorado Springs and St Elmo, Colorado
• An unplanned layover in Alexandria, Lousianna
• 1 new cat
• 6 trips to St. Augustine
• 1 shuttle launch
• 1 trip to NASA
• 1 wrestling match with a gator
• A trip to dive with Manatee’s
• A trip to dive for scallops
• 1 Nintendo Wii (+ Guitar Hero, Jenee)
• A road trip to South Carolina
• A road trip to Tennessee
• 5 visits to Zoo’s (Alexandria Zoo LA, Denver Zoo CO, Jacksonville Zoo FL, Dallas World Aquarium TX, St. Augustine Alligator Farm FL)
• A minimum of 36 plane rides (and you wonder how I know which restaurants are in which terminal in Atlanta)
• 7000+ miles / 11,200+ km worth of road trips
• 3 x 12,000+ ft mountains conquered (Pikes, Flag Pole and another one that slips my mind)
• And well the list goes on and on and on…

I have to say that we have been extremely blessed. Through the goodness of Jenee’s parents, much of our travel to see them has been enabled via airmiles. In one year we have had countless adventures and as a result have hundreds of new memories. I have in excess of 10,000 photo’s to prove it. If you don’t believe me you are welcome to sit down and look through them with me. And while I wrote this on the last plane on the way home to Gainesville I was reminded how good God is to us. Ultimately we recognize that God has indeed given us all these things and more, and through his love for us He has provided over and abundantly for us. I have only touched on the obvious things but its sometimes hard to describe in a few words how God has been there for us during some tough times this year, how he as kept us together through thick and thin and made us closer and stronger as a couple under his rule. I wonder and guess that this training if you will is readying us for the next plan he has for us, what ever that may be. I am excited to see what it is (and a little nervous, such a worrier I am, something else God is helping me work on).

I can’t wait to see what is in-store for year two!

Immigration News

Well, we had some very exciting news on Tuesday. We received the letter for the final interview for the immigration process to make me a permanent resident. The only catch was that the date for the interview was a little, shall I say, unexpected? Have a guess when it has been scheduled, go on...

I'll tell you. The day after Christmas. Yup, you read that right. So Jenee and I will be flying out to Texas for Christmas on the 21st, and then we will be flying back to Jacksonville, Florida, for the interview and then after the interview we will fly back to Texas to meet up with everyone and drive to New Mexico, hopefully with me as a lawful permanent resident.

I have had a bit of a hard time with the interview date and I have been thinking about it. I don't think my initial reaction was very Christlike as I was kinda annoyed that the interview was the day after Christmas but I have since realized that I should be rejoicing because the Lord has been providing for Jenee and I in all things and I should be greatful that He has made this whole process manageable and that we have an interview date so soon.

If you could remember to keep us in your prayers it would be appreciated. I have two prayer points that I have thought of:

1. Jenee and I are busy pulling all the necessary documents together for the interview so prayer that we would be diligent and thorough would be great and,
2. Prayer for me to stop worrying about all the scenarios that my imagination keeps coming up with and to trust in God with a more child-like faith, i.e. trusting that God has and will take care of me and I don't have to be in control.

In our Bible Study Fellowship we have been studying the book of Matthew and just two weeks ago we covered Chapter 6, part of Jesus' "Sermon on the Mount". I love this chapter because a few of my favorite promises from God rest in these pages. I have been drawing comfort from these and I would like to share them with you.

1. Matthew 6:25-26. God will feed us
2. Matthew 6:28-30. God will clothe us
3. Matthew 6:30-34. God is going to look after us because he love us. Stop worrying Nate...
   

The La Chua Trail

After living here for nearly two years, I finally made my way to the infamous La Chua Trail. This trail makes its way through Paine's Prairie where there are alligators, birds, puma, horses, bison, snakes, turtles, fish and stuff.

So, along with Jenee, Dr Powers and Greg, we went for a 2 hour walk this last Saturday to take in the sights. We say about 50-60 gators, one which was at least 15ft (± 1 ft), he was a sight to behold. Check out the slide show below.



The coolest part was that you could get very close to some of the gators. You will see that Dr Powers and I got to with in 6ft of a 6-7 ft gator. We had no intention of getting any closer, but it did allow us to look at these amazing creatures up close. Remember kids, don't get too close to the water because its the gator that you don't see that will attack you.

Guitar Hero III

Some of you know that Jenee and I have a Nintento Wii and last week we bought probably one of the funnest games I have ever seen. Its called Guitar Hero III. The idea of the game is to play your little plastic guitar by pressing the buttons and strumming according to what the computer shows you. Its a lot of fun and it makes you work hard with hand eye coordination. We have completed the easy level and as a reward you get to play a bonus song called "Through the Fire and Flames" by "Dragon Force". I had a hard time on easy, have a look at the video below. This guy is my new hero. He is playing the song on the hardest level and he hits over 95% of the notes, something very very impressive...

Meagan in St. Augustine

Here we are in St. Augustine. The Alligator Farm was great, well worth the entry price. They have more than 800 Crocodillians and here's your random fact for the day: alligators are highly intelligent, they actually respond to their name one keeper could make a gator wag its tail like a dog when she mentioned food!

Check out the pretty sunset at the end of the slide show too!

Megan in GNV!

Yup, Megan, one of Jenee's friends is here in Gainesville for the weekend. She flew in on Friday which was a holiday because it was homecoming for the UF Alumni. We picked Megan up, showed her around and went to the Butterfly Museum on campus. Check it out below.



Tomorrow we are off to St Augustine (surprise, surprise) and we are going to try something new, the Aligator Farm.