Quick Update

So, what's the latest you ask? Well, by golly let me get to updating ya'll then :)!

I believe I'm about a month behind, so please bare with me and hold your horses while we catch up.

We are now 'new to us' car owners.  We got rid of my car since it needed a new $7,500 motor. Due to the fact that even with a new motor the car wouldn't be worth as much as the motor, so it was time to say adios to the Lincoln.  Seth searched online for a sale by owner car, and we ended up with an 07 Malibu.  We are both pretty content with the purchase, and would feel even better if the Lincoln was still up and running and no purchase was necessary :).  

A picture of our new beaut.

Before we found this gem, Seth was actually looking very interested in some hideous older cars and even at mini-vans.  Ick!

A few weeks ago we ventured down to Columbia to check out the zoo.  I very much enjoy the zoo and all the animals around. 

Seth and I on a big chair in the gardens at the zoo.

My favorite animal at the zoo is the elephant.

Elephant.

I like to watch them walk and their feet flatten out.  I enjoy watching them eat and flap their ears.

The giraffe got super close wanting some food.

The four of us at the zoo.

Karla and Zach eating Mexican in Camden.  Yum.

During this past month I've attempted canning.  Canning intimidates me, so I went for the easiest thing to can--Jam.  Seth and I eat the hound out of PB & J's and we love us some biscuits.  We definitely go through jam. 

Getting everything ready for Strawberry Jam.

The final product. 

The jam turned out great!  It was pretty easy to do, but man did it take an unlawful amount of sugar!

Zach and Seth.  We took this picture b/c of the cars in the background.  They are Zach and Karla's cars.  Seth and I were borrowing Zach's car during this time.  Man, do they have nice cars :)!

During this past month Seth and I went to visit Emily and Trevor in NC.  Emily and I mosied around shops in Durham while Trevor and Seth played golf.  We then went to a rock quarry to swim and out to a local place for din din.  Trevor and Seth are two of the most competitive fellas I know.  So, EVERYTHING is a competition of some sort for them.  Golf, Swim Races, PingPong!

Trevor was the pingpong champ.

Emily, Seth and Trevor swimming.

I'm a strange one when it comes to bodies of water.  I prefer to not get wet, especially in the ocean or lake.  I'm not sure the reasoning behind it, but I just don't really enjoy getting into these types of water.  So, I was the loser who didn't participate in swimming.

Seth was by far the swimming champ.  Trevor swam completely off course, swimming back towards the bank rather than out towards the finish line :).

Emily and Trevor at their local joint that serves fries fried in duck fat.

The duck fat fried fries.

The group after playing pingpong.

Seth and Emily.

Seth trying Emily's juice.

Emily has a pretty rad juicer and she has talked about the juices that she makes.  I asked if she could make us something to try out.  It was a completely awkward green color and the smell was horrendous.  I like to try new things, but I always make Seth try it first and then give me an over run of what to expect.  He wasn't very thrilled about trying this before me though.  He made an awful pouty face and attempted the juice.  The face expressed enough for me to expect not to like it.  It tried said juice and it is not something I really care to try again :).

Such an awful pic, but Seth and I have been attempting to play tennis for fun and exercising purposes.  We both wore our Utah State shirts one day and I had to get a picture.

Boy, do we miss that place.

Well this was all pre-beach pictures.  At the beach we spent a week with our wonderful family, and a FULL WEEK with my sweet nephew.  So, due to the sweet nephew part, I have TONS of pictures to go through and sort before putting that blog post up!  

Hope all is well with all our folks :).

The Cook's :)--With our favorite--Elephant!

Joanna & Greenwood Family Visit!

Seth and I visited family this past weekend.  Lots of fun!  These next two weekends we plan to take it easy, and then stay busy for the next month or so!  Whew :)!

Friday evening we stayed with my folks and got to see that sweet Nephew of mine.

He is just getting so big and just stays so cute.

Boy let me tell you how this little guy takes after his daddy and Pops.  These Sineath men like to fight sleep for some reason.  When Mom and I are sleepy we do the logical thing and go to sleep, but not these guys.  Poor Mackay is following in their footsteps and at such a young age.  This kid fights sleep like no other kid I have EVER seen.  It is ridiculous.  

Ridiculous.

But when he isn't fighting sleep he is the happiest, most smiling toothless grinning, drooling, squealing, cooing, and trying to walk baby!

They both like to grin at each other :).

Mackay and Seth.  For some reason Seth likes to hold little man like this a lot!

Excuse the crazy hair, but he's just sweet with his pretty blue eyes.

Mom and Mackay

I don't know what we did before as a family, but it seems now that he's around we all just giggle and our attention is placed all on him!  He's growing up so so fast and I'm so thankful I'm around to see it.  I can't wait to spend a week at the beach with him (during the day of course, I'm not up for night duty!).

He's getting to be such a big guy!

I think he's telling Auntie E he loves her :).

Saturday we got up and headed out to Lake Greenwood to celebrate Zach's 21st birthday!

Zach drove us all around on the boat and navigated the tubers and skiers.  He did awesome.

Cook brothers.

It appears a large black snake slithered by some of the woman.  Once it slithered through their feet, Karla's grandfather announced the snake and the ladies jumped up and on top of tables and things :).  If I was there I'd probably have screamed, but seeing as I was coming down after all the commotion I was fine with the situation.

 We played tether ball.  

I lost every game.

I mean like every game was lost by me.

Karla about to show us all how it's done with skiing.

It was such a beautiful spot on such a beautiful day!

I think he's pretty smart and hot....

I mean how couldn't he be?  He married this :).  Kidding.

Mrs. Cynthia skiing like a pro!

The birthday fella and the newly engaged folks and the future Mr. and Mrs. Cook :). How fun!

Karla riding in the boat.

 Professional skier is what this kid is. :).  

He didn't want to stand more upright than this.  He fell a few times.  He drank almost half the lake with all his falls combined.  He has bruises today and is sore.


This was perky Seth before his skiing adventure.  He was not this upbeat afterwards.  He was whooped!

The Cook Fam--minus Trevor and Emily.

These pictures are from when we first moved back and I've forgotten about them.

After church.

Karla and I attempted to jump.  My timing was obviously off and hers was more correct!  

We are still currently in the market for a home.  We must be pretty dang picky, but it's taking a while!  I'm about to be actively seeking a job-:(.  I want a job, but I sure don't like the whole looking and interviewing process!  And it also appears I am definitely going back to school in the fall, so wish me luck!  Seth and I will soon be heading to the beach to spend a week with family, Mackay, and a new Baird Baby :).

Hope you all have a great rest of your week!

The Cook's :)

Growing up is Scary!

Seth and I are technically growing into full adulthood as I type this.  Our simple easy little lives are completely being tossed about and we just are scared out of our minds.  It is surreal that we lived in Utah for 2.5 years.  Boy, do I miss it.  I love being back in SC, but man this little minute of our lives is just tough.

Seth and I have multiple decisions that we will be making over the next few months that will FOREVER change our lives. Whewwwww!  Seth and I are looking to purchase a home in Florence.  Since Seth is a working man and I am not a working woman at the moment I do the house hunting and narrow down the ones that I could possibly see our lives fitting into.  Seth will then take a peek at the possible home and then we commute back to Camden to our lovely rental home to think and chat together.  Boy is this tough.  I've gotten a headache every time I've gone looking.  It is soooo overwhelming and hard to imagine what home is right for us Cooks.  Which home we can see ourselves in.  This is a huge responsibility and a huge commitment.  It also doesn't help that Seth and I are pretty indecisive people.  We both second guess ourselves and we sure do not want to go outside of God's plan for our lives.

Anywho, on top of the house decisions we also have my car in the shop with the possibility of needing a huge fix up.  Do we fix the car or start looking for a 'new' used car?  I also am planning to go back to school in the fall to study nursing.  We won't even get into having kids and all that cost in this post!

Oh the woes of adulthood :).  Thanks for tuning into my worrisome thoughts.

We definitely enjoyed celebrating Seth's 25th birthday with family!  Seth's mother, my now future sis-in law Karla, and I went to the Greek Festival in Greenville.  Although we all wanted to go to the Festival, Mrs. Cynthia and I had a secretive plan for going that I can now share :)!  Zach needed Karla out of dodge for a bit so he could speak with her parents after purchasing a lovely ring!  We got Karla out of town, ate yummy desserts (not so yummy lunch food), and toured a Greek Orthodox Church.

Mrs. Cynthia & Karla

The Greek Orthodox Church we toured in Gville.

 Lady Cooks and a Future Cook :).

Seth's birthday was this same weekend.  He wanted a Butter Pecan Cake so a Butter Pecan Cake I made.  We had a big lunch to celebrate him with LOADS of food and family.

Seth, his folks, the lovely table.

I'm not yet a pro baker of course.  I was told the cake took on a 'rustic' feel.

My very very handsome 25 yr old Man.

While looking for homes I've been traveling with Seth to Florence and I've gotten to eat lunch with him on those days :).  Our Realtor has taken us out some and we've eaten in Seth's office some.  Victor's, a restaurant that has recently relocated to Downtown Florence opened for lunch and our Realtor took us there.  It was super fancy and quite lovely.  Her husband is one of the chef's at the restaurant, so we had a special in with her and thoroughly enjoyed it.

We both got a pretty good Chicken Salad on a Croissant and a Banana Praline Cheesecake.  Yummm.

Seth hard at work while I hung out on a work couch reading a book.

This coming weekend we will be going to one of our first events with Seth's work.  They will have a Picnic on one of their property's.  I'm excited and can't wait for all the fun events they have planned!

This past weekend was packed!  My folks came in for a night, Zach got engaged, Emily/Trevor and Seth's folks came into town for Memorial Day.

My parents came up Friday night for a quick visit.  They brought a mouse with them in the car unbeknownst to them.  Mom opened the backseat door to get their luggage and saw a small mouse running around.  We couldn't find the mouse after Mom 'saw it'.  For a while we wondered if she was just having a senior moment :).  After a delightful dinner we went and got some mousetraps.  Dad set all the traps out (about 8 total-he was dead set on catching this mouse and making sure there were no others). He also got regular mouse traps that snap on the mouse and sticky mouse traps.  He was hardcore.  As soon as they were set out the poor little mouse got caught on a sticky trap.  He was so small and was trying so hard to get out.  I felt so bad for him and for the suffering he was enduring, so I had Seth kill him.  No other mouses were caught that evening.

The next day we took Mom and Dad to the farmer's market, to the family farm, the Revolutionary site, and antique shopping.

At the revolutionary site.

It wasn't very comfy.

So lovely.

Hofield/Paint Hill 

Seth & Mom.

My folks and I.  Very much enjoyed them visiting and hosting them both.

 Seth in the shed.

While Mom and Dad were here Seth and I found loads of goodies at the Habitat store.  We got a very nice rocking chair that we both LOVE, a dehydrator that we have been wanting for quite a while, and Mom got us a nightstand that matches our bedroom suite!

Sunday afternoon Seth's family came into town.

Even though everyone was together since forever this is the only picture I got :(!  Karla and Zach newly engaged at the end.  A feast in front of us and all the Cook family around the table.

Seth and I now have his Grandfather's real mower.  We used that the other day to cut our grass.  Although it was hardwork, it was fun!

Seth cutting grass.  

It seems that every time I work out in the yard I get some new mishap happening to me.  I've recently gotten poison oak somehow and it also appears that I've gotten stung by a bee on the back of my knee and I have no recollection of it?  Ahhh, the South!

And we always have to have a sweet picture of my main squeeze.

He's beyond precious.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!  I'll update with all these scary decisions that we make when they arrive!

The Cook's :).