This weekend was all about Broomball.

The Des Moines Winter Games were happening around town and The Shams happened to be a part of it. The played both Friday night and Saturday night. And when I say “night” like at 10:30pm Friday (they won!), on Saturday at 9:40pm (they won!) and finally at 1:30am for the championship (they placed second!). I was only there for the Saturday shenanigans, which was awesome. We meet up with some friends at Legends for pre-game warm-up, then Amy drove Nick’s car with just Kari and I in it to the arena. Kari came prepared with three glasses, a nalgene of vodka/cranberry and one straw, which we split three-ways.

After the first game we decided to head to Locust Tap. I had to use the restroom (and not that this is a great story), but the bathrooms at LT need to be mentioned…two small unisex bathrooms neither had a sink, both had urinals, neither had locks on the doors, my bathroom had wet toilet paper and a urinal completely full of pee. It was kind of like camping. I digress, the guys got some beer to go and headed back to the arena. Amy then drove Kari and I to Big Tom’s for some after midnight pizza. And while waiting for the pizza The Shams fan club was born. More info to come from our president, Mindy.

Back to the arena, The Shams take the ice in the championship game against the Ice Monkeys, Nick did a little dance, kicked some ass, the team played hard, but it wasn’t meant to be. The Shams placed second, but placed first in our hearts.

2:30am Sunday morning, finally we get home, I get into bed, but from my waist down I am ice cold. I shake until 6:19am (that was the last time I looked at the clock). I awoke a good five hours later to do absolutely nothing the entire day. Chad came over with a computer virus problem. I read magazines, the paper, did my hair, did my nails…it was a wonderful Sunday, oh and the Superbowl was on as my background noise.

So check out Derek’s awesome pictures from both Friday & Saturday…make sure to see Trent’s broomball injury, it is a rough game.
Here are the rest of my pics

Last weekend it seemed we were never home, it was one busy weekend.

Friday night Nick, Derek & Zach participated in a Broomball exhibition for the Des Moines Winter Games during first intermission on the Iowa Chops game. It was pretty awesome. They did a play-by-play during the whole five minutes they played. Afterwards we stayed and watched the rest of the game which was actually really good. For dinner we went to Raccoon River and then headed home.

Saturday we ran some errands, went over to my grandma’s for a visit and then headed to lunch at one of my favorite places, The General Store. I separated from Nick and headed to Megan’s baby shower for dinner and baby debauchery. Nick headed to Stix for Nathan’s first night DJ’ing.

Sunday we met my brother for a HuHot lunch then left for Altoona to do Christmas with Nick’s grandparents and Kari and Andie. Got some great stuff, like Wii Fit! After that we headed to Pleasant Hill to visit Deb & Bruce and had some amazing Buffalo Wing Dip! And finally Nick went to Broomball and I had a major design breakdown.

And that was our packed weekend. Here are the Broomball pictures.

Two things happened this weekend: Girl Talk & Bridal Forum.

Saturday we met up with Derek & Kari for sushi (tempura for me) at Miyabi 9 in the East Village. Afterwards we headed to Peoples and joined up with more friends for Girl Talk. Before I get to the show, I have a few gripes about seeing shows at Peoples, the bar is in a completely different room where you can’t see the stage or even hear it. You can’t bring the drinks back to the stage area. It is so stupid. The crowd was crazy. The crowd was also all ages, which made me feel about 10 years too old and 100% too sober. With all that said, the show was pretty good. I mean it was basically his CD playing the whole time, but I loved it, I shook my groove thing. Afterwards we headed down to Liars Club for a second. Again, I think we were too sober and Nick was a little lame, so we left that scene for home.

Sunday we went to a Bridal Forum at the Sheraton. Yep, Nick joined me and he was a trooper. However, I always said that if he wants a wedding he has to help (I would elope in a second). The forum was very informational. We found cake, photographers, invitation help and the most importantly we talked to a travel agent who was super helpful. I think we also nailed down dates, not posting them just yet, but I think we are finally getting somewhere.

So my next step is surgery. I am hoping to get this done in March. Then I will start the dress shopping.

This year for Thanksgiving we headed up to Terry & Kari’s place. We stayed from Wednesday through Saturday and had a great time. The only issue was me being sick. I can not shake this stupid cold and I was crazy coughing everywhere, it was awesome.

Thursday - We headed to the movies, some of us to Twilight, some to James Bond (I went to Twilight, yes, I love those books). I had to leave a few times to have a coughing attack. After the movie we went for dinner at Mimi’s Cafe, which had the best hot chocolate. Played some Yahtzee and went to bed early since I was going to wake at 4:45am for Black Friday.

Friday - My first Black Friday and it was a super success! We scoured the ads, had a game plan: Sears, Ikea, Target and etc. At 5:00am we ran to Sears, which was a zoo, promptly left, got coffee, went to Circuit City (no line, no crowd) and bought a new T.V. Then went to Target for some little things (no line, no crowd). Then Ikea for the $99 bed frame, which was super organized. We were home by noon, ate lunch and took a nap. That night some went to a hockey game, Kari and I went to dinner at Sweet Tomatoes and went to Borders.

Saturday - The girls (Kari, Ally, Andie and I) went to Dirty Dancing. It was a little strange…the guy who played Johnny Castle was Australian, his accent kept coming and going, it was weird. None of the main cast sang, in fact there was probably only 4 songs that were actually sung, the rest was a played soundtrack. Penny was not a ballroom dancer and it looked so awkward when she tried to dance with a partner. There was some good things, the actress who played Baby was really good and it was nice to relive my favorite at a really nice theater. Afterwards we went to dinner at Houlihans, which was delicious and I had a martini flight, the best martinis ever. While we were at dinner, Nick was packing us up to leave that night since we heard about a winter storm heading our way. At 8:00pm we headed out with their van since we had so many big boxes to take home. Once we hit Iowa City the weather was awful. We eventually got home at 1:30am.

Sunday - We headed to my aunts house for “all grandkid” picture including the twins. After a lot of picture taking we headed home so Chad could use our printer then the boys wanted HuHot, so went to dinner and then back home.

What a crazy fun week/weekend. I am still sick and actually feeling really terrible, so that’s wonderful.

Pictures: Chicago/Thanksgiving or Grandkid Picture

The girl who said she would never get married just got engaged. It did take until I was 28 in an almost 7-year relationship, but whatev. So here is the story:

This Saturday we went to Walnut Woods to take photos, however we got there and Walnut Woods was pretty brown and dead, not very pretty. It was still a beautiful day and very peaceful. After a while Nick went back to the car to “get another lens”, but he came back with a large gift bag. He said it was because I’ve had a shitty couple of weeks and he wanted to do something nice. After unwrapping boxes within boxes I finally got to this adorable Coach Art Op Wristlet (love it). Then he said there was a note inside, which said “will you marry me” and then gave me the most amazing ring ever, so me. Then it finally dawned on me…handbag/proposal…back in the day I joked with Nick saying my perfect engagement would be a great bag and a ring and he remembered! (With apparently some help from my friend Kari).

The rest of the weekend was a whirlwind, we went to Grandma’s house, mom was there, who called Jan and then Jen showed up. After that we headed to Deb’s and had dinner with her and Bruce. Sunday we did some errands and did brunch with Jen and Ella.

So there it is, I was completely surprised and totally happy! Sort of wished I didn’t look like a hobo that day, but I barack’d it.

The rest of the photos.

The Next Step:
More details to come (website is in the making), but we are thinking Spring 2010, London. And everyone is invited, for those who can’t make London a reception here in Des Moines afterwards.