Locks of Love

So in April 2008, I cut about 8 inches off my hair and went the shortest it had been since I was prepubescent. It was short and I started wearing it straight every day ... I even started contemplating cutting it shorter. Then in life's typical unpredictable fashion, Sean proposed 2 1/2 weeks later and I immediately started growing my hair out again for the wedding. Sean was a good sport about me cutting my hair last April, but he made sure to give me grief about it and playfully, passive aggressively remind me that he fell in love with me when I had long, curly hair. Point received. So I have left my hair long and let it grow back.

About two months ago, Sean said to me: "I'm surprised you haven't cut your hair short again." So I immediately took that as a free pass to cut it short again. This time though ... this time I was going to take a bigger leap ... this time ... I wanted it to be a life change. So I decided I would grow it as long as I could, so that I could donate my hair to Locks of Love, a non-profit charity that provides top-quality natural hairpieces to children suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any disease or condition. So I spoke to my lovely hair stylist, Tabby Willis, and we made plans to make the donation. So yesterday, I donated approximately 11 inches of my hair to Locks of Love.

I am really pleased that I was able to give something so personal to a child! Sean's a great sport and says he loves the new cut because he can kiss the back of neck whenever he wants.

It feels so amazing to give a smile to a child whether or not I ever get to witness it!

And thanks to Tabby for everything she did for me yesterday! She gave me a smile when I was desperately in need of one! Her kindness and giving heart is inspirational!

some of the Summer's favorite moments

So despite all the hurdles and less that stellar life challenges Sean and I were faced with this summer, we still managed to have some pretty phenomenal moments.

In May, I had the honor of heading out to Newport Beach, California to watch my lovely friend, Ann, run in the Orange County marathon. She had been training so hard, for so long and it was such a hugely significant personal journey for her that nothing could have kept me from being there for her. Sean was still in Arkansas, so I made the drive out there by myself (well me and the dogs). I am so proud of her ... she has a fire in her and a dedication to being nothing short of awesome that I admire more than my words could possibly express!

It was great to be there for her and nice to spend an afternoon in my old stopping grounds on Orange County, California.

About six weeks later, I had an industry conference in my beautiful hometown, San Diego. Sean came out with me (one of the few bonuses of his being unemployed for three months this summer). So we played in San Diego's infamous June gloom and checked out the Del Mar Fair (or the San Diego County Fair for you non-locals) with my parents.

Then we headed to the Gaslamp district for the remainder of the week so that I could attend my conference. This is my favorite picture of Sean from that week. I took it during our sunset stroll through Seaport Village. He's developed quite a love for hats this summer!

A couple weeks later, we found ourselves with no plans for the 4th of July, so I took Sean up to the Tonto Natural Bridge in Payson, Arizona to see one of the most spectacular places I have been here in the A-Z. This is a state park that has suffered major budget cuts and subsequently is only open a handful of weekends a year, so I thought it imperative to share this with Sean before it was closed for good.

Can you believe this is Arizona? Just a short hour and a half north of Phoenix!

And then of course all of this travel were road trips ... which nobody enjoys more than our Tucker B. He is so hilarious when he detects that we are getting ready for a road trip. He gets anxious and whines and pants and runs himself into a tizzy trying to anticipate the moment we tell him and Teags to load up. I love my men!

It's important with the summer of trials we had this year, that I have all these amazing memories as strength to keep going and reassurance that no matter how hard this year has been ... I could have it a whole hell of a lot harder.

I love my family and friends! I love the life they share with me! They're fabulous!

Look we're famous ... again!

So our lovely wedding photog, Deann Barrera, has plastered Sean and I all over her blog header and throughout her wedding website and we love it! It feels great to know that she enjoyed those images as much as we do, but now ... we are famous again!

My friend and our wedding florist, Kristi Pohly, has featured us on her website and her blog. She's so talented and has a great soul!

Aren't we lucky to have found two such talents that loved our day as much as we did?!?!

Check both these ladies out if you are in need of awesomeness ... both will travel for the love of what they do.

Beautiful Princeton

So with the frustration of Sean finding himself unemployed this summer came the benefit of being able to travel with my on some of my business trips.

Sean joined me on my week in San Diego in June for the DIA conference and then a couple weeks ago, Sean and I flew together for the first time as he joined me on my trip to the East Coast.

I had to go to North Carolina for about 18 hours for a couple of meetings and then off to Princeton, NJ by way of Philadelphia. This trip was not only the first time we have flown together, but also the first time both Sean and I got a chance to visit Princeton. For this trip, we had a couple days in the middle of it all to just poke around and see what we see.

The first afternoon there in Princeton, Sean and I noticed this building right next to our hotel in Carnegie Center. This is an old home turned office space that is vacant and available for lease.

It's beautiful and I am thinking it might make a superb spot for the future East Coast Regional Office of Compass IRB. Hehe! Just kidding .... kinda.


Sean and I walked around and looked in the windows and drooled over the lush trees and the moss covered stone walls. Then we stumbled upon this massive fungi. It was so beautiful!

The next day, my husband humored me and let me geek out and walk around Princeton University's campus. It was so amazing to walk around this historic campus and witness something so special ... to walk a place where so many great minds have studies, theorized, and/or taught. People such as one Albert Einstein who spent the last 22 years of his life teaching at Princeton.

I have never seen a university campus of this age. The campus was full of layers upon layers of magnificent buildings; each seemingly the best of each architectural era. Sean and I spent a good 30 minutes just staring at the exterior of this building.

We ended up spending about three hours just walking around campus, checking out the gardens, statues and monuments.

Walking around this campus was inspiring, I even started daydreaming about how magnificent it would be to go back to school and get a graduate degree from an Ivy League school. I would be in debt for the rest of my life and I am pretty sure that second semester of my undergrad freshman year would prohibit me from living my day dream, but it certainly was nice to dream.

This is how Sean entertains himself when I go on a walk

So a couple weeks ago, after a VERY long day at work, I decided to take a much needed early evening walk. Sean was hanging out around the house, bored stiff after hours and hours of unsuccessful job searching, so he grabbed a photo book of mine for inspiration and started sketching some flowers inspired by the images in the book. After sketching some ideas, he said he was going to make me a jewelry box and retreated to his new favorite place, his wood shop.

So I grabbed my tunes, laced up my shoes, and went on my standard hour-long walk. So I came home, stretched, drank some water, walked into the back yard and found Sean is his workshop making this.

He's such an artist! He made this all free-hand from a sketch inspired by a photo in a coffee table book I have had for years. So talented that man of mine is!

My man must really love me

For the past 4 years, I had been driving a 2005 Ford Explorer that as many of you know I hated! I just lived with it ... it was a good vehicle, but it had a lot of computer issues that had a way of never occurring when I took it in to be diagnosed. I bought that vehicle many years ago when was in a much different place in life ... I bought it in spite of my lust for another vehicle ... the Infiniti FX35. Instead, I took the practical route and bought the Explorer ... which at the time was a very practical decision.

Since I met Sean he has drove his 2005 black-on-black Chevy MonteCarlo Super-Charged Super Sport. He loves this car! It is sexy and fast and extremely man-tastic! Then in October of last year, Sean took over my Dad's 1994 Chevy 4-Door Silverado Dually as his new work truck.

So all of a sudden we had three vehicles. Sean has always told me to get rid of the Explorer and buy the FX (since I still drool over it every time I see one). I frequently watch them drive by and mutter: "Look, there's the car I didn't get."

Well when Sean got home from Arkansas in May, he suggested that in these financially trying times, we consolidate vehicles and get rid of my Explorer and ... wait for it .... his beloved MonteCarlo. His idea was that we would trade in both vehicles and get my dream car the perfect marriage of both our vehicles. The Infinit FX35.

Sean only waited for 10 days after being home before we went on the hunt for our new car. he must love me ... because he even shed a tear when he signed over his MonteCarlo ... just so I could have the car I was never going to let myself have.

So here is our first big purchase as a married couple. Finally, Look at the car I got!

So my man gave up his man-tastic sports car, I got rid of my infuriating Explorer, I got my dream car and we save several hundred dollars a month! I am such a lucky girl!

11 wonderful months

Today we are just one month away from our 1st wedding anniversary! And wow! It has been quite a ride! With that said, I realize that I have neglected to fill you all in on much of anything going on in our life, so I vow to get better at that. I know, I know ... I promised that before, but this time I mean it.

So strange to realize that it has already been 11 months since Deann captured this moment.

I am not going to lie; as a matter of fact, I am going to be very honest. This past 11 months has been so hard! Not because of anything between Sean and I, but rather just because life is hard for everyone right now. Mix that in with our whirlwind romance and getting married in less than a year of knowing eachother, life definitely has been testing our strength. The good news is that Sean and I have not faltered ... we have gotten stronger every day. Some days have been harder than others to spot the beauty and the lesson amongst the frustrations that life has brought us, but we have come out swingin' ...ready to take on the world and even more in love than the day before.

So when I woke up in Sean's arms this morning ... yes, we still hit snooze every morning to snuggle back up to eachother ... I felt this overwhelming sense of accomplishment and love and belonging. I am so excited to be married to this man ... he has taught me so much about love, life, and understanding.

Here's to our 11 months of hurdles and challenges and discovering we love each other more than we even thought possible.

Yay Team Brookshire!

Fall Frenzy 2009

Sean and I danced our first dance as husband and wife to Jason Mraz's duet with Colbie Caillat, "Lucky." I chose this song for us the day his most recent album We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things was released. The first time I heard the song during my first listen of the album, I knew it would be our song. I came straight home that evening and shared the song with Sean and asked him what he thought and we agreed ... it's perfect!

So imagine our excitement when we found out that Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat were going to be playing together at a festival here in Phoenix. We were amped and then we realized that the festival was going to be outdoors in September in Phoenix ... and thusly, we were disappointed knowing that in September here in Phoenix it typically is still hitting daily temperatures of 100 degrees which would not make for the most ideal experience.

So with the fear of the heat and this summer's financial crunch, we opted not to go to the show. So imagine our surprise, when our dear friends , Ann and Cory, bought us tickets to go to the Fall Frenzy as our early 1st wedding anniversary present. We were so excited! Ann was our officiant for the wedding and she has been my bud since we met more than 10 years ago at a teen leadership camp; she knew how special it would be if Sean and I got to experience Jason and Colbie sing "Lucky" live. So we went to the Fall Frenzy, it was hot but not intolerable, and we did get to dance to Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat performing our song live. So we waltzed right there in the warm late summer air in the middle of thousands of people, under the stars on the grass at Tempe Townlake Beach.

Thank you Ann and Cory! Thank you for giving us a night we certainly will never forget!

Great news for my family and some wonderful American women

For those of you who know me, I am sure you have heard me talk about my phenomenal maternal grandmother, my namesake, my personal hero. She was a pilot in WWII serving as one of only 1200 Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs). Well, this morning my mother sent me this article. It appears that the U.S. government is giving them the highest civilian honor possible. please read ... and celebrate this long overdue and very well deserved recognition.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/30/winged-victory/?features&zIndex=157507&dsq=15762908#comment-15762908

My husband ... the artist, the woodworker, the love of my life

Sean has been home for two months now and I have been insanely busy with work and now his work has been slower than he would like, so he has found ways to entertain himself. Sean has been day-dreaming of making a gorgeous wood-geared clock, so he has been starting to collect tools, read wood working magazines, and has began playing around with scraps of wood to fine-tune his use of the new tools. So the other day, I cam home from work to find him covered in saw dust working on this.

For those who don't know what this is. This is Fifinella; she is a sort of mascot that was created by Walt Disney for the Women Air Force Service Pilots (WASPs) of WWII of which my grandmother was a part of. This was the first thing my fabulous husband choose to make ... it made me tear up a little bit.

So he has been working on Fifinella off and on for a couple weeks now perfecting her and figuring how to frame her or finish her edges. He finished her today.

He also built and finished this today.

He's crazy talented and I love him tons!!!! This is just one example of the many sweet ways he shows me love.

Isn't it gorgeous?!? I am sure this is just the start of many little gorgeous creations my husband will make, I will share them with you as he brings various pieces of wood to life.

This will be a summer I never forget

It's summer ...well almost and the local weather anchors are telling us that the start of monsoon season is just 3 days away, but somebody must be confused. I say this because when I got home from work yesterday evening it was only 89 degrees and when I left for work this morning it was a perfect 74 degrees.

Last I checked this was the Valley of the Sun and last I checked the weather had to be substantially hotter for the monsoon phenomenon to ever occur. Hey, I'm not complaining. I am just astonished! Thank you Mother Earth for this astonishingly beautiful ease into our summer.

Oh and Sean, hater of all air that is hot, loves and appreciates it too!

apparently my house came with a gardener

I have a gardener! He comes while I am at work or away on business and adjust my sprinklers and their watering cycle, mows my lawn, fills in the holes my dogs have dug, stakes up the cacti when they get top heavy, and offers advice of how to make pulling crab grass a little easier.

To top it all off ... he is so handsome and is always smiling. Normally, I think Sean might get jealous, but Sean can't really deny his charm or contagious smile. Here's a picture of him.

This is our next-door neighbor, Gene. He is the sweetest thing in the world and any time life gets little crazy and he sees that Sean and I don't have the time we wish we had to keep up with everything in the yard. We come home and find that Gene had taken it upon himself to help us out.

This week alone I came home last Saturday night to find that he had taken the weed-wacker to the lawn that I had mowed, but not gotten an opportunity to trim, he also filled in some uneven spots in our yard with"some extra dirt" he claimed to have in his yard. Tuesday, I found him in the side yard trimming up the weeds that had come up in the cracks along side the drive way. And yesterday evening, I came home from work and found him mowing the front yard that I had planned to come home and do that same evening.

He's a nut and I can't get him to stay out of our yard. It makes me feel like such a slouch. I wonder what the neighbors must think when they see the sweet old man work in those young kids' yard. There's no harm in it really. It makes him happy and I am truly so appreciative for his little acts of love. I just will never be able to live with myself if he hurts himself doing my yardwork.

I love my gardener! I just wish he would stay out my yard, so this guilty knot would leave my stomach.

Playing catch up ... again!

So I got playfully scolded the other day for slacking on my blog. I've been out of it ... consumed ... overwhelmed ... so many things that I feel like if I stop and breathe and get into the place in my heart and my head that I write from that I might just start crying uncontrollably. This phase in life is hard. It is. It's plain and simply hard ... so hard! I am Bonnie; I haven't lost the sunshiney outlook on life that I have developed over the past few years, but I am tired and the days are hard. I have been having moments where taking the high road and being graceful and restraining myself from yelling at the top of my lungs with frustration has grown increasingly unappealing, but they are fleeting moments. I just married my best friend and I come from an amazing family. I have phenomenal friends and I am so proud of all that I have accomplished in my 29 years, so those weak, frustrated moments are few and fleeting, but I would be lying if I said they weren't here. It's just a miss my husband and once you learn the magic of sharing your everyday with your partner, all of life's challenges begin to seem more daunting when your partner isn't by my side. So please forgive me for slacking on the blog as I find strength in the numbness from disconnect at times. I know that's a cowards way out, so I have been trying to reconnect and be more myself ... more honest with myself and the world about my blessings and disappointments. So I am trying ... thank you for the patience.

With that said, February all in all has been good. Work is picking up we are really BUSY again. My team is phenomenal at the office, the difficulty there comes from just not having enough time to get everything done at the office I want to and then with Matt's recent life commitments, he has decreased time and uninterrupted focus in the office. He's trying though ... he amazes me by how much he is to so many people, but I will be really glad when this phase of his life is over to and he can reconnect with the office. Again though, I am blessed that he gives me so much trust and power and respect in the office and let's me run the company as it were my own.

My parents came to visit me for my Dad's birthday .. which was so lovely. My family is great! It was my Dad's birthday and they drove all the way out here to see me. So I took my parents up to Jerome for some site-seeing and haunted hamburgers overlooking Sedona. We got in some fun shopping and some backyard steak-grilling which equals an all around fantastic weekend.

The next weekend, I went to go visit my handsome and loving husband. I flew into Tulsa so that we could spend some time with his grandfather ans so that I could meet his father and his father''s family. It was really nice to meet them and put faces with all the names and stories. And as an added bonus, I got to see the full picture of what Sean will look like as we grow old together.

Seriously, the resemblance is astounding!

While I was visiting Sean, he surprised me with tickets to the Tulsa Opera. It was really nice to have a date night out on the town, when we get to see each other so seldom these days.

I headed home on Tuesday night and had a few short days in the office before Sean's little sister, Taylor flew out to spend the weekend with me. It was a hard weekend ... since it was Sean's birthday and he wasn't here and I wasn't there with him. All in all, Taylor and I had a very fun weekend. She flew out this weekend so that I could take her to see Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Taylor just recently started dancing a few years ago and well, I just couldn't let her go without witnessing the force that is Alvin Ailey's company. It was fun; she enjoyed it .. that pretty much sums up the whole weekend.

Taylor is an amazing young woman and I feel really privileged to have gotten to spend the entire weekend with her. However, the above picture is not quite such an amazing photo of me, but whatever it was a special moment.

So that brings us to this week, I have to head to Pennsylvania for a meeting on Friday and then I will be in San Diego this weekend. OK now that we are caught up, I will try and pay more attention to the details of everyday.

My favorite wedding picture of today

I had no clue that Deann was even in the room when Sean and I stole this moment. It is by far one of my favorites. Sweet, sexy stolen moment.

Today was pretty dang great!

Today, despite the absence of my beloved husband, was a pretty dang good day. It was a gorgeous Phoenix spring morning with the promise of a storm blowing in which just happens to be some of my favorite weather and then the day just seemed to unfold quite nicely into perfect Saturday loveliness (except of course that my Sean wasn't here to share it with me).

Here are the reasons why today was a good day!

1) I mowed a lawn for the first time. Growing up a girl with a dad and a brother, I never really had any reason to be the one responsible for mowing the lawn and then until now if I lived somewhere with grass it came with a landscaping team to take care of it. So now, Sean and I are here in our rental house with a nice size lawn and Sean always takes it upon himself to take care of the mowing. So of course, with Sean gone, I now had to step up and take care of it myself. So today I mowed! I think I love it. I think I might steal it of of Sean's list of responsibilities. Fresh cut grass is one of my favorite smells in the world and I found it to be quite relaxing. A favorite smell, outside activity, and relaxing ... win, win, win in my book.

2) on my way to yoga today, I saw a man and a woman teaching someone how to ride a bike along the greenbelt ... bonus cuteness ... the person learning how to ride was probably in her late thirties! They all had these fabulous smiles on their faces and the student was sporting a helmet, knee pads and elbow pads. It really was such a rare moment that I got to be privilege to ... adults being astounding friends to one another and relishing in the joy of it like sweet innocent children. Fabulous!

3) I went to yoga! That is no officially the eighth time in 2 1/2 weeks including five days I spent in Arkansas with Sean and no chance of going to Bikram. So really that is eight times in about 13 days. I am very proud of myself and I feel so amazing. I am officially addicted to the Bikram yoga experience. The sweat, the meditation, the journey, the way it challenges my body in a different way each time. Love, love, love it!

4) I got a manicure and pedicure at my favorite place by my favorite girl! 'nuff said.

Today was a study is fabulousness for which I am thankful to have participated in. Now if I was just lucky enough to get to crawl into bed with my husband too .... ohhhh that would be sweet! Alas, that apparently is asking too much since I won't have Sean back in our home 'til April at the earliest. Oh well! I will keep counting my blessing and focusing on the positive. I hope you all are having an equally as lovely Saturday.

Things I promise to blog more about later, but just needed to get off my chest

1.) I miss my husband! This week has been extra excrutiating for some reason. Anytime Arkansas wants to give him back would be great!
2.) I have started doing Bikram yoga (aka: hot yoga) and I am completely and shamelessly addicted.
3.)My husband being out of town for six months and my new addiction to Bikram is breeding a guilt within me for not giving my puppy dogs enough love and attention.

I shall elaborate later ... when I am not supposed to be working for my paycheck.

the reason why Arkansas and other parts of middle America won't have power 'til mid-February

So I was listening to the news this morning and they were talking about last week's ice storm and how the death toll is up to I believe they said 82 people. That's when I remembered that I was there visiting Sean and hadn't shared any of the pictures. Here's perhaps some perspective on why the power is out until the middle of February out there.

my current favorite photo

So since I don't yet have my online gallery up of the wedding photos. I thought I would share my current favorite picture from our glorious, love-filled day. It changes daily depending on how I am feeling.

Here it is courtesy of one super talented Deann Barrera of Deann B. Photography....