It has been a few weeks since returning from the cruise and what a wonderful time we both had! The high light for me was swimming with the stingray. Matt surprised me by his calm demeanor. Unfortunately I had a hard time relaxing until I was out of the water watching from the boat.

The stingray behaved much like cats. They would butt into you and then rub their body along your legs, between your legs, on your back, anywhere and everywhere all the time searching for their much sought after calamari.

The Latest

Well, we are in the information-gathering phase of things in terms of whether we are going to adopt or not. We have been looking at two agencies thus far: CCAI and Great Wall China Adoption. Both agencies seem to be really professional, very caring, and comparable in terms of cost. We're also considering domestic adoption, but there are some pluses to international adoption that are continuing to have us leaning in that direction.

In a few weeks, we are taking a cruise for our seventh wedding anniversary. We're definitely excited about this trip. The uncertain portion of the trip is that two of our ports of call (Cozumel and Key West) were hit hard recently by Hurricane Wilma. Cozumel, reportedly, was virtually destroyed. Key West suffered significant flooding. It will definitely be interesting to see where we end up going. We're sailing on the Norwegian Cruise Line's MAJESTY. We depart from Charleston, SC on 11/12 and return on 11/19.

Nashville Trip 2005


October 7th to October 10th, we spent the Columbus Day weekend in the great town of Nashville, TN. It is not a bad trip at all from Atlanta. Pretty much a 4 hour drive on the nose. There is a lot to do there, particularly if you have a fondness for country music, or really just music in general. There is a thriving music scene, and a very cool vibe to the city. We arrived in Nashville around 1:00 pm on Friday the 7th, checking into the Hotel Preston


After checking in and getting the dogs settled, we set out to explore the town. We drove further down Briley Parkway to the Opryland area. We needed to know our way around this area because we had tickets to attend the Grand Ole Opry the next night. Just adjacent to the Opry itself is Opry Mills, a GIGANTIC shopping complex. We walked through the shopping center, people-watched for awhile, and stopped for a bite to eat at the Alabama Grill. It may have just been the time of the day, but the food was not all that terrific. The atmosphere was kind of cool, though, with a lot of country memorabilia, much of it autographed.

After eating, we drove around the area a bit more and did some geocaching. After that, we swung over to the Opry and picked up our tickets for the next night. We decided to go back to the hotel and hang out with the dogs for the remainder of the evening.

The following morning we got up and went out to do some more geocaching and explore more of the city. That evening, we went over to the Opry Hall. A lady that we encountered outside took our picture at the sign:



That night at the Opry, we saw a nice mix of country legends of yesteryear and the stars of today, including Little Jimmy Dickens, Porter Waggoner, Daryl Worley, and Hanna-McEuen.

The next morning, we got up and did some additional geocaching. We also went downtown to do some exploring. We got the opportunity to tour the historic Ryman Auditorium. The Ryman is a really cool place with a great vibe and is really an important location in the history of American music. The history of the building is interesting because it is actually a converted church. They say the acoustics in the building are second only to the Mormon Tabernacle. Below is a picture of the Ryman windows, complete with stained glass. Below that is a picture of us onstage at the Ryman. Being up there you can truly feel the "aura" of the legends who had been right where you are standing.





Our next stop was the Country Music Hall of Fame. This was an interesting place, especially knowing the wonderful relics of country music that are archived and stored in the library there. Our final stop was the tower, a tall, round room where the persons voted into the hall are honored with plaques. During our tour of the Hall, Matt stopped to pose with a large picture of his cousin, bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs:



After leaving the Hall of Fame, we wandered up Broadway to the area of the Gaylord Entertainment Center. Along the street are sculptures of guitars. Julia had Matt pose with the guitar below, which has the likenesses of various country legends:



We stopped for a bite to eat at Jack's Barbecue, which boasts some of the best barbecue we have ever eaten. We then moved on to try to check out the famous Wildhorse Saloon. Unfortunately, it was closed for a private function, but we did have our picture taken with the Wild Horse:

This is the first attempt in this new venture that is blogging. This will be a shared blog between myself and Julia. We are a Christian married couple. We have been married almost 7 years (November 14th) and are the proud parents of three chihuahuas: Nacho Padre, Sierra Madre, and their daughter Penny. More on them shortly, as well as plenty of pictures to come.

Julia enjoys all types of crafts including scrapbooking, rubberstamping, card making, painting, and drawing reading, shopping (QVC is the bomb!), Birkenstock Shoes, collecting Blue Willow, being outdoors in the winter, music, Fireworks on the 4th of July, traveling, photography, cooking, camping, Cabbage Patch dolls, jigsaw puzzles, people watching, and playing saxophone.

Matt enjoys reading, writing, the outdoors, geocaching, playing the guitar, jigsaw puzzles, travel, emergency management/fire/EMS, and camping. We both enjoy getting late night chihuahua kisses, gourmet tea and coffee, line dancing, and seeing live music (classic rock, country, jazz, big band)

Matt & Julia

This is a recent picture of us.

More on where we are at this point in our lives. Like we said in the previous post, we have been married almost seven years. We have been having fertility problems while we have been trying to get pregnant for about the last 4.5 years. Julia has Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome and, because of this, has never had regular cycles.
We have gone through 3 rounds of inseminations about 2 years ago with no success. Since then, we have taken time off from the whole "fertility game", focusing on each other, our dogs, our hobbies, interests, and careers.

Matt is a "retired" paramedic, and recently decided to become involved with Gwinnett County (where we live)'s CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) program. Through this program, Matt has been able to get his hand back into the public safety response game, without having to go back on a truck. One of the real benefits of this has been Matt crossing paths again with Mike, an old partner of his from his days on the ambulance. In an initial conversation, Matt found out that Mike and his wife, Sandi, have also been having fertility issues. They have actually decided to adopt a baby boy from China. They are approximately 1 month away from traveling to China to get Anthony. It is a very exciting time for them.

Mike and Sandi attend church very close to where we live. While Matt talked with Mike on the phone yesterday, we ended up deciding to go to church with them this morning and then go to lunch afterward. We had a really wonderful time with them and discovered that they had gone through the same emotional rollercoaster that the fertility process entails. They were having the same angers, doubts, fears, and other emotions that we have been experiencing the past few years. It was a very comforting, healing get-together and we feel like this is the beginning of a very special friendship between us and Mike and Sandi.

The next step for us in the process is still kind of up in the air. We are doing some traveling and enjoying each other in anticipation of moving forward in the "baby game" in 2006. We recently traveled to Nashville, TN for a long weekend. We'll do an entry about that in the coming days. We are going to be going on a cruise to celebrate our 7th anniversary next month. We'll post more about that in the coming days. We're also planning to travel to the Las Vegas area next March or April to visit Matt's aunt and uncle and spend some time in Vegas.