one year anniversary

ahh, what a difference a year makes! today marks diana and my one year anniversary. a year ago it was a saturday and i drove over to her house for our first date! we had a great time going to see 'juno' and then eating dinner at logans steakhouse. i can't say i could have ever imagined that a year later we would be engaged and two months away from getting married- crazy, huh? im pretty sure i'm the luckiest guy in the world!

this is the first picture we ever took together. somehow she saw something underneath that crazy beard that was worth going out on a second date with- and boy am i thankful!

unfortunately we wont be able to go out tonight, she works till 9:00pm. but i made sure she got a little something special at work to celebrate... (here it is)

work break

while doing all that hard work of assembling the wedding invitations, i needed a little nap. poco looked like he could use some company on the couch, so i joined him for a couple minutes!

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be our guest

when it comes to wedding planning and stuff, diana and i aren't very good at it. i've heard from many different couples that its important not to let the wedding planning consume you and consume all of your conversations with each other because when its all done you might find you have nothing to talk about. well, thats not really a problem for us, we are actually on the opposite end of that spectrum- we hardly talk about it at all, which is a bit of a problem because its coming up soon! so for the past couple weeks we have been buckling down and really trying to get stuff done. this week that meant taking care of the wedding invitations. my mom has been, ever so gently, hassling us to get moving on these! so i took care of the wording and everything, and now they are all ready to go. saturday i went over to diana's and we began the herculean task of assembling them. diana had been taking time each night to address the envelopes, so that was ready to go for us. after a few hours of assembly line production, we finished them up! done! aside from about four addresses we still need to get, they are completely finished. monday i will drop them off at the post office, and everyone should have an official invitation to the wedding by the end of the week. ahh, it feels good to have that bit done- now we only have three million other things to worry about. who says wedding planning is stressful?
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lost again

a bunch of my friends and i are really into the show 'lost'. for the past couple years we get together each week its on and have dinner and enjoy the show. wednesday it finally came back for its fifth season, so rachel and scott invited us all over to their new place to watch it. it had been quite a while since i saw some of the people who were there, so it was really great to catch up. rachel made some really great food, she had baked potatoes with some strange feta cheese spread for it that was awesome, and she prepared some peruvian chicken, which was really yummy too!

the show was fun to watch again, but the best part was enjoying it with a bunch of friends, catching up, trying to understand what was going on in the show, laughing, and just having a good time! there were a couple new people as well, friends of scotts who work with him. one of them had never seen 'lost' before, so it was kind of funny to try and explain to him what was going on, which was impossible...

i look forward to getting together again. we don't watch it together every week, but when we do its always fun, whether the show is good or not!

tomorrow world

this past tuesday was an exciting day. obama was inaugurated, but the exciting part was how we got to watch it! at school we took a little bit of time out of our schedule so the kids could witness this moment of history. but the problem is that our school doesn't have cable. there is no way for the tv's in our room to get a signal from tv stations.

this past year we added a wing to the school and all the middle school teachers got new rooms. what was really cool is that with those new rooms came new tvs and computers! the tvs are flat screen high def 42 inch sets- which are really cool! and one of the fun features that they allow is that they can be hooked up to our computers. the idea is that we can make slide shows of different stuff we are teaching about, that way we can show pictures of the topics and bring it even more to life. well, this all came in very handy this past tuesday. without a tv connection to watch the inauguration, we thought we would be out of luck. but then we realized that the whole thing was going to be broadcast live on the internet! so we set up the computers and tvs and were able to show a live feed of the whole event from our computers. not only was the event historic, but so was the way we got to watch it- live from the internet into our classroom tvs! i know this will become commonplace over the next few years, but its kind of fun to realize that we are able to do it today! i must say, i am quite impressed with the tech savvy our school has, for that half hour it felt like we were living in the future!

faulty circuits

recently circuit city announced that it is closing up all its stores. i was shocked when i first heard about their financial problems, i had always thought they were doing well, just a couple of years ago they built a new store by me. every time i went in there it was busy, at least a dozen or two people milling about the isles. well, due to gross incompetence (i would assume), they are closing their doors at every location. they announced that they must liquidate all their stock, so that means they are having huge sales on everything. so i went in to check it out, and i must say, this 'huge sale' thing is quite misleading. i was checking out the dvds, which normally sell for ten to twenty bucks, are now all priced based on the manufacturers suggested retail price. that means that they are all fifteen to twenty five dollars. they are saying that they have marked dvds twenty percent off, which sounds like a great deal, until you realize that they are all priced thirty percent more than they are at best buy. i looked around and saw movies that should be fifteen bucks are priced at twenty dollars. hmm, twenty dollars minus 20% is still more than fifteen bucks... good try, circuit city. with these type of tricks its no wonder they are going out of business!

corporate shilling

i spend so much time at panera bread taking advantage of their free wi-fi that i figured i should repay them is some small way. so heres that repayment:
on wednesday the 28th they are unveiling their new coffee blends as well as a new breakfast menu. the coffee is free all day, so if you are a fan of the java, stop by and get some free joe. they will also be giving out free samples of the new breakfast items.
there. i hope that makes us even, panera.

a couple rings

as the wedding date draws closer, diana and i are starting to realize that we need to get planning! ever since the engagement we've always figured 'we'll let future mark and future diana worry about planning for the wedding'. well, its the future, so its time to get busy planning. saturday diana had the day off, so we got to work on the some of the big things we still needed to figure out. we started off by taking a break and going out to eat (even on a day of planning, we still found a way to procrastinate...). a couple doors down was the tux shop, so we ducked in there and make the final choices for what the guys are going to wear.

then we drove over to the mall. diana wasn't quite sure what we were doing there, so i let her know: 'i think its about time we got ourselves some wedding rings' i said. boy, did her eyes light up! she was so giddy, she's been pestering me to do this for the past six months and i always told her 'later'. well, now is later. we have looked before at a few different places, but didn't find anything that matched very well. this time we found one- it matches perfectly and looks really amazing with the engagement band, so we got it. we also went and got the one i've had my eye on since we first started looking, but i have to wait for them to order it, so i didn't get to bring it home just yet. diana has been glowing with joy ever since we got hers, but is quite disappointed that i won't let her wear it yet. i took the box with the ring in it and had to hide it somewhere in the house so she doesn't dig it out every time she visits. i'm holding firm to the rule that she's not supposed to wear it until we get married. sorry honey, i don't make the rules, i just live by them.

i would post a picture of the wedding ring, but that would ruin the surprise!

past due party

the friday before christmas break we always have a party at school. this year, unfortunately, that friday was a snow day (well, its wasn't exactly that unfortunate, we did get the day off after all...). the kids had paid for the party, though, so we figured we should go through with it. so this past friday we did! it was the end of the semester, so it was only a half day anyway. instead of class we went bowling! the kids played a couple games, then we headed back to school and the kids played dodgeball in the gym. afterward we all went back to our homerooms and had some pizza and treats! it was a really good time and the kids really loved it! and i say any day i get to throw nerf balls at the students is a good day!

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cold!

man, its been cold around here! usually i don't mind the cold too much, i'm a bit of a polar bear. there's cold, and then there's COLD, and this week has been COLD!!! most of the week it was well below zero degrees. at one point it was about 14 degrees below zero! with wind chill it was about negative thirty five! on the news they were saying that human flesh freezes after only about 15 minutes outside in that weather- yikes, that's kind of scary...
most of the schools in our area were closed due to the cold weather because of buses and kids standing out at the bus stops. us? nope, we had school every day this week. but i'm kind of glad, i had a lot of fun things planned for class and would have rather had class then delay it. the heat in the school building is better than mine at home anyway, so i was warmer there!
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all to myself

i always love to go to the theater and go see movies. diana is usually up for it as well, but we don't really get a ton of time together, so we usually prefer not to waste it in a dark theater where we can't talk! this leaves me with only one option: go and see movies by myself. i've been doing this for years, in fact, i actually remember the first movie i ever saw by myself: i was only eleven, but my mom dropped me off at the movie theater by myself and i went to see 'ducktales: the movie'! i've been going alone ever since. it's often a really nice time to enjoy a movie on the big screen alone. some people think its really strange and would never think of doing it themselves, but i find it quite enjoyable. even with all this solo movie going, last week i had a first- i went to go see a movie and i was the only one in there! usually there are at least a couple more people, but this time i had the whole place to myself! i felt pretty cool, my own private screening!

taco grande

while diana, barbara, nick and i were in grand rapids we met up with my mom for lunch at taco bell. we were planning to just see her, but as a surprise, my sister was there with the kids! we were quite happy to see them as well! it is always a great time when the kids are around and in good moods. they were excited to see us, but jackson wasn't so sure about nick and barbara though... aves always seems thrilled when she gets to see her favorite (almost) aunt! all three of them were playing around and having a fun time, hanging on the bars in line for food and messing with the taco bell hot sauce.

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in bloom

this past weekend diana and i went up to grand rapids with her sister barbara and boyfriend nick. we met up with my mom and sis for lunch, then it was off to do what we came for: taking care of the flowers for our wedding! we headed over to eastern floral and had a meeting with them to figure out what we wanted. she had some great ideas and diana was really happy with what they decided on. and you know how wedding planning goes: if diana is happy, i am happy!
after the flower shop we went to my parents house to go over things with my mom and try to get on top of the planning that we have left to do. it was fun and really great to show barbara and nick the place i grew up. they hadn't ever been to my parents house, so it was cool to show them around. it was a rather productive day, which is always nice. nick and barbara were sound asleep for the drive home- they both work nights so all of this was during their usual sleeping time which threw them off a bit.

a true hollywood story

last week diana came over to see me on her day off. while we were hanging out she had been watching tv. we started to chat, so she turned the volume down. about a half hour later we were still chatting. i just happened to glance over at the tv and much to my shock i saw someone i actually knew! what?!? it happened to be on the E! channel and while we were talking the show had changed. the person talking was meghann! she is an old friend who i went to college with. she lived right across the hall from me for a year and i was really good friends with here and her roommates. she is also a teacher, so we had many many classes together as well. what exactly was she on tv for? well, she is a music teacher, and it turns out that she was actually the middle school music teacher for the jonas brothers! (in case that name doesn't sound familiar, its a wildly popular trio of boys in a band that middle school girls are obsessed with). it was quite surprising to see her on tv! we rewound the show and she shares some stories about teaching them and a prank they played on her in class once.
its strange where people you know show up, huh?

keeping warm

last weekend i was at panera bread doing the internet thing. i found that my feet were really cold! for some reason, panera doesn't really like to keep its heat on, so i am often very cold when i am playing on my computer. it was really snowy outside and my shoes were soaked. the only way to really heat up my feet would be if my shoes weren't wet, so i took advantage of the fire place they have in the place and proceeded to heat up the shoes myself the old fashioned way!

christmas randoms

it was a great christmas, and a wonderful time with the family! i spent a week and a half home, with diana joining us when work allowed, and had an awesome time. i've shared almost all the stories and all the pictures i have, but it seems that i have a few left. i still wanted to share them so i took the leftover photos and put them here: 1, 2.

painting, round 1

will all that time off during christmas break, i figured i should at least spend some of it being productive. so, friday after new years, diana and i got to work repainting my kitchen. she wants to repaint almost all the rooms in my place before she moves in (i can't blame her, they are all looking a bit gross), so we started with the biggest room. she had always thought she wanted to paint it yellow, but at the last minute she decided it would be too bright, so she went with a light green called 'celery' (sounds exciting, huh?). we got the paint and supplies from home depot, then began our task. my dad had offered to come down sometime and replace the trim in my house, so we started our day of painting by tearing off all the old trim- which was quite a big task! once that was taken care of, we taped off the areas we needed to, and threw up a layer of primer first. once that dried we put down the first pass of color. she decided that she did in fact like it, so i continued with the first coat. she had to work the next day, so she headed out and i finished the job. by the end of the night i had put up the second layer of paint and took care of all the detail work. over the weekend it had dried and i was able to start putting the kitchen back together! sunday diana was able to come back and see it. we both like the way it looks now, but we have a ton more painting ahead!

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new years

for new years we were quite torn about where to go. we had been planning to go to aaron and jeffry lee's house for a party they were throwing, and also go to one of diana's friends houses for a bit of the night. then her sister and nick said they were having a party- which threw all of our plans out the window!

i went down there new years even and picked her up from her place. we drove over to nicks for all the fun and festivities. it was a great time, we played some games, rocked out with his guitar and drums for a bit, watched the ball drop, took advantage of the hot tub, and then chilled and watched a movie. it was a ton of fun and it had been the first time we had gone back to nick's house since we first fell in love. it was kind of neat to be back there again with her. we spent the whole drive there remembering the last time he had been there and all the crazy emotions we were feeling about each other. things are a bit different now, ten months later, but we still feel those crazy emotions about each other! a perfect way to start the new year: remembering what had gotten us to this point, and looking forward to what the year ahead holds for us!

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army strong

my brother doesn't come home very often. this christmas he was around for about a week and a half, the last time he was around was last may. as a military man he is usually all over the place. over the summer diana and i got to go visit him in missouri (the first time he got to meet her). he headed back out new years day, we were sad to see him go, but knew he was looking forward to what was ahead for him.

chad has had quite a speedy and interesting journey in the military so far, he first joined the air force and went to basic training in texas. soon after he had more training in georgia, then his first posting out in germany (where aaron and i were lucky enough to visit him at). after his time there he was stationed in new mexico, and nevada. he decided he was going to be a career military man, so he wanted to be an officer. that meant switching branches, so he left the air force and joined the army. after some more intense training in georgia, he headed to missouri for even more training (is sure seems like they spend 90% of their time training...). this fall he was admitted into the airborne division, something he had wanted to do when he first joined the military.

he is now a paratrooper in the special forces division, and has now been stationed in okinawa, japan. where he goes from there he is not able to share with us (yes, its very james bondian...). it has been an exciting and thrilling journey for him so far and he is looking forward to what might come next, but for all of left back here: we love him and miss him. we get periodic emails and phone calls, which will become less regular now that he is in special forces. we share his excitement, we cheer for him, and we love him. and personally, as a brother, i am immensely proud of him and look up to him with awe, like all little brothers do.

we miss you, chad, but we take comfort in knowing you are doing what you love.

hit the hut

on new years eve the family got together one last time. chad was going to be flying out the next morning, so we took the opportunity to get together as a family once more. we met at pizza hut and enjoyed their tasty lunch buffet. jackson brought a few transformers he had gotten for christmas, so chad and i played with him and had robot wars. tim and diana weren't there, so it was just the original brink family (and grandkids). it was really great to spend one last hour together, even if it was a bit bittersweet. i believe it was at this point that my mom started getting misty eyed. i dont think it ended until well into the next day after she and dad had dropped chad off at the airport...

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sir yes sir

after dinner i headed over to aaron and jeffry lees to see what was shaking. aaron had just gotten home and was finishing up his paint job of the cabinet doors and jeffry lee was trying to shake off a sickness. they guys were planning on having a new years eve party, but the place was a mess. aaron was getting a bit anxious about all the work that they had to do yet to get the place in order, so i offered to help them tidy up a bit. now, i dont much care to clean up my own place, but i get a special kick out of cleaning other peoples places. i get into drill sergeant mode and rally the troops and put everyone to work! the guys don't necessarily like it, but they are thankful when the place looks better!

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familia

in the evening chad and i met up with the family at cabana's tres amigos restaurant. with chad leaving in just two days, we tried to spend as much time as possible with him before he left. jill and tim were even able to come without the kids. they quick got a babysitter and met us there. we just talked and ate and enjoyed the time together. the food was good too!

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surfing with chad

after seeing the kids, i went to panera bread to get on the internet. with chad home i hadn't been able to use the computer much since it was it in his room. i figured i wouldn't bother him, so i brought my computer to panera to play. oddly enough, as i was there, chad shows up! he bought a new laptop for himself over break to take with him where he is stationed next. he was having some problems getting it to log on to mom and dad's internet connection, so he got the same idea as me! we spent the afternoon sitting next to each other messing with our computers. i played on the internet while he tried to download patches for his new system. it was really fun, as we were sitting there we would periodically turn a computer toward the other and show each other some crazy internet video we had found. it wasn't anything special, but for some reason i really treasured that time together, just the two of us.

hula girls

one of the 'great' gifts we got from the dykhouse christmas party was a box of two hula girls (thanks julie and mike...). i thought it would be funny to stick one of them in diana's sisters car! she thought it was pretty funny, but then when i got to my car that little dancing girl was staring me back in the face! aaah! she got me back! i decided to just keep it in there, and diana took the other one and put it on her bookshelf. what fun!

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just jackson

it may be a little self serving, but i always try to get my sister's kids to love movies as much as me, especially jackson. every time i give him a gift, its a movie. i've given him 'monsters inc.', 'the incredibles', 'rattatouille', and 'robots'. for his birthday this year i got him 'kung fu panda', and for christmas i got him 'wall-e'. as a part of this indoctrination, i picked him up tuesday to go see 'the tale of despereaux' in the theater!

i picked him up around 10:30am. his mom didn't tell him what we were going to do, she just said that uncle mark was coming to do something with him. just him. his sisters weren't invited, it was just guy time. he was pretty excited! i got there and told him what we were going to do and he was thrilled. it was a lot of fun going with just him to the theater. we got some candy and found seats all to ourselves. i dont think he quite understood the movie, but he certainly enjoyed it! (my not-so-favorable review here) afterward we headed back to his house and i hung out with the kids for a little while.

at his age i always wonder how much he will remember, but i know i'll remember the fun time we had with just the two of us, uncle and nephew!

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more travel

monday we decided to spend some time at diana's place. we went down there in the afternoon and spent some time with poco, he had certainly missed us and we didn't want to neglect him. we took him for a walk and played with him a bit.

for dinner we went to one of my favorite places: hacienda! we stuffed ourselves with chips and salsa, then it was time for me to go back home again.

when i got back in to town i met up with aaron, bethany, and freddie at bdubbs to hang out.

poco's gift

one of the funniest things when we were opening gifts with my family was the fact that my mom and dad got a couple gifts for diana's dog poco! he will also be my dog soon, so they must have thought that he is as close to a grandson as they will get from us for a while! they got him a little tent to sleep in, and a lovely sweater! my mom was a little confused about poco's gender (he's a boy) and got him a pink one. diana didn't mind, she actually preferred it. and i'm pretty sure poco doesn't care due to the fact that dogs are color blind...

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the dykhouse's

sunday night we raced from the allen christmas party back up to grand rapids so we could go to the dykhouse christmas party! after we took a few minutes to get a family portrait, it was time to see all the aunts and uncles and cousins. and all the cousin's kids (there sure are a ton of them!). we had dinner, then it was time for some gifts! my mom had a great idea to keep the action moving: all the little ones opened their gifts at the same time! genius! it only took about five minutes for all of them to dig in! then we sent them all to the nursery room to play with their new toys. that left the rest of us to exchange white elephant gifts. it was a good time, and ended in many of us (including myself) getting new underwear! (mine had a super sexy homer simpson in them...). after mingling with everyone for a couple hours, it was time to call it a night! we headed back to my parents place and took it easy the rest of the night.

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a family portrait

at the dykhouse family christmas my mom wanted us all to get together for our first family portrait. we rarely get to see chad, so having him around and now having diana soon join our family, it was the perfect opportunity! my cousin kelley took some shots of us so we could have a photo of all of us together, since it so rarely happens.
aw, isn't everyone so cute?
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the allen's

on sunday we had a couple more christmas parties to go to, the first of which was the allen family christmas, which is diana's dads side of the family. we went and picked up her dad on the way and were actually the first to arrive! the place was empty when we got there! just a couple minutes later everyone started to show up. we helped unload the food while the house warmed up. soon after, everyone was there and it was time to dig in! i hadn't met all of that side of her family yet, so it was fun to meet them all at once. her dad and her uncle both have a strange sense of humor, which made for a great time! after dinner we exchanged white elephant gifts, and some of them were... um... interesting. one involved a couple of kidnapped monkeys and a ransom note, another included some righteous bling from state farm, and the highlight had some very disgusting photos of her uncle phil's colon. yikes!

over all they were a lot of fun. i'm glad i got to meet the rest of them, that way when they show up to the wedding they wont be complete strangers...

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the other family

because of the terrible weather on saturday morning i was late in getting home. i quickly showered, and headed out to see diana, but by then it was already almost 5:00pm. i was supposed to be down there at 4pm. oops. by the time i had finally made it to her mom and step-dad's house, the family had already eaten and opened gifts. wow, i felt like such a jerk for being so late. diana was frustrated with me, and made sure that i knew it. her grandma, aunt and uncle stuck around long enough to say hi, but then they headed home, they had a three hour drive ahead. we had spent so much time up in grand rapids with my family, and now the one time we go to see her family i'm three hours late. i guess with the crazy weather these past couple weeks i shouldn't have been surprised. i felt terrible, but there was nothing i could do about it. shoot, now i owe diana big...

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