Halloween is Friday and all I have done so far is decorate the door. I forgot to buy the little plastic spiders, so I don’t think it has quite the effect I was going for.

Our neighbors made the fatal mistake of carving their pumpkins too early. This results in the “old man effect” displayed here. The pumpkin face effectively goes from scary to jolly. .

We are trying to get our pumpkins carved before Halloween is over, but it all depends on That Husband’s work schedule. We might end up carving while the trick-or-treaters come by. I plan on scaring them by reaching out the door with my pumpkin goo covered claws. I’m not revealing our plans, but I think we are going to be able to best what we came up with last year.

This is my pumpkin from last Halloween. Isn’t she beautiful? That Husband’s was just a golfer and it was kind of boring so I am not going to show it here. He came up with something much more exciting this year.

Photo by Shaylene Rene’

I needed a photo for this post so I dug this one up. Here I am in 2006, post breast reduction surgery, waiting for my room service to be delivered. Anyone want to bring me room service for my sickness this week?. Photo by Shaylene Rene’

That is what I have been for the past few days, although I’m feeling much better this morning (I might sneak in another nap today though, even though That Husband discourages sleeping so much, which he is probably right to do since I would sleep 12 hours a day if I could).

It was a sickness that carried with it lots of strange symptoms. On Tuesday night I had this clicking sensation going on in my sinuses. I felt like a Ra’zac, clicking my way around the house. (Don’t be surprised if I make Eragon references for the next few weeks, as I just finished devouring the third book in the series.)

Along with the clicking came the choking. I would wake with a start, and my first though would be “I can’t breathe!”. My nose was so stuffed that I was having trouble breathing through it, but I can’t breathe through my mouth at night because my throat dries out and becomes really sore. I started stuffing the blankets and sheets in my mouth, which acted as a type of humidifier, and helped the air to stay moist enough for me to fall asleep. That Husband was out of town on business, which was probably a good thing because I think he would have made fun of how ridiculous Iooked. I was sick enough that the sleeping never lasted for long, and so I would wake up and panic because my mouth was full of blankets and my nose was full of snot. It makes me laugh to think about it now, but it was quite scary when it was happening. Isn’t it strange how sleep can leave you so disoriented?

It had me wishing I was an iguana. Why would I want to be an iguana? Because according to Radio Lab (my second favorite radio program ever) iguanas only sleep with half of their brain at a time. They literally sleep “with one eye open” to watch for predators. I figure if I was an iguana with a stuffy nose and a mouth full of blankets my right brain would wake up in a panic, and my left brain would calmy reply “You idiot, pull the blankets out of your mouth.” I realy could have used that a few nights ago.

I guest posted for Molly over at These Little Moments today, and since I hid the post at the end of my posts on That Bride (sneaky of me to post it for October 2007 wasn’t it? I wrote it a few days before she posted it and wanted to keep it a secret until then) I thought it would be very relevant to post it here and give you all an idea of how married life began for us.

I got married a few weeks ago, and as I am sure Molly will come back and report about her own wedding day, the day was Mary Poppins perfect (you know, practically perfect in every way). I’m not naive, I know that it was only perfect because I ripped my hair out planning everything down to the last detail. I even took apart my shoes and glued a button on them because I convinced myself I need just one. more. project.

Here we are awkwardly crouching in the woods and kissing on the wedding day during our over-planned “first look” moment.

You want to know what I didn’t plan for? Real life.

That Husband was living in Dallas without me during the time of our engagement so I had no idea what I would be moving down to find. Our first night at “home” as a married couple did not turn out the way I had planned. There was no carrying the fair maiden over the threshold and welcoming her to the new abode.

There were dirty dishes. Dirty dishes that were 2 weeks old.

Boxes EVERYWHERE.

And worst of all, no bed. Sleepover time was not quite as fun as when I was 12. Sometimes in the middle of the night I reached my arm over my head just to make sure he was still there. Maybe I was just dreaming that we ended up getting married?

That was our first night together at home, the next morning we got up and started moving from the slightly trashed 1 bedroom apartment to a 2 bedroom apartment in the same complex. We didn’t even fight one time (I had anticipated we would fight at least twice) and our mattress was delivered as promised so things were looking up.Then we went to bed and woke up to find ants. Ants in my pants. Literally. And in the sheets, and on the pillow, and crawling all over us. We flicked them off and pinched them between our fingers and washed them off of our clothes and down the drain.

We ordered a gas dryer for an apartment that only supports electric appliances. Rookie mistake. I’m blogging from the business center because the internet won’t be set up in our new apartment until sometime next week. I lost one of my wedding bands in the move. [Editors Note: The band has since been found! Hooray for unpacking. Also we finally have the wireless hooked up at home so I am able to blog from the couch again.]

Married life is hard. I’m 11 days in and it’s already tough. But having that one person to share everything with is so worth it. We are one, in every sense of the word. We have never shared our beds with each other before this, and there are few things better than reaching for his hand at 3 AM. Or the way it sounds when he calls me wife.

Welcome to That Wife. Here you will read tales of newlywed life, work, school, photography, cooking, successes and failures, babies, Poland, middle age, and so much more. There will be occasional videos, and many, many photos. I plan to write on this blog, right here, for the rest of my life. I hope you enjoy hearing about the journey as much as I enjoy living it.

Photo by Denise Andersen Photography