Happy Belated Birthday Smeffery!

I just realized that I never posted a happy birthday message to one of our bestest friends, Jeff Scott.  I was a little consumed with the arrival of my niece and apologize for my late post.  But it's fitting seeing as our cards were 3 days late too!  However,  even though we are not good at wishing him a happy bday on time, Jeff has been Kyle's best friend since 7th grade when Jeff moved to Claremore.  We've all heard the story of how they met, but they've pretty much been inseparable ever since that one day at the basketball courts.

Claremore Halloween Party...Cowboy theme...

Jeff was a groomsmen in our wedding, Kyle was the co-best man in his.  These two are legitimate best friends forever.  They have certainly been through alot together in their 15 years of friendship and in the 5 years I have known Jeff I see just how close they are.  Jeff is the kind of friend who will do ANYTHING for you.  We loved getting to live in Tulsa with them and miss them so much.  Jeff and Leah threw us our going away party when we moved to Orlando and are just two of the best friends we could ever ask for.  Jeff and Kyle are so lucky (as we often remind them) that Leah and I have too become best friends through them and we have so much fun hanging out together.  

Just sharing a moment.

Thank you Jeff for being such a wonderful friend to both Kyle and I!  Happy 27th birthday old man!  We love you and miss you!

Happy day of birth Laney!

As of today at 2:45 PM (Eastern Standard time when I got the call, don't get mad central time zoners) we became an aunt and uncle for the very first time.  My oldest sister Alyson had a beautiful baby girl named Laney Alice Zembower.  I never knew it was possible to love a little baby so much, especially since I haven't even met her, but I do.  For the first time since we've moved here I really miss home.  I wanted to be in that hospital so bad to hear the news, and find out her name, and hold her and kiss her on the day she was born.  Even so I can not be sad because today I got to become an aunt to the most beautiful baby girl in the world!  And just thinking about her makes me so very happy.  She is a very healthy 7 lbs 15 oz and 20 1/5 inches long!  10 fingers, 10 toes, 2 eyes, 2 ears, a nose, a mouth, and no health problems.  God is good!  I will be home in 6 weeks to meet her and have never been more excited to meet someone in my life.  I'm almost nervous to meet her!  But I can not wait to spoil her rotten...and take that girl shopping!  She will definitely never be without love, hugs, and kisses.  Between the Zembower's, Aldridge's, Acquisto's, and Payne's this baby is going to be more loved than she will ever know.  

The new addition to the Zembower family!

This is the first grandbaby for both sides of the family and I know my parent's and Ryan's parent's are beyond excited to have a granddaughter.  She certainly has 3 very proud aunts and 2 uncles who have no clue what to do with a little girl ;-)

We love you Laney Alice!  We hope you know the day you came into this world you made us the proudest aunt and uncle!  We are looking forward to meeting you and can't wait for you to come visit Mickey Mouse!

Nona playing with Laney

So proud of you mommy!  

Papaw and Laney.  love that smile!

Aunt Angela on the phone telling Laney how much I love her and can't wait to meet her and kiss her and hold her!

they sent this to me tonight and i've watched it about 20 times.  Love seeing her in real life.

love you more than words,

Aunt A and Uncle K

Our first grilling experience

So I am totally ashamed to admit this but it's true.  Kyle got a wonderful grill for christmas from his mom...2 christmases ago.  That's right, he got it christmas '07 and we had yet to use it until last night!  Basically we're just really lazy (and we all know what a wonderful cook I am) and always go out to eat but since it was Memorial Day and we weren't around all our friends to just tag along to one of their BBQ's, we realized we had to fend for ourselves if we wanted something on the bar-b.  Our biggest excuse was, "We don't have a propane tank."  Finally yesterday we went to Wal-Mart and bought us a propane tank!  Now it's even cheaper to have them refilled, although I'm convinced it's going to take some time for us to use up the entire tank.  (Propane tanks don't go bad do they!?)  We decided to start simple and just grill some burgers, and I must say he did a great job!  We also bought some corn on the cob (I shucked corn for the first time in my life pretty sure) and some beans.  Kyle wanted pork and beans and I like the ones with brown sugar so we had to buy two tiny cans but it was worth it because his were disgusting.  

And of course as our luck would have it, it started pouring down rain as we dragged the grill out.  We have a very small covered patio and at times I was holding the umbrella to block the rain from hitting the grill.  But overall it was an excellent first grilling experience and not to my surprise during dinner Kyle said, "we should grill out more often."  (I told you so ;-) )  At least now I have him on board to cook things on the grill and I can handle the sides.  Maybe this whole cooking and eating dinner at home thing might actually happen.  Or maybe he's just really sick of chicken nuggets and spaghetti O's!  Either way we both win.  

Kyle grilling (notice the rain...it's been like this for over a week now...I know you are all jealous we moved to FL now huh!)

Dubbers was barking at the thunder!

And the final product!  Next time we'll grill the corn on the grill too.  I accidently shucked it and then realized I needed to leave it if I wanted to cook them on the grill.  Oh well...how's a girl that's never grilled out much less shucked corn before know that!

Pretty sure we're going to grab something for dinner tonight, but it was a good effort!  We need to keep more meat in the freezer so we have it to grill now.  

On a side note.  Today is officially Baby Girl Zem's due date!  I can not believe it is already here.  When my sister told me back in September I thought May would never get here.  I am really sad I won't be there for her birth and to hold her as a newborn, but I will be home soon enough to meet her!  Anyway, I could go on forever but trust me you will all know when she is finally here!  Say a little prayer for a healthy and uneventful delivery for BGZ and my sister! 

Hope everyone has a great Tuesday night!  We're going to watch the MAGIC beat Lebrone tonight in game 4!  LET'S GO MAGIC!

Boys from Oklahoma

To anyone who is actually still checking to see if I have posted anything I apologize for my lack of posts in the last 2 weeks.  We had some visitors 2 weekends ago and I have been meaning to post about it ever since.  3 of Kyle's Gallo co-workers (and really great friends) from Oklahoma came to visit us for an extended weekend and we had a blast!  Dustin brought me some Boulevard Wheat beer and I was so excited!  1 of them burst in his bag and he had to wash all his clothes but I think it was well worth it.

They all flew in on Thursday night and we took them to Blue Martini for some welcome to Orlando drinks!!  On Friday all the boys played golf and I am guessing they had a great time!  I was at work and guys hardly say much about a day playing golf so that's all the details I have.  Then we all drove to Tampa, about an hour away, to go see Kings of Leon.  We are all really big KOL fans and as soon as we found out we were moving to Orlando the boys bought concert and plane tickets to come see us for this show.  It was a great concert!  Unfortunately it was 2 weeks ago and I can't remember any funny stories from the weekend but I know there were a lot.

Dustin, John, Me, Kyle, Justin

We came back to Orlando after the show and hit up Bar Louie.  On Saturday we woke up decided to go to Universal Studios!! 

We really lucked out at Universal.  The lines were not bad at all and we were able to ride most rides at Universal and Islands of Adventure.  We even road Dueling Dragons like 3 times after finding a short cut for getting back to the ride lines!!  Dustin, John, and I (after a few beers) decided to ride in the front row and it was pretty intense.  We had fun posing and taking pictures on the rides and overall it was a great day!!

Then we went to Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville for some tropical drinks!

 

Saturday night we took them to Season's 52 and had an excellent dinner of course!  The boys really liked it too.  Then we headed downtown and hung out at Wall Street for a little bit.  Justin and John's flights left really early on Sunday and they almost missed their flight!  Not sure how they made it but they did.  Then Dustin, Kyle, and I ate lunch at Emril's at Citywalk and then we took Dustin to the airport.  

We can't thank you guys enough for coming to spend the weekend with us!  It was so much fun and we are so lucky to have such great friends!  We hope you all come back to visit soon!

We don't have any visitors planned any time soon, so if you want to book your trip to the Payne Bed and Breakfast call and make your reservations!    

Hope everyone had a great Memorial Day weekend!  We love and miss you all!

Happy Mother's Day!

and a late birthday shout out!

I meant to post this yesterday, but I forgot!  We just wanted to wish all our moms a very Happy Mother's Day!  Sorry we aren't there to celebrate with any one of you, we wish we could be.  Thank you to all of you for being there for us and being the greatest mother's we could have ever hoped for.  I hope to one day be as loving, kind, generous, giving, and selfless as yall have shown us to be.  Hope you all had a wonderful weekend and day!  We love you!

And a very happy birthday to one of the greatest friends I've ever had...Kristin Speckman!  Kristin was definitely the first friend I had at Vines and she took me under her wing.  She also turned 16 our freshman year so we thought we were pretty cool getting to drive around in the escort!  She also had a pager, which was really cool (hey it was the 90's) that makes me feel really old.  We've been friends for 12 years and I would have never made it through 9th grade without her.  We are also both the youngest of 3 girls.  Kristin is teaching in Plano and is building her very first house!  I am so proud of her and can't wait to come crash at your place when we're in town!  I hope you had a great birthday Specktator!  We love you!

Love, 

Angela and Kyle

(yes my wedding 22 months ago was the last time we took a picture together)

The Huston's Visit!

Our dear friends from OU and Tulsa came in town last weekend.  Matt's birthday is April 25th and they took advantage of the "visit a Disney park on your birthday and get in for free" deal.   Notice Matt's cute birthday boy button!  We were so excited to have them visit us in Orlando and had a great 4 days with them.  

Matt even got a birthday cake and blew out 27 candles.  I know my cake decorating skills are amazing.

On Friday they enjoyed the Prime Outlets and then hung out at our "Spring Break 09" pool as we like to call it, and our complex bar.  Kyle had a hard day of playing golf at work and was able to join them...

 

That night we went to dinner at a wonderful restaurant called Season's 52 and I'm sure we will take all of you to this place when you come visit.  Matt and Courtney were our Friday night dinner buddies in Tulsa so it was so nice to bring that tradition back!   Then we headed downtown to Orange street and went to Bar B Q bar!

On Saturday we ventured to the west coast and went to Clearwater beach!  This beach was beautiful!  It has white, soft sand and pretty blue water!  We packed a cooler full of beer, a football for the boys and trashy gossip magazines for the girls and a great time was had by all.  This was us taking a break from the sun at Crabby's!

Saturday night we went to dinner at Emeril's (bam!) at Universal's City Walk and had an excellent meal.  We also walked around the Citywalk and took some pictures of the Universal world ball symbol thing.

Thank you Matt and Courtney for coming to visit us in Orlando!  It was so great to see you guys and hang out.  It was like being back in Tulsa except for the really warm weather, beaches, shopping, and good seafood!!  A.W. was really excited to see them too.  You could tell he totally remembered them and moped around all day Sunday after they left.  

We love you and miss you guys!  See you at an OU game soon!

Happy Birthday Alyson!

I just wanted to say Happy Birthday to my sister, Alyson!  Today she turns 30!  I can not believe it.  She is going to be a mommy in 4 weeks and I can not wait to meet my new niece!

       

We love you sister!  Miss you so much!  Hope you had a wonderful 30th birthday.  We will definitely have to celebrate next year when you aren't knocked up!! ;-)