part deux:MOI

hello darlings. come close. gather round. while i whisper juicy secrets and tid bits of my boring twenty something life into your eager little elfin ears. get ready. i'm dishin' it out. no holds barred. (what does that mean, anyway?) all honesty all the time. well. most of the time. i lie. all the time. see? there i go again.

okay!

Ash asked me, When did you get married and how did he propose?!

okay. this is kinda funny. we were out of town for a friends wedding (a friend i no longer talk to, long story. ahem.) (i was maid of honor. see? super long story for another time.) my birthday is july 17th, and Vlads birthday is july 14th- we're a year and three days apart. i'm younger. anyway. so the wedding was on july 15th. that's the day he proposed to me. in a hotel room. he comes out of the bathroom while i'm saying let's go let's go we're late let's go and being my usual freaked-out self about time and he just sticks his arm out, palm up, with a blue box resting in his hand. he doesn't say a word. in fact, he looks quite petrified. of course i hugged him and said yes and all that jazz. i was happy. it was nice. and so funny bc he totally looked majorly freaked out!

Jenn asked me a TON of questions. like these little jewels:

(1) How many guests did you have at your wedding? about 150. we were supposed to have nearer 200 but a lot of people were ridiculous and canceled last minute on us. not fun.
(2) Were you a bridezilla? i think i was the opposite. my mother planned the entire thing- she is amazing and should do it for a living- and actually kept telling me that i needed to get more involved or get pickier, bc i was generally pretty lax with it all. the only thing that i wanted was ambience- which got mucked up anyway, bc the florist did exactly the opposite of what she was going to do and the place it was at? didn't do what i asked, either. oh well. it looked gorgeous anyway.
(3) Kids? Someday? How many? yes kids someday, probably in about a year to two years. and i'd say maybe three at the most but i'll be very gracious and thankful if i am lucky enough to have one.
(4) Are you going to college or are you already done? girl, you have NO clue. i've had like a kagillion different majors and now i think i want to do something w/law enforcement... so i'm going to go back to school next year. i took 3 years off when i decided not to become a nurse. oh and i'm CNA certified. so i am totally qualified to do cpr on you. or for a ton of fun we could play 'heimlich' cuz i'm really good at that now, too. (and wiping behinds, but we won't go there.) (oops. just did.)
(5) Hobbies? blogging, of course! also i LOVElive to read. i adore it. i would be a librarian if it weren't so awfully boring most of the time. i read mostly fiction. and i go on kicks where i'll read one genre for a while and then switch. right now i'm on crime. mmmm. james patterson.... i could, and would, eat his books if it were okay to do so. i love him. before this, i was on a romance/vampire kick. don't ask.

Mama Dawg asked me: I want to know more about your hubbie. His background is so fascinating to me.

okay, here we go! Vlad was born Vladimir Vicktor Kalugin on July 14th, 1983. in Bellaruse, Russia. near Minsk. he wore school uniforms, had a country house, his dad was an engineer over there... and then the cold war hit. and then chernobyl. and the family got scared. under the pretense that they were Jewish, they were allowed safe passage to America. they came in i think ... 1993. he was nine. they moved to Illinois, his dad opened up a mechanics shop and his mom started to learn English, and Vlad went to regular public school. they lived in a two bedroom apartment with four other families that they traveled with. they were successful and wealthy in Russia, and upon arriving in America learned that they weren't so comfortable with finances here.

oh and my husband loves to tell people that he saved up all of his money in Russia- quite a bit actually, for a kid- and when he came to America he wanted to buy a toy at LaGuardia airport. and proceeded to spend all of his money on it. bc THAT'S how poorly Russian money converts to American money. he's still pissed to this day.

Vlad is friends with a lot of other Russians. i hear Russian on a daily basis. and now? when i'm ANYWHERE in public? i run into at LEAST one Russian. it gets to the point that Vlad and i are like, wow, did we seriously get thru Best Buy without seeing one? and then an obviously russian person will walk by and we'll both go, 'there it is! there they are!' cuz there's always one of em. i swear. they are everywhere.

what else? he's 5'8, has like no fat on him no matter what he eats, he owns his own Auto Body Shop and runs it amazingly well. he has a full sleeve (tattoos)on his right arm, which is tribal and then a coy fish. he has three more tattoos besides that one. his family is extremely hard working but his mother still doesn't know how to drive a car. his dad's name is Vitaly which i always thought was Italian. he's been back to Russia only one time since coming to America, but his family goes back all the time... Vlad's sister, Anastacia (pronounced, Ah-nah-stah-see-yah) was just married in Russia and her husband finally got the clearance to come to the USA. she's super excited.

i'm not sure what else to say about him. it's strange, at first his background was so foreign and cool to me but now? it's just second nature. i will tell you, tho, that russians like modern furniture and those weird clocks that are like, mirrors and play noises and stuff.

oh, i am SO gonna do a post on russian decorating now. heh. :)

i will wrap up with the rest tomorrow!!! night ya'll!!!!!!