Waves

It's interesting to me how our lives seem to move in waves. We're really not all that busy, but then a wave hits. It seems like we've had a much bigger wave going on lately and we've been moving way fast for awhile now.  I know a big part of that is that I've been working full-time at my nanny job while still picking up makeup gigs and now the holidays are among us!

We are starting to make progress on our house again too. :) We've finally hooked up the new dryer and sold both our old washer and dryer (yay!), we bought a new couch which is amazing and wonderful and fits in our living/family room much better, put away the fall decor and are starting to bring out the Christmas decorations :D, mounted the TV (Anthony is really happy about that).

We will probably get back to painting soon...and maybe, just maybe we'll have the common areas finished painting by Christmas :p

Appliance wise we just need to switch our garage fridge with our kitchen fridge - because the one in the garage is so much nicer and get our oven fixed so I can get back to cooking and baking! :D


The waves are good though. They come at the perfect time so we're not too busy to go crazy, but not too not busy to feel unproductive. We've finished our Christmas shopping (so thankful we got it done early) and are now working on getting things together to donate. It's so much better to give things away than to hold onto to things that wont aren't needed.

I'm missing old friends again. It's hard. We've left so many great, mature, wonderful relationships in Cali - I miss the longevity of them and the familiarity and comfort of them. We've been out here a year and I still feel like we don't really know anyone. I mean, we know lots of people, but we don't REALLY know people - not like California - not yet. I miss all our random get togethers at the apartment or my in-law's or Lauren's or Marina's or Katie's or...or...or... It doesn't seem like that really happens out here...not yet. On the other side of things though, I am cherishing (and cherishing SO MUCH) the relationships/friendships we are cultivating out here and loving getting to know the hearts of those we do get to meet. I know it all has to do with time - time to meet people, time to meet with people, time to grow - and that - all of that - I am cherishing deeply and continue to look forward to.

Another random thing - I bought a book at a garage sale the other day for our kids. I am not pregnant (sorry Bethses, no plans of it yet - I know your ears perked up a little bit at that though :P). I just really wanted this particular book for our babies when we have them and it was a smokin' deal. Originally $40 and I got it for $1. It was exciting. I couldn't pass it up :)

Anyways,  I know this is really all over the place - I'm just writing what comes to my mind and not editing it because I just don't feel like it. Sorry. So I'll end it here.

There's the randomness...I guess my thoughts come in waves too.  I will start posting recipes again soon (I will Kat, I will).

Did I Tell You My Laptop is Still Out of Commission?

'Cause it is - hence no crafty things and no recipes for awhile now.   It will happen again - at some point. Though I don't know when. Right now A and I are currently sharing a laptop because he has the good fast one that works.... So I've hi-jacked it for a moment to share some pictures with you that I said I would get to (eventually).
Here we go!



Faux Wall in the Living/Family Room - the dark spot is a spot on the inside of lens of the camera...it's in all the pictures.

 

Closer up faux wall - ignore the spot it's not really there



"Chai Latte" in the down stairs bathroom - it's like a muted pale orangey color

With our fun Pier 1 decoartions thanks to Jon & Katie and wedding giftcards :)

I repositioned one of the Scripture signs. As cute as I thought it was before, you could only see the Corinthians one when you were sitting at the table.

And the Bunny Gate so they don't go where they shouldn't! So far it's working!!!!

We have finally put together our room & put up pictures :)

We finally put up the guest bathroom picture instead of just having it leaned up against the wall.


Yay! Things are coming together...now if only we could just finish painting upstairs. hahaha

 

Life Lesson (and I promise I'll post painting progress pictures soon)

I'm learning a lesson in life right now and God is revealing to me my fear of man. That's lame. The fear of man thing, not the learning thing. I'm realizing how much I'm afraid to do certain things or be responsible for certain things because they aren't what other people want for me. And that's just ridiculous - because other people can't possibly know me better than God does. I was discussing this with a friend the other day and she, in her wisdom, told me that I can't let people affect me that way. Fast forward to later in the week, I was talking about the same thing with A and he told me that

If I am more concerned about what other people want for me, then I won't be able to find joy in the things that do happen.

 

I think God is trying to get a message through my head. And it's true. Things in life happen and you hae to make a choice - however, DON'T let someone else determine how you react or what you decide to do UNLESS that person is God. We should be more concerned with how God wants us to react than we are with how others will react.

 

 

In other "news" (because it's not really "newsworthy") - we've taken a LONG break from painting. It's half way driving me nuts, but I haven't been feeling 100% so I need to work on getting the house back in order than painting. BUT our faux wall in the living/family room (because I don't know the difference) is DONE and part of upstairs is painted, but then we ran out of paint.

 

We got our kitchen table and I love it! It was very exciting. It can be a very skinny accent table, a table that seats 4 or a table that seats 6! It's pretty rad and we got a good deal on chairs for it since it originally came with 2. They're slightly different, but I love the effect.

 

We hung our first picture the other day. It was our caricature from Valentine's weekend a couple years ago. hhehehehe.

 

AND I think we've finally outsmarted the bunnies with the additional of a "bunny" (baby) gate. They, so far, have not figured out how to get through it. BUT I'm sure it's only a matter of time before they get through the bars and we have to put up screening.

We are currently trying to organize a BYOP (Bring Your Own Pumpkin) get together with one of our small groups. I'm hoping it'll be as fun as it was when we did it in Cali :)

 

We planted a tree and some flowers in our backyard yesterday - and by we, I mean Anthony. It looks nice and I'm excited to be getting to the front of the house at some point.

 

BUT - now I've wasted more time rambling and really need to get to cleaning the house and putting away laundry and fun stuff like that. SO I hope that you have a wonderful Monday that is full of happiness and joy!

xo

S

My heart

Sometimes -- but in all reality frequently -- I wonder why God created my heart the way he did. I wonder why He created my heart to be so fragile. I hope I remember to ask Him this when I see Him face to face.

encouragement and other stuff

It's been awhile since I've posted on either of my blogs. My laptop is still getting worked on - so I'm left with my phone which is a little frustrating to write with - and I haven't located the Kindle charger which would totally be easier than this. New goal - find the charger.

Anyways, I'm now back to working full-time which is good, but last night it hot me that I'm not doing great with the transition. Prayers would be appreciated . :)

On top of all that, I've been frustrates with my lack of time in God's word. I've been reading, but it's been distracted reading. God has made it clear that a big part of the issue is my prayer life, so I've been reading some books to help me get back into a routine and to remember how important a strong prayer life is and hoe beneficial a strong prayer life is.  It's definitely helping and I'm seeing God more in the little this than before. Praise Him for that!
As I was reading Power Prayers for women this morning, I came across a description of the Bible that brought more excitement in me than I've felt in a long time - so I felt the need to share.

"Adventure, danger, romance - just a few story themes from the beat-selling book of all time. Undoubtedly, billions of copies have been printed and distributed.
Unlike fairytales, this book us true and starts with 'In the beginning.' here you learn of kings and conquerors, love and loss, rebellion and redemption. Turn the pages to discover where you came from, why you are here, and where you are going. You'll find out how to handle money and have better relationships. Most important, you can learn who God is and how you can live with Him forever.
What is this astonishing book? The Bible. Inspired by God, this sixty-six-book compilation is the true story of God's love for all people, including you and me. It's the explanation of a promised deliverance, and freedom for all who obey." -Jackie M. Johnson

I encourage anyone reading this to get a Bible - buy one, borrow one - and open it up. Pray that God will show you who He really is and who you really are through His book,-through His words. Meet God and allow Him to transform your life. It won't be easy and it may not always seem like it's getting better - but its worth it. And when you struggle with how it appears your life is going, take a moment to look back and who you were and where your life was heading, meditate on His promises, and look ahead to where you're going. Look to His glorious Kingdom that is waiting His beautiful children - be faithful and steadfast and cling to the hope that is in the Cross.

I love you all and am praying,
S

Tuesday Night Ramblings

I'm sitting here on the couch next to a mountain of clothing waiting for the monster of a washing machine to yell at me again. I should be folding, but I'm tired. If there's one thing I've learned about owning a house - it's a LOT of work...and this is still the fun stage.

I had great ambitions today - REALLY great ambitions today:

...there's a backside too.

Sometimes I think there just aren't enough hours in a day - other times I realize that I have a horrible sense of time and there's just NO way that I can paint a laundry room in 30 minutes. Apparently, I can't even paint it in an hour - apparently it took about 5ish hours. My feet our swollen, I'm covered in paint from head to toe, and I ran out of paint with a few necessary touch ups needed; but I bet you can't tell.

Ta Da!

Well, that's gonna be there forever

Spiderman's got nothin' on me! Booya.

I love that we're FINALLY getting to the point of putting up our decorative things.

We've been hard at work getting things painted - because a couple of days in a house painted white drove me nuts. I have NO idea how people tolerate that & sometimes I wish I had the ability to...I just need color. The hubster does too and that is just wonderful.

Here's our yellow kitchen - that is waiting for a table & chairs, bar stools, a new refrigerator, a new trash can (we have, we just have to re-mount it under the sink), the removal of the wonderful HD bucket, and some fall decorations ;)

The monster washing machine is calling me again, so I best be going before it breaks or ruins the new paint job in the laundry room.

Until next time,
S

I've been intending on posting pictures and updating on how the house is coming along - it's finally starting to come together (at least downstairs), but the computer has gone unpredictable on me - so I'm left to the phone which isn't much fun to blog on.

But - the downstairs is almost ALL painted - we have a grey living room and dibig room, a yellow kitchen, white trim, doors and ceilings and we've chosen a color for ge laundry room (an aqua type color!). All thats left for downstairs is to decide what color to paint the bathroom and then paint the bathroom and living room - and then the real decorating can start!

So here's to hoping the laptop cooperates tomorrow :D

House work!

Hi Friends!
Things have been crazy busy over the past month and we have taken up ANOTHER residence - this time at Home Depot. My goodness we're there a lot, although I don't think we went yesterday which would be a first since we got into the house. I could be wrong about that though. The employees know us and are waiting for us to bring us pictures of what we've been doing to the house.

So what have we been doing? Painting. LOTS and LOTS of painting.
Thankfully we started with white walls, so it was super easy to cover.
We have almost the entire downstairs painted - I just need to paint the hallway (my job for today) and the kitchen and then the ceilings. So by almost, I mean we have like half of the walls done. Oh and we need to paint the doors too.

We've changed out all the downstairs door knobs so they look pretty & not brass.
Most of the walls are grey.
1 wall is textured that my AMAZING husband spent a LOT of hard work doing.
We've picked out the kitchen color.
I built our extra kitchen storage (it was rather difficult).
We've rearranged the living room.
We've acquired a fun brightly colored canvas painting and a really pretty mirror that goes with the safari theme in our master thanks to Katie & Jon.
We've balanced the pool (finally).
Had to get the AC fixed.
Anthony made the outlets in the master bathroom work again.
AND We've spent a lot of time at Home Depot.

But things are coming along and I can see the downstairs coming together slowly but surely.
Now to figure out what we want to do with the accent wall & locate an affordable sectional...

love until later,
S

Where Have We Been?!

Hi Bloggy & Bloggy Friends!
It's been awhile now, hasn't it? Well, we sure do have some good & exciting news!

We are NOW officially OFFICIALLY homeowners of the most wonderful house we ever could imagine (after a LOT of house drama - you can read about some of it by clicking on the "house hunting" tab at the top of the page)!

BUT - first we went on vacation to Bass Lake and it was glorious and wondering and I'm STILL recovering from injuries sustained on the trip - haha! Yes - I hurt myself. No this isn't a surprise. My boss informed me my first day back that I am accident prone... I think everyone would agree with that. :)

While at Bass Lake, I managed to smack my knee pretty hard on the intertube. And for someone who isn't supposed to smack her knees ever, it felt like I shattered my knee cap. I didn't. But it was painful. This was on day 2 or 3 of the trip. The trip was 10 days long. We've been back for almost a week. I still have a bruise. I also jumped out of a boat, landed on my ankle wrong and ended up spraining it. I've been walking on it, so it's still not healed. This was the same day as the intertube incident. I then insisted on learning to wake board.

And then we moved. We moved all our stuff into our first home and I have never been more exhausted and my body has not hurt so much (at least not in a LONG time). It's a good hurt and a good exhaustion because we're being productive and VERY active. We haven't stopped moving. Wake up, unpack, put things away, go to work, come home, work on the house, figure out dinner, eat, work on the house, go to sleep. Repeat. It's a ton of work, but it's good. We have a LONG way to go, lots of empty bedrooms, lots of empty space, but it's going to be good & we can't wait to see how God is going to use our home for His work!

We will post pictures when things are a bit settled down - some from vacation (maybe even a video) and some of the house...when it's a little more in order. :)



AND - my awesome in-laws moved to AZ today! Woot!

xoxo
S

Drama. Drama. Drama.

The bad news: we will not be closing on our house today and we will not be moving into our house on Wednesday. I feel defeated. I want to go home and curl up with new jammies and cookies. I want to cry. Oh wait, I already did that. My disappointment and tears are selfish though. They are present because things aren't going according to my plan.

There is good news though. We should be able to close in the next week or so and move ib shortly afterwards. Woohoo!

There is a reason for all of this, but right now I am looking forward to this being the only house we will ever buy. There has just been way to much drama and it has been way too much of a roller coaster. I am thankful for all of it, but now I'm just tired.