Yesterday was an adventure.  We had planned to take a trip home to J.C. so that we could visit the parents and pick up Kevin’s antique BMW.  When we first moved here we didn’t have a garage to keep our cars in, so that car was being stored for us.  But now that we have space we were ready to pick it up and get rolling again.  The day started and ended bad, with a good time sandwiched in between.

To begin the day, Kevin was half asleep scratching Maggie after he had just woken up.  He then jumped up when he noticed another tick on her.  We have found three of them on her in just a few weeks.  Not good.  So after using the tweezers on our patient we planned to stop at the vet on our way out and get some medicine.  But instead we spent about the next forty-five minutes trying to find the keys to the BMW.  With no success we just gave up and got in the car late knowing there was a spare where the car was being stored.  At this point my temper and frustration level were running high.  You should know that I am a person who hates to be unprepared.  Even with the little things.  When I have nightmares I usually dream about showing up at work and not knowing what I’m going to teach or where my classes are.  So we couldn’t find the keys – no big deal right?  It’s just a personality flaw…prideful sin…of mine.  As we started our journey home I prayed that God would change my attitude quickly and not let it ruin the day.

Once we got to our destination we had a great time.  We enjoyed brunch with both sets of parents and then I got to spend a couple of hours antique shopping with my mom and Kevin’s mom.  I found two old six-pane windows for $18 that I can use over the mantle, or anywhere!  Exactly what I had been looking for – more on that in a future post.  To round off the day we had dinner from Pal’s, the best fast food joint in East Tennessee (and the whole U.S. in my opinion!)

Then it was time to head back, Kevin driving a 33 year old car that’s been sitting for six months and me following him in my trusty Honda.  We knew there was a possibility his car might have a problem…hence why I was following him back.  Almost exactly halfway through our drive home his car died and we pulled off to the side of the interstate.  To make a long story short the state trooper couldn’t help us even though he tried jumper cables.  We eventually had to call a towing service and get them to drive about 70 miles to where we sat on the side of the road.  All this time Maggie was with us, and even with no food and a hot car she took it like a champ.  As we followed the tow truck back I told Kevin “It could have been worse; at least it wasn’t raining”…enter severe thunderstorm about 10 minutes later.  At 11:30 pm we finally arrived home safe and sound.

Here’s what I learned from our adventurous day:

• I can get so caught up on little annoyances and I need to daily die to my sin, asking God to forgive me of my pride.
• We have incredible parents, neighbors, and friends who tried to offer help during our ‘emergency’.
• Most of all that we are blessed.  If that car dying on the side of the road is my biggest problem then boy we sure do have it good.  There are billions of people around the world suffering, truly suffering, and here I was disgruntled because our extra car was having problems.  God knows just when I need a wake up call.  I needed a reminder that we are so so blessed, and to thank HIM in every circumstance.

But I didn’t get to have one today.  For the second time in about a week I forgot something at home that I needed for my afternoon classes.  I don’t know what’s up with my brain.  Luckily, I live really close to my current job so running back home to get something is not that big of a deal.  But today it meant that I cut my hour long lunch time super short by eating in a hurried frenzy.

I was immediately taken back to the days of teaching when I only had 20 minutes for lunch.  You think I’m exaggerating?  Then you’ve never been a teacher.  I admire/envy people in European countries who take two hours to eat lunch.  Every. day.  Now granted they may be working later into the evening, but still.  Americans work late into the evening and skip their lunches.  Eating a meal slowly is better for digestion, generally helps you to eat smaller amounts, and for me personally it improves my mental health!

So here is my plea people: slow down.  Enjoy the day that God has made.  Savor your sandwich for more than a few seconds…

Okay all my creatively-inclined friends, I need your thoughts on what to do with our fireplace mantle.  The living room/kitchen has quickly become our new favorite hangout spot because it’s one big connected space.  Some other areas have already received my decorative touch but I don’t know quite what to put here:

This is a corner fireplace so the room is not exactly centered around it, but I still think it’s a focal point.  In our old house we used to have a large mirror hanging above, but it’s too large to fit this time.  I know that picture frames and candles are always a good option but I would like to do something different here.  To give you an idea of some other patterns in the living room…

Fabric pictures on the wall

Vase near the corner

Rug on the floor between couch and fireplace

As you can tell we have a lot of warm-earthy tones in the room.  Brown, Green, Red/Orange are the primary colors.

One idea I have is to create a type of picture frame using an old antique-looking window.  I was inspired when I saw these hanging on the wall of Taziki’s, one of our favorite Greek restaurants in Birmingham.  I think it’s better when you don’t put a picture in every single frame but rather have some pictures alternating with blank glass.

Here’s an example:

I also like this design where they cut the picture smaller than the glass frame so that part of the brick shows through behind it.

This is one neat project I would like to try, but I am open to suggestions.  If this was your mantle/blank canvas what would you do??

We officially closed on our house this past Thursday, so we are new homeowners!  Before moving into the house we had my parents in town for a few days to help out with painting and things that needed to be fixed.  Can I just take a moment and say where would we be without parents??  Well we would be tired, stressed-out, sitting in a sloppy painted house with no idea how to fix anything.  My dad is the ultimate hanydman.  I’m convinced he knows something about everything.  Kevin agreed with me that he is definitely a superhero when it comes to dads.  So we are very thankful for the help they gave us and already thankful for the help Kevin’s parents will provide next weekend.  We are truly blessed!

I wish I had taken more “before” pictures so you could see all the progress.  The office/dining room were green and red Christmas colors.  Now they are two different shades of green and I LOVE how it turned out.

I don’t have pictures of the guest rooms, but let’s just say they are no longer blue and pink for boy/girl.

The craziest thing that happened that weekend was having two very large trees removed from the backyard.  They were very tall and close to the house.  With all the recent storms we’ve been getting it seemed smart to take some preventative measures.

The guy was soooo high up there!  I felt much better when he was safe back on the ground.

About once a year (usually around our anniversary) the subject of my wedding dress comes up.  We’ve been married 4 1/2 years and I still have not decided what I want to do with the dress: sell it on Ebay or preserve it.  The terrible thing is that it just hangs in the closet untouched and has never been cleaned!  When I start to consider my options I get really emotional.  I know it sounds dumb because it’s just a dress, a thing.  But of course it holds so much sentimental value.

So the subject has once again presented itself as we pack up our things and prepare to move.  I change my mind about every three minutes, but I need to make a decision soon before it starts to turn yellow and then it’s no longer valuable for anything!

My favorite part of the dress is the back!

Here are my reasons for wanting to sell the dress…

• I will literally never wear it again
• It would be nice to get some money back and pay for other things
• What if I preserve it and then I don’t have a daughter, or she doesn’t want to wear it/it doesn’t fit her

Here are my reasons for wanting to keep and preserve the dress…

• I really like the thought of family heirlooms
• I can try and sell it, but I can’t claim the actual size on the tag because it was altered so much
• I’ve heard that people will cut the dress into pieces and make things like a baby gown, etc. so it can be used again

Thoughts?  Opinions?  I would love to hear what other ladies have done with their dresses.

I want to tell you all about a very worthy cause that helps teachers, and more importantly students, receive good learning materials.  It’s called Donors Choose.  This is a website where anyone around the country can go and search for projects to donate money to.  You can search by a particular city & state or school district.  Or if you prefer you can look for projects related to a certain classroom subject: math, science, music, art, etc.

Teachers create a project based on the needs of their classroom and ask for specific items.  You can read about their stories and learn how it will benefit the children.  Not all the time, but most often the schools asking for things are in high-poverty areas.  As school funding gets cut more and more each year, teachers end up spending a LOT of their own personal money to buy things for the class.  I know from personal experience how quickly you can empty your checking account because you so badly want to give your students the best.

A couple of years ago I used Donors Choose to request two large African drums.  My husband got the word out to his blogging community and in no time the project was funded and my kids were able to enjoy these awesome instruments.

So now I want to pay it forward and do the same thing for one of my teacher friends in Alabama.  Mrs. Short is an *awesome* 5th grade teacher and she has two current projects on Donors Choose.  She is asking for interesting picture science books and flash drives for her classroom.  Go here to read more about her requests.  As she says, “I hope you can find it in your heart (and wallet) to support my class.”

Whether you are interested in funding Mrs. Short’s project or find another deserving classroom, I hope you will seriously consider supporting Donors Choose in some way.  After all our students deserve the best!

I bet you readers out there are shocked when you stumble upon a new post from me.  Aggh!  This is something I really want to get better at.  Blogging is really inconsistent for me: I can either go for weeks without any motivation to write, or have several things to post about all at once.  Hopefully I can find a happy medium.  I think one post a week would be a victory for me.

So here is life lately – I got a teaching job for the fall at an awesome school (praise God!!!), we are closing on our house in less than 10 days, getting more plugged in at church which I love, and my running is still good but slowing down a bit because of the ridiculous heat.

Can I be honest with you for a moment?  (The blogs that I love to read the most are from my friends who are just totally honest about what’s going on in their minds and hearts; I admire that.)  Right now I am so badly wishing to be “settled.”  Not just in a house but life in general.  Through conversations with wise women, and through my own experience, it has been confirmed for me that your 20′s are a really hard stage of life.  Not to say that everything after 30 just all of a sudden becomes a piece of cake.  I know that all seasons have their struggles.  But it seems like this particular decade brings with it so many big life changes.  Moving away from home, finishing college, looking for a job, starting new jobs, getting married, for some people having kids.  For me and Kevin moving to a new city.

An individual flaw of mine is that I am hardly ever just content with the here and now.  I am always looking forward to the next big thing.  As we southerners like to say “I’m ready to settle down and plant my roots.”  I’m ready to have a normal routine, to stay in the same place for many years to come.  And yes, I know how naive that all sounds because as soon as I’m starting to get comfortable I know some big unexpected thing will happen to knock me off my feet.  But it would just be nice if life could slow down for just one day and let me go “aahhhhhhhhhhh.”

This past week Kevin went out of town for work.  Thankfully he only has to travel a couple of times a year.  So I was left as the single housewife, and the time apart convinced me more of what I already knew: we are meant to be together.  I miss him so much when he is gone; there is no way we EVER could have made it 5 months living in different states!  Here are some reflections on why I love my husband…

*bullet points used in his honor*

• He loves to write in bullet points and constantly has ten different lists going at a time.  He is organized on paper, and I am organized in the physical sense.  We balance each other well.
• He writes the looooooongest emails ever.  This is a trait he inherited.  But you always know the details!
• He has to research everything before making a purchase.  Occasionally it bugs me, however it means that we usually end up with good quality products that don’t break.  (Now the one time I had to draw the line was when he wouldn’t choose between 2 humidifiers in the Walmart aisle.  I told his snot-running nose to pick one and get out of there.)
• He loves Maggie Magoo like crazy.  The cutest thing is watching them play and cuddle.  He still holds her like a small child even though she weighs 50 pounds.
• He never ever complains about my cooking.  He compliments it.  He also eats leftovers gladly!
• He brags to other people about me.
• He is very patient when teaching me about something I don’t understand (like football penalties).
• He is so good with money.  I know it’s “our” money but I can tell you we wouldn’t have much of it if it weren’t for his good decision-making.
• He takes advantage of business opportunities to provide for our family and he is awesome at blogging stuff.
• He is obsessed with everything Tennessee, especially football.  When we lose it ruins his entire day/weekend.  He is forever the fair-weather-fan just like his mom.
• We speak our own ‘language’ to each other.  Like funny sounding words that would mean absolutely nothing to other people but that he and I understand.
• He writes notes to me from ‘the dog’, again using a language that no one else would understand.
• He buys me socks for every special occasion: Christmas, anniversary, birthday, even our wedding!
• He is a great friend to others.  We are both alike in that we value quality of friends versus quantity.  If Kevin becomes your friend he will totally invest in your life and you’re stuck with him forever.
• He loves to sing and has more songs in his head than Pandora.  His brain is tuned to the Christmas station year round.
• He is a sucker for a good heart-warming story.  He always reads them online and then shares them with me.
• He quotes Friends as often as I do.
• He is awesome at laundry and does it regularly.
• He values romance and the time we spend together.
• He makes me laugh.  A lot.
• He loves the Lord.  It’s easy to run through the marathon of life when your partner is running the same direction.

I could go on further for a long time, but I’ll wrap it up.  I love my husband.  He’s the best!

Things have been so busy for the last month, I feel like this is the first chance I’ve had to sit back and relax for a moment.  I will go ahead and cut straight to the big news: we bought a house!  Or at least we are under contract on a house and should be moving late June/early July.  When I think back over the last 6 months of our lives it feels like a whirlwind.  I can’t believe how much has happened, how much has changed, and how thankful I am for God’s blessings.  Since I began this new blog I  haven’t dedicated an entire post to all the amazing ways God has provided for us.  I will proceed to do that now.  **Warning: while Kevin tends to write in bullet point lists, I usually prefer stream of consciousness because that is how my mind works.  Prepare yourself for a lot of word-i-ness.

Flash back to December 2010.  Kevin and I were faced with the most difficult decision we’d ever had to make.  According to our agenda for getting to Knoxville three things had to happen.  1- Kevin would get a job  2- I would get a job  3- Our house in Birmingham would sell.  We assumed that all those had to occur at the same time.  God only provided #1 on our list.  Kevin was able to transfer with his company but they wanted him there the first week of January.  So we had to choose money (me staying in Bham and working the rest of the school year waiting on our house to sell) OR marriage (going ahead and moving together as a family regardless of the financial consequences)…We chose marriage.  Hands down.  Best decision we ever made.

God asked us to take a huge leap of faith.  If you know my husband at all – one of the most financially conscious persons you will ever meet – then you can understand what a big deal it was for us to double our living expenses while cutting our income almost in half.  On paper it was a dumb decision.  But God confirmed in both of our hearts that it was the right thing to do.  Not that it wasn’t scary.  It was actually terrifying.  The first week we were in Knoxville I honestly thought “are we crazy?  what did we just do?”

The first week in December we made the choice, and three weeks later we moved.  We only had one weekend (really a day) to find a new place to live.  I had inquired about a posting on Craigslist for a rental town home.  Normally I don’t respond to anyone who doesn’t post pictures in their ad.  But for some reason I was interested in this one.  It turns out the guy we ended up renting from is best friends with someone who works in Kevin’s office.  Coincidence?  I think not.

After we got here and Kevin started working, I was left sitting at home twitting my thumbs for the whole month of January.  I assumed it would be quick and easy to get on the substitute teaching list.  Boy was I wrong.  Due to the snow days we had and trying to get in with such a huge school system – I kept waiting and waiting by the mailbox hoping my confirmation package would arrive.  It never did.  I started to get really bummed that I wasn’t working, but alas God had a better plan.  He always does.  Because I had so much free time on my hands I reached out to every principal in Knoxville that I could.  Long story short I ended up with two amazing part-time jobs.  At my morning job I work with preschool-1st grade teaching music at a large church in town.  My co-workers there are some of the most encouraging people I have ever met and truly show me the love of Christ every day.    At my afternoon job I am an assistant in an elementary school where I found out early on the music teacher was retiring.  (Fingers still crossed for next year.)  Once again: God’s provision.

We looked for a new church.  How could a new one possibly meet up to the greatness of our old church that we loved so dearly?  God led us right down the road (literally about 1 mile) to an amazing church called Providence.  Oh the irony, as “provision” has been my word of the year.  We did a 6 week marriage study at this church where we met a fun couple who led our small group.  It turns out they live in the same neighborhood as the house we are about to purchase.  Do you see how things are coming full circle??  It also turns out that the couple who is selling the house have several mutual friends with us.  We heard through the grapevine that they had people at CSP praying for their house to sell at the precise time we asked people at CSP to be praying about us buying the house!  God took our two requests and smushed them together

Ohh I could honestly go on for several more pages talking about life changes.  But if anyone tried to convince me that all these things were just “fate” or “coincidence” I would have to correct them.  God has proven over and over and over how much He loves and cares for us.  It has been His hand at work in our lives.

“Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.”
Matthew 6:33

This past weekend I got an early birthday present, new running shoes!  I figured if I’m going to be a serious runner then I need to take good care of these feet.  When we started out on our exercise goals at the beginning of the year I was doing this mostly for health reasons.  But lately it’s grown from not only physical health to spiritual health as well.

I have never been good about memorizing scripture.  I’m the type of person who will get into a deep conversation and try to quote a passage…”somewhere in the Bible it says…” and I try to paraphrase it as best I can.  As Dave Ramsey likes to say THAT’S NOT GOOD ENOUGH!   I don’t want to go through life thinking and assuming I know what God’s Word says.  I want to know it, live it, breathe it.  I want to know my Creator more intimately and be prepared to share my faith with others.

So – here comes my goal for May.  I plan to start memorizing a new passage of scripture each week.  And when do I have the time to do that?  While running.   Yesterday I ran for a whole entire hour, ONE hour people!!  That’s a long time that I can spend focusing on scripture memory and that’s what I plan to do.

This week I have chosen three psalms  that fit together appropriately with my goal.
“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart by acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.”  Psalm 19:14
“Let my meditation be pleasing to Him.  As for me, I shall be glad in the Lord.”  Psalm 104:34
“Oh how I love Your law!  It is my meditation all the day.”  Psalm 119:97