cute!

Seriously, I’m obsessed with these two cuties!

(Don’t tell her I told you but Abby was stuck in the blanket and was walking around like that. It was hilarious!)

 

Lately

I know, I should blog more. I sometimes feel like I don’t have much to say. Also, I haven’t been cooking too much… so no new recipes. But, I am loving living near a bunch of places to eat. Ha, we have been eating out more now that we live in Arlington. I’m okay with that. So, speaking of living in Arlington – Life has been so good. We are getting adjusted and are loving living here. It’s so neat to be near my family. I’ve been able to go to dances and t-ball games for my niece and nephew. It just makes seeing my family so much easier. And I love that!

Oh – and I am going to start running! Really. I am motivated and got an app on my phone and everything. Ha. I also ordered a case to carry my phone in and wireless headphones. I’m all set. If I have all the gadgets, I will run right? That’s how it works. Anyway – we will see how it goes. But, I just want to push my body. Make it do something outside of my comfort zone. And, I really want to get in a habit of working out again. We’ll see.

And, just because, here’s a picture of Jonny and I when he took me out on a date to the Stockyards a few weeks ago. He is the best. for real.

The new house!

Well, we are finally moved in and all settled! First big party was last night and we had so many family and friends come to help warm our house. Seriously so blessed.

The house is wonderful. It’s full of character and charm. We pretty much love everything about it and are slowly adding more touches to it. (including a trampoline today!) We particularly love the game room and have tons of fun in there. There is a lot of ping pong playing in this house on a very regular basis and lots of people had fun playing last night. There was also a group playing poker in there.

The party was so fun. We were pleasantly surprised by the turn out and felt really loved. It was neat to have people from all different areas of our lives. And, we decided we have an awesome party house. There is about 5 different spots in the house to hang out, including outside. We got a fire pit and cooked marshmallows outside!!! Seriously, it was the best. And delicious. I also had a pretty yummy spread of food (and hopefully some recipes on here…eventually!)

It feels completely like home already. Home sweet home.

Big Changes!

Pretty big things going on around here. A little less than a month ago, Jonny and I moved to Arlington! We bought an amazing house here and are excited about the transition to living here. The main reason for moving was to be closer to my family, as this is where they all live. It has been so neat to already see them more. We feel so blessed with our house and we love it. Abby and Rocket (our dogs) do, too!

The move was made possible because I was hired as a teacher here! The Lord made the transition clear and relatively easy. I am now teaching 3rd grade at a school here in Arlington. I am enjoying the school and my team. The first day of school was yesterday and it went great. So did the second day! It’s going to be a good year.

We left some great friends in Denton. We had a really great group of people surrounding us. Luckily, they are still around us and checking on us. The Lord is so good and He has shown himself through these people so much to me, even now. I also left a really great school with amazing coworkers. They are going to always be missed, but I am excited that I enjoy the staff here, too! We are anxious to make friends here and get involved with a church. Just have to figure all that out. Oh wait, I mean – we have to trust the Lord in that area! :)

Pictures of my classroom and of the house will come eventually. Just wanted to give an update, since it’s big stuff. Oh, and we are actually close to things now… like a grocery store or 4, and multiple places to eat. It’s been pretty great!

Baby Sy

Holly and Matt have become some of our best friends. We love them dearly and care about them like family. We were so excited about their baby coming into this world! To celebrate, I was able to throw her a shower with some of my lovely friends from home group. It was fun to decorate and prepare the food. We did a brunch – I love brunch food! Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures of the food. But it’s all food I will make again so maybe next time.

Jonny helped with decorations including Sy and Baby in paper letters. I also put up some onesies as decoration. It was a fun little brunch!

Sy is now here and we love her so much! I couldn’t be more excited for Matt and Holly and am praising the Lord for their sweet and healthy little girl! I can’t wait to watch her grow up!

Trader Joe’s

…has come to Ft. Worth! I have been looking forward to this day for a long time. I started longing over a Trader Joe’s nearby a long time ago because of healthy living blogs. All these girls would talk about the store and all of the cool food they bought. I wanted some, too! Then, when Jonny and I went on our road trip to California and back, we stopped at every Trader Joe’s we could. I officially was a fan.

And now – they are in Texas! The one in Ft. Worth opened this past week and the one in Dallas opens next month. My parents and I went to the Ft. Worth location on opening day. It was packed – apparently there are other crazy fans – who knew! :) I bought some cereal, green tea, pretzel thins, chip crisps, and some mango butter. YUM.

Here’s one of the reasons Trader Joe’s is so great (along with delicious food that you can’t find anywhere else!) -

Motivate Me Monday

I’m linking up today with For Love of a Cupcake in Motivate Me Monday! Today I started my summer workouts! So – here is what I have on the schedule for the summer:

Monday: Nike Training Club – a boot camp style class where you get penalized if you ever stop moving for the whole hour. Intense.

Tuesday: Yoga – Love it.

Wednesday: Nike Training Club – AGAIN.

Thursday: Body Pump – a bar bell lifting class. toning happens here.

Friday: Athletic Training or Turbo Kick – depending on what time I wake up. Either are an hour of crazy cardio.

So, I have a workout scheduled for 5 days a week. Why? Because it’s SUMMER! (Wahoooooooo!) I don’t have too much going on in the days. If I miss a day, am I going to freak? No way! Why? Because it’s SUMMER! Gotta relax about it all. :)

I am motivated!

the blog

I just typed a whole post about me planning on blogging more. But I erased it. I’m just gonna say – I want to blog more!!! So, I am going to. It’s almost summer (ONE MORE DAY!) so I will have plenty of time. Here it goes… :)

And I really want to post some pictures but it isn’t letting me upload some. So, here’s a picture of Rocket laying out in the sun… because he is just so cute!

Planting Flowers

Gardening is a hobby I have wanted to start so badly. We contemplate making a garden for fruits and veggies but there are a few things that stop us right now. Well, my cousin had given me these pots for my birthday (2 birthdays ago…) and we finally are putting them to use! They have our address numbers on them and there is another with our monogram.

At first, I wanted to plant herbs in these. But, since they need to be in the front yard with the numbers on them, we decided on flowers. We picked out these gerber daisies and I love them especially because they were the flower we used in our wedding! We also picked out a lily for our big pot and we put one in our landscaping area, too.

I finally have had a hand in planting something! We had fun picking these out and putting them in the pots together. The dogs were out in the front yard with us and it turns out that Rocket loves gardening, too! I think this is a good first step for much more gardening in our future!

Flashback in Time: Save Texas School Rally

So, there are several things that I just never got around to blogging about. I almost just want to skip over them since they happened so long ago, but I love using this blog as a documentation – so I’m just going to roll with it. You might see some flashback’s with some events that happened a while ago but I’d say they are still blog-worthy events! :)

This one was the Save Texas Schools Rally in Austin, Texas. Basically, Texas was cutting funding in education and therefore, many jobs would be lost and in my opinion, the quality of the education system would have suffered. So – in order to try to express ourselves, there was a rally in Austin to try to convince the funding not to be cut and for the Rainy Day Fund to be used for education. (Rainy Day Fund = The reason for the umbrellas… get it?!)

Jonny and I felt strongly about this issue and so we went! It was a blast and was really neat to come together with other educators and citizens who felt this issue needed to be addressed. Our friends Matt and Holly also went and so we met up with them and marched together!

In the end, some of the Rainy Day Fund was used. And specifically in Denton, the cuts weren’t nearly as bad as they could have been. Hey – maybe we had something to do with it! :)