Unannounced hiatus

Suprise! I'm back!

I decided to go on an unannounced hiatus during the time of Kyle's family needs. His grandfather passed away and we were very busy during that time. Right after that we went to Florida and though Kyle came back last Sunday my mom and I stayed until this past Saturday! I missed my furbabies and hubs like crazy but I got some much needed r&r! Being a stay at home wife it would seem like I never had much to do, however I think I work more now than I did before. Even if I'm not physically doing something my mind is constantly at work over what needs to be done, what I want to get done, and what seems too impossible to do. A full weeks worth of not doing anything but picking up after myself and the hardest decision I had to make was what to do for dinner was exactly what I needed. I thoroughly enjoyed hanging out with my mom as well, it's been long overdue.

My parents both went down to FL on August 13th and then my sister, nephew, husband, and I arrived on the 21st around 2AM. On the 24th my dad, sister, nephew, and Kyle all left. Jacob, my nephew, got to see the ocean for the first time and with him having an obsession with sharks you can only imagine his excitement. With all his knowledge of sharks and how they attack he didn't even want to put his toes in the water, he about had a stroke when I was waist deep.

Needless to say we spent most of our time at the pool meeting new friends.


















xoxo Haley

Friday fancy

Hooray for Friday! Here in tennessee it's tax free weekend on school supplies, clothing, etcetera. As much as I love a deal I don't think my nerves can handle the crowds today. So instead I will tell you what I'm currently fancying about!



I am fancying that one day I will own a MacBook. I have an iphone and iPad and, to me, it makes sense to own an apple computer so everything can connect across the board. But it's pricey so for now I'll day dream cause I am more focused on renovating parts of my house.




I am fancying about owning this bad boy as well. A Canon Rebel T5i. It's not high on the list of being professional grade but for a family and blogging camera it covers all my wants and needs. With a price tag of $600-$700 I guess it will also have to be placed on the back burner. Sigh. Who am I kidding? I've totally been whining to Kyle about it.

Surprisingly that's the only two things on my high-priced wants list. I try to keep the list small so I can check things off faster *wink*

What are you fancying about?
xoxo Haley

Our Story Part 3: Engaged

If you haven't read the previous posts on how we met or when we dated you can find those here:
We Met
We Dated

September 9, 2012 Kyle and I were headed to the first Tennessee Titans home game of the season vs the New England Patriots. It started out as a normal day and this game, unlike most, we made good time on the road so we could tailgate. As we neared the exit to the stadium we ran into the game day traffic. I could tell Kyle was starting to getting antsy as there was no ease or gracefulness to his gas and break peddle. Several times I thought we were going to rear end the car in front of us or be rear ended. Naturally I start nagging due to the anxiety attack that was about to take over me head on.

Finally we got to the game. Before we got out Kyle asked, "can we have a serious conversation?" With this I knew I was about to be lectured on "don't drink too much", "behave yourself", etc.

Me, "no because I know what you're going to say"
Kyle, "oh do you now?"
Me (in a mimicking voice) "don't drink too much...behave..."
Kyle, "well that's not exactly it but yeah that too..."
Me, "okay proceed..."
Kyle, "you know this was this same place we had our first date so I thought this would be the best place to ask you, will you marry me?"



Out of no where I look down and see him holding this shiny diamond ring, all I could think was "when did he get this out of his pocket?"

Of course I said yes and in the midst of the "oh my gosh", "how long have you been planning this", "are you sure" etc. I finally stopped in my ohh's and aww's and looked at him and asked,

"Wait...did you ask for my dads permission?"
Kyle, "of course!"

I then proceeded with the ooh's and aww's. I called my mom and told her and she was overwhelmed with happiness. She told me she knew he was going to ask because Kyle had come over to her house and with his face white as a ghost asked if he could speak to my dad alone.

I called and told my sister and after we got off the phone I realized oh my gosh, it's her birthday and I didn't even wish her to have a happy one...she still jokes with me about that.

Later in the stadium we told all of our friends that sit in our section and everyone was so happy for us. One of my friends and I headed out to the concessions and while standing there none other than the real Hayden Penettierre walked past us. My friend yelled out "Hayden!" And she turned around and walked over to us. I practically word vomited "I just got engaged today!!!" and with that she grabbed my hand and told me I had a killer rock and ohh'd and awed over it and then she went on her way.

Then I had to plan the wedding...


xoxo Haley

Taking a chance

5.) Talk about a time you took a chance.

I don't know if I can honestly say I'm a "risk taker" and that I like to take chances on a day to day basis. I would like to describe myself as fearless yet I'm an over thinker and I don't think the two can belong parallel.

Right before Kyle and I got married I had this nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach but I couldn't pin point what it was. As time went on it started to hint at my job. I had gone to college for two years when taking on one of my dads barbecue restaurants fell in my lap. I embraced this opportunity and more often than not I loved my job. As overwhelming as it could sometimes be I found happiness in what I was doing, helping carrying out my dads dream. After several months of that nagging feeling digging deeper in the pit of my stomach I realized just that, it's my dads dream not mine.

I mentioned the idea of changing careers to Kyle in which he responded by telling me that he would support me in whatever decision I made. I just couldn't bring myself to do it though. Leaving the barbecue world didn't just mean I wouldn't be smelling like pork everyday it meant I would be giving up the opportunity to one day own it. The thought of losing that opportunity weighed heavy on me. It could mean a huge sacrifice for my future children, owning a restaurant would have been a nice monetary cushion for them in which I could provide more.

As weeks went by I slowly started realizing that maybe I wasn't so happy with my job. It was the same routines everyday, other than caterings I literally did the same thing every.single.day. Being in charge of a whole crew started to feel like being a babysitter to a bunch of rowdy toddlers, not to say I didn't absolutely love my crew because seriously they were the best of the best, but it started to just become repetitive. The customers started getting on my nerves, believe it or not this didn't happen frequently for me, and somedays I would swear that if one more person complained about our bottled water being $1 I would absolutely lose my cool.

I still couldn't take the chance on throwing my future away.

I started feeling guilty because everyday I would come home in a bad mood which, to say the least, was not fair to Kyle.

Finally after all the signs God threw my way the chance finally came to leave the barbecue world, kind of, behind me. Our lease was coming up and my dad started talking about renewing it. Mind you that my particular store on my side of town was not in the best location which at times was very unfortunate. I had already made my mind up that I was going to be making a career change but I couldn't find the words to tell my dad. I literally would start to sweat bullets even thinking about the conversation.

Finally one morning he brought up renewing the lease and I completely word vomited. I knew this was my chance to tell him and if not now then it would be never. So I told him if he renewed I would no longer be there to run it. He looked at me completely confused and asked why and then that's when I explained it to him. Previously when I imagined this conversation I visualized darts being thrown at me, instead he told me he completely supported my decision and that he understood I had to do what was best for my family. I may have had to pick my jaw up off the floor, just saying.

Needless to say my dad ended up closing that location. After a vigorous job search in the banking world Kyle and I decided it would be best for me to be a SAHW and focus on myself and maintaining our home. I now work two days a week, two hours a day just to help out my dad by pulling the meat and marinating it. Though it's not my top choice waking up at 4:30 AM for two hours of work I'm happy with where I am at and wouldn't take back the decision if I could.

I took a chance and if there was ever a chance worth taking, this was it.

xoxo Haley

Intolerance

For quite some time now I just haven't felt good. Not the "I have a cold", "my belly hurts", etc. feel good but more of the I'm fatigue, I'm dizzy, frequent headaches, I could fall asleep any second, I rather crap my pants than walk to the bathroom...okay, you get it. I just feel like crap no pun intended. I had gone to the doctor months ago to figure out what was wrong and why I was randomly getting so dizzy I couldn't make it through a full work day. After stealing multiple tubes of blood from my body and making me pay a ridiculous co-pay, a week later I received my test results.

"Everything's fine. Your test results had no abnormalities."
...and they sent me on my way, no further testing, nothing...

'Scuse my french but are you EFFING kidding me?! Last time I checked it is not normal to be dizzy and lethargic on a day to day basis. You can take your PhD and ram it so far up your hiney that it will never see a day of sunlight. Needless to say I refuse to ever visit that doctor's office again and should have took the note down when my friend told me they almost killed him when wrongly diagnosing him.

I left it alone though. I abandoned my health concerns in hopes that they would sort themselves out, it will go away...I'll be just fine... After seeing me slowly deteriorate my mom, metaphorically speaking, came knocking on my door telling me I wasn't in this alone and we would figure this out together. So she set me up an appointment to have more blood drawn. This time we would be checking for my food allergies.

Who knew you could be allergic to something and never have a fat clue!?

I finally got my test results back and I'm allergic to many things that I consume on a daily basis, one being gluten. Bye bye beer. Grapes, so long wine. You can only imagine the big ball of pity I'm rolling around in over here...not to say that I'm an alcoholic but I like to consume about two beers a week, three if I get wild, and an occasional glass of Riesling. Do I even need to speak my love for an all-american burger? Well, hello turkey burgers...we may need to get acquainted quite sooner than later. Oh and remember that coffee addiction I was talking about? Yeah, I always use vanilla creamer, as seen above in my yellow intolerance list... I won't lie, I'm crying a little river on this side of the blogosphere.

So what's there to do now? Go through countless recipes and try to figure out what I can and cannot have. Within those recipes that are gluten-free I have to find substitutes for the things I can't have such as white wine or soy, etc. Throw away all of the knowledge I've gained throughout my journey of becoming more domesticated in order to prepare Kyle delicious dinners, because quite frankly those dinners were on the road to killing me and I'm pretty sure he would rather eat poop for dinner than to not have his wife, or maybe I'm flattering myself. On top of all of this I pretty much have to change my entire lifestyle. Kyle and I attend small group every Wednesday and each time is rotated between houses and who to cook, it's not fair to them to have to abide by my weird diet because my body is pissed at me and doesn't want to digest anything therefore it's just floating around like, "hey strawberry, how long have you been here?". Therefore when attending our bible study I will either have to eat prior or pack my dinner. Same with our Sunday brunches at Kyle's Nanny's house. Yeah, my head is still trying to wrap around all of this.

In all seriousness, even if you do not have an intolerance to gluten I would strongly suggest to try to eliminate it from your diet. If you ever do research on what it actually does to the body you, much like I, will want to sue the FDA for allowing such in the American diet. Selfish assholes. To sum it up we might as well let the FDA approve rat poison in our Lucky Charms.

Our story: We dated

Today I'm going to continue Our Love Story. If you missed Part One: We Met you can find that here.

Part Two: We Dated
After meeting December 5th we continued texting and random phone chats, we also hung out a time or two. Five days into dating Kyle I decided I was going to prove everyone wrong. I was going to make a record to show everyone just how long I knew he was the one. Really it was more for him than anyone. I started a journal. My goal was to write him a love note at least once a week and I would give it to him on our wedding night.

Our second official date was on my birthday, December 16th. I knew without a doubt that everything about him was so much different than what I was use to. I treated our unofficial relationship like a delicate flower. When Kyle came to pick me up from my parents house, where I lived, I explained to my parents that I wasn't ready for them to meet him so he would not be ringing the doorbell. My family is extremely southern traditional. Before you take a man's daughter on a date you come to the door and you shake that man's hand, that's just how it goes in the south. With my feelings so intense for him right off the bat, emotionally I could not handle them meeting him yet. Once he text me that he was in the driveway I headed out to his truck where he was standing by the passenger door ready to open it. A true southern gentleman. He took me to dinner to one of our favorite hibachi grills and the night went wonderfully.

I remember being so amazed at how smooth our conversations would flow. Never any awkward moments or twittling of thumbs, just smooth sailing. I quickly realized I could be myself with him, I could laugh, I could chat, I could be a dork. For the first time since high school I felt comfortable in a relationship. There was no pressure, no trying, it just happened.

Kyle waited almost two months of dating before he asked me to be his girlfriend. Being the jokester that he is he asked, "so do you want to be Facebook official?" Heck yes!






We went on many adventures while dating. We went on canoe trips, out of state motorcycle rides, travelled to see tractor pulls, and much more. He was the first guy I dated with an actual career and did well for himself, being that I was only 22 years old it was a pretty big deal...then again he is almost five years older.





A year and a half in to our relationship, April 12th, we decided to take our relationship to the next step. For most that would mean an engagement, but our timeline was a little backwards so instead we bought a house! With mortgage rates low it was in our best interest to buy because they would soon be going up. After six months of being together I basically lived with him and his best friend and it finally became time to start our own nest.

The old saying is once you move in together your relationship gets harder, however that wasn't the case for us. Before we had a bedroom to escape to and a roommate that we had to be conscious of. Once we had our own place we had rooms where we could get away from one another and breathe a little, not that this happened often. Kyle became my best friend. When we would argue over something the first thing I wanted to do was run and talk to my best friend, making it hard because he was the one I was arguing with.

I remember the exact moment I fell completely head over heels for him. I knew I loved him after day one but I wasn't in love with him yet. One day we decided we were going to take a nap and then get up and get ready to meet some friends at the bar. We took our showers and when we started to get ready we just looked at each other and knew we didn't want to go out. At 10pm we went on a road trip to Wendy's and got some burgers and frosty's then stopped by Redbox to get a movie. On our way back we were just goofing off the whole way home. In that moment I realized, without a shadow of doubt, I wanted to marry this man and spend the rest of my life doing just this.

Then September came...
xoxo Haley

Our Story: The Meeting

Forever ago I said I would tell the fabulous story of how Kyle and I met, I've yet to do that. So with Mr. Writer's Block knocking at my door and me trying to ignore him I'll take the time now to give you our little love story! Enjoy!

I started out as a little girl from Hendersonville, TN. Kyle started out as a little boy from Dover, TN. We were approximately 84.5 miles apart growing up. I went to college in Chattanooga, TN, he went to Murray, KY. Approximately 249.2 miles apart. 

When I was in college I was always the single friend, and I didn't mind this. I'm pretty sure my friends minded more than I did because I was just wanting to have fun and have dating flings. As a joke they set me up on a dating website. I actually went on a date with one of the guys from Chattanooga but it was never serious. 

Once I left college I returned back home to Clarksville. As mentioned here I didn't have many friends in Clarksville. I worked with all girls, had only girl friends, the church I attended was mainly younger married couples, how was one suppose to meet a guy? The bar? Um, no! So I decided I would actually look into the whole online dating trend that was rapidly becoming more popular around me. I dated two guys that I had met online and neither were lasting relationships so I decided to call it quits. I continued being single for an entire year, going on casual dates, none of which were met online, before I decided I needed to delete my online dating profile. The night I went to delete my profile I finally decided I would take a look at my number one match, I hadn't prior to this because he has a child in the picture. (Shout out to the girls who have the sanity to date men with children, after one relationship of dating a guy with a child I knew it just wasn't for me). 

And there he was. Hellllooo, handsome! Come to find out the little girl in the picture was his niece. His sister had told him to put up the picture cause in his words, "Chicks love kids". We messaged back and forth and eventually exchanged phone numbers which led to many texts back and forth. One thing that reeled me in on his profile it said something along the lines of, "I spend my Sunday's going to church with my grandfather," and "family is extremely important to me," um, what's up winner!

And then it came time to finally meet. I'm a pretty die-hard Tennessee Titans fan. My parents have had season seats since the first game and I've always enjoyed attending the games. On December 5, 2010 my friend was suppose to go to the game with me to see the Titans vs Jacksonville Jaguars however she dropped at the last second, the day before the game. She told me I should just take Kyle, the guy I had met online. After looking at her and exclaiming she was crazy I finally realized hey, maybe that's not such a bad idea. The stadium may be an hour away from where we live but I have friends there and if all else fails I'll just hang out with them. I shot him a text and asked him if he wanted to go, to which he replied he couldn't because it was his cousins birthday. I told him I understood but I sat there feeling completely shot down. While pitying myself for five minutes I got another text from him, "Nevermind, I'll be there. My roommate told me I'm a douche if I don't go." Blink, blink. SCORE! We set up the plans: I would pick him up from his house I clearly did not want a stranger knowing where I lived and have the beer ready for us in the back seat.

And then it was the morning I met him. I pulled into the cul-de-sac where he lived and notice and big trailer with the company name of my best friends brother in laws concrete business. Hm, maybe it's a sign? I called him to tell him I was outside his house, the first time I had ever heard his voice and vice versa. Oh boy, I have a country bumpkin on my hands. He walked out with a blanket in his hands, it was a December game, and it was nice to see he put some thought into our date. Once he got into my car I pulled off and we start the nervous chatter which was quickly put to rest.

Me: Hey my best friends brother in law owns that concrete company. (on said trailer)

Him: Oh really? Brittny or Lani?

Me: blink, blink. Um, Lani...

Him: Yeah that's my roommates truck and trailer, he's Josh's the owner/brother in law brother which is my best friend.

Could there be more of a sign?



We laughed about how small the world is and then continued to another topic of conversation:

Him: So what do you find attractive in guys?

Me: I don't know what it is but I love a bald head. Maybe it's the southern in me but I also love a guy who dips.

*now you may see in the picture of him above, he has a hat on. I had yet to see a picture of him without a hat and when he got into my car for the date he was also wearing a hat.

Him: oh really? Removes hat and exposes bald head.

Me: immediately blushing I give out a giggle.



We got to the game and he was a complete gentlemen. He shared his blanket with me to keep me warm and put his arm around me. I was seriously stunned at how wonderful the date was. Best first date ever.

The next day I told my sister, "I'm going to marry him" to which she quickly replied, "get real, Haley, you never put up with a guy past two months". She had a point.

Part Two: We Dated

10 Ways to Cool Off

It's that time of the year where we forget how cold the winter was and start heavily complaining about the harsh heat and sunburns. Never fear, I am here to tell you ten ways to cool down during these heated summer months.

Let's start by stating the obvious, shall we?

[one]

stay inside, duh

That's right. Beat the heat and go kick your feet up. Not quite ideal for me because I rather be outdoors during the summer because it's much easier to enjoy the beauty God created in the summer rather than everything that is dead in the winter. 

[two]

invest in this

This little jewel is what gets me through my days of gardening. It's a cooling towel, I purchased the Enduracool from Lowes, and it doesn't matter if you put hot or cold water on it... just give it a few snaps and BAM, it's cold. Kyle obviously has more than one of these for long days of mowing.

[three]

peppermint essential oil

Caution: please do not drink. Grab yourself a spray bottle, add some water, put a couple of drops of oil in it, and spray yourself! My mom and dad swear by this remedy. 

[four]

shower thyself

...with cold water! Kyle likes to take steamy showers regardless of the temperature outside. I, however, am prone to turning it icy cold and enjoying the sting on my skin after a long day of outdoor play.

[five]

spray yo'self before you burn yo'self

It's obviously a given that if you are playing outside one may want to apply sunscreen. However! This Sport CoolZone sunscreen by Banana Boat is quite delightful. It not only smells better than most sunscreens but it also is extremely cooling. Why not kill two birds with one stone? 

[six]

ice ice baby!

Sure, you can suck on an ice cube or two, but why not add a little flavor with some ice pops! Kyle keeps them in stock at home and on the job. 

[seven]

take a dip

 That's right, my friend. Put on your skimpies and take the plunge. A sure way to cool off...and get a little wet.
[eight]

hydration

 Drink yourself some water, friend. I love a nice cold glass of water when I have sweat rolling down my face. If you get a wild hair, cut up some lemon and cucumber and infuse your water. I absolutely love the refreshing taste of cucumber lemon water. Best part ladies: it helps with bloating... you're welcome.
[nine]

i-scream-you-scream

Treat yourself to some ice cream! ...or a fudge pop...or a yogurt pop... or whatever cold guilty pleasure that tickles your fancy!

[ten]

Make yourself a smoothie. Don't know how? No excuse, there's Pinterest for that, or Google.

Don't forget! Please apply deodorant, even if you have to have someone apply it for you. 

(This picture was taken on my wedding day, hence the dress and veil. I couldn't get the deodorant on without getting it on my dress so my sister kindly lend a hand.)

This post was inspired by the one and only Mama Kat and is a part of her Writer's Workshop. 

Fourth of July weekend

I know this post is coming a little late, however I haven't been feeling the greatest lately and I've had a thousand+one things going on. So! Happy Fourth of July!



We spent the fourth camping with my inlaws. We headed to Paris, Tn late Friday afternoon with the pups and put the boat in the water around 8pm to watch the firework display on the Paris Landing Bridge. After being on the water for a bit we decided to call it a night so we could try to pull off the water before everyone made it to the ramp, unfortunately we weren't the only one with this plan.



We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing at the camper and on the water. Saturday night the owner of Hidden Creek, the camp ground we were staying at, put on a firework show. Hands down possibly one of the best I've seen. After the show we all hung out and drank beer, which you can see in the pictures above my MIL and her friend were having a little too much fun. They wrapped eachother in caution tape while my MIL proceeded to ride my five year old niece's bike. Much laughter was involved and I thought a time or two I may just wet my pants from uncontrollable laughter.

xoxo Haley

Lazy Sunday: movie review

Oomph it's a steamy day here in Tennessee and it's only a little pass 9:00am. With laundry going and a grocery list made I figure it's time to sit down and blog.

Yesterday the hubs and I spent a relaxing day doing pretty much nothing. It's free movie channel weekend through our cable provider so we recorded several movies one of which we watched yesterday.



We're the Millers. I'll admit I giggled a time or two but it definitely didn't live up to the hype that surrounded it, not for me anyway. Not to say it wasn't worth the watch but I've seen movies that give more a laugh. When Aniston and Roberts start teaching the brother how to kiss it grew pretty uncomfortable. I would, however, like to see a sequel to see what happens next...that's if they make it right and not just a sequel bust.

After the movie was over we took a nice little afternoon nap. After dinner we watched Big Brother 16 which I'm in love with! I'm kinda feeling the twists this year, it adds to the "expect the unexpected" line.

What've you been watching?
xoxo Haley

House refresh

The past two days I have been hard at it around the house. For months the ugly red door and shutters have been getting on my nerves. It wasn't just that it was red but it was that it was more orangy-red and it was hideous. At first the color wasn't bad when we bought the house but overtime the evening sun did it's damage to make it unbearable. It's kind of hard to see in the above picture which was a picture taken for the house listing.


Our brick has hints of black so there was never a large debate on what color to paint because I immediately knew I wanted to emphasize on the black. I also knew it would give such a refreshing look.





I am beyond happy with the way it turned out. The previous home owners painted the shutters without removing them from the house making the removal process 10x harder than it should have been. They painted over the screws and the screws were stripped out so we ended up having to remove half of the screws with pliers.


Once everything was dry I cringed at the thought of putting the old brassy hardware back on the door. I had Kyle just put the dead bolt on long enough for me to run to Lowes to grab new door hardware which ended up in me replacing all of the exterior door knobs.


I am so happy with how everything turned out and even more happy that now my Fourth of July wreath stands out. You'll get to see it in a later post!
xoxo Haley

Flea Market Finds

This past weekend Kyle and I went to Dover, TN, about 45 minutes away, to visit his family. Every other Sunday his grandmother, Nanny, cooks for the family and we all pile up and dig in. He has a huge family, emphasis on the huge, with his moms side alone he has three aunts and an uncle plus they each have two kids a piece and then there's also all the great grand children.

After catching up with our bi-weekly routine our intentions were to head out for the drive home. His mom is always talking about the LBL flea market so we decided to make a pit stop and visit for the first time. Everything was so incredibly cheap! I easily see this becoming a part of our Sunday's in Dover routine. They had huge old vintage trunks, that could easily be used as a coffee table, for only $20. My heart was fluttering with happiness.



I don't know if I'm becoming strong willed, more disciplined or what but I only bought these two cuties. The yellow one was $2 and the aqua just $3. How could I pass it up? In total honesty I would've came home with a trunk as well if Kyle hadn't been with me cause he wouldn't have been there to talk me out of it. I do plan on going back, with or without Kyle, and digging a little deeper in all the vintage goodness.

Find more home goodies over at Show Me Your Stuff with Stacy Risenmay- Not just a housewife, along with recipes, crafts, and more!

xoxo Haley

Unmade bed

Somewhere I read an article on simple ways to love your home and on the list was make your bed. Yes, just a simple making of the bed should help you to love your home more. Confession: I've never been a bed maker. I'll give you a moment to pick your jaw up from the floor. Growing up if I kept my room tidy that was enough to appease my mom. Considering it rarely was as a child my mom spent all her energy making me clean my room that there wasn't any of her left to nag get me to make my bed. Oh the childhood struggles.





Sophie wanted her and her toy to be in the picture. She's a natural.
I will say that I do love my bedroom when the bed is made. It just looks cleaner and also allows me to open the window blinds. The first day Kyle came home to a made up bed he walked into the bedroom and asked, "what happened in here?" And after last night I know that I should always try to make it to bed first or atleast pull the covers down for him.





When I came to bed last night, maybe 15-30 minutes after Kyle, I walked in to this. He had shoved all the pillows to my side and didn't even roll down the decorative comforter. (we don't actually sleep under the decorative comforter, there's a quilt underneath) You can hardly see him or how Koby is slightly peeping his head out of the pillows. So my lesson has been learned: unmake the bed before the hubs takes the duty upon himself. I'll admit, I bursted out laughing and woke sleeping beauty up.











I've also come to the conclusion that I may be the only one who likes for the bed to be made.
xoxo Haley

Handing out free smiles

It's that time again for Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop! After arguing with myself on which prompt I really wanted to take on this week I finally slimmed it down to:
List 7 things you'd rather be doing this summer.

Though I could go on and on about how I really rather be spending more time with my husband and doing all sorts of random vacations which I kind of um...have... my number one thing I wanted to do this summer isn't going to make it on this summers playlist. Really my whole list of seven stems from this one.



one
I have always wanted to take a missions trip since I was much younger and I opened my church's weekly bulletin and saw a list of all the mission trips that were available for sign up that summer. It ranged from South America locations to Central America locations and even locations in the States. The only opportunites I was apart of was church camp and vacation bible school, which I'm still grateful for. I thought my opportunity to help save the world was long lost for me being that I moved away and I didn't find any more opportunites.


Then I met my small group from church which has a wonderful couple who have visited Honduras several times. Hope restored. After long talks within the group we decided we would be taking a trip however it fell short this summer and won't be happening until later this year or next.


two
Instead of sitting here drinking my coffee on my new outdoor couch with my feet propped up on an ottoman and writing this blog post I rather be spreading hope.


three
I rather be learning and leading. Learning about lives that are much less fortunate than mine. Leading these lives to Christ and to know there will always be someone there for them.


four
I rather be sharing the love of my Heavenly Father. Sharing the good news of His son that was sent here to die for our sins so that we could have an everlasting life.


five
I rather be helping orphanages with everyday chores to help take the load off. I rather be cooking and cleaning for someone else that needs the help.


six
I rather be handing out free smiles to those who have not genuinely smiled in days, weeks, and even months.


seven
I rather be taking all that I have experienced on my missions trip to be more grateful for everything I have been blessed with.

What would you rather be doing this summer?

xoxo Haley

*all images provided via google images