We Interrupt this marriage to bring you...football season!

It's the time of the year we love around our house... Football! Last weekend we hosted a coaches & family fish fry at our house. Of course we had great food  & fun! Here are some of my decor pics...

For my dish, I was inspired by the pioneer woman herself.  She always posts the BEST tutorials on cooking so that even the worst people out there about following directions (like mysef) can make great food! I attempted to make cake ball footballs.

WELL...

They didn't quite turn out like I had hoped presentation-wise, but they were very yummy! Here is her link on how to make this deliciousness.

Here is how I made mine-

Cake pop sticks (or small wooden sticks), almond bard, Butter cake mix, squeezy icing, & cream cheese cake icing.

For my base, I used two foam floral blocks I found at the dollar tree, glued them together & then added green crinkle cut they also have at walmart & the dollar tree.

Glue with hot glue gun in sections...

Ta Da!!!

Dessert Table & Panther Ice Cream Bar

I forgot to get more dessert pics, I know shame on me! But here are the ones I made & if you haven't made a cake ball before, you should!

Weekend of fun...

This weekend was fantastic! I kicked if off by going to Little Rock to visit some of my sorority sisters from college. We went to dinner and had the best time catching up!

Ashley even made us a towell elephant like they make on cruise ships. Isn't this too cute? I think I need the book on how to make these.

I also got to catch up with my wonderful aunt & cousin Bailey to shop for shoes and have lunch. She also just started a new blog, in which Tricia Nae designed for her. If you are interested in starting a blog, you must use Tricia for your design. She is fantastic to work with and does a great job!

Check out my aunt's cute new blog: http://ritwhit.blogspot.com/

Since football season is fast approaching, my friend Hillary & I got together & made Panther wreaths for our houses.  Here are the finished products:

Next week, football yard signs!

Stay Tuned.....

On Sunday,  Jason & I spent the day painting our laundry room. Bye bye lime green! I still have a lot to do, but I will try to post pics of the progress as I go.

Overall, it's been a busy few days but definitely the BEST weekend I've had in a very long time.

Our new Home...

I've had tons of requests to post pics and I am a little bit behind. The last few weeks have been crazy for us! I am posting "empty house" pics and once I get everything settled, hopefully in the next few weeks, I will post pics with furniture in it and about all the changes we plan to make and things to add.

Overall, we LOVE our new house, neighborhood, & community. We were so blessed to find such a great house.

Here are BEFORE pics...

Front of the house....

Side view of our neighborhood...

Large front yard! Our grass feels like carpet.

Back yard & patio

Perfect for a pool right?!

Picket Fence! Home sweet home....

Another backyard shot...

Patio

Here's my favorite thing about the house...the KITCHEN!!!!

Now I have no excuse not to cook all the time.

Laundry room. This room WILL be painted. It's on my "to-do" list for the weekend. Bye Bye Lime green!

Walk in pantry & half bath. -This too will be painted!

Close up of my Kitchen. I just had to get another pic because I love it so much!

Dining area

Huge living room! Now all we need is lots of new furniture to fill it up. 

Half bath off of laundry that is also another painting project.

Entry Hall-I painted this last week. No more Green!

Another view of the living room

Guest bath-double sinks!

Guest Room-

Future baby's room.

Hopefully we will be decorating this at some point in the future, but for now, it is a catch-all.

Hallway

Master bath. I love my marble counters! Also, Jason has his very own closet in here! That way I have another walk-in dedicated to all of my clothes, shoes, & purses!

View of the master (you can see my closet door on the left)! haha

Overall, this is a great home & we can't wait to start our family here.  I have always dreamed of living in a "Leave it to Beaver" neighborhood with my family and that is exactly what we have. Fabulous neighbors & great friends close by.  Even though my commute to work is longer, Jason is still less than 2 minutes away from the school.

I will be posting pictures of projects I am working on and new items that we add along the way.  I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

4th of July Weekend...

This has been a wild weekend!  I have been every where from Hot Springs to Dallas in the last three days. 

Friday, I started out by going to see my cousin Bailey dance in the Miss Arkansas Outstanding Teen Pageant.  Her dance group from Little Rock were invited to entertain during the preliminaries and for the final night and I must say they were amazing as always! As soon as we got there, we found out Bailey had been sick and wasn't feeling well, but she battled through it and put on a great show.

Also, our family friend Jill sang as part of the entertainment and did great too! I hate we missed the big finale Saturday night.

Here's a pic of Bailey & Jill backstage at the Pageant that Ceil posted on Facebook.  Aren't they gorgeous! We love them and I was proud to be there to support them!

I had the honor of fixing Bailey's hair for the show (with a little coaching from my Aunt!) I think it turned out great for my first time with "dancing hair"! lol

My Aunt Rita putting the finishing touches on Bailey's do! (Okay I'm not quite a professional yet....) & working on her makeup & eye dazzle!

Here's the final product!!! My gorgeous cousin has transformed from sick dancer to..... gorgeous sick dancer!

Mom & Bailey

Me & Bailey stopped for a picture at the Hotel. 

Then it was on to Dallas for a family trip to the Ball game.  Rangers vs. Marlins! Needless to say they lost :(  But we had a great time!  Me & J just had to get a picture before the game started. And yes....we were just as hott as we looked!

Pre-game fun!

We had GREAT seats.  4th row, lower level, 3rd baseline.

I told you they were awesome! This is with no zoom!

Overall, it was a fantastic weekend! I was even able to squeeze in a little bit of shopping at Ikea, Francescas, Tj Maxx-Homegoods, Sam Moon, & Charming Charlie. Also we ate at In-&-Out Burger...so good!  So I was happy!

Today Jason started his new job at Magnolia.  We move in 2 1/2 weeks and my house is a wreck.  I'm not stressed....I'm just busy! Words cannot express how ready I am for July 22nd!---Moving day!!!

We're Moving!!!

So.... it's official.  We are trading in our Navy & silver for Red & white!!!   In the last week Jason has got a new job and we have found and started paperwork towards purchasing our first home together.  All I can say is we always move fast at everything we do!

Jason & I have both had feelings of unrest over the last several months. Niether one of us could really explain why, but we felt extremely unsettled.  The last few months have been busy with our first anniversary and trying to finish up with this school year.  We have prayed and asked God to lead us where we needed to be, but still felt unsure of the direction we were headed and still couldn't shake the bad feelings! Out of the blue, Jason was offered an assistant coaching job (one he hadn't even applied for) in Magnolia.  Jumping from a small school like Lafayette county to a 5A school is a great promotion in the world of Coaching.

Okay, I will admit that I had a very hard time adjusting to the idea of moving. I had barely lived here a year and it was already time to pick up and move again?! Where would we live? How could we be moved in less than a month?  I cried.....we talked out the situations....I cried some more.  In the end, they REALLY wanted Jason to come to Magnolia.  And he REALLY wanted to go there. Finally, we made the decision that this was best for his career, as bad as we hated to leave.

So...then I flashed back to my fear of being homeless. How in the world would we find somewhere that fast?! Immediately we began to pray! There was nothing else to do to put the situation in God's hands.  I am so thankful to say we found a house!!! In less than a week, Jason had a new job and we found a house! We close July 18th (fingers crossed nothing goes wrong) and we move in later on in the week.

We didn't just find "any old house"...we found my DREAM house and for a price we could afford (yes that was all God's doing!). I feel like he picked out that home especially for us. Okay let me back up...we actually found 2 houses! God was definitely in over-drive working for us this week.  The first house was older, but in a fantastic neighborhood. We found it through a realtor and went to look at it last Friday.  It was nice, and had a small lake that ran through the neighborhood which was awesome!  It was also EMPTY! Which was a plus! So...we loved it! We put an offer  that day, went to the bank, and got approved for a loan.  So then the waiting commenced ALL weekend long....longest weekend ever!

In the meantime, I had also found a house online at forsalebyowner.com.  Very random I know, and I am usually nervous about that kind of thing, but it was the same price as the other house and definitely more updated. I thought it would be a good back-up-plan, just in case the first deal fell through.  So I sent them a message saying we would like to come look at the house. The next morning, the girl called me and we chatted about our situation.  She was so sweet and said that the short time limits were fine on there part. We had a family gathering to celebrate father's day on Saturday night and had to cut our visits short so we could go look at the other house.  Jason was tired and told me to call the girl and cancel so we could go home and rest.  I told him we needed to go and that we'd make it a quick run through just to see what it looked like.

So that night we went to view their home and ....O...M....G.  We fell in love. Granite countertops...new appliances...2 1/2 baths....yes I said 2 1/2!!!! Large backyard, sprinkler systems in front and back, and everything I could ask for!  It was great.  We left forgetting all about our first house which we "thought" was perfect. All of a sudden we were hoping they didn't accept the first offer so we could jump on this house.

Needless to say we prayed some more and some of you reading this probably prayed for us too!  I had everyone I knew praying we'd find the perfect place.  Monday afternoon we made a deal on the second house!  Now it's just a matter of waiting on paperwork and boxing up all our junk.  We are so thankful for this opporunity and are looking forward to starting a new beginning in Magnolia.  We will miss Lafayette County.  After all, it's where Jason grew up, where we met, and we spent our first year of marriage! It was our first home together.

I will still be working as a career coach at Hope and working out of Stamps, so I'll still see all my kids and teachers, but just have a little bit more of a drive.  Jason is thrilled about his new job. The coaching staff and people of Magnolia have been extremely kind and welcoming. 

Jason and I both know that the only way this happened was through God & his plans. There's NO other way in the world this could have happened without his blessing. I'm still amazed that this happened so fast and so perfectly!

God is able to do immeasurably more than all we could ask or imagine. -Ephesians 3:20

I will be posting pics as soon as we get into the new house!

Back to Reality...

Now that we've had our dose of paradise for the year, it's back to reality. Cooking, cleaning, and laundry have welcomed themselves back into my life!

We had a FANTASTIC time on our anniversary trip.  The waves were huge the whole time we were there and the weather was perfect! We spent most of our time at the beach, but we also squeezed in a little ZZ Top & Lynard Skynard on Sunday, LuLu's, shopped, went to the movies, and all the fun stuff that goes along with being on vacation.  The best part of the whole trip was the Sunset cruise on a Yacht that Jason surprised me with the last night we were there. It was the perfect ending to a perfect trip! We even saw dolphins while we were on the water that afternoon, but I was too nervous to have my camera on the front of the boat (didn't want to risk loosing my camera to the sharks! lol).

All in all, it was a fantastic way to celebrate our year of wedded bliss!