October Recap

I totally bombed at documenting our busy busy October. Here's what went down:

1st- A girl Nathan and I went to high school with just closed her booming photography business. It took up too much of her time, time she had to spend away from her family, so she decided it was time for a break. She fulfilled prepaid sessions, so thankfully we were booked for a beautiful Saturday! I took some pictures of Natalie after the pro did.

 
 
 

17th-22nd: A local couple hosts a huge biannual children's consignment sale. This was my first year as a consignor, and, boy was it a lot of work! We got rid of so much stuff, but  not even half of "Baby Natalie's" wardrobe. Gotta hang on to some of that stuff in case we ever have another girl! We used an electronic system to price our goods, and we consigned over $900 worth of stuff! Checks will be mailed out in two weeks; can't wait to see how much we earned! I plan on starting to work on my stuff for the spring sale right after the start of the new year.




These pictures are from previous sales, off the Little Lambs Facebook page.

20th- Back in September, on the day they went on sale, Nathan surprised me with tickets to see Miranda Lambert in concert. I was in complete shock. Not only were we going to see Miranda Lambert, but we were in the pit! We didn't realize it at the time, but when we arrived at the concert, we learned we'd be standing by the stage for the whole show. Now that we've been so close, I'm not so sure I'll want to sit anywhere else at a concert again. The opening acts were the Randy Rogers Band and Justin Moore.



Off we go to date night!



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21st-23rd: Nathan and I decided we needed a weekend away, and we wanted to go away while the weather was still nice. What better place to go than a potential hometown? My in-laws stayed at our house with Natalie while we spent the weekend in Nashville. We had such a good time looking at houses, bar-hopping and shopping downtown, and hanging out at the Grand Ole Opry and Opryland Hotel. Already looking forward to going back to check out a few other places. I didn't take many pictures, unfortunately.

29th- My mom, my mother-in-law, and I took Natalie to see Disney Live: Three Classic Fairytales. What an amazing show! It was narrated by Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, and Donald, and told the stories of Snow White, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast. Most of the little girls were dressed as a Disney princess, as were a mother and grandmother (though mommy and grandmommy were a little more on the provocative side).



NashVegas, Baby!

Nathan and I went to Nashville for the weekend. We needed a little getaway, and Nate had never been to NashVegas, so I thought, "Perfect! We'll have some fun and maybe I can convince Nathan that we need to move there." We've been eye-balling houses in and around Nashville for a couple of months, found our dream home with the hopes of checking it out while we were there, and, whaddaya know- it sold last week. Apparently it wasn't meant to be. I'm confident that God has a plan for us, and if His plan is for us to end up in Nashville, a home that's even more perfect for us will come along. When I began praying about where we are supposed to be, I begged God for an obvious answer. Shortly thereafter, we looked up information about Vanderbilt Children's Hospital and discovered that the chief of surgery there is a cardiothoracic surgeon who graduated medical school at Vandy just a couple of years after Nathan's previous boss. The chief also did his a fellowship under Nate's previous boss. Connection #1 (well, connection numbers 1 and 2 if ya count other Vanderbilt connections through Dr. H.) Then, I Facebooked an acquaintance from high school who lives in Nashville. She told me all of these wonderful things and that she and her husband would probably never leave the area. Then she proceeds to tell me that her husband is a real estate agent in Nashville, so "if there's anything we can help you with, let me know." Hmmm...is God telling me something here? I still struggle with determining that. I want to say that that's my sign, but then a second-guess it.

Anyway, Saturday morning Nate and I checked out 4 or 5 houses in an eastern suburb of Nashville. No luck. Then we headed downtown to shop and bar-hop for 4 hours (yet only had one drink each). Basically we missed all the different shows the city has to offer, but didn't just want to hang out in our room, so we checked out the Opryland Hotel. It's unreal that, besides Bass Pro and another store, the Opryland mall is still closed from the damage from the flood of May 2010.

I can't wait to go back. Next time we'll stay in the suburbs south of Nashville to check them out. Maybe then we'll see celebs! How fun would it be to run into Carrie Underwood or Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman out shopping?

I still need to get my pictures uploaded, but this "draft" has been ready since Monday, so I wanted to go ahead and get it up.

I've decided to link up with Women Living Well for the 31 day "Making Your Home a Haven" Fall Challenge.

Week #1's challenge is this:

Go buy an extra large candle and light a candle everyday in your home. Each time the candle catches your eye, say a prayer for peace in your home.

On the Women Living Well blog, Courtney gave two scenarios:

"Home #1
1. The woman of the home is distant. She is pulled into her computer, television, books, or text messages and it’s hard for the family to connect with her. She wonders why no one seems to listen to her? The children don’t obey her and her husband is insensitive.

2. The woman of the home is distracted. Her calendar is very full and her daily demands are so high it’s hard for her to focus and live in the moment with her husband and children. She is often late and rushing everyone and feeling guilty about being distracted but stuck in this rut of feeling overwhelmed and too busy.

3. The woman of the home is crabby. She is short on sleep, she hasn’t had a minute alone since the 1990′s and she really can’t see a light at the end of the tunnel to get a break. She is hopeless.

4. The woman of the home is discontent. She doesn’t like her home. She doesn’t like her husband. She doesn’t like one or all of her kids. She doesn’t like her church. She doesn’t like her neighbors. Truthfully, she doesn’t even like herself.

5. The woman of the home doesn’t pray. It’s counter cultural. She’s never lived in a home with a mom who prays. She doesn’t know other moms who pray. She wants to try praying but doesn’t know where to begin so she never begins.

Home #2

1. The woman of the home is engaged. She is aware of what everyone is doing right in that moment. If a child needs help or correction – she is right there to give it. If her husband needs a hug, an encouraging word or a helping hand she is right there to care. She is playful and makes time to tickle, dance, play checkers or Wii with her family. This is a woman whose family praises her (Prov. 31:28).

2. The woman of the home is wise with her time management. She guards her family from getting so busy that they lose their connection with each other. She dissects her calendar and eliminates things that are unnecessary. She is prepared when it is time to go somewhere to alleviate the stress that comes from late minute rushing. She and her family enjoy the slow paced life she has created in her home.

3. The woman of the home has a pleasant demeanor. She does not stay up late watching television, reading, surfing the web or working. She goes to sleep at a reasonable hour so she can wake cheerfully for her family. She knows that some seasons of life are harder than others so she is patient with her season of life and is confident that she will reap what she has sown. She works diligently trusting God with the results of her labor.

4. The woman of the home is content. She knows that no home, husband, child, church or neighborhood is perfect. So she chooses to be content with what God has given her for today.

5. The woman of the home prays. She knows that she is weak but God is strong and that she cannot fulfil the role of wife, mother, homemaker and sometimes employee, on her own strength. She is completely dependent on God and practices this dependence by daily praying for all of these things."

I want so badly to live in home #2, and in many ways I do, but I also struggle a lot with issues in home #1. I pray many times a day (yay for #5!) that God will give me the strength and wisdom to be the best mother and wife I can be. I love Nathan, but I'm so bad at showing it in the little day to day things. He talks, and I allow his words to go in one ear and out the other. He often gets a non-enthusiastic "Hi" from across the room when he gets home from work. I get frustrated with the clutter in my home, so I remove myself from everything going on around me. I know I'm so blessed, but I tend to often find something to complain about. That's not the wife or mother I want to be.

So this week, I'm challenging myself to disconnect from House #1 and fully, 100% be the woman in house #2.



How fitting that this is a "Celebrating Home" candle to celebrate our home and pray for peace in our home.





The Great Forest Park Balloon Race

We spent a recent weekend at a hot air balloon race. We used to go when I was younger, and I'm so glad we got to take Natalie. I'm hoping this will be an annual thing for us, because Natalie had so.much.fun. It really was a great, but totally exhausting, weekend.

There was a children's area sponsored by Purina. I definitely don't remember that being there when I was younger, but it seemed like all the kids (and parents, too) were having a great time. There were inflatable bounce houses and obstacle courses, pony rides, a petting zoo, and a Purina Incredible Dog Team show.

The "race" is not based on speed. The Energizer Bunny is the mascot, I guess you could say, for this race, and a big ol' "X" is placed in a chosen location, and each balloon has to find the "X" and drop a bag of rice. The person who drops the bag of rice closest to the center of the "X" is the winner. When I was younger, I remember there was an actually "Hot Hare Balloon" that would go up, but this year, we got this:

And some of the balloons who participated in the race:

And mi familia:





Product Review: Shaklee

Erin over at Healthy Branscoms was generous enough to send me a sample of Shaklee concentrate to try out. An itty bitty sample made two 16-oz bottles of organic cleaner, one for windows and one all-purpose cleaner. I've had this sample for a couple of weeks, and I finally got two spray bottles to make this cleaner.

I've read nothing but good things about Shaklee, but I'm a serious skeptic, so I was really excited to see the results when I used the all-purpose cleaner today. Natalie had a serious nose-bleed during the night, and being the procrastinator that I am, I still have not put a waterproof mattress pad/protector over her mattress, so there was a disgusting stain on her brand-spankin' new mattress. Yuck! Then...a light bulb went off! I scurried to the kitchen to grab my Shaklee all-purpose cleaner. Two little sprays and some blotting, and this is what Natalie's mattress looked like

What's that? You don't see a stain? No signs of a bloody nose anywhere? Let's look a little closer:

I didn't take a "before" shot, but, believe me, there was a stain. Thanks to my new Shaklee all-purpose cleaner, no one ever has to know. I've already warned the hubs that we will be budgeting for Shaklee in the near future.

Gulf Shores Vacation

We recently went to Gulf Shores for a short vacation. By "we" I mean Nathan, Natalie, and myself, as well as my parents, my sister, and my in-laws. All in one condo. Am I crazy? Yes. Could it have been much worse? Absolutely. We all got along surprisingly well, especially considering we had to spend much of our time inside the condo, thanks to Tropical Storm Lee (that jerk).
We left home Wednesday evening. Nathan and I had an hour drive to my parents' house, where we all met. Even though we both took off work early, we still were late. It didn't help that my car wouldn't start when we were ready to leave. We drove to Tunica, MS, Wednesday evening and crashed immediately. FYI, it's kinda scary driving through Memphis at night. If you don't have to do it, don't.
We arrived to Gulf Shores on a Thursday, and the weather was amazing the whole way, until we got to southern Mississippi. The clouds hovered, but didn't start raining on us right away. My sister and I went to the store get buy the perishables that we didn't take with us in the cooler, and we cooked chicken fettucine alfredo for dinner that night. Friday morning I got up early and worked out. For some reason I am better about working out when I'm on vacation than I am at home. I wanted to shower before I went to the beach to meet Natalie and her grandparents, because after the 8 hour drive on Thursday and an hour of gym time, I sure didn't want my picture taken. I quickly showered and gathered up my beach goodies. I was about 10 steps away from the sand when a downpour came without warning. Everyone scooped up their things, tried to rinse off their feet, and ran to shelter.


I wish I could say we were wet from swimming.





I wish this picture did the waves justice. There were times when they had to be almost 10ft high. Friday night, the chairs were removed from the beach and the water level was past where the chairs were.



The rain never did chill out that day, so we all showered and went to the always-amazing Tanger Outlet Mall. Nathan got some more school clothes, I got some great deals at the Tommy store (thanks, MIL!!), and Natalie....well, she shouldn't have to wear the same thing twice for awhile! There are perks to being an only grandchild on both sides. Ha! Friday night we dined at Wentzell's Oyster House. Boy, oh boy, was it good! And so much fun! There were hilarious phrases printed on brightly-colored paper and stapled all.over.the.walls. Most of us went to bed early that night, after getting our bellies full!

Saturday we went to the beach a couple of times, but never got to stay more than 10 minutes. We were in and out between the rain showers. Natalie got her sandcastle, which was our goal for the entire trip. Nathan, the ILs, and I went shopping again, because there wasn't much else to do. My car got wonky again on Saturday, and we had trouble getting it to start. My family went to church, and when we got out, we had to call the ILs to jump us in the rain so we could go eat at Jake's. After dinner, we just chilled again, and watched the waves cover most of the beach.

Sunday morning, Nathan, my dad, and my FIL went to Wal-Mart to get a new battery for my car while we girls all went to the beach. It was the prettiest it had been since we got there, and we had to be out of our condo by 10:00. WTH!?! Oh well, we knew we had a long drive home, so we needed to get on the road. It rained on us pretty much the whole way, and by the time we got to Mobile, AL, and crossed the Mobile Bay, this big guy tried to get close to us:



Retracting back into the clouds as we're driving away. Darn me for not having my camera in reach at all times!

This bridge seems so much longer when there's a tornado on the water. Yep, it actually touched down and created a HUGE water spout! I'm so thankful we all made it through safely! We made it to my parents' house around 9:00pm, so Nathan and I decided we'd just stay the night. An extra day in Gulf Shores would've been nice had the weather cooperated, but it felt so good to be home!

Natalie with her only true Aunt

My monkey didn't want a picture with me.

Natalie with her Mimi, my mom



We Remember 9/11/2001