A Beautiful Life...

Well I have a night to myself at home tonight (James is working at a 4th grade writing workshop at school) so thought I would take a little time to update the blog. Things have definitely been busy as always, but good, on our end. This weekend we had James' family in town and had a great time with them and they even introduced me to what it feels like to have real buttermilk and shortning in the house when they made us some good ole southern homemade biscuits and gravy Saturday morning (which we ate instead of going to weight watchers) and we also got some homemade oatmeal cookies that night. We also got a chance to take them out to one of our favorite restaurants for dinner which was a lot of fun. We definitely enjoyed having them here and are thankful for the help that James' Dad gave us around the house as well!

While we were getting ready for them to come we attempted to clean out the office and in one of the boxes that I went through I found an "old" card from my Mom. Now I have the word old in quotes because it was given to me last year just after my birthday but is dated May 24, 2008. Now you would have to know my mother to enjoy this fully but basically she bought me the card for my bday last year and forgot to give it to me so she decided to just give it to me when she found it and date it for 2008...lucky for her I found it! Anyways reading through it again made me remember how much I loved the card and what meaning it had for me so I thought I would share it on here for everyone to enjoy so here it is!

"How to make a beautiful life...

Reflections for a daughter on her birthday.

Love yourself.

MAKE PEACE with who you are

and where you are at this moment in time.

Listen to your hear.

If you can't hear what it's saying in this noisy world,

MAKE TIME for yourself.

Enjoy your own comany.

Let your mind wander among the stars.

Try.

Take chances

MAKE MISTAKES

Life can be messy and confusing at times,

but it's also full of surprises.

The next rock in your path might be a stepping-stone.

Be happy.

When you don't have what you want,

want what you have.

MAKE DO.

That's a well-kept secret of contentment.

There aren't any shortcuts to tomorrow

You have to MAKE YOUR OWN WAY.

To know where you're going is only part of it.

You need to know where you've been, too.

And if you ever get lost, don't worry.

The people who love you will find you.

COUNT ON IT.

Life isn't days and years.

It's what you do with time and with all the goodness and grace

that's inside you.

MAKE A BEAUTIFUL LIFE...

The kind of life you deserve."

I hope that my Mom realizes how lucky I truly feel that I am to have someone like her in my life and all of you that know her, know what a wonderful person she is and how much she meant each one of those words just for me (and all of her "other" daughters). After reading through this a few times I decided to post it on the wall in my bedroom so that I can read it often. I thought that it might just be able to help out a few friends in my life right now who are going through a rough time...just remember that those of us who love you are ALWAYS here for you!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Well you got it...nothin says "Happy Valentine's Day" like a heart shaped pizza from Papa John's! Yes James and I celebrated the night before v-day by going out and doing some research on dresses and tuxes for the wedding and then stopping on the way home where he surprised me by ordering the v-day special at Papa John's! It was a darn good pizza too if you ask me! That was not even the end of our celebration though...I was surprised with a card at school the next day that had a message for me telling me that I would be going to get a massage that night at 7pm...now that was a GREAT present, especially after spending the day in my classroom with a bunch of hyper children and no assistant I definitely welcomed a bit of relaxation time!

The next night we made dinner together and I made a special weight watchers treat for him that was a baked apple with candy pieces inside and it actually turned out pretty good so he said we "had to take a picture for the blog" so here it is!

I guess that's really about it that is new for us right now. We have been trying to lay low lately and save up a bit of money but I have to tell you that through doing that it is amazing to me how much we have been able to learn about each other and learn to appreciate that time that we now have to be able to just hang out and actually "do nothing" together. When James was still working at HHGregg we were lucky if we spent an hour a day together and now we have all weekend and most nights to just be together! Along with the time of just relaxing together we have gotten quite fond of going out and renting movies from our local store with the 1/2 price movie special that they have! We have rented quite a few movies and if you have time I think we would both highly reccomend seeing Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married. It's one of those movies that just really makes you think and appreciate the things that you do have in life and in love. We also were able to go out to lunch the other day and just talk and sit and ask each other questions. We kinda realized that we don't always do that as much as we used to in our long distance days because during those times we would talk on the phone for hours and now we are always with one another so we tend to take those moments for granted.

OK well I guess I will stop rambling on about all that now but just thought I would try to share a little bit about what we have been up to lately since we haven't posted in a bit! Oh yeah and we also have James's family coming out to see the house for the first time next weekend so we have been trying to clean up the office and get it ready for them...we are looking forward to that visit and will be sure to have some pics to post when they are here!

And you know us, we can't make to many posts without including a picture of A.J. so here is one of him that we took after he got a bath the other night...I think it is definitely a good look for him, what do you think?!?!

Superbowl Fun!

Well as planned we had a few friends over this past weekend to watch the Superbowl on Sunday. Now how does one get ready for a superbowl party you ask? Well by raking leaves of course! Yes we borrowed a rake from some friends and spent the first three or so hours of our Sunday raking the leaves up in our back yard and putting them into about 25+ bags. Here are some pictures of our work!

Even A.J. pitched in to help clean up some sticks in the yard...no telling where they ended up!

Shortly after that was finished everyone came over to have some Superbowl fun. We got some chips and salsa from Chili's and James made his families ham, cheese, & pineapple snacks and then everyone else brought a dish to make quite a nice spread...needless to say we all ate WAY to much that night, right Melissa?

Our new cooler that we got for the party!

Everyone pitched in to make some fabulous snacks!

It was definitely a nail biting finish to the game where the Giants won...yes friends the Giants and the Patriots were the ones who were playing...and the Patriots were wearing blue while the Giants were wearing white...glad we cleared that one up finally! Anyways wanted to post a few pictures of us all hanging out...can anyone guess who gets the award for most spirited? I know that James and I had a great time with our first "party" in our new home and hope to make the Superbowl get together an annual tradition!

Right on Jones, way to be ready for the party!

Melissa and Beth...hanging out on the couch "watching" the game!

The Brown gang at the (soon to be) Brown's house...can anyone guess who is the most innocent out of this group?!?!

The girls...ready for bed after a long night of eating, eating, and more eating!

OK well last but DEFINITELY not least I have to give some props out to Brian and Matt for coming over tonight while Tara and I were at class and helping James to hang our new light that we got for the dining room...thanks so much guys, it looks great!