Three Inches of Snow in March

Hello!
Yesterday, we woke up to this:

 So of course, this had to happen:

...what?? Why, you ask? I don't know. I don't try to understand. I just love everything that makes him who he is. After much debate, I decided NOT to sleep outside in single-digit weather. I kept the bed warm, just in case. ;)
We have gotten a few more projects done around the house. We were trying to decide on whether to get a new chandelier or save money and paint the one we have now. We decided to cheap-out and paint. This is the before picture:

 Matt is a brilliant spray-painter. His work is flawless.

And here it is after! I bought the lamp shades at a garage sale. Though it might not be our ideal, we like it better than the brass!

What do you think?

In other news, we have painted the nursery a light green-gray color and Matt put up the crib! Apparently, we're not in a hurry to get things done in there. But I did order a print online today! I'll show you when I hang it up. 

 And for those of you who keep asking for baby belly pics, here you go! We're at 30 weeks and counting!!!

Our little boy is kicking like crazy these days and I LOVE it!!

Trout, Paint, and Other News

Hello!
Seeing as it has been almost a year now from my last post, I apologize. Thank you all for caring enough to make sure I keep up my blog! It will be especially good to have around when our little baby boy gets here!! :) We are so excited! Stay tuned for updates on the nursery!
In other news, Matt went on a fishing trip a couple weeks ago and brought home trout! I have always wanted to try trout (admittedly, due to watching The Parent Trap at least 10 times). I am glad I finally got a chance! It was delicious! Matt cleaned it and cooked it in the skillet. We served the fish on top of jasmine rice (Matt's fave) with homemade rolls and a salad. My sister, Kate, was in town and got to experience new things with us! I would put a picture up, but it honestly does not look all that appetizing. Thankfully, it was much better than we were expecting. Matt can go trout fishing any time he wants!
We also got around to painting our bedroom (finally!). I figured if we didn't do it before we started on the nursery, we might never have a painted room. After much debate and indecisiveness, we settled on beige (File Cabinet by Martha Stewart, to be exact). At least it will go with everything! Matt also changed out the ceiling fan for a more modern look. We are thankful to our sisters for helping us paint!!
Here's a before picture:

 Matt working on the light fixture:

After During (there is still much decorating to be done):

The colors are a little off, but you get the idea: much better. You will just have to come by and see it in person! Glad we got that checked off our list!
More renovations are underway! Does "nesting" apply to the whole house?? I thought that would only be for the nursery. Who cares! We are finally getting things done! :)

I'm Alive!

Yes, I am still breathing! It's been a while so I wanted to take time out of my studies and share some house updates with you!!
So far, we've stripped wallpaper, painted, and moved in furniture. All thanks to help and gifts of furniture from our families!!! Thank you!! :)
There is a lot I want to share, but I'll just show pictures for now!
Here is what the dining room used to look like! Forrest green.

During:

And here it is now! It's hard to tell the color exactly, but it's a beautiful green! All it needs now is a dining table!

The kitchen was our next project. I was so ready to get rid of this wall paper! 

Thanks to our family for helping tear it down!

 Matt did an excellent job texturing the walls! Our kitchen is now a beautiful butter yellow.

Woohoo!
And we love spending time in our living room now that it has furniture. I'm almost sad to see winter go since we won't get to have anymore fires in our fireplace! Isn't my husband cute? He likes the leather chair. Sorry about the yellow tinge!

And we have a bed for our guest bedroom!

Matt rewired that hobnob lamp for me! I couldn't resist when I saw it at a thrift store. Love it! All it needs now is a lamp shade.
And here are our current projects: refinishing a dresser and chairs!

We are so happy to call this our home. It has been a joy getting to work on it with each other and our families. We are so blessed!!

Craigslist

Recently, craigslist.org has become my best friend. Matt and I recently bought a wooden kitchen table on clearance. I love it! But is has no chairs. So I have been scouring the ads on craigslist for chairs. My intent is to get six mix-matched chairs and paint them all one color to tie them together. Maybe white? Or blue? Probably white. It's versatile. I'll send you some before and after pics...once I get the chairs. ;)
How I wish I had my sisters here with me to rummage through the local antique/thrift stores! I like going on my own, but it's so much nicer to share things you love with people you love.
Matt and my sister-in-laws are here in OKC with me, but they're all at work. I think I just need to get back to school. And get busy. Hello, last semester of nursing school! Woohoo!
But that's not until next week. Today, I think I'm going to check out a few antique stores. ;)

Gingerbread

Yesterday, Matt and I made gingerbread cookies! It is so wonderful being back together. I love cooking with him!!

We're definitely ready to close on our new house (hopefully next week!) and get all of our stuff out of storage. But for now, a glass works just fine for a rolling pin!
He did all the hard work. I just enjoyed them. ;) 

We both had wonderful Christmases with each of our families. We received thoughtful gifts, many of which we've already put to good use! Most of all, we loved being together with all of our family. Looking forward to another blessed year!!

Antiques and Motors and Antique Motors

This past weekend was perfect. Matt and I had such a wonderful time together, living life. He took me up in a plane! It was my first flight with him since he got his license! So fun!

These were our views from the plane! The leaves were a bit past prime and they definitely looked better on the ground, but they were still much better than Oklahoma.  

That was one of the Finger Lakes in Upstate New York.
And it was so wonderful getting to hang out with friends. We're going to miss them when we officially move back to Oklahoma!
Speaking of Oklahoma, BOOMER SOONER. I could not believe how much we dominated the University of Texas last weekend. We enjoyed every minute of it.
My favorite part of the whole weekend was getting to cook with and for Matt. We made excellent breakfasts (e.g. Sausage and Apple Pancakes with Maple Cinnamon Butter) (Whatt?!? Yes, it was as good as it sounds). And it actually felt like fall!! It didn't even get above 60 degrees except for one day! So of course, we made delicious soups.
And Matt took me to antique shops! How sweet is he? Then we went to a museum about Glenn H. Curtiss, the "Fastest Man on Earth," who broke the speed record with the motorcycle he built (one of the first!) in 1903. He also engineered the first airplanes and motor boats, so the museum was chock full of motors, progressing through the twentieth century. So we both got to enjoy our respective loves: antiques and motors. And we had a blast we each other while doing so.   
Loved every minute of this weekend. Wish we could do it all over again exactly the same. 
Hope y'all had great weekend too!

Porch Swing

We're still alive and kicking! Promise!
Nursing school just doesn't leave much time for blogging, you know. Here's one of my favorite pics of us for you in the meantime.

Jesus is wonderful. Life is beautiful.

Welcomed Home

This was one my favorite things to see upon entering the South Plains:

Beautiful. Of course, it would be so much better if the cotton could be twice this size, but it's still alive at least! For my friends from Pennsylvania and New York, that's how flat we're talking about here in West Texas.
More Southern greetings:
--Texas twisters (aka: dirt devils)
--shrubs (which I used to think were trees)
Things I miss from PA:
--real trees
--water
But as much as I loved the beauty of the Pennsylvania forests and mountains, I could never choose them over wide-open spaces and Texas sunsets.
It's good to be home.

A Little Hike

The other day, we went for a hike in the woods. It's been a bit more parched here than normal all summer long. The grass in our yard is dead, but the woods are still alive and kickin'! And so, we dove into the beauty.

I'm so glad I brought my camera. I usually rely on Matt for the expert photos, but there is something joyous about capturing something beautiful from your own perspective. My pictures look very different than Matt's (I would say less artistic, but we'll just leave it at different). I like that.

We saw this fallen tree. Remarkable.

He almost blends in to his surroundings.
Of all the pictures I took, this one is probably my favorite. I love roads and this one is so beautiful with the sun shining through the trees. And it reminds me of country life.

Beautiful!!

PA Picnic

Yesterday, Matt and I spent our Friday evening with a picnic. The weather was perfect at 80 degrees and cloudy. I couldn't think of a better way to spend time with my hubby.
We stopped by a drive-up BBQ place that was actually pretty good for Pennsylvania barbeque.
We brought along Bananagrams for a nice, competitive game in which Matt barely squeaked out a win. :) Just kidding. We were neck-and-neck the whole time. I love Scrabble games.
Our view from the hilltop park looked down upon our little town. That's the high school track where we run. Matt is training to run a 5K in less than 18 minutes. I'm training to run a 5K in less than an hour.

Isn't the greenery just beautiful?? That's one thing about PA that I will miss.
Hope y'all are having a wonderful weekend!!

Vacay

This past week Matt and I were blessed to be able to take off work and celebrate our first year of marriage together!! We had a wonderful time road-tripping along the east coast. Our first stop was in Ocean City, Maryland. Beautiful!! I don't think I've ever loved the beach more than last week. I just wanted to stay always. We then drove a short way to Assateague National Park and camped right on the beach!

Peaceful. When we awoke in the morning, we lazily made our way to Williamsburg, VA. We stopped along the way in Norfolk, Virginia to look at a gigantic battleship, the U.S.S. Wisconsin.

Woah. Seriously huge.
I was quite excited to reach Williamsburg. It's such a cute town!! I love old things.

While there, we toured Jamestown. Remember John Smith and Pocahontas? We learned all about them and how the Disney version is not exactly accurate. It's amazing what the first settlers of our country went through. We learned so much but the best part was walking where they walked and imagining them there over three hundred years ago. Can you tell which president this is?

After we'd had our fill of city life and bed and breakfasts, we started out for Shenandoah National Park in Virginia to do some camping. We backpacked in, crossing a couple streams until Matt found us a good camping spot. I don't have any pictures of it, but I can show you my future backyard. This will be the waterfall and pond that Matt will build for me.
Just kidding. It would be kind of difficult to recreate that. Isn't it beautiful, though??

 After a hot bowl of oatmeal in the morning, we hiked to the top of the highest peak in the park and got these shots:

And this:

Don't be too impressed. We only hiked 700 of the 4050 feet. I wouldn't have made it otherwise. It was pretty steep. Gorgeous, isn't it?
Over the week, we soaked in all the experiences we could. We were thrilled to be closer to the South we miss so much. While in Virginia, we had our fair share of fried chicken, BBQ, sweet tea, and pie. Oh yum. I now feel that I don't need to cook for a week. We can just run on that.
I couldn't have asked for a better anniversary trip. I'm so grateful that we got to spend so much time together!

New Favorite

Can I share my new favorite drink with you?
This is was is referred to as the Green Monster. I haven't come up with a better name for it yet. I tried a version of it a while back and didn't care for it. Then I tried it again based off of Joy the Baker's recipe and loved it!! I think the problem the first time around was using Nutella instead of peanut butter. Wrong choice. What better combo is there than peanut butter and bananas?

Those seeds on top are Chia seeds. I like to mix them in for some added protein, Omega 3's, and more good stuff. For the smoothie, I basically just throw in a handful of spinach and ~3/4 cup milk into a blender and blend until smooth. Then toss in a banana, a tablespoon-ish of peanut butter, and a teaspoon (or more...:)) of honey. Blend again! So good! And it's a healthy snack or breakfast drink. Try it!
Well I'm a busy, busy bee these days. I'll try to post again soon! Now I'm off to work! Have a blessed Thursday!!
P.S. Doesn't it feel like a Wednesday? That Memorial Monday threw me for a loop this week.

Rummage

There are very few garage sales here in PA. Reason: there are very few garages. So here they are called rummage sales. I rummaged all over yesterday while Matt was away. Want to see my finds??
First up: tea towels! How cute! The blue pattern fabric is a table runner that may or may not live a long life as a table runner.
Vintage calendar towels! I see my dad's birthday there!!
Stationary. Only 25 cents. Lovely.
Bowls with handles. Perfect. Items in picture are larger than they appear.

Cute sunglasses! The only problem is I didn't realize they were bifocals until I got home. Bummer. Could've been cute.
Well...maybe not that cute:
Goofy. Oh well. They were only ten cents.
Pretty successful day, though, huh? The towels and stationary are my favorite. The whole day cost me less than 4 bucks! The only thing that could've made it better would have been to have company. I missed my sisters, mom, and grandma yesterday!!