the boy is home

my boy is home...mustache and all. yup, apparently his whole unit decided to bring on the manly`ness during their few weeks of training. awww, but it's nice to have him home even if the mustache came with the package c; 

this weekend we have been giddy homeowners, the epitome of first time buyers. frequent trips to home depot, starting {key word} like eighteen projects only to move onto number nineteen and even mowing our poor DEAD lawn in 100 plus degree weather {he was pretty stoked about his new lawn mower}. my boy left just days after we officially moved into our home, so i've been doing all the unpacking by my lonesome. having him home just makes it feel so real...i love it. 

to do this week:

paint our mantle c: c:

unpack that last box i've been ignoring

organize the linen closet

make a bird feeder

finish the spare bedroom 

{in`laws are coming to town}

...and that's all i'm committing to for now.

happy sunday my friends!

sparkling wine glasses

last weekend's bachelorette party was spent in napa {aawwhh. yes, it was beautiful}. the bridal party all chipped in, rented a house, then spent the weekend soaking up sunshine and wine tasting. unfortunately i had to leave a day early in order to make the wedding of my dear school friend. so it was only proper for me to excuse my short stay by crafting some fun, girly and very appropriate wine glasses. upon much research, here was my favorite tutorial i based this project on...{credit}

what i used:

~martha stewart multi`surface craft paint $2.99 {use michael's coupons}

~wine glasses {i bought a variety of sizes from the dollar tree}

~brush to apply the glitter paint

~scissors 

~tape 

~tooth picks 

step 1: wash all of your glasses and have them completely dry before you begin.

step 2: squeeze some glitter paint into a small container.

step 3: use tape to create a line circling the top your glass.

step 4: paint several layers, 3-10 layers depending on how concentrated you want the glitter to be. each layer should be light, so you don't have the clumpy look. each of our glasses were a little different, some more concentrated where the tape was then faded out towards the bottom...others we heavily painted the base and gave the faded look going up. 

for the bride to be, i wanted her's to stand out. first i used tape to outline a box, then i placed a sticker in the middle of my box to personalize it. i slowly added light layers {maybe 10} over the sticker and within my box. once the paint dried i used my tooth pick to carefully take off my sticker and touch up the 'N'.

step 5: time to cure. putting glass in a oven made me a little nervous, so i did A LOT of research to guarantee my wine glasses wouldn't shatter. here's what you do: place all your wine glasses on a baking rack, put the wine glasses in your oven, turn it on for 350 degrees and set the kitchen timer for 30 minutes. it's important that your baking sheet is cool and your glasses are in the oven WHILE it is preheating because it allows everything to heat up together. when your timer is rings, turn your oven off and leave the glasses inside to cool down {again we are avoiding dramatic temperature change}. once everything is nice and cool, feel free to take your glasses out. let them set for three days before you use or wash. after the third day you are ready to use, enjoy and throw it in the dishwasher {bonus!}.

craft and enjoy c:

what a weekend

this weekend... i began with some crafting

then celebrated at a bachelorette party

i did a little wine tasting

attended a wedding

big PLUS, i got to see my mustach`ed husband

{no picture available}

ha!

we then bought a couch

and concluding the weekend was a heart`to`heart with my dear friend. 

today {monday} my first day back to work and i'm beyond beat, but i absolutely can't wait to go more in depth with each amazing and truly blessed aspect of my weekend. but as of now, i'm calling it a night and catching up on some much needed sleep c;

how i met my neighbor

it was about midnight and i was getting ready for bed when i realized i hadn't seen our cat lynnee. i went to the back yard and whisper called her name {hoping to not wake the neighbors}. after a few seconds i heard her jingling bell coming in my direction. i repeated her name and she meowed back, sounding like she was in the neighbor's yard. i grabbed step stool and peered over the shared fence. sure enough, lynnee was on the other side trying to find her way back home. 

at this point i'm slightly hanging over the fence, given lynnee encouraging words and hoping she would just jump back over. then i heard this deep voice, 'who are you?'

not going to lie, i was startled...so i froze and didn't make a peep. 

five long seconds passed and i saw a head poke up in the neighbor's window, yell at me and then instantly duck back down. 

at that point i introduced myself as her new neighbor and apologized for my cat being stuck in her yard.

neighbor sue was relieved i wasn't a robber and we ended up having a decent conversation given that it was past midnight. she gave me the skinny on the neighborhood skunk, everyone's dogs and cats and the next door neighbor who likes to drum. she even turned on a light so lynnee could see and offered to help me get her back over the fence. sweet neighbor sue ended the conversation saying that lynnee was welcome in her yard anytime c:

thank you lynnee for choosing a nice neighbor's yard to get stuck in. 

the stool used for operation retrieve lynnee. 

God is bigger than our house

we have been house shopping since the beginning of the year, somehow cramming in at least one meeting a week with our realtor driving around the areas we wish we could afford and those we couldn't drive out of fast enough. there would be houses with great features but just a couple things that make us say bleh. then other possible homes we would walk into and see the potential. before each house hunting date, the boy and i prayed. we prayed HE would decide where we lived, where our future children would play, where our marriage would continue to grow, the house that would be used for His glory and blessing others. then it happened, about forty houses into our search we stepped into a house that caused our hearts to say yes, this is it.

it was God's house from the beginning, here's how the day went {eighty~eight days ago}. it was a saturday and i had just gotten off work. we decided that after looking at houses that day we would take a break because the boy was leaving on sunday for a few weeks of coastie training and i didn't want to go house hunting without him for the obvious reasons. as we were walking out of the door i got an update on my phone of a house that literally just went on the market. i glanced over the pictures and got excited...as i usually do about everything. we were able to fit it in as the last and final house we looked at. this house was in the perfect area, a place we were pretty iffy on if we could afford. it was cute, small and everything we wanted. and now the boy was the one getting a little excited about what we came across. i remember just looking at him, both of us sporting ridiculously large grins and knowing this was our home. so we did it, we wrote up our best offer we could give...going a little over asking price and volunteering to pay for items that are usually the seller's responsibility. i even typed up a little paragraph about who we were and how in love we were with the place, to add a little fluff c: we wanted this house, but most importantly we felt God tug on our hearts. 

fast forward about two and a half months now, purchasing this house has been like riding a never`ever`ever ending roller coaster that had up's and down's every single day. ends up the seller is a scam artist and her real estate agent was her sidekick. in the beginning it was a traditional seller with a wonderful family ....um no. that's the act they were playing, really she flips houses for a living. which is all fine and dandy, minus the fact she lied through her teeth every occasion she got and attempted to weasel us out of every penny left in our newly~wed savings. but we felt lead to this house, so we pushed forward, never gave up hope and held on tight for the ride. we prayed about every decision we made. some of her demands, we felt at peace about paying...but others we said no and miraculously she agreed to our biggest requests. God's hand was in the entire process and like always, he followed through on his promise.

alright now that i made you read first...here are some pictures.

 the night we got our keys.

opening the door for the first time and our first cooked frozen pizza meal c:

the boy was a little over taking pictures at that point...can you tell?

i cannot even tally the number of times things went drastically wrong when we were in escrow
but God is SO GOOD. 
He was bigger than every problem we encounter and stayed true.
this truly is His house and we are incredibly blessed to be apart of His plan. 

officially summer {for me at least}

first year of grad school can be crossed off the to do list and it's officially SUMMER. my calendar is already jam~packed with big move to our new house, visits from family and seven, yes seven weddings. the beautiful thing is i am only working part~time this summer and for the first time in forever i have weekends off c: this is the summer for bridal party craziness, diy projects and friends. enjoy.

~~~~~

for my first post back, i wanted to pay tribute to my dear friend and beautiful graduate nicole.

this was us just one year ago at my graduation...

and now it's her time to shine c: 

i am so incredible proud of her, these past two years have been huge:

marriage, deployment and now graduation.

she is truly amazing and inspiring to be around

i absolutely cannot wait to see what God has in store for her,

and i am so blessed to be a part of it. 

congratulations nicole!

well, hello.

happy beautiful sunday evening. yes, i'm very guilty of not blogging for over two months. life has been overwhelmingly crazy but amazing at the same time. any ounce of free time i've had is spent with that pretty cute husband of mine. here are a few updates from the past sixty~something days..

~1~ we bought a new vacuum. yes this is both BIG and exciting news. we have needed a new vacuum since pretty much the beginning of our marriage...and the boy did some  a ridiculous amount of research, i saved up the coupons and we purchased a beautiful little number called the shark.

~2~ i'm about a month away from completing my first year of grad school {yikes} and i've been swimming in homework this entire semester... hence the two month absence from blogging.

~3~ the boy has gone on a couple of drill weekends and an additional training that gave us more details on the deployment status and dates...yay {said very sarcastically}.

~4~ i've been only listening to gungor radio on pandora and soaking it up.

~5~ instagram is now available for the android...about stinkin' time. so yes, please begin to enjoy my instagram pictures from now on :)

~6~ lastly...we are currently in escrow on a little house { :D } if all goes as planned we should be closing and starting the move a week from today. so needless to say, any spare moment we have has been packing up the apartment.

first insta ever..taking a picture of my boy and then my coffee and easter candy :)

the boy's trip to the grocery store..the essentials of course and my white lights in a vase, before i packed them.

my spring wreath..again before packing it and lynnee sandwiched between my shirts as i was folding laundry..always being a helper. 

lastly.. our guest bathroom is currently our storage unit..brilliant. the bathtub is full of boxes and now lynnee has her own jungle gym :)

happy rest of your week.