Travel Bug

The past few weeks have been busy with us traveling. We had a Wilson vacation in Hilton Head where we ate and hung out on the beach most of the week. I was able to finish a book I started on my family's beach trip called A Million Miles in a Hundred Years by Donald Miller. It was a pretty good book that reminded me of the importance to truly live the life we have on this earth and make it memorable. For me it is so easy to get stuck in routines and the mundane reality of life, but the memories we actually remember are the ones that were different and exciting and a change from our day to day. So I am going to try and work on this, keep me accountable.

On our way home we bought the audiobook of The Help which is really good. As much as my hubs and I love audiobooks this one is soo long, I could have read the book quicker than listening to it. I wanted to read it before we saw the movie, but by the time we are done it will be out on video.

Have you read any good books lately?

This past weekend I went to Williamsburg and Norfolk to see my best friends. Norfolk is an interesting place, I have driven through there a few times but had yet to really visit the place, my initial reaction was ehh. As the weekend went on and I discovered more of the city, it really wasn't so bad, don't get me wrong I wouldn't want to live there, but I would visit again considering my best friend and sister-in-law live there. 

Me and my little Laura

My BFF, Laura, is finishing up school in Norfolk and she recently got engaged so we spent Saturday wedding dress shopping. I never thought I would cry seeing her in a wedding dress, but boy did I lose it. I guess it has to do with us knowing each other since we were three months old and going through everything together and this just signifying how much older we are getting and at this point I am just trying to come up with a good excuse why I lost it.

On my way back from Norfolk I stopped by my dad's and Chris came down from the Burg and we had a yummy family dinner, Foster made the trip too. I absolutely love being out in the country at my dads, it is so peaceful and relaxing. We went four wheelin' and made some fresh pesto and just porch sat, what could be better than that.

Now back to reality...cleaning. This house is a wreck from being gone, do you have any good cleaning tips?

Living Room Switch-a-roo

Although I have been working like crazy this week I did manage to get the living room spiffed up and re-arranged.

I am still hunting for a new couch which has been a more in depth process than I would have thought. I have been looking at West Elm, Rowe, and PB and scouring blogs to find a cost effective, quality couch, but I still haven't been able to find the perfect one. I am wanting something slightly more casual contemporary, but Chris likes the more rounded country look. As I look over at my living room I want something more out of it, for starters it needs a nice color on the wall rather than the beige that surrounds the rest of my house (it is better than builders white). I am working on talking my dad into building me some white built-ins similar to these found at Jones Design Company , her living room is almost identical to ours and we are loving the antique pew, well really I love the entire room. But for now this is what I have:

I re-angled the furniture something I do about once a month to switch it up

I centered all the wooden boxes to make it slightly more modern

Added a wooden white tray to the coffee table, we can't put anything too high on the table because of Foster's monstrous tail

I removed Foster's crate and put it in the office and moved an antique trunk, that was positioned near the door, to create a cute little nook, this is probably my favorite part of the living room and I found a gallon sized mason jar at Target to add to my collection, as if I don't have enough, look above my cabinets in the kitchen

Also, at Target we purchased a rug to go under the island, this is probably one of my favorite patterns, we already owned this rug in a smaller size, but the 5X7 was finally on sale, so here it is. It adds a nice pop of color.

Have you found any great deals on couches lately? Any brands you would avoid? We could use all the help we can get.

Now on to cleaning the rest of the house and packing for a long awaited trip to the beach.

A relaxed state

What a cool summer day it is in Lynchburg, I am sitting outside my local Starbucks enjoying the breeze blowing through. I got back last night from a week spent vacationing with my family on Kiawah Island, SC. It is always hard coming back from a relaxing vacation and starting work the next day, but sometimes with my job I have the flexibility to be on call, which was my preference today. I am hoping for some productivity and a refreshed outlook today.

This was my first time on Kiawah which is located about 25 miles from Charleston. To me Kiawah seems to be an island filled with different neighborhoods and bike trails. We went on daily bike rides around the island and toggled back and forth from the beach to the pool. Each night we shared yummy family meals and fun stories. There isn't a ton to do on the island unless you love to golf, which none of us do, but I really enjoyed spending quality time with the fam and working on my suntan. I definitely recommend this vacation spot, but would suggest to venture to Charleston if you are going to eat out.

Braden and I relaxing by the pool

It is nice to be back in Lynchburg, especially since I hadn't seen my hubs nor Foster in week. Now we are counting down the days until we leave for vacation with the Wilson Clan.

Summer time: Part 2

Along with redoing our TNT boxes, I summer-ized our mantel. I am a huge fan of white so that was my overarching theme. It is still a work in progress, as is everything in my life, but we are thinking about continuing the white frame look all the way up to the ceiling. As much as I loved having our TV mounted above our mantel when we first moved in, it is really throwing a kink into my design plans, so...why not decorate around it? We may try it. Also, those speakers are becoming quite an eye sore, but I have a feeling I won't win that battle given my husband is an audio engineer.

Speaking of white... I attempted to spray paint some mason jars last week.. you must be warned... I am not the best at spray painting and it really erks me that my husband is better at it than me. So I tried it out and man was mine a drippy mess, but of course hubs comes and home and tries it out and it could be in the next PB catalog...not cool. But I got over my jealousy and am using it in my center piece on the kitchen table. What are those gorgeous flowers you might ask? They would be my $5 dahlia bouquet I purchased down at the farmers market this weekend, it was so large I was able to have multiple groupings around the house.

Next project... a burlap wreath..I have only had the supplies for 2 months.. I'll let ya know how it goes.

Summer time: Part 1

I cannot believe it is already the middle of the summer, it has flown by! We have stayed busy with working and traveling some.

 In May we ventured to Florida for Chris's best friend's wedding near Jacksonville..
a few things we learned from that trip:
-fill the gas tank up at 1/2 a tank ( we almost ran out of gas twice)
-directions are not my strongest suit even though sometimes I am confident that they are (we travelled a good distance to find a BBQ restaurant and when we got to the destination it was an open field which almost led us to running out of gas)
-in the future we will be flying to Florida, not driving

In June we took a trip to Bristol to celebrate our anniversary and visit with family. Chris and I thoroughly enjoyed our anniversary dinner at The Tavern in Abingdon, Va. We had some great conversation about the past year and the future (we highly recommend doing this on your anniversary, its important to reflect and see how you have grown and what you want for your marriage in the future). Also, we were able to spend some time with Chris's parents.

At the end of June and beginning of July, I took two trips to the Chesapeake Bay to spend some time with my family. These pictures are four years old and taken by my best friend Laura, we have shared some fun memories over the years.

My Grandpa's tractor

The view

Had to throw it in there

The rest of the summer we have two vacations planned to South Carolina in August, but until then we will be working hard in the daily grind.

A few fun things we have done thus far:

Summer spruce up

Favorite piece: framed piece of one of my favorite fabrics

Color time

Frame to Chris's outdoor table

Finished product, plans from Ana-white.com
Now we just need some chairs

Our love story

In celebration of our one year anniversary, I decided to share the sweet and sloppy  details of Chris and I's story leading up to today.

The story begins eight years ago at the YADAPP conference where Chris and I first met. We exchanged brief hellos with no inclination that we would be married years later. We stayed in contact over the following three summers as we were both staff at the conference. 

At Yadapp

Occasionally throughout the year we would catch up over the phone, Chris was always so good about calling when he was near Richmond, but it wasn't until the summer of 2007 that we met for coffee. Chris was preparing for a month long trip to Africa and I was trying to sort through life changes. As Chris was in Africa I couldn't help to think about what a strong Christian man he was and how I wanted that in my life, so I did what any crazy young girl would do and surprised him at the airport when he came back.

Day that we "offically started dating"

The rest is basically history... (don't want to bore you anymore) we had a long distance relationship for about two years as I was studying at the University of Virginia. Chris proposed on top of the mountain at Wintergreen surrounded by beautiful views and a yummy picnic.

 I moved to Lynchburg about two months later to be near my sweetie. We bought our first house six months later and got our miniature pony then six months after that we tied the knot in Winridge Manor in Amherst County.

Our wedding day was slightly toasty, but I was so wrapped up in the day that I barely noticed.. as for my guests well they shed about 10 lbs soaking up the sun. 

One of my favorite wedding details was our invitations made by my dear friend Kathleen who owns Leen Jean Studios, she makes custom invitations and offers calligraphy at an affordable price--check her out!

So.. thats us in a nut shell...

No ifs ands or buts

Over a month..are you kidding me..I think about blogworld a lot and different posts I could write but life gets in the way and I dont take the time to type it out. So instead of making this post perfect, this will just be some word vomit.

The past month or so I have been staying busy with keeping people alive, traveling, gardening, and eating.

TRAVEL:
At the end of April I took a trip to Northern VA and DC to see my good ole friend Melissa. We spent a day walking around Georgetown, got a yummy cupcake at Georgetown Cupcake and some great coffee at Baked and Wired. We enjoyed dinner and drinks at Circa in Dupont Circle with some of her friends and danced with the DJ at Public Bar. Another day was spent shopping at the Leesburg outlets and finished up the evening with dinning in Old Town Alexandria at Mai Thai (very yummy) and getting our groove on at Nick's Nightclub where we perfected our two step. My last day we explored a little farmers market and enjoyed brunch at Bustboys and Poets. I thoroughly enjoyed my long awaited visit to see my Melissa.

I highly recommend Baked and Wired for coffee, Mai Thai for fresh spring rolls, and Nick's nightclub for some country dancing in the city.

The husband and I just got back from a wedding near Jacksonville, FL. Oh an adventure it was...we got lost multiple times (sad part is that we had three GPS's) and came way too close to running out of gas twice. We did enjoy a day in Amelia Island hitting local eateries and laying at beach. The rehearsal dinner Friday and the wedding on Saturday were beautiful ! We decided to hit the big city of Jacksonville and boy were we disappointed...not too much in that city. On our way home we made a pit stop in Savannah where we ate some yummy baked brie and crab cakes at Belford's. We also made a stop at a Krispy Kreme in SC.

Lesson learned: 10 hour drive = long road trip// we will be flying next time

We have made a few day trips, one of which we went to Roanoke and visited Black Dog Salvage which we highly recommend for home goods and DIY projects and had some grub at Fork in the City.


Our flower beds are sprouting up and our herb pots have taken off!

Well sorry for the straight forward and slightly bland post, but will talk soon.