If I were to win the lottery...

This is linked up to Becky's "52 weeks of blogging with a purpose" at From Mrs. to Mama. 

I have honestly thought about this question a million times in my life and I often ask it to my husband. He so kindly reminds me that I will never win the lottery because I never (maybe 5 times in my whole life) buy a ticket. 

Well, today I'm just going to pretend that I did buy a ticket and that I won!!

First things first. I would probably make a list of all the things I want to do/buy. Since I'm doing that now I will get to skip on to the really fun part once I win. 

I would pay off all debt owed including Seth's school loans, my car, new eyes and our house. Then I would buy my husband a new fancy truck and let him get all the expensive add ons like a sunroof:)

Obviously, I would invest at least half of the money so that our future children and their future children have money for education, and life's necessities with a few extras. I would set this up as some sort of trust with maybe a yearly allowance so that they don't turn out to be spoiled brats. Plus, I want them to know how to work and understand the value of a dollar. 

I would quit my job and make Seth quit his so we could travel. We would travel to Europe and Australia, the Caribbean Islands and as many other places as we want. 

I would retire my parents and Seth's parents and give them money to build/buy new houses to retire in. 

Our Church is raising money to build a new church large enough to hold everyone, so I would donate the money needed to build it. Then volunteer or help with whatever they need to get it done. 

I would pay off any debt my grandparents have and give them money to travel as well. They used to travel a lot more but haven't been able to nearly as much lately.

I would go on a shopping spree to stock the shelves at the food pantries in my home town as well as Seth's. 

I would also have Seth help me design and then build, with the help of people we hired, a large dream house that can hold lots of children. 

We would then obviously have lots of children and spend our days with them. 

Lastly, I would probably hire a chef, at least part of the time. I like to cook but I want someone that will make me healthy delicious meals. I can make some pretty good meals but they aren't always the healthiest. And, if I don't have my health, millions of dollars don't really help a whole lot do they?

Does anyone else think about this a lot? Is there something different that you would do that's not on my list?

7 Quick Takes {7} and Wedding Photos!

(If you just want to see the Wedding Photos, scroll to #7)

1. I had a heart attack thirty minutes ago when I went to wash my apple and realized only my wedding band was on my finger. No engagement ring. You know the expensive one with the big diamond?! Never has this happened to me and I freaked. (I have been wearing my rings on my pinky finger for the last week or so, because with the humidity my fingers swell up first thing in the morning and I can't put my rings on my ring finger.) I now understand the saying of "my knees were weak" because they were. They were shaking and my heart was racing and I was praying that I would find it. I dropped my apple on the counter, looked in my lunch bag that I had just set in the fridge, and then raced back to my desk where my ring was sitting right inside of my work bag where it had fallen off probably 3 minutes before. Thank you Jesus! 

You can see why I was freaking out. Gorgeousness.  

2. Seth is getting closer to being done working out of state and I can't wait for him to move home. After being in a relationship for almost 12 1/2 years this will be the first time we live together for more than a weekend at a time. Things might get interesting:)

3. I finished Season 3 of Downton Abbey so I will probably shut up about it for a while but holy bananas! They definitely ended Season 3 with a cliffhanger and I googled and Season 4 doesn't even air until January 2014! Is that a joke?!!! Why so long??? Okay, I'm done now. 

4. I don't know what Google Reader is but apparently it's going away because every blog I read is freaking out about it. Apparently BlogLovin is the new cool thing to have though so I guess that's where you can find me. Or using the reader that's in blogger since it's so conveniently located. 

5. I'm considering switching from Blogger to Wordpress but I don't know if I want to go for it or not. I have noticed that a lot of blogs I read are using Wordpress but then I stumble on a bigger blog and they are still using Blogger. Ugh. I don't know what to do. Feel free to argue your case for either in the comments section because I'm sick of researching. 

6. Yesterday morning I wake up this adorable innocence outside my window.

Precious, I know. 

I arrive home to this lovely un-innocent-ness in my mail box. Face palm. 

This isn't the first time we have had a note from a neighbor in our mailbox. 

Lucky for us our neighbors are all great and this little old lady just wanted to tell me that, there has been more traffic on our road lately, and, she is worried about our dog crossing the road and getting hit by a car. She was sweet as could be and didn't care about the old muddy boot or shoe and I think she just wants a friend. After talking to her on the phone for over 30 minutes I have promised to come visit her at some point. And Gunnar was locked in his pen today:(

7. Apparently people enjoyed my engagement photos last week because they have been pinned quite a few times. Because of the enthusiasm I decided to give you some wedding photos for your viewing pleasure this week! (and because I just love to look at them:)

The guys.

My gals.  

The most gorgeous flowers ever. 

My groom. 

LOVE our smiles in this picture. 

:)

Same church my Grandparents got married in over 60 years ago. 

The farm my mom grew up on.

All wedding photos taken by Leigh Miller Photography. She is amazing talented and so sweet:)

Linking up with Jen at Conversion Diary.

The Most Exciting Weekend EVER

It's Monday and my little brain is not in the mood to function today. It's cloudy and rainy outside and I really want to just crawl back in bed and nap all day. Maybe mix in a few more Downton Abbey episodes.

Instead, I'm stuck at work, patiently waiting for 5 o'clock.

Since I'm feeling such a lack of inspiration today I will bore EXCITE you with my weekend happenings.

Friday evening I watched a coach pitch baseball game of a little boy I used to babysit. He's 8 and adorable and turns out he's a pretty good little first baseman.

Went home to be my normal exciting self and make popcorn for dinner which I ate with my butt planted firmly in it's dented couch cushion position while watching approximately 3 episodes of Downton Abbey. Thrilling, I know.

Slept in on Saturday instead of spending money thrifting at garage sales. I'm sure my husband was proud.

Decided that Dad's are absolutely impossible to shop for because if they want it, or need it, they buy it. Since the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, I baked pies. Apple pies actually. With homemade crust. I know what you're thinking...woah there Betty Crocker, don't hurt yourself. I promise you I didn't. Unless you count the fact that I didn't get to eat the pies. That hurt.

My lovely father wanted to go out to eat Saturday night for Father's Day so that's what we did. He got to choose the place so obviously he chose Five Guys Burgers and Fries. Who am I to argue with a greasy cheeseburger and brown paper bags filled with hot fries? If you have never eaten  at one of these fine establishments I encourage you to jump on it. Oh, and share the fries. I promise, you don't need two unless you want a career as a contestant on The Biggest Loser.

Big Bob loved his pie. Well, I think, he hadn't tasted it yet when we left.

All 6'7" of Big Bob and me.

My little brother Joe wanted in on the picture taking action.

As I previously mentioned, I live a life of excitement so I did the most exciting thing I could think of after dinner. Went home, put on pj's, and watched Downton Abbey.

Gunnar prefers licking my ankle to watching DA.
(I promise my ankles aren't as huge as they appear in this pic.)

Are you sensing a theme? If not, let me help you. I'm boring exciting and I watch a lot of tv, especially Downton Abbey.

Sunday morning I drug myself from bed to go to church where I set with my grandparents. I would like to point out here that I always set with my grandparents which I think makes me the favorite grandchild. Or at least one of two favorites. The other one is little and cute and the youngest of all 34 of us grandkids (yep, 34) so I feel like he has a little bit of an edge but he'll grow out of the little and cute stage so I'm not worried.

After church I delivered my second homemade-pie-crusted pie to my Stepdad, Dave. Him and my mom got married when I was 8 and I was more than lucky to have this guy in my life. He was busy doing some electrical work for a family friend so we didn't get to hang out much but we are going to go to dinner next weekend when Seth's in town so it's all good.

Hung out with one of my bff's/cousins, Jacqueline, and her family for awhile and perused the aisles of Target.

Made it home in time to lay on my back deck to soak up some sun, for about 3 minutes, before I was drenched in sweat. Thank you Kansas humidity. Decided, I'm going to be the weirdo that goes to the pool on my own so that's what I did. And it was lovely. Nice and hot but a little bit breezy and cool from the water. Took a mini nap and read some magazines. That, right there, is summer my friends.

Pure perfection.

At this point it's 7:00pm on Sunday and I have done absolutely zero productive things so I decided to go for a run. With my dog. While I can't say that Gunnar is an amazing running partner, he is way better to take when off a leash than when he is on a leash. Something to work on I suppose.

Wrapped up the weekend with a frozen, it's not delivery, it's Digiorno pizza, some Kardashians and Downton Abbey.

And there you have it folks. Too much excitement to handle. Maybe I should have warned you at the beginning.


Linking up with Sami's Weekend Shenanigans.

Prayers

After living in a world that seems to always be filled with violence and unexplainable hateful acts, it's important to remember that there is good in the world. 

That people are inherently, good. 

From people that smile at you on the sidewalk to people that run into an explosion to rescue others. People are good. 

I believe in God and that everything happens for his reasons. It's not our job to try to understand those reasons but to do our best to help others in any way we can. 

As we are, yet again, surrounded by the media coverage of an unexplainable act,

remember to treat others with the love and respect that we all deserve. 

I pray that God will help all of those who were affected by the Boston Marathon tragedy and give them peace in the coming days, weeks, months and years. Help them to know and remember that there is still good in the world. 

Another prayer I found that I thought was fitting... 

Be with me, Lord

O Lord, I am torn up with grief. I know you are there, but I cannot see past my sorrow and tears. Be with me, Lord... guide me through these dark days and bring your light to my life, so that I may see your goodness, even in my mourning.Maureen Pratt

What I Wore: Easter Outfit:)

Hope everyone had a fantastic Easter. Mine was wonderful and filled with family (and food).

My hubs and I got up early (7:55) and scrambled to get ready.
I have a lot of hair to curl and wanted to make sure I didn't forget all the food we needed to take.

Fortunately, rushing to get ready is something I am a champ at (because it happens way to often) and my husband thinks he is a Nascar driver so we made it to Mass 25 minutes before the 9:30 start time. Plenty of time to get prime seating on a busy Easter Sunday.

I love Mass on Easter Sunday. It's great how so many people are dressed up and celebrating that Jesus died on the cross for us and rose on the third day to save us. It is an amazing feeling to know that you are loved so much.

After Mass we stopped by my parents to put food in the fridge that would be going to Seth's family easter. We then headed over to my Aunt Roberta's for a giant family meal.

By giant I mean over 50 people. The food was excellent and there was tons of it since we all took stuff.
We took a crockpot of green beans, a green bean casserole and an angel food cake that was fluffy like a cloud.

After stuffing our faces and watching the kids hunt eggs we packed up and headed over to Easter at Seth's Grandma's house.

Here we were met with another big family and tons more food. Surprisingly, we remembered to pick up the food from my mom's house so we had a platter of fresh fruit and another angel food cake.

Is there anything more Easter-y than fluffy angel food cake? I think not.

For the Easter Egg hunt at his Grandma's, Seth thought it was the right time to teach kids that...

Life's not fair.  

The day before he had his sister, Sara, spray paint an egg gold. Then he stuck $20 in the egg and hid it for the kids to find. Basically, he was expecting all the kids to complain that Life's not fair when only 1 kid got the $20.

What really happened is that I learned Life's not fair when your husband takes the $20 from your purse to teach a lesson that nobody even cares about because they got candy.

Oh, and Happy Easter. Here's what we wore:)

Good Friday

HABEMUS PAPA! We have a POPE!

Wow, what an exciting day to be a Catholic!

The cardinals have elected Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the new Pope of the Catholic Church. He has chosen the name Pope Francis I.

I was on my lunch hour at my parents house when I got a text from popealarm.com telling me that there was white smoke and a new Pope had been elected. My mom and I anxiously watched the news until Pope Francis I came out onto the balcony in St. Peter's Square to give the Papal Blessing.

It was a pretty amazing moment to watch even if it was on tv. Eight years ago when Pope Benedict was elected my mom happened to be in Rome, on vacation, and she said it was the experience of a lifetime. I'm hoping someday I may get that opportunity as well.

Overall, not a bad way to spend a lunch hour (and a half, oops) I will tell you that!

All images pulled form Bing Images.

Top 10 Tuesday: Lenten Sacrifice

Since Lent has started I decided to come up with a Top 10 list of things to give up/do for lent in case you hadn't started yet.

1. Give up some type of social media - Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest - Even better if you replace these activities with #4:)
2. Stop using the lords name in vain and/or stop using cuss words. 
3. Give up your favorite dessert/snack or treat.
4. Read books, blogs, magazines and newspapers that focus on faith and strengthen your relationship with God. 
5. Go to weekly stations of the cross at your local church if available. 
6. Give up listening to the radio in your car. Replace the silence with religious music or audio books, talk with those riding with you, or spend time talking to God.
7. Focus more on others instead of self by doing daily or weekly random acts of kindness for people. Do these things anonymously if possible.
8. Give up watching TV or even just your favorite TV shows. 
9. Give to the poor in any way you can. Food, clothing or even time. 
10. Spend time daily talking to Jesus. Thank him. Ask him for guidance in something you might be struggling with. Be sure to listen as well.

I wish I could say that I'm doing everything on this list but I am trying to do a couple different things. I have given up pop (aka:soda for those of you that don't know what pop is;) which is super hard for me. I love to have a nice cold caffeinated Pepsi or Dr. Pepper right after lunch in the afternoons to keep me awake. I also love it with popcorn, pizza, Mexican food, at the movies.....you get the idea. Luckily, I love water and Ice Tea as well so I should hopefully survive these 40 days and nights just fine. 

I'm also working on reading several different books that the head LifeNight teacher loaned me over a year ago (yikes). My goal is to return all three after Lent is over. 

Several of the other ideas on the list I'm trying to be more active in but I don't want to try to over commit and then fail. I guess we will just have to wait and see how I do. My goal is to have a deeper understanding of my faith and closer relationship with God. Wish me luck!

Have you decided to give up/do something for lent? What is it?

Why do I believe in God?

(This turned out a little longer than I intended so if you just want to read my reasons skip down to "Here goes...")

I help teach the high school youth group at my church on Wednesday nights. We call it LifeNight. 

Recently, the Youth Group Leader, had a high school science speaker come talk to the students about how our faith can co-exist with evolution. Basically, we can believe in God AND that we, as a species, have evolved over time. These are two different truths in our church and it's okay to believe both because they go hand in hand.

Honestly, this can be a little complicated to wrap your head around both ideas and I know if I even try to explain it I will most likely butcher the facts so I will just move on with my main point of this post. (Maybe in the future I will write another post on this and get some feed back from someone who has a little more authority on the subject than myself.)

This idea of God and Evolution is not the main reason for the post but it's intent is to give you a little background on the evening and how it led into this next question asked of the speaker...

"Why do you believe in God?" 

I was honestly taken a little aback that one of the students would ask our speaker this question considering he had basically just told us that he does believe in God and science and how the two work together. 

Then I realized that the student didn't merely ask, "Do you?" but "WHY do you believe in God?"

This seems like a question that should be so easy to answer but in reality can be very complicated. Our speaker gave a fantastic answer for his reasons Why but even after listening to his answer I kept pondering the question in my own mind. 

"Why do I believe in God?"

Sure I believe in God because that is what I was taught from the moment I was born. I was raised by a family who is Catholic and as a Catholic that's what we do, WE believe in God. 

The prayer, The Apostles Creed, basically spells out our beliefs as Catholics and the first sentence says, "I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and earth." 

While it's great to grow up Catholic I definitely think that we need to understand why "We" actually believe what we believe. 

I've put together a short list of reasons why I personally believe in God. While the list may be short, these were all significant moments in my life that strengthened my faith.

Here goes...

I believe in God because my parents tried for over 10 years to have a child (me). At a certain point they opened their hearts to God and decided that maybe he was leading him into having a child another way. On the day my mom received a letter from the Catholic adoption agency telling her they would be able to apply for adoption she tells how she felt filled with the Holy Spirit and at that moment she knew that she was pregnant. A quick test and 9 months later I was born. 

I believe in God because when I was 5 years old I woke up to the sound of an ambulance on the highway. Never before had I said a prayer for the person to whom an ambulance was traveling too, but at that moment I did. Several minutes later my Dad came upstairs to find me awake and tell me that my cousin and best friend, Maria, who was also 5, had just been hit by a car. The ambulance was coming to take her to the hospital. Thankfully she only had a broken collar bone and has since recovered:)

I believe in God because when I was 8 years old my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and survived. She had a mammogram only 1 month before finding a dime sized lump in her breast during a self exam. God gave her the strength to fight cancer and to win!

I believe in God because I met my husband at the age of 14 years old and my life was changed for the better. He is truly my best friend and the most respectful man I have ever met. He is the kind of husband that you would want for your children. It is truly the power of God that made everything align so that I even had the opportunity to meet my husband. One small change in our lives and we may have never met. For this, I am eternally grateful and will share more about some other time. 

I believe in God because when my brother, Joe, was 18 years old he jumped from a car filming a "stunt" and was in a coma with a Traumatic Brain Injury. It was such a serious injury that my parents and I had to meet with people about donating his organs if he, most likely, didn't make it. Later that day I was in the ICU standing next to my brother who had not moved since being brought into the hospital. A priest, who was a great family friend, came in to say a blessing over Joe. In the middle of his prayer I watched Joe move his hand! I believe that God was in that room with us and that He was not yet ready to take Joe into his loving arms in Heaven. God has great plans for Joe here on earth that I will tell you about later. From that moment of prayer and blessing in his ICU hospital room Joe has continued to improve. 

These are only a handful of some of the reasons why I believe in God, the Father Almighty. 

I am a true believer that everything happens for a reason. For God's reasons to be more specific. I no longer try to understand God's plan for me because I know that someday it will be revealed when he is ready. 

At this point in life I am just thankful and content to be in awe of God's power and Grace. 

So, Why do YOU believe in God?

Here's the Apostles Creed in case your interested:)

I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into hell. On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.
Amen.