Things I'm currently loving...

Anything and everything gold!

The beautiful flowers my husband sent me for no reason on Tuesday.

The Maroon 5 song Sugar. It's so good!!

Gas prices. I can't even believe they are so low. Hopefully I'm not jinxing it.

(Okay, so maybe I used some fuel points on this one.)

Peeling wallpaper. Oh wait…I HATE that. 

Giant greasy hamburgers. Not sure why but almost everyday I want to eat a hamburger. (Don't worry I don't. Sadly.)

My husbands butt in these jeans…

American Sniper, the movie. It was really good and super intense. Makes you appreciate our freedom and what soldiers do for our country. You know it was good when the theatre is dead silent as the credits roll until people start clapping. Check it out. 

The lovely free printable Meal Planner I made for all you lovely readers :) You can find a downloadable file of it on my Blog BFF Kala's page My Breezy Room!

Have a lovely weekend!!

IKEA in KANSAS!

As mentioned in my previous post, IKEA in Kansas has opened not 5 miles from my office and it is equal parts awesome and bad news bears (because it will take all my money).

Let me mention that I had been to the IKEA in Florida a couple times so I knew what to expect when going into the store for the first time but that didn't stop it from being magical.

The store opened on September 10th, a Wednesday. I couldn't contain my excitement so I drove over and around the store on my lunch hour. Realizing that there was going to be no way to get in and out in an hour I just admired from a distance. (I may have issues.) Let me just say that there were cops and security at every intersection, stoplight and possible crossing within a mile radius of this place. They were keeping the traffic flowing by manually changing the stoplights.

I made it to Friday the 12th before I couldn't wait any longer and I ventured out again over my lunch hour. I parked on the second story of the parking garage and speed walked my way through the throngs of people that didn't realize I was on a time crunch.

The following are a few of my thoughts while visiting IKEA:

• Don't these people have jobs? I realize I'm here too but there are literally entire families here. And couples, who look like they're on dates.
  
• Why in the world would you bring multiple children to this place? Especially on the week it opened. I realize they have childcare but anyone with half a brain would realize it's going to be full.
  
• I want all the things.
• Man, I really feel sorry for the guy that has to use the little hand-clicker (technical name for it obviously) to keep track of the amount of people that come in.
  
• Some lady just ran away from her table asking me to watch her (probably) 1 year old little girl because her 4 year old-ish wild child boy just ran away.
• I wonder if she's regretting bringing her kids now.
• What is in this Pepsi? It's very possibly the best thing I have ever drank.
•  I'm pretty sure I have a goofy grin on my face right now.
• I might need a second job to pay for my future Ikea purchases.
• The chicken strips aren't as good as I thought they would be. Might need to try the meatballs next time.
• I want all the things. No really, I do.
• Get out of my way.

Okay, that about sums up the highlights of my visit. Obviously once wasn't enough though because I went back this past Friday also. I have yet to buy anything outside of lunch and I'm starting to wonder if this might turn into a weekly thing. We shall see!

Has anyone else visited the new IKEA, in Kansas, yet? What did you buy?

What's your favorite item(s) to purchase at IKEA?

Technically this photo was taken at the IKEA in Orlando when we were there in August but you get the idea. I like it.

Mom, you're photo taking skills need a little fine tuning. Just saying.

We can all pretend that's more tan than it is shadow.  

First Time at the Farmers Market

With my new job comes this lovely little perk called "summer hours". Basically, Monday through Thursday you work an extra hour each day and then you get every other Friday off. For a grand total of 5 Friday's off throughout summer. It's fantastic! 

I enjoyed my first Friday off this past Friday. I spent the day catching up on cleaning. Boring I know, but I did have family coming over on Saturday for a Fathers Day cookout so I figured I better make the main floor presentable. 

Besides wasting my whole day doing laundry and cleaning, I decided to do some baking to take to the local Farmer's Market. Since I have a fairly large garden and I'm hoping to take some extra produce to the Farmers Market later this summer I wanted to check it out before hand. 

I baked up some super simple peanut butter dog treats as well as some super delicious human treats that I like to call chocolate chip cookies. (P.S. I'm a CCC addict. The first step is admitting the problem right?!) 

Guess which is which!

I decided to give my  Grandma, who is a notorious bread maker in my home town, a call and see if she wanted to bake a few loaves I could sell for her. She contributed 8 still warm from the oven loaves of bread. My mom also added in some of her beautifully iced sugar cookies and I threw in a couple jars of my homemade apple butter. I was all set and ready for the sale. 

Since you only have to pay 5 bucks for a space I figured the worst case scenario was I lost 5 dollars and gained a few extra pounds eating the cookies. Luckily the FM had a decent crowd during the 5-7 time period and I sold 6 loaves of Grandma's bread and several packages of both kinds of cookies and dog treats plus almost all the apple butter.

The next day my parents were having a garage sale so my mom sold almost all the rest of my homemade goodies. Now don't get me wrong, I still ate my fair share of cookies but I'm okay with that:)

I spent the rest of the long weekend hanging out at home cleaning up the house and having a cookout. My mom and I did manage a mini movie marathon and watched The Fault in Our Stars and Maleficent on Sunday. I haven't read The Fault in Our Stars yet which I hate because I always prefer reading the book first but I thought the movie was excellent and I'm pretty sure there wasn't a dry eye by the end of it. Maleficent was also good but not quite what I was expecting. Overall I would recommend TFIOS if you can only pick one. 

Hope you all had a good weekend! Maybe I'll share my dog treat recipe soon. 

7 QT {21} - I lost my job

Well, it's been quite a week. One I wasn't expecting at all. For the sake of linking up at Conversion Diary I guess I will give you the 7 Quick Takes version.

1. After months of communicating via our blogs, emails and text messages I finally got to meet a blog friend in real life, on Saturday. Her name's Kala and she blogs over at My Breezy Room. My mom and I met up with her at First Fridays in the West Bottoms in her adorable furniture booth at Bella Patina. I think we managed to make it through without any awkwardness and I think we both hope to go on another blate (blog date) soon. I realize I'm not giving our first blate the attention it deserves but check out Kala's blog and she will give you a great rundown of meeting and discovery that neither of us was a serial killer. It's a good read, I promise!

Check out her booth at First Fridays! It's awesome:)

And on to the more depressing...

2. Monday rolled around and I headed into work feeling well rested because of the time change. I walked in and my boss immediately called me into his office. Obviously that was weird but I just shut the door and sat down. He then proceeded to tell me "where gonna have to let you go, we just don't have enough work to keep you busy". At that point I just sat and stared at him with what I'm sure was a look of shock and disbelief. It honestly was one of those out of body experiences where it's like you're looking down on what's happening but the voices are muffled because I have almost know idea of what he said after the first sentence. Something about healthcare and all that jazz but I didn't really catch it. 

Once he finished talking he asked if I had any questions and so I just asked if it was only because they didn't have enough work that I was being let go and he asked if I would disagree. I guess I was extra surprised because I have been nothing but busy the last month. Our business really picks up before the holidays and I thought we were doing well. I guess I thought wrong. 

3. I never thought I would be 27 years old with a college degree and filing for unemployment.

4. The past couple days I've spent hours at my computer searching and applying for jobs. Some seem okay and some sound dreadful. At this point, I don't know that I even want to go back to work in an office environment. I honestly feel pretty lost and not sure which direction to look. Thankfully I have a husband who has been amazingly supportive and encouraging. 

5. I guess it's times like these I'm thankful I have Faith that God has a plan for me even though I have no idea what that plan is. My Grandma (the one that freezes everything) always says if you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans. I guess he's laughing now. Maybe this is his way of telling me that he has plans for me and he will help me when the time comes. For now, I'm waiting, praying and applying. 

6. I've officially been a desperate housewife all week. 

7. If anyone in the NE Kansas area has a job opening that I might qualify for feel free to let me know :) For now, I guess I'm a full-time blogger and housewife. 

Have I put on weight??

I'd say I had a semi-average weekend. What else is new?

After work Friday I stopped by to check out the progress on my parents new house and got suckered into helping carry tile. Ugh, that stuff is heavy. I managed to leave in time to stop at the local farmers market to check out the goods people had on display. Since I can't carry cash with me, or I spend it, I only had a measly dollar in my pocket which I used to splurge on some homemade dog treats for Gunnar. Spoiled much? 

Since I have my very own jungle garden I just went home and picked my own produce. Good thing or I'd be in the poor house. I've got my own tomatoes that cost way less than $2.50 a lb. Is that really the going rate?? If so, I easily picked 25 bucks of tomatoes from my garden Friday night. 

Obviously I sliced those puppies (tomatoes, not real puppies) up and fried some bacon to make myself a lovely bacon tomato sandwich (or 2). Best summer meal ever. I know most people add lettuce to make this a bLt but who are we kidding people? Do you really think that one measly slice of lettuce is making this meal healthy? I assure you it's not. Just replace the lettuce with another slice of bacon and be thankful that you are enjoying those savory bites of fried pork before your heart explodes. 

Summer on a plate my friend.

Then I sorted my coupons and made my shopping list for my price match extravaganza the next day. Maybe watched a little DVR because I'm cool and can do that now.

Saturday I spent an unnecessary amount of time price matching groceries at Wal-Mart. Apparently every effin person in the little ole town of Lawrence, KS (aka Jayhawk territory) was back to school shopping. A living nightmare. Literally. I managed to grab the items on my list and make it out in right under two hours. Not sure if I would consider that a win or a lose. Fortunately Target housed a little more sanity as I swung in to pick up a few un-neccessary (shirts) items.

I ventured back to my parents house in the afternoon to play with a cute baby, my parents watch, when his parents are on call. My mom and I went to church and then I gotta to spend more time playing with the other baby, that my mom nanny's for. The little girl is just precious and she let me hold her so I was pretty excited. Baby fever? Maybe. 

Apparently someone else must think I have baby fever too, or possibly just thinks I've put on a few lbs, cause these dang magazines all showed up to my house last week....

#notpregnant #toomanyblts

Sunday was pretty lackadaisical with another meal of blts while meeting with my church's other youth group leaders. Followed by lots of couch lounging and maybe a nap. I finished off the evening by doing a photoshoot for a high school senior and catching up on my favorite mind numbing (dumbing??) shows.

Oh, and I found $20 in a parking lot so that pretty much makes the whole weekend a win right?

Hell-o Mr. Jackson!

Married Life in a Nutshell

I swear yesterday was Monday. 

Whatevs. 

I'm pretty sure I lead one of the most boring blog lives ever. I mean seriously, lets recap.

I left work a little early Friday and went home to help the husband finish building a tool bench in his shop. Turns out I'm not too terrible with a screw gun...is that what it's called? I asked him to take a picture of me, for blog purposes obviously, and a got a look that basically said "you are a weirdo". So, you will just have to take my word with no visual evidence that I can screw screws. (That's what she said.)

Since I didn't whine too much Seth suggested we go out to eat. Obviously, I never say no to eating out (or food in general) so we hit up the fanciest place we could think of... Buffalo Wild Wings. I gorged myself on fried food and boneless wings while watching the Royals game. Then we hit up the Home Depot for more screws. Damn the excitingness of this post is over the top. Buckle your seat belts people this is what married life is all about!

Saturday was a fun filled day of meeting with our tax guy, yay IRS audit! Signing paperwork, mailing paperwork. Drop off at the Salvation Army and consignment store. Groceries, prescription pickup and visit to the bank. Is it possible to fit more un-fun errands in one day?? But wait, there's more! I got to follow that up with cleaning out the garage while Seth built more shelves. Better keep that green-eyed monster in check people. Jealousy is vicious!

Garages look so much cleaner when you carry
everything out of them and set it in the driveway.

It was only 9pm when we decided to grill out since we were both starving. Cheeseburgers, potatoes and onions, and corn on the cob. Not gonna lie, it was pretty darn good. Followed up our food with a trip to Sonic for ice cream. Nevermind that my hair was like a lion and I had dirt smudged all over me. I think we made it about 20 minutes into the movie I rented before we both fell asleep. 

Best Friends ForEvah!

Good thing the photos blurry so you can't see how muddy I am. 

Spoiled puppy with his ice cream.

After church Sunday we headed to the city to hit up Nebraska Furniture Mart to buy a mattress! Wow, it's depressing to think that we are excited about buying a mattress. In my book, mattress shopping ranks right up there with tires and trash bags. BORING. I managed to drive Seth completely crazy when I found bad reviews online about the mattress we picked out. So, we spent an hour and a half driving to another store to check out their mattresses only to return and buy the same one we had previously picked out. Time will tell I guess. 

That exciting adventure was followed up with a nap, another late dinner and the movie we failed to finish the night before. 

And that my friends is what married life is all about! 

Act like our dog child isn't pretty. 

Linking up with Sami's Shenanigans. 

Worlds of Fun!

I'm FINALLY catching up with my posts relating to last weekend, right in time for another weekend. 

After the whole she-bang on Wednesday and Thursday we slept in a little bit Friday morning. Woke up, I did some laundry and cleaned our messy house while Seth worked on stuff outside. By mid-afternoon we were all packed up and on our way to Kansas City. 

First stop was our hotel. We stayed at Harrah's so we could do a little gambling. Aka lose money. We got checked in and then checked out the casino a bit before heading to the Royals game were we sat in no traffic, which was awesome. 

(centered perfectly!)

I'm cheap so we used my Pepsi can to get a buy one get one free ticket in the nosebleed section. Honestly, they really weren't bad seats. Conveniently enough it was also buck night so we chowed down on hotdogs, peanuts and Pepsi. What's more American than the food? Baseball. Even when the Royals are losing I can't help but love watching Baseball. I'm not sure why I love it so much except maybe because Seth used to play and that's how met? No idea, but I do love it. 

I've never seen so many people at a Royals game. Loved it!

Yes please!

And this is why America's kids are fat.
They go to a real life Royals game and prefer to sit in an
air conditioned room playing video games. Ridiculous!

Selfies!

It was pretty hot and sweaty but I was easily entertained by the lady sitting in front of me. AND the first date couple I was eavesdropping on right next to me. The girl told the guy she had been in 20 car wrecks and one involved a donkey she hit. He staid noticeably sober the whole game, presumably because he didn't want her driving him home. 20? really?? 

The game ended with a firework display which was great since the day before was the 4th and I obviously didn't see enough fireworks then:)

Me: "Let's take a picture with the field in the background."
Seth: "Eh, good enough."
Me: "Really??" 

The Royals lost so we headed back to the casino to drown our sorrows in slot machines and black jack. No bueno. We will just say that we had something in common with the Royals and it wasn't winning. On to the next best thing. Loaded nachos at 2:00am. Hallelujah, they were amazing.

Let's say my inner fat kid came out:)

Pretty sure I passed out about 3 seconds after my head hit the pillow that night and I didn't wake up until Seth drug me from bed so we could have more fun at Worlds of Fun!! Oh, and I'm five. I freakin love Worlds of Fun and all of its roller coaster glory. Luckily we got there fairly early and we managed to ride all the roller coasters we wanted before it got too crazy crowded. 

Around 1:00 we headed to the Oceans of Fun waterpark side and waited too long in lines for slides that I must say were not life changing. So we headed back to the roller coasters. Thank goodness Seth was in the mood to try out some of the roller coasters because normally he is not a fan. After a quick ride on the Patriot, where your feet dangle, he was pumped and wanted to get right back in line. Who am I to argue? 

One terrible photo with the Patriot in the background.
Fly high Patriot, fly high.

We ended out the weekend by stopping by Buffalo Wild Wings and then heading home to pass out and sleep until 11:30 the next day. My kinda weekend:)

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.

7 Quick Takes (5)

1. Super excited about a co-host post (is that a thing) I'm doing with my bloggy friend Kala at My Breezy Room next week. I should probably make sure I get the project done this weekend though. Cryptic enough for ya?! Oh and you should probably check out her most recent furniture transformation. It's legit. 

2. My eyelids feel like they weigh 10,000lbs right now. I'm not sure though if it's because I'm tired, which I am, or darn allergies. I love spring/summer but I'm not loving the allergies this year. I literally wake up every morning with a tickle in my nose and sneeze. Over it already. 

3. The library has become my new best friend. Well as best of friends as inanimate things can be anyways. I don't know why I think this is so cool all the sudden. Maybe it's because I'm just used to always having to pay for things at this point in my life. I just checked out a few more audio books and I was getting ready to pull out my wallet to pay when it hit me! No ma'm, your money's no good here (unless you return the goods late that is.) Yep, I'm a nerd. 

via

4. In the past 5 days my dog has killed a total of 5(!!!) baby bunnies:( It is really sad, but at the same time, I guess I'm glad they aren't stealing food from my garden. Gunnar is just SO proud of himself but I wish he would catch the darn birds eating my strawberries instead.

5. Today I found a recipe for Cotton Candy Cake Cookies from Mama Miss and I almost peed my pants with excitement. Okay not really but you get the picture. I'm what you might call mildly obsessed with cotton candy ever since I was little. Some people have signature drinks or a carving station at their weddings, I had a cotton candy station. (And, cotton candy taffy, stick candy and rock candy). Complete with a sign I hand painted. Love the stuff! 

this may or may not be hanging in my house now...

6. Since the person who has checked out the third season of Downton Abbey from the library obviously doesn't have the dedication that I have, and therefor hasn't returned it yet, I have had to start a new series while I wait. Impatiently. I had heard that if you like Downton Abbey you will probably enjoy Call the Midwife. They were right. I do enjoy it. I'm about four episodes in and it is quite good. I still want the DA though. Hurry up you under-ambitious tv show watcher that's hogging the only copy. 

7. In approximately 2. 5 hours I get to see my husband again. That will last approximately 42 hours before I don't get to see him again. And then I will wait another 290 hours (approx) before I get to see him again. This whole work out of town biz is getting OLD. As are we...

circa 2006 at the KC Plaza

Happy friday lovely people!

Linking up with Jen at Conversion Diary.

7 Quick Takes (4)

1. At 5:30 a.m. this morning my alarm system blared like someone was trying to break into a bank. As I lept from my bed (with a heart attack) I was sure someone was trying to break into my house. I grabbed my phone and started stumbling down the steps turning on all the lights as I went. While tripping over my half asleep self I had a vague thought that I had no way to defend myself if it was a burglar. Apparently I was going to be the girl that runs back upstairs and hides in the shower like in every horror movie you've ever seen. Fortunately, the torrential downpour outside had just happened to splash water all over the flood sensor in my basement, tripping the alarm. Thank goodness, I wasn't going to be murdered and my basement wasn't really flooding. On the unfortunate side, we live in the country surrounded by fields, with field mice (bleh). I guess one of them must have eaten the poison in the basement and he decided to die right in the middle of my carpeted basement tv room. Disgusting! I will save you the dead mouse photo. 

2. With the humidity that has been in the air lately my hair has been a little bit cray cray. All the wispy pieces of hair right around my face like to frizz out into a lions mane that I assure you is beautiful. I really need to remember to snap a photo of this sometime because you probably have to see it to believe it. Anywho...I decided that maybe I should attempt to find some sort of taming product. Tame my mane...like taming a lion...get it?! Anyone have any good suggestions? The current hair products I own consist of shampoo and conditioner. The end. That's it. Not even an old can of Aquanet. Do people still use that? So suggestions would be appreciated and my hair is already really thick and heavy so let's avoid the heavy hair products. Mkay? Mkay!

Sorta like this only not red.
via

3. One of the new daily rituals in my house is pulling ticks of my dog. What has happened to my life?! A year ago I was revolted by the idea of touching a tick on my dog and now I make him sit still every night for 20 minutes so I can pull them off of him because I'm afraid there going to suck all his blood. We use tick meds every month but they still seem to find, and cling to him like Bella to Edward Cullen. I have decided that even though the tick meds say they are waterproof what they really mean is....if your dog steps in a tiny puddle they are waterproof... not... swim across the pond 40bajillion times a day waterproof. 

The things I do for this little puppy...

4. I started watching Downton Abbey a couple weeks ago on Netflix and am now in the middle of Season 2 that I checked out from my local library. Why did nobody insist I watch this show earlier? It's ridiculously addictive with all sorts of drama and scandal that seems even more dramatic and scandalous since it takes place in the early 1900s. I totally love this show and am insisting that you watch it. Plus everyone has lovely accents and they say things like jumpah (jumper). Watch it now.  

via

5. I talked to Seth about having a garage sale this weekend and he suggested I go garage sale shopping instead. Who am I to argue with a husband who wants me to shop? I will have to be sure to drag my butt out of bed early Saturday morning so I don't miss all the good bargains. 

6. It boggles my mind how many people feel like it's okay to ask you when you are going to have kids. Close family and friends, sure I'm fine with them asking, but all the people you sorta know, talk to at work because you have to? NO. Don't ask. It's none of your business. Usually, I'm just a smart ass and tell them we'll have kids when they want to pay my husband to move back into the state. I know we dated forever before getting married but we have yet to live under the same roof for more than a couple days at a time. Plus, every time they ask, I always wonder, "what if we had been trying to get pregnant and can't?" It's not true for us (at this point anyway) but I know it's true for lots of other couples. It's gotta be hard for those couples who are wanting nothing more than a baby and people ask constantly when they are going to have one. Take a hint people and quit asking unless you know that the person is fine with it. 

To be completely honest, this question doesn't bother me personally a whole lot, I just feel like it is really rude. Sort of like asking someone how there sex life is. None of your biz-nass!

7. I'm currently obsessed with listening to audiobooks. I feel like I never have time to just sit down and read so I've been listening to books in my car and I seriously love them. Right now I'm listening to Jodi Picoult's, Handle With Care. It's fabulous and I love the readers. The only downfall to audiobooks is that I seriously get angry when people call me while I'm driving now. First world problems I guess. 

Have a stupendous weekend! Not to be confused with a stupid weekend which is probably what you'll have if you were confused;)

Linking up with Jen at Conversion Diary.