Irmagrsh

I wanted to blog about Hurricane Irma for quite some time now but we had guests every night for a week (Friday night was our first night with the house to ourselves) so I didn't have time to talk about our hurricane adventure. First off, I want to thank everyone who messaged or texted us to find out how we were doing and send prayers. It was so thoughtful and we felt so loved. Also, the power of prayer really works - the storm changed course countless times but through it all, the Lord protected us and kept us calm.

Saturday, we saw the beginning of the storm start to come through so our friend came and stayed with us since he was in an evacuation zone (long story but his wife was out of state and his flight to join her got cancelled the day before) and we hunkered down. Thankfully, we had quite some time to prepare so Stephen was able to help board up 3 houses, including ours, so we didn't feel as rushed as we did with Matthew. Saturday was low key, lots of wind and rain but nothing too crazy so we watched movies, ran around outside while we still could, I baked and the boys played video games.

Sunday was go time. The wind started picking up so we stayed indoors and played board games and video games. The worst of it was that evening/night. It sounded so awful - definitely worse than Matthew. Throughout the night, we kept hearing branches hit the roof and thinking it was our oak tree out back falling on the roof. We started to see some small leaks in the roof but thankfully, it was from the vents and not the roof coming apart. It was an intense night but thankfully the Lord got us through and once the eye was beyond us around 2 am, it wasn't as crazy outside so we were able to get some sleep. I seriously can't believe that our power didn't go out until 12:30 am Monday morning and then it came back on at 5 am - our street is seriously on the best grid!

After sleeping for a few hours, we decided to go outside Monday morning so assess the damage. We literally couldn't believe that we didn't see any big roof damage (we still need to get it inspected to verify) and there were no trees on the house! There was definitely a lot more debris down than Matthew but no body's house was damaged!! The Lord truly protected us. There were breaks in the main water line for our county so we didn't have water for a few hours. We decided to stay inside for a few more hours since it was still windy. After lunch, we walked a few streets to see the damage then started the clean up the yard. Thankfully, we only lost water for a few hours so we could shower but we couldn't drink it for a few days. The next few days, we cleaned up the outside and checked out friends' houses and helped them clean up as well.

This was the biggest area of debris. Thankfully, the magnolia didn't fall so now we're trying to pull it back into place

Since we were already doing a lot of cutting, I decided it was time to finally give our front bushes a good trim lol Everything looked so clean after all of the yard work!!

This plant got the worst of the wind and so I had to basically cut the whole thing down

We both went back to work on Wednesday which was difficult to do but we were thankful we were able to clean up the yard before going back. A few of our friends lost power for a few days after the hurricane so we were more than happy to have them stay with us until their power came back on. I'm so glad we had power and was able to help them out :) 

For now, we are enjoying getting things back to normal for only the past few days ;) Today, I left for a week long business trip to Charlotte and it seems that there's 2 more tropical storms in the Atlantic that could hit us so we'll see... Probably shouldn't have taken down all the plywood just yet ;)

Linking up with Biana

Hurricane Irma

Well, I had a few post ideas lined up for this week but looks like we're having ourselves a hurricane in a few days! I didn't take this storm seriously until yesterday and then it was like, crap, it's not going back out to the Atlantic. Everything is a mess and people are panicking since it's going to be such a bad storm and the devastation from Harvey was so great. All of the water and plywood is already sold out but thankfully, it's so far ahead of time we should be able to get things restocked before it hits.

Keep all of us in your prayers and let's hope it either turns away or isn't as strong when it hits. I'll be taking some time off to get prepared for the storm and depending on the damage, maybe after the storm as well.

In the meantime, these memes had me laughing!

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Linking up with Jessi

Labor Day Weekending

We were so thankful for the long weekend and even though we only had plans on Saturday, we were able to get a ton of things done the rest of the weekend - definitely a labor day on Monday ;) Needless to say, there were a lot of things to get done and we're glad we were at home and able to get them done.

Friday, I worked on some PPE after work, we ate Pub subs for dinner and then watched Baywatch before bed - it ended up being just okay, it was pretty silly.

Saturday, we slept in and before heading to Disney, we stopped by our friends' house to support their kids' lemonade stand to benefit Houston. It was such a cute stand and we loved being able to pop in to see them :) Afterwards, we were off to Epcot for our first Food and Wine Festival visit of the year. It was crowded but we loved getting to try some of the new foods they had this year!

These guys were so good and fun to watch!

I seriously don't know how I grew up in Florida and yet every year, I get weaker and weaker in the heat lol I felt so bad until it got overcast then I was like a whole new person!

Loaded Mac N Cheese

Ahi Tuna

Pot stickers and duck bao bun

Charcuterie in a cone

Salmon BLT sushi

Almost the minute after we got our last dish, it started raining. Thankfully, it wasn't a hard rain so we decided to head over to Magic Kingdom to finish out our evening. We really only wanted to see the fall decorations (okay, that was me), use our 1 fastpass and get a dole whip but once it stopped raining, we decided to hang around for the fireworks. We watched them from the back of the park so we were able to scoot as soon as they were over and not wait in the longest lines ever. 

We made a pit stop to the dance party before watching the fireworks ;)

Sunday we went to church and then one of our friends' came by to advice us on my business and the next steps we should take. We were so thankful for his advice and hopefully within the next year, we'll be doing some big things! The rest of the day we worked on getting things done around the house and then started Despicable Me 3 but we didn't get very far before Stephen fell asleep.

Monday, we slept in and then I got to work on a bunch of embroidery items while Stephen did a lot of car work. I finally tried out Sheaffer's recommendation on how to cut a blanket scarf and it worked!! I love how my scarf turned out and wanted to add a monogram that wasn't super prominent... it ended up being hidden because the blacks blended so well lol

Later that afternoon, we scotch-guarded all of our kitchen chairs and then ran out to shoot some pictures for an upcoming milestone for PPE :) Overall, it was a really productive weekend! Now, we're lying in wait to see what this new hurricane is going to do... pray that it goes back into the Atlantic and no one is affected!

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend as well!! Linking up with Biana

Five on Friday

Here we are... first day of September, Labor Day weekend and thus, the first weekend of fall!! This makes me so excited - fall is truly my favorite season but let's be real, it's going to stay hot for quite a while. And to kick off our Labor Day weekend, we are going to Epcot for the first weekend of Food and Wine and then over to MK to see the fall decorations. We are pumped! Time to get into today's 5:

One

So since it's now fall, I ended up picking up this chambray dress from Old Navy yesterday and can't wait to pair it with booties or boots and a scarf. I was hoping to be able to wear it for casual Friday's at work but it's slightly short in the front (I'm 5'10") so I'll just wear it outside of work ;)

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I also just saw J Crew restocked the shirt I wanted earlier this year but sold out... Let's see if I end up getting it ;)

Two

This past weekend I tried out 2 new recipes and both turned out delicious! I finally made Jessi's taco dip which was ah-mazing!! I'm now making it for our cookout next weekend :) Also, for our girl's night last weekend, I made a GF dessert because one of our friend's is GF. I made peanut butter cheesecake brownies and they were so delicious - maybe better than regular brownies!

Three

Okay, even though I said I wasn't going to do anymore recap posts, I realized I have 2 more things to recap on... my bad. Stephen's family wanted to celebrate our birthday's and since we had been traveling, we got together a few weeks later; after we moved my BIL & SIL in to their rental in Orlando. Stephen loves Red Robin and since it's a child-friendly place, that's where we decided to go - it was the perfect place to go and we had a lot of fun.

Four

The week after my conference in Napa, CA I hopped on a plane and went to a conference in Nashville, TN. I never blogged about that trip and while it wasn't as grand as Napa, I wanted to make sure it was still captured. Stephen stayed behind for this one because we had just gone to Nashville less than a year ago. I had a great time and for our big customer event, we went to the Country Music Hall of Fame - it was a really neat place but I'm glad I didn't spend any money to go there since I don't listen to country music and didn't know who 3/4 of the people were. Our biggest surprise of the night was after dinner in the rotunda, they had country music writers and singers, Billy Montana and Steve Dean perform their hit songs and tell us stories. It was so neat and such a special thing to get to see. 

Five

How many of y'all shopped the Lilly sale? I was staying away until my girlfriends at work had a huge group text about it so I got curious... After sitting in line for over 2 hours, I finally got in to check things out. I almost bought 1 dress but they sold out of my size right before I checked out. I may or may not have picked up a birthday gift for someone though ;)

Lastly, I'm considering offering some pre-orders for these sherpa pull over jackets. I've never done pre-orders before but I wanted to see if anyone is interested! Let me know if you'd be interested in pre-ordering a monogrammed sherpa pullover :)

As another plug for PPE ;) Be sure to check out our Facebook and Instagram pages for a fun Christmas announcement today!

I hope everyone has an amazing long weekend!!

Coffee Talk

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If I were having [iced] coffee with you today, I'd say...

I still can't get over what's going on in Texas! I'm in utter disbelief of the flooding and how bad it can get. Ashley lives in Houston and has put together a list of ways you can donate. We decided to send diapers to the Texas Diaper Bank - they had a wishlist on Amazon which made it super easy and I don't have to worry about what percentage actually goes to the cause

I am not a fan of the new Taylor Swift song - sure it's kind of catchy but I'm pretty sure it's just the tune to "I'm Too Sexy". Also doesn't help that I'm not a fan of her at any stage of her career haha! However, I will say that girlfriend is a genius with her music video. There is so much detail in it and I want to know how everyone was able to find the things they did. You can find it all outlined here and here.

On Friday, I talked about how I was going to make this salad - well, I made it this week and it was not a hit... Let's just say we ended up having frozen pizza with it and I won't be making it again ;)

I work in the same area that I went to college so every day, I'm driving past my old townhouse/apartment and school. Well, school just got back in session and every time I think about starting a new semester and going to class, I get anxiety... #thanksengineering

I'm so excited because I'm so close to finishing up a big project I've been working on at work. Long story short but I'm putting together packages for our district offices and decided it'd be nice to give it a southern touch by handwriting all of the notes that go inside. I still think it was a good idea but 40 full page notes later and my hand is killing me... which is also the reason why it's taken me so long to get these done lol

Linking up with Annie

Stone Wedding

Alright, this should be my last "catch up" post. The last week of July, I headed up to Atlanta for a week long business trip but at the end of the week, I drove up to my parent's house in Chattanooga. The evening I got up there, my dad had a business dinner so my mom and I went to dinner at Public House in downtown Chatt which was a super cool place! We had a great time and then came home to hang out with my dad before bed.

The next day, my mom and I went to get a pedicure and then we met my mom's college friends for lunch. It was great catching up with them and having lunch all together. Afterwards, my mom and I headed over to the mall and I found some great deals. After shopping, we met my dad at a new rolled ice cream place that was across from the mall. We probably shouldn't have eaten ice cream butttt we couldn't pass up the rolled ice cream since New York lol That evening, my dad grilled out and then we just relaxed at the house - my favorite thing :)

Saturday morning, we got up and dropped Frisbee off at the kennel - not before trying to get a cute picture with her but she wasn't having it ;) Then we tried to get a free tube of lipstick from MAC which was an absolute fail... not a fan of the company because they should've planned better. After that fail, we got some fun donuts for breakfast and headed out to Knoxville for our childhood friend's (the one who came with us to HHI) wedding.

It was great because my sister and her boyfriend drove down from Indy for the wedding (we all missed Stephen - he stayed behind because he thought he was going to have to work) so it was great getting to see her again! My mom and I ran to the outlets while everyone else played a round of golf before the wedding. The wedding was so beautiful - the venue was so neat and the bride was so gorgeous! We had to much fun spending time together and celebrating Daniel and Charlsey - we loved seeing everyone and danced the night away.

Too bad my sister wore flats... I look like a giant!

We're just missing Stephen!

We went to bed as soon as we got home because everyone had to wake up early so my parents could drop me off at the airport. It was a great weekend with my family but I was so ready to get back home to Stephen :)