Monday, September 17, 2012

My baby started school! TEAR...

I can't believe the day has come for SCHOOL!  I can remember the day Hale was born, which seems like yesterday (cliche, yes, but so true). I know today he's not starting school-school, just Pre-K, but it's all the same to me.  I'm sending him on his way, so grown-up, to preschool with a teacher, and a classroom, and lunch, and recess, and music, and chapel. Hale keeps telling me how excited he is to go to school... "like you Mommy", he says. Yes, I know, I'm still in school at 26, and no, I'm not going to med-school, or going to be a lawyer, or anything fancy like that. I'll be a Nurse, a dream come true!  Sorry for the detour, Hale is the subject here! WOW, is pretty much all I can say.  I try really hard to savor each moment that I get to spend with my little man, because I know I can't keep him from getting older, and he'll be graduating high school before I know it. This is tough.  I know he's just about 4, but where have those four years gone?

Emotions and thoughts overtake me often... and I can't help but ponder several questions: Have I done enough? Have I been there enough? Have I held him enough? Have I told him I loved him enough? This is what goes through my mind, but I need to focus on if Hale has seen Jesus enough in me! I obsessively pray for him, that he know Jesus at an early age, that he do well in school, that he will make wise decisions, that he respect himself and others, and many many other things!  Besides God, and my husband, he has brought so much joy, happiness, hope, and love in my life!  I tear up often when he smiles, when he laughs, when he discovers something new, and when he just needs his mommy! He makes my heart melt!



Thank you Lord for a healthy, smart, and loving little man!

Ashley 

Friday, September 14, 2012

Bathroom Re-vamp

I've been wanting to redo our guest bathroom for a long time now, but hadn't made the time, or rather haven't had the time.  With the help of my handy-of-a-man husband, we pretty much sealed the deal on decorating and totally redoing the bathroom. I debated for a while what style I wanted to bring out.  I love many different styles of decor, and I went back and forth on modern with splashes of color, or vintage chic (which I absolutely love), and I decided on more modern, clean lines with and orangish red, and aqua.  I love the color combo, and it really came together.  Plus I got to use my awesome fabric I found at IKEA in Dallas a few weeks back.  It only cost me $3 for probably two yards of fabric!  

Here is the proof:

BEFORE:





It's hard to tell, but the walls were a darker green and the cabinets were a medium natural wood.


 In Progress...

I sanded and painted all the cabinets white, and we painted the walls a medium grey.  We went with a medium grey because the colors we decided to accent with were brighter and I thought it would look better than a lighter grey.





Here is the finished product, and the fabric on the canvas was from IKEA! I think the fabric was the deal breaker when I was debating on the two styles for this room. 

It was a lot of fun, and we did most of it in two days!!  We need to put our new pulls on the drawers/doors (the screws that came with them weren't long enough), and we need to put silicone around the sink and baseboards.  I think we want to put small crown molding too?  

What do you think??
Ashley



Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Bright Lights, Big City

Well, Dallas is known for many things; off the top of my head: The Cowboys, BBQ, Dealy Plaza, and probably many others that you all could name quicker than I. Our girl's weekend did not consist of any of that, but we still embraced what the city had to offer!

We trucked (or carred) the infamous 5 hour journey from NWA at 10AM, so we still got our beauty rest so we could party hard when we reached our destination.  I enjoyed every minute of our drive there, and it seemed to fly by... it may be a different story from my awesome friend's, Teresa,  perspective, since she had to drive. :)  Snacks, music, and great conversation, hopefully helped ease the dread of sitting and driving the open road for so long.  Anyway... let's skip ahead, and get to the exciting stuff!

Friday:  Her trusty GARMIN lead us straight to the hotel we were staying at. We checked in and headed up to the room to settle in for a few minutes before we decided what we were going to do that night. Shopping was the ultimate choice so we headed out to the outlet mall in Allen. We shopped, and shopped, and shopped some more. Grabbed a snow cone halfway through to recharge, and we were off again. Enjoyed every minute of it, and snagged some great deals! Oh, and of course we had to get some chocolate treats for dessert from the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory! YUM! Our stomachs began to rumble for some real food, and we decided to indulge in the infamous Chuy's Mexican restaurant.  I ordered fish tacos that were beyond amazing!!!  I was so full halfway through, but I couldn't let those tasty treats go to waste, so, yes, I finished them!  Don't judge!  Teresa ordered beef fajitas; they looked great, but didn't taste so great!  The chips and cheese dip were pretty good too, so she didn't starve.  :)  After dinner we headed back to the hotel to rest for the next fun-filled day!

Saturday: 8:00 came pretty quickly that morning, but we were well rested.  While Teresa got ready, I went down to the lobby cafe and ordered me a healthy start English muffin sandwich which had egg whites with spinach and Havarti cheese!  It hit the spot. I know what you're thinking... and no, I didn't get my lovely friend anything, because she doesn't eat breakfast.  Well, I guess I ordered an OJ, so I got her something. Anyway, we ventured out to the Bishop Art District, as recommended by my friend Cyndi, and it was lovely.  It was very eclectic and very interesting!  Tillman's Roadhouse was on the menu for lunch!  It was so good! Perfect, rather! My lunch included a fresh pineapple lemonade to drink, charred tomato basil soup, and a grilled cheese on sourdough bread!  Scrumptious!  It sounds simple, but it was very gourmet! Teresa had a smoked turkey sandwich with bacon and avacado!  To die for, right?  It was so fresh! We also enjoyed some melt-in-your-mouth kettle chips!  Next time we venture to Dallas, I'm making a special trip there! mmmm-mmmmm!!!  We made our way back to hotel, and decided to go to the dinner theater.  Not like the Dixie Stampede, more of a movie theater and restaurant combined!  Awesome!  I couldn't believe it, but whoever came up with the idea, is a genius in my books!!  We watched the Campaign with Will Ferrell!  Oh my gosh... it was pee-in-your-pants FUNNY!!!  I can't think of the last movie I laughed that hard! Overall it was a great experience!  NWA should definitely look into this establishment!  I would definitely be there more often than I should! Next, we went back to the hotel to "rest" for the night, and decided we needed some cheesecake for dessert!  Can you guess where we made a run to?  Yes, you guessed it, Cheesecake Factory!  This was a first for me, and we just ordered an $8 piece of heaven and took it back to our hotel to indulge!  On our way back to the hotel we had to stop at starbucks!  Who eats cheesecake without coffee?  Um, no one! Oh, and Teresa made fun of me for ordering 3 drinks!  Let me explain.  I just wanted regular coffee, not all the fancy frappucino and such, and then I thought I needed some milk to help offset the sweetness of the cheesecake, and then decided I wanted a very small white chocolate mocha (my favorite), and I'm pretty sure I thoroughly confused our clerk! :)  Great end to a perfect day! :)  Oh, and we went to downtown Plano earlier that day before the movie theater and walked around for about an hour.  It was fun, and we ordered some salted caramel gelato (another first for me). TASTY!!  It's always sounded good, but I guess I wasn't every presented with the opportunity... that's all!

Sunday: 8AM came even quicker this morning!!  IKEA was on the agenda today, and then we would head out!  I didn't realize how big a store IKEA was until we were done.  We were exhausted, and I could have used a nap!  We were in there for probably two hours.... it seemed like it was never ending!  I'm not complaining, and I loved the store, don't get me wrong, but WOW!  We found a few items to purchase to finish out our weekend getaway!  Next, the open road! Since Teresa drove down to Dallas, I guess it was my turn to drive home!  It was part of her evil plan from the beginning!

Here are a few pictures...

 On our way...

 Chuy's: Fish Tacos

 Inside Tillman's Roadhouse!

 Charred Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese on Sourdough


 We're dorks!

 Driving through the city!
 self explanatory.

 By the train in Plano.

 It was windy!


 IKEA 'super-store'

I had a BLAST, and can't wait to go back and experience some other things that we didn't get to!

Thanks for bearing with me through all our shinanagins.

-Ashley

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Our "FAIR" adventure.

Ok, so you all know the annual Benton County Fair that comes around, and boy howdy has it gone downhill, or at least from what I remember. Nonetheless, Hale enjoyed it.  I can say that the foot long corndog, cotton candy, and "fresh" squeezed-sugar loaded lemonade that we inhaled was pretty scrumptious, if I do say so myself!  Between the rickity rides, and the outrageous prices, we thouroughly enjoyed ourselves.  Tricked you, huh?  Well, I enjoyed watching Hale go on the tea cups, Flinstone train, and the soft-punch kiddie toy maze complete with slide! My favorite part was seeing Hale's eyes light up when he popped two out of three balloons and won a fake, felt $100 bill!  He was proud of that thing! 

Here are few of the pictures I captured of our time together! We really did have fun... not to mention we got to see tons of farm animals!!