Everything Happens For A Reason

Well ladies and gents,

I apologize for not writing in so long but I've been quite busy and stressed with no time to do anything! Not with wedding stuff either. We have gotten lots of bad news over the past week or so and it's stressful trying to figure out what to do about it all.

First we found out that J. starts UH-60's on Dec. 10th, so he's quite busy trying to get all of his information for the bird learned (which is a lot trust me) because they have no mercy on you if you don't know your information. So he's going to have quite a few weeks so pray for him to have patience.

Then on my way home on Tuesday my car broke down when I got 20 miles down the road. It's so dead that I have to actually buy a new car! It was going to be $5000-6000 to fix it, so we're just going to get a new car. This didn't happen at a good time obviously with having to pay for the rest of our wedding which is no small feat. So pray for me that we find a car that is reliable and a good deal.

I hope everyone has had a great thanksgiving holiday!

I'll be back Monday!

4 weeks baby 4 weeks!

This is exactly how I feel (only watch the first minute or so)

4 weeks from today we are getting married & not only does this signify we are exactly 1 month away from our wedding but J. is officially done with his first part of flight school! It's been a long hard 20 weeks but we made it now it's on to hawks (whenever that may be) and BOLCIIIBravo then we are going home baby! I cannot wait!

After the wedding that will be my countdown I cannot wait to go home!

I just cant believe it! Only 4 short weeks left to go! Holy Moly there is still so much left to do!
We (well I) need to:
-Finalize the ceremony
-Make programs
-Finalize centerpieces
-Order flowers
-Do one last thing to my dress (more on that later)
-Figure out what to do about my shoes
-Create a day of timeline
-Pack for the honeymoon
-Finalize reception menu
-Finalize & Download music for the ceremony
-Create playlist & download music for reception
-Pick songs for our entrances and special dances
-Pick dinner music
-Pick prelude music for the ceremony
-Make plans for our after party & make invitations
-Make plans for the girls after the rehersal dinner and make invitations
-Make a final "Aisle File" to send the girls with all the final details
-Find jewlery for me & the bridesmaids
-Make rehersal dinner invitations
-Make my veil
-Order my fur wrap

& there are probably things I am just not thinking about right now!

Baby it's cold outside

Well, I've been told it's has been snowing in Kentucky already, and even down here in Alabama it's very cold (especially in the mornings.) I love to be warm, being cold is just so uncomfortable and I hate trying really hard to get warm.

So, in my quest for staying warm I thought I'd put together an outfit for just lounging around the house that still looks nice enough that you wouldn't be embarassed to answer the door but still keep you warm and cozy.

Happy Birthday To Me!

Well here I am officially 22 years old. My Mom when she called me earlier asked "well do you feel any older?" and I said no not really after 20 it's just not that different. Except for last year when I turned 21 I could have a drink and no one gave me flack about it.

So I promised a look back at the year of 21 for me so we'll start with that.
November: On this exact day one year ago was the day that J. first told me he loved me. We had been dating for over a year at that point but him waiting made it that much more special.
December: My best friend from North Carolina came and visited us and we had our own Thanksgiving/Christmas at our house, and also a going away party for J. as he was leaving for Flight School that weekend also. Christmas came and went, nothing especially memorable about it.
January: J. left after New Years and I had to get used to not seeing him or even being able to talk to him again. Nothing especially memorable about this month either.
February: J. graduated from WOC school and I got my first taste of Alabama, I rode the 580 miles with his mom (which I was really nervous about). This is also when me & J. started seriously talking about getting married. He was home for Valentines Day and that is when he bought my ring, but told me I couldn't have it yet.
March:March brought spring break and I decided after fighting with my parents over it (they still hadn't figured out that I was a grown up) I was going to travel the 580 miles to Alabama to see J. for the week. Boy was it worth it because this is when he proposed, and I couldn't have imagined it any better. We also decided toward the end of March that we would get married in December so I got to work on wedding planning.
April: We decided in April that I was going to move down to Alabama with J. for at least the summer and we'd see where it went from there. I had also booked everything for our wedding at this point (by the first week of April) photographer, church, reception hall, catering and bought my dress.
May: I had finals the first week of May then I headed to Missouri to visit my family. The next week I moved down to AL. It was nice getting to be with J. every day and night again!
June-August:In June me & J. made the trip to North Carolina to see my best friend get married and it was so great I'm so glad we got to be apart of their special day, and I can't wait for them to be a part of ours! Most of the rest of the time through August I spent my time honing my domestic skills taking care of the guys, cooking cleaning. And making new friends.
September:The very last week of September I made the long trip back home for my first bridal shower, my mom and matron of honor (best friend) put it together for me and it was so great to see her and everyone else from back home.
October: Before I came back to AL, I had boudoir pictures taken for J. as his wedding present. It was a very empowering experience! One I'll never forget!
November:And here we are a year later. Alot has changed since last year. I've gone from a girlfriend to a bride-to-be, and from a girl who clinged to home to a semi-independent woman. It's hard to believe in a little over a month I will be a wife! I cannot be more excited to start my life with J. though!

The years just keep getting better and better! Even though they go by faster too!

Now for a little wish list:

Friends Seasons 3 & 8 (the only seasons J. doesn't have)







This dress from Old Navy in electric blue






These two bikinis from Victoria Secrets for our honeymoon.












These slipper boots from Old Navy


And finally, the skirt I raved about in a previous post! (It's gone on sale, glad I waited!)

Getting Older

Well tomorrow marks my 22 years of being here on this Earth. I have found that through the years birthdays have taken on a different feeling from year to year. I find myself at a loss because never more will I have one of those "milestone birthdays". I'm way past a year old, even way past thirteen for that matter. I'm a few years past 18 and no longer a teenager once I turned 20. I've had my feel of being able to "legally drink" at age 21. Now here I am at 22 and I'm sitting here thinking "well what do I have to look forward to now? I can do what I want now so what is left, well besides getting older?"

When I was yonger I always knew what I wanted to do for my birthday, and now in the last few years I've found myself at a loss for as to how to celebrate my birth. I mean really you can't have a sleepover (too old for that) Going out to a nice restaurant is nice, just spending time with friends and family is a great thing too. But since I am away from my close friends and family this my 22nd birthday, J. has taken over the responsibility of making sure that I have a nice birthday since it will once again be my parents turn next year since he'll be deployed. He has asked me what I wanted to do, and honestly I don't even know what to tell him.

At first I wanted to go to the nearest "city" (if you can call it that) to us and go to a fancy restuarant and get all dressed up and go have anice dinner with our friends down here. But as luck would have it, we have a meeting to attend tomorrow night at 7PM (prime dinner time in my opinion)so we considered dinner to be out of the question, but J. has decided we just wont eat at our meeting and go out to eat afterwards where ever I want because the restuarant our meeting is at is definately not great.

So finally I chose to go to a Japanese grill here in AL and then to a drive in movie (I havent been to one in ages)and I figured it would be nice to go and snuggle up and watch a movie. Then maybe after we'll go to a respective friends house and play some games (which is how we spend a typical friday night) but that is just fine with me because I enjoy getting to spend time with my fabulous friends that we have made down here. And lucky for me I get to take most of them home with me! As they are all the wives of the men in J's unit back home in Kentucky! So lucky me!

Ok so anyway, tomorrow I'll write about my birthday wishlist, and a look back on my year as a 21 year old.

Day 5 & 6 of the Fall Cleaning Challenge

Ok for yesterday we had to clean up our main living area which was hard for me because the boys have a 4 day weekend and all they wanted to do was watch movies and drink their beer and relax & I kept getting in their way and making noise. But it is done. Once again no pictures because it's not pretty and it's already messed up again.

Here is the list from day 5:
Living Areas:
-Wash inside of windows
-Change HVAC filter (don't have one)
-Flip sofa and chair cushions (I just vaccummed them well as they only have one "side)
-Clean and scrub down baseboards and moulding.
-Wax floors if needed (not necessary)
-Shampoo wall to wall carpeting and air-out area rugs(I don't have a shampooer so I just vaccumed really well)

Here is day 6:
Outside

-Wash outside of windows with water and vinegar solution
-Clean screens
-Power wash porch areas
-Clean out grill
-Clean and store outdoor furniture and accessories

It's a good thing I don't have most of this stuff since I got a rush job to do on a map book (it has to be ready to go by Tuesday) and I'll tell you guys more about this later but it is $200 to pad my pockets!

Spotless Bathroom

Here is our latest challenge from Katie over at Hyper Homemaker for her Fall Cleaning Challenge

Finishing up the bathroom

-Throw that shower curtain in the laundry (plastic curtains come out perfectly clean when laundered, just don't put it in the dryer!! Hang it dry)
-Shine and degunk the sink (you know how to do this from the kitchen)
-Scrub all the tile grout (YES you can do this! Magic Eraser, I hear, is a big help)
**If your tile hasn't been sealed in a while, it's worth doing to help you clean it easier.**
-Mop the floor
-Wipe switch plates, doorknobs, and doorjambs
-Empty and disinfect wastebasket

All done, but no picture because even clean once again it's too hideous for pictures!

Medicine Cabinet Revival

Our challenge for yesterday from Katie for the Fall Cleaning Challenge was to clean out the medicine cabinet & organize it.

Well I don't exactly have a medicine cabinet but we use the area under the sink to keep all of our toiletries and personal hygine products and medicines so I cleaned it out and boy did it need it!

Here is the before:

Yikes!

This is during & after organizing it into "his side" "her side" and "our side"


After all of this I still wasnt happy with the results so I ran to the dollar tree and picked up 3 white buckets to put stuff in and keep it from being so all over the place.
So this is the final product:


Not as pretty as some people's but it does it's job!

Mini Penne with Italian Sausage, tomatoes & green peppers

I originally found this recipe at Taste of Home Cooking I thought it looked easy enough and was yummy and something I could use the left over sausage I had before it went bad.

Also, I used mini penne because that's what I had laying around and I didn't have any red pepper so I used some green bell pepper instead. Also, J put some leftover tomato sauce on his and he said it was good so I may try that next time also.

Ingredients:
3 Hot Italian Sausages
2 Cups of shredded Parmesan Cheese
1 medium tomato diced
1 red (or green) bell pepper diced
2 Cups of Mini Penne (or orzo or pasta of choice)

Directions:
1. Boil pasta of choice until tender
2. Broil sausages until cooked through (this is the easiest way)
3. Dice tomato and bell pepper
4. Cut sausage up into slices
5. Lay down a bed of pasta layer on your veggies and sausage
6. Sprinkle generously with Parmesan cheese
7. Enjoy!

Nice Clean Kitchen

OK well as you know I have been following Katie's Fall Cleaning Challenge over at her blog Hyper Homemaker and we finished giving our kitchens a good scrub down yesterday so I finally decided I guess it is OK that I can post a few pictures of the finished product.

Now I promise you it isn't pretty but this place is a rental and for what we are paying (and putting in the bank) each month is worth it since we were only going to be here for a little over a year anyways.

OK so are you ready? Sure ya are!


See that little brown cabinet over there, that my friends is my pantry! (Katie & Bryn I win for having the smallest pantry EVER!) Oh and PS: all of this furniture is included in the rental so it's not ours and we had no choice what got put in here but I do have to admit that some of it is nicer than what we have at home!


This is the sink area, like my little checked and watermelon curtain? My mother-in-law made that for us so I just had to hang it.


There is the refrigerator. I worked my butt off cleaning that thing on Saturday (more pictures of that further down!)


And here is the microwave and all my cookbooks (I love them all!)

Finally here is the inside of the refrigerator.


See the boys have a habit of putting a beer in there to get nice and frosty and sometimes (well not all the time) forget about them and they freeze and explode leaving our freezer full of frozen beer and glass shards. Nice huh? So Friday night it happened (again) and I had just had enough! On Saturday morning after they had woken up (both of them) I said no more beers in the freezer and if I catch one in there again and it explodes they will clean it out! So hopefully they will enjoy having a nice clean freezer and refrigerator for their food. Hopefully being the keyword there.





I swear this thing probably hadn't been thoroughly cleaned since way before we moved in. It was disgusting! So as you can see I live in boy town where the fridge is constantly full of beer and pizza. Oh and BTW that amount of beer has since shrank by about 2 six packs!

So I hope you enjoyed this tour of my "loner" kitchen!

Now it's on to the medicine cabinet today!

Let the cleaning begin!

Ok I mentioned yesterday that I was going to start a cleaning challenge with Katie over at Hyper Homemaker. So I got on today to pick up the list and see what I had to do today.

Here it is:
Pantry
- Take everything out of the pantry.
- Wipe down shelves.
- Toss old items and donate unused good items.
- Repackage all messy items into nice containers.
- Place all items back into the pantry in an organized fashion.

Fridge
- Take everything out of the fridge and freezer (placing items in a cooler with all the remaining ice.
- Scrub down the inside and outside of the fridge, shelves, doors, ice maker and freezer.
- Replace water filter if you have one.
- Clean fridge condenser coil.
- Toss old or useless food.
- Place everything back into fridge in an organized fashion.

Cabinets
- Take ALLL your items out of all your cabinets and drawers. Yes... ALL!
- Wipe down the inside of all cabinets and drawers.
- Wipe down the inside of all containers such as utensil holders.
- Store items not used in over 6 months, or summer seasonal items.
- Thinking logically (ie - potholders next to stove, towels next to sink), try to put everything back in a more useful and purposeful place, and in an organized fashion.
- Scrub down the cupboard exteriors, from to of the kitchen to bottom.

Now I'll admit that seemed like a lot to me at first but I did get it all done and I felt a sense of accomplishment. J & our roomate thought I was crazy and kept asking me "what are you doing that for?" obviously men do not understand the importantce of a clean house!

They'll thank me later!

Sad to say but I didn't take any pictures I still haven't worked up enough guts to be proud of this place (it's a trailer for crying out loud its not pretty in the least little bit) *sigh* I'll try and take some tomorrow after I stock the fridge because I got yelled at for taking all the beer out (it's quite full of beer and pizza boxes right now but it's all clean underneath!) It looks quite bare with out all of that in there but it's not pretty! LOL

So how did you do today?