Busy Bees

This week has been very busy for Kevin and I with work and things to do in the evenings. So I am deeply sorry I haven't posted until now. Now that the days are longer Kevin doesn't get home until later.  I have been going home and either going to the gym or working in the yard and garden. Our garden is doing fantastic! I'm so proud!

I am on a mission to lose some pounds and have had great motivation this week to do it.  I am very unhappy with my body at this moment in my and want to change it! I have been eating less and healthier and I managed to fit in some type of physical exercise every night this week, except last night. I was exhausted and decided just to go to dinner with some girl friends instead of going home.  I knew Kevin wasn't going to be home until after 7 so I treated myself! We all need treats every now and again, right??!?!

We leave next Thursday to go on vacation for 10 days! I'm so pumped. We are going to the wedding of a long time friend of mine next Saturday in Kansas City. While we are out that way we decided we would go visit some of Kev's family in Oklahoma City. Then the next Saturday my cousin is getting married down at the beach. We are driving the whole time so it should be an interesting road trip! I can't wait!! I'm promising myself I will take pictures, hopefully lots of them so I can share with you! 

So with that said, this long weekend will consist of me cleaning house and doing laundry! Fun times! NOT! If I were richer I would so have a maid. Really. I'm not ashamed to say it! I would even be okay with someone that just cleaned the bathrooms and did the laundry. I could handle the rest. I procrastinate while doing laundry. Instead of folding and hanging clothes as soon as they are finished drying like any normal human being would do I let them sit in the dryer or throw them on a chair in our bedroom. I used to not be this bad about laundry.  I'm not quite sure where this lazy beast inside of me came from! I'm blaming it on moving the big chair into our bedroom about 3 months ago! I'm determined that you will actually be able to see the chair after this weekend and I am going to try my best to not clutter it as soon as I get back from vacation.

I hope your Memorial Day weekend is a more relaxing and more fun than mine appears it is going to be! Stay safe! Until next time....

Closer to My Happy Ever After

August 2010: I was in Pine Bluff, Arkansas for work and Kevin back home. We decided before I left that we would meet up in Memphis at The Peabody Hotel for the  next weekend to see each other and have a quick trip in Memphis. We had not gone a weekend apart since we met so we thought it would be fun to meet in Memphis for a quick trip. When I got to Arkansas a little kink was put in our plan and I was told I would have to stay in Arkansas to work and would not be able to go to Memphis to work. After being in Arkansas through the week my boss told me on Friday morning that I could go to Memphis after all. I was ecstatic and called Kevin on the way to the courthouse and told him that we could go. He was somewhat hesitant which I thought was really weird, but told me to go ahead and book the room. So in the middle of the courtroom I am on my laptop booking a room at The Peabody for Saturday night. It was a 4 hour drive for both of us so we agreed that we would just get up early Saturday morning and head up there and just stay one night.

Saturday morning, August 21 I woke up and hit the road. We both got to The Peabody about the same time and checked in. Kevin was adamant about asking what time the rooftop floor closed, which at the time I didn't think anything of. I just thought he wanted to make sure we got to go up there and look at the city at night before it closed.  After we checked in and got settled in our room we decided we would grab some lunch from a local Bar-B-Q joint, walk  around Beale Street and then take a quick nap before our dinner reservation Kevin had made that night.

Fast forward to post-nap time....I get a shower and get ready and then Kevin gets ready while I'm finishing up. He is acting really weird and takes his bag in the bathroom with him and shuts the door. At this point I think something is up, but kind of ignore it (not really though). We go to dinner and it was yummy.  Kevin was a little quiet, but assured me he was okay. We go back to the room so I could change shoes because we were going to go to walk around Beale Street and experience the night life for a little while before calling it a night. We went up to the roof top on The Peabody to see where the ducks sleep, at least that's what I was told we were doing!  When we got to the roof top Kevin decides he needs to go to the restroom (later I found out he was taking the ring box out of his sock and putting it in his pocket)....Inside I'm screaming "we just went to the room, wouldn't you have used the bathroom there."  While waiting on him I manage to get the butterflies anticipating what may or may not be happening and tell myself to be cool and don't give away to him that I might know something is about to happen that is going to change my life forever!!!  We go outside and walk around and look at all the pretty lights and the skyline of downtown Memphis at night and then next thing I know Kevin is on one knee!!!! He said some stuff that I don't remember because I was more focused on what was happening and couldn't wait to see the ring!

It was beautiful and everything I had hoped for! The ring and the moment! We went back to the room and celebrated with some wine and called our parents and my best friend! Then made our way out to Beale Street to continue our celebrating. I hated that I had to go back to Arkansas and not go home with him to celebrate more with our friends and family. The week thankfully went by fast and I was home the next weekend!

I couldn't have asked for a more perfect moment or man!

To see the beginning of our Love Story go Here

Our Weekend

This past weekend was filled with a lot of fun activities for us. Friday we had dinner with my best friend Betsy, her boyfriend Matt, her mom and my mom. It was good to see them and catch up. Life gets busy for all of us these days so dinner and seeing each other doesn't happen as often as we like. Friday was also my mom's first time to get out since her surgery.  I was so glad she got to go to dinner with us and see something other than the walls of her house.

Saturday Kevin, Betsy, Matt, my brother, cousin and some others ran a 5k here in town called the Motherwalk to support Ovarian Cancer research. Friday after dinner, Betsy and I had a great time decorating shirts for our team to wear. Our team name was BeBe's babies. My mom also got to go go along with us to support all of us that were running in her honor. It was perfect weather for the run! It had rained the night before and cooled everything off. There were a lot of people running for the cause. It was such a good feeling to know that many people care about Ovarian Cancer Research. Our team pretty much rocked and we had a great time!

Later that afternoon Kevin and I went to his best friend's 3 year old daughter's (Anna Kyle) birthday party. It was probably the greatest 3 year old party I have ever seen. They had a pretty white pony giving all the little ones pony rides. They had a blow up jump thingy and to top it all off a hay ride. All the decorations were hand made and absolutely precious!  Thank you pinterest for all the fabulous ideas you give all these mamas! They even used hay bails as seats at the tables. I should have taken pictures, but completely forgot to take my camera and my phone in.

Saturday night we went to a friend's house down the street and had a crawfish boil. And finally Sunday we went to church and then spent Mother's Day with our mothers and my Grandmother!

As you can see it was a very busy weekend. We needed a weekend for our weekend. I enjoy having lots of fun things to do and events to attend on the weeekends, but sometimes it can be exhausting and make me more tired than I was at the end of the week. I'm ready for our vacation in June! 
Tootles for now! I will hopefully get out a more interesting post tomorrow!

Becoming Happy Ever After

I'm a romantic at heart and I love hearing everyone's love stories, friends and strangers.  I don't discriminate when it comes to hearing a love story. I like a good romantic book, movie or reality show. They always make you feel so warm and fuzzy and always put a smile on my face and sometimes bring a tear to my eye. Kevin always teases me when we watch a movie with romance in it because I usually end up crying at some point. I can't help it. Give a girl a break hubs!

Kevin and I met on a Saturday night in December of 2009. I was with some girls hanging out and he was at his usual place of interest, Buffalo Wild Wings. *Side note: Kevin is a sports fanatic! He's a little obsessed and might need therapy for it one day! Kidding, but he really does watch it EVERYDAY and is always on the computer reading about it. Some of are petty little arguments are over this.* Anyway, back to how we met. One of the girls I was with was dating a long time family friend of mine (they are getting married in June!) who was also at BWW with the same group of guys Kevin was with. The girls decided to stop by BWW to see what the guys were going to be up to the rest of the night. We got there and I did not pay ANY attention to Kevin because he was somewhat anti-social and zoned in to whatever team was playing on TV that night. Imagine that! (Kevin is one of the most social people I know, which is funny thinking back to that night.)

 A little while later our group decided to go to another local hang out and that is when Kevin came up to me and introduced himself and asked if I would like to go out with him sometime. I gave him my number and I honestly didn't think he would call. I was wrong! He called the next night and told me that some of the same group that he was hanging out with the night before were going out to eat that Monday night and asked me to go. So I went and glad I did because it was nice getting to know him a little better in a group setting and I wasn't as nervous. (Yeah right, who am I kidding! I could barely eat!) The night ended well and has asked if I would like to go on a date by ourselves the next weekend and I accepted the invite. We went to one of our favorite restuarants, Superior Grill and the to a movie, Brothers. And guess what? I cried. Yes on our first official date I balled my eyes out. If you haven't seen the movie it is a tear jerker!!!

We continued dating and getting to know each other and quickly realized that we had tons of friends in common and lots of common interests. How we had never met before then I will never know.  About 3 months into it dating we talked marriage. Little did I know that on that December night that I would meet the man I would marry. They always say that the one will come when you aren't looking and least expect it and boy did it!

I will post our engagement story next! It's a good one you won't want to miss! 
Happy hump day!

Home Grown

This year Kevin and I decided that we would try to grow our own vegetable garden! I have always wanted to try to grow some veggies, but wasn't sure if I would be able to give the TLC needed to grow a fruitful garden. I grew up eating fresh veggies out of my Grand-daddy's garden and there is no comparison to something fresh out of the ground, especially when you work hard for it! 

When my mom was diagnosed with a recurrence of ovarian cancer I decided it was definitely time to try to eat more clean and fresh. Thus putting all the procrastination aside and getting the garden in action! Here's to the beginning of our eating clean and healthy.

I'm so excited about my (I mean our :)) garden now and it gets bigger and bigger everyday. Not only is it going to be healthier for us, it is also going to save us a ton of money! I started everything from a seed and most of the seeds I got at Dollar Tree. The others I got at Wal-Mart and they only cost me about $1.50. Kevin builds houses so we fortunatly had access to cedar boards to build the garden box and an abundance of top soil.  We only had to spend about $25 total for this garden! The garden consists of green beans, squash, zucchini, okra, cucumber, tomato, jalapeno and habanero peppers. I know we will have an abundance and will either have to freeze some things and/or give them away! We will definitely get our moneys worth out of it!  Now I can't wait for some scrumptious veggies!!!

Here are some pictures of the progression of the garden for your pleasure! I hope this might inspire you to start your own garden adventure and to eat cleaner and healthier foods that haven't been drenched in pesticides and miracle grow!  Happy Tuesday!

Life

*Warning: This post is gonna be a deep one!

Life has been really tough lately. I have always seemed to have pretty big life changing moments throughout my life; more than anyone should have to deal with especially at such a young age. I always know that I will get through those storms and seasons with the support of my family, friends and most importantly God.
A month ago my mom was diagnosed with a recurrence of Ovarian Cancer. It came back almost exactly five years after the first occurrence. She had surgery the first time to remove all of her female parts.  This time it came back in the same area but attached itself to the colon, bladder and female genital. Fortunately they were able to get the whole tumor out again. Unfortunately, she will have to go through another round of chemo that will last at least a year and half. She is a fighter and will win this battle again! God will once again heal here of this nasty disease! I know that she will live many many more years and see the birth of my children one day and see them grow up!
As her daughter this has been so heart wrenching to watch her go through this AGAIN! Many times when I was staying at the hospital with her and even when she came home and Kevin and I were staying with her I would have to fight back the tears and tell myself to keep it together for her.  My mom is a very strong woman and I know she will get through it this time just like she did the last. I have to be the strong one in this situation, which has been hard at times.

 

Growing up she was a great mom and now that I am grown and married she has become one of my best friends.  She was always there for my brother and I and she did a darn good job raising us by herself for what some consider some of the most challenging years of childhood. My father died from cardiac arrest when he was only 40. I was only nine at the time.  She made sure we had everything we needed and then some. She raised us in a loving Christian home and has helped mold us into the individuals we are today.  Now I am the one reassuring her that everything is going to be okay and making sure she is ok.  It's crazy how roles in life can reverse so quickly and so early. You never expect when you are in your mid-twenties that you will have to deal with such grown up things with your parents. Life sometimes comes too quickly and that is when we have to so grateful for what we have and not take for granted our relationships with others.

With God's help our family will get through this and not only get through it, but come out of it even stronger! Every event and every season in life has its purpose. I know that God uses those to mold us and to continue to mold us into the person he wants us to be.

If you don't mind keep my mom in your prayers as she continues to recover from surgery and as she prepares to start chemo! Thanks y'all!

Hope everyone has a great weekend and a happy Cinco de Mayo!

My New Adventure

Hey there! Sorry I have been MIA! Kevin and I had a pretty busy weekend with friends. Friday night I went to dinner and to see The Lucky One with my sister-in-law Kristie and some other ladies in the neighborhood. We had a great time. Saturday night we had a shindig at another neighbors house and just enjoyed the beautiful weather.  Needless to say, I didn't have much time on the ole' computer! A lot has been going on in life these days! I will go into all that in a later post, but for now I want to tell you about my new adventure in life!

I'm now a Scentsy Consultant! That's right, you can now get all your Scentsy warmers, scents and other fun products from ME! I'm so excited about this, but a little scared at the same time. I have always had a fear with anything in the field of sales and that I won't be successful at it! I'm trying my darndest to be postive about this and just have fun with it!

A Scentsy warmer is a decorative ceramic peice that plugs into an outlet. There is a light at the base of the warmer and on top there is a dish that holds the scent bar. The scent bar will soften and release the fragrence. The scent bar does not get very hot so it is safe around children and pets. The warmers range in 3 different sizes. There is the full size warmer, the mid-size warmer and a plug in.

Every month there is a new scent of the month.

May Scent of the Month - Cherry Vanilla 10% for the month of May Only! Sweet as the finishing touch atop your favorite sundae. Cherry Vanilla is a delightful swirl of candied cherry and sugared almonds folded into velvety white chocolate ice cream.

If you would like to order products or just browse you can check out my webpage:  https://ashleywhitfield.scentsy.us/ There are a lot of fun products. These make for great for gifts, too!