greetings from vacationville

Can I just tell you how overwhelmed I am by each of your sweet comments and e-mails after my post last night, thank you!  I sincerely appreciate your kind words, encouragement and support.  

Sometimes it just helps to talk about the real stuff and be raw.  

I know that God has a plan for our life and even though I don’t know why he puts us through different situations, I trust that he knows what’s best.  And if nothing more, I have learned what I don’t want for my family/kid(s).  

In other news, vacation is still AAAmazing.  Jay woke up at 7 and is still nap free & going strong right now (@ 7:30pm) aka we have a teether Grumpy Gus in the house.  Josh sent me these pictures today of us and the face in the hole mural outside of the Old Schoolhouse Brewery yesterday:     

and look at the funny bathroom signs on the restroom doors:

Today has been a pretty uneventful but very relaxing, which is my kind of vacation these days!

 Exhibit A. That would be Josh(Ty's friend), Josh(my honey), Jay and Ty playing xbox on 2 different tvs.

 I spent some quality time with le poochies.

 How cute is this little pup?  My in-laws are fostering him until they can find him a new home and I.am.in.LOVE.  I think he would make a perfect addition to our little family, don't you?! 

 See! Oakley and Jay are already best pals :) 

And I tried about a million times to put the little beebs to bed!

Ok, Grandpa just got Jay to bed so we are going to watch American Idol as a family.  Oh, and it's SNOWING!  Hopefully we can take the snowmobiles out tomorrow.  And thank you again for your kind words, they truly mean the world to me.  I am so very thankful for the beautiful life that God has blessed me with.  You can't appreciate the sunshine without a little rain, right?! ;)

Happy Humpday!

And of course I can't resist showing off my cute baby in his snow gear:

Today

 Today was a good day but it was also a hard day.  We went on a day trip to Winthrop (which is about an hour away) with Josh’s family.  I had so much fun looking at the local shops and checking out the town.  We went to the best restaurant called the Old Schoolhouse Brewery.  

The food was amazing (can you say guacamole, pepper-jack, bacon burger with sweet potato fries- yum!) and after sampling some of Josh’s beer I was kicking myself that I didn’t order my own (and I’m not even a beer drinker).  We met up with one of my Josh’s dad’s firefighter friends who now lives up there and checked out his place up in the snowy mountains.

On the way home I ended up riding home with the in-laws and my sister-in-law, Kenzie & Josh, Jay and Ty (my brother-in-law) rode together.  We drove into the mountains through the most beautiful scenery and I started reminiscing about family trips of my own.  I started thinking about the good times that my family had.  I hurt hearing Scot talk about plans he wanted to make with his family and the love and interest he had in each member of his family.  I wondered how my dad could have given up on our family.  I wished that my dad would have that same interest in me that Scot has in his kids, instead of the reality of my dad only talking to me 3 or 4 times since August.  I fought back tears and focused on the scenery, I bit the inside of me cheek and tried to keep up with the small talk. 

After we pulled in the driveway I went to our room, I crawled under the covers and just let go.  I don’t understand.  I don’t understand how you can cheat on your wife for 24 years of your 28 year marriage.  I don’t understand how you cannot have time for your kids who so desperately want your attention and approval. I don’t understand how someone can stand in front of a church pretending to be something they aren’t.  I don’t understand how someone could live a double life.  I don’t understand how you could hurt your kids so badly and not show any remorse.  I don’t understand. 

I laid under the covers in the dark for what seemed like hours.  I heard the door open, the covers lifted and Josh’s arm wrapped around me.  He held me and I cried.  I cried until I had no more tears.  He held me and made promises to me about our life and our future.  He held me and prayed for me, for us.

Today was a good day, but it was a hard day. I am so thankful for the amazing man that I get to call my husband.  I love that we get to write our own endings and I refuse to let the past shape my our future. 

Marvelous Monday

So far vacation is MARVELOUS!  

This morning Josh, JAY and  I slept in until 9!

It's so beautiful over here, just look at the view from our morning walk:

I've seen this "write it out" challenge on a few different blogs and wanted to participate.  There are 8 questions and you hand-write your answers out instead of typing them so that everyone can see what your handwriting looks like.  

Here are the questions:

1. What's your name / blogger name?
2. What's your blog's URL?
3. Write "The quick fox jumps over the lazy dog."
4. Favorite quote?
5. Your favorite song?
6. Your favorite band / singers?
7. Anything else you want to say?
8. Tag 3 - 5 other people.

Here goes...

 After writing this out I realized that my handwriting is so much different than it used to be and basically changes daily.  I really don't ever write much more than drink orders in coffee short hand these days {speaking of, I need to do another Barista Blabber... I have a few doozies for you guys!}  You should play along and show off your penmanship, good or bad.

Hope you all have a great Monday.  My challenge for the night is to try to convince the family to watch The Bachelor tonight, wish me luck!!

Greetings from the road...

We are mid road trip and everything is going great.  I have my Sbux, my buns are toasty {thanks to the in-laws for letting us use their Denali with glorious heated seats}, my honey, good tunes, a cinnamon crunch bagel from Panera and a sleeping baby in the backseat.  What more could a girl want?!

I wanted to share something with you that made me giggle... one of my Valentine's Day cards from Josh.   The perfect card for your barista/wife:

-Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Friday Favs

ThankG

od

It's

F

riday

!  

Ok, was it just me or was today the hardest day ever to wake up?!  I hit the snooze button until the last.possible.second. and it was definitely "one of those days" @ the cafe today.  Which makes me even happier that next week = our full week vacation to Brewster!  I cannot even begin to tell you how excited I am.  Knowing that there was a vacation light at the end of the tunnel is what kept me going this week!  

I plan do to a lot of sleeping in and hanging with the family.  

I haven't done a Favorite Things Friday in a few weeks because honestly I didn't have any life altering products to share.  But now I do.  

Life Altering Product #1

Ok, so maybe a Kinect isn't "life altering" but it's pretty dang sweet.  The thing I love most about the Kinect is that there is NO remote or controller, you are the controller.  We all worked up a pretty good sweat after playing it for a few hours, which is probably the main reason why I like it.  I'm not a big gamer.  My favorite game so far is Dance Central, it is especially fun to play after a few cocktails! 

 Another cool feature is that it is has a voice control start, I literally say "x-box" and it perks up... I feel like I'm in the Jetsons.  

Life Altering Product #2

highlighter/blush

First off, how come nobody ever told me about highlighter/blush?!  I recently bought Smashbox's soft lights in Shimmer and HOLY COW it is aaaaamazing.  It gives your skin the perfect healthy glow, I love putting it on my cheek bones/ brow bones for a little luminescent dewiness.  My sister got a sample of benefit's highbeam as a bonus the last time she went shopping for makeup and gave it to me.  It is also a great product, but I think it is meant to be used with a liquid foundation because sometimes when I put it over my BareMinerals it looks like a hot mess.  Anyways, bottom line: a good highlighter is now a necessity for me and if you haven't tried using one yet GO!   

Life Altering Product #3

I've been wearing NARS Super Orgasm blush for awhile now and as a lip sauce junkie I don't know how I'd never heard about the Super Orgasm gloss.  It is seriously the most gorgeous sheer pink color, it has sparkle without being too in-your-face.  It has a really smooth texture and that's really important to me, I hate feeling like I have heavy makeup on my mouth.  Basically if you like the blush you should definitely give the gloss a try. It's my new fav.

Super Orgasm blush

And those, my dearies are my favorite things this Friday.  I hope you have a fabulous evening.  I just found out that it is National Wine Day so I'm off to celebrate!! *Cheers*

pay it forward and my lie

Time to come clean about my two truths and a lie.  Any last minute guesses?  

Here they are again:

1.  I attended 3 different Colleges/Universities

2.  I have never been to Disneyland

3.  I had a pet duck in college named Oliver

The lie: #2.  I HAVE been to Disneyland {3 times actually} and I can't wait to take Jay when he gets a little older!

Which means that in college I did fact have a pet duck named Oliver.  He was the sweetest little guy in the whole world.  He would follow me and my roommate around our apartment and his little webbed feet made the cutest noise on the tile floor in our kitchen.  He loved to sit on my lap when I watched tv and yes, he was potty trained.  Oliver's all time favorite thing was swimming in our bathtub.  

He was a good duck.

A few weeks back I came across Kristen's post about the "Pass it Forward" project, thankfully I commented quickly and was able to participate.  I love the idea of one person doing something nice for someone else for no reason other than to make that person's day a little brighter!  Last week my package came in the mail and it totally made my day.  I love finding more than just bills in the mailbox!  

Here's what was in my package from Kristen:

A super cute daily desk calendar with pictures of tired poochies on each page!  Hopefully, it will curb my puppy cravings until we get one of our own.

Today's picture:

The best part of the challenge is that I now get to pass it forward to 3 of you!  

Here are the rules:

1.  The first THREE commentators on this post will be my three "Pay it Forward" recipients.

2.  I will contact the THREE commentators to get their home address and then ship out a fun little gift.

3.  You must be willing to host a "Pay it Forward" on your own blog for THREE blog commentators.

Please make sure to leave your e-mail address so that I can contact you for your mailing address!

HAPPY HUMPDAY!

I feel just like Haley Joel Osment ;)

I'm a liar (ok, not really, that was a lie)

Melissa @ Write it in Lipstick is hosting Two Truths and a Lie Tuesday, feel free to pop on over and link up in the fun! {how cute is she?!}

Here are my 2 truths and a lie in no particular order:

1.  I attended 3 different Colleges/Universities

2.  I have never been to Disneyland

3.  I had a pet duck in college named Oliver

Alright folks, what do you think?! 

1, 2 or 3?

Grammys 2011

Time out.  There's more to the grammy's than the red carpet?!  I'll be honest... this year I only watched the red carpet coverage and the first couple minutes of the actual show.

Here are my top 2 picks for best dressed:

 Selena Gomez

Julianna Hough

...and some of my picks for worst dressed:

 mia

 Rihanna

Nicki Minaj

Honorable mention:

the always fabulous Giuliana Rancic 

Eva Longoria

Katy Perry

How amaze does Jennifer Hudson look these days?!

 I thought her body looked great, but didn't like the little peek-a-boob black bra thing going on under her dress.

talk about a total transformation!

I loved when she told Ryan Seacrest, "I can't even sleep at night because I can't wait to see what I'm going to wear the next day."


...and I'm not even gonna go there with Lady Gaga incubating in the egg/womb.  Don't get me wrong, I love me some Gaga but what.is.next?!  At least she's entertaining!!

What are your best/worst dressed Grammy picks?

All you Need is LOVE Challenge: Day 8

Today is the last day of the "All you need is LOVE" Blog Challenge, thank you to Neely, Sam and Courtney for the fun topics!  The final topic is:

On Valentine's Day I {LOVE} to...

Spend time with people I love.  

This year Josh worked late so we had a sibling date, it was so much fun spending time with Jay, Claire and Brenton!  I think it's important to not only let your significant other know they're appreciated, but to show your appreciation for other special people that you love on Valentine's Day.

Enjoy some delicious chocolate

Tell friends and family how much they mean to me

And of course, spend some quality time with the Mr.

What do you {LOVE} to do on Valentine's Day?!