Day 16: Dream House

This would definately be a dream house for me... I LOVE castles. I always have. When I was in Europe a few years ago I saw every castle I could. They just fastinate me. I love how unique they always are. Obviously this is not something I would ever own but this picture below definately is! It has a few castle like qualities- my main desire in houses is that they have personality, even with our first home I wanted something that was sweet and cute. I also really like plantation homes because I love the white columns but the gothic era is probably my favorite.

I can't wait for a few years when we start looking at houses again - although we had to move quickly I had so much fun looking at everything. It really didn't stress me out too much because I was just too excited!

Day 15: Favorite Bible Verse

It's hard to just pick one but I have become a pretty big fan of Psalms in the last few weeks and one of my new favorites is below:


Psalms 62:5-8
For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fotress; I shall not be shaken. On God rests my salvation and my glory; my might rock, my refuge is God. Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.


My all-time favorite verse since I was a kid was:
Isaiah 40:29-31
He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.

Day 14: A picture that you love

This is totally cliche but I love this picture from our wedding day. It was actually taken by one of my bridesmaids/bff's, not sure if it was Raven or Lindsee but I love it. Our wedding day was definately the best day of my life thus far and I so wish I could do it all over again! I love change and fresh new starts so of course I love the start of our new life together. Some people remember their day as stressful but thankfully I just remember mine as pure bliss :-) It was a day that we were surrounded by all of the people that we love who support our relationship- what could be better??

I keep telling Ryan that I want to renew our vows soon so we can have another ceremony and I can wear my dress again- he tells me we aren't celebrities and should probably wait a few years. I disagree... ;-)

Day 13: Goals...

Goals... these change from day to day at times but here are a few that I have right now:

• Become a runner- I would really like to at least accomplish a 10K in the next year. Before moving to Fort Worth I really had a great start on training and then the wedding and my new job took over and now here I am 2.5 years later and want to start it all again!
• Get debt free! We have some student loans to take care of and with Ryan still being in school we are unable to make as a big a dent as I would like so we are trying to make a conscious effort to cut back on things that we don't need.
• Become healthier! Yes, I would really like to lose weight- I have lost about 12 lbs so far but I have a long way to go. Beyond just loosing weight though I want to become healthier and I want the weight to be lost in a healthy way through diet and exercise.
• Travel as much as possible before we have kids- I know that once we decide to start a family our priorities will need to change and we want to welcome the changes. This being said I want to enjoy this time that it's just us because we can never get it back and we have alot of places we want to visit and things we want to do- I really love this chapter that we are in!
• Continue to enjoy my career- I am so lucky to have a job that I get to work from home and do something that I enjoy while also making a difference- I don't know where my career is headed but I do know that I want it to continue to challenge me and be something that I have fun with.

Those are just a few for now!

Day 12: What you believe...

I am so thankful to have grown-up in a strong Christian home. My parents didn't just take us to church- they served and they lead very Godly lives and I look up to them so much. I was saved a very young age of 5 on December 11, 1989. Although it is young and some people don't thing a 5 year old can really know what they are being saved from I remember the feeling of asking Jesus in my life and never being the same.

Although I grew up in church I did loose my way a little after highschool like alot of people. There were definately chapters in my life that I was selfish, lost and confused about where my life was headed. Beyond anything I ever deserved though the Lord fought for me and brought me back through a Christian sorority that I joined while in college. Shortly after He blessed me even more with bringing me Ryan. I am so blessed to be with a man of God who truly leads me closer to the Lord. No, he isn't perfect (although I really thought he might have been for a while there haha) but he fights daily for his relationship with God to grow and I can't ask for anything more.

I believe that Jesus is the only way and by His grace alone I am saved. I hope that my lifesong will sing to Him and that one day our children can say that they grew up in a home like the one I did.

Day 11: Favorite TV Shows...

I do love a good sitcom... since we have joined Netflix however Ryan and I rarely ever watch the actual TV- we became huge fans of Psych, Arrested Developement and after we finished those we moved on to Lost which is by far the most addicting thing I have ever watched! We are in Season 3 and its going to be sad when it is all over! My favorite shows of all time are below:

Boy Meets World
Friends
One Tree Hill
Felicity
Dawson's Creek

My fav's that are actually still in existance are:

Psych
One Tree Hill
Glee
The Office
Modern Family
Dancing with the Stars

What are your favorites?? Any of you Lost fans out there??

Day 10: Something you are afraid of...

I am not really afraid of much, simply because I don't think about fear much. I also know that my God is much bigger than any fear I could muster up but one thing that I hope is that when I leave this world that it is better off because of me.

That being said I guess you could say that a fear of mine is getting caught up in the mundane business of life and miss out on making a big impact on the people I come in contact with. I hope that I am remembered as being a great wife, friend, daughter and mom someday. Everything else can fall where it may :-)

Day 9: A picture of your friends...

Well finding a picture that has all of my amazing friends together would probably be impossible so I decided to give you a "written picture" of my friends because I am a very blessed girl when it comes to my friendships! I think you can tell alot about a person when you meet their friends so I hope all of you will learn a little bit more about me through this post!

I am a very loyal person, so loyal that I have only lost maybe 2 friendships in my entire life. Obviously friendships are always changing so there will be seasons that certain friends are a bigger part of your life than others because of distance, being in the same chapter in life etc. but my feeling is that once you are friends with me you are always my friend unless you decide differently. That being said I have been so lucky to have picked-up some pretty fabulous friends throughout my 26 years of life. My friends are so important to me and I love celebrating the happy times and being there for them during the sad times and just laughing through everything else.

Because of the importance that I place on my friendships when something goes wrong with them it hurts me pretty bad. I have been deeply hurt over the last few years because of a broken friendship that took a toll on an entire group of my friends. I don't want to go into detail because I want this blog to be about the great friendships I have but I feel you should know where I came from to understand how lucky I feel today. I don't think I will ever know why this brokeness had to occur nor will I understand what actually event happened but there are a few things that I do know...

What I know is that the Lord was so faithful to me during this time and He used some amazing girls and my husband to get me through it all. I know that God is in control and He had a purpose for it happening, that purpose that I truly believe I will learn someday. I also know that the friendships that I do have in my life are based on unconditional love, honesty and the truth that each person is better because of the friendship and for that I am so thankful. I am also thankful for restoration with a few of the friendships invovled and although they are not the relationships they once were there is hope that they will be better despite the pain.

I have a pretty diverse group of friends and I love all of them so much. Below is the line-up... :-)

I was very lucky to have been dropped into a Christian sorority in college and was able to meet girls that brought me closer to the Lord, brought me to Ryan and have been fantastic friends ever since. There is just a closeness I have with these girls that it unexplainable and I just love them!

My jobs have always brought great people my way as well- I have 2 very close friends from a previous job and 4 great friends that the AHA brought to me that have been so great to know!

I also made some incredible friends while living in Fort Worth and was able to become closer than ever to 2 of my sorority sisters while being there as well and those friendships are ones that have a special place in my heart because they were my family for two years. I miss them everyday but I am so thankful for the weekends I get to spend with them and that when we are together it's as if we haven't missed a beat which is exactly how it should be!

Here in the Houston area I am so lucky to have another group of my sorority sisters that I have been able to see on a pretty consistent basis- obviously I wish I could see them every other day but everytime we get together it is so much fun and I really cherish them! We are scattered from the Houston area all the way up to Huntsville and I love when we have reuninons!

Along with all of my work and college friends I have also been able to acquire some really great married friends! This group is a mixture of people from my youth group, college friends who are married now and new friends from our church! Married friends were definately something we lacked up in Fort Worth and here we have an over-flow and I couldn't be happier about that!
Another group of friends that I adore are the mentors that I have been able to acquire from our church. I feel so blessed to be surrounded by older women who love the Lord and who want to invest in me and our ministry. It has been so great to get their advice and just to have that support!

I am also glad to still have a few friends that I have had since highschool, some from TWHS that I have I have recently reconnected with and some from my youth group that have stayed so strong and I love that we have so many great memories while also still having so much in common today.

When I think about the friendships I have been blessed with I know that Lord is not only in control of my relationships but He is also blessing me a ridiculous amount despite the pain that I went through over the broken friendships. It doesn't make me miss those friendships less but it does show me that He hasn't forgotten about my pain and that he is filling my life with uplifting people and I couldn't be more thankful for that!