Bunny trails

Good evening, readers! Back to the blog! This past weekend we enjoyed a very much-needed visit "home" to see my parents in Hattiesburg.

Yes, I still call it "home" even though I have been married for a year-and-a-half. Can any of you relate?! There's nothing like going home to be greeted with a snack and either an ice cold Fresca or Diet Coke with lime from my precious momma; and there's nothing like going home to be squeezed by a big teddy bear hug from my dad; or there's nothing like going home to sleep in the freshly, clean-made sheets on my cloud, soft bed in my old bedroom and being woken up to the fresh smell of coffee brewing and breakfast cooking. My mom never fails to cook a big breakfast when we go home.

If there is one thing I admire about my mom the most is her giving and serving heart. She is constantly looking out for my family and I whether it is cooking us a nice meal or just simply sitting down and taking the time to ask how my sisters, brother, and I are really doing; and when she does, we tell her because we know she will pray for us. And I'm not just saying one time, my mother is one of the strongest and most devoted prayer warriors I know. She truly trusts and believes in the Lords' faithfulness. If we said it once, we said it hundred times this weekend: God is Sovereign over all things. I pray that I will be more trusting and less doubting and more faithful and less faithless in all circumstances.

 My mom has set such a good example for my sisters, brother, and I, and I pray that I can be half the servant that my mom is to us to other people. A verse that my mom truly does live by and encourages my siblings and I with is this: "Those who sow to please their sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; those who sow to please the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." Galatians 6: 8-9

Okay. I just went off on a big bunny trail, but I definitely had to share that with y'all. I am one thankful and blessed daughter.

Back to the weekend: Will and I went down late Friday afternoon and visited with my mom and dad. The four of us later met Will's parents and sister Erin to eat at Robert St. John's new Italian restaurant in Hattiesburg, Tabella. It was a lot of fun for my parents to visit with Will's parents as well as it was to celebrate Will's 24th birthday!

Erin, Will, and I

SIL

 On Saturday morning, we slept late, ate a good breakfast, and lounged around the house. Later on, my mom and I went and ran errands. We love getting in the car and just going to look at different places. I found a couple of refreshers for the house including a new fall wreath. I am officially ready for cold weather and FALL! After getting back from running errands, Will and I got ready for a highschool friend of mine's wedding. It was so much fun and beautiful! I had a great time seeing old friends and getting to celebrate Susan and Blake's Wedding Day!

Friends since elementary school: Susan, Whitney and I

Olivia and I :)

Laura! Sweet college friend and the groom's cousin.

My groom :)

Happily married

On Sunday, it was Will's 24th birthday! We went to church with my family and then celebrated with a yummy, home-cooked meal and a three berry angel food cake trifle.

We didn't have 24 candles so we used 6. 2+4=6. Get it? Ok. I'll stop now.

Mom, Hannah, and I

Me and the Birthday Man! I can't say Birthday Boy any more because he is old. JK.

One of the presents I got Will for his birthday was a fire-pit. Can you tell I'm ready for fall?! We are really excited about having friends over and using it when the weather cools off. This probably won't be for another two months or so, but it gives us something to look forward to, right? We are both so ready for Mississippi State football and fall weather. Not to mentioned how excited I am about scarves, tights, and boots season! Ahh...

Ok, so this post was filled with lots of bunny trails, but that's kindof what you do when you blog, right? Get your thoughts down. If you have a blog and I'm not following it already, leave a comment with your blog name! Y'all have a good night and thanks as always for reading! Hope you all had a fabulous weekend as well!

A fabric face-lift

We are in the process of working on our latest DIY project: a fabric face-lift! It's one of those projects that I've wanted to do since we moved here, but have procrastinated actually starting it because I thought it would be much more work than it actually is {do you have one of those?} Also, it's actually a lot easier than what I thought it would be thanks to my handy husband, Will. Here's a brief tutorial to recovering chairs:

Step 1:

Pick out your fabric!

The yellow fabric above is for the kitchen chairs and the colorful paisley fabric is for the kitchen window valences. I thought these two fabrics coordinated well together because I wanted something a little more simple for the chair cushions and something a little more fun for the window valences. So, this is what I picked!

Step 2:

Gather all of your supplies

All you need for this project is fabric, drill, staple gun, staples, and pliers.

Step 3:

Use the drill to unscrew the old chair cushion

Step 4:

Once the cushion is removed, take the pliers and pick out the old staples

After taking out the old staples, the old fabric will come right off.

Step 5:

Use the old fabric shape as a template to cut the new fabric piece

Step 6:

Use the staple gun to staple the new fabric onto the chair cushion

 Hold the fabric very tightly to ensure smooth fabric. Otherwise, you may have creases if it is not tightly stapled.

Step 7:

Once the new fabric is stapled onto the cushion, drill the cushion back to chair, and voila!

This is one of our four kitchen chairs. We still have our eight dining room chairs to recover, but I'm just so glad to be done with our old {rainbow as I call it} kitchen chairs.

Old

New

There you have it: out with the old, in with the new! Let me know if you have any tips to recovering chairs that I may not have considered this go-round. Have a good night, readers!

Today marks a year

August is here! Can hardly believe it! "Summer" has come and is almost gone {for Will at least.} He has his summer school night class final this Thursday {please say a prayer for him if you think about it} and then starts his second year of law school in a couple of weeks. Wow, where has the time gone?

Speaking of time, we have now lived in Jackson for a whole year! We moved here last summer {July 29th to be exact} and I cannot believe it has been a year. As some of you may know, I had a hard transition coming from the small college town of Starkville to the big, "metro" city of Jackson. I think it was more post-college that was so hard and getting used to the newness of everything, but that's a different story. I'm so thankful to God for His continual pouring of blessings on Will and me, and how He has caused me to grow and love where I am now.

Today marks a whole year of me working at my still beloved Anthro! I've come a long way from starting off part-time. I honestly thought that it would only be a part-time job when we moved to Jackson and that I would find a full-time job at a hospital or some kind of advertising firm where I could use my marketing degree. However, the Lord had other plans in mind for me. {Still continuing to learn that His plans are greater than my plans.} I'm so thankful to do what I love--selling and working with people. I cannot tell you how many people I have met and connections I've made just through work alone--not to mention, how many people I see at my job. In fact, I've seen people that I haven't seen in months or even years and it is so fun to just catch up on life!

Even though we've been in Jackson only a year, there's already some updates I want to make on our duplex. Yes, we are renting and we will probably continue to rent until Will gets out of school, but I still want to make it a livable and enjoyable place! Decorating and updating are always on my mind. In fact, I am always getting ideas off of my latest social network obsession: pintrest. If you don't have one, get one. Yes, it's just another distraction, but it is a fun way to get decorating ideas, recipe ideas, etc. Seeing all of these decorating websites and ideas, I have been inspired to learn how to sew!

With that idea in mind, my mom is going to teach me how to make throw pillows, and we are also going to make new window valances for the kitchen.

I am also planning on recovering our dining room and kitchen chairs with some of this fabric, and I CAN'T WAIT! The fabric on our chairs right now has been on my to-do list to change ever since we moved to Jackson, but I just haven't gotten around to it. We are finally getting around to it! I will be sure to post a before and after picture once we are finished.

Back in one of my older blog posts, I mentioned Will working on a project for me in our den. I just realized that I never posted a picture of what he did. So, here it is! Below is the before picture. {Unfortunately, the only before picture I took was at Christmas time, so please note that the white reindeer did not sit on the piano for 9 months of us living here!}

Before

After

Will made those two shelves for me so that I had more room to display decor. I think he did a pretty good job! The four green brackets that the wooden boards are sitting on are from Anthro, and Will found the wood at his dad's shop. All he did was measure the wall space and bracket length, cut the wood to those measurements, sand it, and put a natural gloss on it. Then he just placed it on top of the brackets. Ta-da-there are our two new shelves! I made it sound so easy, and I ain't no wood-worker, but according to Will, it was that easy to make.

Have any of you been working on any home projects or do you have any ideas for home projects? I'm always so interested an open to any kind of decorating ideas--so please share if you any! Have a wonderful week!