Thursday, April 24, 2014

Spring!

  Blogging is something that really enjoy! I love reading others blogs as well, however, I fail miserably at posting once or twice a week. I am so busy between my two jobs, my wonderful husband, and two pups that need my love and attention that I constantly put this on the back burner. I feel like I should focus on making this a priority though, It helps me vent and talk about things that are constantly going through my mind.
Y'all see this sidewalk? Well I want you to know that I have worked my butt off on this thing! Yes my husband did help, but from hauling the border rocks from a rock pile in the woods to the stepping stones this has been my latest project. I am sooo proud of this! We needed something because we live on a dirt road and I was honestly tired of tracking all that stuff in my house. I still track some, but not near as bad. My crazy pup Remi thinks that she is JAWS and seriously terrorizes any and everything that we try to put out. She has an obsession with eating things especially plastic so my solar lights did not last long (the cheapie ones anyway) I has invested in more durable ones that have yet to be placed in the yard. We will just have to wait and see how that goes...
      Don't let their cute faces fool you Banjo(top) and Remi(bottom) are two of the most spoiled rotten dogs on this earth! I sure do love my fur babies even if they do tear things up and dig up my plants!

I just can't help myself, I just love him!!!

   And well, this fine fella right here is my partner in crime and my hunk of a firefighter! He will probably kill me for posting these pictures but I don't care. I love him and these pictures capture exactly what it is about him that I love. His ability to be some composed and together at all times. That man has had my heart since we were in middle school. We dated on and off all throughout high school and college but he has always been there for me. These past few months have been a whirlwind because he has been studying his butt off (between 3 jobs mind you) for a chance at an Engineer promotion at the Fire Department. Well at 4:30pm on Friday April 4th he got the call that he has gotten the position! Boy was I proud of that man! I am always proud of him and everything that he had accomplished but this was different. I think it was because it was an advancement to create a secure foundation for us to hopefully sooner rather than later start a family on. (give us a few years!) He is such a supportive man and even though we are both hard headed I would want to be on this journey through life without him! God knew exactly what he was doing when he put Jason into my life, and I will forever be grateful.
This is a picture of us from 8th grade! Ohhh my I had serious brace face and he was all cute and baby faced! 

Now that spring/summer is upon us we are going to be planting out garden and continuing to do some exterior improvements to our home! i love this time of year and I can't wait to update y'all on what is next to come! Hopefully my next entry will consist of LOTS of blooming flowers! :) 

Oh Happy Day! Enjoy your Thursday, and remember to always tell your loved ones those three little words; I Love You!

Always ~ Krista

Thursday, March 27, 2014

Catching up on this whirlwind we call Life

        It has definitely been a while since I posted, I had every intention of making my post a weekly or monthly thing but I am a slacker when it comes to these things so I will try again... TAKE TWO!

        Since my last post I have been on a cross country road trip to Wyoming ( I promise that one day I WILL live there), had some detrimental losses in our family, celebrated a wedding anniversary, Christmas, and who knows what else... It's so very hard to keep up with everything when you work two jobs and have a busy life outside of work!

        Let's start with the cross country road trip. This was our honeymoon (the OFFICIAL one!) I won't bore you with pictures of the road trip its self, but I will share a few. If I had more on my computer I would share more. We started in good ole North Carolina at 4 in the morning, and it took us about 30 hours to get there. We stopped in Kansas City our first night and arrived in Jackson Hole Wyoming at like 10 at night. The time changes threw us off but they were definitely in our favor. I strongly recommend road trips for couples especially newly weds. I'm not sure it would be so great with a car full of kids, but then again I could be wrong. The time that we spent together was so nice and we talked and enjoyed the scenery ( even if it was at 75-80 mph). I have never in my life seen such vast farmland. Being an agriculture lover myself I wanted to take pictures of EVERYTHING! From the land to the farm equipment everything was massive and in such larger quantities that you see here in North Carolina. Here are a few from of the states we drove through...
Illinois!

Gateway Arch in St. Louis Missouri!

Kansas!

Iowa!

Nebraska! ( Loved their sign for sure)

           
       Wind Farms were everywhere especially when we entered Nebraska and it was really windy (of course). We thought it was so cool because we have a lot of solar farms here in North Carolina so seeing another source of generating power was awesome!

    When we FINALLY reached Wyoming, I was beyond excited. I was never so glad to see a state sign than I was then. I couldn't believe that this was actually happening. This was the farthest that either of us had ever been from NC. We were on our own Peewee's Big Adventure.
Sorry the picture quality is awful and the bugs and bug guts Oh my they were awful.
And the sky... Did I mention how beautiful it was?!?! Pictures just do not begin to do it justice. The clouds were so different than they are around here. It's weird, I don't really know how to explain it. I took soooo many pictures of the sky, but this is one of my favorites, even through the bug guts! :)

As we drove through Wyoming this reminded me of the Badlands that you would see in a western movie. These rock formations were totally cool. 

This is Lake Jenny is Teton National Park. It was beautiful and the water was soooo clear you could stand on the rocks and see little fish swimming around your feet. I could have sat at this spot all day and just enjoyed my day. it was very relaxing.

        We also visited Yellowstone but I have yet to put my own personal pictures on the computer. We got to see Old Faithful and the other geysers and hot springs. My favorite had to be the Morning Glory Pool. The colors were phenomenal! Here is a pic I found online. 

     This was one of the best times of my life and I am so very thankful for this opportunity. Jason (my husband) and I decided that we would definitely visit again. Even though we wish we were rich and could just up and move out there. It's just breathtakingly  beautiful! 

    When we got back from Wyoming, as life started to get back to normal Jason's grandma had to have surgery and she ended up taking a turn for the worse and we lost her in August. She was such a special, beautiful woman and I loved her so much! I now have a wind chime tree in my front yard in remembrance of her and the love that she had for them. You never realize how much you take people and the time that you spend with them for granted until they are gone.


        We grow as people and learn to adjust to loses, but it still hurts. I can say that experiencing a tragic loss can either bring you together as a couple or tear you apart. in our case I feel it only brought us closer. I was able to be there for Jason and his family during their time of need. While I was hurting too, I knew that I had to be strong. As life continues we found ourselves in the month of October and we were celebrating our 1st Anniversary as a married couple.  Jason surprised me and took me to the Christmas Inn in Pigeon Forge for our Anniversary. It was so very special and I LOVED IT! You see, Christmas is my absolute favorite time of the year as far as Holidays are concerned so I guess you could say I was in my own personal heaven! <3
They gave us an ornament! It was in our room when we arrived!

LOVE IT!!!

We ate a slice of our cake a year later, and surprisingly it tasted good. 


      Christmas came and it was a big one because I decided to host Christmas for most of the family ( I know, what was I thinking?!?!?) Well, it really wasn't that bad. Other than the frantic cleaning of the house! Hahaha. We fried a turkey in the deep fryer that I won in a Holiday contest on the radio and it was delish. A big reason behind hosting Christmas was that my grandma ( my dad's mom) has Alzheimer's and before it reaches advanced stages I want to create memories that we will have to cherish for the rest of our lives. Christmas was hard too, especially without Jason's grandma it just wasn't the same. I am so grateful that family plays such an influential part in our lives because they help make this life better to be in. Without their love and support sometimes life would really suck!
These are my fur babies Banjo and Remi at Christmas! 

     Well, since I've caught you up on basically the rest of 2013 I will leave it at that for now because trust me there's more to come. I hope that you enjoy reading this. Sorry for the overload of detail and pictures. I wish that I had documented our trip daily, that would have been amazing! Oh well...

Just let me leave you with one of my favorite quotes;

"Like branches on a tree we grow in different directions, yet our roots remain as one".

Always,

Krista

Thursday, June 13, 2013

And so it begins...

Having only been married since October I guess you could say we are still in the "honeymoon phase". Jason (my husband) and I have been working on his great grandparents home for several years now and it has definitely been a task! Currently we are finishing up the trim in the dining room. I really wish that we had taken before and after pictures because the house is slowly but surely becoming "Our Home".


The picture above not only describes the whole renovating/ remodeling process, it also describes the process of marriage, and the weight loss journey that I am currently on.It feels so weird putting this out there for all of you to read, but I am on a journey; one that I wish I would have started while I was in college and life wasn't so hard. My goal is to lose 75 to 100 pounds. I know when some of my friends hear that they are like there is no way that you need to lose that much but in all honesty I do. I am currently involved in a small support group and we just finished up a 6 week challenge. I only lost 9 pounds, but it was a very eye opening experience.

The hardest part of this for me is lacking the support of my husband. He doesn't really eat healthy food or scale back on the portions. In return this makes the whole process stressful and very hard to do. I also blame his love for ice cream and the fact that we have to keep it in our house! LOL.

I hope to post more soon, I feel like by putting everything out there for y'all to read is going to help me not only hold myself accountable, but also help me along this journey! Please feel free to comment, just please be nice! :)

Always ~ Krista


p.s. Here is a picture of our trim and the color I stained it!