quick fix

ugh - falling towels (plus un-hung pictures)

little ribbon loop

quick fix!

decorating

I finally pulled out my sewing machine and since it's taking up over 1/2 of our counter space - literally, that's all of the counter space - I figured I better get over my fear of messing things up and start working on some of these project I've been bookmarking forever.

I've been looking for a shower curtain for forever and couldn't find anything I really liked until I ran across this table cloth at Target. Yes, the walls of our apartment are mint green and the carpet is dark green but I've decided to ignore it and use my pretty turquoise stuff anyway :)

Since button holes are terrifying, I decided just to sew a pocket on the top of the cloth for the rod and use a 2nd rod for the plastic curtain. It's kinda bunchy at the top, but I'm dealing with it.

Propping the pictures up on the rail is the first step to hanging them, right?


The combo of plastic apartment blinds and a window unit is a real beauty, but I decided to try to hide it in our bedroom using this tutorial of some faux roman blinds. Don't you love all the Ikat prints out right now?!

And now lets pretend it's all pretty with no window unit -


I'm about to drive James crazy by moving stuff around, but we're almost - almost - all unpacked and moved in!

Raccoon Mountain

This weekend we headed to Raccoon Mountain for our first hike!
When we got there and finally found the trail, it turned out to be an advanced trail instead of beginner and then it immediately started lightning.
Good start.


We made it about 1/2 mile before it started raining - like torrential downpour, thunder echoing off the trees, lightning like crazy raining.



So we hiked/jogged back to the car looking like real official hikers. nice.


We headed back to the mountain on Sunday for bike rides instead.

We drive across this huge dam with this gorgeous view.




I was really nervous about trying to ride the trails, but we had a blast.
James is one of those crazy athletic people who can do anything and likes to do it fast - snow-skiing, wakeboarding, mountain biking, water skiing, whatever.
Lucky for me, he really likes teaching and is super patient.

Here we are all geared out in our sweet helmets, gloves, camelbacks, and cushy shorts - not stylish but totally necessary.



I'm pretty horrible but quickly learned:
biking is better than hiking
biking in the mountains is way more fun than biking on the street
and downhill is way more fun than up.

We had so much fun and I can't wait to get back out there.

Chattanooga Lookouts

Last week we braved the heat and headed out to a Chattanooga Lookouts baseball game. They're a AA team of the LA Dodgers.

With my handy-dandy coupon, the tickets were a whopping $4.


3 for $1 - the best money I ever spent. They obviously didn't last long.

good times

IKEA

My very first trip to Ikea was during Spring Break when we came to visit James' school and since then I've been dreaming of the day when we would move here and I could take the hour and a half trip to Atl to go again.

I know.
I dream big.

To further show you how dorky I am: Me, Em, and Grace had a garage sale in the spring and I've been saving the proceeds for months just for the ikea trip :)

'Unfortunately' when we were moving, one set of shelves wouldn't fit up the stairs, our desk broke, and we needed more room for clothes, sooo...


we headed to Ikea on Friday afternoon!!

Here's some things I was seriously loving -







Check this guy out - we first spotted him lounging in the chair sections and then here in the closets, completely out of it. He didn't even budge at the flash. hilarious. He might have been ready to go.


We ended up getting 3 small shelves that go together, one bigger shelf for clothes, a desk for James, and a couple knick-knacks.
Here's James obviously pumped at the hours of putting furniture together ahead of him this weekend.

I'm not gonna lie - I was seriously impressed with how fast he put it all together. Everything was done by noon on Sat. He's a good one.

And for supper on the way home:

Ikea's famous cinnamon rolls. pretty amazing.

The clothes shelves still need some organizing and the desk is covered in stuff so I'll show them later, but I'm loving our shelves in the living room!


Please ignore the boxes and the elbow in the corner. I'm proud to say that we almost have all the boxes unpacked!! Ready to start having some fun decorating!

Happy Sunday

crazy...

It's been a crazy week, but finally,

It's official!





We've moved!



We headed to Hattiesburg to pack up all our stuff last weekend and I'm so glad we had one last weekend in the barn. I really am sad it's over! Excited about the future but still sad - these mixed emotions are really draining...

We moved in on Wednesday which also happened to be my first day of school so my sweet parents drove all the way up here late on Tuesday to help James move us in. I walked in after school expecting to see piles of boxes but instead they had not only moved everything in but unpacked almost all the boxes! It was amazing!!

The first day of school is always so exciting. We plan and plan and have lists of things to do but never know quite what to expect. It's exciting and terrifying all at once.

piles of 'Caught Being Good' coins all ready to be handed out for any decent behavior


the classics, of course




even Frog and Toad and Mouse are ready


Oh how I love new, clean, school supplies. So bright and cheerful - is it weird I get giddy over a new box of crayons?


I guess it's official - my own stationary!



And what makes the craziest first day of school in an brand new city and moving day so much better?


Grace sent flowers to my school and they were delivered right when I was starting to wonder what was I going to do with these kids for the next 5 hours - they definitely make everything better



Yea, she's that kind of sister-in-law. Amazing


Besides one kid calling me out because I said the principal's name wrong and another one calling me out because I had 2 Diet Cokes before noon, things are going pretty great!
I think I'm going to love 2nd grade.

Our First Visitor

Look who came all the way to Chattanooga to see us!



Ok, so maybe he also preached while he was here on Monday :)
It was so fun to see a familiar face.
While we were waiting to to talk to Tony, look who walked up to say hey to him:



Oh yea - that's Kay Arthur

I said, "James, why is Tony taking him picture with that...oh my gosh, it's her! it's her! it's her!"
I only freaked out a little.

We'll be headed home this weekend to pack up the trailer so we can finally move into our apt on Monday! yay!!