It turned into a monster.....

  "It's no big deal!"  "Just a little paint and all will be well."  "We've done this tons of times, this time won't be any different."

  These are the things Layton and I said to each other before we started the big painting project... not knowing how big of a deal it would turn into.  =P

  It was a little bit of a last minute project.  Layton hated the paint color that was through the entire house and the living room had bugged him the most.  Not only was it a terrible khaki/gold/sometimes-looked-green color, but we had brown walls, brown carpet, and brown flooring through the dining room.  Everything was this weird khaki/brown!  So finally we decided to do something about it.

  I have to admit early on in this post that I was so afraid of getting anywhere near the color that was already on the walls that I swung a little bit too far in the other direction.  I have now learned my lesson... a lesson that all first time home owners and self fixer-uppers need to learn... the paint WILL look brighter when it is all over the walls.  :)  All of that to say it is brighter than what I wanted, but Layton loves it and it is better that khaki/green/gold.  ;)

  So here is our painting journey that turned into a monster...

  This is the before color... it's kind of hard to see in the weird lighting.  

  And here is Layton cutting in way up high.  :)  I did not want anything to do with the high stuff.  Usually I wouldn't care, but pregnant I didn't trust myself and my clumsiness.  The yellow looks really yellow next to the khaki which made me really nervous at first.

  So, we got the first coat of paint on and realized that we were going to need 3 coats, not 2.  It wouldn't have been a huge deal, but I was almost in my third trimester of pregnancy and just don't move very fast, Layton had some work and then on top of that we both came down with a stomach bug.  So this "small" painting project took about 3 weeks from beginning to end.  ;)

  And here it is... This isn't the best photo of color, but it's the same spot I took the other one so I figured why not.  ;)

  

  This is my house almost back in order.  I was so very glad once everything was put back where it went and everything was clean once again!  I get easily stressed out in a messy house.  :)  (this is probably the best picture of the color)

  And a preggo picture against the newly painted wall.  Third Trimester!!!  Glad to have this big project out of the way before this little one gets here!  :)

Hinkle Colorado Vacation

  Catch-up post number 1.
  We went to CO with Holly, Larry, and Chewy back in August.  It was a lot of fun and we all really enjoyed getting away.  Though it was a lot of car time since we went to 3 different destinations.
  There was lot so laughter and talk, games and hiking, telling each other not to panic while in the mountains and telling Chewy to scoot over!  :)  Coffee, sights, and fresh air.
  Our first stop was to see Kim and her family.  She was a high school friend of Holly's and they hadn't seen each other in 23 years!  We stayed with their family in Denver and got to go up to Estes Park.  It was a lot of fun getting to know new people and see new places.  :)

  This is Kim's family.  The girls were so sweet!  They adopted these two girls and then have three grown kids of their own.  :)

  We stopped at the cutest little coffee shop on the way up the mountain.  But sadly we found out a couple weeks after we got home that it is no longer there, due to the big flood that went through Estes.

  We stopped half way up the mountain and did some hiking and enjoyed the fresh air and time out of the car!  We had been in the car for 14 hours the day before this, so stretching our legs was a much needed experience.  :)

Oh the love!  ;)

Beautiful, beautiful!!!

We made it up the mountain safe and sound.  It was super cold at the top so we didn't stay up for too long.  :)  And then it was quite an adventure getting back down the mountain and out of Estes due to a bike race that was taking place that day.

  Next stop in our trip was to see Holly's mom and her husband Ed.  We enjoyed our time with them and it was a little more relaxed which was nice.  We played games, went to coffee, walked the dogs, and went ATVing in the mountains.  Lots and lots of fun!

  Playing dominos.  We were all laughing so hard that I couldn't get a good picture.  =P

Attempting to get the second four wheeler out of the truck without unhooking the trailer.  They got it, but I was quite nervous the whole time.

Half way up this mountain...  We stopped at this beautiful waterfall and an abandoned gold mine close by.  Needless to say... the boys did get gold fever.  You will see more of that later on.

  And our last stop of the trip was to see Holly's dad and his wife Wina.  They were super sweet the whole time we were there.  Continually try to give us anything and everything we wanted.  While we were there the guys went dirt biking, we went hiking in the mountains and had a picnic lunch, had dinner with Holly's brother Rick, and went tubbing down the river one day.  Lots of fun and we enjoyed all the sunshine.  :)

The waterfall we hiked to when we were up in the mountains. Absolutely beautiful!

My beautiful mother-in-law.  :)

The guys with gold fever.  They panned and panned and panned.  I thought they would never quite so we could get to Rick's in time for dinner.  ;)

And this is from the day we went tubbing.  It was beautiful weather and the water was perfect.

  The next day we headed home.  We had a wonderful time but were definitely ready to get back to Texas and all we had left there.  It was a really long ride home, but we worth the trip.  :)  Next time maybe we can make this trip while it is snowing...  :)

Birthday Blessings

  I know, it really has been forever.  But I have to admit... updating my blog has been nowhere near number 1 on my priority list.  Between still getting settled in from the move, not having internet for quite a while, and then finding out that baby Hink is on the way, and all the sickness that has come with that news, I have not even thought about the blog until last week.
  So now, I am going to attempt to do better.  I have quite a few "catch-up" posts to do, but those will come later.  :)

  On with life... my birthday was this past week.  The big 21!!!  I was absolutely pampered all day.  :)  My husband made breakfast for me that morning and then we acted like we had never grown up by playing the wii for a little while.  After that the real celebrating began...

  First stop was a lunch date at Cheddar's.  Definitely one of my all time favorite restaurants.  :)  This is the onion ring appetizer... it is huge so don't expect to be hungry after eating these.  ;)

  And my sweet husband let me get a Dr. Pepper for my birthday!!!  I have decided to do one a month... and maybe one day I will give them up for good.

  Then it was movie date to go see the new Thor movie!  It was really good and we both enjoyed ourselves.  A very fun day out, but it definitely wore me out.  :)  I came home and crashed out on the couch.
  On top of all the wonderful things my husband did, I got many encouraging texts, facebook posts, and phone calls throughout the day.  I am one very blessed lady!!!

~Enjoy your weekend!  And the beautiful weather outside!!!

Health, God's Faithfulness, and Yoga

  I don't have any pictures for this blog and you will figure out why soon.  :)  I just wanted to take a little time to update you all on Layton and I's life.
  Most of you that read this are fairly close to Layton and I, if you are one of those people than you know that the first year of Layton and I's marriage, though wonderful, has been a bit ridden with trial.
  Right before we got married I had my wisdom teeth pulled.  It was a horrible experience.  I know a lot of people go through it with flying colors, but I did not.  They had a break one tooth into three pieces in order to get it out of my jaw.  I didn't heal well and got dry socket really bad for two weeks.  I also didn't do very well on the antibiotics, which made the whole pain factor hard.  Because of that my immune system was shot without us knowing it.
  While all of that was going on I started having some pretty bad back problems (we think just from the stress of job, wisdom teeth, and wedding).
  So, we got married, had a wonderful honeymoon, came home and the storm hit.  One week after we got back from our honeymoon I got really sick (we thought I might have been pregnant, but alas, it was to be a different storm ahead).  Through months of sickness, back pain, nausea and no energy we tried to figure out what was wrong.
  This was also a very hard time for me because Layton is a huge naturalist.  He loves essential oils and hates doctors, and that was a big submitting time for me.  There were many times I wanted to quit and just head to the doctor.  But as it turns out it was good that we waited, watched the symptoms and researched.  After six months of sickness we finally narrowed it down to hormones which lead us to my adrenals and thyroid being totally off.  That resulted in food allergies coming up to the surface.
  We continued to work through things and try to fix all the many problems.  To fix what we know about.  To change our diet time and time again.
  Praise the Lord my energy has come back up and been up for about three months now.  I can do a lot of things that seemed so impossible those first six months.  And we have adjust pretty well to our diet, though it is very hard at times to stick to it.  :)
  Our newest "medicine" has been hot yoga.  I was very skeptical of yoga and the benefits of it, but there is a place just down the street from us and they were running a special so we decided to try it out.  Though it has been a lot of hard work staying in a 105 degree room for 90 minutes, stretching out my stiff back and muscles, the results are already beginning to show after two weeks.
  All of this to say... In two weeks time I have a major doctors appointment to figure out how bad my thyroid is.  Layton found a naturalist doctor who uses vitamins and minerals to help your body heal naturally.  I am a bit nervous and scared, but most of all I'm just ready for this trial to be over.  I try to continually remind myself that this trial is good for me and not to compare my walk to others.  To remind myself that what the people are going through around me is hard for them, even though it may look easy to me.  And that what I am going through it perfect for me, to draw me closer to Christ.
  It has not been easy and is a daily struggle.  To find joy and contentment, especially on the days when my energy is low and just making the bed seems like such a task.
  I would ask for prayer from you all though.  For the upcoming doctors appointment, but mostly for me to find rest in God and who He is as our sovereign God.  And pray for my husband as well.  This has been hard on him too, but he has stood by me the whole way... making dinner and doing laundry when I need him to.  :)
  Thank you for reading all my ranting.  Please message me or email me if you have any prayer requests.

~Thankful for the body of Christ, my husband, and God's perfect plan.

`Proverbs 19:21
Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that stands.

Anniversary Date Night

  So, I know this is a little late, but better late than never, right?  So, Layton and I made it... One year down.  Though it has been a hard year of trials we have praised God for the fact that we got to go through it all together.
  So to celebrate one wonderful year Layton bought tickets to Bass Hall to see Sister Act.  He had never been to a live performance, much less a musical. :)  I was thankful that he was willing to try something new.  And what do you know... He really liked it.

  At Bass Hall.

After the show we went to P.F. Chang's to eat dinner and then Layton took me to go do a little shopping.  This was when we were getting ready to head home, on top of the parking garage.

  Individual pictures... I had to get a picture of him all dressed up for me. ;)

  One year down, hopefully many, many more to go. :)  Thankful, thankful, thankful!

It's the Small Things in Life

  I know, I know... it has been forever.  We have been in the process of buying a house in the last month and with that comes boxing everything up and getting ready to move.  :)

  I'm so excited about living in our new place (we closed last Friday and we get to stay our first night tomorrow), but it has been a lot of work and very stressful at times.  I know it will be great though.

  Layton and I are not big apartment people.... I have many friends and family who are, but when something breaks Layton and I like to fix it.  I love to paint and make a place my own with the tile I like or that specific ceiling fan.  ;)  And since we have been living in this apartment for almost a year now we have not been able to do anything ourselves... and we are definitely ready to.

  But anyway, through all of this crazy process it has definitely been the small things that have made my day... like

A homemade Frappe on a hot, muggy day.  And it had salted caramel on top...  :)

Or a wonderful walk with my husband to get out of our untidy, boxed up, in the process of moving apartment...

Or coming down stairs in the morning to a lot of clean dishes (done by my husband at 5:30 in the morning).

  Through out it all there have been hard days and easy days.  Those good days and the bad, but I praise the Lord that I can always find a reason to smile.  :)  He has blessed us with so much and now we will be completely blessed with a new dwelling place.  We are very much looking forward to having a place of our own.

~God Bless and Enjoy your Memorial Day!

{Together}--The Joys of Married Life

  Layton and I went to our first bed and breakfast a week ago.  We so enjoyed it.  The bed and breakfast was in Grandview, TX on a 860 acre, working cattle ranch.

  We loved every minute of it.  Just a break in every day life.  A time to get away from all the craziness.

    Our room was so pretty!  They had rose petals on our bed and gave us complimentary champagne and chocolate covered strawberries.  :)  My absolute favorite part of the entire room... it had a claw foot tub!  It was wonderful!

  Here are the pictures of our room and bathroom.  It had an old-fashion toilet, beautiful hardwood floors, and a huge king sized bed with feather pillows.

  Along with breakfast we also got to go to dinner on the ranch.  They have a restaurant on the ranch as well and since it was Friday night they had a live band playing.  There was also a huge dance floor in the middle of the room and all these older couples out two-stepping and doing all sorts of fancy moves.  It was really cute... they all looked so happy together.

  They had a pool table in the dining room too, so Layton and I played a few games after dinner.

  It was a lot of fun and we really enjoyed our first experience at a bed & breakfast!  So much to be grateful for and so many joys in married life.  We are definitely blessed by the road God has planned for us and we just continue to take it one step at a time!  :)

 {Togetherness}

~Valentine's and Anniversaries~

  I know it has been a long time once again... life just never slows down, no matter what stage of life you are in.  Different stages just bring different complications, different things to keep you busy, and different things that "have" to get done.
  Meanwhile, through all of the craziness, Layton and I have celebrated an anniversary... not the anniversary of when we wed, but of when we got engaged.  He proposed 3 days before Valentine's so it should always be pretty easy to remember and brings a whole new meaning to Valentine's Day.
  We haven't celebrated big yet... that has to wait a few weeks, but we are apart of a young couples group and last night they had a Valentine's Dance and so we were able to celebrate that way for now.  :)

  We enjoyed dinner, the company, and the dancing.  One of the couples taught us all how to swing dance.  Great fun!  haha... but pretty funny as we were all trying to figure out what we were doing.  :)

  I hope everyone has a wonderful week!  I plan to spend my week focusing on God's gracious gift of giving me my wonderful husband.  Our journey was a rough one, but it has been wonderful to look back and see God's grace throughout our relationship and now to be married is marvelous!  God is good!

A Dallas Adventure...

   So, last Saturday Layton and I used some Christmas money we had gotten and went to the Dallas Aquarium.  It was so very fun!  We both enjoyed a day out together.  And we decided beforehand that we were going to take our time and not rush... just a relaxing day, so that was really nice.  :)
  First we went to Starbucks... Layton's idea.  :)

He got a vanilla spice latte because his throat was bothering him.  :-/

I got a White Mocha Frappe with toffee nut... So good!

It's by far my favorite.

   Then to the Aquarium we went... traffic wasn't too bad which was really nice and we got there rather quickly.  Though once we got got of our car we realized it was very good we were going to do an inside expedition... it was really cold out side and windy.

   As your walking in there are already animals which is fun.  We purchased tickets and then started our adventure through the rainforest.  It was pretty crowded which was a bit of a bummer, but not to bad.  All the exhibits were really fun.  There were monkeys, birds, turtles, fish, sharks, and so much more.

This guy was one of the free range birds and he had landed on a branch right above our heads.

Our camera does not do him justice... his colors were beautiful.

This guy was hilarious.  Layton and I laughed at him for a while.

They are tiny little monkeys and they move super fast.

And I loved his mustache... :)

At one point he even jumped onto the fence right in front of us.

This was taken in the main aquarium part...

He loved swimming on the glass.

The crazy part is he looked huge and I went to another aquarium one time and they said that the glass makes everything look 20% SMALLER!  Craziness.

Flamingos!  They were orange, not pink, which was interesting.

Afterward we went to the Dream Cafe.

It was suggested by Ben and Rhiannon and was pretty good.

They serve brunch and lunch, so Layton got pancakes and I got chicken enchiladas.

   We had a marvelous time and I would definitely say it is worth going to.  And it is always just fun to take a little road trip and do something you have never done before.  =D
   Now it is another weekend, starting tonight...
~Enjoy your loved ones and all the blessings God has given you!