Happy Friday!

It's another beautiful Friday here in sunny Florida. Blue skies, warm weather on the way... I'm a happy lady! Let's see what goodies happened this week...

1. As I mentioned in last week's HFFF, Hunter and dad started their new jobs this week. They both have had a busy, but good first week on their new jobs. I know they miss working together but they still manage to call each other almost every day to catch up.

2. I was able to see my youth kids this week for our Wednesday night meeting. I've missed seeing them and it was so nice to catch up with all of them!

3. Talking about warm weather and blue skies... Mom and I were able to lay out this past weekend and get a little bit of sun on our skin. It felt so good!

4. Zumba. Man oh man... My friend Ashley came over Thursday with her Zumba DVD in hand and let me just tell ya'll, we Zumba'd {is that even a word?!} until our hiney's about fell off. But it was still so much fun!!

5. Just kind of a reflective/reminder to all my friends, family, and loyal readers {thank you!}... Never take for granted the ones you love in your life. Never judge a person based on a mere speculation because you never know what goes on behind closed doors, in their private lives. And above all, always love as Christ loved us first.

#EndItMovement

We live in a world where we can be very blessed by the things and people we have in our lives, by the experiences we get to share, and by the love surrounding us. Today, February 27, marks a day to remember those who are enslaved against their own wills and to shine a light on slavery.

Slavery, by definition, is:

1: drudgery, toil

2: submission to a dominating influence

3a: the state of a person who is a chattel of another

 b: the practice of slaveholding

 

27 million men, women, and children are trapped in slavery through brothels, factories, mines, street corners, homes... You name it. What's worse is these people are hardly given a second glance by society because we don't want to believe that slavery actually still exists.

 

News flash... It does. February 27 will mark a day in our calendars where we need to shine a light on slavery by sharing with the world through social media, networking, talking to people... Let's show that we will not stand for this slavery. End it. Shine a light on it. Make a difference.

 

I was fully influenced by this movement when I attended the Passion 2014 conference, and today, I am showing my support by drawing red X's on my hands. This symbolizes the stand against slavery. I will use my social media outlets to help make a difference and shine a light on such a horrible act that still lives and breeds in our societies.

 

Join me today... Draw a red X on your hand. Hashtag #EndItMovement on your Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram... I don't care. Just get the word out there. Will you join me in making a difference in the world?

 

For more information on this awesome movement, visit End It website.

 

A work in progress... The kitchen

Ok, for those who know, I LOVE FOOD. It's a problem. And because I love food, I LOVE TO COOK. Therefore, I wanted this space of the house to be the most functional, personal, and pretty much ideal to my needs of being able to cook. Come on now, I've got hungry boys to feed.

I did change the theme up slightly from the living room and the dining room . I have this odd obsession with chickens. Like old, country, what-you-find-in-your-grandmomma's kitchen. Therefore, my goal is to slowly add little things here and there that are country chickens...

Thus far, I only have one thing. But hey! We've all got to start somewhere right??
**Side note: I used to have two of these adorable, chicken themed stove top covers, but this nutso got distracted. Thought I had turned on the back burner, when in fact I had turned on the front burner with the cover on it... Yea. Nearly burned my house down...

If you notice in these pictures, I'm cooking dinner. Come on in and grab yourself a seat!

**Just a heads up, my kitchen is tiny for my taste. But once I hopefully sell this house in the next few years, I can graduate into big BIG girl kitchen. I've got this folks...

As I accrue more funds, and things start to die, I will update the appliances accordingly. Otherwise, they serve their purpose pretty well. Come on back next week to see where we head next!

 

Ya'll...

I have a confession to make. If you don't already know, I'm deathly afraid of spiders. I'm talking screaming, running for my life, I wouldn't make it in Fear Factor deathly afraid. Put me in a room with roaches... Yea they're gross, but I can handle it. I might even name the little guys.

But spiders. No sir. I don't do them.

I have no shame in admitting that I've called Hunter before, crying, because a spider was on the inside of my windshield while I was driving. It was absolutely traumatic.

I've always said God has a funny sense of humor. Man oh man, He sure was messing with me yesterday.

After leaving work, being the good girlfriend I am, I decided to drive to our Bass Pro here locally to exchange a shirt for Hunter. Traffic was awful so we weren't really moving. When pulling up to a red light, I see something brown skitter across the back, top of my steering wheel (by all the speedometer, gas gauge, etc.).

And I spot him. A tarantula of a spider. Okay, maybe not a tarantula, but my God he wasn't a little bitty fella. At this point, I may or may not have let out a whimper, squeal, ohhh maahhh gahhhhh sound. I'm pretty sure folks around me were videotaping me at this point.

I immediately reach over to my passenger seat to arm myself to go in for the kill. What do I grab? Not a shoe. Not a rolled magazine. No, I grab my Sweet Baby Ray's sauce from my lunch bag. I wasn't thinking at this point people and it was the first thing my hand grabbed!

Once I grabbed my ever-faithful weapon, I turn back... And you guessed it. He's gone. Want to scare the turds out of someone deathly afraid of spiders? Let them see the spider, and lose the spider. That'll send any nerve-wrecked soul into panic mode.

So I did just that. I freaked. I immediately U-turn into our mall parking lot, park, and sat and watched. And waited. And searched. The little freak was gone!

At this point, I started praying. Yes, laugh away people. But I had to get home. And God's sense of humor got me into this; by golly I would pray my way out of it. So I bravely got back on the road. I may have flinched and/or screamed a few times on the way home when a hair brushed me. I was on high alert! I was constantly looking around my steering wheel, partly hoping to God he'd come out so I could just bludgeon it to death. The other part of me hoping he was burning on my motor because, let's be honest, I probably would've wrecked if he made an appearance.

I finally made it home, and still haven't found the spider. I considered taking the bus to work today. I thought about driving Hunter's truck to work. I even contemplated walking to work. But I put my big girl panties on, drove to work today, and made it fine. It was a tense ride to work I tell ya.

And no. I didn't make it to Bass Pro to exchange Hunter's shirt. Spider- 1 point. Kelly- 0 points. Spider wins.

Are we there yet?

Last year, I was able to travel abroad to the beautiful country of Honduras. If you know me personally or follow my blog, you would know that I fell in love with the people of this country and the country itself.

Sadly, I will not be able to return this summer to Honduras. I cannot wait to see the pictures and hear the stories when my fellow missionaries return. Keep on spreading the love of Christ friends!

However, excitedly, I will be traveling with our high school youth group to North Carolina for MFUGE. I am beyond excited about this opportunity to travel, work, and love with my kids. I cannot wait to see where God takes us on this journey, and watching their hearts grow even more. God is so good!

I'm very excited to be able to do mission work "locally" this year. God can work in some mysterious ways in putting things together and I'm thrilled He has opened this door for me. I absolutely love spending time with my youth kids, so a few days away doing nothing but sharing the love of Christ, it'll be awesome to say in the least.

Some of you may be wondering what MFUGE is. Check out their website here!

I cannot wait for June to be here! Watch out folks... First Baptist is headed your way!

HFFF

Hello Friday, you arrived mighty fast this week!

1. As a follow-up to my post on #CrawlForACause, we raised over $4,000 for the Broken Hearts of Florida Foundation. HOLY COW! Thank you again to everybody for your support.

2. Earlier this week, Ashley and I were able to catch up over some Dunkin Donuts breakfast. Love that place! And I always love catching up on our busy lives. It does a girl's heart some good {and her boyfriend/husband's ears some good as well, ha!}.

3. I'm in the process of having my backyard fenced in {due to a neighbor's vicious dog...} and I was able to meet our fence guy, who happens to be a good friend, and get things rolling on the process. I'm beyond excited to have a fence put up... Now Jep and I won't be walking on eggshells when we go out.

4. Thursday night, Hunter and I joined my family for dinner. While Hunter was in class before dinner, I was able to watch my little sister knock a few balls out of the park. She is an excellent softball player! I know I may be biased, but the girl can rock some socks I tell ya.

5. This week has been a week of change. To make a very long and drama-filled story short, Hunter and my dad have left their company to pursue better opportunities. I could not be more proud of them for striving to achieve their goals, and walking out with their heads held high. As stressful as the situation was, they're both on to bigger and much better things.

Button craft

So I was feeling mighty spunky with these random buttons I have. I mean, what the heck are you going to do with all these buttons?!

I decided to peruse the famous Pinterest to see if they could offer any fun, DIY projects. Behold, this lovely piece:

I had to try something similar to it. So I collected all my little buttons {ha! It's kind of cute when you say that!}, and an empty frame, and my ever-trusty Elmers glue.

Here we go...

• Choose bright, fun, festive colored paper and size accordingly to the frame. I chose blue since it goes well with the theme of the room. 

• Draw an outline of what you would like to say, or the shape (I did a heart)

**See above image

• Using the glue, dot the outline of your shape.  

• Fill your outline or shape with your lovely buttons. Then start filling the inside of your shape.

• Once you have stuck all your buttons, allow it to dry, and insert into frame

• Find a cute place to hang/set this treasure on

Easy as pie! And super cute! This button beauty has made it's debut in one of the rooms in my home- you'll just have to check back each week as we tour through my home to see where it ended up.

Fun fact: Many of these buttons belonged to my great-grandmother. I was honored to be able to use these as a decor in my home.

Stay crafty, friends!

What to do with that old window?

Some time ago, I purchased an old window from a local thrift shop. {Warning label: I love to thrift shop! One man's junk is another man's treasure people.}

I stumbled across this little beauty and had to buy her...

I wanted to do something with this window in a creative manner, so I brainstormed and researched differnt craft ideas to do with it. Here are a couple of things I found, courtesy of Pinterest:

Here's what I decided to do:

I love it! And I love where it has been placed in my home. Thanks for stopping by!

**Update: A country style lamp has been placed on the table in front of the window and it looks so much better with that lamp. Simple, yet sweet.

A work in progress... The dining room

Continuing our tour through my home, next on our list is the dining room. Since the dining room and living room are connected in an open floor plan, I wanted to continue the theme of rustic country throughout. No need to have rustic country and beach scenes mixed together... It'll confuse this poor gal!

**A glimpse into my kitchen...

**The wine rack was a housewarming gift from a very sweet friend. Sadly I can't keep wine in it long enough before I'm ready to drink it. Ha!

**This painting was done by a dear friend of mine.

There are only a couple of things I may add/change: cushions for the chairs and a cute table cloth. Easy fixers friends. Thank ya'll again for stopping by to see my lovely, humble abode! Check in next week, same time, to see more of my home.

2014, you are my year sister!

Driving to work one morning, thinking out loud {don't act like you've never done it before}, I was brainstorming the ways to keep more money in my pockets rather than seeing it fly away so effortlessly. And how to pay down my debts faster.

Then it hit me. 2014 is going to be my year of knocking out debt like nobody's business.

Let me paint an honest picture for you of the things I owe on:

Car
Credit card (just 1, thank you Lord)
Student loans (yes, there's more than 1)
House (I'm not really counting this into the equation right now)

Looking at these debts, I decided to tackle them one by one. First one being my car. I am so so close to having this baby paid off and officially mine so that will be the first big boy I knock out. From there, I will work on my credit card, and after that, the student loans.

My goal for 2014 is to have my car completely (or almost completely) paid off by the end of this year. It may be tough, but it is doable. I also want to knock a very good portion of my credit card debt down this year, so that I can have it paid off my the middle of 2015. My student loans will be next... Watch out boys!

I read a piece of advice the other day that stated simply "Don't set lofty, long-term goals that cannot be achieved right away. Focus on the here and now." That struck a chord deep with me and I just HAD to set myself some endpoints in the near future.

I'm quite proud of my endeavors to achieve my goals. If you are fighting some debt giants, join me on this quest of focusing on the here and now goals, and achieving what you've been trying to do for so long. I am very excited about this journey, and will surely share with you as I trek on.

To wrap this blurb up, I want to leave you with this piece of advice:

No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

-1 Corinthians 10:13

 

Always know that you are NEVER given more than you can handle and God works His wonders with the best intentions at heart.

 

Oh Happy Day

Why hello, Friday! You've always had me at hello...

1) It's Friday, need I say more?

2) Earlier in the week, I was out sick. The positive of this? My body was able to get the much needed rest. I'm not feeling totally 100% again, but I am feeling better. {Thank you to my sweet friends and co-workers for your kind words!}

3) Jep and Manny have really been bonding... And it's been great! Pretty soon, Manny will be able to come live with us, and I absolutely cannot wait!

4) and 5) {simply because I'm that excited about it} As I've mentioned before, this weekend Hunter and I will be attending an event put on by the local chapter of Junior Women's Club that I'm involved with. This is a great event for a great cause, and I hope to see many familiar faces out there! Thank you to everybody for your support!

 

Oh yea... Happy Valentine's Day lovers!

 

 

Crawl for a Cause

This weekend, I will be partaking in a community charity event with my local chapter of the Junior Women's Club, and I could not be more excited about this! What a fun, great way to raise money.

If you are a local (Tallahassee, FL folks) and you're looking for a fun afternoon, please come join us! If you are unable to make it, we are graciously accepting donations that will be benefiting Broken Hearts of Florida.

Thank you in advance to everyone's support. Hope to see ya'll there!

 

Today I'm linking up with the Little Friday Link-Up