Our Memorial Day Weekend… part 1

This weekend was SO wonderfully FULL!  I’m learning to LOVE the camera on my new Blackberry, so I was able to take LOTS of pics… hope you enjoy!

Friday night we celebrated our 9 month anniversary {which was actually Saturday}, some of my co-workers who have been married for awhile thought I was nuts, but I don’t care! 

We went out to eat at this cute little restaurant by some water… {pics didn’t really turn out}

Got ColdStone Ice cream!

Went Mini-golfing here… it was SO cute and colorful!

The golf-balls we used…

                            

Us :) {see the Disney castle??}

Saturday – was another beautiful day!  We went to a quick job for Mike, a cute little restaurant on Horse Neck beach for breakfast, back home, Driving Range, Batting cages, appliance shopping {again}, to my new favorite Ice Cream place, and then to his parents house for dinner!  Here it is in pics…

Swinging Hard!

Goofy Pic {He insisted I take this… notice the ball is still on the tee… :) }

Batters Up!

In Motion!

Black Raspberry…. YUMMY!

 

Tomorrow, we’ll get into Sunday and Monday… we spent both days with friends from Church.  It was a blessed weekend for us!  How was yours??

Love,

~H~

 

I got flowers…

My hubby was gone, working north of Boston, for a couple days… with gas prices bring what they are, and his van getting the MPG it does, getting a hotel on Hotwire.com was cheaper…

But when he got home, he surprised me at work and brought me flowers!

 

{see the little hat above the rose on the right…so cute!}

Isn’t he sweet!!

It’s a Friday… before a long weekend… SO looking forward to sleeping in, playing worship songs on the keyboard someone is letting me borrow, and maybe even curling up on the couch with a good novel!

What are you up to this Memorial Day weekend?

Love,

~H~

Appliance Shopping…

Last night was an adventure!  We’re meeting with our Mortgage lady today to go over all of our numbers… which meant we had to figure out what appliances we want in the kitchen. However, Mike it out of town on a job, so I had to go by myself! I’m totally clueless, so I called my mom on the way there to get some practical advice… she’s such a blessing!

Now, we can change our minds, but we just had to submit something for the numbers… so here’s what I landed on for us:

Fridge {bottom freezer –it’s more efficient because cold falls}

Stove {gas w/ convection}

Dish-washer {Basic, yet quiet}

I also had to pick stuff out for the two rental floors… they’re getting a basic fridge and stove, both in black {cuz it doesn’t look dirty as quickly…this is a HUGE factor in my kitchen decisions, which I never would have though it would be before getting married}

I have to admit, I can tell God is doing a work in my heart. In different points in my life I have gone from wanting the nicest in everything, to the cheapest in everything. Finally, I feel like I’ve found a good balance in being wise, practical, and frugal. Not that I have arrived by ANY means!

More decisions to be made and I’m glad you get to come with me on this journey of fixing-up our home!

Can’t wait to put these appliances in our new house!

Love,

~H~

I love food…

And since moving to the East Coast, I have discovered a wonderful place to buy bulk foods and great prices… BJ’s!

Here are a few things you would find in my fridge:

Greek, Low-fat, High Protein, All-Natural Yogurt!

Organic Burritos… great for a quick meal!

And typically you would find these BUT…. when I ran home over lunch to make myself a wrap… these were sitting on my box of yogurts and I accidently knocked them over and ALL OVER the FLOOR!

Oh well! No since crying over spilt…. eggs?!?!?

Right?

Love,

~H~

An Encouragement….

This morning, in my time with the Lord, I was reading in Luke 6.  I have to admit that lately my morning times with the Lord have been dry, mostly because my thoughts have been wandering to work situations and dreaming about our home.

Worry – is really what it boils down to. It stinks! Literally.  It’s not a beautiful offering to the Lord AT ALL!

Praise God that my salvation is NOT based on my works… it’s by GRACE (thus the name of my blog) that I have been saved (Eph. 2:8). NOT the “greasy grace” though… this is a LIFE changing, LOVE filled, JOYFULL Grace that compels me to DESIRE and STIVE for holiness in my life and MAKE WAR on my flesh! Therefore, I will daily preach to myself the things of Christ and trust Him with all my heart!!

{Ok – that’s not where I pictured my blog going today, but I hope it blesses someone!}

 

Back to this morning… We have been going through a Bible study called “The Good Steward” {it’s SO good!!}

Last night they read a text in Luke 6: 20-27 that caught my eye. Specifically verse 22, which states…{here it is in my bible}

“Blessed are you when people hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you
and reject your name as evil,
because of the Son of Man.”

Witnessing at work has been a challenge for me…I’ m scared of what people think. Bottom Line.   This verse is was I needed to hear.

My Savior is worth being hated, excluded, insulted and rejected…because ultimately it’s not me who they are doing these things to, it’s Him… and that makes me want to  WEEP!

Love,

~H~

Our Weekend…

Some of you may have seen glimpses of my weekend as I Twittered them… but it was SO wonderful! Saturday we went to Horse Neck Beach… Here’s a few pics! (all from my cell phone)

We Drew in the Sand…

Made foot-prints in the sand… with flip-flops he bought for our honeymoon
(we’re a little behind in taking pics!!)

More prints…

LOVE!!!

And sand castles…. we didn’t make it, I just thought it was a good one!!

*sigh*

I am blessed beyond measure, with a great husband, but more importantly a God who is SO gracious and loving!

We continue to meet with contractors to go over the house…

Please pray that we would Glorify God in all we do!

 

Love,

~H~

Money…

The topic of money has come up a lot in our conversations lately… {buying a house tends to bring that up}.

Here is a “Sermon Jam” that has really hit home with me…John Piper is the person speaking…

If you’ve never heard of sermons jams before, they are sermons put to beats… and they’re free!!

You can check them out here:http://www.1031sermonjams.com/

 

~H~

Thoughts on our NEW adventure…

My thoughts lately have been up and down… it’s been hard to focus at work… so I find myself on here, to share my thoughts with you! Yesterday was a full of....

• Anticipation on hearing back on our offer…
  
• Excitement of so many things to do…
  
• Realizing we’ll have to move out of our FIRST apartment together…
  {this almost made me cry… seriously…}
  
• Dreaming of how to decorate our NEW house…
  
• The reality of all the things that need to be fixed…sigh…
  
• The Excitement of a bigger kitchen to come!! {wouldn’t take much!}
  
• Overall ~ thoughts on how good the Lord is to His children!
  ~ We have treaded carefully, yet confident in our God.
  ~ We have prayed and sought wisdom… both scripture and practical.
  ~ And we have made sure our hearts are always remaining open to His will!
  
• Feeling like a true grown-up, with a big girl mortgage soon to come!

Those are just a few of the things I’ve felt over the past 24 hrs. What an ADVENTURE!

Looking forward to what’s to come!

~H~

My Favorite parts of our little apartment…

BOOKS! But not just any books… ones that teach and help me to grow in knowing my FIRST love more deeply!! Which I hopefully now have the time to read.

GAMES! We love to sit and play… it’s what we did a lot this winter…

And COMFY places to sit and enjoy being home…

This weekend was one to clean, and after only being married 8 months, sometimes I feel like I clean the same things over and over.  I always find it refreshing but sometimes in the midst of it, it’s frustrating… so this post is to remind me of the little things I enjoy… even when my little apartment isn’t perfectly clean.

I also remind myself that I need to be faithful with this little apartment, if I expect the Lord to trust me with a bigger house someday.

~H~

Be Thou My Vision…

No matter where I am at in life, this song {and a lot of the old hymns} always speak to my heart…and this one just came on to the Pandora Station I was listening too…

Be Thou My Vision by Ginny Owens

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best thought by day or by night
Waking or sleeping Thy presence my light
Be thou my wisdom and Thou my true word
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord
Thou my great Father, I , Thy true son
Thou in me dwelling and I with Thee one
Riches I heed not nor man's emptly praise
Thou mine inheritance now and always
Thou and thou only first in my heart
High King of heaven my treasure Thou are
High King of heaven my victory won
May I reach heaven's joys, O bright heaven's Sun
Heart of my own heart whatever befall
Still be my vision O Ruler of all

Lord – may YOU always consume my vision!!

~H~

OUR OFFER WAS ACCEPTED on our HOUSE!!

In case you missed it a couple days ago, we’ve been house hunting … we looked at a 3 family home, in a good area, needing a new roof and a few other minor fixes (including PAINT!!)… Here are some pics I stole from this website.

We are just trusting in the Lord, and know that there are many doors that he could choose to open or close as we move forward in this new adventure! 

BUT… they accepted our offer!! Now it’s just getting all the little details in place and getting a home inspection to make sure we have no surprises in what it’ll take to fix it up!

We are SOO excited… we don’t feel like this is “our home” but simply a door the Lord opened to take a step towards getting there! 

Well… off I go to do a little paperwork!

~H~