O'Baby: Maternity Pictures

Hello! Still here and still pregnant. Currently 39 weeks 1 day and feeling every extra ounce and every possible emotion. Excitement. Apprehension. Fear. Impatience. Concern. Loss of control. Thankful. Joyful. Ready to meet our kid. Not ready for life to change. And everything in between. 

Mama B is coming down tomorrow and Sportyspice is heading this way Friday with my niece. Baby is due the day after my birthday [WHICH IS MONDAY, what?!] and I've always thought it would be wonderful to have a baby for my birthday. But, we all know baby knows best so I'm trying to hope and pack my patience at the same time. 

One way I've distracted myself is pouring over our maternity pictures I took when I was 36 weeks. I hadn't planned to take pictures [justifying the money was tough] but the photographer, who is a friend, had an incredible first year package so I said "what the heck?" and just went with it. She was increidble efficient and had a great eye for pictures and allowed Le Husband and I to be ourselves [he hates photos] which was helpful. I knew we didn't need a full hour for our pictures and when she suggested a split session with me doing fitness pictures I was thrilled. Never thought of that [which is so weird] and I'm grateful for her awesome idea. I love the pictures from both sessions and am having a hard time picking WHICH ones to buy. Let me know your favorites!

ALL PHOTOS PROPERTY OF PINKPERSISTENCE AND ADARA EVENTS & PHOTOGRAPHY

Back to Life, Back to Reality

Back in town and wearing a frown. Well, not really, but kinda sorta. I happy to be home after ten fabulous days of travel, my bed felt so nice last night. Yet, my heart is sad because I miss my sisters and my lil niece something fierce after a week of glorious togetherness. Recap will be up later this week, so here are a few teasers of my trip to Arizona and Las Vegas.  

 Thank you all for your sweet birthday wishes yesterday. You sure know how to make a girl feel loved and cherished. I am beyond thankful for my 35th trip around the sun and look forward to everything this year has to offer. This right here is LOVE, HOPE, JOY, HAPPINESS and this right here is 35! Hope you have a fabulous Monday and wonderful week.

We Found Our Christmas This Year {What's New With You}

[source]

If I had to change my blog tag line it would be "what a difference a year makes". Seems every time I come here to write something deep about my life that phrase shows up. Right now, I find myself thinking it over and over, multiple times a day. I'm so grateful to be 365 days away from the end of 2016.

Last year, oh man, what a perfectly awful December. My life was day in day out 'Where Are You Christmas?' on repeat. It was dark. And sad. And lonely. And just gosh darn horrible. Both Le Husband and I were stuck in jobs we couldn't stand and we still hadn't found a place to live. My aunt and uncle gave us NO grief, nor made us feel in the way, but celebrating the holidays in someone else's home is super tough. Our timeline of three months [HAAHAHAHA] had extended to six. I cried multiple nights going to sleep because it wasn't supposed to be THIS WAY.

My job was a month old, yet I found myself drowning daily. Changes in policy, changes in merchandise, changes in memberships, changes in pricing, changing in personal, all happening in a single day frayed my nerves to nothing. My first December weekend I received a call at 0300 because someone didn't show up for their next shift and the buck stopped with me. So I had to drive to the gym to cover the 0300 - 0600 shift. I cried driving out there. I cried sitting in the office. I also vowed to never have the experience again. It was terrible and the weekend was lost. And then my friend was killed in a car accident, bringing a tidal wave of emotions and more darkness.

Our marriage was at it's lowest point last year, too. We were tired of nothing working. Le Husband was tired of his job's drama, while also being tired of me complaining and crying all the time. He's an amazing man, though comforting is not his forte. He also was experiencing what I call 'the man's worth crisis' because we were still in someone else's home. Which made him angry about circumstances and when I didn't want to look at homes online or drive around when I got home from work he'd get so annoyed with me, causing arguments. Christmas cheer was so hard to find, there was a lot of faking. So much time spent pretending to be happy to people while silently feeling like a failure and feeling so incredibly lost.

Then came the house. Then came the new job. Then came more sleep. More joy. More time. Most importantly MORE LIFE!

What's new with us this December? So much goodness. I know longer work a job I can't stand because it makes me cry with unpredictability. Call me a baby, but those six months were some of the toughest, darkest months of my life. My current job is not where I see myself much longer than a year, but it gives me stability. It gives me peace of mind [usually]. I am allowed to walk out the door and not think about work until the next day. I sleep. I take vacation. I am actually bored, YES!

We are in our home. OUR.HOME. Something we'd wanted for years but waited to buy in Virginia. Something so close, yet so unattainable in 2016. Then came the one visit and the moment we knew. This was it, this is our home. Which is decorated for Christmas, making it so cozy. Not everything is done or put away, Le Husband is currently painting our upstairs, but it is livable and lovely. Pictures below are snapshots taken last night. Nothing fancy, just moments. Christmas cheer is everywhere and I'm basking in the glow of our Christmas tree lights and candles.

Just typing OUR Christmas tree has me tearing up a bit. You might call me a bit dramatic or emotional but this month is bringing out all the feels. That's what's new with me. My joy of the season is back. My love of the holidays has returned. I can feel the jolly. I can say without faking "Merry Christmas"! I can read posts on blogs, Facebook and Instagram without feeling hollow inside. We have finally reached A YEAR LATER and it has never felt soooooo good to be on the other side of a year. If you are struggling, I get it. All my love and hugs to you. If you're on the other side with me, I cheers you, we did it. 

Thank you so much, friends for supporting me. To each and everyone of you reading, I appreciate you sticking with me and reaching out when it was dark. Your friendships mean more than you know and sometimes just a 'hang in there' got me through the day. So much love and lots of Christmas cheer to you!

Thanksgiving Family Vacation {Arizona}

***Only two weeks later than promised, but hey, I'm here right? Life kind of just happened and spending time here was the last thing on my mind. So thank you for waiting and I hope you enjoy my lil recap of our Thanksgiving family trip to Arizona. ***

Most of you will remember my sister, Sportyspice, moved to Arizona with her husband this past January. He's in the military and they are stationed out there until 2018. This year the family decided to head out to west for a full week of Thanksgiving fun with a little sight seeing thrown in too.

Travel
Normally I wouldn't even update this, but man, our trip out there became a bit cray-cray. About two days before we actually bought our tickets T-Bone, my 92 year old grandfather, decided he wanted to come out west with us. We said "YAY", then Le Husband and I went "oh boy, we in charge now". Thankfully it wasn't too crazy getting out of Knoxville on the way to Nashville [we flew on Southwest points and SW does not fly into Knox, boo] just had to chase down the GPA who got lost getting to our house. Once that was straightened out, we pushed the speed limit, got to the airport where I took T-Bone through security and to the gate and Le Husband went to drop the car off at parking. Here's what ensude the hour before the flight boarded - Le Husband got a flat tire and almost missed boarding; I left my backpack at security because I was so worried about T-Bone, we were told the wrong process for pre board, we almost didn't get the seats we wanted. Thankfully everything worked out but it was a STRESS MESS until take off.

It's A....
One of the most EXCITING moments of the trip was finding out the gender of Sportyspice's baby. She put together a super fun, yet still casual gender reveal party and it was quite lovely meeting her Arizona peeps. There was voting and yummy food to enjoy and then it was time. After waiting FOREVER it seems we FINALLY found out....IT'S A GIRL!!! Bring on the pink, haha. Mama B and Daddy didn't land until later on Saturday evening so we did a separate lil reveal for them at the kickball fields {yes kickball, read the next point, ha} using the napkins from Sportyspice's party. Mama B was so overcome with emotion, it was super sweet.

Kickball
Immediately following the gender reveal party we all headed onto Luke Air Force base for a kickball tournament. SPortyspice joined a team made up of wives/girlfriends/service women and of course they scheduled a tournament when we were out visiting. I was initially bummed when I heard but then thought 'what a cool way to meet all of her friends'. The rules were different and there were a few times my competitive nature almost sprung out, however I was good and kept it in check, ha. The team ended up losing in the finals and we were EXHAUSTED with the time change. I was super happy to have played though and jumped in when needed.

Sedona
Sunday morning we repacked into our suitcases and headed off for the two hour drive to Sedona, AZ. Sportyspice is only four hours from the Grand Canyon, but we decided to split up the trip and see a lil more on the way out. Our first stop was the CHURCH OF THE HOLY CROSS which is a gorgeous church built into a mountain side. Super popular destination so parking was kind of crazy, since you are parking UP an incline. We used the 92 year old grandpa and pregnant lady to our advantage, woop woop. The church is super popular so if you plan to go try and get there early and just prepare yourself for a bit of a walk up a hill.

Devil's Bridge
The second part of our Sedona visit included hiking up Devil's Bridge, another popular tourist destination. We had a picnic lunch before the hike and then all the girls and Le Husband headed up the mountain. The original plan was to have Sportyspice's husband, CT, stay with T-Bone since he'd already done the hike. Sadly, his unit had an emergency call and he wasn't able to travel with us, super sad face. Daddy decided to stay with T-Bone [such a great guy] and they actually ended up going on a helicopter ride together which was soooo cool to hear. Yay for everyone having fun. Devil's Bridge wasn't too tough if you've been on other hikes and the views are pretty awesome. We all had fun taking pictures and being silly on the actual bridge. Once we had all the pictures we wanted we headed back down and met up with Daddy and T-Bone for a delicious dinner at the Sedona Airport Retauratnut. Highly recommended if you head out that way. To split up the drive we stayed right outside Sedona before the next morning's drive to the Grand Canyon.

The Grand Canyon
Our last two days were spent in the Grand Canyon. Where it is quite chilly in the winter time, le brrr. Key thing to note, cell services is pretty horrible so make sure you have a PLAN and then stick to it when meeting up. The first thing we did was the tourist thang, looking over the rim and getting pictures together. People were really helpful and our tripod came in SUPER handy, too.

Next a group broke off to hike the popular Ooh Ahh trail. If you take this trail be prepared for lots of people. It started of kind of blah then became more like hiking. The weirdest part about canyon hiking is the going down then up, verses normal up then down hiking. We snagged some great pictures, had a quick lunch then headed back up to the top. It was a bit of a snafu trying to meet back up with T-Bone and Mama B but we made it about an hour before sunset. Since it was so chilly we spent time in the rock museum, snapped quick pictures then heading back to the village where we grabbed some dinner then relaxed the rest of the evening.

The following day, Le Husband, Babyspice and I stayed to hike a bigger trail and the rest of the group did some walking around then headed home. The Hermit trail is a lot more difficult and wouldn't have been fun for the rest of the family. It was fun, challenging, gorgeous and awe inspiring. We had a fun time then headed back to Sprotyspice's house, stopping for my first In and Out burger experience for dinner.

Thanksgiving
The reason for the vacation finally arrived and Thursday was a fun day of pulling together food, having drinks, hanging out and just being together. I found many moments of just sitting back and BEING. Hard to explain but my heart was so so so full, even fuller than my tummy, ha. We all had a blast together and I'm honestly sad because I don't know the next time we are all [including husbands and T-Bone] going to be together again.

There you go, the highs of our amazing trip. I'm so sad it's over and can't WAIT to get back out there again. Le Husband and I have big hiking plans and I can't wait to get out there early next year to snuggle on my baby niece when she arrives. EEEEK!!!