This weekend {cannot believe June is OVER!}

A little recap of the weekend....
-We rented a movie we had already seen in theatres so instead paid $2.99 to watch 21 Jump Street  from Time Warner Cable. It was good, bring it on 22 Jump Street.
- I played a great tennis match Saturday morning. Besides it being really hot and really early.
- We furniture shopped allllllll afternoon. But walked away with some goodies!

Bar cabinet, super excited about this place for wine, wine glasses and liquor bottles!

Not exactly the chairs that we purchased, but very similar. I totally forgot to take a picture!

 

- Drank lots of beer and enjoyed a summer league baseball with some friends on Saturday night.

My husband is a goofball.

 

-Sunday was filled with a TON of yard work. I'm talking 24 bags of mulch, which was after we pulled out lots of pine straw and other things. I'm also talking about major sunburn and really sore legs. Ouch.

- As if that wasn't enough we then rented a rug doctor and cleaned all of our carpets. Okay let's be honest here, Brian did all of that.

-As a reward we treated ourselves to dinner at our favorite restaurant and froyo afterwards. It was a good weekend!

 

Here's to our 4 day week and 3 day weekend ahead! I'm excited for the 4th! Happy Monday friends!

The Glorious Unfolding {What a JOY this song is!}

This song brings so much joy to my heart on a Friday morning. Hope it does the same for some of you!

"And this is going to be a glorious unfolding. Just you wait and SEE and you will be amazed. You’ve just got to believe the story is so far from over, so hold on to every promise God has made to us and watch this glorious unfolding" - Steven Curtis Chapman

Moving on....

Am I the only one that is seriously excited about the premiere of Girl Meets World? TONIGHT, it is TONIGHT! It is either going to be great or awful, I really hope the first!

 

Lastly, I have made this cookie cake twice recently. I made the funfetti sugar as well as the chocolate chip. Both were SO good and SO easy. I would highly recommend. Well only if you aren't watching your calories :)

 

Happy weekend friends!



I love a good recipe! {4th of July Recipe Linkup}

Especially when it involves holiday food (or let's be serious anything sweet!!) I was just trying to think about a good treat to take to the lake for the 4th when I remembered a super easy cookie cake that I made a few years back!

Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:

For the cookie:
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup light brown sugar, packed
11 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
For the toppings:
4 ounces cream cheese (half of one 8-ounce package), at room temp
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temp
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup blueberries
3 cups raspberries (or strawberries work too!!)
1/4 cup white chocolate chips

Equipment: Quarter size (9x13 inches) rimmed baking sheet

Directions:

Make the cookie cake:
Preheat the oven to 400ºF.
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour and brown sugar. Cut the butter into pieces, and using two forks or your fingers, work the butter into the flour mixture until it's the consistency of wet sand. Press the cookie dough firmly and evenly into a non-stick quarter size (9x13 inches) rimmed baking sheet.
Bake the shortbread for 10 to 15 minutes until it is pale golden. Remove the shortbread from the oven, place it on a cooling rack and allow it to cool completely while still in the pan. Once it has cooled, use a sharp knife to carefully cut around the edges then invert the shortbread cookie onto your serving platter.
Make the frosting:
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, blend the cream cheese until it is smooth. Add the butter and continue blending until combined. Add the vanilla extract then sift the powdered sugar into the bowl and blend just until combined. (Over-blending the mixture will cause the frosting to be too runny.)
Spread the cream cheese frosting in an even layer on the cookie cake. Position the blueberries in the top left corner of the cake in even rows to form the blue portion of the flag then position the raspberries in horizontal lines across the cake, leaving about 1 inch between each row, to form the stripes. Position the white chocolate chips between the blueberries to form the stars.

Using a sharp knife, slice and serve the cookie cake immediately, or refrigerate it until ready to serve.

And just for fun...here is the cake I made last year, not as festive, but still good :)

 

My first Wedding Wednesday {The dress}

I don't even know where to start with recaps for our wedding day. It was a truly perfect day, I wouldn't have changed a thing about it and I am still overwhelmed with the amount of love and the joy I felt! I think where I want to start today is with my dress. I loved my dress so much. I only went to David's Bridal, I tired on about six dresses, and I bought mine. It was one I had found online and loved and then loved it just as much when I saw it in the store. I feel lucky that it was so easy and I am sure my mom, Erica, Lauren and Jessica felt the same way!

 

 
 

 
 
 
 

I wore two pairs of shoes. The pink ones were Nina's from Zappos and the Tom's were made for me by one of my bridesmaids for the rehearsal. I also wore a veil that was from David's Bridal as well as pearl jewelry that was a from my brother and sister in law's wedding a few years back. Next week I think I will talk about the rehearsal dinner (it was super fun!) and then move onto the getting ready! Hope you will come back and join me! I was sad our day was over but now I am so glad I can share it here!

Linking up for Wedding Wednesday

I confess...

- I ate 3 pieces of cake and 1 piece of pie this weekend. Ouch.
- I also ate Biscuitville twice. Double ouch.

If you haven't tried the above...you are def. missing out!!

- Last week at work, I had one of those moments like you used to in classes in college where my head almost hit the desk. Whoops.
- I read two books (Emily Giffin, The One and Only and Janet Evanovich, Top Secret Twenty-One) in a day each. Slightly obsessive. But highly recommend both!


- My house looks like a tornado went ripping through it and so far I have zero energy to correct this.
- Time Warner Cable makes me want to gouge out my eyes. I try really hard to be nice but my goodness they charge you an arm and a leg for cable and then they aren't even polite!
- It's only 10 am and I have tried to see my dogs on our new security system camera multiple times this morning.
- All I want to do right now is go home and sit on my couch and watch Pretty Little Liars (it scares me too much and I can't watch it at night)
- I have not meal planned in a few weeks and we have not eaten very well at all because of that. Helloooo Domino's.
- I am already ready for Friday (and lunch I might add)

Enjoy your Tuesday y'all! I plan to do some wedding recaps starting tomorrow!

Another weekend, another wedding

ZzZzZzZz....man that is how I am feeling today is anyone else with me on that one?! We had a whirlwind of a weekend with another wedding, lots of family fun, but also exhausting! It was a family friend getting married :)

Friday we headed up to NC, made a pit stop at my parents for the night and left the fur children there. Saturday morning was up bright and early to head to the bridal luncheon at my in-laws, then onto a mani-pedi with my sister-in-law and MIL and then to the rehearsal dinner. The rehearsal dinner was a lot of fun, great food and we met some super fun people which always makes for a good time! The groom was from Pennsylvania and we met some of his friends. They were telling us that WaWa had good biscuits. Brian who is obsessed with Biscuitville, told them they were crazy and then gave them directions to the closest one. The next morning when we went, there were all our PA friends enjoying some real southern biscuits. When we walked in Brian just yelled at all of them "you're welcome!" So funny!

Rehearsal dinner 

Sunday we attempted to sleep in after drinking a few too many Mich Ultras (well at least in my case) and then just hung around until time for the wedding at 4. The wedding was beautiful! The bride and groom shag dance, so there was some AWESOME dancing going on and of course none of us were going to dance since we would have been shown up! We left a little early so that we could drive back to SC and we still didn't get home until 12:30 am. Hence the extra zzzz's today. All in all though a great weekend with family and friends! I am struggling a bit more than usual for a Monday, but here's hoping for a good week and a relaxing upcoming weekend with NO plans!

All my sister in laws and mother in law

 

The happy gorgeous couple

 



My handsome date

 

Linking up with B Loved Boston & Champagne and Suburbs today. 

 



Friday's=JOY!


You know every week I try not to wish away my weeks for the weekends...but it is hard and I am happy to see Friday! We are off to NC today for a family friend's wedding on Sunday afternoon so it should be a good, but probably tiring weekend! Happy weekend y'all!

1. Last night Brian and I were running some errands and ended up at Qdoba for dinner. It was quite delicious and even left me leftovers for lunch today! Double win. Across the street was Insomnia Cookies, a place that stays up until 3 am and delivers cookies. I have been wanting to try it so what better time after stuffing my face with Mexican. Oh but how it was worth every calorie....

 

2. My celebrity husband (sh don't tell my real husband) released a new single today!! I am obsessed with Kenny Chesney and am really hoping his new song "American Kids" does not disappoint. I need to suck it up and spend the $2 to buy it on iTunes. Maybe by the end of the day.

Be still my heart...he may be old but I swoon over him.

 

3. I am getting a MUCH needed pedicure with my mother in law and sister in law tomorrow and I cannot wait! I have been needing/wanting one for a while but just haven't found the time to do it. Can't beat a pedicure and quality time with the in-laws :)

 

4. So I have two puppies who are my whole entire world. I probably love them a little too much and one of them may have a few behavioral issues. Wilson is so sweet and is really a good dog, he is just a bit overly excitable. So I had a guy come out and talk to us about helping train him, but when he dropped the price of $625 I might have cringed a little. So I have now decided to try and do some training on my own. So I am the weird lady in the kitchen with treats and telling him over and over "watch me." Good gracious. So far he is not so good at this, but I'll keep trying. Anyone have any tips for dog training? Specifically being an overly excited greeter and not walking great on a leash.

How can you not love that sweet face?!

 

5. I have played two tennis matches this week and have one more tonight. It is only about 100 in Cola today so no big deal. My partner and I have won both matches this week so here's to hoping we can pull out one more W this week!!

Tennis=my happy place.

 

 

Hope everyone has a great weekend! Cheers!! Linking up with the ladies today (April and gang!)

 







I'm back & I'm a MRS!

 

 

Hi y'all! It's been a while since I updated this little space, but I have decided to jump back into it and see how it goes! We got married on March 1st so I have lots and lots of wedding pictures and info to share and am looking for something to help occupy my time! Looking forward to sharing lots of recipes, DIY's, stories about our lives and really hoping to meet lots of great people along the way! Grab some coffee (or rum in Coke in my opinion) and stay a while! :) I will be back tomorrow for 5 on Friday!

 

 

Who doesn't love a good wedding picture?!