Planes, Grains & Automobiles

Monday morning - we meet again.... and this is a seriously exhausted Monday morning at that. This weekend was so crazy busy, I got very little sleep, and I could have definitely used an extra day just to recover from it. So let's just head straight into our normal recap, shall we?

FRIDAY
Jeff's parents took us and the boys to see the new Disney movie, "Planes," and it was really, really cute. Good job Disney for making another heartwarming movie that brings a tear or two to my eyes... But really, it's a great little movie and we all enjoyed it :) After the movie, we got the rest of the boys' stuff packed in the car and ready to go for the next morning.

SATURDAY
Got up bright and early for our drive up to north Georgia to meet their mom. We grabbed breakfast from Chick-fil-A, and then hit the road. A couple potty stops and five hours later, we ate lunch, and said our goodbyes to those super sweet little boys. We are so thankful we got to spend six full weeks with them this summer, and we just had so much fun with them!

We then made our way over to Atlanta, to visit Jeff's best friend/best man. We went to a cookout at one of his friends' house, and had lots of fun. All of his friends were really nice and welcoming, and didn't make it awkward for us even though we knew no one! After a delicious dinner (grilled chicken and sausage made by an awesome guy from Australia) and some homemade ice cream, we all played Cards Against Humanity. It was my first time playing, and I loved it! I want it for myself now of course. There were 12 or 13 of us playing, and I actually won with five black cards! Holla!

SUNDAY
Woke up bright and early again to head home from Atlanta. We splurged again and got Dunkin Donuts for breakfast, and it was oh so yummy. We took a different route home from ATL than we normally do, and we loved it! It was so gorgeous. We saw so many fields of crops and things, and it was actually really interesting. (We ended up Googling how corn and peanuts are harvested, and we learned something new while we drove...)

A couple of potty stops, some gorgeous back roads of Georgia and about four and a half hours later, we made it to my Grandparents house for a big family lunch! We celebrated my Aunt and my Papa who both have August birthdays. I later worked on addressing the envelopes for our wedding invitations, then we had our first pre-marital counseling session. We stopped by Publix to grab a bit of groceries and pick up a Redbox (since we had a code for a free night!), and then spent some time just resting at Jeff's house...while I addressed some more envelopes.

Super busy, and super fun. We had a great weekend, but we are definitely both exhausted. I skipped my run this morning so that I could sleep until 7 am, rather than 6 am, and just that one hour wasn't quite enough. I'll run tomorrow morning though, so I can start week 6 of 5K training! Tonight and tomorrow we will be busy working to get our invitations stuffed and ready to go, so that we can get them sent out by no later than Friday! Ahhh, so exciting! They turned out great, and I can't wait to show them to you in a couple of weeks, once they've been sent and seen :)

Hope you lovely ladies are having a good Monday so far. I'm looking forward to working on wedding stuff tonight, and making what Jeff has named "Adult Bagel Bites" for dinner! I'll try to make them kind of healthy-ish, and count the calories, but they're just gonna be so yummy!

Much Love,
Halie

Party, Pool, Pictionary, Pizza & Putt-Putt

Whoa that's a lot of things in one weekend that start with a "P!" Makes naming this post pretty easy :) So, I'm feeling a bit tired today, but (as weird as this sounds) it's a good kind of tired, because I started off my day and my week with a 2.5-mile run this morning! My legs are now tired and sore, but I'm feeling good about it, and definitely glad I got up and did it! Week 5 of 5K training is underway. And now of course, let's rewind the past few days and do a bit of weekend recapping. Well, the weekend plus a Thursday recap as well...

THURSDAY
Pizza and putt-putt with the fiance, the twins, Lacey, Josh and Danielle at Fun Station! Their awesome Thursday-night deal is: buy a large pizza for $3.99, and get four games of putt-putt for free! Holy crap that's just too good to pass up, am I right?

FRIDAY
Tried out a new pizza place here in town, Uncle Maddio's Pizza Joint, and it was so freaking delicious! I had a Portobello Pesto Pizza, and I loved it. Sooo yummy. And there were so many other options I wanted to try, so I can't wait to go back and get something different. Then we did some shopping at Walmart to get ready for the twins' birthday party the next day, and even found us all matching shirts to go with the party theme - get ready for pictures of those from Saturday :)

SATURDAY
Birthday party day for the twins! It was actually about a week and a half ago, but we waited until we could work it out the best, and it ended up being a great day for a party at the park! We had a Superman theme, so there was red and blue everywhere, and the four of us all wore matching Superman tshirts we found at Walmart!

After the party, we spent quite a few hours enjoying the beautiful sunshine at the pool, then cooked dinner at Josh & Lacey's house. Then while the kids all watched a movie, we played a couple rounds of our favorite game - Pictionary! One round of couple vs couple, and one round of boys vs girls. Always lots and lots of fun when we play Pictionary!

Picture of ALL the kids at the pool ;)

SUNDAY
The usual morning of hurch and lunch with my parents, then my Mama and I went wedding shoe shopping for me at DSW. Unfortunately, we didn't find anything, so I'm still on the hunt for shoes. Turning my search online now to see what I can find! Then Jeff and the boys and I enjoyed movie rest time for a bit, before the boys finally got restless and forced us back into action. We made a trip to Target (I bought a new dress, in a smaller size!!), then grabbed food from a new-ish place called Zacadoo's - where thanks to a coupon and kids meals being cheaper past 4 pm, all four of us ate dinner for a mere $8.94, and it was really good too! Score!

I then went to Kohl's while Jeff bathed the boys and got them ready for bed. I found a new dress for one of my upcoming wedding showers, and a potential leaving-the-wedding-dress. I just want to try it one with the proper undergarments (*ahem* my Spanks slip....) and see how it looks. I also got two cute, soft v-neck t-shirts, and since I had a coupon, and a couple gift cards, I only paid $4 for two dresses and two shirts. I love when stuff like that happens!

Now it's Monday morning, and I've got two full days ahead of me at work. I've been in training for the last three weeks, just sitting in my supervisor's office learning and watching. Today and tomorrow however, she's out of the office so I finally get to do some work on my own! It's a big responsibility, but I'm ready for it, and I'm ready to just do some hands-on training of my own. So wish me luck as I work on my own the next two days! Happy Monday morning, and happy start to a new week!

Oh, and here's my current mani, which I kinda love! This is the first time I've tried the free-hand painted clouds, but I think I did a decent job, and I will definitely be trying again sometime. Jeff also likes them, and says they remind him of the clouds from Mario (the video game), and I think he's right!

A bit chipped, because this is four days after I first painted them last Thursday...

Much Love,
Halie

*P.S. - This week I'm linking up with Glitter & Gloss, Sami's Shenanigans and Synfully Delicious.*

People Watching & Weekend Happenings

This Monday morning seems to be going a little rough so far... nothing specific has really happened, but it just seems like one of those morning's that are a little bit off, a little bit blah. And so I just feel kinda out of it right now. And I'm also kinda in a hurry today to get this blog post out, so we're going with the ever-so-popular, picture-heavy, light-on-words kind of post today to recap the weekend.

FRIDAY
Dinner with parents, sister and brother-in-law at the new Texas Roadhouse that just opened here
Dessert with all of them at Big Easy Snowballs, and people watching at Lake Ella
Movie rest time with my parents at home, and fell asleep in the living room around 10:45 like an old lady...

I know it's blurry, but I just wanna include it anyways, so oh well....

SATURDAY
Picked up MY wedding dress!!! And it looks gorgeous, and I love it soooo much. Only minor alterations needed and it will be absolutely perfect!
Lunch at the mall with my Mama, and then shopping for a few hours
Did some Pinterest research and Google-ing for wedding stuff
We tried out a craft project for the wedding, and got an idea of how to do it, but it will need some improvements still
Once Jeff and the boys got home, we had pizza at their house, then went and hung out at Lacey's for a bit for the kids to play together

For the wedding, we'll use book pages instead of sheet music, to fit with our theme...

SUNDAY
Helped Jeff teach Sunday school at his church, and hung out during their Children's Church hour
Helped get lunch with with Jeff's mama, then we had spaghetti for Sunday family lunch
Took the boys to the pool to meet Lacey & Josh, but by the time we got there it was cloudy and gray
Hung out there anyways, but eventually went back to Lacey's to grill hamburgers and just hang out for a bit

I love coloring pages and crayons

I'm feeling really tired and kinda icky this morning, and would so much rather still be in bed. But alas, that can't happen and instead I'll be at work in training all day instead. I did still get up and run 2 miles this morning, and honestly I'm surprised that I made it through the whole run! Hopefully I start feeling better soon, or else this is going to be a long, rough day.

Hope y'all had a good weekend, and that your Monday is off to a better start than mine is!
Much Love,
Halie

Pitaria Weekend Happenings

Good morning Monday, and blog, and bloggy friends. Have a good weekend? I did. Although, let's talk about how going from a four-day weekend, back to just a two-day weekend, is a little rough and I wasn't a huge fan of that. When can we work out another super long holiday weekend? Anyone with me on that?

Well anyways, despite it's seemingly short length, it was still pretty great, and it of course deserves the usual weekend recap, I mean am I right?! So let's back it up...

FRIDAY
Well, first of all (before it was officially the weekend), I spent the entire day in training with my new supervisor (who is extremely nice and I like her a lot), and started learning my new position. And it was a loooooot to learn, and we barely even scratched the surface. Still so much more to learn before I get it all down, but I'm on my way at least. I also got to spend just a few quick minutes in my new office, and I can't wait to set up and decorate in here! It's so bare right now and just begging for cutesy little things to brighten up the drab space.

Friday right after work, I went on a short 1.16-mile run for my second run of the day - go me! Then Friday night was the last night of leading games and rec at VBS for Jeff's church, so we took the kids outside and played water games. The kids loved getting soaked just as much as we loved spraying them with squirt guns and water hoses! :) Afterwards, we got cleaned up a bit and went to hang out with a couple friends for a while before finally calling it a night.

SATURDAY
Went with my parents to pick up some furniture that my mom's boss was giving away to her for free. We got a big comfy chair with an ottoman, and a huge coffee table. Mom wants to keep the chair (even though I tried to convince her to let me have it), but she said Jeff and I could have the coffee table. It's not exactly our style though, so we'll definitely want to try to DIY something for ourselves. Anyone know what we could do to get that marble out? We're thinking about maybe using some mosaic-type tile, or some Spanish-style stuff, but first, that marble stuff needs to go!

Then we had lunch and ran a few more errands around town, and eventually Jeff came and met us at Marshall's. I bought some cute new things for my office, some cards to use as shower/gift 'Thank-You's', and my Mama bought me a few office things too! Then Jeff and I just hung out at his house for a bit searching on Craigslist for random things, and found a nice comfy chair to buy, almost identical to the one my mom claimed earlier in the day, for only $30! Score. Then we went with his family to see "The Lone Ranger," and we all thought it was a pretty great movie. Definitely entertaining, and I enjoyed it.

SUNDAY
Went to church and Sunday school with my parents, and then a group of us did a pot-luck style lunch all together, and that was a great time. Mom and I then spent about an hour going over the guest list and doing a few wedding planning things, and then I went to meet Jeff for more wedding planning. We went and hung out at a local coffee shop down close to FSU's campus, Atomic Coffee, and we sat there for about two-ish hours with laptops and sketch pads and to-do list's, and I think we got a good couple of things accomplished, and at least got the ball rolling on some other things. Then we walked to the Greek restaurant that was right next door, Pitaria, and had a yummy gyro for dinner. It was probably the best one I've ever had. So yummy, and so huge and filling! I was real full from just the gyro, and brought the whole salad home for another day. Definitely going to visit there again.

After dinner, we drove around for a bit checking out a few places we found online to rent, but none of them ended up being good. They were either kinda crappy looking (not like their online picture of course), or one was in an extreeeeemeeeelyyy ghetto part of town. Like whoa. So they all got ruled out tonight. But then we went back to his house, and both pulled out our laptops to continue more wedding planning and research! And guess what, we have even more wedding planning stuff on the schedule for tomorrow, and Tuesday, and Wednesday, and well...you get the picture.

So see? Pretty great weekend, if I do say so myself! Good food, time with lots of family and friends, and Jeff too of course, some shopping and lots of wedding planning. Sadly, the only thing I would have wished to add is some good ole' Florida sunshine! It only barely peeked it's head out for a couple minutes at a time, for a total of like 15 minutes the whole weekend, so it was still practically non-existent here in "The Sunshine State." Psh! Yeah right. Here's what I have to say to that though, "Rain, rain go away! We can't take another day!"

But ending on a happy-ish note - I'm back in training again today, and looking forward to learning more. And maybe I'll get a few minutes to start setting up the cute new things in my office! Tonight after work we're going to pick up that chair we found online, check out some potential groomsmen wear, and then get some save-the-dates sent out! Hooray! Hope y'all had a good weekend as well, and that of course your Monday is off to a good start also :)

Much Love,
Halie

Peaches, Purses & Parties - Weekend Recap

Well first of all, I'm pretty irrated with Google/Blogger/the internets right now...I had this post about 80% done, with pictures placed in and everything formatted the way I wanted it, and then something freaked out, and the whole dadgum thing got deleted. Not cool Blogger, not cool at all.

So since I'm annoyed at this point, we're gonna let the pictures handle everything again this Monday (just like last Monday pretty much), with just occasional narration from yours truly. And for this recap, we're actually taking it all the way back to Thursday, so let's get to it, shall we?

THURSDAY

Dance recital for Lacey's daughter, then dinner all together to celebrate Lacey's birthday.

FRIDAY
Drove to middle Georgia to spend the night with Jeff's brother, before taking the boys back to their mom the next morning. Ate a quick dinner at Burger King, and we all enjoyed ice cream cones for dessert. Stopped at a gas station, and the sky looked gorgeous, so of course I grabbed my camera to snap a couple pictures.

SATURDAY
Drove a couple more hours to meet the boys' mom, ate lunch, and headed our own way. We took our time and slowly made our way back to Tally. First, we stopped at fruit stand and bought a basket of peaches; then we wandered around downtown Macon for a while; ate dinner at Cracker Barrell eventually; and spent a few hours catching up with old family friends of his who just moved back to Tifton; finally made it back to town around midnight.

Bumped his head getting out of the car, and a nice worker-lady who saw it gave us ice :)

SUNDAY

Church. Lunch with family. Laundry. Game time with Jeff and my parents. Bought a pretty new purse at Kohl's, with Kohl's cash and a coupon, which was an awesome combo that allowed me to get an originally $55 purse for just $11.88, with a gift card! So I didn't pay a dime. Perfect. Then a going away dinner for one of my bestest friends, who leaves on Thursday for a mission trip for 11 months, to 11 countries - called The World Race. Gonna miss this girl so much!

These 5 guys are all her brothers! Chris, Michael, Steven, Taylor & Tim. She's the oldest, & the only girl. Whoa.

It was another really great weekend, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. This week I only have a three-day work week, so of course I'm thrilled about that! Thursday is the 4th of July, and then I took Friday off as well, so I get a five-day weekend. Woohoo!! Gonna soak up some sun and do some wedding planning and hang out with friends and family, and it's gonna be so great.

And here's some super exciting news - I just found out that the interview I mentioned a month ago, finally resulted in a new job for me!! It's actually still at the same place I work now, but it's in a new section, and I get to move from OPS (hourly, no benefits) to Career Service (salary, benefits, better pay)!!!! I'm so stinking excited about this folks. Like over the moon on this Monday morning. I start on July 15th, so I've got to train someone else in my current position until then. I don't know what kind of blogging I'll be able to do once I start my new position, but we'll just see how that goes once we get there. I'm just so excited to be starting something new! (And I aint upset about a bigger pay check either...) Here's to a new chapter!

Hope y'all had a great weekend, and that your Monday is off to a good start as well. TTFN! Which stands for, "Ta-ta for now," as Tigger would say. (I really have no idea why that just popped into my head right now - I think it's just because my brain is going at a million miles per second from the excitement of my news, so everything's just swirling around like crazy in there...just go with it ladies.)

Precedent Has Been Set - FFTL Link-Up

Welcome to another Tuesday morning around the blogosphere, ladies! I'm sure there's a lot going on in terms of other link-ups, and giveaways and who even knows what else. But this girl is just excited about this little link-up here with y'all! I love reading y'all's posts every week, and seeing your answers to some of our firsts. This has been a fun link-up to host, and I'm still having fun with it every week! So let's get going on today's topics:

First blate you went on (or who you would like to meet if you haven't done this yet)

First daily blog you visit from your RSS feed, blog reader or blog roll

First blate I went on

This was just a couple of weeks ago, when I finally met up with my dear Angie from Happy Bean for a lunch blate one day. (For you non-bloggers, that means blogger + date = blate.) We found each other's blogs by chance one day (I don't even remember how or when) but it turns out we're not only around the same age, but we both live in Tally! So obviously there was an instant bond.

Then driving to work one morning, I just happened to see her walking across the street downtown, but wasn't 100% sure it was her. So I creepily texted her and asked if she was wearing a pink dress that day, and was she downtown, and it was her! And then we made plans for lunch the next week :) So since we both work downtown, we just walked to a nearby restaurant, 101 Restaurant, and met for lunch for some super yummy salads, and we had such a great time. We talked about weddings (she's also a bride-to-be with a really cute engagement story), and our men, and family, and all sorts of things. And it wasn't the least bit awkward for a first 'date.' ;) And sadly, even though I took pictures of everything else, we were too busy chatting to be good bloggers and take a picture together... Next time, we'll make sure that doesn't happen, and we'll snap one right away. 

And now since we had such a great time on both of our first blates, I'd say the precedent has been set for all our future blates with each other, and with other bloggers! Definitely a good first blate :)

She was so sweet and brought me an engagement present, which was a yummy candle!

First daily blog I visit 
No matter what the title of the post is, I'm always interested in what Whitney has to say. She is so funny and I always love reading her stuff. She's also a fellow Florida State fan, so of course she gets extra points for that. A few other 'big bloggers' that I always enjoy reading are: PinkLouLou, Lovely Little Things and So Shay. If you want funny stories about and conversations with a cute 7-year-old, I suggest you check out Smacksy. And then of course I always read every post my blog-friends write: Robin, Erin, Kaitlyn, Kayla, Rachel & sooo many more...I love this blogging world!

If you'd like to join in on this fun link up, check out the super simple 'rules' below, and get to writing! Can't wait to see all the new link ups this week, meet new friends, and read y'all's posts!

1. Write your own post about this week's topics & link up with us!

2. Put the new button on your post or somewhere on your blog

3. Visit some of the other links, and share the love with them on their posts!

4. Spread the word on Twitter and/or Facebook

<center> <a href="http://penguinspastapolkadots.blogspot.com/search/label/From%20Firsts%20to%20Lasts" target="_blank"><img alt="First Things First" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVrwkIAid5vWXfGGkNjq6FQv4vvqZDxLXcMp670eJ2k7tfrfkBrZYiGCr0icOPCsIYvq5MR3qLifCTXPxMVdiq77A56Zq2_nIiRzk2hyphenhyphen1gEmgp6NcoBlX5TNfobmRzpUAjnkoXPjsNXIU/s1600/Firsts+to+Lasts+-+1.jpg"/></a></center>

And next week I'll be taking a break from this link-up to reevaluate, and I'll let you know later where things stand...