Or in Jeff's case, go ahead and just draw out the plans...we've finally begun work on my cabinets for my craft room! Yay! This has been a long time coming and when I say that, I mean this all started back before we even moved into this new house almost a year and a half ago.
I know it's hard to see what we've got here, but it's the left drawer and the right drawer on the lower part of the wall. I'm going to have an L-shaped desktop/workspace and these drawer shells are on the ends of the desktop/workspace as support (and storage, of course).Stay tuned!
My husband was a busy bee over the long weekend (he took Monday off and had Tuesday off due to Veterans Day). My parents were here and while me and my mom worked on her first (ever) scrapbook, Daddy & Jeff hung out in the shop for the better part of the weekend "building stuff".
Yes, I got a suh-weet dose of Cora Beth this weekend! I went to Lexington Friday mid-morning and tore myself away Sunday afternoon about 4pm.
I have to admit I was such a "hog" with her but I tried to give everyone a chance to hold her -- my family is so great about letting me have her to myself when I'm there because they know they can see her whenever. I know my mom & dad don't get to see her as much as they'd like and they're still so good about letting me have her. And that's not to mention how great my brother & sister-in-law are about being around whenever I'm in town so I can see her just as much as I can before I have to head back. They're absolutely wonderful.
This weekend we had absolutely beautiful weather -- sunny skies, a nice breeze, mid-70s for the high...it was a great time to work out in the yard. We weren't planning to work in the yard but it seemed like a good idea. I was sitting out on the porch with my bible study when Jeff got home from mentoring and the men's breakfast at church and we just got to talking and looking around at our neighbors' houses/yards (and feeling the gorgeous weather). Our neighbors to our left had just gotten brand new pinestraw laid down which made ours look really (REALLY) bad...
SURPRISE!!! Almost 50 people were there to wish me a happy birthday and help me celebrate. It was awesome -- the best birthday party I've had so far! And the CPC was a great place to throw a party. As you'll see in the photos, the kids were pretty well taken care of with video games, arcade games, air hockey, pool tables, a basketball court. And of course, we ate good! Jeff stepped outside his mind when he went to buy hot dogs & hamburgers (& buns) for this party -- we brought TONS of food home with us. But we had enough for everyone to eat hearty and that's the important thing. Our friends helped with setup and also brought side dishes like mac & cheese & scalloped potatoes, chips & condiments for the burgers & dogs, as well as brownies & such.
Then Jeff brought out this beautiful cake in my absolute favorite colors -- I bet he didn't even try to do that (I don't think he even knows what my favorite colors are! :). And it was sooo good! We took lots of that home, too. That's okay -- it just spreads the birthday celebration out a little longer (not so good for the diet, but waddya gonna do??).
And we're finally to fall -- it seems like summer lasted for.e.ver since it was so stinkin' hot. But it's begun to cool off rather quickly around here. We're enjoying highs in the mid to upper 70s with gusty winds (thought we'd somehow gotten into March today), sunshine...what could be better?! I love fall...
We get to go see our sweet friends, the Seerings, tomorrow night! Matthew & Elizabeth used to be in our SS class at church until God called Matthew into ministry -- he's now at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, NC. We miss them a lot but I'm able to keep up with them pretty well through Elizabeth's blog -- she's actually the one that inspired me to start this blog. And she keeps me in stitches reading hers... 
Yeah, not really the "veranda"... just the porch. We don't have a "veranda" (I'm not sure I really even know what a "veranda" is). But the porch is good enough for me right now! Jeff had the good idea to eat dinner out on the porch tonight as it has cooled considerably since our highs-in-the-high-90s temps the last few days. It was cloudy all day & the breeze blew the humidity right way. Our new furniture worked really great for dining!
I found something that I thought would look good on our kitchen table as a centerpiece. I think it will be versatile enough to stay on the table no matter what types of tables Jeff builds for us --er, I mean, no matter what types of tables we go through in our lifetime -- dark, light, big, small, etc. We don't use our table too often (to eat on, anyway) since we have the nice coffee table with the lift mechanism that Jeff built me a few years ago (this post has a photo of it), but it will be easy enough to move the centerpiece when we do use it (for guests & such).
This was the image about 16 min ago...see where my arrow is pointing, folks? That's where we live. Right there in the middle of all that junk from Hanna. Now, we're not too concerned at this point. It is, after all, a pretty unorganized tropical storm but there's potential so we're not being stupid about it. I'm pretty much glued to The Weather Channel to see the latest. Right now, we've just got some wind accompanied by clear skies. Yeah, I said clear skies. That will change the closer we get to midnight which is when they predict landfall around the SC/NC border. We did have some rain earlier this morning around 10am, and then another rain band came through about 2pm.
Personally, I like storms. Now, I try to be smart about them, but I rather enjoy the whole process of watching these tropical storms/hurricanes approach, all the maps they show us on TWC to show us how the storms are being guided and what causes them to form, etc. I think I would've enjoyed a life as a meteorologist...for a little while at least. :)
But now tornadoes are a whole 'nother ballgame that I am not a cheerleader for IN THE LEAST. Tornadoes are completely unpredictable and something you can't watch "approach" and know, for the most part, what they will do. Tornadoes, though, are a possible "side effect", if you will, of hurricanes and as a matter of fact, that radar map above has a red box around our area...that red box means we're under a tornado watch until 5am tomorrow morning. I don't like that. But that's why I'm glued to TWC.
So that is the reason I really haven't gotten around to this post yet. But here I am. I wanted to show you the new furniture Jeff got me (us) for our front porch. When we moved in, we had some plastic gray adirondack chairs out on the front porch and that was sufficient for awhile. We both have been observing what everyone else had on their porches, just gathering ideas for what we wanted. I came home a few weeks ago and there was a brand new set of 2 chairs and a table on our porch! It was dark by the time I had gotten home so I flipped on the light to see them. They were really pretty. But then the next day when I saw them in the daylight, they were even prettier! 
I just love how the burnt orange-ish red color looks against the blue of our house and I really have been gravitating toward dark colors for furniture lately (that used to not be the case -- I was natural wood all the way). The table is great & even has a little basket underneath to store some things. And if all that wasn't enough, the chairs are really comfortable to sit in! I love it when you don't have to sacrifice comfort for style. Jeff did really good picking these out -- he didn't run it by me or have me look at it at all before he made his purchase. Aaaaand, he got this set on clearance. I've said it before and I'll say it again: he's a keeper! :D
Okay, I'm giving you guys a first glimpse into the master bedroom. For a long time, our bedroom was a sort of "catchall" and I'm not saying it's changed a whole lot, but it's starting to slowly evolve. Jeff picked up some bookcases (for free!) after I mentioned that the one bookcase in the guest bedroom wasn't gonna cut it for all the books I have (and will be purchasing in the future...). Of course, I really want him to BUILD me some bookcases (or at least one, for pete's sake!), but I don't know when that will be. I wanted to get these boxes of books unpacked to 1) see what kind of shape the books were in after being in the storage unit for awhile, and 2) to get the boxes out of the house and tidy up the guest bedroom. Mission accomplished on both accounts!
My niece, Cora Beth McAfee, made her way into this world Friday, July 25, at 2:36am. She weighed 6 lbs. 5 oz. and was 20 1/4 inches long. She brought with her the most delicate features and the sweetest face you've ever seen... she is the first child of my brother & his wife, the first grandchild to my mom & dad. And she has stolen every last one of our hearts! 
Brandi was such a trooper, going through about 8 hours of labor before her doctor decided that it would be best to perform a c-section due to the baby's dropping heartrate during Brandi's contractions. She wasn't dialating very quickly and the doctor didn't want to take any chances. What was so neat is that he wanted to pray with Brandi (and the family) before he took her into surgery. Praise God for Christian doctors!
So as they prepped Brandi for surgery, we all headed down to the waiting room to pray & wait for the miracle that was taking place just down the hall. About an hour later, the proud Daddy, my brother, Daniel, came to tell us we could come see Cora Beth in the nursery. It was there that we all instantly fell in love with her...and my level of pride in my brother shot up. I was so proud of both him & Brandi -- they made this child-birthing thing look so easy...Daniel was just as "cool as a cucumber" every time I saw him...just going with the flow of things, doing what needed to be done. Huh.
We got another home project done this morning. We've been wanting to put some sort of shelving up in the attic to organize our "junk" somewhat -- nothing really fancy; just something to get the stuff up off the floor so we can actually move around up there.
I am really loathed to show you guys my "makeshift" craft room at this point...this has been the bane of my existence since we moved in. I understand everyone usually has a "catchall" room when they first move in -- a room they throw all the "boxes we don't know what to do with yet", all the "items we don't have a place for yet". Well, this room most definitely qualifies as that room. I'm always extremely embarassed to show this room on "the tour" when anyone comes to see the house for the first time, and usually everyone understands and doesn't care at all (they'll usually tell me all about their "catchall" room at that point), but still. If you know me, you know I care. :)
Happy (belated) 4th of July! I was so busy enjoying my day off yesterday, I didn't have a chance to blog. But I did think about it and planned on blogging today since I know it has been a ridiculous amount of time since I blogged last. My day yesterday was filled with a variety of things -- some I wanted to do, some just needed to be done. 
all of my life
Okay, okay, okay. I know you all have been waiting (some patiently, some maybe not so patiently) to see photos from our fabulous cruise. I have chosen just a scant few from our trip, out of the myriads & gazillions of photos we took, to share here. I do want to say that I'm putting together a slideshow of sorts to "showcase" our trip and you three or four that check this blog will definitely get a link to that when I get it put together. :)
Our second port, Grand Cayman: 
Our third & final port, Ocho Rios, Jamaica:
We really enjoyed each place that we visited and had great weather the entire trip. We had a great time on all the excursions we chose. Of the three ports, surprisingly, Jamaica was the most beautiful to me. The water was such a beautiful aquamarine and the vegetation was absolutely lush. We got to experience both as you can see from my photos. Grand Cayman was also very beautiful; very clean with beautiful waters and scenery. The people there were very nice & friendly, too. Cozumel was probably my least favorite stop, although we still had a good time there. I had my first snorkeling experience there and it was a lot of fun.The cruise ship was incredible and there will be lots of photos of that in my "showcase" when I finish with it. Jeff and I had a really great time hanging out and making lots of memories, going to places we've never been, experiencing things we've never done before. It was a wonderful trip, one I won't ever forget, and the perfect way to celebrate a decade of marriage with the one my heart will love forever...
