Last week, I was laying in bed, reading through blog posts on my bloglovin’ reader. I had just read Elise’s post about things she’d tell her 22 year old self, when I realized that one of my blog posts that was supposed to post the following week, actually posted that day. Before we continue, here a few things that you need to know in order for this story to make sense.
1. I noticed that the post had gone live because it showed up in my reader. I haven’t shared the details yet or promoted it, but you can use bloglovin’ to keep up with my blog posts. If you use it (or if you’d like an easy way to keep up with your favorite blogs), please follow me there!
2. Even though it may appear easy, blogging is actually quite a bit of work. It takes several hours just to make one post happen. For the past couple of months, my assistant (who is fabulous by the way) has been helping me make sure my posts actually happen. I write the content, take photos, plan out the links/format, and then she sets up the post on WordPress and schedules it to publish. Most of the time, getting the post ready to share with the world takes much longer than the actually writing. Having Taylor’s help with this, has been a tremendous help in making sure I post regularly.
When I saw that the post had gone live before I meant for it to, I cringed. After all, the post wasn’t finished. Before this discovery, I had spent a little time thinking about my 22 year old self. My 22 year old self would have panicked. I would have immediately called Taylor and had her take the post down. I would have told her to be more careful and I would have made sure that never happened again. Not only would my 22 year old self have reacted this way, I think my 26 year old self would have too. 
My 28 year old self emailed Taylor to let her know the post went live accidentally and what we could do to watch for that sort of thing next time. I ended the email with, “Btw…this isn’t a big deal and I’m totally not upset about it. Just wanted to point it out for next time. Love you!”
After hitting send, I realized that my 28 year old response to this little issue was much different than my 22 year old response would have been. I certainly want us to pay close attention to details like this, but I knew this wasn’t a tragic event. The post would be just fine without adding the extra photos I was waiting on.
As I thought about the significance of this small event, I realized that we are constantly changing and growing into the type of people we want to become. I feel like the past two years have been simply monumental in my personal growth, a fact that I’ve really struggled to put into words. This short, little email in itself shows one of the larger changes I’ve experienced personally. While I still pay very close attention to detail, I understand that the details aren’t always that important. I also have to give people room for error. There’s not a perfect person in this world and those imperfections are often what makes life so fantastic. 
I think the moral of this seemingly pointless story is to realize (and celebrate) how ever-changing life is. As each day passes, we have the opportunity to grow into better and better versions of ourselves. With each new experience, we learn something new. We should take that knowledge and use it to become the best we can be. Even at the young age of 28, I can see how very much I’ve grown already. I love the person I am today compared to who I was at 22, and I’m certain that I’ll love 38 even more than 28. One of these days I’ll be able to wrap my head around some of the life-changing realizations I’ve had lately. For now, I’ll just celebrate this one small example.
If you’d like some more inspirational reading, I had also just read this post that mentions not waiting for perfection. It seems like my Bloglovin’ feed was preparing me for that night’s discovery!
On another note, I’d like to say thank you to everyone who follows along here. Sometimes this place is filled with adventures from my life and decorating ideas. Other times it’s more of ramblings about the things swirling in my head. Either way, it means the world to me that you come and read. I love you all!
Tag Archives: 2014
On a Beautiful Life
The past year I’ve thought a lot about living a beautiful life. That sounds so incredibly vague…what does that even mean?? I’ve read posts here and there that reference a beautiful life, and I’ve spent quite a bit of time thinking about what that means.
I’m starting to realize that what a beautiful life means for me is surrounding myself with things that I love, things that inspire me and make me happy. This sounds so simple, but it’s actually a lot more challenging than it seems. I am a very thrifty person. I don’t like spending lots of money of frivolous things and most of the time will only make purchases if something is on sale. (I do make exceptions for things that I absolutely love.) I’m known for being great at making things work or making the most of what I have. In turn, I tend to use things that I already have rather than buying new versions that I may like better. After all, if it works just fine, why would you replace it??
When I envision living a beautiful life, I think about having a few specific non-important items that I think are beautiful. As a matter of fact, I think of simple things like a pretty ironing board cover, fun towels, beautiful coffee mugs, and the softest and prettiest throw blankets. 
Reality is that I’ve kept the same, not-so-pretty and definitely not my style ironing board cover because nothing was wrong with it. However, I swoon over the pretty ones every time I walk by them at Target. I often find patterned towels that I love, but I registered for solid khaki ones when we got married because they would match almost anything if I changed the bathroom decor. I haven’t purchased any of the beautiful coffee mugs that I’ve ran across, because the promotional ones (you know, the ones with logos that your insurance agent gave you) I have in the cabinet work just fine. I also never buy those furry and fabulously soft throw blankets that match my decor because I have 10 blankets that will still keep me warm…I just have to keep them tucked away when someone comes over.
When I sit and think about it, it’s crazy to think that not buying new versions of these things are what’s standing between me and what I’d consider a beautiful life. Reality is that I could replace all of these things for $50-75 and my mental image of a beautiful life would have manifested itself. Sometimes you have to really stop and think about things like this. You may be stuck on something that would only cost you $5 or $10 to fix. Sometimes, a $20 purchase can really make a huge difference in your life. After spending months of thinking about it, I finally realized that a new ironing board cover and coffee mugs were what I needed to feel like I was surrounding myself with beautiful things. That’s so simple! 
Of course, I’m not saying that I have a terrible life because I drink my hot chocolate from a North Monroe Baptist Church mug. However, as I’ve spent so much time thinking about what a beautiful life means to me, I’ve decided that beauty is found the little things for me. It means surrounding myself with only things that I love…not just things that I already have. It means buying a $5 coffee mug because I love it, rather than continue to use one that I don’t love. It means making cloth napkins like these and using them for daily life instead of a paper towel just because I can throw them away. (Her post talks about making average things feel more extravagant which really echoes what I’m saying here.)
Since coming to this conclusion, I’ve decided to make it my mission to replace the bland items in my life with things that I love. Since we don’t have a “for fabulous things” budget, this will be something I do over time. (By the way, since I’ve made this decision, I haven’t found a single coffee cup that I like. Go figure.) This mission doesn’t have to be something that costs a ton of money. You can buy little things here and there that are only a few dollars each. In turn, you end up surrounding yourself with things you love. To me, that’s what a beautiful life is all about.
What does a beautiful life mean to you? It can certainly be different than mine, so please share anyway! I’ve spent quite a bit of time thinking about this, so I’d love to hear your thoughts.
#maptennessee – Gatlinburg
After spending the night in Stone Mountain, Georgia, Matthew and I headed on to Gatlinburg, Tennessee to spend a few days relaxing before going on to Nashville. We stayed in a fabulous cabin with an AMAZING view!! Waking up to those mountains was certainly a great way to start our days.
We didn’t do too much of the touristy-type stuff in Gatlinburg, but we did walk around downtown a bit. We ate at the Smoky Mountain Brewery, which was a fun place. We also ate at the Melting Pot fondue restaurant (not a local joint, but also not a place that we have back home). I will say this about the Melting Pot….even if you don’t get a full meal there, you absolutely must stop in and try the creme brûlée dessert fondue. They give you a tray full of yummy items to dip in the chocolate…bananas, strawberries, cheesecake, crusted marshmallows…you name it. It was simply fantastic and possibly the best dessert I’ve ever had. (As I’m typing this, my mouth is watering.)
In Gatlinburg, we also hiked to the top of a mountain. That would be part of the Great Smokey Mountains, y’all! We hiked a 7 mile round-trip trail to the very top of Brushy Mountain. For the record, hiking 7 miles on a mountain is nothing at all like seven miles on flat ground. Towards the end we were both pretty worn out, but it was so worth it. I think this might be one of the coolest things I’ve done so far. There was a waterfall about half way up where everyone stopped to take pictures. We encountered quite a few people (probably 40 or so) on the way to the waterfall, but once we passed the waterfall we didn’t see half as many people. Actually, we only saw around 10-12 others once we passed the waterfall. That should have been my first clue that it was a tough hike! Nonetheless, we did it and it felt pretty amazing.
We spent the next morning recuperating from the hike before walking around downtown for a bit. After leaving Gatlinburg, we stopped at an outlet mall in Pigeon Forge (shopping – yay!). Then we were in route to Nashville!
Having these few days to relax and take things easy was just what we needed. Even the strenuous hike was relaxing because we were unplugged and soaked up some nature, which is my absolutely favorite. I will forever remember our little cabin and the fun memories we made in Gatlinburg. Are there any other fun towns you’d recommend in Tennessee?? I’d love to hear about other places we could visit next time!
Farewell First Home
Only July 31 we moved out of our very first house together…our sweet little rent house. In preparing to move and talking so much about the new house, I realized that I never shared a tour of our rental. I shared bits and pieces here and there, but I never shared any full room tours.
Check the archives for our antique mirror gallery wall, bathroom makeover, and living room sneak peek.
In thinking back on it, I didn’t share any tours because I never felt like things were “finished.” I had ideas for making things even better, so I’d wait to share the space until all of those little projects were done. Well, a lot of those projects never happened. I’d be too busy or it wouldn’t turn out like I hoped, so I never shared the spaces. 
I’ve recently stumbled upon this blog, and her mantra is that things don’t have to be perfect to be beautiful. This approach really struck a cord with me because I’ve waited on perfection to share my home on the blog or invite people over. However, perfection isn’t really my goal, and I don’t actually ever want to feel “finished.” Instead, I hope to make things beautiful (per mine and Matthew’s standards), not perfect. My goal with the new house is not to wait until everything is perfect and finished and instead celebrate the beauty in imperfections and progress along the way. 
Since I never shared a full home tour in the rent house, I’ll share a few highlights today. In these pictures, you’ll see what one version on my living room looked like. My favorite piece of furniture is that white piece that held the TV…absolutely love it! The gun rack hanging over the entry table was my Dad’s. I loved using it for something other than it’s intended purpose. I think it may end up going in my closet room in the new house. 
In looking back on these photos, I regret not sharing our space simply because things weren’t finished. I can’t wait to decorate the new house and will definitely make a better effort to embrace the in-progress stages. I may need your help reminding me that “it doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful.”
By the way, that leopard rug doesn’t have a home in the new house. It’s up for grabs if anyone needs it! It’s great at hiding puzzles. 🙂
Our Two Year Anniversary
Matthew and I celebrated our two year wedding anniversary last week. I’d love to tell you that we celebrated with a romantic getaway for two to an exotic island. Sorry, it’s not that glamorous. Instead, we spent our second anniversary MOVING.
We did make sure to wrap up in time to have a nice dinner together though. (Somehow I managed to make it from moving attire to anniversary-date-night attire in a pretty short amount of time.) The traditional gift for a second anniversary is cotton. We decided to cheat a little and have dinner at a local restaurant, Cotton, instead of purchasing something. After all, the chance to sit and eat something other than delivery pizza on the floor (moving is tough on meal time), was way more valuable to us than anything we could have purchased. 
Cheers to two years with this amazing man! You can read about our first anniversary here. I went back and read the story of how we met and our proposal. Such fun memories! You can also get some highlights from our first two years in the archives. Here’s to year number three! Something tells me that it’ll be full of house projects…
Closet Room – Shoe Shelves
Anyone who knows me, knows that I have quite the shoe collection.
My last count was over 150 pair, and that number has certainly grown since then. The problem with having so many shoes is how to store/display them.
If you read my last post about shoe storage you know that I found an awesome new strategy for storing my out of season shoes. While that set up is still working wonderfully, my in-season shoes weren’t as accessible as I’d like. During the spring and summer months, my old shoe shelves worked ok and everything fit on the shelves decently. However, there was simply no way to fit all of my winter shoes/boots on those shelves. (See my earlier post to see what shelves I was using.) Last year I used a second shelf for tall boots, but I didn’t like having to rearrange the room to bring in another shelf just for boots. Besides, we sold that old shelf in the garage sale. (What better way to force yourself to come up with a better solution that to sell your current method in a garage sale?!)
I am so very lucky to have a handy husband who agreed to build me some custom shoe shelves. By making the shelves go from door frame to door frame, we added room for more shoes. Plus, by spacing the shelves farther apart, I can fit all of my shoes there, including my tall boots. We used the Pinterest-popular molding trick for heels and even ran the molding above the doorways for more storage. (I use one of those grabber thingys to get those down.) The molding isn’t working quite right, but it’ll do until we can investigate other solutions.
I’m not offering a full tutorial here because these were your basic shelf design…except for better because my wonderful husband built them. Matthew purchased the wood and ready-made brackets from Home Depot. He cut and rounded the corners of the shelves so I wouldn’t break my hips from running in to them…it’s bound to happen. He attached the brackets, sanded the wood, and I painted them this cool teal color. I wanted the color to be a tad darker, but I wasn’t going to argue with the grumpy old paint man in Lowes. (By the way, if you or someone you know needs a Lowe’s coupon, let me know. I have discounts that I can email to my clients/friends.)
I had to fight to fit all of my winter shoes out, but my summer shoes fit pretty well. During my last closet organization spree I mentioned getting rid of extra lounge pants to make them fit in just one drawer. I had to do a similar thing with boots. While I wasn’t ready to part with any of them, I had to put a few pair back in their containers to have enough room for my favorites. If I couldn’t remember wearing them even once last year, I figure they’ll be fine to leave in the top of the closet. After all, I can get them down if I decide to actually wear them this year. The reality is, I only wear those black cowboy boots to country music concerts. They can hang out up top with a few other not-regularly-worn friends until it’s time to “go out with my boots on.” I did the same thing with some summer shoes that aren’t worn often.
What do you think about the new shelves? Didn’t Matthew do a wonderful job?? I love getting to shop these shelves while getting dressed in the morning. It’s like having my own personal department store! I hated to have to take the shelves down when we moved last week, but I’m already working on ideas for the new house!
That day I took a bath at 4:00
If you’ve never taken a random bubble bath at 4:00 in the afternoon, you should. I did, and it was fantastic.
Why share this on the blog, you ask? Let me tell you! This random afternoon bubble bath symbolized something far greater. I allowed myself to do something I wanted to do, just because I wanted to do it. I’ve alluded to my struggle with guilt in the past, and I’ve certainly gotten better with it. (There’s some discussion of it here). Today was another milestone because I had no reason to take a bath at 4:00 in the afternoon. However, I just wanted to, so I did. Then, I finished responding to the day’s emails from my bed in my bathrobe. It was simply amazing! (If you haven’t ever considered a career in real estate, we should talk. You can do things like this, and it’s wonderful!)
Back to the point. I write this post for two reasons.
- If you struggle with self-guilt like I do, know that you can start to break that cycle. Do something fun just because you want to and then celebrate your accomplishment. You deserve it!
- Even if you don’t deal with guilt, you deserve to do something for yourself today. It doesn’t matter what time of day it is….do something to celebrate your fabulousness. It doesn’t have to take long. It can even be as short as a few minutes. Nonetheless, doing something just for yourself, just because you want to can have a profound impact on your day. Both your mind and body will thank you.
Usually my challenges revolve around going out and doing something nice for other people. Today, I want you to do something nice for yourself! After all, you’re a spectacular person and you deserve it!
P.S. Don’t forget to try a bubble bath in the middle of the day. You can thank me later. 🙂
Let’s talk about home renovations.
When Matthew and I started looking for a house, we definitely wanted something “move in ready.” It was mandatory. We’re busy people…no time to work on a million projects at home. Welllllll….the house we ended up buying was not exactly move in ready for us.
While the house was in good condition, it just wasn’t quite our style. It had popcorn ceilings with flooring and paint colors that weren’t quite “us.” However, the house was in a great neighborhood where we could easily ride our bikes and walk together like we enjoy. So, we went for it and decided to budget for some updates and changes instead of insisting on a fully updated home. 
We have quite a bit of plans for our new house, and I’ll likely share my inspiration/plans for each area as we go along. For now, we’re working on having the popcorn ceilings scraped and everything painted. We’re also hoping to have the current floors demoed and replaced before moving our things in. Here’s some of the bigger plans we have for our new home.
- Ceilings scraped, leveled and painted
- Entire house painted (walls, cabinets, closets, trim….the whole house!)
- New flooring throughout
- All new light fixtures (except for 2)
- Painting the exterior brick
- Installing wood beams and shutters out front
- Renovating both bathrooms
Most of these are immediate things that’ll be done rather quickly. Some of them (plus a lot more) will be done as we go along. Just changing the flooring and paint before moving in will make a huge difference in making this home feel more like Matthew and I. Even though we have several projects up our sleeves, we’re very excited about our new place to call home. We’re looking forward to making lots of wonderful memories here (hopefully they don’t involve construction mishaps), and we know that this home has amazing potential. It’ll still be a couple of weeks before we can move in, but we’re shooting to be in there the last week of July. 
We’ve gotten so many sweet comments from you all! Thanks so much for sharing in our excitement. You can keep up with the daily progress by following the #mapfirsthouse on Instagram. (That stands for Matthew and Pamela’s first house, by the way.)
Here’s to new homes filled with lots of projects! (See the before pics here.)
#maptennessee: Stone Mountain, Georgia
Matthew and I just wrapped up our first “real” vacation. I say “real” because it’s the first week-long trip that we’ve taken, and it wasn’t tied somehow to work or family holidays. Needless to say, it was much-needed and fabulous.
We ended up getting to leave a day early so we took the long way and stopped in Atlanta for the night. We chose to stop here because Matthew wanted to see the laser show at Stone Mountain. I’ll be completely honest…I was not excited about seeing this show. I pictured a big rock in the middle of a field with lasers flying through the air for 45 minutes. I would have lost interest after two! Boy, was I wrong!
First of all, the park was lovely. There was an old town area with food and various merchandise vendors. There were picnic tables and plenty of places to visit while waiting on the show to start. After grabbing a bite to eat, we headed over to the mountain area to pick a place to watch from. We enjoyed a little picnic while waiting, and those chicken strips were phenomenal! I loved seeing such a diverse group of people here. There were adults, families, young kids and teens….and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves equally. If you have kids, this would be a great place to take them because they could play for hours while waiting on the show. They were throwing balls around and playing all sorts of outside games. (As a matter of a fact, I wish you could have seen the face of the little girl behind us when her ball rolled through my ketchup! Luckily, I brought extra.)
Now for the show. Again, I wasn’t looking forward to it. I had enjoyed the park and our picnic but I was trying to prepare myself to make it through this show. I was totally off base here. They combined music and storytelling to make the show so captivating. Plus, it wasn’t just lasers flying through the air…they used the lasers to draw pictures on the mountain for an animated show that matched the music. At one point, they even animated the General Lee carving in the mountain. Needless to say, I didn’t even realize that it was time for the show to end and was thoroughly impressed. What I found the most interesting was that everyone loved the show and was very attentive…young and old. I should also mention that there’s no charge to see the show. It’s a win-win!
We stayed at the Stone Mountain Inn, right up from the mountain, which was lovely. The grounds were kept immaculately. It had nice landscaping and a great pool/courtyard area. The interior rooms have a little porch with rocking chairs where I could have sat for hours and hours. In addition to the scenery, the staff was so nice and friendly. Usually, there are one or two people who are nice and then you have those other people. Not at Stone Mountain Inn. Everyone that we came in contact with was very nice and helpful. We also added the breakfast to our room at the last minute. Honestly, we almost skipped this because we figured it was your run of the mill continental breakfast with a make-your-own-waffle station. Not at all! It was a restaurant-style breakfast with a full buffet. (I could have eaten French toast for days.) Again, everyone was happy to see us and friendly. The best part was the balcony where you could enjoy your breakfast while overlooking Stone Mountain and the beautiful landscaping. I wish we would have had more time here, and this is definitely somewhere I’d like to return. If you’re considering a visit to Stone Mountain Park and the laser show, definitely plan on staying at the inn. I loved it!
I think what made this part of our trip so exceptional was the attention to details. Both the park and the inn focused on making the experience a good one. From maps to customer service, it was obvious that they wanted their guests to enjoy themselves. We loved our time here and look forward to going back soon.
Have you ever been to Stone Mountain or somewhere similar? Please share! I’d love to hear your stories.
P.S. You can see more photos from our trip through #maptennesse on Instagram.
Our First House – Before
Yesterday Matthew and I closed on our very first house together! It’s such an exciting time, but we have a bit of work to go before we make this house into our home. As a matter of a fact, it’ll be several weeks before we even move into the house, which is sort of sad.
Nonetheless, we are very excited to have a new place to call our own that we will make into a home that we love. I wanted to go ahead and share these before photos, so everyone could see what we’re starting with. These are the photos from the MLS listing (taken by my sweet friend, Anna Kay), so you can see the home just as Matthew and I saw it when we made the decision to purchase this home.
We have several big ideas in mind for this home, so you’ll have to stay tuned for the final product (if there’s actually such a thing as a “final” product). My biggest goal for this home is to create a place that we love to come home to. We’ve thought a lot about what that means, and I plan to be very intentional about every decision that’s made for this home. The ultimate goal is to create a space that reflects our personalities, is free of clutter and excess, and full things that we love. I’ll certainly be sharing our journey here, and I’d love to hear your thoughts. Now I’m off to choose more paint colors!
Photo credit: Anna Kay Springer, Realtor