Book Club Friday: Heaven is for Real

I'm linking up today with Heather from Blonde, Undercover Blonde for Book Club Friday!!!

This book is written by a pastor about what his child experienced during his stay in the hospital while discussing their every day life as well. It is a non-fiction book about what the child saw while he was in Heaven. While I don't know if it is safe to believe everything a 4 year old says, I highly recommend this book. I read it in a few hours, and it was sad, uplifting, and heart-warming. It is very neat and interesting to hear the stories the child says about what he sees. This would be a good read for anyone that has lost a loved one or a woman who has had a miscarriage as Colton, the little boy, talks about both of these things. While I don't recommend using this book as a way to learn about Heaven and God, I think it is a simple book that everyone could get something out of. 

More Htown Blogger Fun

Yesterday Savanah and I went to see Friends with Benefits at Studio Movie Grill. It was entertaining and I highly recommend that you see it. If you are a JT fan, you will love it even more! After the movie we met up with some Htown bloggers at Yard House for a drink. 

 me, Meg, Stephanie

Lindsay and Savanah

We had a great time and I am loving getting to know more girls in Houston. Friends are what have been getting me through this rough time in my life and I feel like I have met so many great girls this past week that I want to get to know even better.

This weekend my cousins are coming to stay at my apartment so that means I need to get to cleanin' and also figuring out what we can do all weekend. Any suggestions????

How Pinteresting

Today I am linking up with Michelle for my first pinteresting Wednesday! I joined pinterest last Friday and have been addicted ever since! If you haven't checked it out yet, I highly suggest that you do! You will always remember where you saw that perfect bedroom that you want to copy! 

I figure in my journey of looking for Mr. Right, I should just start with this...

Source: marthastewartweddings.com via Megan on Pinterest

Isn't it lovely????

However since there is no Mr. Right even close to being in the picture, isn't this cute for a bachelorette pad???

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This is my new motto......

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I am loving blues, grays, and neutral colors right now......

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how cute is this....

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And last but not least, I love everything about this outfit!

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Can't wait to see what you are pinning!! Leave your email in the comments if you need an invite to Pinterest! 

P.S. I am so excited about the Houston Blogger Happy Hour today!! I am so glad I got a twitter account to keep in touch with all of these girls!! 

Slacker

So when I started my diet plan back in February, it went really well. It continued to go well through June. I lost about 25 pounds or so. My weeks went something like this most of the time. However in July, my weeks looked like this....

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I was out of town for a good bit of July on vacations and back in Louisiana. We had a family reunion for the Fourth at my parents house which meant all the leftover cake and food stayed at my house. On top of that, vacation means no less working out. So my splurge month is coming to an end. I have got to get back on track. I haven't actually gained any of the weight back but I can definitely tell that I lost some muscle. I am not as tone as I was. I also still want to lose about 10 lbs. I am going to the beach in 2 weeks so I must do as much as I can before then. So off to the gym I go! This plan is back in action!

Htown Blogger Brunch

We had a large group- about 20 girls, but we were split into different tables. This was our table of 8. It was a blast getting to meet this sweet girls and I hope to spend more time with them again soon. I want to spend more time with the other girls that I wasn't able to talk to that much also. I am thinking we should get together more often than just once a month! Maybe even a Htown bloggers road trip???

Brynn, Celia, Savanah, and Michelle

Breanne, Jennifer, me, and Lauren

The food was delicious. The photography is terrible for several reasons- I am no photographer and the lighting was not too great. I also am not in the mood to try to edit anything! 

 chicken wings and pancakes

 Red Velvet pancakes

Thank you Max's for a great time!

Now What?

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My first emotional post.....here it goes....
What do you do when your world has been totally rocked??? That is what I am wondering because in the summer of  2011, my world has been changed. What do you do when you thought your future was planned out and now you don't even know where you will be next year??

A man who I thought was "The One", a man who talked to me about our future bedroom, the ring he was going to get me, what our kids would do, our future house, our future in general.....decided I wasn't going to be in his future anymore. Apparently it took him 4 years to figure that out. Seriously dude?? You couldn't have figured that out in year 1, maybe year 2??? Really??? You need to be with me for 4 years to figure out that you don't want to be with me????

Where does a newly single girl go from here??? I feel like I am starting over in a new place knowing no one. After a break up- you don't just lose a best friend, you break up with other friends as well. I am sure you all know how that works.

Thankfully, I have had some good girl friends to hang out with to get through this rough time in my life. I have met lots of new people already and I am looking forward to meeting more. I met a large group of really nice girls this past weekend for the Houston's Blogger brunch. I will blog about that as soon as I can find my camera cord. I found about 15 cords today. Of course, none were the ONE I needed.

I know I will get through this. I know I will look back at some point and be glad that it happened. I will realize why God has this plan for my life. But in the meantime, it sucks! So join me on this journey as I begin my search for "Mr. Right". I am sure I will have plenty of guy bashing posts about all the losers I meet along the way! I already have a few I could write!

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I also signed up for twitter this morning....trying to figure it all out!

pool day

Yesterday, I went out to Missouri City to hang out at the pool with this Mama and her precious little boy!

We stayed out there for a couple of hours. L slept in the shade for most of the time. The 5 minutes that he got in the pool/sun wore him out! We are gonna do another pool day next week. I will try to take lots of pictures because my blog has been lacking pictures lately.

Not much else is going on this weekend. I am exciting about the blogger lunch going on tomorrow! Any other Houston bloggers wanna join??? I will definitely get pictures from that! Have a nice weekend!

Something Blue

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Linking up with Paw Prints and Pastry Bags.....

What have I been up to??

I have been a bad blogger lately. It seems as if I blog in spurts! I am going to try and blog more often. I have spent a lot of time in Louisiana this summer. We had a family reunion at my parents house for the fourth of July. That was a lot of fun and I enjoyed spending time with them. I did some volunteer work in a low income area in Houston last week. We had a lot of fun working with the kids in the area. We helped the older girls make scrapbooks and taught them ways to read the Bible and think about verses as they read them.....

1. What does it say?

2. What does it mean?

3. How can I apply it in my life?

I do not have any pics from the week and could probably not post them anyway.

I am going through a really rough time in my life right now and will eventually blog about it, but I am not ready yet. I prayed for some answers and the next day I read this post about waiting on God, read this post about God being faithful, and got in my car and Waiting by John Waller was playing. So I guess my answer is to just keep waiting and be patient.

"I'm waiting, I'm waiting on You, Lord And I am hopeful, I'm waiting on You, Lord Though it is painful, But patiently, I will wait"- John Waller

Painful is an understatement. I am 99% sure this is the hardest thing I have ever had to go through. I have hope that in the end, I will look back and realize why things went the way they did. But in the meantime, it's painful.

DIY conference

I need to find some people that want to go to the DIY conference in Atlanta next summer. Sounds like it will be lots of fun! I would love to learn more about power tools, painting furniture, photographing it, etc.

Posts about it:

http://www.havenconference.com/

http://www.centsationalgirl.com/2011/07/haven-conference-june-2012/

http://www.homestoriesatoz.com/2011/07/announcing-haven-conference-home-diy-blog-conference.html

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

A week ago, Pastor Gregg brought his wife's banana bread into his sermon. Well apparently, EVERYONE was asking for the recipe. They posted it on their facebook account and sent out an email with the recipe. I was bored this past Saturday and actually had all of the ingredients on hand so I decided to make it. It is delish! I have tried several banana bread recipes before and have failed at all of them, but this one is a keeper! It is absolutely not on my diet though! Only thing I changed about the recipe is that I did chop up some walnuts and add those in it. I do not know how much because I did not measure them.

CHOCOLATE CHIP BANANA BREAD

1 ¼ cups sugar

1 stick butter, softened

2 eggs

3 medium sized ripe bananas

½ cup buttermilk

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 ½ cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk chocolate chips

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottom of bundt pan with Crisco shortening and dust with flour. Mix sugar and butter in large bowl. Stir in eggs until well blended. Add bananas, buttermilk and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Mix in remaining ingredients except chocolate chips just until moistened. Stir in chocolate chips. Pour into pan. Bake about 45 minutes until top is light brown and wooden pick comes out clean. Cool 5 minutes. Remove from pan. Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Slice and spread with butter. Serve warm with a glass of cold milk. Enjoy!

Speaking of my diet, I have being very lenient this summer I guess you could say. Somehow, I have only gained one pound back. The end of June and most of July was basically a free for all! I was on vacation and also spent a lot of time in Louisiana with a lot of extended family in town. I am now back in Houston and I am back on track for the most part. I think that is the most important part- that you do allow yourself to indulge every now and then but must get right back on it.

I have had to scale my running back due to knee problems. That is a whole other post for another day! Hope everyone is having a great summer!

Pray for baby James

http://jamescamdensikes.blogspot.com/