A place to call home...

As much as I wish I had an unlimited budget so that I could decorate our new home, I am enjoying being here, even if the walls are somewhat bare. This house is quite large, so if I were to purchase decor for the whole thing, it would certainly deplete our savings account...but it's still fun to dream! One day...one day, I will have my DREAM house (even though the house we live in now is REAL close to it...)

Our dream house will look something like this:



See that screened in porch on the side and the HUGE wrap-around porch in the front? Ahh..it's my dream! I love old southern homes like those...
And the master bedroom will look something like this:



Even though we have only lived in this home for two weeks, we already know we want to own a house by the lake on day. Whether it be ten years from now or fifty years from now, there is just a serenity that the lake brings and we both love it. A group of our friends have talked about chipping in and splitting the price of a big lake house in the distant future...hopefully that will become a reality one of these days...

Well...I got my first paycheck today! It felt really good to get it, because it is my first "big girl" paycheck...Now that I am married and out of college, i like to call myself a big girl...most people who start work dread it and wish they could be back in college, but I LOVE my job. I get to nanny the cutest kids and also get to be an assistant for weddings. I KNOW that this is the perfect job for me and not once have I regretted moving up here to pursue it. God is so good and I feel that He is definately present here in our lives. Seth got a job within one week of us moving to NC...we were in Athens for two months and he did not recieve one phone call for a job...for those of you who do not know, Seth is working at Chick-Fil-A. It's not his dream job, but it does put food on the table and with him going to law school in a couple years, it isn't bad at all. The owner said he has high chances of getting promoted after two months of working there, and that means a pay raise...so that is good news! He really enjoyed it today at his first day and of course, if you have EVER eaten there, you know it stays busy because of the great food and friendly service. He said everyone that works there feels like family because they are so nice. That is a huge blessing to me and to him! I am so glad he feels loved there and is not stuck in an office or a cubicle with people he doesn't get along with, or that he doesn't like. I'm proud of my husband!

Here is a photo of him on his first day of work! Isn't he handsome?



Today I got off work around three o clock, then I came home and got to thinkin...i really want to be crafty. I consider myself very creative and crafty, but i want to learn a lot more about what it means to be a DIY kind of person. When I have children (years from now) I want to make my daughter dresses, bows, leggings, hairbands...etc...so I thought: why not start now? No, i am not going to make dresses for my future baby, but I do want to be more crafty around our home...

My first project is going to be to paint a bible verse on some painted wood to go in our living room. It will look something like these things that you pay $30 for at Target...



I am going to buy the wood tomorrow and start on it tomorrow afternoon while Seth is at work!

The second project is going to be to start frequenting garage sales (which i kind of already do) and purchase beat up things (like those hideous gold lamps from the 80's, or really old furniture that needs a new coat of paint). I may head to a few in the morning to see what I can find!

Also, since we now pay our own bills, I decided I want to be Mrs. Organized so that nothing ever gets overlooked. I am compiling a "Home Organization Notebook" that will have EVERYTHING you could ever think of in it. Here are a few things that I am putting in it:

1. The phone numbers to the police department, poison control, garbage man, post office...local things that you may sometimes need but can't find the phonebook to look up the numbers...
2. Birthdays of important people in our life. Our moms, dads, siblings, grandparents, friends..etc..
3. A page with emergency info on it
5. a chore list
6. a monthly calender with appts on it
7. A folder for bills that we have paid and ones that we need to pay

and much more!

It is going to be my go-to notebook for most things!

Now that we are finally settled in, I have gotten back into my cooking schedule..once we found out we were moving to NC, we didn't really buy groceries because we couldn't bring frozen items with us..but now, we are here for good (or at least a year) and so the Cooking Kaitlin has come back!

Here are a few tasty things we've had at the Jones' lately

1. Orange Chicken and Fried Rice. I bought the orange chicken from Trader Joe's and made the fried rice myself. I used brown rice to be a little more healthy, and added butter (the healthy kind!), green onions, eggs, soy sauce, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower and a few other ingredients I can't remember that made it taste just like a chinese restaurant! Seth LOVED the orange chicken, I think it may have been his favorite meal in a long time.

2. Tonight for dinner I made homemade calzones. I bought some whole wheat pizza dough that you just roll out and I put pizza sauce and fresh mozzarella that I grated with a vegetable peeler because we don't have a grater! haha! Seth really liked those too, and I thought the whole wheat was really yummy!

I have decided that if I plan the menu ahead of time, it keeps me from having to go to the store three times a week and I always know what I am cooking ahead of time..

Here is our menu for the coming week:

Sunday: Dover Sole Fillets (I bought this fish on sale at Trader Joe's and found a recipe for a yummy garlic lime marinade!) and rice pilaf.
Monday: Peppercorn Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Kait's famous mashed potatoes (It is actually my grandmother's recipe, but i like to take some credit for it! haha) and some green veggies..maybe a fresh salad
Tuesday: Mexican Tortilla Pile-Up..This is something I just thought up and hopefully it will be good. I'll post the recipe if it is. ;)
Tuesday: Chicken Spaghetti
Wednesday:Date Night!
Thursday:Left-overs
Friday: TBD

I liked having my menu to look at ahead of time and it makes me feel like a good wife, too!

I love being married..it's such a blessing to be able to serve Seth and to go to bed by his side and night...to wake up in the morning to his sleepy self. I love coming home to him in the evenings..I love the simple moments we share together...like walking Penny in the evenings, or sliding down the hallway in our socks...laying on the living room floor staring at the ceiling just talking, dancing in the kitchen...there are so many more moments that I love to share with him. He brought some beautiful flowers home to me the other day!



Thank you, Lord, for this wonderful thing called love. Thank you for loving us so much than we deserve or know.

Alright..i'm getting sleepy. Running a few errands tomorrow before i start being crafty! Wish me luck!

Ciao!

-Kait

The summer is almost over!!!!

Goodness, I can't believe the summer is almost over. It is depressing, but also exciting at the same time.

We have been in our new house for just over a week and I still wake up thinking "Is this real life?" (That quote taken from David after Dentist...if you haven't seen it, please click this link!:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txqiwrbYGrs

We love our new house so much and Penny and Huey love it too. There is a leash bolted to the end of the deck that we can put Penny on so she can run around in the backyard which she is doing right now! Huey loves all the space in our house and his favorite perch is on the fireplace. He will sit there watching everything go on all day.

So...this past weekend we had a lot of our good friends from college come over for a "house-warming" party...there was about 15 of us and we went swimming in the lake, played a lot of rockband, and just sat and talked. It was a lot of fun, and we are hoping to make that a regular occurance. I didn't take any photos! (i know, isn't that rare?) I was having too much fun, and forgot all about it! We had about 7 of them stay the night and the next day our neighbor took some of us out on his boat! We rounded up Penny and she came along too! She LOVED the boat, and then when we stopped to swim, I threw her in the water...she didn't like that too much, but quickly got over it. She is such a sweet dog.

I am on week 2 of my new job! I LOVE it! I get to spend the day with 4 adorable children and believe me, they keep my busy! I will have to post some pics of them sometime soon. Tomorrow I am going to meet with a DJ in Matthews, NC to discuss a wedding they are doing with us (The Charmed Event) and so that will be my first experience with the wedding planner side of things. I am excited to get involved in the planning process.

Seth has applied for about ten jobs here in the Charlotte area and STILL hasn't heard anything from anyone..so a few days ago, we were eating dinner at Chick-fil-a (my ALL TIME FAVORITE restaurant) and he decided to get a job application. They told him there were full time positions available so the next day, he went and turned in the application. He was interviewed on the spot and then hired! We talked about it that evening and decided that it would be best if he took it. If something else a little better comes up, he will quite CFA, but until then, he is working there! I am excited for him to have a job and I really like the values and beliefs behind the company. He starts work on Friday!

That's what has been going on in the Jones household...i am sorry we've been kind of slow with the blog...it's been so busy here!

Hope everyone is doing well and I promise to be a better blogger!

Love,

Kaitlin

Home Sweet Home

We are HOME!! Home as in, Cornelius, North Carolina. We packed up the uhaul Thursday night/Friday morning (it took 12 hours! We took a break to watch The Jersey Shore...) and left on Friday morning for Cornelius. We signed our lease to a house we've never seen and then moved on in! Let me tell you, our house is EVERYTHING we could have ever wanted. I mean, this house is something we would buy well into our retirement. We are SO very thankful for the circumstances that have allowed us to live here for a year. I bet some of you are wanting to know the story of how we found a house to live in, etc..so i'll do a small recap.

After Seth and I decided we were for sure moving to the Charlotte area, we immediately started looking for places to live. Right off the bat, we noticed that the price of living was higher than Athens..a one bedroom apartment was the same price as our current three bedroom townhome! A little discouraged, we decided that was the only option we had because we had TWO weeks to find a place to live, since we just subleased our current place starting on August 1.

Well...then Katie (my boss) called me and told me that her aunt (Mary) had a house on Lake Norman that we could rent for a REALLY good price. After going through some details with that, i KNEW that God had his hand in the whole situation. We told Katie that yes, we would love to take her up on that offer and so we packed our things, and moved to Cornelius to Lake Norman!

What are the chances of us (two newlyweds right out of college) being able to rent out a beautiful house with a wrap-around deck ON Lake Norman? Slim to none. Goodness, just thinking about it makes me smile because that was the confirmation that I needed to know that I was doing the right thing. Seth and I like to see it as a wonderful gift from the Lord (and from Mary!) that because we listened to Him, we are getting to live in such a wonderful home.

So we moved into this home on Friday and we love it. All of our neighbors are so nice to us, and I am no more than thirty minutes from Jill and Katie's houses. That makes it really convenient for the both of us.

Seth is still in the process of job searching....nothing new there... :( We are keeping our heads up though!

This weekend we are having a get-together at our home and will be grilling hamburgers and dogs. We are so excited to share our new home with everyone and can't wait to see our friends. One of the things we love about living here is that we are closer to our friends and family. (Seth's family, at least).

I already started nannying and have my first appointment with Katie and a DJ next week. I am just sitting in on the apt to get an idea of the "planning" side of things...the first wedding I will be helping with is Sept 25! It'll be here before you know it.

Can you believe it's already August? Sheesh...May seems like SO long ago.

I will be posting wedding photos soon, so stay tuned!

-Kaitlin