Yay America!!

Happy Fourth of July!!

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Thank you to all who fought for our freedom and for those who continue to do so. You are much appreciated.

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Have a happy fourth!

Today is the day!!

It's finally vacation time!!

We're leaving this morning to head to Mexico Beach. I have been looking forward to this since Christmas. Yeah...you read that right. Since Christmas. I don't think I can fully describe to you my love of the beach. So just take my word for it when I say I love it.

My plan for vacation:

-get tan

-read a book a day (yes, I can do it)

-eat lots of fruit

-watch F.R.I.E.N.D.S. (new tradition I started last year)

Sounds like a great vacay, right? Be jealous.

Sadly, we have no internet access at the beach house. So while I will love being technology free (no sarcasm), I won't be posting for about two weeks.

This is where we say goodbye! Temporarily of course.

Happy (early) Fourth of July!!

Which Wich

Lately, my cousin Allie and I have been watching the Harry Potter movies. We just read the books this year so now we're catching up on all things HP. 

Last night, our plan was to watch the fourth and fifth movie. After the fourth was over, we were starving. So we grabbed Jennilee (Allie's little sister) and headed over to Which Wich. Have you been there before? If not, you are missing out. This is their menu board:

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You pick a category (1-10) based on the sandwich you want, grab the corresponding bag, and mark out which wich you want. Once they make it, they give it back to you in your bag. So fun! [Sidebar: If the cashier is smokin' hot, it makes the whole experience even better.]

I got an Italian Pepperoni Pizzawich. So delish. Allie and Jen got BLTs. Boring (jokes).

Allie

Jen

We then went to Peachwave. Fro-yo is soooo good. This place wasn't my favorite, but it looked pretty.

These are jello balls. The burst
when you bite them. Strange.

We did end up watching the fifth movie after we got back home from our cousin/sister bonding trip. Let me tell you. I don't know how people watch those HP marathons on ABC Family. It is so difficult to watch such long movies! They are good, don't get me wrong. But good grief...it takes up way too much time.


By the end of this week, we will have watched all the Harry Potter movies. I'm so sad to see this come to an end! Any other HP fans out there?

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Good times at Goodwill

Hello friends. It has been a crazy busy but fun weekend for me. I've been crafting, shopping, reading (of course) and decorating. Here's a glimpse into what I've been up to.

I have had a lot of fun looking for decorations for our apartment. I don't move in until August, but I am taking full advantage of Zeb being there already. I went to Hobby Lobby on a whim last week and was pleasantly surprised to find 10 aisles of merchandise marked down 80%! Needless to say, I spent over two hours in there. I was in heaven. Here are a couple of things I bought on that trip.

I got these for only $2!

This mirror is my favorite purchase so far. It's amazing! We don't have any nails handy so I was forced to put these under the window. It looked nice but they will not be staying there for long. The first item on my shopping list: nails.

This is the entry hallway of the apartment. The right wall is VERY big and therefore daunting. I have big plans involving that mirror and curtain rod. Hopefully the end product is as great in real life as it is in my mind.

Yesterday, I went to the Goodwill in Hamilton Mill with my mom and two of my brothers. I found some fun toys but was sadly too big to play on them. I recruited Wyatt instead.

This was his first time on one of these.
One of my favorite toys ever!

I asked him to smile...

Wyatt and I found some masks laying on the furniture, and Callaway decided he wanted to get in on the fun, too.

Yes, Cal really is a head taller than me. He's still not
done growing at 6'1".

As we were taking these pictures, five workers walked by and started laughing. Out loud. Glad we could provide some entertainment.


For those of you who don't know, Hamilton Mill is a very nice area. The Goodwill was much nicer than the one near our house, but what blew me away the most was located in the parking lot at Wal-Mart. These are the shopping cart holders:

What?! I guess they are too upscale for the regular metal poles all the other Wal-Marts have. Those millionaires...


On a different note, this is what Zeb bought on his first shopping trip in the new apartment:

Powerade and peanut butter. I kid you not.


On that note, I hope everyone is having a great weekend! Hopefully you have more to eat than Zeb.


PS: One of my next posts is about the crafts I've been doing lately.

"The Guardian" of my phone

For the past I don't know how many months, I have had a picture of Ashton Kutcher as the background of my phone. Wait! Before you judge me, you should know it happened as a temporary thing. I had to replace my phone and didn't have any pictures, so I took a picture of something our dorm room. 

[Sidenote: You can go ahead and judge the fact that we had a poster of him on our door. I won't blame you for that.]

Anyways...good ol' Ashton was only supposed to be on my phone for a couple of days. I really did plan to get better photos to replace him. But I never did. I'm not sure if I just got lazy, or if I just thoroughly enjoyed looking at Ashton every day. Either way, he stayed. And I don't feel bad at all. Sorry bout it.

In case you appreciate him like me, here's the picture. Go ahead. Bask in his glory.

And this is what it looked like on our bathroom door beginning in February (we take holiday decorating very seriously).

Forgive the horrible quality. It's the phone's fault.

Speaking of holiday decorating, I may have to do a post just on that. Kristen and I went wild with decorating. The bad thing was we never took down any previous decorations. By the end of the year, we had something representing every holiday and every season. We never ran out of things to look at if we ever had time to stare at the walls.

Sadly, I changed my background last night. But you never know. This picture may make a come-back in the future. Does anyone else share my infatuation with Ashton? I'd love to know I'm not the only one. 

Memorial Day Weekend

I was looking through my posts today and realized I never posted the one I wrote about Memorial Day. You'll see as you start reading that I was already a week late in writing the post. Now, I am three weeks late. Lovely. But here it is: 

Despite the fact it is almost a week late, here's a recap of Memorial Day Weekend with the Burtons. We started the weekend by going to visit my grandmother in South Carolina. Sadly, Zeb could not come because he had to work. In his place, we decided to take Copper which meant he definitely needed a bath. Unfortunately, he hates water so it was a struggle. But there was no way we were riding for four hours with a smelly dog. No siree!

Then it was off to SC! Copper is such a good dog in the car. He fell asleep within 15 minutes. He slept the entire four hour ride with one leg sticking out of the box. So precious!

Once we got to her house, we had a lot of fun going through some of her old stuff and finding new things to take home. I got a lot of goodies for the new apartment. I also cut some fabric that I'll be using in cute frames like the ones I saw here. Gramma used to own a fabric store so I had a whole shed of fabric to look through! My dad, on the other hand, did not have such a relaxing trip. Gramma lives on a farm with a lot of grass to cut. My poor dad was using the push mower for two days straight! The riding lawn mower was MIA. We had a lot of fun catching up with Gramma. Her birthday was on Saturday so we celebrated by grilling burgers and eating cake.

On Monday, we were back home and ready to partay. We grilled out at my cousin's house, which is located in the field between my grandparents house and our house. I love living so close to my family! We, as always, had tons of good food and lots of fruit. My mom was thoughtful enough to make us a watermelon basket. Isn't she amazing?!

Aunt Linda made a few fat free hotdogs and labeled them so my dad wouldn't get confused. I thought it was pretty obvious which hot dogs were which, but my dad was so worried he was going to eat one on accident.

And what happened after we ate??? Pool time!!! They have a gorgeous pool in their backyard (did I mention I love living by my family?). Even though only four of the eight cousins were there, we still had a great time. I seriously love my family. (Please ignore the bad quality of photos. They were taken by the good ol' phone.)

Oldest to youngest: Me, Zeb, Jennilee, Wyatt

All in all, it was a great weekend. The fact that I got to see both sides of my family made it even better. I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend! And now if you'll excuse me, I'm headed to the pool. Peace out!

Life's a Beach

Happy first day of summer!

Reasons I love summer:

-no school

-the beach

-complete free time

-the beach

-watermelon

-the beach

-tanning

-oh did I mention the beach??

We are leaving next Thursday for our annual family vacay to Mexico Beach and it could not come fast enough. I would so live at the beach if I could. Especially at Mexico Beach. Haven't heard of it? That's the point. It is never crowded, even on major holidays. There are no high rises and no traffic lights. Sounds like a perfect place to me.

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Best souvenir store ever.

This year, we'll be gone June 30-July 10, meaning we'll be there on July 4th. Yay for fireworks on the beach! Because I am so excited for the trip, I have already started making my packing list. (Yes, I do make packing lists. It's totally normal.) I have also changed the background for every electronic device I own to a beach picture. To say I am excited would be an understatement.


If I haven't convinced you of the greatness of Mexico Beach, check out this article from Yahoo news. Apparently they thought it was great, too.

Anyone else have any fun beach plans?