Heart.



Success....

I found this quote online today, on a blog I frequent...  The blogger is a stay at home mom, who is also an amazing photographer and an arts and crafts queen!  I often get involved in crafty projects and get this very excited, jump out of bed feeling so that I can get started on it again..  Once the project is completed, I feel accomplished, and I guess in a way, like I've succeeded...  It's a pretty great feeling.  I appreciate this outlook on success, because at times, I think about my life and wonder what it is that makes me successful and if I've succeeded yet.....  I'll be 28 next month and am only a sophomore in college.  We're living in limbo in Tennessee waiting to get out of the army next year, both in jobs we don't exactly love.  I'm surrounded by friends that have graduated, have jobs they're proud of and/or are in the process of starting the next big step in life, by having babies.  Matt and I have decided that for both of us, our education has to come first.  We must succeed in our education before any kids can be in our agenda.  This is sad to me at times, because I would love to have a little Davis babe in my house screaming, pooping, and oogling over mom and dad.  Should I measure my success, but the successes of others??  No, definitely not.  I'm learning that it's ok for us to live our lives differently than everyone else.  We're a few steps behind, and are just in the process of catching up.  One day, we'll be in the right place and time, and we'll be ready to begin the process of completing our family.  Until then, I will remember this quote, and consistenly remind myself that sometimes it's ok to march to the beat of your own drum, when it's the beat suited best for you...... 

Spring showers bring, rainbows!

Aren't rainbows amazing?  I'm almost 28, and everytime I see a rainbow, I get excited like a little kid.  We had storms roll in Friday night, and in the midst of their rolling and rumbling, I looked out my window to see this:


Double Rainbow Beauty

Growing up in a religious household, I was taught that the rainbow was a sign from God, to Noah, of his promise that life on Earth would never again be destroyed by a flood. 

In mythology, Iris, was the greek goddess of the rainbow, and the messenger of the Olympian Gods.  She was often represented as the handmaiden and personal messenger of Hera. Iris was a goddess of sea and sky--her father Thaumas "the wondrous" was a marine-god, and her mother Elektra "the amber" a cloud-nymph. For the coastal-dwelling Greeks, the rainbow's arc was most often seen spanning the distance beteween cloud and sea, and so the goddess was believed to replenish the rain-clouds with water from the sea. Iris had no distinctive mythology of her own. In myth she appears only as an errand-running messenger and was usually described as a virgin goddess. Her name contains a double meaning, being connected both with iris, "the rainbow," and eiris, "messenger."

The Chinese believed that the rainbow was a slit in the sky sealed by Goddess Nuwa using stones of five different colours.

The Irish leprechaun's secret hiding place for his pot of gold is usually believed to be at the end of the rainbow.

In Silesia, an obscure area of eastern Europe, it was said that the angels kept tons of gold there and that only a nude man could obtain the prize.....

So no matter where you come from, or what you believe in, the rainbow is significant to everyone for one reason or another.....  Even the nude men scowering Europe trying to find angels secret stashes of gold.

Eat Smart!

I mentioned yesterday in my blog that Matt and I were starting a diet....  Well, it started out as a diet and has since turned into a little "get healthy" project.  I've always wanted to be one of those people that does all their shopping at Whole Foods, and while there, orders a healthy chicken salad sandwich on some sort of very healthy bread, with a fruit or salad on the side for lunch.  Instead, like a true American, I crave McDonald's or Burger King, or something of the fast food variety and stuff my face with burgers, grease and all.  We, unlike your average dedicated dieters, cannot starve ourselves in order to get "healthy" and lose weight.  So we're taking on a new approach and a new outlook on our way of eating.  We have no intentions of becoming vegan's or anything to that extreme, (since I only know a very small handful of people that are vegan's and they seem to be sick more than they are heatlhy) we're just going to adopt new ideas on what we need to eat, versus what we crave.  We made a list of YES and NO foods.  The big "no" we're going to really stick to is High Fructose Corn Syrup.  This stuff is bad bad bad, and there is no reason for it to be in our diet.  The reason this is our big "no," is because it's in a bunch of crap we shouldn't be eating anyway!  And when I say everything, it really is in everything!  So, since Monday we have consumed little, to no high fructose corn syrup (I didn't realize until this morning that in our name brand, supposed to be healthier for you, fat free salad dressing, also contained high fructose corn syrup) and we are admittedly experiencing some food/sugar withdrawal.  Our diet has consisted mostly of lean proteins, eggs, fruits and veggies....  We are SOOOO not used to this.  Don't get me wrong, Matt and I are not completely unhealthy.  We rarely eat at fast food restaurants, and will try to go out to eat at a nicer restaurant on Friday nights for dinner.  I always cook at home, and we take our breakfast and lunch everyday.  However, the food we're eating might be considered healthy by most, but is full of so many bad things, that it's not healthy at all.  To avoid getting preachy, I'll stop there.  This is going to be one of the hardest things we've ever done, because we've had bad eating habits for all 27 years of our lives, but will also be so rewarding...  Today for lunch I made a healthy chicken salad.  We ate it on Whole Wheat bread, with flaxseed and olive oil.  The Chicken Salad consisted of Chicken, Olive Oil Mayo, Greek Yogurt, Walnuts, Grapes, Green Onions and Salt and Pepper...  I toasted my bread and it is soooo yummy!  I decided to take a picture before I finished scarfing it down:



Looks tasty, huh?



So I'll periodically update how our food lifestyle change is going, but won't bore you every post on us being healthy snobs....  C-ya!

Hills of Steel!

This weekend was pretty low-key for us.  After a week of doing nothing but working and then coming home to study, I was in the mood to do nothing.  I only have a couple weeks left until this semester is over and I cannot wait.  Anyway, since I no longer have the ability to sleep in, even on the weekends, Matt and I woke up bright and early, loaded our bicycles in the back of Matt's truck and drove out to the Green Way.  It's a walking/running/biking path in Clarksville and is super nice.  There are two starting points that lead to Path B, and Path C.  We are still wondering where Path A was....  Leave it to Clarksville to not even start at the beginning of the alphabet when they label things....  Anyway, Path B was 2 miles one way, and Path C was 2.6 miles one way.  Being that we had never been there before, we flipped a mental coin and headed off down Path C.  It was a pretty overcast Saturday morning, and along with the amazing trees that covered the paths, it was a nice and cool ride..... Until, we came face to face with the hills... Which should be renamed as steep mountains.  Going downhill on a bike is super fun.  Going uphill on a bike sucks.  These "hills" were a 15% grade downhill...  I'm pretty sure that when you ventured uphill that number increased to 50%.  I had to get off my bike and walk it up the "hill" as there was no way my legs were going to pedal with the super power forces required in making it up the krypotonite "hills."  They were so long and steep I had no chance at all.  We each successfully made it down and up the first "hill."  Thats right, I said FIRST "hill."  There was another, STEEPER one a ways down.  We successfully scaled that one as well, and even received a compliment from a walker we passed, who said "Wow!  I'm so impressed you made it up that on a bike!"  Little did she know, we walked the crap up that "hill!"  And we didn't bother to tell her we didn't ride the bikes up it.  Ignorance is bliss, right?  The rest of the ride was smooth sailing.  We saw one man running in bare feet.  What a dedicated runner!  We turned around at the stopping point and made our way back.  We conquered each "hill" once again and completed our first adventure at Clarksville's Green Way.

After leaving the Green Way, we went to Get Some Coffee.  Not only did we get some coffee, but we got it at my new favorite coffee shop, called, Get Some Coffee.  They have the best latte's!  Around noon, I headed over to my friend Crystal's house, and she and I drove out to Guthrie Kentucky, to a small amish bakery called Schlabach's bakery.  I now know what Heaven must smell like.  This very small bakery, had some of the yummiest smelling and yummiest looking treats EVER!  They had cinnamon rolls, honey, jelly and jams.  They had donuts, pies, cakes and granola.  They also had homemade oatmeal cream pies!  Oatmeal cream pies, and iced oatmeal cookies are my absolute favorite cookie ever!  Sadly, I didn't purchase one since Matt and I were starting a new diet, today (which will be discussed in later posts) but I did purchase some seedless strawberry jelly!  I can't wait to eventually get to use it! 

Sunday, I cleaned house and Matt mowed the lawn and left me for a couple hours to go out and cruise on his sport hog.  One day, when I'm not shackled at home cleaning, I'll get to go with him... (for anyone reading this that can't sense the sarcasm, I was totally joking...  Matt lets me out of my shackles when I clean)

That's all for now!  Be back soon!

Well this weekend was full, full, full!  Saturday we went to the mall and this is how Matt felt about that:

On Sunday we finished our front yard wall project AND did a serious spring clean of our garage.  I didn't take any pictures of the wall building this time, because a wall is a wall, and the right side looks just like the left in our previous post.  Also because Matt is a slave driver and seriously put me to work this time.  I'm feeling all my hard work in my hammies and back today.  OUCH!  Anyway, after completing the wall, we took a step back to admire our hard days work, only to realize the right side isn't level with the left.  It's about a half inch shorter.  CRAP!  I think we'll only have to fill in the spot that leads right up to the porch, because it seems to get higher as the wall continues.  Totally annoying and I wanted to knock the wall down with the tamper we used to level (or so we thought level) the ground under the wall, but I decided against it because it would have done no good and also the tamper is super heavy.  Thank goodness for Matt's superhero muscles.  I did take a picture of us at the start of the day... I don't think we were as smiley by the time it was over:

While Matt was building our trench (which I am absolutely no help towards) I took our cat Otis, for a walk.  Below is a picture of our little Oti:

That's right, a walk!  I leashed him up and we explored the yard, the driveway, and even some of our neighbors driveway.  He's so cool and we seriously love this little guy who is so unlike a cat, it's crazy.  He loves to snuggle, take rides on our backs around the house and will eat just about anything.  He apparently also likes to go on long walks with his mom around the yard.... Until a car comes, then he bolts and is a big pansy.  So cute though to have a cat who is so adventurous.  Here is a picture I took yesterday of our other cat, Baby, who wished more than anything that she could have come outside:

We're so happy the weather was nice and had such a good time together.  Just wish the weekend could have lasted much longer!

Extreme Front Yard Makeover.

Matt and I are moving back to Florida next year, and we own a house that MUST sell.  We do not want to be landlords and have no desire to have a mortgage along with a rent payment in the event we don't sell our house.  While we were in DC, I decided it would probably be a good idea to fancy up our front yard for a little curb appeal.  I come up with ideas and plans, and Matt is always reeled in to help me execute them.  He has the much needed muscle that I so desparately lack.  So Saturday we spent most of the afternoon raking up old mulch from our flower beds in the front yard, and ripping out the black sheet weed "stopper" stuff.  After that Matt dug up two bushes that were so ugly and I'm so happy now that they're outta' there!  We bagged everything up and put it in Matt's truck to take to the dump the next day.  Sunday we woke up early because we had much to accomplish before going back to work on Monday.  We went to the dump and arrived to find the "yard work trash" section closed.  It would have been a huge bummer, if I wasn't married to a CRIMINAL!  We dumped our bags of mulch into a regular trash dumpster, and then sneakily drove to the closed section to drop off the branches and stumps of the two bushes he dug up.  I got seriously scared when a worker drove down the hill towards us, but was able to breathe a sigh of relief when he kept on driving.  We high tailed it out of there and made our way to Home Depot.  We purchased 60 concrete retaining wall stones.  I ambitiously decided while coming up with my lawn beautifying scheme that we needed a decorative wall around each of our flower beds.  The nice people of Home Depot loaded them up for us.  Before we could begin building our wall, we had to build a small trench for the foundation blocks.  We made the trench Saturday after removing all the mulch, so Sunday we had to measure, level and tamper the trench so it was even.  Thanks to Matt's muscle, we completed this part and then began to build our wall.  One the ends, the blocks were too long to fit, so Matt had to use a masonry chisel to break them.  Who knew I married such a talented sculptor?!  He did such a good job, and our wall looks so awesome!  We didn't want to tackle too much at once, so this coming weekend, we're going to complete the other side.  As hard as it was, we enjoyed completing this project together, and our really proud of the end result.  Here are some of the pictures of our progress: