Priorities....

So, I've been off of the internet for about 4 days....because of 2 reasons!
1) Priorities
2) I'm exhausted!

After 4 12-8/11-7 shifts in a row....I'm POOPED!

I am so sorry that I haven't posted anything lately! Looking at my traffic, I'm definitely letting some people down! :(

SO - tomorrow is the bathroom/bedroom post that we've all been waiting for - ok so maybe not...but still! AND then...the Craft room and a PEEK inside Kenny's MAN CAVE! This rooms are not yet complete - so I'm excited about getting that done!

Today, I wanted to mention priorities because they have been on my heart lately... I have been so off course when it comes to those - and really, are we EVER on course?
It seems like everyone is .... BUSY, tired, stuck in traffic, and their schedule is too full -so when does that stop?

Well, the truth is...it doesn't - it only gets more full!
The key is prioritizing! Now, I'm DEFINITELY not preaching on the matter becuase I'm not a prioritizer, but I really want to show the people I love that I do keep then in priority over my job, the internet, etc.

Not to say I don't LOVE LOVE LOVE hanging out online & chatting!

In order to fill the void at home - MAINLY because Kenny is off and I'm working (or have been!) - I've been leaving love notes! Poor guy is probably SUPER exhausted after working only to come home and find an empty house and chores staring him in the face!

He's my love, and I'm SO lucky to have him - AND he's my priority - to show this I've been leaving these -

and these -

Do you? Do you leave these for your priorities in your life? Remember when I added that to my 101 goals? I've seen a great response! :)

God included. I'm definitely not preaching on this either because I have a long way to go...but do you leave love notes for Him?

Here's what I found about priorities....

· What we can afford and how much time we can find all boil down to what’s important to us.

· Priorities aren’t spoken – they’re lived.

· So, let’s dig in and discover how to beat “busy”! I wholeheartedly believe that busyness is one of the biggest battles we must fight in our war on mediocrity. If mediocrity is the opposite of excellence, then busyness is the biggest enemy of excellence (followed closely by laziness and unawareness). But we must march into battle positioned to win. Warriors stand taller, walk stronger, and march with purpose when they know that victory awaits them. But they also know that they still must be willing to march into battle in order to actually claim the victory.

· Claiming busyness puts you in the passenger seat of your own life, because you’re just along for the ride, reacting to whatever is next on the schedule. Succumbing to busyness is a life of existing from day to day at the mercy of obligations that we’re not passionate about. [Found here: http://www.allisonlamarronline.com/digging-deeper.html]

So while we take the time to read blogs (believe me, I do too), go to work, sit on the couch and watch t.v., we must ask ourselves if our priorities are feeling like priorities today!

Wishing you the BEST day ever!

See you tomorrow!

Lida

Until Tomorrow!

I'll be posting the bathrooms tomorrow....sorry for the little break!

The Dining Room

Well, I guess you are just gonna have to wait for our living room pictures!! But here's the dining room! :)

A before:


Nice, huh? Just kidding - the color of the walls is what I call FLESH....oh yeah, it's not tan, it's not orange - it's the color of the crayon in the multicultural box of crayons....
it's this:

And now....the BIG reveal!!!!!!



Sorry the pictures aren't great - I don't have Photoshop on my laptop!! So we have gray walls ... we love them....and black accents - and as you can see on the shelves that we are gathering some fun stuff to add to them (so please send us some!) - I love vintage stuff & unique stuff that can remind us of great times!!

Sorry the post is so short - but I'm SO tired ... so I'll see ya tomorrow for the living room & office tours!
I can't wait!

Love always -
K & L

FINALLY....the HOUSE! First stop, Kitchen -

**WARNING: LOADS OF PICTURES**

Kitchen .... finally! :)
Well, the kitchen was the MOST work and we knew it from the start - the kitchen needed MAJOR work - here are some BEFORE pictures! Warning, these are scary!

Click on the pictures to see the REAL scariness of the house! At first we thought that we could refinish the cabinets (ie. PAINT) and redo the counter tops so we did this....

Oh, what's that you ask? UMmm...yeah it's ROACH POWDER...and dead animals...in my cabinets....at that point Kenny & I rethought our decision to redo the cabinets - good thing we did because we also found this:



The left picture was under our sink and the right picture was under the dishwasher - so we mold re-mediated (obviously)!

To truly understand what it looked like for a while, this is what it looked like:

And now - the BIG reveal!

So, we still have some work to do, we want to decorate more; especially adding a little sign that says 'Life is Sweet' along with paint the top of the bar ... and finally flooring! Our little breakfast area was turned into a long term pub area/laundry area. Here's the picture:

Can you see the flooring in the back?

So, what do you think?? Little improvement? We'd love your feedback!

Love always-
K&L

The Jaws of Life

Today was ... interesting! Sorry for no posting yesterday - I knew I wouldn't have time! Got LOADS to tell you about Saturday...but the excitement also happened today! I witnessed the Jaws today! Here's how it all happened:
On HAPPY NEWS...my final day was today at the Kirk jazz! I'm so excited to be moving on to different ventures and feeling like I'm actually moving in my career and moving myself in the right direction!! My day was filled with both an excitement and a nervousness about leaving something that I've been a part of for a long time (almost a YEAR) - in any case, at the end of the night EVERYONE was so amazing - G made me cake & everyone was hugging! I'm pretty sure CJ shed a tear, it was little ... but maybe so, HA!

In any case, on my back from lunch I came over the intersection and saw the scene of an accident. Although I didn't see the scene my first instinct was just to check and make sure everyone was ok. I saw a lady on the phone and the other car was completely smashed. The driver of the other car came towards me and said that the girl was hurt inside the vehicle. I went over and started talking to her - completely relieved that she was breathing and coherent - the emergency crews came shortly after! I decided to call her family because I know that is something I would have wanted- one of the worst things to have is a family member in a car accident ... especially when it's a bad one... but then to have a police officer not give you details, that would be awful. I called her parents and chatted with them..waited to find out what hospital she would go to and called them back to tell them. At first they were supposed to be closer but the ambulance decided to take her to a better hospital further away. So the most interesting part of the time (not that I'm measuring) - was when they cut her out of the car -

*NOT the actual accident, this is courtesy of: www.blenheimfire.com*

I've never witnessed someone being 'cut out' of their car. The emergency workers let me stay because I was in touch with the family, and to be honest, it was a moment I will never forget. As I was standing there watching this I was thinking about my life....and how we're

sometimes in that state where we feel like we couldn't move. How we have to be cut out of our shells - wow, crazy thought, huh? But until recently, I had felt that way - I had felt as though I was trapped and I needed specialists to come and get me out. I cannot TELL YOU how much freedom I feel leaving my job. I ABSOLUTELY adore my team, and that's who I'll miss...but I knew that my friends at Kirk Jazz would always be there for me, and I'm super thankful for that! They have been my friends through all the adventures...really and truly, besides Kenny's co-workers our friends for almost a year. But that trapped feeling was so real - it's super easy to get caught up in the drama, the business, the meetings, the early/late days, (I could go on and on) - but at the end of the day ... do we really want to feel trapped? And do we?

I strive to always live out of the box and since I've been 'cut out' - I've felt like a new person. If you are struggling in your current state and need someone to help you out - reach out - I know I'll be there for you!

J was taken to a hospital and I've tried to call her parents, but to no avail - so I'll make sure to keep you updated on how she's doing!

On a mission to stay out of a trapped life -
L

House Intro! (finally!)

Sorry if this is a little disconnected, I'm writing this in the middle of the night, after a long night at work! And I have to be back at 8 a.m.!! In any case, this is the story about our many houses! You may or may not know it, so I'll go ahead and tell you the story!

We didn't come by this house without much grief and anguish, in fact, we came to this house by pure grace! After a GRUELING time dealing with builders, moving, sickness...and house!

We first started having the desire and push to move to Houston in 2008 so Kenny set out to find a job in the around February. He found one quickly...REALLY quickly - and although we questioned the timing, we figured that it was perfect timing for us.

In short - we were wrong!

Amazing things happened during this time, 2 hurricanes, an illness, and MANY lonely nights later Kenny moved back to Alexandria 9 months after moving to Houston to pursue a career there!

This was one of our homes...

It was custom built for us....WAY out of our price range...but SO cute and right where we wanted it! It was in our S-T-R-E-T-C-H budget - but we could make it work! So we signed the contract in April....2 weeks later (supposedly) groundbreaking was to occur....but late August we were told that the company was going out of business and our home was no longer ours......BUMMED, MAD, UPSET...many emotions flooded this time in our life! At the time I was still living in Louisiana and Kenny was in Houston...only he was sick and having to take treatments...which made it HARD on everything else. This was devastating...so the realtor found us another house and we looked at it the same day....

But we just didn't feel right about the entire plan....why should be pay more for less...and we shouldn't be pushed into something that wasn't us.

So we moved back to Louisiana, not that our whole family had moved...but it was still a process!

Finally, last summer we decided to move again. It was going to be the final time we tried and we couldn't look back - so we didn't take ANY chances....we rented a cute little place on Melham Lane! Since that point we have grown so much, we have worked harder than EVER, and now we're finally starting to see something from our hard work! But we wouldn't change what has happened, because it's only made us realize that we can ONLY count on what we do and NOTHING is handed to you. Not that we thought it was, it just seems that sometimes you find yourself in a place where things DON'T happen as quickly and you thought and you realize that it's LIFE. So, finally after a YEAR of renting we purchased our first home! Although you have probably heard about it....you haven't seen the ACTUAL house! So here is the front shot....

Every day this week I will be posting different rooms in our house, what we've done to the room & what it looks like now! I hope you'll follow our house tour, we can't wait to share it with you!

The Schedule:

Sunday - Different posting (not house related)

Monday - Kitchen

Tuesday - Living Room/Dining Room

Wednesday - Office

Thursday - Bathrooms

Friday - Master Bedroom

Saturday - His & Hers Rooms

When I was your age....

While I'm going to be posting twice today (since it's past midnight) - I wanted to bring up a conversation that Kenny & I had the other day!

Remember the long running joke that grandparents were supposed to say?

"Well, when I was your age I had to walk up a hill barefoot in snow, both ways!"

Now of course, joke is the word because one, it's Texas (or Louisiana) and it snows ... ummm...close to never - but I'm not going to say NEVER! And two, because you can't walk up both ways...ok, I knew you knew that..it's just for my fellow...well, I'm not blonde!

Anyway - our question was...

What will we say to our children when they are born & grow up?

Honestly, our children (when we have them...um, in a LONG time from now) are going to grow up where social media is the real deal. They are born with a blue tooth in their ear, have a facebook account prior to birth, and expect Disney HD/3D before the age of 2! Our 'when I was your age' statements are going to be...

· I had to dial a phone, and if you weren't home...you didn't get the phone call!

· I had to rewind a tape, it took 3 minutes!

· I didn't get my cell phone until I was 23! *Lida only!

· Facebook didn't EXIST

· We had to read books....(this is a sad reality, but it might be true! I love, love, love books...but I do read monitors most of my life!

· My first computer didn't have windows, word, adobe, or internet!

· My third computer had dial up internet, and we heard the dial tone.

· My first phone didn't have internet....or apps, or anything except a keypad!

· I had to pay cash at the gas station

· Our privilege at school was going to the Apple Lab and playing games

· We had to write on chalk boards

· We had overhead projectors

· Heck, we had to write our notes!

The list of course goes on and on...but isn't it a little sad to you? That our children will never experience NOT living in a socially driven society? Well, that opens a HUGE can of worms...but my thoughts are

...I want my children to grow up reading books, understanding the value of personal relationships (not on the phone or on a monitor), and feeling as though they have to work for what they get.

Sure, we make our lives the way we want, but I'll never forget the conversations I had with my grandmother about her childhood - the typewriter papers that I created in the fifth grade - and the value of spending time with my friends in the summer, outside in the heat!

We need to see the seasons in person (well, if you live in a place with seasons) - not because your screen saver changed... or carving a pumpkin during this time of the year, or savoring a moment with your family and friends.

Be sure not to miss out on the REALness in life; take a break from the monitor and LIVE it out loud!