THANKS BE TO GOD...

JUST A FEW THINGS I AM THANKFUL FOR:
1. My Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ - His death has given us Life.
2. My awesome husband and best friend, Josh. (I am so proud to be your wife! Thank you for loving and supporting me every day.)
3. Our loving families - we are so thankful for all of your love and support. We are so excited to be with you for Thanksgiving this year :).
4. Our wonderful church & pastor.
5. Our amazing small group - such an answer to prayer. We are so encouraged and continually in awe of how God has us in exactly the place He wants us at this moment.
6. Our friends - both here - you are our family away from family - and back home - we miss you but we are so thankful for each of you as we continue to pick up where we last left off :).
6. My job & Josh's future internship!!
7. All the "things" God has blessed us with - we want to glorify God with everything that we are and everything that we have.
8. Molly - thank you for still loving us when we don't have time to walk you every day and when we dress you up in ridiculous outfits.
9. Sweet (and very funny) memories of my Dad - I miss him but am so thankful for teh time that we got to spend with him.
10. Our trip home to Jacksonville for THANKSGIVING this week!! So excited to take time off and spend it with our wonderful family and friends back home.

"Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord." 1 Corinthians 15:56-58

FREE CARDS PLEASE!!

In case you have not heard... Shutterfly is offering 50 FREE Christmas cards to bloggers who sign up on their website and do a blog about how wonderful Shutterfly is.

I have actually not used Shutterfly personally... yet... but I have heard only good things about them. I have had several friends use Shutterfly as a way to share an album of photos - for a big event or trip, etc. They were very easy to navigate and their prices are very reasonable.

I am very excited about this promotion - here are some of this year's Christmas card layouts that I am thinking about:

So excited!! Christmas cards are going to be easy this year :)

HARRY FANS FOR LIFE

This picture says it all. Yes, Josh and I are part of THE nerd herd that follows everything that Harry Potter does... both in written word and on the big screen. This is a picture from early college with our friends Laura, Scott and Lauren where we waited in line at Barnes & Noble in the middle of the night for a book release...

For those who didn't know (and then therefore probably don't care) the 7th movie - Part 1 opens tomorrow and we have already bought our tickets with our friends Ryan and Laura to see it in IMAX on Saturday night. WE CAN"T WAIT!!

Also - side note - for those who know me well, you will recall that I don't read... usually... well with all of this work traveling I have been doing I have suddenly become a book worm (when on a plane and in the hotel at least) and among some of the big books (I mean, yes, this really is an accomplishment for me...) that I have read lately is Harry Potter book #5. I still need to read 6 and 7 but my new goal is to read both before Part 2 of the 7th movie comes out next summer... and with all of the traveling I have coming up - I am sure that this will not be a problem.

SECRET CHURCH & BIRTHDAY VISITORS

Last weekend Josh's sister, Melissa and her friends Hannah and Eliza came to visit us here in the Ham. They decided to make the trip in order to come with us to Secret Church and hang out a little bit to see Birmingham and celebrate our birthdays. They arrived Friday night and when I got home from work, we immediately headed up to Brook Hills to attend secret church - it was amazing. The conference lasted 7 hours and covered all topics related to The Body of Christ. Very cool.

On Saturday we slept in to recuperate from the late night and then decided to go hiking at Oak Mountain. The weather was beautiful and we had some much fun hiking around the mountain.

On Saturday night, Melissa took us out to dinner for our birthdays - to one of our favorite BBQ joints - Jim N Nicks. Afterwards we did a little shopping at the Summit.

Later that night, I made a birthday cake to celebrate - Josh's favorite: yellow cake with Chocolate Icing. I only had a few candles - not 26, or I guess 52 with both of us - we did not want to start a fire.

There are more pics - to see them all check out facebook. We had such a fun weekend with the girls - thank you all for visiting. We are so glad that we were able to "share secrets" and show you around Birmingham :).

This weekend Josh and I will be relaxing after all of our fun weekend guests from the past few weeks. We are getting excited for our trip home to Jax for Thanksgiving (and then again for Christmas...) Happy Friday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY HIGHSCHOOL SWEETHEART...

... who is now my wonderful husband. I can't believe that this will be the 8th birthday that we have celebrated together. This picture is from - you guessed it - our Senior Prom. My, how time flies!

Joshie - I love you and I am so thankful for all that you do. I am so proud of how hard you work every day and so happy to be married to you. I hope you have a wonderful birthday today. I love you.

BATON ROUGE AGAIN

So do you remember the project from August in Baton Rouge that I complained about here? We went back again earlier this week on a short 2-day trip for a follow-up and this is what we saw...






Not too bad, huh? Maybe all the hard work (and sweat) was worth it? Please tell me YES!

MOM & AUNT LALA VISIT THE HAM

This past weekend we had a visit from my Mom and Aunt Lala. We were so excited to have them visit Birming- ham - we did lots of site seeing, went to a Fall Festival that our small group did and of course tasted lots that Birmingham only restaurants have to offer.

Friday when I got off work I hurried home and then was off to pick them up at the airport. We went home first to let them see the apartment, met Josh and immediately headed off to dinner at Dreamland - a Birmingham must. After dinner we toured downtown so that Josh could show my Mom and Aunt Lala his school and UAB Hospital.

On Saturday we did lots of shopping and site seeing in the morning but made sure, of course that we were back in time for the beginning of the Florida - Georgia game to begin. We left later that afternoon to head over to a Fall Festival that our small group was throwing as a Ministry Opportunity in Inner-City Birmingham. We had so much playing games and handing out tons of candy to all of the kids. We were excited for Mom and Aunt Lala to meet some of our small group buddies as well.

On Sunday morning we went to church and then had lunch at Jim N Nick's BBQ - YUM! Josh had to head off to school for a group project and so we went to the Galleria Mall to check out a new Christmas store that just opened... very fun. We finished up the afternoon with Frozen Yogurt from Yogurt Mountain - delicious!

Site seeing at Vulcan Park

Beautiful hills of the Ham :)

Always trying to come up with new pictures with Vulcan

Mom & Aunt Lala working a booth at the Festival

My Favorite Costumes of the Night: Our Small Group Leaders - The Tooth and The Tooth Fairy (Richard and Tara)

Josh helping the kiddies get candy :)

Mom and Aunt Lala - We are so happy that you came and we can't wait until you visit again soon! See you in 3 short weeks at Thanksgiving!! Love you both.