Lazy Days of Summer? Wishful Thinking...

Hello all!! Another month is drawing to a close. We're officially less than six months away from Christmas. How insane is that?! I swear I say this every year, but every year goes by more quickly than the last. Fourth of July is in a week. The next big holiday after that is Halloween! Crazy.
June has been a blur. I literally don't think I did anything but work. Nothing eventful or too exciting. How depressing is that? I am still only doing 40 hours a week, but doing the job of two people is exhausting leaving me no energy for anything exciting after work. I was hoping July would bring some relief, but it looks like I'm still on my own. I'm hoping we get my old position filled soon so my schedule can change a bit. Hopefully, I won't have to work as many weekends since my old position required me to work almost every Sunday. It'll be nice to, you know, actually hang out with my husband.
Speaking of my husband, we finally found him a truck! It was such a huge weight off of our shoulders to finally find one. It was more expensive than I was hoping for and overpriced, but it was exactly what he wanted so I didn't complain. Now if he would only take care of his two non-working motorcycles and get rid of the truck that no longer works....
Despite finally getting a truck, we haven't been kayaking yet this summer. I can't believe it either. But our schedules just haven't matched up. I'm way too tired after work to go for even a quick trip and he has classes on Saturday and I work Sundays. Sigh.. I'm hoping we get to go out for the Fourth since I managed to get the day off. I'm looking forward to getting on the water and spending some quality time together.
We've started to really plan our trip home in September for Ty's sister's wedding. I asked off for two weeks which my boss wasn't thrilled about. But I haven't taken any sort of vacation the entire year I've been there and I have plenty of PTO for it so he can deal with it. We've decided to drive too which is going to take away two of our days. It's just going to be easier than finding something to do with Pheobe and way cheaper. I'm looking forward to getting out of town and seeing the family. It'll be stressful having to drive all over the freaking Midwest to see everyone we need to see, but oh well. I can't believe it'll have been almost 2 years since we've been home. That's the longest we've ever gone without going home. All part of being the family members living a thousand miles away I suppose. I wonder if it'll feel strange at all. I know it will. Everything is different back home than when we were there. On my side of the family at least. My mother is married and in a different town with his kids. My dad is married and in his wife's hometown. My little sister is married and in a different city. Luckily, Ty's side is all pretty much in the same place. Sure, his sister is getting re-married, but she's been living with him for over a year, so no real change there. It's strange to think that my family have new families that I've never met. I've only met my mom's husband once when they came to visit before they got married. I've never met his kids or been to their house. I've spent a little time with my dad's wife before we moved out here, but I've never been to their new house or met her kids. I've never met my sister's husband (still too weird to say). Yet another drawback to living so far away.
As much as I feel a disconnect to my family now being so far away, I like that we have our own life out here. I like that we aren't stuck in the same towns we grew up in. I like that we don't have our families constantly looking over our shoulders or butting in. We've done it all on our own. Sink or swim, it's just the two of us. I definitely think that has helped our marriage. We figure out how to deal with things and each other on our own.
I'll stop my rambling there...
Hopefully everyone has an exciting Fourth of July! I'll spend my kayaking and then drinking and eating by the pool... sounds so nice right now. Can this week get over with already??? Until next time!

Birthday dinner outfit. I own this dress in three colors....

Did I mention I love to lift? If not, here's a douchey post-workout photo to show you

Rainy days and big mugs of coffee make for very unproductive days off..

5:30 am has it's perks..

I've started filling in my eyebrows (really random) and I think it's the best life choice I've ever made.

New hair!!

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Adventure is Out There!!

Hello everyone!!
I hope you are enjoying the last few weeks of summer... As for me, I've been ready for fall since about May so I'm done with summer. My house already has fall decorations and even though there are only a few, they make me all warm and happy inside.
Anywho... Life has been pretty much normal and uneventful the last few weeks. Work, work, work. It's a good thing that I like my job. Otherwise I would be miserable..
I do have some new family news to share: My mom got married the other day! She and her now husband decided to just go to the Justice of the Peace and get it done. It sort of took me by surprise since she had been discussing having at least a small wedding not a few weeks prior. Oh well.. I'm always an advocate of JP weddings. It's worked out for me. :)
So she got married and then next week my little sister ties the knot! This is craziness. Everyone's lives are moving onward and upward it seems. I'm still upset that I won't be there for her wedding, but I know it'll be lovely without me. It's so surreal having both of my parents remarried now and my little sister right behind.. Life is so crazy sometimes.
Besides that little bit of news.. we finally went kayaking! We've been trying to get out again for so long, but work schedules have been in the way. Over the long weekend, though, we were able to be out on the water for three of the four days. The first day we went to a new reservoir. It was really lovely out on the water. It definitely takes some getting used to for the paddling.. my shoulders were not having it that day. We didn't stay out long that night since I had worked all day, but it was still a nice little jaunt.
On the second day we went to the same reservoir but launched from a different point. The water seemed a lot murkier and stagnant for some reason. We decided to risk taking a couple of Blue Moon's with us to relax with. We found a little alcove where the hubs fished for awhile while we drank a bottle. It was so relaxing and we had such a good time together.
The last day we went on a river for the first time. I was a little nervous about paddling against a current, but luckily there was barely any force on this river. Unfortunately, that's because there hasn't been a lot of rain which means there were a lot of very shallow areas. We had to drag our kayaks over a few spots to get to deeper water. We did encounter some rough, rocky areas where the current was pretty strong. It got a little intense at one point when I was attempting to walk my kayak over a shallow but rough spot and almost lost my paddle and then my boat. I managed to hold on to them and not get swept away myself, but it was close. Getting over those rough and shallow parts was definitely an unintended workout. We got quite a ways up the river, but we were coming to a lot of shallow areas and didn't really want to drag our kayaks anymore so we decided to head back. The trip down was a blast. Coming back over those rocky and rough areas is a lot more exciting than going up. I felt like an extreme kayaker (even though it was probably the un-roughest "rough" area ever). It was an amazing day to say the least.
I managed to "finish" the summer on the water, got some sun on my skin to take into the fall, and beefed up my shoulder muscles... I think I bid farewell alright.
I hope you all did something fun over your Labor day weekend. Are you as ready for fall as I am, or still holding on to the heat??

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