Adventures come in all shapes and sizes. Sometimes it is camping, hiking and exploring the great state of Arizona every weekend. Usually it is more of an everyday moment that turns into a great story. For us, our November was exciting and eventful, sad and overwhelming, and definitely a period of growth.
We closed on our house, refurnished almost our entire house due to our storage unit flood, replaced my totaled car, and got a puppy. We also sprinkled in some babysitting of my nephew, my getting back on the worship team at our church, and starting new jobs.
Home Life
We closed on our new house at the beginning of the month and were super grateful to get the keys the same day. (You can read all about buying our first house here) The very next day, our family and friends came out to help us move items from our storage unit to our house. Unfortunately our unit flooded in Hurricane Florence and we lost almost all of our furniture due to water damage and mold. We are still working through the insurance claims process. That blog post is linked here.
Within a couple days of moving in, the microwave handle broke off, which was not surprising since it had been glued back together. Despite all of the stress from no furniture, chaos in boxes strewn throughout the house, starting back at work, and replacing everything that had been irreparably damaged, we were still very grateful to be in our own home with a roof over our heads. The first few nights felt like a dream. An air mattress padded dream.
New Stuff
A few days after we closed on the house we bought a new (to us) car. If you haven’t read about my car being totaled on our move out to North Carolina, that is linked here.
If you didn’t know, you canNOT finance a car while you are under contract for a house because it will seriously mess up your mortgage process and you could lose the whole thing. Thankfully we were scheduled to close very shortly after returning home so we only had to wait about a week before we could replace my car.
My dream car is a 1996 4Runner, and while financially that is attainable for us, I wasn’t excited for the upkeep of an older vehicle with a lot of miles. While I may be drooling over the new 4Runners, we decided to be more financially responsible and get an all wheel drive RAV4 four our adventuring. I am super pumped! I love all of the bells and whistles that my little Mazda2 was lacking. Cruise control, bluetooth, and a sunroof? This girl is a happy camper.
While we had to replace a lot of things that were damaged, we also got to indulge a little on things we didn’t have before. We have a bonus room over our garage and our intent is to turn it into a cozy and fun movie room with a game corner and space for me to work out. We got this super beautiful sectional from Ashley Furniture and we are in love. It is so nice to unwind at the end of a long work day by watching some Brooklyn Nine-Nine in our nice little get away.
We ALSO got a washer and dryer and I am over the moon, even though I am doing laundry almost every day. I have never had my own washer and dryer and having them in my house feels like such a luxury. What do you mean, I can do laundry whenever I want?!
#everydaymoments
Our new dish set survived the #GreatFlood of 2018. We love them! We got them as wedding gifts and they are from the Ellen collection. I personally think that pizza looks very good on them, but I suppose all of the other healthy meals we have been having look just as good.
I also began reading Eragon (not for the first time, don’t worry) but it has been hard to find time to read while we are SO very busy.
My family lives in Fayetteville and every Sunday we all get together for dinner and quality family time. My nine month old nephew has grown six teeth since we saw him in June and is basically walking. He also ADORES music and he plays the piano with just one finger and gets frustrated when he can’t play as well as me or my mom.
I don’t think I have ever mentioned EyeBuyDirect on here but I LOVE them. You can get prescription glasses for a fraction of the price that you would spend somewhere else. You can also invest in more trendy frames if you’re feeling it. I spent less than $50 on these two pairs! Click here for $10 off your own pair.
Being back at church is amazing. We love all of our friends, the culture, and the events that Manna has. We arrived back in Fayetteville just in time for their yearly missions event called The ROC. Last year I played with the band through the event, which ended up being a huge time commitment but I had a blast. It was nice to just be an attender this year and not commit to serving. I did hop back on the worship band the Sunday before Thanksgiving, though, and I sure have missed it.
Holidays
We celebrated both Halloween and Thanksgiving since my last monthly round up. We had just arrived in North Carolina when Halloween rolled around so we were very “chill” with our costumes and dressed up as “Netflix and Chill.” You have my permission to steal this costume idea, because we sure did.
My nephew was an adorable lumberjack and at this point he was still pretty unsure about us. A couple weeks later he was giving me hugs and sloppy kisses though, so I’d say he has warmed up to us.
I got to eat three glorious Thanksgiving meals this year. Everyone brought their A game. Our Friendsgiving was probably the best ever, with our traditional southern fried turkey, sweet potato casserole, and my huge bowl of mashed potatoes. The spread at my mom’s was just as delicious and I made two dishes I have never made before. They both turned out great! I am so glad that we live here so that I don’t have to brave making my own turkey yet.
Adventures
Fayetteville had a fantastic Harry Potter themed event downtown the weekend before Thanksgiving. There was a horcrux scavenger hunt that involved riddles and we explored all of downtown while freezing our buns off. We stopped in at The Coffee Cup for some delicious Harry Potter inspired drinks (mine was a golden snitch coffee).
What would have qualified as an adventure in Arizona came in short number this month, but we have a LOT going on! Hopefully in the new year we will be able to get out of town a little and explore more of the east coast. For now we are content to work on the house and play with our puppy.
Yep, we got a puppy. Also on the weekend before Thanksgiving we drove up to Virginia to pick up our girl Blue (read her blog post here).
Blue’s November
We brought her home when she was 8 weeks old and weighing in at a little over 10 pounds. She was unsure and timid the first couple days but we worked hard to help her feel safe and loved with her new forever family. She is a Golden Retriever (my favorite dog breed in the world) and is super sassy, but also super snuggly.
Her first night here was the one and only night that she could fit under this couch. She almost immediately grew too big and if she tries to jam herself under there now, she just gets stuck. It’s super adorable.
We are making sure to have her meet a lot of people, men, kids, and other dogs while she is this age to get her nicely socialized. My nephew loved her when they first met and my sister’s dog got super excited! We were careful about those two meeting. Our friend also just got a puppy who is a month older than her and they had a great play date.
These were taken on her first few days with us. She is already so much bigger! I can’t wait to compare photos of her side by side. We think she is super adorable, a LOT of work, and are excited to help her become a good girl with great manners who loves hiking and exploring with us!
I hope you enjoyed this monthly round up! My goal is to do this on the last Friday of every month, so stay tuned for some glorious iPhone photos from December in a few weeks.
Hoping you all had an amazing month. Share your top three favorite things from your November in the comments below! If you enjoyed this post, please give it a like and don’t forget to subscribe and join our family if you haven’t already.
Until next time,
Jamie out
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