July's Favorite Things

Here are a few of my favorite things from July.

1.  Golfing: My dad took me and the boys golfing last week and we had the best time.  Charlie would actually hit his ball in the hole, Walker would throw his in, and they both loved riding to each hole in the golf cart.  What a fun night!

2.  Blogger Events:  What a fun month to be a blogger!  I co-hosted the quarterly NC Blogger Buzz, participated in a fashion night for Apricot Lane's Grand Opening at Southpoint Mall, and attended Belk's Fall Fashion Preview.

3.  Orly Nail Polish: Mirror Mirror.  I've been looking for a great grey color, but the only ones I could find were too dark or too sparkly.  I'm really liking this color and this brand of nail polish.

4.  Our Mother/Son Date:  I love this age.  Charlie loves life.  He thinks everything is really fun and really awesome.  So glad we were able to go see a performance together this month.

July has been a great month!  I hope you had a great one.

And now it's your turn to link up.

1.  Link to your actual Favorite Things post.

2.  If you have an old post you want to use, that's totally fine!!  Just make sure you link back to my blog in some way.  (You can grab a Favorite Things button on the sidebar if you'd like)

3.  Go visit a few other bloggers and say Hi!  (I've met some pretty amazing people through link ups!)

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!

PS.  Make sure you enter to win this incredible giveaway. 

Mixing it up

I do love my maxi skirts and dresses, and have been trying to change them up a little bit lately.  A button up dress shirt, tied up, is a perfect way to do a variation on the theme.  (I've worn this dress here as well..apparently I like wearing this dress with a braid as well) :-) 

I'm so excited to introduce you to 2 amazing ladies today with great blogs and great style!

Giving away a $25 Ann Taylor Gift Card

Carrie blogs over at Lego House, is a beautiful dancer, and is such a great person.  I love all of her posts, but one of my favorites from this past month was her Anthropologie for Less where she recreates some of her favorite Anthropologie looks for less!   Today Carrie is giving away a $25 Ann Taylor Gift Card!

Giving away a $25 Etsy Gift Card

Dawnelle blogs over at Just Dawnelle, is a beautiful mother of 2, and makes the most gorgeous headpieces.  (Her Etsy shop is on vacation right now because of a big move, but she'll be back in mid-September!)  One of my favorite posts of hers from this past month has been her Five Tips to Healthier Eating...fantastic post that I've pinned for now and for future reference!  Today Dawnelle is giving away a $25 Etsy Gift Card!

1 lucky reader will win $50 in gift cards!!  So awesome.  Just use the Rafflecopter below to enter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The giveaway will end on Sunday and the winner will be notified via email.

Comments turned off so you can go show Carrie and Dawnelle some love!
Linking up with Shanna, Amy, and The Pleated Poppy.

NC Blogger Buzz: Summer Edition

What a great night we had at our Summer NC Blogger Buzz.  Angela, from Head to Toe Chic, and I co-host a mini blogging conference once a quarter, and have a great time doing it.  The NC Blogger Buzz is intended to create a wonderful community for NC bloggers, and to provide an atmosphere of learning and growth.  

We hosted the event at Clothes Hound in Raleigh, where the entire store was 50% off!  There were yummy treats provided by Hannah from Swirl of Cinnamon, great swag, and fun giveaways for the ladies who attended.  

We mingled, shopped, and ate for a bit at the beginning of our meeting.  My sister, Sarah ^ came to help out and to take pictures!

We then had a really fun activity...Blogger Speed Dating.  We answered all sorts of questions to get to know each other better, and to learn about each other's personal and blogging experiences.

Angela and I went over a few fun things about the Blogger Buzz (one of them being that we're starting a FB group soon!) The social media director for Clothes Hound, Mary Gillogly, then spoke to us about social media, and afterwards we had an open group discussion.

What an incredible group we had!  And what a fantastic night!  I was so impressed by the talent, knowledge, and over-all goodness of every single blogger who attended. 

A big thanks to our sponsors for providing the treats and the swag!

Refreshments:

Swirl of Cinnamon

Swag Bag goodies:

Kai's Kookies

The Little Canary Shop

Booop: Handmade Books and Paper Goods

Giveaways:

Zailove: NC Necklace

Clothes Hound: Monogrammed Necklace

Thanks to everyone who attended! We are really looking forward to our Fall NC Blogger Buzz.  Be on the lookout for more information!

Imaginary Shopping Cart

yellow maxi, pink dress, coral dress , white dress, shoes, shoes2

I have a slight obsession with dresses and skirts.  (And flats for the summer.)  Aren't these all just beautiful?  I put them in my imaginary shopping cart...and hope that certain people (Noel, my sisters, whoever!) will go ahead and put them on my birthday list. (My birthday is in January).  

Any certain item in your imaginary shopping cart?

Happy Friday!!

Linking up with Lauren

A favorite workout

I try to get to the gym 3 times a week.  Sometimes it doesn't work out that way, of course.  But when I actually stick to my schedule, I do my own thing on Mondays, Pilates on Wednesdays, and some type of class on Friday (usually Body Combat).

On Mondays, I try to get a really great workout in, in a really short amount of time.  So I do about 25 mins of cardio and then some type of circuit training.

I use the Bosu Ball a ton because it works my entire body instead of just the one body part I'm targeting.

The most awkward I've felt while taking pictures....ever!

I turn this ^ Bosu Ball upside down for a lot of my exercises.

These pictures look super awkward, but a plank with a curl-in on top of the ball is an insaneeee workout.  I feel it for days after.

I'm always interested in finding new workouts, so I thought I'd share mine!  I also really enjoyed reading Sarah's workout tips over here.  Great for keeping motivated and for feeling great!

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I also want to introduce you to Talisha who blogs over at Reupena Household.

It's the perfect day to introduce her to you today, because she is a workout champ!!  She's running a half marathon in a few days and always posts motivational workouts/quotes/pictures on her Instagram. I love this post of hers because it showcases her beautiful family and how they love to play and stay active together!

I always feel so amazing after exercising, and love finding others that inspire me so much!

Comments turned off so you can go show Talisha some love!

White Shirt; 3 Ways

Let me know if you any questions about outfit details(!) Pictures edited by Kayla

I have a thing for Old Navy tees.  They are amazing and I have a ton of them in different colors.  My white one is probably my favorite.  Whenever I'm in a, "I have no clue what to wear with this", mood...I throw on the white shirt.  Perfect.

I wore the top outfit to the Science Museum last week...cool and casual.  The second outfit is a perfect day-to-night outfit....just the tee and the shorts with some flats for the day, and throw on a blazer and some heels for night.  And the third outfit is my favorite for every season...all white.

How do you wear your white tee?

Linking up with Shanna, Amy, and The Pleated Poppy.

The things about it is....

Last Friday night, Noel and I took the boys to a Cat and the Hat story time at Barnes and Noble.  They hear the story and get to meet the character.  Great idea.

I wish I could say that the story time was entertaining because of the book;  But it was the unexpected entertainment that made everything worthwhile.  

One little twin girl flew off solo (while her mom was sitting with the other twin), running with an "ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" all the way across the floor, in front of the storyteller, until she ran into the bookshelf and totally busted.  Not to be out done, a little boy on the same side took off running with his little brother in tow in the stroller, only to have his mom catch him on to the back of his shirt to reel him in.

It was one of those moments, where, after a really long day myself, I just had to laugh.  Mainly because I kept thinking of this Buzzfeed article (it's so ridiculous, but so hilarious), and that, although my boys were sitting and listening at the time, they had delivered an Oscar-worthy scream-off at the pool earlier.

It got me thinking about how EVERYONE has rough days.  Rough days with their kids, rough days at work, rough days with themselves. 

If you see someone looking gorgeous with a perfect outfit, perfect hair, and manicured nails, just know that, yes(!), they were probably wearing yoga pants with nothing on their face yesterday.  When you see someone's child acting perfectly and throwing out yes m'ams, just know that that same child had a full on, stomp it out tantrum when their cookie broke in half at the restaurant yesterday.  (And yes, some kids are naughty acting all the time because their parents don't discipline them..but that's another blog post for another time...but most of the time, it's just kids being kids!)

So don't feel bad if you're having a bad day...because we all have them.  And when you're having a great day, maybe use some of that extra spice to help someone else out! :-)

Top Scenes

For about 2-3 years, I posted on my blog about....twice.  One of those posts was about my favorite scenes from movies.  I thought I'd freshen things up a bit and talk about 5 more of my favorite movie scenes.  (#4 on the first list is still my all time favorite scene)

Here's an updated list in no particular order:


1.  Adoption scene from What to Expect When You're Expecting:

It's confirmed that if you experience no emotions while watching this scene, you are a robot. I love, love, love this adoption scene.  So beautiful and JLo is perfection.

2.  Audition scene from Pitch Perfect:

We watch this single scene on a weekly basis at my house.  (I'd be the girl who sings "took the time".  Acting everything out literally.)


3.  Pocahontas and John Smith "get caught" scene.

Interesting choice, right?  But really....this scene is incredible.  The gorgeous instrumental music, the swirling wind, the emotion....come on!!!  Disney killed it with this scene.

4.  New Moon "changing seasons"

New Moon was my least favorite book of the Twilight series, but was my favorite movie.  Say what you want about the Twilight movies, but this scene was brilliantly directed.


5.  Leo's first appearance in Romeo and Juliet

I couldn't find the exact scene on Youtube, but this clip shows it (kind of) around 5 seconds.  I fell in love with Leo during his opening scene in Romeo and Juliet...and have loved him ever since!


My amazing friend, Courtney, and I were able to have a full on girls' night last night, and it was fantastic.  I was telling her about my post for today...we're both movie lovers...and we agreed that the entire movie of West Side Story should be included in my "favorite scenes post".

What are some of your favorite movie scenes?!

Happy Friday!!
Linking up with Lauren. 

Church Outfit

Skirt and Shirt: Gap Outlet, Shoes: DSW, Necklace: GroopDealz, Pics edited by the fab Kayla

Dressing for church can be a challenge, so I am going to start a section on the blog featuring different Sunday outfits.  This page will hopefully serve as an inspiration for you while getting ready for church! I'll post some of my Sunday outfits, but would also love for you to contribute to this page.  If you have any modest dress or skirt outfits, (ones that have some sort of sleeve and is around knee length or longer),  I'd love to feature them on this page.  (You don't have to be a blogger to contribute).  You can send outfits you've worn in the past, or you can send them to me in the future....no deadline, as it will be ongoing.  (Email pictures to ashanderson10@gmail.com) Thank you!

I wore this outfit to church this past Sunday, and was excited to wear my new necklace from Groupdealz.  Another exciting happening this Sunday was that our ward split (for the 2nd time in 4 years).  It's incredible to see our church grow so much in our area, and even more exciting to be part of it!  The LDS church has a women's organization called the Relief Society, and this last picture is of me and the rest of the Relief Society presidency in our ward.  It was a bittersweet day, as 2 of us will be staying with the "old ward", and 2 of us will be going to the "new ward".  I have learned so much from these sisters and friends of mine.

Happy Wednesday!
Linking up with Shanna, Amy, and The Pleated Poppy.

I Declare

A few events have happened this week that have torn my emotions slam up.

We repainted the second floor of our house last week, so we took everything off of the boys' walls in their rooms, including this alphabet wall in Walker's room. 

Because we rearranged things, we took Walker's glider out of his room.  Like.... the glider that was in the nursery before Charlie was even born.  The glider that I sat in while I was pregnant with my first little baby, waiting so anxiously for him to get here.  

We also converted Charlie's crib into a toddler bed, and for some reason, it really hit me hard...as in, I snuck in his room in the middle of the night to hold his hand and give him kisses and cry.  

Sooo.....anyways....because of all these emotions, I took a trip down memory lane and found these sweet, older baby pictures.  But today, I'm going to be much better and enjoy the stage that they're in right now, because honestly, it's kinda fantastic.  I do love these babes of mine.

Excited to be co-hosting my dear friend, Cortne's, "I Declare" link up.  Make sure you pop on over to link up any type of post today!