• Life

    That Moment I Realized I Was A Real Adult

    October 26, 2015

    Am I the only one that has ever questioned whether or not they were considered a “real” adult? I mean what happens if you pay for your own car, pay for all your own bills, but still live with your parents? Or what if you live on your own but still are attending school? I’d say both of those situations qualify for the “real” adult title but how do we really know? We’re considered “adults” when we turn 18 but most of us are still in high school at that time and we still aren’t allowed to drink alcohol. So when do we cross over that line- the line of being considered an adult into the “real” adult category?

    The moment I realized I had actually grown up and was a “real” adult happened quite recently and I don’t know if I am happy or sad about it. The moment I realized that I had entered into real adult territory was when I bought myself a watch. I know, I know, not exactly what you thought I was going to say I’m sure but honestly who wears watches? Adults….. lol. When did I become so old? Just last year I was still in college- sure I had a full time job but I hid behind the “student” part of my identity so I didn’t have to face the fact that I was an adult then but there isn’t anything left to hide behind. Except maybe the fact that I’m living at home still?

    Being a real adult is actually something that I have honestly always wanted. I’ve always been very independent and haven’t enjoyed relying on others. I’ve always been hoping and dreaming of the time of my life when I was a “real” adult and didn’t have to rely on anyone else at all. I mean I technically haven’t reached this stage completely- I still live with my mom. I still can’t wait to move out completely and be able to afford my own apartment but for now this is the only thing that I can’t yet do on my own.

    But anyways- if you’re wondering if you reached the level of a “real” adult, just ask yourself have I bought myself a watch yet? Or maybe someone has bought it for you- then they must feel that you’ve reached the level of “real” adult 😉

    What do you consider being a “real” adult? When do you remember crossing over that line and what triggered those thoughts? Or maybe you haven’t crossed over that line yet- what do you think will cause you to feel like yes- now I’m a real adult?

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  • Faith,  Life

    how to experience J O Y in every day life

    August 6, 2015

    Okay so my computer has a virus and that’s why I haven’t been blogging all that much. I’m currently on my work computer (shh don’t tell anyone). But my plan is to buy a Mac, hopefully tonight actually.

    I love sharing what God’s doing in my life in hopes to encourage others too. God’s really teaching me how to experience joy amidst my every day life.

    Joy.

    Real joy. Something that I’m not too familiar with if I’m being honest. God’s really teaching me how to really enjoy my life. Wanna know the secret? Focus on the good. Only the good. Acknowledge the bad, sure. But focus on the good. Dwell on it. Be thankful for it. All of the good, even the small stuff. Especially the small stuff.

    A fresh cup of coffee

    Sunshine at lunch

    Good smelling lotion

    A cute coffee mug

    A sweet kiss

    There’s so many good things to be thankful for on any given day, it just takes us to direct our attention towards them to realize they’re there. I also found this is the key to struggling with contentment as well. It’s hard to be wishing for more when we realize just how much good we already have. We are blessed, truly blessed and I don’t ever want to forget it. Join with me and let’s commit to never getting bored of the blessings in our lives.

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  • Faith,  Marriage

    Life Update: God Cares About The Small Things Too!

    July 29, 2015

    Disclaimer: This is super long and way more personal than my prior posts. I hope you guys will enjoy learning more about my life and what God is doing in it. I’d love to hear about yours as well! Leave a comment with your blog website and I’d love to check it out 🙂

    God is SO good guys! My main reason for documenting this is because I really want to be able to clearly remember how God showed up and answered my prayers in such an amazing way. My hopes is that it encourages you too and helps you to remember that God is always here with us and cares so so much about us.

    So let me let you to what’s currently going on in my life a little bit. As I’ve written about in an older post, I have been dating Tommy for quite some time now – tomorrow is actually our 9 month anniversary! Tommy and I by no means have a perfect relationship, we have our struggles just as everybody else does but I know that this is the man that God has made for me to marry. He is the most thoughtful and caring guy I have ever known. He loves Jesus, most importantly, which is what makes our relationship so great.

    Tommy and I have gotten to the point where we know that we want to marry each other but we are trying to figure out the details and getting ready for that point. Obviously this means that we would both need to be financially able to live on our own. I am most likely going to have to find a new job within the next six months or so because my bank has been pending a merger for about 3 years now (lol) so if/when that goes through I will be let go. I just graduated from college in May though and am not too worried about finding something, just because I know that God will provide and take care of me.

    Tommy happens to be two years younger than I am and he has not exactly figured out which direction he wants to go in when it comes to jobs. His dad is a welder and for a while his plan was to learn from his dad and become a welder also. This path however is a little uncertain because his dad would have to be able to get him a job at the quarry that he works at and we weren’t sure that this was 100% going to be able to happen. Tommy also has an interest in business and has been debating continuing his education and getting a business degree. (Did you catch that?? He’s hands on (wanting to be a welder) and also super smart when it comes to managing money… am I a lucky girl or what?!)

    But this has been tough for me because I can be quite an impatient person sometimes and always one to want to be in control of things. Both Tommy and I have felt that our relationship is at the point where we want to take the next step (& get engaged!!) but we obviously need to make a mature decision and make sure that we can provide for ourselves once we’re married. So to the impatient part lol I have realized that if Tommy chooses to continue with his education that we will most likely have to wait until he graduates before we are able to get married, which could be about 2-3 years. I’m not going to lie I went through a time where I was really struggling with this. I admit that I don’t want to wait that long, and I had a time where I was really unhappy thinking about him doing this. But I also really wanted to be able to support him no matter what he chose to do and I wanted him to make the right decision for himself. I spent a lot of time praying and telling God how I was feeling about it and I can honestly say that He gave me the grace to trust that His plan was way better than mine and be 100% okay with whatever Tommy chose to do, even if that meant that we had to wait 2 or 3 years to get married.

    Now to the exciting part… God seems to really have answered Tommy and I’s prayers in a crazy way. Right when we felt that working with his dad was not really an option anymore, God brought this option back and I can’t tell you how grateful I am. Tommy’s dad is planning to try to get him learning more about welding throughout the rest of this year and hopefully get him in at the quarry sometime early next year! When Tommy told me about this I couldn’t believe it, I’ve never had God surprise me in such a way and it really shows me how much he actually cares about the details of our lives. If Tommy gets the job with his dad, we will be able to get married, and he will also probably have enough time to go back to school to learn business as well. It’s a win all around and so amazing.

    Although I do recognize that God could change his plans again, and it is possible for Tommy to not get the job with his dad, I still am insanely grateful for the hope that He has given us that this is the path that He is leading us down. I’m so excited to see what He has in store for us, even if things do change and Tommy and I aren’t able to get married for 2-3 years. I just am so grateful to have such an amazing man in my life and a God who loves us so much that He takes the time to care about the small details and leads us down the correct path.

    If you managed to read all of this and make it this far, you’re the best!! This was super long haha but something I felt I really wanted to share. Would you mind just praying for Tommy and I – that we would keep following down God’s path for us? Thanks so much guys!

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  • Life

    Lake George Vacation Recap :)

    July 23, 2015

    Hi guys, I’m sure no one has been wondering where I’ve been, BUT if you have I’ve been, I’ve been  here…

    IMG_5986

    Lake George, New York. It’s been so much fun and I’ve been super busy which is why I haven’t posted at all this past week or so. I just thought I’d recap my vacation and let you all know what I’ve been up to.

    So my boyfriend’s family has been going up to Lake George every year for as long as he can remember. This year I was lucky enough to join them for a few days. My boyfriend and I drove up Saturday night and stayed until Wednesday night because I had to work today and tomorrow. Our days have been packed full of fun stuff so I thought I’d just recap each day so I can try to remember everything we did.

    S U N D A Y

    Tommy’s parents had a wedding to go to so they weren’t up at the lake yet but his brother was. On Sunday we woke up kind of late because we didn’t get there until pretty lake Saturday night. We went shopping for some food and things that we needed at the store, then hung out at the public beach for the day. At night we stayed in and watched some Friday Night Lights on Netflix (our new fav show we watch together).

    M O N D A Y 

    Sunday night I had researched a cute coffee shop to go to the next morning and I found one called “Cafe Vero” so on Monday morning we went out to breakfast there.
    IMG_5998

    I’ve never seen latte art before this so I thought that was pretty cool. I got a peppermint mocha latte and it was delish. Tommy parent’s got there while we were out to breakfast. We all went down to the beach and hung out. We got to float around on the tube, lay in the sun (my fav), play ping pong and just hang out with Tommy’s family. At night we went out to a cute little Italian restaurant. We got to eat outside, it was really nice. Tommy and I were planning on going down to the beach to hang out by the fire but we both passed out when we got back from dinner. We had a long day 🙂

    T U E S D A Y

    On Tuesday Tommy woke up early to go wake surfing (see picture below) while I slept. (He’s the morning person obvi). I woke up when he got back and we headed down the beach again to hang out. I got to try wakeboarding for the first time – which was really difficult. I almost got it but will have to try again next time.
    IMG_5989

    We also went fishing on Tuesday and I caught a small mouth bass (woohoo!).

    W E D N E S D A Y 

    One of our plans while we were up at the lake was to go hiking so we did this Wednesday afternoon. I was hoping we would get a nice view of the lake but it was kind of hard to find trails or really know what they looked like before we picked one. The one we picked was a cool one though and wasn’t like any of the hiking trails we normal do in New Jersey. We hiked near this cute little lake:

    IMG_5993

    After we went back and hung out with his family at the beach again before we had dinner and drove home.

    It was an awesome little trip and we decided were going to drive back up Friday night and spend the weekend up there too. It’s a nice little getaway and is super relaxing. God has been showing me lately how awesomely good He is and reminding me that he really only wants what is good for me and that I do not have to be afraid because He’s always with me. This trip really reminded me just how blessed I am. I have the greatest boyfriend who always showing that he loves me, and I’m so thankful that he wanted me to be apart of this vacation.IMG_6001

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  • Faith

    For Those Of You Who Have Anxious Hearts Like I Do….

    July 14, 2015

    This post is for those of you who know how it feels to be anxious. Anxious about life. Anxious for no reason at all sometimes. This post is for those of you who want so badly to trust in God’s good promises for you, who want to experience the peace that Jesus offers – but just can’t seem to grab a hold of this peace and keep it in your hearts.

    Instead you know how it feels to keep repeating the same anxious thoughts over and over again not sure how to make them stop.

    “If only…”

    “What if…”

    Now I want to let you know I am no expert on this. I too struggle with grabbing a hold of the the peace that Jesus offers. I’m on the same journey as you but I want to share with you what God is teaching me along the way.

    I don’t know about you guys but sometimes when I’m feeling anxious I think that I can figure out God’s plan if I think hard enough about my life. Now I realize how ridiculous this sounds admitting it but I’ve realized that that’s exactly what I am trying to do when I can’t stop my anxious heart from worrying.

    Sometimes I even examine other people’s lives and think that I can figure out how God works.

    So she grew up in a Christian home and has had a good life so far so ultimately something bad has to happen to her eventually, right?

    Or, I’ve had a really good year.. that must mean that something bad is lurking around the corner…

    Or, I better not enjoy this too much because then it might get taken away from me…

    Just admitting those thoughts out loud and bringing them into the light makes me realize how ridiculously wrong they really are.

    ” He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority.”

    – Acts 1:7

    This verse hit me hard when I read it today. No matter how hard I try to figure out what is going to happen, I simply cannot. It is not in my ability to do so. That again is reserved for God alone. Just like I mentioned in my post “If God’s Ways Are Higher Than Ours Why Does He Allow Bad Things To Happen To Us?”.

    God must really be trying to tell me something huh? Our jobs aren’t to figure out our future, what might or might not happen. Our jobs aren’t to go over every bad thing that can happen to try to figure out how we are going to deal with them if they do.

    Our jobs are to rest in His great love and provision for us. God is faithful guys. He promises to always meet our needs. That’s His job, not ours.

    But more than that, let’s remember how good our God really is. What I’m learning is that this is at the root of our anxieties and worries – we do not ultimately believe that God is good…

    And how wrong we are. God is really transforming my mind about who He is and the main thing that He’s showing me is that He is good! So good we can’t even fathom. If something bad is to happen to us, He’ll be there – every step of the way.

    Holding us, loving us, and growing us.

    We’re never alone, and never without what we need.

    “What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?”

    Pray that God will open your eyes to just how good He really is – it will rock your world.

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  • Life

    10 Fun Facts About Me!

    July 13, 2015

    Hey guys, one of my favorite types of posts to read on other people’s blogs are the posts where the writer shares a little bit about their life. I enjoy being able to connect with them on a more personal basis so I thought I’d share some fun facts about me in this post.

    1. I work at a bank that is closing soon and I’m going to need to find a new job. (prayers please)

    2. I still live with my parents, I have a younger brother, and 4 dogs (yikes, crazy I know).

    3. I have an iPhone 5 with a very cracked screen and a missing home button lol

    4. I enjoy reading but rarely make enough time to do it.

    5. I drive a VW Jetta that’s manual and I just bought my first dirt bike in December.

    6. I just graduated college in May with a Psychology degree but don’t know if I’ll ever really work in that field.

    7. I’m very shy and prefer to hang out by myself or with my close friends or boyfriend rather than go out any day.

    8. I can’t wait to be in the stage of my life where I get to buy my own house, get married, and have children – although I am learning to be content with where I am in my life also.

    9. For some strange reason I am unable to finish the bottom of any drink. There is usually multiple water bottles in my room where there is only about 2 sips left in them. My boyfriend usually combines them all into one water bottle when he comes over.

    10. I love coffee and tea and will probably end up having a whole cabinet devoted to them when I have my own house.

    What about you guys? I’d love to hear fun facts about you 🙂

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