Audrey Life

The Good, The Good, & The Good

How’s everyone doing? It’s been a long month. Or year. Or decade? The Roaring Twenties are nuts. Or I’m nuts. Or the world is nuts. I can’t keep track.

We’re doing ok but sometimes I feel like God had the wild idea to really TOSS me into motherhood. “OH, you’re nervous and introverted and unsure about sharing your life with a needy and helpless human for the rest of your days? LET’S KICK THIS OFF WITH SOME MANDATED QUARANTINE. Enjoy motherhood!”

I’m kidding. I am exhausted, covered in slobber (M’s & Bristol’s), and drained by the end of the day but I feel fortunate to have comfort and safety, as well as time to spend with M (& K & the pups). I’m not missing her big milestones and I think that’s incredible. I also know that people are risking their lives to help others. And some people have lost their life or their loved ones… so I am aware that this whole thing is not God testing me with trial-by-fire motherhood.

Alrighty. Enough bitching. I’m going to share some good things with you and then you’re going to do the same (in the comments)!

My best friend just asked me to be in her wedding!! I am SO excited. It’s next May so we have plenty of time to match our masks to our dresses. (JK PLEASE let this be over by then.) I can’t wait to shop with her and help her prep and plan the pre-wedding festivities. Oh yeah… I’m not just IN the wedding- I’m her matron of honor! I am so excited!!

Maddie can now roll over both ways with no hesitation. She’s now trying very very hard to crawl… GULP. She’s mostly just lays on her stomach, straightens her arms, or yells really loudly and kicks her legs. She hasn’t figured out that she needs to do all that at the same time… thankfully. She’ll be 5 months on May 4th. She needs to cool it.

Bristol and I went hiking at a local waterfall this past weekend. If you’ve watched my IG stories you might know that B-town is a total nut job. Well, turns out she’s a GREAT hiking buddy. She was easy to guide and she stayed with me (on a leash, obviously). She climbed rocks and jumped logs and splashed through the creek bed. She also didn’t bother the other hikers on the trail- didn’t even show interest in them. A+ for social distancing.

We took our 7 year anniversary pictures ON our anniversary! I don’t know if that’s ever happened. We had nothing better to do and it was a pretty day so we checked it off the list.

That about wraps it up for now. I’m forcing rainbow and sunshine today because it’s tough to wade through the crap sometimes. We have multiple loved ones out of a job, family members that have been hospitalized (fortunately NOT with covid-19), and tough business decisions. But there’s a lot of good out there, too.

Speak of… I’m just throwing around the idea of this, but would anyone be interested in a Pass the Good Stuff train? Essentially a small gift/goodies chain… I’d assign you someone to send a little happiness to. It could be a gift card for coffee, flowers, a new book… anything you want to send! (And someone would send you a special something, too.) Any takers?

Ok. Enough blabbering. Tell me about the good things in your life!

Audrey Life

My People

First of all, thank you to everyone who commented on and shared Wednesday’s post. You all totally reinforced my point about the blogging community. I honestly believe every single one of you is great and I’m so happy to know/”know” you! ❤︎

Onward with the good vibes (and Chelsea‘s Tell Me Something Good link-up)!

Last weekend K and I attended his cousin’s wedding. His entire paternal family came from Texas, Tennessee, and parts of Ohio to celebrate the bride. I also knew the groom’s family because his sister and I were really close in grade school. He was also friends with my brother. Plus we all went to the same church. #SmallTownVibes. Needless to say, I knew a lot of people at the wedding.

There was one point during the reception when I was off to the side, standing between K and his sister. On either side of them were my in-laws, as well as K’s brother (and maybe his wife? I can’t remember). For whatever reason, in that exact moment, as the group of us stood there watching the party around us, I became aware of how ridiculously fortunate I am to call those people my people. I felt so special to casually stand among them- like there was never a time that I didn’t fit into that group.

*I wanted to insert a ridiculously adorable throwback photo K’s family here, but I didn’t know if they’d be ok with that. Just trust me on this one- it’s an adorable picture!*

I enjoy weddings. They give my an excuse to drink a lot bit and dance. I get to see friends and family that I don’t normally see. And more than anything else, I love watching two people exchange vows while I sit next to the guy that I promised to love +3 years ago. Additionally, sometimes a wedding joins two families. I know that’s not always the case- it depends on the family dynamic- but that was the effect of our wedding. I honestly don’t believe there’s anything that my mother- or father-in-law wouldn’t do for me. I love splitting a glass of wine with all my siblings-in-laws. My heart flips inside my chest when I see my dad and K hanging out. I loved that Fred & Christina asked both K and me to be a part of their wedding party. I honestly try very hard not to take for granted the family that I was born into and the family that I was blessed with through marriage. I know I’m lucky.

And standing among that tribe at the reception with K and his my family just made me feel it 10xs over. Whether it’s friends or family, I hope everyone has a group like that. Remember to be grateful for them.

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Tell Me Something Good Friday!
Audrey Life

Good Stuff on a Wednesday

Happy Wednesday, folks. Are you having a quiet week? I am, surprisingly… Our weekends are totally bonkers this month, though, so calm weekdays are a blessing.

I’m a little early to Chelsea‘s Friday link-up party, but I have a story, some photos, and a few blog posts that I just can’t wait to share!

S T O R Y
I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions that my husband runs his own company. He sells all over the US, but the majority of our materials come from local shops and companies. There are a few businesses that he ends up visiting every week multiple times a week, and they know his name and his employees.

He was driving past one of those businesses last week and saw that they’d posted something new on their outdoor sign. It read something like, “Thanks to the person who hit our cat and didn’t stop.” I don’t know what it’s like in those big cities, but us small-town-folk love our pets, especially our shop dogs & cats. K had met the cat (Oliver) on multiple occasions and knew that he was primarily an inside cat- apparently he’d slipped out.

K stopped by their shop the next day to order some materials (and drop off the sympathy cookies I made for the employees) and heard the story: A customer came flying into the parking lot, drawing all the employees out of the building, and pulled from his truck a box with the deceased cat. He saw him lying on the side of the road, recognized him, and brought him to the business for a proper burial (which he got). The employees were obviously heartbroken and felt the best way to honor their fallen furry co-worker was to adopt another friend from the local humane society. They couldn’t choose and came home with two new babes.

The husband sent me a photo
The husband sent me a photo.

So in the end, Oliver’s death gave a new home to two little kittens (one of whom was christened “Oliver” by the humane society! Fate!)

P H O T O S
I mentioned last Monday that K and I took some anniversary photos with our tree. Have I elaborated about the tree here? I feel like I have but maybe not…

Well, if not I’ll give you a one-sentence-rundown: On our first anniversary we planted a tree on my parents’ 75 acre property (where we hope to live near some day) and we promised to take a picture with the tree every year to document our little family.

A progression of our photos...
A progression of our photos…

Blog Photo 1

We got a little artistic this year…

Blog Photo 4

And Kayla captured some candid ones (which I LOVE)…

Blog Photo 2

. . .

Blog Photo 3

Thank you to my best friend Kayla!! She’s our official family photographer 😉

B L O G S (that you should check out…)
This week a few ladies talked about some really important or informative stuff. I encourage you to visit:

And that about sums it up on this fine Wednesday. Chelsea’s link-up actually happens on Friday so you have plenty of time to take note of something good, write about it, and link up with her!

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Tell Me Something Good Friday!
Audrey Life

Sharing all the Goods This Friday!

This was going to be a bitchy post but then I had a change of heart and a million happy/funny things happened to me and I just snapped out of my bitter mood. So today I’m linking up with the amazingly wonderful Chelsea from The New Wifestyle (who just spent the week in Hawaii (shut up!!) with her birthday-boy husband) for her Tell Me Something Good Friday!

Speaking of Chelsea, that selfless, giving, big-hearted woman sent me some cloth napkins that came her way via a generous neighbor. I super LOVE that we have some cloth napkins around the house now so we can use them at every meal verses creating waste with paper napkins and paper towels. Yay!!

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Also arriving in the mail this week was this book. (Cue the embarrassing story…)

So I open my mailbox and find this book addressed to me from the author (!!). I excitedly open my random package and squeal to my husband that “I’ve finally made it as a blogger! An author just sent me her book to review! Someone actually sent me something for free!” Then the next day I’m browsing my usual blogs and see this post from Kristin at SYIAP. And I realize that about a month ago I signed up to receive this book. So no one hunted me down or sought me out- I signed up for the copy of the book.

I’m such a dip sometimes.

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Moving on…

I won one of those awesome rafflecopter-y giveaways!! I seem to have good luck with these giveaways and I am SO thankful to the hosts for doing these. Now I can get some fancy make-up from Ulta! Thank you:

Lindsay // Libby // Amanda // Becca // Kate // Rachel // Cherie // Amanda // Tabitha // Ashley // Mar

This week feels like it’s dragging on… but at least it’s been a pretty good week! This weekend we’re taking our annual anniversary picture with our tree, and I get to see two of my best friends from high school, and on Sunday we’re watching my baby brother graduate from OSU! (a.k.a. I’m going to sit in a stadium for +6 hours and read a book.) Plus it’s Mother’s Day so I’m expecting a diamond necklace from my fur-kids (kidding).

Ok. I’m done rambling. Tell me about something good in your life! What are your plans this weekend?

audielou.com_signatureHere are some other “Tell Me Something Good” posts: Road Trip Story | My Hometown

Tell Me Something Good Friday!
Audrey Life, Travel

My Hometown: Tell Me Something Good

Just in case you missed the memo: Today is Friday! Yippee!! I haven’t linked-up with Chelsea in a while so today I’m jumping on the “Tell Me Something Good” Train and talking about my town! (I was a little inspired by Steph’s post last week.)

hometown_ohio

Maybe all towns are like this… but when I was in school all my classmates were hell bent on “getting out of this place.” I started dating K when I was 17, but I still thought we’d both leave my little town and settle in Pittsburgh or Nashville. (I don’t know why I thought it’d be either of those two cities, but I did.) In the summer of 2012, right before my college graduation and less than a year before our wedding, K decided to start a business. And that pretty much sealed our fate in this small town.

We’ve joked about moving to Texas (K’s market is really strong there & being in the “center” of the US would be beneficial), but that’s not going to happen because A) I love snow and B) I love snow. So here we stay.

At one point in life I thought that this might mean that I failed; I’d failed to see the world & escape my hometown. I have high school friends in Cleveland and Columbus, college friends that now live in Arizona and Japan, and my brother is getting ready to permanently settle a few hours away… but I left for three and a half years of college and came right back here. ‘How pathetic,’ I once told myself.

But I was oh so wrong. Deep down, I’m a big fan of this small town I grew up in.

  • We have a delicious coffee shop that resides in our cute little downtown square.
  • I never feared for my safety in my small high school.
  • Our local park offers ball fields and summer rides and fireworks.
  • I pass “first date” locations and my teenage hangouts all the time- and it brings back a lot of good memories.
  • I can drive by my childhood house when I’m feeling nostalgic.
  • My parents and K’s parents are less than 10 minutes from us. Same with all our grandparents.
  • While we’re a fairly small town, we do have a lot of big businesses- and it’s a painless drive to get to larger neighboring cities.
  • When our out-of-town friends visit their families “back home”, they call us up and we get to see them.
  • From our house I can walk to my job, K’s business, the local high school, or the park- in under 15 minutes.
  • The housing market is inexpensive.

And of course we can always leave and travel and visit others… and we get to come right back to our little community. It’s a peaceful place. We don’t have public transportation. We’re 20 minutes from the cute little Amish towns. And there’s plenty of grass for our dogs. You don’t always get that in a big city.

If K woke up tomorrow and said, “Let’s move!” I’d probably be on board, but if the furthest move we ever make is from in town to the countryside out of town, I’ll be happy, too. And I think it’s good to be at peace with that 🙂

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Linking up with Chelsea for “Tell Me Something Good!”

Tell Me Something Good Friday!