Life

Post Thanksgiving Thankfulness

/ Cami Grace / Leave a comment

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Thanksgiving is the one holiday that seems to change for us.  With family being spread out all over the country and with our schedules being a little tricky to work around, we never seem to know what we’re going to do, but something always works out and we’ve been blessed to be able to spend Thanksgiving with family and/or friends.

This year I slept in, spent some quality time with God reading my Bible and in prayer, talked on the phone with my parents in Chicago, and sister in L.A., then we did some more unpacking and organizing (for those of you who don’t know, we just moved into a new house!), then we headed over to my brother’s house to spend the afternoon/evening with him and his little family.  It was definitely a great way to celebrate the holiday.

With thanksgiving in mind I am grateful to God for so much.  Here is just a list of a few things I’m thankful for.

  1. God and his unconditional love, faithfulness, mercy, grace, and forgiveness
  2. My husband
  3. Fresh beginnings daily
  4. A new home for our little family (huge blessing)
  5. Kahlua, our lab, and the goof ball that she is
  6. A small yard for Kahlua to be able to run around in
  7. Our kitty, even though she has given us a ton of grief, she’s still my little baby
  8. That I was born into a Godly family
  9. For deep, meaningful friendships
  10. God’s constant provision
  11. the blessing of my job
  12. for my husband’s job
  13. Turkey’s being 50% off the day after Thanksgiving (woohoo!!)
  14. Food – I love food
  15. Health
  16. Safety and protection
  17. For our cute little car that has been reliable ever since we bought it about 7 years ago
  18. For the people that inspire me
  19. For awesome technology to be able to stay in touch with long distance family (yay Skype!)
  20. For rest and relaxation
  21. Books and blankets – and how well they go together (along with hot chocolate)
  22. Electricity – being without makes you appreciate it sooo much more
  23. For the things we get to look forward to (Christmas, a new year, vacation…)
  24. Laughter
  25. For this blog – it’s been a fun little journey on here, but I’m also thankful for blogs in general, because it’s fun being able to look into other people’s lives and receive inspiration and encouragement.  So thanks to you guys out there too! :)

I hope and pray you all will continue the rest of the year with many blessings and continue to give thanks through it all.

Much love xoxo

Storm Recap

/ Cami Grace / Leave a comment

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The exciting news of the week was definitely the storm we had this past Tuesday, so here’s what happened.

The Storm

We had a huge wind storm this week that ripped down power lines, toppled trees, and caused huge amounts of damage.  You can view a few photos of the aftermath here.

The Drive Home

My typical 25-30 minute drive home took me a little over an hour, and that’s after leaving work 2 hours early.  I decided to avoid the freeway since my car has a hard enough time with 35 mph wind gusts, let alone 35 mph sustained winds with 60-70 mph wind gusts.  Power was out at half the stoplights I came to, which meant it was now a 4 way stop at major intersections with multiple lanes.

After about 40 minutes I came to another major intersection, also without power, and decided to take a detour.  I was going to jump on the freeway, but when a huge gust of wind started shaking my car, I changed my mind.  Thankfully, I knew another way home, and the way I was going was taking me to an area that still had power.

As I continued on my way the wind was picking up even more and trees were bending over, practically in half.  I made it allll the way down to the road when I notice the truck in front me suddenly swerved into the other lane. Directly in front of me was a tree laying across the road.  I followed the truck in front of me (glad I was following at a safe distance) and drove over the top of tree.  For about 5 blissful minutes my car filled with the scent of pine.  As I was thoroughly enjoying the scent of Christmas, reality soon kicked in and suddenly all the lights along street went out.  Thankfully the stoplights flickered but decided to stay on for the remaining 5 minutes of my commute.

Home

Our apartment was dark and cold, but I was so thankful to be home and safe as the storm grew even more strong.  I called my mom to let her know I made it home ok and then waited for my husband to get up (he works graveyard, so he sleeps during the day).  It just completely amazes me that he can seriously sleep through anything, even a hurricane, apparently, haha.

Once he was up I made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and pulled out our board games.  It was fun but we were definitely getting cold and couldn’t concentrate after a while.  Since Mikey still had to go to work later that night we decided to find somewhere we could get something hot to eat and went to my brother’s house, which amazingly enough, only lost power for 2 hours.

After 24 hours our power finally came back on (24 hours in the middle on November is miserable – but that’s nothing compared to the people who are still without power 5 days later and counting).  I’m thankful to be safe and have a home that was unharmed.  Unfortunately there were many who were not so lucky.

As for my pets?  the storm didn’t even phase them.  I think living on the Oregon coast for so long had them pretty well prepared.  While my dog Kahlua lounged on the couch staring out the window, my cat was on the floor in front of the window trying to chase the leaves that were blowing on and off our balcony.

The End

So that was the excitement for the week.  This weekend has been busy with packing, packing, and more packing.  Today is our last and final day for packing and tomorrow we move into our little house!

Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend.  Happy Sunday!

Currently – September Edition

/ Cami Grace / Leave a comment

Happy September!!  I can’t believe this summer is practically gone!  I’m usually a little sad when I turn the Calendar and say goodbye to August, but this year, I seem to be ok with it.

Since I took yet another 2 month break (I know, I know, I honestly thought I would be doing better at this), I decided to break my silence with another Currently Edition.  So here we go!

Currently Watching:

“When Calls the Heart”.  Thank you Netflix!  And thank you Hallmark for making such a happy, only slightly cheesy, tv show.  There is only 1 season, so that’s a little sad, but hopefully there will be more.  If you liked Downton Abbey, I have a feeling you would like this.  Go check it out!

Also, Rizzoli & Isles is still going, so that keeps me happy on Tuesday nights.

Currently Reading:

Harry Potter Book 3…actually 4.  I literally have just a couple pages left and I’m done with 3.  I realized I left book 4 in my drawer at work as soon as I got home.  Gah!  Good thing I can grab it tomorrow.  Love the books!  Obviously they are better than the movies, but I still can’t get over how well done the movies are.

Currently Making/Baking:

Tomato Basil Pasta.  Look it up on Pinterest (I might also try and post it on here sometime)!  Super Easy, it’s one of those one-pot meals and takes about 20 minutes to make, probably less.  It doesn’t call for it, but I add Italian Sausage to give it a little protein (in which case turns it into a 2 pot meal).

Current Obsession:

In my June “Currently” post, I mentioned I was obsessed with looking at cruise vacations.  Well…we ended up booking one and I’m SUPER excited!  I have everything planned as much as I can right now, just waiting until it gets closer to our travel dates to book our flights and hotel and what not.  So yeah, that obsession is still going strong.

Anywhosies – Speaking of that Tomato Basil Pasta, I need to get cracking on that.

Hope you all have had a wonderful first day of September!