{Five on Friday}

{ONE- IMPROMPTU GATHERINGS}

I mentioned here that we ended up having an impromptu football party at our house on Sunday night.  Every time we actually try to plan a get together, someone cannot come.  However, randomly start calling people and inviting them over for dinner and football and magically everyone is able to come.  I LOVE IT!  I also got to love on all their little ones and we even let them get in our bed and watch TV.

SO CUTE!!

{TWO- HANK GOT A FRESH CUT}

Hank was LONG overdue for a groom.  He is definitely one of the fluffiest dogs I know and his mane can often times get out of control.

See what I mean?  It is insane but once his hair grows out, we can no longer see his eyes.  We had planned to get him cut 2 weeks ago but with his annual shots, we felt it would be best to wait.  We wanted to try a new groomer in town called Yuppy Puppy so Crawford called and made him an appointment.  Let me just say, Yuppy Puppy is AWESOME. If you are a local Wilsonian or are near the area, I highly recommend Yuppy Puppy.  The staff is extremely nice and just make you feel right at home as soon as you walk in the door.  I also think that Hank got one of the best cuts he has ever gotten.  They also take a picture of your dog and post it to their facebook page.  I love it!! Seriously, check them out.

{THREE- THE MANTEL}
Now that fall, Thanksgiving, and Christmas are over, I have been struggling with how I wanted to decorate our mantel.  It was full with all kinds of pretty decorations at Christmas and ever since we put up the decorations, it has been BLAH. It needed some serious help.  I wasn't sure how I wanted to decorate it but I knew that I wanted to do something that I could keep up for a while so I didn't want to do anything themed.  I already had a gorgeous yellow mirror on the mantle before Christmas so I decided to mix and match some different items that I already had on hand along with some items I found at Hobby Lobby.  It is not 100% finished but it is definitely getting there.  I welcome your thoughts/suggestions.

Candle Sticks, Hand Lettered Picture: Hobby Lobby
Mirror: 5thandSmith
Letter B: Gifted by a friend

{FOUR- IT IS WELL}
I have been listening to this song on repeat ALL WEEK LONG.  Rebekah introduced me to it months ago and I liked it then but I only listened to it once.  About a month ago, I pulled up the lyrics at work and listened to the whole song.  I literally sat at my desk with tears flowing.  It is so uplifting and encouraging and pretty much sums up my prayer for my life right now.  My favorite part of the whole song is "Far be it from me to not believe, even when my eyes can't see. And this mountain thats in front of me, will be thrown into the midst of the sea." Such powerful words.  We all face mountains. Every. Single. Day. It is so encouraging to know that through all the hard times, all we have to do is release our fears and trust in Him and it is well.  May not always be the outcome we hope for but He has a greater plan for us.
#truth

{FIVE- BOLTON WEEKEND}
This weekend, we plan to spend some much needed time with Crawfords family.  I love when we get to see them because I feel like time slows down when we are with them.  I am able to enjoy every single minute without having to worry about cleaning the house, running errands, or going here and there.  Crawford would probably disagree with that because he feels like we don't see them enough which is also true.  They only live about 45 minutes away so we try to see them at least twice a month.   It is going to be a great weekend!!

Today, I am linking up with 

{darci, april, christina + natasha}

Becoming Homeowners

The day Crawford proposed, he was currently living in a one bedroom apartment.  About a month into our engagement, we started talking about where we wanted to live once we were married.  We probably could have made it work in his apartment but it would have been tight and we would have been miserable.  I actually think we probably would have needed to rent out a storage unit.  We started looking in to whether or not we wanted to rent or buy and had pretty much decided that something would work out in Gods timing.  We honestly were not looking to buy at the time, it sort of just happened.

In early March of 2014, our pastor that married us asked us to come over to his house.  When we got there, he walked us over to the house next door and he had taped a sign to the mailbox that stated "The Boltons" as well as baked us a plate of cookies.  It was hilarious.  He told us that the house has been empty for about 3 months and told us that he would love to have us as neighbors.  We were able to peak through the windows and it looked nice. The next day, Crawford called the realtor and made an appointment to view the house. Within 3 days, we were officially under contract. We closed on April 16, 2014 and were officially first time homeowners. 

The cliche key picture. Also, the purple door was the first to go.

The house was in great shape minus some needed painting. Luckily, my dad and papa love to paint and they graciously helped us paint every room in our house. We painted the entire house in 2 days. AWESOME! We have spent the past 10 months slowly making the house our own. Decorating is a work in progress.  The pictures below are pictures we took the day we closed.

Hank is not quite sure about this new place.

He loves the big window.

One of the previous owners "flipped" the house about 2 years ago so as you can see, the house has some awesome updated finishings and decor.  

Hard at work, painting away.

The day our refrigerator arrived.  As a side note, my moms father started a CD for me the day I was born.  He died when I was only two.  I was able to use the money from the CD to buy our fridge so I think about him every time I see it.  I love the fact that even though I do not remember him, I see a little of him every day.

Weekend Recap

I loveeee long weekends.  Working for a bank, you do not get a lot of time off so I embrace those long weekends when they come around and have already started counting down to the next one.  We had an amazing weekend filled with a whole lot of nothing.  The best kind, right?

We dog sat our best friends lab for the whole weekend and that was quite the adventure.  Hank is only 10 pounds and is a complete lap dog.  Nala is an 80-ish pound lab that is one big ball of energy.  Hank and Nala are literally like boyfriend and girlfriend.  All we have to do is say her name or Na-Na and he goes ballistic.  

Friday night we took both dogs over to Kevin's house.  Kevin has a HUGE bloodhound and Nala loves playing with Charlie.  We basically just chilled the entire night and let the dogs do their thing while Hank remained permanently glued to my lap.  We are still working on him liking Charlie but right now, he just sees Charlie as a HUGE beast even though he is the friendliest dog in the world.

Sorry for the blurriness but these two don't stay still long.

Saturday we slept in which was glorious and then Crawford and I cooked breakfast together.  Hank also got a haircut. We didn't really do anything else during the day but we went to the movies that night with some of our friends and Crawfords brother.  We saw American Sniper and it was amazing.  The best part of the movie was the fact that the theather remained silent while the credits started rolling and no one said anything as they walked out.  Sort of like a moment of silence to a fallen hero.  It gave me the chills.  God bless the fallen heroes and God bless our troops.

Hank with his fresh cut

Sunday was awesome.  We went to church that morning and our youth pastor preached and did an amazing job.  After church, Crawford called a few of his buddies from church and we ended up asking people to come over for an impromptu football party.  What started as a few ended up with about 12 adults and 5 children.  Oh yeah, and this happened.  All of the kids crawled in our bed and watched tv together.  So cute!!

Monday we slept in and decided to get up and clean out our cars.  They were long over-due for a cleaning.  Kat and Andrew came and picked up Nala and we decided to end our long weekend with a trip to Smithfield for a little bit of shopping at the outlets.  It seriously was the best weekend and I enjoyed every single moment with my husband.  I love going and doing but the best weekends are the ones in which we have zero plans and can just do whatever comes up.  I was sick last week so that is the reason for such little posting but I am feeling back to normal and I am looking forward to a new week.

Engagement Pictures

Is it just me or does it feel like I am going way back in time?  I really want to capture every single aspect of our wedding so I feel it is only appropriate to take it all the way back to our engagement pictures.  I look forward to one day being able to look back on these posts and live each moment over in my mind.  

We decided to take our engagement pictures at the place we met- Mount Olive College.  It is now called the University of Mount Olive but it will forever be Mount Olive College to me.  A family friend, and our ring bearers father, offered to take our pictures as a wedding gift. Before I start sharing some of the pictures, I feel that I need to note that the days leading up to the photo shoot were warm, like 70s-80s.  The day we took our pictures, a cold front came through and the temps dropped to the 30s-40s.  IT WAS FREEZING!! I have never been so cold in my life.  Somehow, we made it through and the pictures turned out great! Thanks again Dustin for braving the cold and capturing these awesome images.

{Five on Friday}

{ONE} Is it just me or has it been tough getting back in to the groove of things after the holidays. Working for a bank, we only got Christmas day and New Years day off but I took a couple extra ones. Even with very little time off, I got used to sleeping in and being lazy. It was nice. Now I am struggling. 

{TWO}  Crawford surprised me with tickets to see Wicked for Christmas. It's in my top 3 favorite Broadway shows and I am ecstatic. Crawford has never seen a Broadway show at all so it's going to be wicked fun-no pun intended.

{THREE} One of goals for January is to clean and organize our house. We bought our house last April but I didn't move in until November. Trying to move my things in the midst of the holidays as well as piles and piles of wedding decorations/presents is difficult. We started on the office last week. It's slowly getting there. This was the room we "junked" so we at least have a walk way in to the room now. YES! 

{FOUR}  Hank has been extra cuddly this week and I love it! We are scared he may be getting sick because he has not had any energy at all but I do enjoy the cuddles from that fluff ball. He is getting his annual shots today and then a majorly over due hair cut next week.

This picture was taken about 2 weeks ago so his hair is now covering his eyes.

{FIVE}   We got our wedding pictures back from our photographer about 2 weeks ago.  I have been enjoying sifting through all of the pictures.  Yesterday made 2 months of marriage.  At times, it feels like it has absolutely flown by and at other times, it feels like we have been married for years.  I am enjoying every single minute of being married.  There are moments that are challenging but that was to be expected.  I would say our biggest challenge thus far has been coordinating our busy schedules.  We are definitely the type that love going and doing but have found that it is important to sometimes scale back and just be home together. 

Today, I am linking up with 

{darci, april, christina + natasha}

Papa Gregg

My dad is my hero. Plain and simple. Always has been always will be. I look up to him for so many reasons. My dad was 1 of 4 kids and his father died of a massive heart attack at the the young age of 45. To say that they had it tough at times is an understatement. However, my grandma did everything she could to provide and helped pave the way for my dad to go to college. Long story short, he went to ECU, graduated with a BS in Business Administration, started a successful career for a good company, retired at the age of 53, only to start completely over with a new job. He is the definition of success to me! I knew when I graduated college I wanted to invest my time in to a company that I could see myself retiring from because I loved that he retired early and then started over again. He also gives great advice and has been my rock since the day I was born. Needless to say, I love my dad and he is my hero.

My dad is one of those people that I would consider a work out guru and a health freak. He is probably shaking his head if he reads this, but it's true. He loves to exercise. He is what I have always considered the definition of healthy. I have never ever worried about him a single day of my life...that is, until Monday June 10, 2013.

I will never forget that day. I was at work when one of my childhood friends that I work with asked me to walk with him outside. He then told me that dad had passed out while working out at the gym and was going to the hospital for further tests. I'm a panicker so I immediately asked if he was okay and Daniel said yes. They were just going to run some tests but he would drive me to the hospital. I thought that was a little odd if all he did was faint but I agreed to let him drive me. I called Crawford on the way and asked him if he could come to Wilson since I wasn't sure what was going on. 

On the way to the hospital, Daniel calls his mom who is an ER nurse. I will never forget that call because I felt like he was talking in code. When he got off the phone, I started asking a hundred questions while also losing my breath (such a panicker and the exact reason I needed a driver). He told me that they were still running tests but that I needed to go to the family console room when I walked in. I'm no medical expert but I knew something was very VERY wrong when I heard those words. I started having a panic attack and somehow Daniel managed to calm me down.

When we got to the hospital, there were no parks so Daniel dropped me off. I walked in and went to the desk and I was surprisingly calm. I saw my nanny at the desk and I walked up just in time to hear her say "you have to let me back, he's had a heart attack." **Insert me LOSING it.** I lost it so badly in the middle of the waiting room the nurse quickly ushered me to the family console room and that is when I saw my mom. I remember seeing about 9 people in the room, mostly men, and they all turned their backs to me and were sobbing. I remember Daniels mom telling me that they were doing everything they can to save my dad but I had to pull myself together.

 My mom then told me that dad had been working out at the gym when he just collapsed. He had suffered sudden cardiac arrest (not a heart attack) and was clinically dead for 5 minutes. Miraculously, 2 ER nurses were working out near him and immediately started CPR. They did CPR for 4 minutes until the ambulance arrived. They then shocked him twice before trying to shock him one last time. On the last shock, he gasped for air. God is GOOD! Once he came to, he became combative because he didn't know where he was. They had to medically sedate him and he stayed in that state for about 24 hours.

By the time news spread through Wilson and church, there were about 50 people that showed up at the ER. I find that incredible. We got to see dad for a few minutes and I will never forget that moment. He had a black eye from the fall and he honestly looked dead. He was intubated and that is when mom made the decision to have him transported to Wake Med.

When we got to Wake Med, he was starting to wake up. He was intubated so he couldn't really move but he started communicating with us by his hands. Mom stayed at the hospital for an entire 5 days, never once leaving him. They ran tons of tests and he did have one major artery that had a blockage but they were able to put a stint in. I read that only 5% of people survive cardiac arrest. That is astonishing. It is also crazy that it can hit any person at any time, no matter how healthy. Dad comes from a long history of heart problems and unfortunately, you can't escape heredity problems.

Dad was released from the hospital on Friday, 5 days after his cardiac arrest. He was practically a brand new person- minus the black eye. He has to limit his physical activity levels but he has not had any other issues. That week was by far the hardest week of my life. I saw first hand just how precious life and loved ones can be. We are never guaranteed another day. I fully credit God for saving my dads life that day.

So there it is. My dads story and one of the many reasons why he is my hero.