House update & 3 things

We found out last night that we did not get the house we made an offer on :( That's ok though, now I get to pretend like I'm on House Hunters a little longer :) It would have been awesome to have gotten better news, but we did have to rush into things. It was the 4th house we had ever looked at and it already had 2 other offers and we had to come up with our own by 5PM the next day with no idea what the other people put on the table. We have had to change the location of our future house because of our budget, but we're embracing it as a new adventure and a new town we get to explore. Everything will work out, I'm sure of it.

Now onto 3 things. I have recently purchased some new beauty items that I have been using the past 2 weeks and I think it's time for a good and honest review on them. I read The Small Things Blog everyday and Kate, a professional hair stylist is always raving about the Kenra hairspray so I found out where to buy it and just bought the travel size so I didn't waste my money in case I didn't like it. I have been wanting a pale purple polish for a while now and every time I see it in the NYC 99cents sections I pick it up and contemplate buying it and never have until I was at Ulta and just went with it.

Finally, I discovered the E.L.F. (eyes, lips, face) makeup section at Target. Everything was under $10! I was sold because I want to try new things but I don't want to spend a fortune on them. I kept going back and fourth on investing in Mac products but I think I will be going to Target this weekend to get some concealer for $3 and lip gloss for $1. I have been reading reviews on this brand and have heard nothing but good things!

$6.00 at Ulta. Works great, doesn't make my hair feel hard but holds everything in it's place.

$2.00 at Ulta. I love the color. Hate the product. It dried pretty quick but the next couple of days it felt "sticky" and I would get marks on the polish if I rubbed something against it like it was still in the drying process. I should have stuck to my 99 cents polishes from NYC.

$1.00 at Target. Love the colors but I think I'll be investing in an eye brush because the one that came with it is a little rough on my lids when applying.

Useful tips when moving

We are still waiting to hear if we got the house we bid on. It's been a long couple of days. We do have other houses we want to look at (just in case.) All I can do is think about how I want to decorate, paint and re-do things in our very own home. I have gotten so many great ideas from Pinterest that I can not wait to use! I am actually glad I didn't discover Pinterest before the wedding, I think our decorations would have been completely different. I do love how our wedding turned out though!!!

While pinning I have found so many things that make sense once you read to how to do them, but never have thought of them myself. I want to share some techniques that we (Ryan doesn't know this yet, lol) will be using when moving into our new house that I feel will make things 10x easier.




Turn an adhesive hook upside down on the inside of a door to hang a wreath (or anything) on the front of the door. 



Use a dustpan to paint the bottom of a wall without getting paint on the floor.

Use a hot glue gun on the bottom of rugs so they do not slide on tile or wood floors.

Put toothpaste on the frame where the nail needs to be, press the frame on the wall and then you know where you should put a hole in the wall.

*Photo credit: all of these pictures were copied and pasted from the Pinterest website.

Birchbox Review



I absolutely love getting my Birchbox in the mail each month, even though I've only gotten 2 so far it has been completely worth the $10. I have seen other ladies reviews on the beauty blender sponge and didn't want to spend $25.95 on 2 of them so I was ecstatic when I opened my box and saw the pink egg shaped sponge! I also got some good tinted moisturizer which I am debating on buying a full size tube (it's $38 :/ ) I've been using it for a week and love the effects. The lip gloss I got is perfect, I am very picky when it comes to what gloss I put on because of the texture. I will be buying the full size one for sure with my points I've earned.

Points? Every time you review a product, refer a person to sign up or buy full size products you get points and then you can buy the full size products with those points. So pretty much it's free!!! I love the points system. So if you want to sign up for Birchbox let me know and I can get some points for referring you :)

July box: makeup sponge, lip gloss, tinted moisturizer, caffeine mints, head phones and perfume.



List of products.

My favorite new makeup sponge looks like an egg.

Weekend in Cedar Key, FL

Over the weekend Ryan and I drove up to Cedar Key. My aunt and cousin are staying the week so we thought it would be nice for us to get away for a couple days and spend some time with them. It such a cute little fishing town that has a population of 200. I did my research on things to do and knew what to expect, but I was totally wrong once we had done everything there is to do by Saturday afternoon. When the websites said it's a small fishing town with no chain restaurants, grocery stores or chain anything for that matter they were right.

It was a culture shock to all of us when we realized that we had seen everything after driving around after dinner Friday night. We kept joking about "what would the locals do in ______ situation." It was a great weekend with plenty of eating, catching up and sight seeing. I love to explore new cities so this was a perfect place for that.

We all went on an island boat tour and then Ryan and I went on an airplane ride around the island which was one of the coolest things I've ever done! I took over 100 pictures, but I narrowed it down so you can the feel of Cedar Key for yourself.

There is only 1 grocery store. Walmart is 30 minutes away.

The boat we took for an island tour.

The locals drove around in golf carts.

The view from the back deck.

On the water.

Birds, birds, birds.

Boat tour.

Warning sign.

Tons of birds.

Flying in a plane.

We're over Cedar Key.

Ryan sat up front.

Seahorse Key.

The Gulf of Mexico.

The pilot telling Ryan what is ahead.

Aerial view of the house we stayed at.

Cedar Key.

Restaurants and fishing pier.

All of the key.

Ryan and I with the pilot.

Kayaking in the back yard.



Kayaking in the back yard.





3X world champ clam chowder soup. I agree with this!



Three

After finding out we can start looking for a new place to live I've been pinning a lot trying to figure out what kind of vibe/feeling I want our new place to have. In college we just bought things because they were cheap and somewhat matched. I am determined to make this next place look very put together. We plan on being in our new place for years so I want it to feel like a home; every place I've lived before now I knew I was moving and didn't really put any effort into it.

I don't think I need to explain what Pinterest is, but this will be my go to place when decorating. I haven't been able to craft as much as I would like because we are living with my parents with no extra space to put large items. My mom used to be an interior designer so I think I get some of my creativity and love of decorating from her.

This week I am going to focus on 3 headboards I've been dreaming over. They all are simple, yet very different and look like they will bring a master bedroom together just right.

Simple: wood with "love" hand painted

Practical: use as a shelf to display things

Dramatic: white fabric hanging from ceiling (top runner right now)

This weekend Ryan and I are going on a mini vacation to Cedar Key with my aunt and cousin for a nice getaway. I have been doing some research on this little fishing town and I'm excited to get away from technology for a little bit. I plan on only bringing my phone, book and boardgames, no computer this weekend!

We're buying a house....soon

Even though this week has just started it's been really good so far. We had gotten Connect Four at a garage sale over the weekend for $1 have been playing it every night since. I bought it for our mini vacation this weekend to Cedar Key but we've gotten our money's worth from it by now.

Today was a very exciting day. I woke up to an email from our bank; we got pre approved for the mortgage amount we applied for!!!! Now it's time to house hunt. We know exactly what we want and where we want to live, I hope a realtor is ready to take on our challenge. I have been doing a lot of research, blogging and pinning on how I want to decorate a new house so this new adventure will defiantly take us through the end of the year.

I keep changing the layout of my blog, but I think I will stick to this yellow one... for a while at least. I have also changed the name of it and the web address. Even though many people don't read this I feel like I should make it look like a "real" blog.

I am obsessed with the colors yellow and grey. I found this in the $1 section at Target with a bunch of other things in these colors, I might or might not be going back to get the other things.   

A nice surprise from my husband.

Our nightly obsession. 

Three

Three things I did this week...besides work. Wednesday was the 4th of July, Ryan and I drove out to the causeway and got to see Tampa's, all of the east coast beaches and Manatee County beaches fireworks. We got stuck in some traffic getting there (I really had no idea Safety Harbor was putting on a free concert that night.) Thursday I had the day off so we went to Clearwater Beach, it was nice and relaxing then by 2 we were starving so we ate lunch in downtown Dunedin. Friday, I had been nervous all week about Friday. We applied at our bank to get a mortgage loan! Why Friday, because that is when I got my first big paycheck from my new job.

Now the waiting game to hear back from the bank, and if we get the good news it's time to house hunt! I am so excited to start this next chapter in our lives. I lived away from home for 6 years and then to all of the sudden get married and move back into your parents house isn't exactly glamours when your trying to make a name for yourself and start your own family.

Just because you are 18 doesn't mean you are an adult. I think there are many things that go along with being older and responsible. I don't necessarily have a list of the "requirements" but buying a house would be in the top 3 for sure.

4th of July fireworks

Clearwater Beach

Now it's a waiting game to find out if we can buy a house or not

*I can see the number of people who read each entry on here but no one ever comments on them. I got a text from one of my friends asking about Birchbox so that made me happy to know that people really do read my blog to see what's going with me :)

Birchbox review

I love reading blogs and most of the ladies who write them subscribe to Birchbox. It is a monthly subscription where you pay $10 a month and you get a box of beauty samples (sometimes their even full size!) I received my first box this past week and was so excited. I wasn't expecting to get my first box until July because I thought I had signed up too late for June so it was fun going through everything after a long day of work. 

I love how I can cancel at anytime and my card won't be charged, but after liking my first box so much I think I will be sticking with this subscription for a while :)

This is all of the goodies that came in the box. 

I like the description of each item and how much it would cost if you wanted to purchase the full size product. 

This was the most interesting product I used. It's a self tanning wipe. If applied right it really does make you look tan after 3 hours.

The tanning wipe looked just like a wet wipe so as I was using it I didn't think it was working and had no idea I missed a bunch of spots on my arm. 

It is hard to see it in this picture but my arm is a couple different colors. I woke up and didn't have any time to fix the problem so I ended up wearing a sweater all day until I got home and immediately used the second wipe.