Happy Friday Everyone!

 

Can you believe it is the end of June? We are almost getting into the midway part of summer break! I feel like the summer always goes so slow the first half and then the second half goes crazy fast. How do you feel about it?

 

One – What We’ve Been Up To This Summer

On Father’s Day weekend, Brian and I went to Wild Sun Winery, which is about 25 minutes away from us in Hillsboro, MO. The view isn’t as nice as Augusta, but it isn’t bad… and they had live music! Plus, the wines are so, so good here and we love the food. I have been thinking about this slice of chocolate cake since we came here 2 years ago! The beer cheese they make to go with their soft pretzels is delicious too and we also enjoyed their thin crust veggie pizza. YUM!

 

 

I have been wanting to get to IKEA forever to purchase a white craft table with wheels for my at home office that is downstairs. The name of the desk is Linnmon Krille and it was really easy to transport home in our car since the legs weren’t attached. The legs have wheels, which is another reason why I love this table so much. While at IKEA we ate in their cafeteria and I noticed they had these new carts where you can set your trays. IKEA thinks of everything!

 

 

We’ve been trying to do one fun outing a week. Since Nathan and Autumn are working this summer, it is harder to find a free day in which we can all do something together (and we usually bring Grandma along!). I always love browsing the Kate Spade store, especially the window display. They had strawberry everything on display! Autumn loves Pacsun, but I don’t know about these corsets I saw in the store!!! Kids are wearing them with denim shorts AND not covering them up! It was even see through! Ahhh!! What in the world?! 

 

 

We have had A LOT of bad storms around here lately. But… we also had a TORNADO a few miles away from our house that went through the area! We only got some wind damage. The entire top of our Tulip tree got ripped off and flew through the air and landed in the middle of our yard (thankfully not on the fence or the house!). One of our neighbor’s helped us with the clean up, he was so incredibly kind to do so. We are so blessed to have great neighbors around us! It doesn’t seem as big in this photo, but it was A LOT of tree. And now I need to call the tree trimmers to come back again to reshape the tree. I just had them out last fall.

 

 

Nathan got free tickets for good grades and we all went to the ballgame. I LOVE ballpark food!! Can you tell? I just found out that I’ll be going back to the ball game in July, Brian’s boss booked one of the rooms. That should be fun!

 

 

I have the Timehop app and LOVE it. It goes through all of your photos you have saved, social channels, etc. and gives you a recap of what you were doing last year, 2 years ago, 5 years ago… etc. Mine goes back about 12 years? I wish it went back further! Anyhow, this came up the other day… This was significant to me, because we used to go to the Zoo several times a summer with my parents. This was the last time my dad went with us. He’s pretty much housebound these days. Anyway, this was the summer during Covid and we are wearing cloth masks AND the Zoo had all of their statues wrapped in saran wrap with signs not to touch them, because of Covid. I think they saran wrapped them so they could clean them easier without damaging the statues? I’m not sure! Anyway… I am SO glad we are past all this my friends. And I miss hanging out with my dad in public. These were such sweet days… and the teens were little then… well, they were still ‘preteens’ then, but they look like babies here. Covid just sucked and man aging parents sucks even more. That’s all.

 

 

Two – Amazon Swimsuits for our Disney Cruise

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There is nothing I hate more than wearing a swimsuit… I really wanted to go shopping in some stores to find a really nice one for our Disney cruise, but I ran out of time. SOOO, Amazon to the rescue! I actually landed up liking what they sent me and I won’t need to do any returns. First up we have this light blue one (it comes in a lot of others colors too) that I think is my absolute favorite of the bunch. It’s stretchy, helps me to not look flat chested (always a plus), full cheek coverage in the back (another plus) and it is high wasted (a must). I really love the pale blue color, BUT I’m not sure if it is the best color for my complexion. BUT, I’m too lazy to return it and I’ll be wearing it on the cruise! Next, we have this tankini that has a butterfly print on top and black bottoms. I actually have this suit with solid black on top and thin b/w stripes on the bottom and it is SO cute. But, I wanted something fun and frilly for the Disney Cruise and I LOVE butterflies, so this is what I went with. I will probably wear this near the end of the cruise after I’ve indulged in way too many goodies. Ha, ha! I gotta plan ahead, right?!

 

 

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Ok, so next up I bought a black suit top with a peak a boo cut out on the top and separate bottoms. This one is cute too, although I kind of wish I had gotten the top or bottom in a different color to make it a little more interesting. Last, I have this really cute beaded hot pink suit with a cut out coming from Chicwish as part of my collaboration bundle. It is so cute on this model and I’ll be happy if it is just half as cute on me. It has full cheek cover too in the back, which is surprising for Chicwish. Ha!

 

 

Three – Hi, I’m Carrie… And I’m Addicted to Coffee 🙂

I’ve been having fun trying out some new coffee places that have opened up around here. We just got a Scooters by Autumn’s high school and I tried their S’Mores seasonal latte. It was delicious! Then the Nine Mile Food Truck venue opened up a coffee truck! Yes!!! I was the most excited about the bakery items, they had homemade Hostess Cupcakes the day I went there. That is one of my FAVORITE indulgences. It was so good! I got their Caramel Cafe De Olla and their Black Forest Latte. Yum!

 

 

Four – Latest Shows I Finished / Latest Books I’ve Read

I was excited to watch The Tattooist of Auschwitz on Peacock. I read BOTH the books quite some time ago, so the mini series was a little refresh on the books for me. Oh, it was so gruesome and sad. I just can’t imagine living through this time period. Here is a summary of it that I found on Google: Jewish Holocaust survivor Lali Sokolov shares his story of love and resilience, told through fractured and traumatic memories, with novice writer Heather Morris. It starts in 1942, when he volunteers for “work duty” to aid the Slovakian war effort but finds himself sent to the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp. Those not murdered immediately are forced to build the emerging Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp. The smell of death hangs in the air as Lali realizes he’s condemned to work in a kill factory. When he’s offered a job tattooing numbers onto prisoner’s arms, he takes it in the hope of surviving. But unexpected meaning is given to this hell when he meets a beautiful Slovakian woman — prisoner 4562. For Lali it’s love at first sight, and before long “Gita,” as he will come to know her, drives his will to survive. Through perseverance and manipulation of an SS guard, Baretzki, Lali finds Gita again, but the risks he takes to keep them both alive may backfire.

 

 

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Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros – So, I decided to read this book after hearing all of the hype about it and YES it really was good. Kind of reminded me of Twilight, but with dragons instead of vampires. Ha, ha! This book is about how a select few go through a trial and if they survive, dragons may select them individually to become their lifelong bonded rider. It is a really cool concept and the story pulled me in, even though I am not one to typically care about dragons or read books about them. The story focuses on Violet’s journey, her complicated family, her friends she makes along the way… OH and then there is always the childhood friend she always had a crush on growing up AND another more alluring NEW love interest. I listened to this book on audio while doing the family taxi service and it was about 24 hours long. It took awhile to get through the entire book, it is LONG. Oh, when I got to about 6 hours left the book took a turn to some REALLY X-Rated (if you can call it that with it being just audio) stuff between Violet and a love interest. That kind of caught me off guard, but I rolled with it. It went on for a good hour. Ha, ha! So, I decided to read the SECOND book which is 4 hours longer (28 hours with audio) and I’ve heard a lot of mixed reviews about it. But, I’m 4 hours in and I’m really enjoying it so far… we’ll see if I’ll want to read the third book that comes out in January 2025. One other note… the lady that does the audio for this book is AMAZING. Wow. I read online that some people found her to be a bit much/annoying, but I found it much more interesting to listen to with how she pulled it all off. Have you read Fourth Wing? What were your thoughts?

 

 

Five – Latest Purchases

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I just finished The Bible Recap in April, which took me through the entire Bible. I took a little break after that while we had our Scottsdale trip, graduation and getting used to the summer break schedule. I’m now ready to start my next project, which is this Prayer Journal for Women. I’m so excited to get started and so many of YOU have told me that you’ve done this journal and have loved it.

 

 

The kittens are still LOVING their KitNipBox, which is a monthly cat subscription box. You can order it with the food/treats or with just toys. This month the box has a Mexican theme, which is fun! If you’re interested in trying one out for your cat, I’d love for you to use my referral link HERE, it’ll help Oliver and Aurora earn a free box! Yay! You can also get 3 extra toys in your box with the code SUMMER. Annnd, did you know that Oliver is turning 1 next month on July 9th? His momma is already planning some special things for him! He’s SO spoiled! Ha!

 

I hope everyone has a nice and relaxing weekend!

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