A new dining room table and the story of the cat

Nate and I had a great Fourth of July weekend! On Thursday we enjoyed the first annual EMUN cook off. There was so much food to choose from and it was all so good. It was so great seeing everyone because we don't all get together as often as we would like to. After dinner, the ladies of EMUN sat around talking about childbirth, marriage, and menopause (no joke)...it was hilarious. We had a great night with everyone.

On Friday, we grilled out at granny's. We all ate with her and then headed out to the pool for a relaxing afternoon with the family. I really enjoyed just sitting and reading by the pool for the afternoon. Especially because a friend of mine (one of the EMUN wives) gave me a great new book titled, "Created to Be His Help Meet." The woman that gave it to me said that it completely changed the way she viewed marriage and has helped her to grow so much as a wife and mother. After reading 5 chapters, I understood how reading a book based on the biblical commands for a wife could change how we view marriage. I will have to tell you all more about it as I continue to read, but I am really enjoying it thus far. It talks a lot about finding fulfillment in serving your husband and family...ultimately, being his helper for life and allowing him to lead you by taking the role of his helper. I think this is the greatest way to view marriage and it feels very natural for me. More to come on that...

Friday night we had friends over to play poker. The best part was that there was no money involved so we could just enjoy playing. We played for hours. No one wanted to stop playing, we were just having such a great time. It was a wonderful way to spend our 4th of July night!

On Saturday, we finished registering! One more thing off of our to-do list! Nate and I still can't get over how expensive everything is. We are hoping that our informed buyers will feel free to look at what we have registered for and find it at a better price! Plus, we went furniture shopping. Nate and I have been looking for a nice formal dining room table and we saw this one a couple weeks ago, but we needed more time to look around and decide if it was the one. So, we looked at several other stores and then decided to purchase this one. We are super excited to have a table that holds 10! While a lot of people do not use their formal dining rooms, we really enjoy having people over for dinner and it is not uncommon for us to have at least 8. So, we will actually have room for everyone now, which is fabulous.

As for the cat...oh my lands. This cat decided to make our covered porch it's home about 1 week after we closed on our house. We didn't feed it for one month because we thought that the cat would eventually go away, but it did not get discouraged and run to the neighbors. Instead, it started to stay for longer periods of time and meowed louder! So, about a month ago someone convinced us to feed the cat at least until we found a new home for it.

We have sent emails out to our church family asking for someone to take the cat in, but no one seems to want our persistent pet. So, to make a long story short, we continue to claim that Jinxsy (Brent just had to name her...ha ha ha) is not ours, but we are currently feeding and medicating her. I must commend Jinxsy for her persistence, but my allergies (and honestly our not wanting to have any pets) will not allow us to keep this friendly pet. If you know anyone who would like a good outdoor cat, please let me know. We would love to bring her to your porch :)!

Hope you all have a great week! I will be MIA for most of the week because I am trying to complete a large paper. The good news is that I only have 2 more weeks until summer classes are over and we go to the beach for our second annual family beach trip with the Walker clan. I can't wait!

I must end this post by saying that I can't stop thinking about how blessed I am. I have been truly blessed in the past couple of years and I am reminded of this so often. I am so thankful for everyone in my life and everything I have. Sometimes it is so easy for us to think about the things that we don't have, but it is so much better to focus on the things that we do have because when we do, it is truly amazing!