On July 28th, Locke and I bought our first home together! Here are pictures of closing and of the moving truck in front of our new house!

Pictures of the inside of the house will be posted as we get things unpacked, organized, and decorated!

Proud Aunt

Is Tessa not the most adorable baby?! I love my Tessa time :)

One year down...

and hopefully many more to come! :) This past Sunday, July 11, was our 1 year anniversary. We have had an incredible year! We celebrated our anniversary at a little cabin called Rustic Hideaway at Covemountain Resorts. It was so much fun! We cooked our meals, played pool, and relaxed in our cabin's personal hot tub! We also visited Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge, and went for a short hike in the Smokies. Below are some pictures from the trip.

I am blessed to be married to such a loving and supportive husband!

What's for dinner?

This summer I have decided to teach myself to cook. As a beginner cook, I am starting with simple recipes I find on allrecipes.com, which is a GREAT site for finding recipes. You can search for recipes by ingredient, read reviews, find nutritional info, save and file recipes in an online recipe box and/or print recipes. I used this website to find a recipe teaching me to cook roasted new potatoes and Parmesan roasted asparagus. I also made spinach stuffed chicken breasts (Locke really enjoyed this dish) and tonight, Alfredo Lasagna (with chicken and spinach...the spinach and chicken combo in two dishes was purely coincidental). And I haven't only made dishes from recipes... Last night we hadn't gone to the grocery store in a while so we didn't have much to work with; however, we did have several types of beans and some corn bread mix. So I looked up spices that can go in bean soup and used what I had to make a fairly delicious concoction. I also spiced up the corn bread to make what I call "Sweet corn bread" by adding brown sugar and cinnamon.
With the extra time I have this summer, I have enjoyed learning to cook and even experimenting with flavors and ingredients. And Locke has seemed to enjoy it too! :)

Our New House!!

This is our new house!!!

Well...it's not technically ours yet. We made an offer, they countered, and we accepted. Now we're in the process of having it inspected and negotiating repairs, then we'll get it appraised and make sure everything works out with that and then close at the end of July! I am so excited! I feel so grown-up :)

ZUMBA!

Zumba is my new favorite way to exercise! Zumba is a "Latin infused cardio dance" says the YMCA. It is so much fun you don't even realize you are sweating buckets!! What a fun workout. And I can't dance but I still have a great time! I recommend it to everyone!! I go to Zumba classes at the Y whenever I get the chance... I would go everyday if I could!

Churchill Downs

Yesterday I spent the day with my girls at the horse races in Kentucky for Rachael's bachelorette party! We had a wonderful time watching and betting on the races from an indoor box... thanks to Rebecca and her firm! We had a blast and especially enjoyed the great excuse to dress up and wear big hats :)