June 2012 - 101 in 1001 Update

This update comes a little before the end of June BUT we won't complete any other goals before the end of the month. 


Our Goals

1. Add a member to our family :)

2. Pay off all student loans. (our deadline: 12/31/13)

3. Visit NYC.

4. Take a long road trip. 

5. Sell something on Etsy  

6. Have Dad's Crawfish in Louisiana.  

7. Take a trip to Louisiana at least once a year. (1/3)

8. Host a holiday in our home.

9. Go camping.

10. Build a real fire.   

11. Rent or buy a house. (Goal: 10/12) 

12. Decorate the outside of a house for Christmas.

13. Stay at or Visit the Biltmore. 

14. Serve in a soup kitchen.

15. Grow our own tomatoes.

16. ******* ;)

17. Give an item away each time we buy something new (clothing, housewares, etc).  

18. Go on dates at least every other week.  (I am keeping this on here because life can change over the next 2.5 years, however, we go on dates usually once a week)

19. Complete a blog series together. (DONE June 2012)

20. For one month, don't buy anything extra. (completed June 2012)

21. Contact our family members at least once a week.

22. Go to a shooting range. 

23. Go sailing.

24. Get involved in a community service group.

25. Go on a mission trip.

26. Read at least one book a month for a year. (6/12)

27. Start a small business. 

29. Buy a new Christmas ornament each year. (0/3)

30. Get a massage.  (Done-Couple's Massage 6/9/12)

31. Send a card to a friend or family member just for fun.

32. Begin a photography business (big or small).  

33. Eat at a local/non-chain restaurant every time we travel. (we do this consistently because it's so fun!)

34. Visit a new place once a year. (So far this year, Charlotte, Asheville, Columbia, Chimney Rock)

35. Ride in a hot air balloon. 

36. Attend at least one festival a year in the state where we live. (1/3)

37. Stay at a B&B.

38. Floss more- at least once a week. (WE HATE FLOSSING) 

39. Give a 100% tip. 

40. Go see a musical.

41. Eat a new type of foods (Korean, African, etc)

42. Repurpose a piece of furniture. (done June 3, 2012)

43. Watch a sunrise and photograph it.

44. Explore secret paths.

45. Do something nice for someone anonymously. 

46. Pick fruit at an orchard. 

47. Get a library card. 

48. Go to a garage sale together.

49. Celebrate our Golden Birthdays in style! (1/2)

50. Make homemade ice cream. 

51. Learn a new hobby together. (we are talking about becoming fishermen :))

Leslie's Goals

52. Lose my desired amount of weight.

53. Continue to utilize this blog to document our lives especially once we start having children.

54. Get a Skype account and use it. 

55. Paint something worth looking at (not just a wall) :)

56. Add at least one cross to my cross collection. 

57. Learn to make the best sweet tea my husband has ever tasted. 

58. Make homemade marshmallows.  

59. Sell/Give away at least one cake or cupcakes that I've decorated for a party/gathering/birthday/etc.

60. Plan a scavenger hunt for Matt. 

61. Bake and decorate each of Matt's birthday cakes. (1/3)

62. Rake someone's leaves.

63. Meet up with at least one other blogger whose blog I read.

64. Complete a blog series or post about our wedding, including the planning. Just for my own sake :) (DONE on 6/12/12)

65. Continue mailing out birthday and anniversary cards to our friends and family. (I have continued to do well with this; if I am able to continue for the next several months, I'll consider marking this one off) 

66. Invite someone to stay with us for a weekend or longer at least once a year. (1/3)

67. Complete a vlog.

68. Go fishing.

69. Make a point to call my closest friends as often as possible, not just texting.

70. Take a continuing education class related to Autism or other childhood disorders-even though I don't currently work with children.

71. Find a yummy Low Country Boil recipe and cook it. (done 6/4/12)

72. Take at least one picture of Matt and I every time we travel.

73. When we take a long trip (5+ hours one way), drive so that Matt doesn't have to.

74. Take a trip to visit a few special friends (we know who they are).

75. Take a cake decorating class.

76. Read a book, write a blog post about it, and link up with a book club blog. (done 6/12/12)

Matt's Goals

77. Run a 5k. (Officially registered for the Color Run-Charlotte on 11/17/12)

78. Take a photography class. 

79. Take Leslie to an air show. 

80. Make a picture frame out of an old or hand-made window frame.

81. Go to a college football game.

82. Get a dog.

83. Get a new camera lens. (we are in the process of saving for this. Our goal is 9/13/12)

84. Make my wife cry in a good/romantic/sweet/you get the idea way.

85. Give Leslie a love letter at least once a month for a year. (Doing well on this 6 down, 6 to go)

86. Visit Chimney Rock, N.C. 

87. Wear a suit, and look good doing it. ;)

88. Visit a new, to me, zoo. 

89. Watch the Flyers destroy the Hurricanes in Charlotte (hopefully with Leslie).

90. Fix something for someone.

91. Cook something new and exciting.(DONE 6/8/12; homemade poptarts!) These were amazing! 

92. Swim in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

93. Make something from scratch. (DONE 6/8/12; fresh baked artisan bread!) 

94. Do something with Granddad. 

95. Journal more often.

96. Learn all the words to or learn how to play one of Leslie's "high school days" favorite rap songs.

97. Teach something to someone.

98. Ride a horse.

99. Surprise Leslie with surprises. (doing good so far) 

100. Spend an entire day, literally the entire day, in bed. Hopefully not while sick. 

101. Figure out how we will finish all 101 things on this list. 

Ours: 13/51
Leslie: 8/25
Matt: 8/25
Total:29/101


Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans? 

Commenting Challenge Day 2

Today is day 2 of the commenting challenge. Yesterday was fun so I thought I'd do it again. 

Our blog is just about our lives. It's a way for us to keep a record of what is going on in our lives. Our first post was written on our honeymoon and it has chronicled parts of our lives since then. It's very fun for me to write about our journeys and adventures and I hope to use it one day to journal the lives of our children. It is also a way to keep family and friends updated. 

Our blog has a little bit of everything from recipes to crafts to day-to-day life stuff. I'm also spending a lot of time this year blogging about our "101 things to do in 1001 days" list. You can read further back in our entries to learn more about that. I love to use our blog to share things about our marriage. We knew when we got married that God wanted us to share our lives with other people and model a Godly marriage for others. This blog is a small portion of that! 

Hope you enjoy reading!

Til then-

Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?

Blog Commenting Challenge

 Linking up with Jenna's Journey for a fun Blog Commenting Challenge. Today's topic is all "About Me!"

My name is Leslie. I live in Spartanburg, SC with my husband, Matthew. We moved here from Montgomery, Alabama on November 21st, 2011. I am originally from south Louisiana but have also lived in north Louisiana and Birmingham, Alabama as well. Matt is an Air Force Brat originally from New Jersey moved to Illinois and then Montgomery, Alabama.

We LOVE our little city.

We have been married for 18 months, since January 1, 2011. We both work outside of the home. I am a Speech Language Pathologist and Matthew is a new photographer who also works at home depot. We don't have any children yet, although we look forward to filling our home one day!  One pet, a fish named Splenden. As soon as we rent or buy a house, we will have a puppy dog.

We love to sell craft items on Etsy and my husband just started a photography business. The links are below

Etsy
Matt's photography


Welcome to our blog :)

Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?

Knoxville

Have a busy week coming up so I won't have much time to blog. We are both working a good bit and then we head to Knoxville, TN on Friday for a few days to see The Moody Family and for Matt to take pictures of sweet Lela!

Can't wait!

Til then-
Did YOU Hear About the Morgans?

The Morgans...Part 3

Part 3 of this series which we are calling "The Future". We mentioned in our last series post that enjoy talking about our future. Obviously, we have no idea what the future holds but we like to talk about the plans we have for one day in the future, nonetheless.

Work Less
                 Matt and I both enjoy working. I love being a speech language pathologist and Matt is enjoying starting his photography business as well as working at Home Depot at this time. However, we would love to be in a place financially and just overall in our lives where we work less. We would love for Matt to be able to do his photography, for me to work PRN as an SLP and for us to support ourselves in other ways as well including making and selling crafts. It's a dream for sure.

Home School
                     We have gone back and forth about this for a while and we know that we may change our minds again before we get to this point BUT as of right now, we plan to home school our children. Matt was home schooled and there were things he liked about it and things he didn't. Our goal is to teach our children as much as we are able and then be a part of a co-op so that they can also be taught things that we can't teach them as well. The only way that we will ever do this is if we are able to have our children involved in children's ministry, youth ministry, play groups, co-op etc so they are involved with their peers. We never want for our children to be isolated from their peers.

Travel
          We want to be able to travel more. We don't necessarily want to take huge, expensive trips but we would love to camp inexpensively, take our children and ourselves on mission trips across the nation and even the world. We love the thought of an across country RV trip to visit family and see the USA. Lovely lovely idea.

Budget Well
                     Matt and I love our budget. We love knowing that we have a great amount of control over our finances because we prepare ahead of time. We hope and pray that we are able to continue this for all of our lives. There is so much freedom in that!

Discover New Things
                                   Between the two of us, Matt is the more adventurous one. Because of that, he encourages me to be adventurous. With that in mind, we want to be adventurous with our children too. We want to always explore new things--cooking new foods, making new things, hiking, camping, etc. etc. etc.

Teach our Children to cook
                                               Matt and I love to cook and we want to pass that down to our children and grandchildren in the future. My grandmother was a great cook but I didn't learn much from her because I just ate the food :). Matt kind of had the same experience. We think that cooking with your children can be a great teaching experience. We can't wait for that!

Buy/Rent a home
                           We know that we are a long way from buying a house but we hope to be able to do this one day. In the mean time, we want to find a great home to rent for an extended period of time. We have enjoyed apartment life but we are ready for a free standing structure to reside in :)

Grow our own Garden--Be more self Sufficient
                                                                           Matt has talked about having a garden since before we were married. He is so good growing pretty much anything and he can't wait to have space to be able to do as he wishes. He wants a big garden that will allow for a large amount of fresh produce so that we can be more self sufficient.

Finish our 101 in 1001 list
                                         This is a short term future goal. We have so enjoyed completing goals on our list. Over 20 completed so far and each have been fun. By end of September 2014, we hope we have done all 101 :)


Foster/Adopt
                     Of course, Matt and I want to have children of our own but we hope one day in the future to be foster parents and possibly eventually adopt children that are in the foster system.


So there you have it. Just a brief look into our thoughts about the future.

Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?

Sunday Social, Week 2

Linking up for week 2 of Sunday Social

Favorite movie of all time?

My favorite movie of all time is a toss up between Dirty Dancing, Steel Magnolias and Pretty Woman. I have loved each of those movies for years but I guess if I had to pick one to watch forever, I'd pick Pretty Woman

Favorite movie quote?

I love to watch movies but honestly, I don't remember specific lines from Many of them. I'm going to go with "It's so fluffy I'm gonna die" from Despicable Me. Also, a special movie because Matt and I saw it on the day we got engaged.

Best movie to watch for a girls night in?

Hmm, I pick How to lose a Guy in 10 days

Best breakup movie?

I have no idea...

Favorite celeb eye candy?

I don't really look at celebs very much. Before I was married, I liked Channing Tatum. Now, I just like to look at my hubs :)

Which movie star's closet would you want to raid?

Again, I'm not really starstruck so I guess someone who wears my size :)

Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?

Show Us your Bedroom

I linked up with Kelly's Korner two weeks ago for "Show us Your Living room". Last week it was kitchens and our kitchen in our apartment is SOOO small so I skipped that week. This week it's a tour of bedrooms. This is our bedroom. Our apartment has two bedrooms but our spare bedroom is being used as our craft room right now too and it's nothing special. Maybe I'll show it one day :) Enjoy the tour of our small yet great space! 

Entrance to our room from the living  room

This is our bed. The quilt on our bed is a t-shirt quilt that our dear friend, Keva, made for us. We normally have a brown comforter on the bed but for the summer this quilt is perfect plus, it's special! The picture above our bed was painted by another great friend, Mandy. 

Our sink is in our bedroom. So cool...NOT! The messages on the mirror are love notes we write to each other. 

This scripture is our Morgan Family life verse. Mandy painted it too. We both love it. It's on the wall opposite of the window. 

An up-close of the painting above our bed. 

Our dresser, mirror and our TV with our current guilty pleasure playing :). The dresser is at the foot of the bed. 

Our closet. Small but functional for us. This door is right next to our dresser. 

This is "our" wall. Pictures of us, bridal, engagement, and wedding. Wedding license too. 

We love our room and hope you do too!

Til then-

Did YOU Hear about the Morgans? 

A Wedding-related post....One of my goals :)

As one of my goals on our 101 in 1001 list, I wanted to write a post or a series of posts related to our wedding including all details that I felt were relevant etc. Since Matt and I have been working on our blog series together and I've seen how much time it seems to take, I decided one post about the wedding etc would probably be best. Also, I likely won't post many, if any, pictures because they are on a post from last year. This may get wordy.  Here goes...

We were engaged on July 10th and we knew that we did want to be engaged longer than 6 months. Our original plan was to get married on October 31st (I think) because it was a free weekend from football (not that that is a huge factor) and it was close. This got vetoed for reasons that I don't care to discuss anymore but we then decided that it really didn't matter what date we picked whether it was 4 months or 4 years from our engagement date, that it would always be a conflict for someone. That being said, we decided to get married on 1/1/11 at 1:11. We were so glad to have the date chosen and could not be happier that we chose that date.

Of course at this point I went into planning mode. I did not plan to go crazy planning a wedding because we knew our budget was tight, we didn't want anything extravagant, we just wanted to be married AND it wasn't about the wedding at all. It was about the marriage. BOOM!

Side note: To everyone who feels like they have a terrible marriage and thinks that marriage can NEVER be good. I'm so sorry. Please don't project that onto all happily married people. KThanks. 


We chose our date 1st. Then we decided to get married in Louisiana because it was just the most practical. We then decided on details...flowers, dress, church, catering, groomsmen, bridesmaids, cake, photographer, favors, gifts, invitations, etc.

Flowers...We chose artificial because it was more cost efficient for us and Matt's aunt is a florist so she got us some great and simple flowers for a great cost for us.

Dress...Mom, Mandy and I went to shop for a dress and I found the perfect one after trying on 3. It was a little more than I wanted to spend but after talking to my maid of honor about my dress etc. She decided she would make our wedding gift from she and her husband, my dress. It was a great blessing. I went the next day and got the dress. Didn't even have to be altered. I got the perfect purple shoes to match and I was pumped! Also, another dear friend made my veil and gave it to me as a gift. Another blessing.

Church...We decided to get married at Mom's home church, House on the Rock. It's a great setting with an attached fellowship hall that we knew would be a perfect size for us. Since we picked an afternoon wedding on a major holiday, we knew the crowd would be smaller.

Catering...We chose a local lady, Ginger Tastet, to cater our wedding. She does a lot of events in Amite and she did great. We went with a mainly dessert reception including an ice cream bar. It was simple and fit within our budget and we liked it.

Groomsmen...Matt knew from the day we get engaged (probably before). Just who his fellas would be...Ben, his brother, Chad and Jeff, his buddies and Drew, his friend and mentor

Bridesmaids...Again, I've known for years who would be in our wedding. Jill, Brittany, Rebekah and Rachel...The BFF's  Neither of us could have chosen better

Cake...We went with a simple sheet groomscake shaped like an open Bible with Matt's life verse on it and we did our cake as cupcakes. We loved them.

Photographer...We originally chose a photographer named Jody Herring because she photographed a friend's wedding and we liked their pictures. However, after shooting our engagement photos she discovered that she had a prior engagement and we were back to square one. We chose Mary Degruy because we loved her simplicity, her price and her photography packages. We LOVED her and are so glad we chose her. We loved our pictures.

Favors...We went with a candy bar and CD's with our favorite songs. We were glad to have the candy bar but the CD's weren't marked (our fault) and there were many left. Oh well. Along with the candy in baskets, we decorated the table with self portraits of us that we took all throughout our courtship. It was a piece of us.

Gifts for people involved in the wedding...We gave some people personalized Tervis Tumbler cups. The bridesmaids received personalized canvas that I had made for them. Some received gift cards that suited them. Others received mugs with the "ingredients" for the perfect cup of tea. There were also some fun items thrown in with most of the gifts just because that is SO us.

Invitations...We ordered these from The Prints Well Store where one of our dear friends works. They were simple but we liked them a lot.


As it always goes with posts like this, I'm sure I'm leaving something out but those were the main details of the wedding. The planning was fun for us most of the time and very little stress was involved. I know that the wedding wasn't extravagant and at times, I wish more people had been in attendance, etc. BUT at the end of the day, we were married and we have lived happily ever after.

Also, parents helped a tremendous amount with the financial aspect of it!

Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?

The Whipping Boy

Matt and I decided a few weeks ago that we were going to read through all of the Newberry Award winning books since our birth years. We started with 1984. We have so enjoyed it so far. We skipped one because it was a thicker, fantasy-style book but we will come back to it later. 

So far we have read: Dear Mr. Henshaw, Sarah, Plain and Tall, The Whipping Boy and Joyful Noise: A poem of two voices. 

We are currently reading: Lincoln: A Photo biography, Number the Stars and Maniac Magee

They are such fun books to read and we just like laughing during most of them. 

I thought I would talk about The Whipping Boy and try to find a blog to link to for a book club post. Just for fun! (it's also one of my goals.)

Synopsis: (I had to use Wikipedia's explanation as a Guide because I'm just not great at summarizing!)

Prince Horace AKA Prince Brat is spoiled and always searching for attention. He is always being
mischievous but because is a royal, no one can punish him. In comes the whipping boy. Everytime Prince is in trouble, the whipping boy, Jemmy, is summoned to receive the Prince's punishment. Jemmy is an orphan whose father was a rat catcher. He lives in the castle and despite his circumstances, he has learned to read and write etc. The Prince decides to flee the castle and forces Jemmy to go with him. Along the way, they are captured by two no good fellas, Hold-your-nose-Billy and Cutwater. These fellas want a ransom since they realize who they are dealing with. Jemmy tries to convince them that he is the prince so that they can both escape but Prince Brat is offended and just doesn't get it. Finally, they escape and go through a series of events including meeting a girl with a dancing bear and a wagon driver. Back come the fellas and because they are confused about who is who, Horace gets beaten. 

Lots happens in between but the prince does overhear several people talking about how terrible it will be when he is king. The prince is hurt. Meanwhile, they learn that the king has posted ransom for Jemmy. The boys have another run-in with the fellas. They finally lure them into the scary sewer where rats attack them. 

The prince decides to go home. The prince explains everything to the King. Jemmy is forgiven and the story ends with both boys being able to live in the castle. Best Friends. 

LOVE the story. It's just a great story about how things can change in an instant. Great read for kids! 

Til then-

Did YOU Hear about the Morgans? 

The Morgans...Part 2

As part 2 of this series (which was started a while back), we are sharing some of the things we like to do for fun!

Matt and I love to have fun BUT we are also on a pretty tight budget right now as we finish paying off student loans and save as much as we can for future endeavors. We still make time to have fun and budget for that as well. Here is a quick list of the things we enjoy doing for fun!


-Watch TV shows
     We don't have cable but we love to watch TV series on Hulu or check series out from the Library

-Work on our 101 in 1001 list
     We started our list in January and we have already crossed off over 20 goals! It's so much fun!

-Go to the library
     We recently got library cards and have enjoyed reading new books and watching new DVDs. We decided to read all of the Newberry Award winning books since we were born. That has been fun. We have an AWESOME library too.

-Go out to dinner
     We try to go out to dinner twice a month just for fun. We love to cook but going out is fun too!

-Cook together
     We love to cook together. We generally do this 1-2 times a week at least and we have made some YUMMY foods too!

-Work on crafts together
      In an effort to make and save extra money and also have fun, we have started doing some crafts together. We have made several wedding gifts, Christmas gifts and things to sell. More to come!

-Travel together
     We like to travel together. We have taken some fun trips together. We try to do trips on a budget so we can take them more often!

-Play games together
     We recently started playing board games together. We have been playing a new game called, Zooloretto. It's a fun game but mostly it is fun to sit down and talk while we play.

-Rub each other's feet (mostly Matt rubbing mine)
     Matt mentioned this one and I had to laugh out loud because I hardly ever rub his feet but I always let him rub mine :)

-Find new hobbies to do
     This has been a fun thing to do. Crafting, refinishing furniture, cooking, working on our list etc. Coming up with new hobbies to do together is such a blast and keeps marriage fresh!

-Dream about the future
     We LOVE to sit together and dream about the future. It's possibly the most fun thing we do together.

What do you do for fun?

Til then-
Did YOU Hear about the Morgans?