Meeting Mike the Tiger

Casey and I drove through Baton Rouge this weekend so we decided to stop off at the LSU campus. I'd never been before! We walked around and saw Mike the Tiger. He was enjoying a lazy Saturday. Unfortunately, I made the not-so-smart decision to keep my wedges on instead of swapping for sandals... my feet were killing me! Next time I'm wearing flats so we can see more of the beautiful campus!

Taking Care of My Temple (aka Self Care)

Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17

In the last few months, I've been realizing I need to take better care of myself. Self care has been a thing all over the internet lately, but sometimes I find it hard to make a point to care for myself. But my mindset changes when I realize that taking care of myself is taking care of God's temple, and I want a beautiful temple for Him to live in. Not just physically beautiful, but I believe that temple care/self care also includes the mental, emotional, and spiritual state.

I read this verse this morning and I began thinking about how I already take care of my temple and what changes I can make in the future to take even better care of my temple. I truly believe that in order to accomplish any goal, we must take baby steps, or "small wins" as my mentor likes to say. It's a lot easier to accomplish one big goal when we break it up into a lot of little ones. Plus it gives us a reason to celebrate every milestone instead of feeling like we're so far away from the big goal.

I'm working on a post about a few things I currently do to take care of my temple (aka self care), but here are some other things that will be on my baby steps list.

• Switch to clean/natural body products. I'm in the process of making this switch, but I know it will take a while. My goal is to replace my current products with clean products as I run out. I've been doing some research on clean products, and one problem is that they are more expensive! However, I know it is worth it in the long run! I will still be shopping for good prices though because I'm so frugal!
• Eat cleaner. I used to do a really good job at eating clean, but then my life turned upside down and that was not a thing I prioritized anymore. However, when I reflect, I realize that while I may have been eating healthier, my head was not in good health. I began to think I was better than everyone else who didn't eat as healthy as I did, and that is not good mental health! I'd like to eventually begin to eat cleaner again, but I want to make sure my brain "eats clean" as well.
• Spend more time in the Word. It's amazing how reading the Word of God makes my brain feel "cleaner"! This helps take care of both my spiritual and mental health! I'd love to get back to "Meditation Mondays" and sharing what I've been reading lately or reflecting on sermons I've heard.
• Drink more water. When I got my first office job out of college, I started drinking more water because refilling my water bottle gave me a reason to get up from my desk. I noticed that the frequent headaches I used to have went away! Turns out, I was dehydrated and didn't know it! I'd say I do a pretty good job at drinking water, but I think I can do even better!
• Exercise. A few months ago I stared doing yoga videos on YouTube. I've really enjoyed it! I'm not a person who enjoys most forms of exercise, but yoga is something I can do and enjoy. I also love taking walks with Casey and Oxford. I'd love to eventually incorporate more exercise as my body becomes stronger. 
• Pamper! This kind of goes along with the first one, but I want to make it a habit to enjoy taking care of myself! Maybe this means painting my nails, enjoying long baths, doing face and hair masks, etc. I want to slow down and enjoy taking care of my temple.
• Get off the phone. I'm so bad about being on my phone on Instagram or Facebook! I don't think this constant social media is good for me, but it's so hard to take a break! So I'd like to start purposefully taking time off from social media.

I definitely have lots of things I can work on! Thankfully I know I don't have to do them all at once—it would be almost impossible! I want to make sure the changes in my life are sustainable, so I will work on incorporating them slowly. How about you join me? What is one thing you can start doing to better care for your temple?

A Taste of Hammond: Blackend Brew

Casey and I love eating at local restaurants, and we're totally blessed because there are SO MANY good ones! It makes it hard to choose where to eat because they're all so yummy! So I figured I could share some of our local restaurants on the blog!

The other day was my first trip to Blackened Brew. They're known for their burgers and beer (we don't drink, though, so we just went for burgers). Normally I just prefer a plain cheeseburger, and that's what I was planning to get, until I saw the Coffee Rub Cheese Burger. It had a burger rubbed with freshly ground coffee, pecan smoked bacon, smoked Gouda, and BBQ sauce. Oh my word, it was so flavorful and delicious!

Casey went with the "You're Bacon Me Jelly" burger. It's made with freshly ground peanut butter from the local Berrytown Produce and blackberry jam. It also has cheddar cheese and pecan smoked bacon! (Fun fact, my besties' last names are Smoak, so I keep typing "smoaked" instead of "smoked.") I stole a bite (he knows that I'm always going to ask for a bite!) and was happily surprised that I liked it! I wasn't sure how PB&J on a burger would be, but it wasn't too much. Just enough to give it a unique flavor!

I also got the parmesan truffle fries. Normally I'm not a huge fan of flavored fries, but I like to at least give them a try. But these were SO GOOD. I didn't even bother to try one of Casey's normal fries because I loved mine so much.

We've decided that this one of those places where we'd love to take people who are visiting Hammond. I know we will be back when we're craving a delicious burger!

A Little Bit of Home

I've been wanting to pick up my camera more often so yesterday I snapped a few photos around the house. I love our house! We're renting a cute old house not far from downtown, which we love! The house has the original hardwood floors, and I'm pretty sure these doors are original too. There's so much character, and we're loving adding our personal style as well.

I almost didn't take this photo because the front was so nasty, but I figured I'd love to look back on our old door one day. This afternoon I finally took a rag to the door and frames and accidentally washed off some of the paint! Oops! 

The colors of the house are... interesting. Not what I would have chosen, but the lady we're renting from loves them. I do love our cute mat though! Unfortunately, the front porch is inside our gate, so it's not used. (Well, except for by the cat, since his food bowls are there.)

Casey and I are loving incorporating more green into our home and bringing in plants! We're accumulating succulents and also snagged a Majestic Palm for $8! It was in poor condition, so we got it for a steal. We accidentally overwatered it, but are trying to learn how to take proper care of it! I'll have to get a photo of it soon. (You can see it in the background of this photo.)

The yellow bathroom. Y'all, this bathroom. That yellow tile (though I love the hexagon shape). The yellow tub. And sink. And counter. But I'm truly learning to love it. The white curtain and rug from Target help break up the yellow at least a little bit. Also, I took some tips from The Home Edit and completely reorganized our bathroom cabinet using some adorable bins and boxes I scored at TJ Maxx and Target! I thought I'd really hate the bathroom when we moved in (Casey actually thought I'd give the house a "no" because of it), but it's not as bad as I thought it would be! 

Last, but certainly not least, is our coffee station! For some reason I've always wanted to have a coffee station, and I was thrilled to inherit the family Singer sewing machine which was the perfect coffee cart! One day I'd love to have my coffee mug collection displayed on the wall behind it (see my inspiration), but in the meantime my DIY scroll looks cute! I used this tutorial.

That's it for now! Hope you have a great weekend!

A New Chapter

Every time I get on here I'm like, wow! Life has changed so much! And it has! (Probably because I so rarely blog!) Obviously the biggest thing is that Casey and I are married! People ask me a lot how married life is and I tell them it feels right. I can't believe we've only been married a little over a month. It feels like we've been married for longer, and I think that's just because it feels so natural! This is how life is supposed to be!

The second thing is that I'm living in South Louisiana! (Which I mentioned in my last post.) When we started dating, I knew if we got married that I'd be the one moving. Not because we talked about it, but because I'd felt for a while that I'd eventually find myself living further south. And here I am! Though it was tough to leave home and my family and my church, I really love it here.

We live in Hammond, just a walk away from cute downtown. We love walking downtown to the many delicious restaurants! On Saturday mornings, we walk to breakfast (a lot of places have outdoor seating so Oxford comes with us!) then head to the farmers market for a few goodies. This area is known for strawberries and strawberries are my favorite, so I often get those!

Here are a few photos that I've taken on some of our walks!