Miscellany Monday

Can I just be honest here?
When we moved into this apartment, I was secretly hoping we'd only be here for a year.
I didn't hang a whole lot on my walls. 
In fact, there are a couple of shelves that have yet to be hung because of that very reason.
However, we signed another year-long lease last month.


Lately, I've been feeling a bit convicted...in several areas of my life.

1.  Last year, I wrote a final post on my P31 Woman Bible Study I had been doing.
One of the things that I had learned was that housekeeping was important to her.
I'm not a very good housekeeper.
Oh, I am when we are expecting company...
I will clean and clean until our home is perfect.
If there is anything out of place, I'll just put it in our office and explain to our guests that it is our "junk room."

But I don't want to have a "junk room."  
I want everything to have a place and for things to be nice and tidy.
Being that we're in an apartment, that's somewhat difficult with the limited closet/storage space.
So I'm not on a mission to clean up our home, organize it, and to make it feel homey.

Just today I went out shopping.
I bought new drip pans for the stove, a new shower curtain {the one we've had has been through a move, 3 months of storage, and a year and a half being used...can we say, "ick!"}, a couple of new pillows, and a rug for just outside our door.
I hope to clean up and organize our office as well as my craft space {which doubles as our dining room} in the coming weeks.

I did start with the kitchen, though.  It looks pretty good, if I do say so myself.

I'll let you know the progress and unique things I can find to help develop this space into something pleasant and welcoming.
I see the P31 woman having a home that is organized just right so that when company comes at any time, she is prepared.

2.  I have also been feeling a bit lazy lately.
Not only with how things are going around our home, but in the physical part of life, too.
I need to get up off the couch and go do something active {hopefully this rain will disappear for a bit}.
So this weekend, I made a meal plan and grocery list for every. single. meal. this week.

Usually I only plan our suppers, but since I work full-time, I want to know exactly what I need to put in my lunch box.  
It's better for my sanity that way. :)

We now have a fridge full of healthy foods!!
Oh, and those are my last diet cokes for awhile...and no fear, they're made with Splenda. :)

Tonight, I hope to hit up a walk or some elliptical time...

3.  I've also been struggling with my quiet time lately.
I know that it's not what it could be, so I hope to remedy that.
When I first started this blog, I knew that the Proverbs 31 woman was who I wanted to strive to model my life of being a wife after.
She has so much to offer, and I have so much to learn from her.
I want to memorize her verses from the Bible.
I've posted them here if you'd like to read them.

4.  And for a little bit of light-heartedness, I've posted some new jars in the shop!
Take a look here!

5.  Also, if you've been following my shop's instagram feed (@asimplekindoflove), you'll know that I'm looking to highlight some small businesses!  
If you're interested in guest posting here about your shop {for free} send me an email at asimplekindoflove {at} gmail {dot} com.
I would love to feature you! :)

Disney World, Part Three {Photo Dump}

Missed a part?  Catch up here:

Part One

Part Two

On Sunday and Monday, we played "catch up."

I was thankful to have some extra days to go back and do everything that we didn't get to do, or do things again that we really loved.

Sunday morning we got up and went to Downtown Disney.

I've only been there one other time, and I didn't really remember any of it.

If you've never been there, it's basically a place to go shopping.

We headed back towards our hotel to grab a bite to eat and then made our way back to Hollywood Studios.

They had a stunt show that Tyler wanted to see, which was actually pretty cool.

Right at the time we grabbed our seats, it started pouring. 

I was thankful we had a roof over us and that I brought my umbrella.

After the show was over, we sat there a bit longer until they kicked us out.

We didn't want to be soaked early in the day.

We did the Backlot Tour {where they show you some "behind the scenes"}, which was really neat.  

They're costume department would be me dream craft room!!

We thought we would try to make our way back to Magic Kingdom, but first we were going to stop over at the Polynesian resort because a couple of our friends said that they had self-serve Dole Whip.

Now, I'm not a huge fan of Dole Whip {or Pineapple Whip, if you're from Springfield}, but they had vanilla, so that's what I got!

The resort was really cool, complete with their own beach!

We saw the Grand Floridian resort in the background and decided to go check it out (you can see it in the picture above) via the Monorail that connects the resorts.

Can you say GORGEOUS?!?!

Straight across on the 2nd floor, there was a live jazz band that played.

Then a man in a tux (with tails) played the grand piano for awhile.

I just wouldn't want to pay the price to stay there (starting at $540/night).

It started pouring, so we decided to call in a day and headed back to our resort.

We ordered pizza and watched The Amazing Race.

Oh my gosh, this pizza crust is seriously, like the best I ever had.

And how cute is that pizza box??

Monday was our very last day.

We wanted to make the most of it, so we headed back to Hollywood Studios again and finally got in line for the new Toy Story ride.

We didn't know anything about it, other than it's freaking popular.

We got fastpasses at 8:58 am {before we went on it the first time}, and they were for 1:45 pm!  

It was ridiculous!

It's a 3D ride...

I hate 3D anything, so I was kinda bummed.

Well, come to find out, it was a shooting game!

...and right then and there I knew I was gonna lose.

For those of you who don't know my husband, he loves to shoot.

He was on a trapshooting team in high school and placed at Nationals.

That's how good he is.

Please notice that I'm Player 1 in the photo above.

Yes, I DID beat him!  

Oh my gosh, I was so excited. 

And oh my gosh, Tyler couldn't believe it!!

We did end up riding Rockin' Roller Coaster and The Tower of Terror all before 10 am.

We headed back to our resort because we had to check out and eat the rest of our pizza.

Remember how I said Disney caters to their guests?

They had airline check in at the resort.

That meant we could check our bags and receive our boarding passes before we even thought about going to the airport.

Niiiice...especially since our bus wasn't leaving until 5 to take us to the airport.

After our pizza lunch, we headed {once again} back to Hollywood Studios for round 2 of the Toy Story Shootout.

I will admit that I was player 2 this time around, and he did in fact, cream me. ;)

{But we all know that if we went best 2 of 3, I would have won!!} hehe

We still had a few hours to kill, so we headed back to Magic Kingdom.

I wanted to ride Space Mountain one last time before we left.

We did get some ice cream, saw the afternoon parade, and wished we were staying longer.

It was then time to go home. :(

We did have a wonderful time.

It was a great time away from work and the real world.

I definitely feel rejuvenated, and I'm even caught up on all my work now! :)

Disney World, Part Two {Photo Dump}

On Friday and Saturday, we went to Magic Kingdom.

This is my absolute favorite park out of all 4 of them.

Go figure, right?

My I mean, Cinderella's Castle.

First thing we did when we got there was head straight to Space Mountain.

It is also my favorite.

I had told Tyler that's what we were doing, and we did.

Since we had a 6 day pass, we just took the sights in and didn't hurry to do much (other than get to Space Mountain at park opening).

Big Thunder Mountain (better than Thunderation at Silver Dollar City, but comparable).

We stayed for the 9 pm parade, which is the Electrical Parade.  

This is also one of my favorite parades...

On Saturday we came back to the park, because we had more stuff to do!

We went through the Haunted Mansion.

Tyler said this reminded him of my dad...he'd appreciate the poetry.

We saw the performance at the castle with a lot of characters.

We rode the new Little Mermaid Ride!

We ate lunch at Beast's {Belle's} Castle. 

It was incredible...straight out of the movie.

The food was delicious.

They gave us a "magical rose" and told us to sit wherever we like.

I'm pretty sure that dang rose had a GPS tracker in it.

Then they brought us our food on a cart, and knew exactly where to find us.

I know this picture isn't the best {by the way, all these pictures are from my phone}.

Everything was so fancy, from the architecture, right down to the chairs we sat in.

I found these in a shop in MK...one of each, please! :)

We also rode the WDW Train around the park.

We watched the nightly show, staring with a digital projection of images on Cinderella's castle.

We ended the night with Wishes.

Wishes has the best fireworks I've ever seen.

It seriously in the most incredible show.

Fireworks are hard to capture on an iPhone...

Part 3, coming tomorrow!

Catch up on our trip with Part One!