SNOW!

I hear what you're saying. You're all like, "Abby. It's March. You're like three weeks late on this snowpocalypse thing." I hear ya. Life happens. I still really really love snow! It's true. Despite the fact that on the day of this great snowpocalypse, I got stuck in my car on the highway for four and a half hours trying to get home ON MY BIRTHDAY and it was horrible. Snow and I made up quickly. It's just so pretty!

I am definitely one of those weirdos who legitimately loves the winter. I love the calm and the peace and the beauty of a fresh snow. The world seems to move a little bit slower when it snows, and it's really nice.

Before the great snowpocalypse, during our first snow of the season, B and I went outside for an adventure. Duke Forest is seriously so beautiful all the time, but blanketed in a fresh powdery blanket? Bliss. Also my car may have almost spun out on the way to get those pictures. It's fine.

ALSO please notice the sequence where B is being so nice with the snow and then the next picture where you see smudgy mascara and a mean mug. That punk hit me in the face with a snowball. Also not pictured: Abby totally biting it trying to climb up a snowy hill. Face first. In the snow. It was awesome.

That has been kind of the theme of life lately. Totalling wiping out on your face and having the ability to brush it off and keep going. Eventually you will both laugh, and it'll be awesome.

It's getting frosty outside again, and B and a friend and I are headed out to a fancy dinner at Lantern thanks to a raffle! No other way I want to warm up and pray for spring than with some fancy Asian food. Yes.

Love from this side of the world!

Abby

DC Magic

This weekend was full of DC magic. My sister flew up from Tallahassee on Friday night, I drove up from CH, and we spent the weekend with my brother, who lives up there.

It was an awesome time. The last time I was in DC was over a year ago for fall break, and it had been at least four years for Carrie. She majorly geeked out at the Lincoln Memorial and we spent all day in cold and dreary weather hiking around to the monuments and the Smithsonians. It was a real adventure and we loved every minute of it.

The highlight of the trip for me was definitely seeing Julia Child's kitchen at the American History Museum. Before her death, Julia donated nearly all of the pieces of her kitchen from her Cambridge home to the museum, which is a near exact replica of what her kitchen would have looked like, including her raised countertops (Julia was 6' 2", after all). It was wonderful to finally get to see it, as last fall when I visited the exhibit was under construction, to my extreme disappointment. It did not disappoint, and I took more pictures on my phone (since my camera died the moment we got to the exhibit, of course) than I would care to admit. It was awesome.

On Sunday, we walked around and got brunch in Georgetown, including a trip to Georgetown Cupcake, by far still the best cupcake I've ever had, and then I drove back home. It's always hard to say goodbye to family, especially when it was such a wonderful weekend, but I am excited to see everyone again in just a few short days going home for Christmas!

In denial about all the presents I still have to make and loving every minute of it,

Abby :)

pretty pictures and a little life update

I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving. Brandon and I have had a whirlwind of a couple of weeks, he finishing up a brutal test block, me moving forward with work and wedding things. We drove down on Wednesday after hosting a wonderful Friendsgiving Tuesday night with our loves in Chapel Hill, and spent the rest of the week through this evening in Orlando with my fam.

Yesterday, we had the BIGGEST blessing through Lori of Shutter Life Productions, who spent the afternoon with us shooting engagement photos. This is one of those God-really-came-through-at-the-last-second scenarios and seriously we were so overwhelmed with gratitude! We were even more blessed getting a text from her at 11:30 at night saying she had already finished editing our photos! What an amazing team!!

Needless to say, we are completely in love with their work. Below you can see a few of our favorite shots, and be sure to check out their blog post on us here.

I seriously want to get to a point in my life where I can capture life's moments as beautifully as they do. Wow, you guys. Just wow.

We are headed back to "real life" in NC tomorrow morning bright and early, and would love, in the most general way possible, for prayers as we enter this holiday season. Me, for some big changes professionally, and for Brandon to make it through the last push before a well-deserved break. We know God is in control, and we are trusting him through what has the potential to be a stressful December.

Anyone out there have any good Advent devotionals they'd recommend? I'm in the market for one!

Lots of love from sunny Florida,

Abby

friend weekend.

Don't you love it when friends come to visit?

This weekend was pretty much the best friend weekend ever. It involved staying up way too late on Pinterest, wedding dress shopping, cupcake eating, venue exploring, brunch munching, and so much laughter. I was completely overjoyed when Jordan told me she wanted to come in for a weekend. Living so far away from friends is a sacrifice I gladly made to be with this wonderful man, but it is so wonderful to see them when they can come! I felt like we got so much accomplished this weekend on things I really needed to jump on, probably because they were just so much better to do with a friend. 

Love you to pieces, JR! 

(Also I live in a pretty cool city, I've decided. It is just gorgeous in the fall)

xoxo. Abby

3

Thursday was a very special day.

It marked three years of dating, of loving, of doing life with the best person I know.

Brandon and I met through a friend at school, and I can still remember the very beginnings of our relationship like they happened yesterday. The first time I ever saw him, he was performing at the first ever Melodores concert. The first time we met, I still remember the table in Rand I was sitting at eating tortellini, and what shirt he was wearing that day. We have been reminiscing on a few of those early moments and how sweet they were, which is such a wonderful blessing to think about how much our feelings have deepened since that time.

I try really hard not to glorify our relationship too much. We are both sinners and even now we are still learning new things about each other, and new ways to love each other better. But I think that this is a lifelong process we're walking into and the fights we've had, the transitions we've survived, the time apart and the sweet time together I see as a testament to God's grace that he has allowed us to show each other. No one makes me laugh like this guy does.

He sent me flowers at work and took me out to the most wonderful restaurant in Chapel Hill, Lantern, to celebrate. And for us, it was perfect.

19/52 (because he's my other half)

I know God has some pretty amazing stuff lined up ahead for us. And I'm so excited to share it with this man along the way.

Lots of love from this corner of Chapel Hill,

Abby

gettin' it back. (the new normal)

How is it Sunday night already? Wasn't it Saturday morning about two seconds ago?

Weekends seem to go really fast when Monday morning comes so early, that's for sure. But you will never hear me complain about my job. I am eternally grateful for it and cherish the people there more than I thought I would after just two weeks of working.

SO MANY things have been going on lately! First, let me apologize for the abismal amount of posting I have been doing recently. It's a long story but my apartment still is internet-less and so every time I want to use the internet I have to go to Starbucks or Brandon's apartment. So please don't think to yourself, "Oh Abby, now that she's working full-time she is forgetting us." False. I miss this little space on the internet and plan to blog as much as I did when I was unemployed (if not more, because now my life is actually interesting). Things have just been a little crazy.

As a snapshot, in the past two weeks I moved into my new apartment, bought a car, traveled out of state for a wedding, and spent all of my work days training to take over my position at work from the girl who has left the position. There have been very very stressful moments in there, and I am so glad to be moving forward. Getting settled. Gettin' back into the groove of a new normal.

Here are some snapshots of my life the past two weeks!

boxes on boxes on boxes

garage sale finds! love this funky journal.

the messy bun is so awesome for weekends when I no longer care about polished hair (18/52)

And finally, some bare bones shots of the apartment! Soooo much decorating will be done soon. My awesome roommate's mom just so happens to work at an antique store so we are going to have all the goodies!

It's hard to tell, but my room is going to be cozy and very dark, so I have a feeling that my drafting table corner is going to be one of my favorite spots in the apartment. 

Here's to settling in and bed in half an hour. :)

xoxo. Abby

on living in a new city.

17/52

It's been four years since I've moved to a new city, started all over. It's only the second time in my life that I've ever had to do it, and so for the past couple of weeks I've forgotten what that feels like. I use my GPS to get everywhere because I'm still figuring out how to get places. I still kind of feel like I'm visiting a lot of places, not really at home yet. There's no freshman orientation this time, but there is a lot of meeting new people. There are a lot of wonderful things too. Discovering new restaurants and making a new list of the places we've gone to from the Chapel Hill/Durham/Raleigh food lover's guide. Finding a thrift store down the street where they boast nearly a collection of great vintage shoes. And of course, this time around, I have a really wonderful person named Brandon who is making this transition a million times easier than it is for so many who start over in a new place. And for that, I am humbled and oh so grateful to be here (even if I am still partially living out of my car ;) ). 

16/52 (A POST ON LEARNING TO WAIT)

16/52

The past year of my life has had its challenges. Being in a long distance relationship and trying to land my first job after college were two of the big ones. It's a big, wide world out there, but I was trying to find a job in just one little piece of it. That was the hard part. 

I didn't really start to worry too much about the job hunt until my second semester. By that time, a quite few of my friends had landed jobs at big corporations or had accepted positions at places they had interned. And there I was, looking for entry-level positions in a place where I knew only one person, and as I searched we were 500 miles apart. I applied, and applied, and applied. I sent my application out to places I was overqualified to work for, even as a new college grad, and plenty of places that were reaches. I emailed, I cold called, I followed up with anyone I ever knew who had a job or connection or family member in Chapel Hill. I promised myself, and Brandon, that I would definitely be employed by April. And when April rolled around, I promised myself, and started pleading with God, to be employed by graduation. 

When graduation rolled around and I found myself with no job yet, I was deeply unhappy. This job, wherever it would be, was in my mind the key to all of the pieces of my life that I wanted to fall into place. I started shopping for professional outfits I could wear to work. I browsed apartments online and thought about if I'd want a roommate. I looked at cars to see which ones would be in my price range. But none of that could move forward without the job. And the pressure of that fact grew larger and larger until the pressure of it nearly broke me. 

Vanderbilt is not an easy university to graduate from without knowing what is next for you. I know Vanderbilt graduates whose first job was at Time magazine, others who started making $80,000 a year the summer after they graduated. I felt like a failure going home after graduation. I was ready for my life to start, and I was mad at God for making me wait, for what felt like humiliation every time I had to tell someone (which was very frequently) "I'm not totally sure what's next for me." 

This past year and through all of the trials that I went through, I met with a girl named Molly every Thursday morning to catch up on life and study God's word. One scripture that she introduced me to, and that we studied together, was Psalm 27. It struck me as we studied this passage that my "one desire, the one thing that I seek" (v.4) was not the Lord, or to be in His presence. It was to have life move at the pace I desired, and to go the direction I desired. In so many areas of my life, I was finding it so hard to want that more than anything. 

"Wait for the Lord, be strong and courageous, wait for the Lord." (v. 14) 

But most of all, I was bad at the waiting. I felt like I had been waiting an eternity. I remember one night in particular, after I had come home from a trip to Chapel Hill for a few job interviews in May, when I got the call that I hadn't gotten a job. They had picked someone else. I think that that was my lowest point. My self-esteem, my self-worth, my identity were all so tightly wrapped up in that one person saying "Yes", that I found myself crying in my room, pleading with God to have mercy on me. To just deliver me already out of the loneliness of being home and being unemployed. I had made the ultimate mistake. As Beth Moore puts it, I had given "people the kind of power that only God should yield" over me. And at this point, I reached a point of total surrender where I was able to say, "Not my will, but yours be done."

"Wait for the Lord, be strong and courageous, wait for the Lord."

Well, I didn't wake up the next day with a job offer. Or the next day, or the next day. In fact, after this point, after my complete and total surrender to exhaustion, I went through what could have been the most personal rejections of the whole process. But in that place of surrender, of realizing that my identity was not in fact in what job I held, or who I was dating, or where I was living, or how many times people asked me "what was next for me", that I was able to withstand it, and be ok with the fact that if I could see what was happening and where I was being led from His perspective, I wouldn't be so dismayed. 

The day before I left from Chapel Hill at the beginning of June for another round of interviews, I got unexpectedly sick. I was supposed to have an interview that morning, and luckily, they were able to push it back to the morning before I left. Normally, that type of thing is frowned upon and I knew it probably wasn't scoring me any points, but I couldn't help it. And the interview went really well when I did finally get to go in. I ended up doing some very unusual personality testing for them, and waited all week to hear back from someone at the company. They called, and we set up a video interview for this week. Even though I was miles away in Orlando, they wanted to meet with me. Usually, not living in the area didn't score you any points either, this I knew from experience. And then the video interview went really well. 

That afternoon, they called and said, "We didn't want to make you wait. We'd love to offer you the position."

Wait for the Lord, be strong and courageous, wait for the Lord. 

Out of all of the jobs that I applied to, I know that God had this one picked out for me. He was the one who delivered it to me. This company wasn't even one I had heard of until they reached out to me through Linkedin. And I was so humbled knowing that all of the glory and the praise for landing this job did not belong to me at all, but to the one who is the good giver of ALL things. 

Writing these words, I breathe deeply, knowing that once again, my Savior has proved more faithful that I gave Him credit for, and that He has delivered to me something much better than what I could have achieved on my own terms. 

"I believe that I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord, be strong and courageous, wait for the Lord." 

Thanks for letting me share my heart a little bit today, friends.

Lots of love,

Abby

15/52

15/52

(My typical reaction to Florida humidity.) 

My room at home is on the side of our house that faces our back porch, so there are no windows, but an entire wall is the sliding glass door that accesses it. When I wake up in the morning and the blinds are closed, it is pretty much a cave, and I blame it for the very late wake ups I've been having the past few weeks. In that dark, sleepy cave, I often wake up and think "It's summer! I should go for a swim! I should ride my bike outside! Maybe I'll run to the Y, do some strength training and run home! Six miles is nothing!" Obviously, I am delusional in more than one sense, because as soon as I step out on that back porch...

WHAM. HUMIDITY.

And then I go and sit in my pajamas and watch Breaking Bad on Netflix for three hours. 

Welcome to my life. 

xoxo. Abby

**P.S.- If you've been counting, you probably realize we are more than 15 weeks into 2013, which means I'm about 9 weeks behind on these posts. I promise to try to not bombard you with a million selfies all at once but I just bought a new tripod so hopefully they will be a little more regular. Thanks for following along with me!

14/52

14/52

Sometimes it's good to be reminded that there are bigger things going on in your life than things that revolve around you. A good walk in the park will do that for you, especially the way trees grow around here. 

THERE IS NO "NORMAL"

This week, as you guys may know, I have been in Chapel Hill with Brandon, continuing the job hunt and figuring out some logistical things that are still really up in the air. It's been really sweet time, and a pretty great visit in terms of time we've gotten to spend together. As I was writing an email to someone on Monday, I found myself writing "there is no such thing as 'normal' for me nowadays". And it is so true. And it is so exhausting. But it is also ok. Maybe this post is just a way of convincing myself of that fact, but it is. Because I got to do some pretty awesome stuff this week.

I did some freehand stitching! So far in my embroidery adventures I've only used patterns, but I loved how this one turned out, and I loved this little reminder.

I made a friend.

I played with a sweet (and much better trained!) Maggie when Brandon and I went home to Charlotte for his brother's 14th birthday party. I also realized how rusty my Spanish is when I met his abuela and little cousin from Puerto Rico. Note to self: work on that. 

I made kale chips! This had been on my list of things to try for at least a semester and I finally did it! Full reviews and notes on the recipe in a later post. 

Brandon bought me a new cookbook! This weekend we agreed that we really wanted to start eating healthier, so this was a great first step. It's Rocco Dispirito's Now Eat This! cookbook, and the shrimp tomatillo tostadas we made on Monday night were DELICIOUS. 

If you follow me on Instagram, you may know that Brandon started working at a very fancy French restaurant in Chapel Hill this summer called One. It's been really fun to learn lots of new things from how they prepare their food and last night we used his employee discount (woop woop!) to meet up with a friend and try it for ourselves. 

First course: Smoked Oyster Bisque with Pork Belly

Second course: Grilled Hudson Valley Duck Breast with Foie Gras and Orange

Third course: Milk Chocolate and Chili Mousse Tart

I could not describe these dishes with justice if I tried, so I'll just refer you to their menu to see for yourself what an amazing meal it was. And of course, any night with this guy is going to be awesome, that's pretty much guaranteed. :)

Tomorrow I fly back home and on Monday I get to see one of my best friends from school. Even though right now there is no such thing as "normal", it is definitely ok. 

Lots of love on my last night in Durham (for a little bit),

Abby