More Decor

If you ever see these jars..get them for me please!!!! lol.
Gotta love this darling baby girl room
Soothing colors and fluffy couches are the best
I LOVE this blue couch!
Isn't this the cutest little room!

Okay, so I don't have any amazing new pictures to post of mine and Joey's extra uneventful lives so I had to post the latest decorating pictures that have caught my eye. Right now I am trying to decide on what kind of couch and sofa we should get for the living room. Dakota has done a marvelous job of butchering our current furniture with her claws and teeth. As soon as she grows out of this phase we will need to replace our hillbilly stuff (slight exaggeration) with something more presentable (lol) and since a couch is something that hangs out in a home for at least 5 years or many more...I want to make sure to get one that I like!:). Wish me luck!

Good Neighbors

Our neighbors Bruce and Judy brought these flowers over for us :-)
Joey getting in some pre-party video game R&R (you deserve it babe!)
The cupcakes that I ate one too many of
The soon to be food table
We had about 17 neighbors and 7 kids over last night. I have been wanting to get to know some of our neighbors better so we thought the best way to do that would be to feed them and get them all in one house. We didn't expect so many people to show up and although the house was full to the brim; it worked out just fine and it was a nice night. I made some easy chili and cornbread and cupcakes and Joey reminded me again why he is my favorite man in the world when he cleaned our house from top to bottom for me without a single complaint. Truly, he is an incredible husband to say the least! Joey is also getting amped up about the spring and our lawns turning from brown to green again. He has done tons of research on the right kinds of weed killers and fertilizers for our lawn types, so he put that information to good use by throwing some stuff down yesterday. I would just like to add that I feel so blessed to even have a lawn that we can work on and hang out in. I do not take that for granted and I give all thanks to God for the things he has given us for as long as he should choose to do so. I am also so thankful for our neighbors! They are all such wonderful people and we feel very lucky to be a part of this community of people!

Kota Mota Pictures

I never would have thought that a Dachshund could be so feisty!
She loves to crawl under my legs when I'm sitting on the ground
She goes through a raw hide bone every two days!
I love when she cocks her head to the side like this
Dakota had a collar a long time ago but she chewed through it. I have felt that she has since looked more like a stray dog than our beloved pooch without a collar so this week I bought her a new one and an identification tag. She has been vigorously trying to bite this one off so I have had to watch her like a hawk and tell her no every time I catch her in the act. I'm not sure how long it will last, but hopefully she will get used to it!

Dia De Amore

What a treat to spend Valentine's day with the one you love whether that person be a friend, a family member, or a spouse. Joey gave up a day of fishing this past Saturday to head over to the Raleigh Flea Market with me. I was hoping I might find a farm table and didn't have any luck, but we did enjoy being in each other's company and browsing through the various vendor's booths and eating a hot dog from a stand. Afterwards, we went to my favorite antique shop (still no luck) and then we went home, took a nap and headed out again for a delicious sushi dinner:-) I had such a wonderful time and I just can't believe that after all these years, Joey and I are the best of friends and our love keeps growing stronger. All thanks and praise to Jesus! Hope that you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day too! Sorry for the blur that should be Dakota. She didn't want to sit still for a family photo:)




I

Princess Dakota

I thought I would dedicate a post to the world's most pampered dog and the first child of the Martinez family, Dakota.:-) Let me explain exactly why Dakota is so spoiled. Since I work from home, Dakota has never had to be alone during the work week and has only experienced a fraction of the crate hours that most puppies would. After sleeping a nice long restful night, you would think that Dakota would be eager to play or get into trouble; instead, as soon as I sit down in my office chair for work at 7:30 AM, Dakota jumps up in my lap and gives me a huge, "sucks that you have to work mom, but, I'm going back to bed," yawn and then she konks out for a good 4 hours in my lap. Now, imagine trying to get your legs under your desk to type on your keyboard all day with a fat Dachshund snoozing away on your lap. It doesn't work! So, instead I have to sit in a very non-ergonomic fashion, somewhat twisted to the side so that Princess Dakota can sleep comfortably and I can attempt to get some work done. Heaven forbid a mail man or a garbage truck drive by while I am on the phone with a customer. Then I have to brace myself for this tiny dog's extremely large bark and then her smaller woofs that can carry on for the next 10 minutes as she tends to be rather on edge after hearing loud noises. To get her to stop barking while I am on the phone I have to think quick and I usually resort to giving Dakota a utility bill or a notepad to chew on or something intriguing enough to distract her from her woofing. Meanwhile, I am hoping the call doesn't last too long as I watch Dakota eagerly desecrate my not so replaceable monthly bills. Then when Dakota decides she is tired of my lap, she runs to our back door and begins scratching it furiously until I decide to let her out. She used to be like normal dogs who only want to go outside when they have to go to the bathroom and then they can't wait to get back inside. Now I never know if she is scratching the back door so that she can get outside and dig a crater sized hole in Joey's irreplaceable sod (this has been a problem lately) or if she truly needs to go to the bathroom. Sometimes I let her out because I figure she might need to go potty and other times I let her out because her 20 minutes of scratching on the back door has caused my left eye to start twitching and my mind to wonder to not so appropirate thoughts of feeding her to our neighbors German Shephard. Just last week I let Dakota hang out in our backyard for a couple of hours so that I could get some work done. That's not asking too much is it? When I got around to checking on her, she had collected a good sized pile of our lawn at the back door and was throwing pieces of it up in the air to catch and then she would roll around in her victory. Sigh. One of Dakota's other specials is that she makes sure we know when she wants more food or water. She walks over to her bowls and if they are not filled to her liking, she sticks her paw inside the bowl and drags it into our view (wherever we might be sitting) and then cocks her head to the side as if to say, "you are the most horrible parents ever, can't you see that my water bowl is empty!!" Then she drags the bowl around in front of us until we realize that she wants a refill. We usually filled it for her because we thought it was cute...we have created a monster!! lol. There is so much more that I could add to this story but alas, I have to get to church so this will have to suffice. We have enjoyed so many laughs on account of Dakota's antics, but I will eave that for another story:-)

Farm Table Quest

I have been searching high and low for a farm table just like this one shown above for the past two years. I can't afford the brand new ones that typically cost anywhere from $900-3,000 so I have been checking craigslist, ebay and amazon, faithfully everyday for farm tables in and around this area. For the first time in nearly a year I found this one online two days ago and I immediately e-mailed the seller, as it is exactly what I am looking for and the price was so reasonable $325. I was sure the table was meant for me! lol. She didn't get back to me so I e-mailed her again this morning and she informed me that she sold it last night and I felt like someone knocked all the wind out of my sails. So, if any of you ever run across a table that is very similar to this one in appearance and is 6-8 ft. long and under $500...please let me know. Maybe I'm just not looking hard enough or not in the right places. Anyhoo. Just wanted to recruit you all in my farm table hunt. Thanks! :-)

Warm Weekend

Our new big screen armoire that took us a year to find! So glad that big TV is hidden now!
Diana, Heather (also from Cali) and muah at bible study
Who woulda thought I'd have a Cali friend in NC!

We enjoyed the warmest weekend we have had here in NC since last Fall. It was about 65-70 both Saturday and Sunday and boy, it felt amazing! Joey fished Saturday with his buddies Bobby and Bruce at a local lake. They didn't catch much at all, but they enjoyed the warm rays while out on their boats. I went wedding dress shopping with a sweet neighbor friend, Annie, who is getting married this November and another wonderful neighbor joined also us, Erin. I love helping Bride's to be, with their wedding plans. Things are stress free when it is someone else getting married! We went down to Burlington's Bridal warehouse and I think Annie may have found her dress. The prices were so reasonable...well, for a wedding dress. Sunday's weather was also wonderful so after church Joey and I ran some errands, enjoyed a delicious Quiznos sub OUTSIDE, for the first time in months and then went home and I took my time washing my car while Joey worked on some new running boards for his boat trailer on the lawn. We put Dakota outside in a large pen and she seemed content to be outside with us until a dog walked by and then she tried to act all tough with her loud bark. Wus. Joey and I felt so rejuvenated by the warm sun and we also felt like God was giving everyone in North Carolina a chance to thaw out after all of the cold weather we have had. Thank you Jesus for the sun! Sunday night we have bible study with some other young adults from our church and I added a couple pics of some of my friends in this home group. Joey and I are so thankful for this group as we have all become great friends over the past year. Hope the weather stays nice so I can take Dakota on a few walks this week!

Our Dominican Trip is Booked

I feel so much better now that our tickets are purchased and our Dominican anniversary trip is set in stone! Now I know we can't make excuses not to go or back out at the last minute...because we can't get our money back:) haha. I'm really looking forward to visiting this large island, for the scenic beauty and the historical experience but, also because it is a 3rd world country and I think that one of the best ways to be made aware of the needs that are out there in the world, is to see them and experience them first hand. I hope that God really opens our eyes to see what more we could be and should be doing to help our brothers and sisters around the globe. We have been blessed with so much in the United States and as such, it is easy to take things for granted here. I know I have at times. I could use a good wake up call. I thought I would attach some pictures of the DR for the heck of it:). The count down is on....3 months to go....tick, tock, tick, tock.