Luray Caverns - Luray, Virginia

Caving with this hunk on his birthday -July 31, 2016. 

ps, this is almost 2 weeks late but we have been super busy.

anyway. 

after church we dropped the girls off at Wendy's so we could hit the road.

Little did he know, I had a day trip planned for us two, about an hour & 15 minutes away from home.

As we headed down I-81, he says to me.. "can you tell me the city or town or something? because I like to know where I'm heading at least" so I said "umm I can't tell you without actually telling you.. do you want to know?" he then tells me no.. he'll just wait. so the gps is on because neither of us can trust me to get us somewhere.. I tell him "24 more miles on this road"

10 minutes or so before we arrived he says to me " I thought I knew 24 miles back that way but I didn't want to be wrong" I said "ugh why didn't you just tell me? how did you guess?"

his response -> "the road sign with huge letters saying "Luray Caverns next 24 miles"

me : oh.. as we both laugh.

 Virginia is a beautiful state, just as West Virginia is.

The caverns were a ton of fun, I took a ton of pictures for our own memories to look back on but also for others to see this amazing place so you can maybe one day visit also. It's not very toddler friendly, ours probably wouldn't be as interested but we do plan to take them once they get a little older because at 3 I don't see them liking it very much. We aren't into antique cars, but when you purchase tickets there are a few other things you can do including an old antique car store. We skipped those and just went straight to the caverns. It took us about an hour & a half to get through it.. there was a large crowd in there with us.. and wouldn't you know as JD and I were having a conversation about how crazy the world is today.. the lights went out while we were going further and further down.. not to mention JD had just showed me his phone and said "I have no cell service but I didn't plan on that anyway"... I felt a little worried.. maybe even a little scared. JD carries so that is one thing I am thankful for.. his hobby may be more expensive than mine.. but it keeps us safe so that's what matters most.
& puts food on the table during hunting season.
 

this was the coolest part.
The bottom part is water.. they called it a lake.. which shows the reflection from the ones on top.
how cool!?

Here is another picture of the Lake.. with the reflection.

After the Luray Caverns we headed towards home so we could grab something to eat but we ended up going in to sit down and eat due to us being kid free.. which makes for a peaceful dinner. we chose outback steakhouse.. yum. I tried the cheese fries on the bloomin onion as our appetizer and it was delicious.. the server says to us "I won't tell you the amount of calories in this but it's really good"
Don't ask, don't tell.. right?
I ordered this (below) for my meal which on the menu was considered a "snack"
holy. snack.
that is a meal for me. an amazing one though.. I love their Alice Spring Chicken meal.. I make it at home all the time so when I saw this on the menu.. I had to get it. It's the same thing except inside of a tortilla... how amazing does this look? If you're a honey mustard lover, this is for you.
Another awesome fact about this was our server told me she's a Younique presenter also.. JD tipped her an extra $5 bucks.. she was the best server.. not because she was a younique presenter or anything.. ha ha.

After stuffing our bellies completely full.. JD decided he wanted to ride over to Gander Mountain.. some women may complain about the guy stuff.. but anywhere JD is, I like to be.. he's always working hard for his family, which means when I get time to be with him I go anywhere even if it means standing inside a "guy" store for hours.. Of course, he bought his gun he's been dreaming of for months now.. he walked out smiling, and excited to finally own an AR.. (I'm sure when he reads this, he will correct me on how I was suppose to say that...sorry babe ;)"

on the way home we saw this pretty rainbow because thankfully for us we missed the rain but every one at home apparently were slammed hard by a rain storm.

We picked up the girls.. they were beyond excited to see us.
Kylee... especially. She is her mommy's girl through and through.
We arrived home and Kaylee was demanding she go shoot her bow.. yes, it's a nerf brand bow.. for kids.
She loves to be just like her daddy.. and I know he is just thrilled since he's such a girl dad and all.

 She caught on so fast.. she'll be a pro before we know it.

x0x0 Brooke

 

it's FRI-YAY + reversible hats for the babes

As everyone knows, we do most of our shopping small. We use to be the ones who did all of our shopping through Target, Carters, & any store we could find cute toddler clothes in, and although we still do shop at those big name brand stores.. However, we have fallen in love with shopping small. Thanks to Instagram you can find just about anything you are looking for because most Etsy shops are all over Instagram. We recently learned about a company called The Unbroken Circle also known as "ubcircle" - Deborah Brawley started designing and creating reversible clothing for women and children 35 years ago while she was working part time in Boulder, Colorado. The reason behind the reversible clothing is because she was constantly changing her two year old's soiled clothing which I think is an awesome little story behind this company. The Unbroken Circle is constantly changing/improving with new designs.

The girls have two of The Unbroken Circles' reversible Summer hats and we absolutely adore them. The minute I told the girls they received a package in the mail, they were so excited to see what was in there.. they opened it up and immediately wanted to put them on. Kylee wanted hers to be on the pink side with polka dots, while Kaylee wanted the purple hat with little flowers covering it. Both of the hats come with velcro on the front so when you reverse the hat to the way you want your child to wear it that way, they can still have the bow on the front as well. They come in different designs + different sizes to fit your little one just right, these are both a size Medium 3-4 year.. & they fit just right with plenty of room for my little ladies to grow into considering they just turned three. 

Good news for us is, sometimes I like to switch the girls' clothing up by having one wear one color while the other is wearing another. These summer hats are perfect for doing just that, reversible so if I want one to wear pink while the other wears purple I can do so.. Or both can wear the same color hats at once. I'm always looking for hair accessories for Kylee and Kaylee to have something to match their outfits, well we found the perfect fit. These little hats may just be the new thing for my little babes.

To shop for a summer reversible hat for your little as well, go to www.ubcircle.com 

also find their shop on Etsy at UnbrokenCircleStore

Instagram - ubcircle  

Have a great weekend!

x0x0 Brooke

27 things all about you

....on your twenty-seventh birthday

1.  my hard worker.  Not only does he work hard on days he is scheduled to work, but he also works as many overtime days as he can get. He works hard around the house, and works hard at making sure the girls and I have everything we want and need in life. - it's clear to us, we are number one.

2.  he cannot do anything without thinking it all the way through.  making a purchase, deciding on where we're going or what we're doing. he thinks everything through. something he clearly needs to teach me.

3. he loves to hunt and has been going for as long as I've known him, he could spend hours in the woods, he goes with some of the men of his family. 

4. He has a temper, but is the most loving man I know. he's come along way.. we both have.

5.  he's also the funniest guy I know, he is always joking with the guys at work or with me at home.   

6.  he looks just like his mother but has the shape of his fathers eyes.

7. he has one brother and they are complete opposites

8. his hobby is guns. yes, guns. we have guns everywhere.

9. he could eat chicken or spaghetti every week or every day of the week. we're the same on that one.

10. his favorite color since I've known him has always been blue.

11. the only thing he watches on TV is the news, weather channel, or the hunting channel.

12. he has to keep me grounded 90% of the time

13. he says the most obnoxious things, and I think he will always remain young at heart. Between him and everyone he works with, he always has something crazy & new coming out of his mouth.

14. he is a great cook, breakfast is his thing.

15.he loves George Jones and any old classic country.

16. he's not a beer drinker besides Mikes Hard Lemonade in the summer time while grillin'

17. he's a talker. the grocery store, football game, the parking lot.. he'll talk to anybody especially if it's a topic of interest.

18. Fall and Winter are his two favorite seasons

19. he loves the cold weather, and in the winter he loves driving in the snow even in the middle of a blizzard. which terrifies me.

20. he loves to help others, but he can read a person like a book so he knows when someone isn't being completely honest with him.

21. he once said he wanted to learn to braid the girls hair and giggled.. just being the girl dad he is.

22. I met JD at his job when he worked for his aunt at a fitness center // tanning salon, at just the age of 13.

23. he fought hard for our relationship, due to our age difference it wasn't always the easiest and nobody wanted to see us together the first two years.

24. he is the one who taught me a ton of firsts.. like cooking, how to wash clothes, (I was always a spoiled child.. whoops), he took me on my first jet ski ride & took me to get my nose pierced after wanting it done for so long, and he has taken me to plenty of places I had never been to before.

25. he always calls himself a "forever girl dad" and says it proudly. hopefully one day you'll get that boy. until then it's just you and our (male) dogs.

26. he works at a milk plant. wait until the girls can understand their daddy works for a plant that makes yoo-hoo's.. if they even knew what a yoo-hoo was. because they haven't got a clue.

27. he would do anything I asked of him, and go to the moon and back for the girls and I.

the most important people in his world are under this one roof.

.... & we are all so thankful.

happy birthday, sweetheart.

-x0 Brooke