I Heart Tattoos Link Up!

Today I'm linking up with Raven at A Momma's Desires and Pacifiers. 

 I am super excited about her starting this link-up and I hope to meet a lot of really awesome women with ink.  :)  I personally have four tattoos, and cannot - can.not. - wait to get more!  My husband can't go more than a few months without some fresh ink, so I know that I'll have to make a decision soon as to what tattoo comes next.  So anyway, here is what I have so far:

~.~

Age:  18

Location:  Inner Left Wrist

Meaning:

  It roughly means "beautiful person" and it was in honor of & is now in memory of my Aunt Lati who passed away from breast cancer in July of 2009.  She was diagnosed in October of 2005, battled stage four breast cancer for 45 months.  She was such an amazing person.  She left behind a husband and a 5 year old daughter.  If you care to read her story (she kept a blog) click here.  Grab a box of tissues.  It's been over two years and I can't go on the site without crying.  It's still too fresh.  She was too young and too good.  But anyway, my family did a lot of Susan G Komen walks/races.  Our team name is "Bella Person," which is a combination of my maiden name, Lati's maiden name, and her married name.  It means beautiful person because we were doing it for her..the most beautiful person any of us had ever met.  I have this tattoo because she has an amazing story full of inspiration and faith.  I wanted people to ask me because I wanted to do everything I could to share her story.  She was and is such a precious person to her family.  She was my favorite aunt.  I loved talking about her.  I still love talking about her.  A lot of people think cancer is for old people.  She was 34.  I'm going to start crying if I keep on, so moving on to the next tattoo... 

    

Age:  19

Location:  Right Hip/Thigh

Meaning:

none

Age:  22

Location:  Left Rib Cage

Meaning:

This tattoo is a fleur di lis.  It is French for lily and is a symbol of strength and excellence.  I got it because I really like the shape, and Mr. Robinson (who at that time was just my friend) drew it for me.  :)  We went and got tattoos together as friends.  Um...the design inside this tattoo is supposed to (subtly) resemble a marijuana plant.  The colors used are the Rastafarian colors, commonly associated with marijuana smokers.  I got the tattoo during a darker time in my life...and this tattoo no longer holds the same meaning it did when I first got it.  I had it done last January.  Now, it's a reminder of falling in love with "the one" and a reminder how far I've come in the past year. 

Age:  22

Location:  Right Rib Cage

Meaning:

 Finally, my fourth tattoo is a cross.  More specifically, it's a Unity Cross.  I did a post all about it not too long ago and you can read about it here.  My husband and I both got this tattoo, except his is on his forearm.  We put together a Unity Cross in our wedding ceremony, display the Unity Cross in our home, and have the tattoo on our bodies to remind us of our love for each other and for God.  The other post goes into more detail.  It's so much more than your typical cross tattoo.  

~.~

As for future tattoos...I want tons more!  :)  I love having a new tattoo.  I love doing the unexpected.  I love shocking people.  I love how expressive tattoos can be.  I particularly love the adrenaline rush.  Oh man, there's nothing like it.  Getting tattoos is incredibly addictive because it is incredibly fun.  Yeah, they hurt.  During the tattoo-getting-process, I always VOW to never again get another tattoo.  When it's healing and itching and driving me crazy, I SWEAR that I'll never go back!  Once it's healed and pretty and not hurting or itching anymore, I start planning my next one :)    
I love tattoos that are uniquely placed.
I love tattoos that collectively tell a story - like a sleeve.

That's my goal.  I eventually plan on having my entire back tattooed.  I love the idea of "sleeve" tattoos, or a tattoo that is made up of tons of smaller tattoos and all fit together perfectly and tell a story.  I love it.  I want a sleeve tattoo, but don't have the guts and would lose my job.  I want a sleeve tattoo on my back.  Does that make sense?  I want my back to tell a story of who I was and who I am.  I want my tattoos to symbolize where I have come from, how far I've come, how much I've grown, who I used to be, who I hope to be..

Can't wait to see everyone else's tattoos in the link-up!  :-D  If you have ink, go check out Raven's page.  She's pretty cool and you absolutely should link up and meet this girl.

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

I am loving that December will be here tomorrow = my birthday will be 28 days away!  I will be 23 and for some reason, that kind of depresses me and makes me feel old.  :-/  However, I am very excited to celebrate with my hubby!  He has something planned...but is keeping his lips sealed as to what!

I am loving my husband a lot right now and am learning to really encourage him and rely on him.  We are going through what could turn out to be some HUGE changes in our life, and it's teaching me a lot about marriage and myself.  Oh, and this picture reminds me...I'm loving that my hair is getting so long!  It's even longer now...this picture is from our honeymoon!

I am loving all of the fabulous Christmas presents I have picked out for my husband!

I am loving that Zombie gets to wear his new Christmas outfit!  :)  And in general, I'm just loving Zombie.

I am loving ADORING hearing so much Christmas music!  I don't know about y'all, but I listen to the old stuff!  Classic Christmas music from the 50's and 60's.

I am loving all of the fun crafts I've been working on!

I am loving decorating our FIRST home for our FIRST Christmas together in our FIRST year of marriage!  Did you know (I'm sure that you didn't..) that decorating for Christmas is the ONLY, yep - ONLY - thing we are doing together this year that we also did together last year.  It's pretty crazy.

I am loving that my brand-new-baby-blog is up to 9 followers!  Hooray!  I have really enjoyed getting involved in this amazing blog community.  I have been repeatedly pleasantly surprised at all of the CHRISTIAN women out there who blog.  I've enjoyed reading about your lives, marriages, and families.  Blogging is so much fun!

I am loving that since I'm doing an 8-part-mini-series about our love story, I get to relive every precious memory we've made in the past year.  I have had a lot of fun digging through our past.  :)  Love stories are the greatest, aren't they?

I am loving all of the scrap-booking I've been able to do lately!

I am, as always loving Pinterest.

I am loving that Christmas is right around the corner.  It's such a special time of year.  My birthday is right there on top of it all, but my anticipation is mostly about Christmas.  This will be the first Christmas in many years that I have considered myself a Christian.  I am so excited about watching God move in my life during this special season!  My husband and I are running a "bakery" for our church's Live Nativity we are putting on for the community.  I am very excited about participating in something so much bigger than me.  I hope God uses the LN to touch people who are long hardened by the world.  I am looking forward to celebrating this Christmas as a season of GIVING for the first time in a long time.  I used to regard it as a season of receiving.  I am looking forward to spending a very romantic Christmas under the mistletoe with the godly man my Lord has so generously blessed me with in the form of my husband.  I am loving all of the excitement in the air that comes with new traditions, old traditions, Christmas trees, and nativity scenese.  I am loving this season!

What are you loving?  Go visit littledaisymay.blogspot.com to link up!

Weekend Synopsis

Happy Monday & Happy Halloween!  It's a pretty dreary day here.  The type of day that makes me want to throw this coffee mug out the window and crawl back into bed.  I pretty much have no desire to be awake.  Also, Hubs & I had a pretty eventful weekend and we were both exhausted when we woke up this morning.  I've already drank two cups of coffee in vein, so I've decided I will try to write a great blog post and hopefully that will wake me up!  :)

Like I said, we had a pretty eventful weekend & I hope all of you reading had a good weekend as well.  Friday, after work, was just a normal night in.  Pork chops for dinner, we watched Game 7, and went to bed because he had to work Saturday morning.  After he got off work Saturday afternoon we started getting ready to go up to his parents house.  They live about two hours away and threw us a party Saturday.  They wanted to have a Meet-&-Greet party so that their friends who weren't invited to our small wedding could meet me.  Before we left, we got into a little squabble that turned into something bigger.  I'd made him angry without realizing it, but he didn't want to talk about it.  He said "let's just go ahead to my parents house and get this little charade over with."

Ouch.  Charade?

We talked about that a little... he brought up how we never talked about or resolved any of our issues.  We just pretended like they didn't happen.  He told me a lot about the way I had been making him feel...and it really broke my heart.  I had no idea I made him feel so...BAD sometimes.  It really opened my eyes and I am glad he shared with me, even though it was hard to hear some of his feelings.  I do encourage you all to ask your husbands some hard questions this week...questions you don't really want to know the answers to.  I feel like it really helped our marriage for him to confess how badly I can hurt him sometimes, and for me to sincerely apologize.  I can already tell a significant difference in our relationship and it's only been two days since this talk.  I cried, I was emotional, but I had HURT my HUSBAND.  I had caused my soul mate pain...what a horrible feeling.  I had disappointed him and I resented myself.  But, without that knowledge I can't fix my actions.  We went to the party as planned, but I was really beating myself up.  I wanted our marriage to be perfect again!  What an unrealistic expectation.. But...it's still what I want.  My husband said some very true words during our talk.

The party....it was tough at first, to put on my party face and smile like everything is perfect.  Pretending to be in the honeymoon phase is pretty difficult when you are many, many miles away from the honeymoon.  It's not only difficult, it's very sad.  Everyone was asking, "how's married life?!"  They only wanted to hear the good things.

Eventually, the "charade" became easier and easier.  And then it became real affection.  It was almost like he accepted that I was trying, I accepted that he was trying.  We accepted that we are going to "try" in different ways.  We had a nice time at the party.  We escaped for a few minutes to take a bathroom break & warm up inside his parent's house.  We talked for a few minutes.  I was feeling very anxious, but during our little sneak-away chat he comforted me and promised that he loves me always and that we will always be together.  It was like hot chocolate for my soul.  It warmed me from the inside out and was exactly what I needed to hear in that moment.

We snuggled that night and fell asleep.  We made an improvement.

Sunday, we went to church together at the church we went to when we dated & lived in the city.  Then, we ate lunch together at Ruby Tuesday, where we first met and fell in love.       

THEN, we went to Wal-Mart and bought some stuff for our Halloween costumes.  And made it home just in time to get ready for the Night Service at our church...which just happened to be our final shower!  :D  No more wedding showers for us!  While we loved the gifts and all of the love & support, we are both tired of writing thank you notes and unpacking!

I guess the short version of this story would have been..."we're okay."  I love my husband, he loves me, & we are getting better and better at marriage with each passing day!  Not to say that marriage is easy, and our marriage is nowhere close to being perfect.  But we value each other, we value our love, and we are really starting to learn that if this is going to work we are going to have to not just love each other every day.  We have to MARRY each other each day.  We have to try and try and try.  Trying once is not enough.  Our love is not enough.  Love is pretty flimsy stuff in terms of being a foundation for marriage.  It's a learning process and a growing process.

DIY Fancy Chalkboard

I worked on this project for what felt like a long time, but I am so pleased with the final outcome!  There are tons of tutorials on the world wide web for painting things with chalkboard paint, so I am aware that this is nothing "new" or "exclusive."  However, I consider my craft to be a FANCY CHALKBOARD and that is a little different from the norm.  :)  This mirror has been around for years.... my parents had it hanging in their living room.  They remodeled their home and this gorgeous mirror got stuck in the garage.  So, when I moved out of their house and into an apartment, the mirror came with me and thus began our travels.  We shared several homes together and it was the focal point of every living room I've ever had.  However, my new husband and I are living in the house I grew up in because my parents have moved into a smaller home.  So...back to square one:  beautiful mirror, but because of the remodeling my parents did several years back, there is nowhere for it to hang.  I decided that if I turned it into a chalk board it would be more versatile and could go pretty much anywhere.  So, that's what I did.

Start out by cleaning your mirror.  

I used Rust-oleum chalk board paint.

Make sure to stir your paint really well!  I forgot to get a paint stick, so I just used a cheap wooden spoon I had around.  :)  I am painting a mirror that has a bordering frame, so I started painting the borders using a small paint brush.  The mirror was attached to the frame and there was no way of separating them.  It got a little messy, so I'd encourage anybody doing a similar project to use something that has a removable frame.

Even though I didn't "stay inside the lines," the finished product looks perfectly imperfect.  It worked out.  :)

After I painted all of the boarders

After you've used a smaller brush to get close to the frame, fill in the rest with chalk board paint by using a much larger brush.  Luckily my husband helped me, because it took forever.  We needed four coats of paint to cover the mirror completely, and I later learned that we should have sanded down the mirror first.

• It takes four days for the paint to dry completely and be used as a chalk board
• The back of the pain can said to drag a piece of chalk across the finished chalkboard before writing it on.  Erase the chalk, and now your chalkboard is ready!

Below is a picture of the FINISHED PRODUCT!  and I even got it done in time to use it at our "Sweetest Day" dinner party!

We had it out on the porch for our guests to see as they arrived and it was such a nice touch!  Everyone was impressed and I think it really dressed up the chalk board!  Now, I have it sitting in the foyer by the front door, as pictured below:

P.S.  God Gave Me You was our wedding song.  I ran out of ideas of stuff to write on the board that day.  But, it is very versatile and I love it!  :)  It makes me smile every time I see it and I hope that if you choose to make a Fancy Chalkboard, you'll enjoy yours as well!