Currently Loving Life, Home, and Coffee. Seriously.

Life has been a whirlwind lately—a crazy, fantastic, awesome, and very, very busy whirlwind. Earlier this month my mom and I embarked on a five-day road trip with two littles…AND WE SURVIVED!  Actually, we thrived. I expected and planned for the worst (the iPad was out of storage, because I stuffed it with all sorts of Disney movies and the toddler’s favorite cartoons, and I over-packed snacks and pull-ups in case of accidents), but somehow we didn’t need to use any of my reserved emergency stash. Get this: the only tears we had were when weather and traffic delayed us one night by an hour and I got a little hangry. Yeah, the tears were from me, go figure.

But now we’re “home” in New Mexico, and things are wonderful. I’m eating lots of chile, hanging out with family, seeing friends, and just enjoying life. It’d be even better if my husband was here with us, but since he’s off doing military stuff, this is the next best thing. Follow my vacation adventure over on Instagram and Facebook!

In the meantime, I’m currently…

• Happy, because I’m back home.
(See the first two paragraphs, but..) Being back in New Mexico is simply delightful. My senses come alive when I’m here, and I feel rejuvenated. Yeah, home is where the heart is, but home for us will always be in Albuquerque. Stay tuned as I spam your feeds (and this blog) with all of my favorite things (i.e. mostly food) from home.

• Playing “Nurse Mama.”
Julia randomly got sick overnight, and I don’t know why. We all ate the same thing, but something is certainly upsetting her little tummy. On the bright side, she’s being super cuddly and just wants to be held and loved. On the downside, her little sister also wants to be held and loved, but I need to keep them away from each other so Maddie won’t get sick. I’m loving the affection from both of them, but I just need to figure out how to direct it when one of them is sick.

• Lusting over this sweatshirt, seriously.
It’s pretty much the epitome of perfect: the speckled-hued color, the slouchiness, the pocket {!!}, the words, the font, the heart—LOVE. I seriously really need it in my life. I was going to put it on my Christmas list this year, but I think I need it before then.

• Going to live until I’m 91 years old (give or take).
So there’s this life expectancy quiz from AAFMAA (a non-profit that provides financial services to military communities), and it was actually pretty fun to take. As an Air Force wife, I’m all about supporting organizations that help the military. But back to the quiz: not only was it simple, interactive, and easy to use, but it was really informative. The tool takes different categories of your life into consideration to factor your life expectancy, and for each category it gives you little tidbits of information (from reputable sources) about how you can easily better your life for that section. Take it here, and then tell me how long you’re expected to live in the comments.

• Eating ALL the chile.
If we’re eating out, or dining in for that matter, there’s a 97% chance some sort of chile is on my plate. It’s chile season here, and the smell of roasted chile is intoxicating and amazing and my favorite thing EVER. Oh, and fun fact: one medium-sized chile has more vitamin C than six oranges, so yay for boosting my immunity and helping me, essentially, live longer 🙂 I also have 50 Ziploc bags of fresh roasted chile in our freezer here ready to make the trek back to our freezer in Georgia.

• Coffee shop hopping.
You guys, I have babysitters here! AND THEY’RE FREE! Grandparents are the best, and since we typically live very, very far away from them, they’re all eager to hang out with their grand babies, which means I get some time to myself! I’ve been checking out local coffee shops, and getting work done while they’re off having fun with the grandparents. It’s a win/win for everyone. (Except I still miss them something fierce while we’re away from each other.)

• Excited for the weekend.
We’re going up north to Red River, New Mexico, for a couple days. My whoooooole family’s been going up there on the same weekend for the past two decades (at least), and it’s the perfect way to get away from it all. Plus, I’m ridiculously excited about the fall weather they’re experiencing—time to finally break out the long-sleeves and scarves!

• Obsessing over this book.
I have it in the actual book form—as opposed to on my Kindle “Light-Bright edition”—so it’s taking me a little longer to read it since I need two hands (and really, how often does a mom with two littles have both hands free? Exactly). But seriously, whenever I do get my hands on “For the Love,” my life changes. I basically want to be best friends with Jen (Hatmaker, the author, but we’re clearly on a first-name basis, so I can call her that), because she writes the way I think, and I feel this electrifying connection with her words. Everything she says just makes sense in a practical way. Not to mention that I just feel good after reading this, even if I can only manage to squeeze in a page or two here and there.

• Ready for TGIT to start again.
Well, just Scandal, because I’m over Grey’s. I’m happy NCIS is back on, and I need to find out when Jane the Virgin starts up again. I’m looking for some new shows to watch—Quantico sounds pretty good, but other than that, I’m not sure what else is starting. What prime-time shows are you ready for?

• Planning my girls’ weddings.
What’s that? Oh, you think it’s too early to plan their wedding? Nope. Not when one of your best friends has a little boy who is just a month older than your daughter. I called dibs on him for Madilyn, and clearly she already has googly eyes for him. I’m totally okay with her little crush.

*Thank you AAFMAA for sponsoring today’s post. All opinions were my own.

Whew! Lots of stuff going on over here. What are you currently up to these days?