Sun Worshiper

My little guy is a sun worshiper. 

Just like his Mama.

He tends to follow me from room to room.  But no matter what room I'm in, he finds that little bit of sunshine to lay in. 

A dog after my own heart.

I think there's a chance we both suffer from seasonal affective disorder.

** And on another doggie note, obedience classes start tonight.  Wish us luck!

Pumpkin Patch

I really look forward to October every year.  For some reason sweatshirt weather, pumpkin spice lattes, the leaves changing color, pumpkin carving, Halloween costumes, my birthday, and Hocus Pocus just warm my heart.  For the last two years, we've kinda had to make due without the fall festivities and I've been okay with that because, well, we've been living in foreign countries.  And that's pretty fun too.  But it is sure nice to be able to celebrate fall with all my regular traditions this year. 

We finally had some cooler weather this past week and so Josh and I kicked off fall with a trip to the local pumpkin patch today.  The pumpkin patch, conveniently named, The Pumpkin Patch at Live Oak Canyon is by far the most decked out patch I've ever been too.  It was complete with a tractor, corn maze, gift shop, bounce house, petting zoo, band, food, and every kind of pumpkin available.  You could literally spend all day there.  Our friends Nick and Amy joined us as well as our doggie child Doyle.  We had a really fun time!  It was a much needed day date for Josh and I.

They had some beautiful sunflower fields!

Running away with his "pumpkins."

Amy, Nick, and the Scurlock family

Look closely, Doyle's in the middle.

My handsome little pup.

Josh even suggested we get a bale of hay to properly display our pumpkins!  A man after my own heart. :)

We plan to carve them once it gets a little closer to Halloween.  As for now, they are displayed proudly on our front porch for all our apartment complex to see.

Are you planning to carve pumpkins this year?

Feeling a bit nostalgic...

...what else is new?

Today, my good SO friend Sarah (whom I've now lived near in 3 different countries) and I went to a restaurant in Redlands called Dhat Island, Caribbean-Creole Cuisine.  Yup, "daht."  We were both aching for a touch of island in our lives and any place with the word "daht" in the name is most definitely islandish. 

The food was great, a lot yummier than some of my island food experiences.  Who knew that seeing plaintains on a menu would make me both happy and sad at the same time? 

It's always nice to have someone around that understands the life you've lived for the past two years as the spouse of a medical student and who's living a similar one now.  Someone who's trying to deal with transitions just like you are.

I don't want to live in the past, I want to seize hold of the here and now.

But of course, I couldn't help coming home from lunch and looking through old pictures of the Limes kids and watching videos of sweet Kyla, sassy Shanika, and silly Miguel.  It's impossible not to miss children that made perhaps the biggest impact on my life thus far.

I'm saving my pennies to go back to Grenada for a visit.  Anybody want to pitch in? :)

Come on in...

...to our home.

We've been living in Redlands for almost two months, but I'm just getting to this post because decorating takes time and well, money.  While I have loads of the first, the latter is typically lacking. 

However, Josh and I were blessed with so many wonderful wedding gifts that had been un-used and in storage for 2 years and family who gave us "IOU" gifts in the form of money once we got back to the states that I have been able to (for the most part) completely furnish our apartment.

I really enjoy home decorating and I could spend hours in stores like Target, Home Goods, World Market, Pier 1, Marshalls, Pottery Barn, and Crate and Barrel.  Most if not all of our home furnishings came from these stores. So without further ado, here is our Home Sweet Home.

When you walk in, you have the dining area/kitchen to the right and the living room to the left.  The washer and dryer (an absolute must for me) are straight ahead down the hallway with the bathroom to the right of the hallway and the bedroom to the left.

 I'm STILL trying to organize this etagere but I keep playing with different things in different spots.  Any ideas for what I could put on the top shelf are welcome!



Mom made me these curtains to match my chairs.  Find out about bottle flower vases HERE

An Anthropologie splurge

Here's the living room.

My Grenada wall; not there in person but always in my heart.

Our patio that you can enter by either the living room or bedroom.

DIY twine "S" post HERE



My plants that are coming back to life!

Next up is our bedroom.

This adorable table was a Home Goods purchase on a whim.

Walmart dresser put together by Mom and yours truly.



I'm not kidding, the closet is bursting at the seams.  Our My biggest worry about getting a one bedroom apartment was closet space, but thankfully, it DID all fit.



One year anniversary (paper) gift; all the places we've been cut out of maps.  Learn how HERE

Pottery Barn Hurricane with Grenada fillings.

 And, here's what Doyle was doing while I was taking pictures and writing this post.


We are crate training to help with separation anxiety and so far it is going well.
 

So, that's our apartment.  I will post more about it as I continue to fill up wall space and stuff, specifically in our bedroom.  But for now, I am very pleased with how it has all come together.  We don't have a second bedroom, but we do have a couch and floor space and we always love visitors.  :)  I hope you enjoyed our home tour!

Transitions

You'd think I'd be a pro at them by now.

Let me let you in on a little secret...I'm really not. 

But I'm pretty good at hiding it to everyone except my husband.  Poor guy has had to deal with an emotional wreck lately.  I'm sure most of you are familiar with the ugly cry.  You know, the one where your face is all wrinkled up and there is snot dripping from your nose and you can't really understand a word the person is saying because they are about to hyperventilate.   Yeah, if there were an ugly cry award I would win.  Hands. Down.

I've moved to the UK, to the island of Grenada, and back to California in the last two years and for some reason, this transition of being back in America is equally as hard if not harder than it was when I moved to Europe.  I'm not even kidding. 

I'm crazy...seriously.

When Josh and I moved to Newcastle in 2010, I kept saying to myself only two years until we are back in the states.  The move to England wasn't easy.  I missed my family and friends, my car, American food, the sun, my husband and it took at least 4 or 5 months until I felt like I could call it "home."  Maybe it took until Julie moved there.  Ya, I'm pretty sure that was a big part of it.

Then we moved to Grenada and that transition was EASY compared to Newcastle.  We had already made friends (that felt like family), we had Toby, American food was abundant albeit overpriced, I was living in the land of sunshine, my husband was still MIA, but I also found LIMES and in that found my purpose in life on the rock.

And before I had time to blink an eye, the two years abroad were over. 

We've been living back in CA for four months and I am STILL trying to transition back to "normal" life.  This should have been the easy part!  I'm finding ways to fill my time by working at home, blogging, and taking care of my husband and dog but it's been hard.  Harder than I ever expected it to be.  There were nights early on in England when I cried for no reason other than the fact that I missed home and now, I'm back in California and I cry because I miss Grenada.  I can look at a picture, read a status on facebook, or watch a video of Kyla and tears stream down my face.  I'm jealous.  I'm so very jealous of the people who are still on the island, loving on those kids.  And I'm angry.  Angry at the people who are there and aren't loving on them because I wish so bad that I could be.  What is wrong with me!?!? 

I never could have predicted this two years ago.

I've talked to a few girls new to Grenada who are struggling with the transition to the island.  I want those people to know that it's a struggle for most people to deal with transitions. Whether it's moving to an island, starting a new job, ending a relationship, or moving back to your home state, change is just plain tough.  And I've told them it just takes time.  Time to adjust to new surroundings.  Time to make new friends.  Time to find new hobbies.  Time to develop new routines.  Just...time.  And here's the kicker, there's no time limit on time and there's no way to speed it up. Which really sucks by the way.

So I need to follow my own advice.  

Life must move on, move forward.  Change is the only constant and there's no way to run from it.  Especially not while on this medical school journey.  I have to figure out a way to embrace these transitions so that I can be thankful for the experiences I've had and look forward to the experiences that have yet to happen.