Simplicity

I came across this challenge on another blog and I'm not sure that I'll be able to devote time to post about one of these every day, but I thought it might be a fun challenge for February.

Today's challenge is Simplicity (as it relates to honoring why you are dedicated to your health). Well, today's act of simplicity for me has to be my plans for eating healthy this evening. My sweet Daniel is going to help at the Brother Bryan ministry tonight so I'll be on my own for a bit. I've reserved a copy of Bringing Up Baby to watch and I've got some rotisserie chicken, green beans, and a honey biscuit with my name on it. I've found that keeping a weekly meal menu (something I learned from my mom) really helps me stay on track for cooking meals every night. I also know that if a recipe involves too many ingredients (or obscure/hard to find ingredients) I'm probably not going to make it. Simplicity and organization are key for me, personally, to stay on track with not only cooking, but also for eating right.

Do you have any tips on living/eating simply?

Happy Wednesday!

Love,
Laura

Mom & Dad Logan came to town!

A few weeks back we had the privilege of having Mom & Dad Logan come for a weekend visit! We really enjoyed that special time with them and appreciated them driving to see us, sleeping on an air mattress, and sharing a tiny bathroom. That is true love!

When they arrived on Saturday we headed over to Moss Rock Preserve in Hoover which turned out to only be about 10 minutes from our apartment. A friend of mine recommended this park and I'm so glad we took the time to explore it! It was hard to believe that such a beautiful, grand park could only be a few minutes from a busy city highway. Truly a diamond in the rough.

We explored for a bit and then found a nice, flat rock to sit on to eat our picnic lunch.

Enjoying our picnic atop a rock! (Top: Mom & Dad, Bottom: Laura & Daniel)

                              

After lunch we had fun exploring and hiking and all really enjoyed that time out in God's great creation.

Isn't he cute??

Once we had worn ourselves out from walking around we headed back towards home where we stopped at the Library in the Forest (the awesome library just up the road from our apartment). I know I had to have sounded like a total nerd to suggest taking my parents-in-love to the library, but it is just too cool not to share! I have to admit that I go there at least once a week. (My Sunday afternoon routine usually involves taking a nap and then spending a good bit of time at the library..). Once we got to the library we had fun showing them around and ended up renting some DVD's to watch that night after supper.

We had a good dinner together and afterwards we all retreated to the living room to watch one of the movies that we rented. We ended up picking Out of Africa. It was an excellent movie! Spoiler alert: it was a little bit sad, but it really was a great movie with excellent acting, beautiful scenery and exotic animals. Despite the feeling of melancholy after watching the movie I think we all enjoyed it overall.

We are so grateful for that time we got to have together with Mom & Dad Logan! We love having family come stay with us. It was a fun weekend filled with great memories!

Jacob's visit

As the weekend aproaches, it brings to mind some of the fun we've had the past few weekends. One such weekend was back about 2 weeks ago when Daniel's brother, Jacob, came for a visit!

Jacob got in on Friday evening and after some catching up we started watching The Hunger Games. I'm pretty lame and wound up falling asleep about 30 minutes into the movie and woke up right at the end. The guys tell me they enjoyed it, though. Anywho, the next day we had fun hanging out at our apartment, later the guys went to a movie, and then that afternoon we had fun exploring Five Points.

Our first stop was Charlemagne Records. We had a lot of fun sifting through old albums and cassettes and finding new releases as well. Daniel found a rare Beatles record (I think it was like $200!!), but most of the music there is incredibly reasonably priced. It is just a fun place to explore. The people who work there are so nice and will even special order music for you if you don't find what you're looking for. Daniel bought a John Coltrane CD and we enjoyed listening to that in the car on our way home.

The guys looking through some records..

Inside of Charlemagne Records

Left: Jacob & Daniel in the stairwell, Right: Daniel and I outside of the store

After leaving the record store we decided to walk around and explore some more of the area. My friend, Stormy, once told me that if she had to pick a last meal it would be from The Pancake House. I hadn't seen this before so it was a nice surprise to find the restaurant she was referencing. We'll have to go back and try it some time. (I feel like if someone tells you they would choose a certain restaurant for their last meal you should probably take that recommendation to heart.. just sayin').

As we headed further into Five Points we came across a beautiful church and a statue of Brother Bryan (there is a men's ministry named for him in Birmingham). We planned to explore the church a little bit, so I took this picture of the guys and we were going to head across the street.

While the guys were looking at the statue I looked across the street at the church. About that time I noticed that there were some guys who looked like they were about to get into a fight- and one was not wearing any pants. Soooo.... we cut our exploration short and went home. Hahaha! We often feel like country mice in the big city and afternoons like that are part of the reason why.

We really enjoyed having Jacob here for the weekend and can't wait for him to come visit again! The leaves here have changed and are so beautiful.. anyone want to come visit next?