Panama City Beach, FL 2016

Hi everyone! We have had a crazy month already between being in Florida twice in two weeks and me getting adjusted to my new job and getting ready for school to start that I am just now having time to finally get this post up!

I did something new with this trip though, I made a video blog (vlog) of the trip! I will link it below! I had so much fun making the video and will definitely be making more of them :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUEjWH8R3oE

Anyway, this year we stayed at the same condo as last year except this time we had 8 people instead of 6. My sister and her husband came along, my parents, Alec and his girlfriend Kati, and myself and Austin! It's the first trip in a long time that my sister came which was fun! 

We spent a lot more time relaxing on the beach this year and except one day we rented a pontoon boat to go out to Shell Island! We rented our boat from Aquatic Adventures ( http://www.pcbeachadventures.com/) we already plan on doing it again next year! We were able to anchor on the island, grill out, swim and snorkel!

Another day we also rented tubes again, as we did last year, to float down a near by river! We rented from the same place as last year and would recommend it to anyone! The man who brings your tubes and picks you up is so nice and friendly. Also leaving the link to their website, they have a bunch of different rental options!   http://www.chipolariveroutfitters.com/

Of course we went down to Pier Park a couple of times over the week to get ice cream and shop.

Lucky for us it only really rained one day and that still didn't stop us from enjoying the day!

Below I am going to insert some more pictures from our trip and a video tour of our condo! :)

Our condo, Aquavista!

What Your Mom Didn't Tell You About Waxing....But Mine Did

Hello everyone! Welcome back! Today I'm jumping a little into the beauty side of my blog and am going to be talking about body waxing. I thought this would be a good topic with the summer being right around the corner! As some of you know my mom has been a licensed esthetician for about two years now, so lucky me I get free waxing services right at home! When my mom was in school I was her guinea pig at times resulting in having just about every wax you could wonder about. In this post I'm just going to share some tips and tricks that I have learned over the last few years when it comes to waxing!

1. Don't get waxed a few days before your period, on your period or the first couple days afterward. And this isn't for the reasons you may be thinking..it's actually because your skin is more sensitive and is more prone to lifting (skin sorta tearing off, nothing major just hurts a bit!). This doesn't just come into play when getting a bikini wax or Brazilian, the skin on your face will be more sensitive too!

2. They do make numbing spray and yes it does make a difference, below is a link to the one I love and use :)

• http://www.amazon.com/Gigi-Anesthetic-Numbing-Spray- Ounce/dp/B0030ZRSDY/ref=sr_1_1_a_it?ie=UTF8&qid=1462592289&sr=8-1&keywords=gigi+anesthetic+numbing+spray

3. Bikini vs. Brazilian...if you ask for a bikini wax, you will just be getting your bikini line hair removed. You can always ask to get a little more just to make sure your comfortable with how much your swimsuit will cover. If you ask for a Brazilian...be prepared to get ALL of your hair removed. You can always tell your esthetician before hand that you want to start with a bikini and work your way toward a Brazilian. The pain level is totally bearable and with every time it will get better, promise.

4. Before any waxing, let the hair grow to about the length of a grain of rice (it has to be long enough for the wax to attach to)

5. If you have sensitive skin, ask if there is a soy wax available. It is much softer and sticks to the hair and not the skin (similar to hard wax), so it results in less irritation.

6. DO NOT GET WAXED AT A TYPICAL NAIL SALON. I can't tell you how many times I have gone to the nail salon here in town and the woman who did my nails offers to wax my eyebrows...most people there are not licensed to do waxing. Go to a salon and spa that offers waxing services professionally, or a beauty school (where the teacher is licensed) or go to a licensed esthetician who has an at home studio

Waxing is so much better for your skin than shaving and it lasts a lot longer than a shave does too! 

If you have any questions about waxing feel free to comment and if I don't know the answer I will go to the expert..aka my mom Bridget :)  

Blog Update and a New Found Fave :)

Hello Everyone!

I have been absent on here for a couple weeks but I’m working on coming back! During the passed few weeks I have been busy with work and school just starting up, but now that I know what my workload is going to be for this semester I am going to try to post at least once a week! Hopefully twice if I can!

This brings me to a small problem though, for the majority of 2015 Austin and I were traveling at least once a month, usually more, so that always gave me tons to write about…this year is going to be a little different. With January already slipping away Austin and I are jumping into a new project…APARTMENT HUNTING! With spending time searching and soon having to make trips to go walk through places, we are not going to be traveling much at all. We might have some small trips here and there (and plenty to Champaign) but definitely not as much as last year since we both want to work as much as we can and save up as much money as we can. This is however going to allow me to jump into another side of blogging more beauty, fitness and lifestyle posts, which I am beyond excited about! I hope you guys enjoy it J

Speaking of beauty products, I want to jump right in and tell you all about a new favorite beauty product of mine…coconut oil. 

I actually didn’t even know what coconut oil was up until a couple of years ago, but I still didn’t know what to use it for besides cooking. In the last few weeks or so I began to look up more information about it and came to find out that there are SO SO MANY uses for it that I never would’ve thought of!

My most frequent use for coconut oil is for make up remover. It works great! I mainly only use it for my eye makeup and it takes everything off (I have yet to try it with waterproof mascara). I just take a tiny bit and start to rub it all over my eyelid and eyelashes, it makes a black mess on your face but I always end up using a makeup wipe for my other makeup anyway and that takes the black mess right off!

After using it on my eyes and taking the rest of my makeup off I use it for a moisturizer. I typically only do this at night just because it does take a little longer to soak in but it leaves my face hydrated and super soft!

You don’t just have to use it on your face though; I also started using it for body lotion! Winter months are hard on our skin (so is my hot tub), so it definitely helps to use coconut oil. It takes a little longer to absorb than lotion does, so it is keeping your skin more hydrated.

I only talked about 3 ways to use coconut oil but the possibilities are endless! If you simply just type into pinterest “uses for coconut oil” you will find sooooo many pins with great ideas! I have a small list on my phone of ones that I think could work and be beneficial that I cant wait to try in the next couple of weeks!

Highlights of 2015

2015 was a year of a lot of change and ups and downs but I can definitely say the good outweighed the bad! I wanted to make a post of something that stood out to me in every month

January
I feel like January is always an uneventful month for me haha I hate winter and the weather always sucks in northern Illinois. One exciting thing that did happen is that I made it onto the deans list and invited to an honor society for having a 4.0 GPA for my first semester of college!

February
From 2015 and on, February will always be special to me because Austin and I started dating on the 20th. We spent the whole day in Chicago freezing our butts off and I almost turned him down when he asked me while we were ice skating because I was supposed to be leaving in August (sorry Aust) but I ended up saying yes and that's all that matters :) one of the best decisions that I've made :)

March
One of my favorite memories of March again involves Austin (notice there will probably be a trend going on). Toward the end of March, Austin and I took our first little trip together, little did we know that in the next few months we would go on 8 more trips to 9 more towns in 6 different states!

April
In April, Alec and I got to go spend a weekend with Mama Sue and Grandpa Jim to celebrate Mama Sue's birthday :) I always love going to Wisconsin to visit. The weekend always consists of a lot of naps and SUPER YUMMY food!

 May
May was a pretty exciting month. I finished my first year of college, had my sisters bachelorette party and Austin and I took another trip! My sister's bachelorette night was so much fun. We went out for dinner and then went indoor rollerskating and bowling! A week or so after that Austin and I were on a plane to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for a long weekend! That was our first far trip away together and we made it out alive ;)

June
June 5th..MY SISTER GOT MARRIED! She had such a cute little wedding and I'm so happy with how it all turned out for her! I got to make my first wedding cake, which was pretty nerve racking but I think it turned out pretty good if I do say so myself ;) It was such a fun day getting ready with all of the girls, seeing my sister marry her best friend and then Austin and I had a blast at the reception!

July
We went on another trip...surprise surprise ;) we headed to Ohio this time to visit Paige and Chuck! Had a blast as always! And at the end of the month we get to celebrate John's 97th birthday!

August
Every summer my family takes a trip to Florida for about a week, this year we went to Panama City Beach! I brought along Austin and Alec brought his girlfriend McKenna! It was such a fun vacation! We spent majority of the time walking the beach and at the pool, we also went on a jet ski tour and parasailing! Since we drove two separate cars this year, Austin and I decided to take a detour on the way home and stay in Nashville for a whole 36 hours haha

September
This was a bittersweet month for me. We got to celebrate my grandma Judy's 74th birthday! We had a pretty big party and she had such a fun, happy day. She got to see so many people, majority of the grand-kids, her great grand-kids, her brother from Tennessee and lots of friends :) unfortunately this was the last birthday we would get to celebrate with her, but at least it was a great one. A few days after the birthday party, my sister and I ran our first half marathon together in the Quad Cities! We kicked ass of course and finished in 2 hours and 32 minutes!

October
I feel like October was a super busy/exciting month. Austin and I went to Missouri to visit one of our best friends, Ash :) that was such a good long weekend trip! The following weekend Austin surprised me with another trip to Galena to celebrate my birthday and MY PRACTICALLY OTHER SISTER GOT ENGAGED!

November
This was the fastest and roughest month of the year. My grandma passed away November 2nd. I don't really know what else to say about that at the moment besides the fact that I miss her a ridiculous amount and not a day goes by that I don't think about her. This is one of my favorite pictures of her.

December 
This month I would say the most exciting things that happened were Christmas and New Years. This Christmas was a Christmas of firsts, first Christmas with Austin, first with his family and the first Christmas that I got to spend with Mama Sue and Jim! As for New Year's Eve, Austin and I drove down to Champaign to stay the night with Hannah and John :)

 If you're still reading this super long post thank you for enjoying my year with me :) This year had so many surprises and it makes me so excited to see what next year brings! I already know of a few things that will be in this type of post for next year ;)
A lot of the things I mentioned in here I have already written a blog post about so make sure to check those out for more fun pictures :)