About Me

My photo
I created this blog as a way to "Keep up with the Joneses"! We feel so blessed to get to spend everyday together and my hope is that this blog is a way for us to look back and remember our journey together! I know this will evolve and I cannot wait to see what it turns in to. I have recently added my side business on to the blog. I taking a leap of faith with my photography and cannot wait to see what happens. I hope you enjoy!

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Whole 30

Well Jeffrey and I along with our best friends James and Krista are taking on the whole 30 challenge. It is supposed to change the way we think about food and what we are putting in our bodies. Since getting married we have kind of been eating whatever whenever we want. So we are hoping that this challenge will help instill better habits. It is a Paleo based challenge which basically means no BREAD, CHEESE or SUGARS (except fruit). It is actually a lot more detailed than that check it out here Whole 30  We will be doing this for the next 30 days..luckily we end in just enough time for BOSTON (we can eat whatever we want there). It is nice to have our friends cheering us on and to hold us accountable. We are hoping to loose weight and tone up a bit (as we will add exercise back into our lives as well), but really hopeful that we start to treat our bodies better. Krista and I (mainly Krista) meal planned 30 days worth of recipes. As we try them I will share them on here because they will be WHOLE 30 approved which is all natural and good for you. I will post throughout the process and a final post with results. Hopefully we see some major change! Will you take the challenge?


Thankful for eating healthy,

MJ

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Happy Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day! Thank you to all that have and are currently serving our country. Especially my sweet Dad! At the National Cemetery in Dallas in honor of Memorial day 28,000 flags were put on display. Thanks to my mom and Annie I got some awesome pictures! 



Thankful for service to our country, 

MJ 

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Thankful Thursday

Well I almost forgot to blog today, but thankfully I did not forget. This week I've felt a bit overwhelmed with life. Not sure why, but my prayer this week has been for peace. So here it goes... This week I'm thankful for: 1. God's plan for my life 2. A sleepover with my mom and sister two nights in a row! (lots of Pinterest projects in progress..will post soon) 3. A Saturday with my best friend filled with pampering and shopping 4. A three day weekend and only 8 work days left 5. New running shoes from Jeffrey (hopefully this will help my motivation) Thankful for the life God has given me, MJ

Monday, May 21, 2012

Jeffrey's 26th Birthday

Happy 26th Birthday Jeffrey! Yesterday we celebrated my sweet husbands 26th birthday. Actually we made an entire weekend out of celebrating him. I am so thankful for the day that he was born and the man that he is. I hope this next year is the best one yet and filled with many blessings. I love you Jeffrey! Here is a weekend recap:

Friday: We walked down the street (literally) to downtown Grapevine for Main Street Days. We met up with our friend Jess to just check it out. We did not stay long, but since we live so close and it was FREE we decided we should at least give a try. We then spent the evening relaxing, eating pizza and watching a movie gearing up for the festivities to begin!


Main Street Days 


 Pizza Bagels 

Saturday: We woke up bright and early. Jeffrey cleaned out the entire garage (fun birthday right?), it looks amazing and he loves doing that sort of thing. We then headed to Ft. Worth for lunch and to meet everyone at the RAHR brewery. Which if you have not been and you have a free Saturday you should check it out. Then we headed downtown to check into our hotel/refresh before heading to the Ft. Worth Food park. This is basically like an alley filled with food trucks. It was beautiful weather, great company and yummy food. We will definitely be going back there. After that we went with the Jeffrey's on a stroll through down town and to our favorite spot (Flying Saucer) where we had great conversation and yummy pretzels (you must try these if you have never had one). It was a great day to celebrate Jeffrey and James (James's birthday was at the beginning of May). It has become a tradition to do a joint celebration for the boys. We had a blast! 

Headed to Ft. Worth 

AJ recommended this amazing DELI 


Rahr Brewery: 






Food Park 





Downtown 

Sunday: The four of us (James, Krista, Jeffrey and I) woke up and had breakfast and enjoyed coffee on the patio of our hotel. We then went to church where Mark and Lauren met up with us and to try out EATZIS in Grapevine. It just opened and it is amazing..a bit overwhelming, but so fun. We all sampled and grabbed our lunch then headed back to our house to eat. Since it was Jeffrey's actual birthday the two of us decided that Braums was a must so we went to Braums and to see the Avengers (which surprisingly I really enjoyed). Great way to end an incredible weekend.. not to mention to Eclipse happened on his birthday (we missed it because of cloud coverage) but saw some incredible pictures of it (from our Amarillo peeps). It was such a special weekend celebrating such a special man. 

Eatzis 



Eclipse 


Happy 26th Birthday Jeffrey! 

Thankful for Jeffrey's Birthday, 

MJ 






Thursday, May 17, 2012

Thankful Thursday

God is so good and to him I give all the Glory. This week  I am thankful for....

1.This weekend I get to celebrate my favorite person's birthday! Jeffrey turns 26 on Sunday and we have a fun filled weekend planned! (post to come)

2. I got to have a week day dinner date with my best friend and accountability partner Krista (it is nice to have someone to question, challenge and encourage me in my goals and walk with Jesus)

3. That throughout all the craziness of the semester I managed to keep my 4.0 (not trying to brag) this school year has been crazy to say the least (getting married, changing careers, being a newly wed) and I managed to keep my grades up. Only 12 hours left until graduation!

4. Only 13 work days left until Summer vacation

5. A game of kickball we played with a bunch of Colleyville/Grapevine YL kids on Monday night (that I am still sore from.. can you say out of shape?)
Headed to Kickball! 


6. Bonus this week: I am extra thankful to have three weeks off of going to classes to just enjoy life



Thankful for the life God has blessed me with,

MJ

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

The YEAR of the BEAR

SIC EM!!!! 
Baylor will ALWAYS have a special place in my heart for many reasons: my dad went there, I got to spend two years here with Annie, I met my BEST FRIENDS there, I got an amazing education, I got to be a part of an incredible group of women PI BETA PHI and I met the love of my life (Jeffrey). It really is an AMAZING place and I enjoyed every minute of the 4 years I spent there. I will ALWAYS love BU, but this year has been incredible for the bears! Hope you enjoy this video clip of what Baylor Nation accomplished this year! 



Thankful for Baylor, 

MJ 

'SIC EM

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Mother's Day Weekend

We had a fabulous Mother's Day weekend. The Joneses came in from Amarillo so we got to celebrate with both of our moms which made the weekend very special. We feel so lucky to have two incredible women in our life that we call MOM. We love them very much and are so thankful for all they do for us! We hope they felt very special this weekend and realized how much we appreciate them. Here is a weekend recap: 

Friday: The Joneses got into town and we grilled steaks. It was so fun to have them over for dinner. We had great conversation and just relaxed at home.

Saturday: The boys left bright and early at 4:30 to head to Lake Texoma for their fishing trip. Cathey and I had breakfast on main street then headed out for shopping. We hit up the Apple store, Allen outlets (we got great sales here), then back to main street to shop some of the adorable stores and we sampled some amazing chocolate cinnamon coffee. It was so fun to spend the day with Cathey. We always have so much fun! We ended our day with lunch at Panera (her fav) then back to meet the boys. The boys were exhausted from waking up so early, but they got their second wind after we watched our wedding slideshow (for the thousandth time) and of course made a trip to Paciugo. We then headed to Chef Point cafe (check out diners drive inns and dives for more info), it was a super looonnng wait, but SOOO worth it! 
At Chef Point Cafe 

The CHEF! 

Waiting outside

Our long but worth it wait 

 Paciugo--Wedding Cake 


The BEST cheese fries I have ever had! 


Sunday: We headed to Compass and then to take Cathey for Mother's Day Lunch. Then we had quite the adventure going to the Game day Fan Fest so Rich could get a baseball appraised. While we waited we had so much fun getting yogurt, shopping around and attending an open house (WE LOVE DOING THIS). It was sad to say good bye. That always seems to be the worst part of our weekend, but the positive is we will see them again in 3 weeks for our trip to AMARILLO to meet our new nephew BENNETT! Then we headed over to my mom's to have dinner and celebrate her. Annie cooked an incredible dinner and we had a great time hanging out. 
Happy Mothers Day! 

The Joneses 


 Yummy dinner 



 Happy Mothers Day 

The Chef 

Our weekend was a blast and we loved getting to celebrate two incredible women! :) 

Thankful for my mom and Cathey, 

MJ 

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Thankful Thursday

Today I am thankful for... 

1. My sweet Mom

2. The Jones family coming in town from Amarillo to spend the weekend with us.

3. A week that involved having no class and no plans

4.  A great new co worker/friend

5. 16 days until SUMMER!


Thankful for all of my many blessings,

MJ


Wednesday, May 9, 2012

FIESTA

This past weekend was Cinco De Mayo. We had been planning for a very long time to host a FIESTA during our normal community group time. To say that I was excited was an understatement. We got tons of amazing Fiesta pieces as wedding gifts that I could not wait to use, I love having people over and spending the evening with our community group is always a good time. My mom and sister helped me shop for the decorations and sweet Kendall came over early to help me finalize everything for the FIESTA. Instead of giving you a play by play I will just let my pictures do the talking... so here we go.. the JONES 1st ANNUAL FIESTA!!!!!

 Entrance to the Party 





















Sweet Babies in our Community Group 




It was an AMAZING evening! For more pics check out my fb album! 



Thankful for being able to celebrate,

MJ