Snowy Valentine's Weekend Recap

How was your weekend sweet friends? I hope each of you got to enjoy it with someone you love and had lots of down time to catch up on relaxation! Thank y'all so much for all the sweet comments you left me on Friday's post. I'm so glad that y'all enjoyed looking at pictures of Josh and I through the years! This past weekend I was still in Pennsylvania for the majority of my time. Let me tell y'all, I have seen more snow in the past three weeks then I have in my entire lifetime...and I loved every minute of it! So here is a look into my snowy and fun filled Valentine's weekend:

 We went sledding!

 Lots....

and lots of sledding!

 I spent Valentine's Day handing out these beautiful balloons!

 I learned how to trust those driving on the icy roads

 At the biggest plate of sausage gravy and biscuits twice...yep no regrets here!

And saw the largest icicles that literally formed on every house!
Then yesterday morning I hopped on a plane and am now soaking up the sunshine in good ole' Florida! Stay tuned tomorrow to find out how YOU can impact a little boys life on his upcoming 11th birthday! Happy Monday friends :-)

Five on Friday: Valentine's Edition

Happy Friday and Happy Valentine's Day! I'm excited to be celebrating one of the first major holidays of 2014 and even though I'm not at home, I'm sending lots of extra love back to my favorite people in North Carolina today. Today's a little bittersweet for me as this is the 5th Valentine's Josh and I have celebrated together but also the first that we don't get to be together. 502 miles separate us today but I can promise you that won't stop us from have a wonderfully long Skype date tonight! (Oh modern technology, I am so thankful for you!) So today I'm linking up with my favorite ladies for Five on Friday and I'm doing this post a little differently than normal. Today is all about looking back on the past five Valentine's I've spent with Joshua. Enjoy :-)
one// 2010

Our first Valentine's Day came a little over 3 months into us dating. We spent the weekend in Chapel Hill and got to experience our first snow fall together. We ate dinner at a Japanese restaurant and then had a snowball fight outside his Carolina dorm room. 
two// 2011

Valentine's Day number two was spent having Josh as my date to my sororities date function. The theme was "Famous Couples" so we went as the red and green M&M. Pretty clever right?
three// 2012

By 2012, Josh was interning as a youth pastor so we spent our Valentine's weekend skiing with 30 youth group members in West Virginia. Luckily no broken bones happened! 
four// 2013

Valentine's our senior year of college was celebrated with hearing the acceptance of Josh getting into grad school at Wake Forest! 
five// 2014 And since we aren't together today for me to snap a picture, I made Josh a little surprise montage of many of our pictures together. This is what I sent him earlier today, so if you have 4.5 minutes to spare you can take a little laugh at how much our looks have changed in the past five years!

Valentine's Day 2014 from Alyssa on Vimeo.

Happy Valentine's day to all of you, my sweet sweet friends! 

The Liebster Award

Oh my goodness y'all, my little heart is so excited this Monday morning! I've seen the Liebster Award floating around blog land for the past few months and always dreamed that someone would pass it on to me. Well, over the weekend Lindi at Sweet Southern Sparkle gave it to me and I'm just so honored. 
For those of you who do not know, the Liebster Award was started by bloggers to nominate new bloggers in order for them to gain recognition and give them a boost to keep going.

The Rules 1. You must link back to the person who nominated you 2. You must answer the 11 questions given to you by the nominee 3. You must pick 11 nominees with under 200 followers to answer your set of questions 4. You cannot nominate the person who nominated you 5. You must tell the nominees that they have been nominated by you
So here are Lindi's questions for me:
one// Why did you start blogging? For a few months I had been following different blogs and I loved the community that surrounded these bloggers. I wanted a way for my family to keep up with me after I graduated college and started my "big girl life". I knew these first few months would be a little slower since I was traveling with my job and not really living a "normal" life, but I'm excited to come off the road in May and turn this little blog more into the vision I have!
two// What is your favorite beauty product? My favorite beauty product is one that I found while traveling to Texas last semester and it is Jane Iredale's Zap & Hide Blemish Concealer. I featured this wonderful product on My Favorite Makeup of 2013 post so you can read more about it there!

Jane Iredale

three// What was the name of your very first pet? Well, I was one of those children that was deprived of having a dog until the summer before 7th grade. So growing up we had lots of fish but our first real pet was an all white guinea pig. I named him Casper (like the ghost) and let me tell you, besides my puppy, Casper is the best pet I've ever had. 
four// What does your blog name mean to you? Growing up in North Carolina my entire life, I've always considered myself a southern girl. Upon taking this job as a Traveling Leadership Consultant, I've learned just how much southernness there is in my blood. Every where I've traveled from snowy Pennsylvania to the gulf of Texas, everyone always ask me where my accent is from. I guess you could say I've got that southern charm ;-) So I decided that the second word in my blog name would be "abundance" for the overflowing amount of southern love that runs through my blood.
five// If you could pick one place to travel to where would it be? My dream vacation is of course New Zealand. Y'all if you've never been there you must go at least once in your lifetime. It is by far the place I feel the most blessed to have traveled to in my young age. Since I've already been to New Zealand though, the one place I would pick to go to now is South Africa. Who can resist these breathtaking views?

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six// What are your hobbies besides blogging? Traveling, crafting, taking pictures, scrap booking, and reading
seven// Who is the most influential person in your life? This is a hard question for me to answer. Personally, I don't think there is just one person who has influenced my life the most. Everyone from my parents, to my little sister, to my grandparents, Josh, and the families I've worked for at mission camp. I'm one of those people who is a firm believer that if you take the time to get to know someone, they can leave an impact on your life for forever. 
eight// What is your dream job? Growing up I had one dream job but then when I attended college I added two more dream jobs to that list. I'm currently living one of those dream jobs being a Traveling Leadership Consultant and cannot believe my time will end in May! My other two dream jobs include: being a teacher and owning my own Etsy shop. Hopefully both of those dreams will come true this summer!
nine// What is your go to wardrobe item? Even though it's not an actual clothing article, my go to item every day is my black long champ tote. The reason I love it so much is because it literally can go with the most dressed up of outfits but you can also rock it at the gym. I love how big it is and that I can carry so much in it.

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ten// What is your favorite type of candy? Anything sour all the way! I love Sour Patch Kids, Warheads, sour gummy worms. If it's sour, chances are I love it!
eleven// What advice would you give to a new blogger? While I still consider myself a new blogger as well, I think one of the biggest things I have learned is to be a reader. The more blogs you read and comment on daily, the stronger of a bond you create with that blog author and have the chance to gain new followers. Also, just be yourself :-)
My Nominees: 1. Ashley @ A&O on the go 2. Chesson @ A Southern Twenty-Five 3. Jessica @ Preppin' Postgrad 4. Hope @ Hope in a Blog 5. Cait @ Home Sweet Ruby 6. Khala @ The Birdie Bowl 7. Jessi @ Jessi's Design 8. Lauren @ Peach State of Mind 9. Courtney @ Southern Class, Carolina Sass 10. Kristin @ Young & Southern 11. Kaitlin @ The Sequined Spatula
My Questions: 1. Why did you start blogging? 2. What is one goal you have for this year? 3. If you could go back in your life and relive one moment, what would that one moment be? 4. When you were younger, what was your dream job? 5. If you could live in another state, what state would you live in and why? 6. What is your favorite winter Olympic sport? 7. If you could switch lives for one day with anyone in the world, who would it be and why? 8. Favorite organizer/planner/calendar company (because I love organization!)  9. Where would you like to see your blog be in 6 months? 10. If you could only read one blog for the rest of time, what would that one blog be? 11. What is your biggest advice to any bloggers?
I loved doing this post so much and hope that the eleven of you ladies I've tagged will participate as well! Happy Monday :-)

Five on Friday

Happy Friday! We made it through the week and in just a few short hours it will be the weekend, wahoo! I'm linking up again with some of my favorite women for my usual Five on Friday post. Thank you April, Darci, Christina, and Natasha for hosting this every week! one// Sarah Jessica Parker cards at Hallmark I think it might be the southern soul in me but I sure do love me a good handwritten note. Pair that note with some beautiful stationary and my heart just smiles! I travel with lots of stationary on me as every college I visit, I normally leave behind 3-5 thank you notes (so you can imagine I'm going through cards like wild fire). Last night I popped on over in to Hallmark mainly to find Josh a Valentine's card and the worker persuaded me to buy Sarah Jessica Parker's new stationary box set. I'm not too crazy about the price of $12.95 for only 10 cards but I do love the high quality that they are. 

Hallmark
two// 2014 Winter Olympics The Winter Olympics start tonight, need I say more? I'll admit that I get more into the summer games than I do winter, but nothing will ever beat the opening ceremony of either. I think the main reason I love the opening ceremony so much, is for one night the entire world seems to be unified. 

via

three// Birthday

Y'all, this past week my little sister turned 19! Where has the time gone? It did not hit me until her actual birthday how quickly life goes by. She will be 20 in less than a year now and my mind still cannot comprehend that. To me, I feel like we should still be those little girls with cow licks in the top right of this picture. This was the first birthday that I've been away from her for and it was a lot harder than I originally imagined but I sent her lots of love and goodies throughout the day!

four// Godly Friendships

Four years ago this summer, God sent the most amazing lady into my life that has now become one of my very best friend. Emily Sue and I worked at mission camp together for 8 weeks in 2010 and were not that close to begin with but after that summer a beautiful friendship began to develop. My friendship with Em is one of my most prized relationships on this earth and I was more than honored to stand beside her this past August as she married the love of her life in what was truly the most unique wedding ceremony I've ever seen. Over the past few weeks all of her wedding pictures have finally been seen and it's without a doubt that I am so thankful her photographer captured the shot below. I knew there was nothing more I wanted to do than pray for Em and Derek right before their marriage started and it was such a highlight of the day for me. Thank you God for such a beautiful friendship that is truly centered on you!

 Tara Mauldin Photography 

 Tara Mauldin Photography 

five// $75 Sephora Gift Card Giveaway

Lastly, don't forget you have until 11:59PM on Sunday night to enter for your chance to win a $75 gift card to Sephora! I know you don't want to miss out :-)

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Winter Wonderland

By the time you read this I'll be on a plane headed out of New Jersey and into Pennsylvania  That was obviously written before my connection got canceled due to weather in Detroit so I'm staying here in New Jersey one more night (which I am super excited about)! If you've been following the weather, you're bound to have seen the winter weather the North has gotten over the past week. Not to mention if this new snow storm hits just right they might get 31 inches this weekend. Like what? Is that even possible? I do have to say though I have loved every single bit of living in this winter wonderland for the past ten days and yes, my 23 year old self had to go play in the front yard. Who can blame me? We never get snow like this in North Carolina!

Also, don't forget you still have a few days to enter this wonderful $75 Sephora gift card giveaway!

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