Never say never

Yesterday I finally watched the Justin Beiber movie with some friendsnand now know what all of this Beiber madness is all about. I have a feeling his music will be playing quite a bit around our house for a while now. Poor Preston. 

*The pretty poppies I picked up at the Farmer's Market*

Not only was the Justin Beiber movie overly exciting for one day, I also had a little girls day fun with a couple of other wives that are out here for the summer. Shannon, Tiffany and I ventured back to Uptown Charlotte to hit up the local farmer's market again. 

Once again it didn't disappoint and we all came home with some lovely finds. I got some yummy nectarines and strawberries and the beautiful poppies that you see up above. I've been noticing along the freeways out here there are random fields of poppies and have been wanting to stop and pick some, so when I found these at the Farmer's Market I was ecstatic! Four stems for $1! Quite the steal if you ask me! 

Instead of heading home after the farmer's market, we took advantage of being in such a beautiful city and played tourist for a couple of hours. Charlotte is really a beautiful place. It's so clean and nice and we never once felt like we weren't safe. It was great! We stopped by the visitor center downtown and the sweetest lady gave us a BAZILLION brochures and pamphlets of fun things to do in North Carolina. It was perfect! I've already started making a mental list of all of the things I want to do before the end of the summer. Hopefully we can squeeze them all in somehow! Here's some pictures of some of the things we saw throughout the day!

 This cute little bakery we found had the coolest and most unique light fixtures! I loved them!

Amelie's

There was a little park in the middle of town with all sorts of cute stuff for kids. 

 Funky skull thing

Fountains that would be so fun to take little kids to.

Shops at the Epicenter. I really want to go back here at night! It looks like such a fun place!

Shannon 

Shannon, Me, & Tiff

 Our humble abode :D

All I can think about is food, apparently.

Farmer's Market, Uptown Charlotte

I just realized that all of the pictures I have taken lately have been of food. That may or may not be a good thing. ha ha. But when you live the life that I do lately, there isn't much more to think about or worry about throughout the day. Let me just give you a little run down of a typical day for me out here in North Carolina. Preston and I typically wake up between nine and ten, and depending on whether or not there is time, we go to the gym. We then eat breakfast (always a breakfast shake. sorry i don't have pictures to document that. haha) and then get ready for the day. He heads out the door at noon for work and I head to the pool to soak up some sun. I know some of you might think that is lazy of me but I figure, why not? I haven't heard back from any of the places I have applied to yet so while I wait I might as well work on my tan while indulging in my nerd books! I can't wait to be done with the Fablehaven series. While those books are entertaining, I could really use a good love story! That's beside the point. Back to my daily agenda. For the rest of the afternoon I usually sew, do laundry, wash dishes, prepare dinner or facebook/blog stalk. Eventful huh?!? Yesterday was super fun though. I went to Panera with some of the other wives out here and it was so much fun!! They are a great group of girls. (Yet again, my fun revolves around food. haha)

I have managed to think outside the box and break up my routine once or twice since I have been here. Last weekend I went to a Farmer's Market in Uptown Charlotte. It was awesome! I got a couple of really yummy things and I can't wait to go back! I swear, their produce is way better than what you find in a grocery store. It was in such an awesome location too! Right in the middle of downtown. I loved it.

 Sweet Corn. love it. I'll be back for more next weekend. 

 My treasures. Those strawberries were TO DIE FOR.

Preston and I also managed to have a date night this past week. Its hard for us to really ever spend time together with his work schedule so it was really nice to go out to dinner. We went to TGIFridays! We were hoping to try some authentic North Carolina restaurant but everywhere was closed so we went there. It was great! Date nights with the hubby are seriously the BEST!

 Green Bean Fries. Love.

 Cajun Shrimp Pasta. LOVE!!

 A little disappointed in the Oreo dessert. It was waayyy smaller than I was imagining but still tasty. 

 Looks like someone enjoyed his dinner! 

Full tummy=happy wifey! :)

And while we are still on the topic of food, I have to share this yummy dinner I made the other night. It wasn't anything special but it was really good. I marinated chicken in this spicy mango marinade, sauteed some zucchini and yellow squash and served it over rice and it was so good. If you are in need of a quick, easy and cheap dinner, I would highly recommend this.

Try it, you'll like it! 

Well, I feel like that was kind of a rambling, boring post but thats all I've got this week! I have all the time in the world to blog lately but the problem is I just don't have anything to blog about! Guess I'll have to start getting more creative! Thanks to the two people for humoring me and actually reading this!!! I appreciate it! :D

McDowell Nature Preserve

One of the best things about living in a new place is all of the exploring you get to do! Preston and I don't get to spend a whole lot of time together during the days because of his work schedule so when a time opens up that is free for him, we jump at the chance to find some place new to go!

 On the one particular occasion that this has happened to us since we have been here, we headed down to the Nature Preserve that is just two miles from where we are living. It, like everything else in North Carolina, was beautiful! It is a very wooded area with lots of trails to hike around and explore on.

 There is also a little information center where you can go and learn about some of the wildlife that is in the preserve. Preston wanted to stay and learn about the animals but I talked him out of that idea since there were snakes involved and I'm still trying to get over the little snake escapade from back home. Ugh, gives me the chills just thinking about it. 

The preserve is connected to a beautiful lake: Lake Wylie. The day we went to the preserve we just had intentions of going down there and seeing what there was to do. We are planning a trip back there very soon because there is TONS to do.

You can go fishing, swimming, canoeing, camping and all sorts of stuff! It looks like so much fun! We had a really great time just walking around the docks together but are very excited to head back and spend a little more time there! Charlotte hasn't ceased to amaze me yet of just how beautiful it truly is!