Merry Christmas, y'all!

So, it's 1:28 A.M. And it's officially Christmas. I'm laying in bed and Andrew is in the living room being sneaky about Christmas gifts. My work for the day is finally finished and I am able to finally rest for a moment before I have to do it all again.

I just closed out my bible app and the devotional was about worrying. Something I do best. Here lately God has really been telling me to chill. It's like every time I turn around there is something about letting go and letting God.

I asked Him a few weeks back to let my mind rest if the things that I worry about are okay for me to let go. Slowly, every single day I can feel a little bit of my burdens drift away.

I'm a control freak, I know this is true. I'm pretty sure that's why I have fears and anxieties over certain things. I want to be able to control things about my life that only He can. Slowly, and I mean realllyy slowly, I've been able to let Him be in control.

It's funny because I've heard people say recently that I look genuinely happy and I look back at my stupid social media and see all of these photographs where it just looks like everything is fine and hunky dory and I wonder to myself.. "am I really that happy? Or do I make an effort that I don't even realize to come off that happy?" Honestly, I'm happy. So very much so. I have a million reasons to smile each day so I know that when I'm feeling down, it's not permanent. My fears and anxieties aren't real. That's not what God has in store for me. He wants me to be happy and I know that's why he has blessed me with so many beautiful things in life.

I wasn't feeling Christmassy this year but honestly, just seeing how much my family loves Hazel and how much my husband cares for me has changed my mood. After going to church today I was reassured once more that I'm okay. Everything is okay. God is in control and He loves us. I was down because we have so many reasons why we can't afford to buy gifts for every single person we know but it's not about that. Christmas is about love. I'm definitely feeling the love.

I typed all of this out on my phone so I can't leave you with a photo. Instead I'll leave you with one of my favorite bible verses. One that has got me through so many tough times.

"Don't worry about anything, but pray about everything. With thankful hearts offer up your prayers and requests to God."
-Philippians 4:6

I'm having a moment. Again.

So I'm here to do what I do best. Complain. If you don't want to hear me vent just leave now because I know there are going to be people out there who are going to say I should be thankful for what I have. Trust me, I am. I thank God everyday for waking me up and for all of my blessings in life, but hey, I'm hormonal. So leave me be.

We've finally hit that holly jolly time of the year when you're supposed to be all smiley no matter what, right? Wrong. I'm not feeling grinchy this year, but I'm pretty darn close. I've decided it's extra hard being pregnant in the winter. My mood depends heavily on the weather and I hate when it's all cold and gray..being pregnant makes that worse. Trying to stay positive though, because I'm lucky to be carrying my second baby!

Honestly though, we've been struggling. Every day seems like it brings a new bump in the road. From having to push opening day for Embers back to our car breaking down. Andrew managed to get sick and I'm hoping with everything in me that Hazel and I don't get it. We're going to miss my family's christmas light limo ride, which is fine, but honestly it would be fun to do something fun like that. We can't seem to get a grip on things. People don't care either, sometimes it seems like our support system isn't much of a support system, I really need to stress that 'sometimes' because most of the time, the people we've surrounded ourselves with are pretty great. I've got my boo's back, though. He's got mine. We'll get through it and we will feel that much better about it because we stayed strong, focused on God and believed in ourselves. Please don't send me any hateful comments, I'm well aware I've got it a lot easier than some people. I just need to a minute to let this out.

Oh and also, I'm thinking I'm going to take a long and much needed break from my Photography shin-dig. Something happened today that really just, I don't know? Bummed me out? Shocked me? Whatever, it wasn't cool. I don't want to put them on blast or anything but I shouldn't feel bad about doing it, if I decided to. They did it to me, pretty much... let me just say this, if you hire a photographer. Don't re-edit their images and definitely don't delete said photographer from Facebook right before you do it either. Most of the time, if you just ask, you can get your images checked out again and made to your liking. Not cool dude. Oh, and can I add that you shouldn't say you're happy with them if you obviously are not.

ANYWAY

Here's a random throwback of my wedding day just to change the subject.

On top of everything I just complained about I do have a slew of things to be happy about. Andrew gets some time off in a couple of weeks and I know he really needs that. I'm going to enjoy having him around! My pregnancy is going great! THANK YOU JESUS FOR THAT. My sweet Hazel is happy and growing up so fast! I've got a lot of things to look foward to. Mostly, I can't wait until March. I'm ready to have this baby. I wasn't ready this soon with Hazel but I'm seriously just so excited to be a family of 4. I've been trying to focus more on God and really stay steady on my bible study. It's going well and honestly, I feel like the luckiest girl in the world to know Jesus. I'm really looking foward to our Christmas Eve church service. It's a tradition that Andrew and I do and it always puts things into perspective right before all of the celebrating. This year, I'm going to invite my family. I hope they come but I'm not holding my breath! 

Alright, I'm done I guess. Andrew asked me to make him some tea so I need to get back to my wifely duties. Good night y'all.