CANCUN

Hello friends. I have the post vacation blues. Last week we went to Cancun for a long girls weekend. We stayed at an all inclusive resort and now I don't think I'll be able to go to the beach without a cabana boy to bring me drinks and snacks. It really was the best. We had these matching hats and they were a huuuuuuuuuuuuuge hit you guys. People really loved them, we all took artsy instagram model pictures of us looking out over the ocean from the daybed with a drink in our hands. Coming home and having to make my own meals and pay for things was really tough... 

Without further ado, here are some photo highlights from our trip!
four women look out over the gulf of mexico wearing floppy beach hats with cute sayings

three women in snorkeling gear are mostly submerged in the ocean, smiling

a four poster bed is made up on the beach with towels and a beach bag on top of it

a mimosa is featured with the ocean shortly behind it, to show the view from breakfast

three women sitting at a bar with swings instead of barstools, their backs are to the camera and they're wearing the matching floppy beach hats

a porch hammock is in the front of the shot with the entire resort behind it, there is a pool closer to the hotel, and the ocean in the back

I might write a whole series of posts, or maybe this will be it. We may never know! We had such a blast though, I'm already ready to go back. 

Out Of Office

I found myself struggling to schedule content for this week, since Wednesday I'll be hopping on a plane for a long weekend in Cancun. I came really close to saying "I'm so sorry, I don't have anything for this week!" Which then made me think about this post from Britt. It also made me think abut the whole reason I stopped blogging for so long. I recently got instantly rejected from some other affiliate programs, so I was already feeling like I haaaaaad to post something so that I could show I was consistent or whatever. (which, I guess this little paragraph still counts towards that impulsion. You win some, you lose some) All of this is to say, I'm off to Mexico and I'll be back next week. Hasta luego amigos! 
sunday night sunset from the coca cola seats at suntrust park, home of the atlanta braves

Can I Bring Albus: Variant Brewery & Roux on Canton

We've decided it's also our mission to try all of the breweries. Just all of them. It's a tough job, but someone has to do it! This brings us to our next installment of "Can I Bring Albus?" Last Wednesday we went to Variant Brewing over in Roswell then we explored a little bit and popped into Roux on Canton for dinner. It's a cute little place and it was a new one to us!

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We immediately spotted other pups the second we walked in, the patio was great and spacious! We learned from one of the guys working, that they technically have a kitchen (used for roasting coconuts for one of their brews) so dogs are not allowed inside. They do have lots of dog treats and a cool water dispenser like you see at the airport fill up your pup's bowl (or they have some there if you don't have a cool collapsible one like this) & your own water glass. I really love the water thing, and honestly I think everyone should have them that way we can cut back on plastic bottles. 
Some high top tables and chairs in front of the logo for Variant Brewing painted on the wall
ANYWAYS. Great big spacious patio with heavy picnic tables that you can tie your pup to. Even when we have two humans, we always tie him down. The combination of his harness & 5' leash gives him room to explore but not escape. The parking is a bit limited, but it seems like that's a whole downtown Roswell thing, not any business in particular. It all seems very walkable if you end up parking downtown or somewhere else, but this was our first trip to Roswell.... Since we were there on a Wednesday, we didn't have any trouble finding parking. 

Kasey and Albus smile for the camera on the patio at Variant Brewing
We had a couple of beers, which were all very tasty. 5 stars all around on Untappd. The bar staff was super friendly and knowledgeable (at one point I ordered "your darkest and maltiest beer" and they didn't hesitate to pour us one.) They were also super laid back, again it's a Wednesday so probably not the busiest night, and they took time to talk to you outside while they were clearing glasses from outside. 
Albus licks his lips thinking that the delicious treats are being brought for him (they're not)

After a couple rounds of beer, we made our way into the downtown area for dinner. We decided on Roux on Canton and even got to sit at a special seeming table where Albus made sure to get pets from literally every person walking by on the sidewalk. Roux is a cute little southern restaurant with a great beer and cocktail list. We had "The Dip" which was incredible, then Meatloaf and a Cuban sandwich and topped it off with some Beginets and oh my goodness was it delicious.
Two cocktails (an old fashioned and a moscow mule) sitting on the table
That's it for this installation of Can I Bring Albus? Do you have any suggestions for where we should go next? What's your favorite Atlanta brewery? Should we bump it up over our next one?

3 Things Owning A Home Has Taught Me

A fun way for me to remember Albus' birthday, is that he was born the day before I closed on my house. (Fun fact, I was supposed to have closed on my house on June 15th but someone at the broker's office wrote the date down wrong, and my dad, who was my agent, was going out of the country the day after our original closing date. So my mortgage broker came to the closing with me instead.) So that means I've been a homeowner for three whole years now. I have learned a lot of lessons the hard way. Here are the three biggest things I've learned in the last three years.

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kasey shaking champagne after buying her house


WHATEVER YOU THINK A PROJECT WILL COST: DOUBLE IT: One day, in August the first year I bought the house, I want to say the week before my housewarming party? I hadn't brought Albus home yet, so it had to be very early. I came home for lunch and heard a dripping sound. I went down into the basement to discover it was raining directly under the bathroom. I called the plumber who managed to get there that afternoon and install a little valve to turn the water to the shower off and on in the meantime before he could get back to fix the actual problem. FUN FACT, the house was built in the 60's, so our plumbing is cast iron. What would have been a simple fix for regular pipes required ALL of the pipes around the tub to be replaced. $500 later, we decided that we would replace the tile and drywall around the shower. Three years later, there's still a hole in the drywall. It's on the to-do list, I swear.

If you follow along on instagram, you've probably seen the saga that has been my fight with the English Ivy the people who lived there before us planted. WHATEVER YOU DO, DON'T PLANT THAT TRASH. I'm begging you. I have been FIGHTING it for three years now and it still just POPS up out of nowhere. It shows up in the siding of the house, it's growing up the giant live oak, but it hasn't killed it yet, so that's nice I suppose. If you're from my neck of the woods, this stuff is like Kudzu but is somehow still on the damn shelves at Home Depot. 

EVERYTHING COMES IN THREES: Much like celebrity deaths, big problems have always come in threes for me. As mentioned before, very expensive threes. Most recently,  we upgraded our bed, but we sold ours before the new one came in. So we were in the guest bedroom, which is just a full mattress. Sorry to all of my guests, I really didn't realize how small of a bed that was until I was used to a queen. You can read all about the mattress saga here & here. Then, while I was washing the new linens for our king size bed, there was a gushing coming out from behind the washing machine. Remember how I said cast iron pipes? Well the reason they don't use those anymore, is because they rust. So the pipes finally clogged up with rust. We snaked them and it seemed to drain juuust fine. So I got that running, and went to run the dishwasher. Which was full of smelly old water. Turns out, the motor went out of that AND the sink was draining into it. Keep in mind, this all happened in the span of three days. Y'all. I thought I was going to lose it. We ordered the new dishwasher (which of course didn't use the same hoses as the old one, even though it was the exact same dishwasher but see lesson number 1.
a living room with an abstract painting and a painting of wonder woman

DON'T TRY TO DO IT ALL AT ONCE: I have pinterest board after board of projects I want to do. I spend hours looking at closet organizational systems, shelves I could totally do myself, cool decorative things, a better chicken coop so the owls don't eat the chickens, raised beds so we don't have to buy vegetables anymore. I would start to try to do one thing and then I would get overwhelmed because the weeds were growing too fast for me to clean out a room in the house and then the house was getting to disorganized for me to spend all weekend doing yard work. It's almost like a hamster wheel if you don't make yourself some reasonable plans.

We've started focusing on one room at a time. We've aaaaalmost got the living room the way we like it. New couch, furniture rearranged, OG boat door for a coffee table, now we just need to get the TV mounted & bring the record player in and the living room will be D O N E. I installed our Nest thermostat ALL BY MYSELF* with the help of a youtube video. Maybe an extra thing I have learned is that I can do a lot of things by myself and now with some help. We've also installed a new ceiling fan and a storm door! Our next project, I think, will be the kitchen. We have minimal cabinet and counter space so I've been studying organizational racks for the pots and pans. I also REALLY need to deal with my closet/office space if I want to start writing blogs at my desk and not using a fun little lap desk like a 10 year old.. I've got a plan for the chicken coop too, but I keep telling myself that's a project for when it's NOT the middle of a heat wave. Along with all of the yard things. So, so many yard things. Home Depot/Lowe's, wanna sponsor some DIY home improvement posts? I'm sure the minute we get everything just right will be the minute someone makes an offer we can't refuse causing us to move and start all over again.

So these are the biggest lessons owning a home has taught me. Do you have any homeowner stories for me? Tips and tricks? Cabinet storage ideas? We really need a pantry but there's just nowhere to put one... Did anyone notice I didn't put fix the hole in the wall in the shower on that list of projects I want to tackle next? Are we surprised it's been there for three years anymore? 

What I Read In June

Hello, I am still trying to dry out from this weekend. We played very hard at the lake and it was the best time and I made it all the way until Sunday afternoon before I got sunburnt, so that's gotta count for something. Today I'm rounding up what I read in June for Show Us Your Books! I had a much slower month than last month but I still had some good ones! Whenever I have holds at the library, they all seem to come free at the same exact time, does that happen to y'all too? My library is now closed for renovations so I have no idea where my holds will be when they're free...... 

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Little Fires Everywhere: I really enjoyed this but I also really hated Mrs. Richardson. It took me a while to decide that, but man she was the worst. Only worried about her reputation, not paying attention to what her kids were up to, and Isabelle man, she got the brunt of all of that. This one lived up to the hype, and I definitely recommend reading it. I actually had picked it up for a book club that I ended up missing for pizza...

Born a Crime: I had seen this one a few times and then decided to pick it up after so many people talked about it last month on this linkup, I really enjoyed it! I feel a little iffy on memoirs sometimes, because I really like stories about pretend people, and the sad things are more sad when you know it's a real person? I really liked how his sense of humor came through in his writing and the way he didn't gloss over the ugly bits. I recommend this one too!

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo: So, when Born A Crime came off of holds at the library book, this one did too. Of course. It took me a little while to get through the first one, then I got an e-mail from the library saying this one was due back in two days. I tried to renew it, but other people were waiting on it, so I had to read it super fast. I literally sat down and read almost the entire thing in one night. It was so good, I laughed, I cried, I felt all the things. This one has been recommended to me several times lately, but most recently by Emelia. I absolutely and wholeheartedly recommend this one!

That's it! That's all I read in June. It wasn't one of my bigger reading months and I don't really know why, I carried my books with me everywhere I went. We'll see how July turns out, right now I'm reading At The Water's Edge because I just can't resist a book set in the Scottish Highlands. What are you reading?

Linking up with Steph & Jana for Show us Your Books!


Life According to Steph