Belko Birthday Bash

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happy day

The past two weeks we have been celebrating birthdays in my family!  My birthday was May 12 and Phil’s was exactly one week later on the 19th.  In my family, we celebrate “Birthday Week.”  Growing up, we would open a couple of presents on our birthday day and then we would get to pick where/what we wanted to eat for our birthday dinner.  Phil’s family celebrated similarly.

Recently, my mom began to slowly introduce us to the whole birthday-week world.  I think it originated because my mom loves Starbucks and celebrating a birthday week was a good excuse to get Starbucks more than one day per week.  I, too, love Starbucks so I was not opposed.  This year, mother went above and beyond the call of birthday week duties and brought me little birthday “treats” to work almost everyday.  Basically, it was a good birthday week.

And for my birthday, I got to go on a sushi date with Phil!  So.stinking.good.  Just a year ago, I didn’t like sushi.  Somehow he got me hooked on it and now I’m slightly obsessed.

The following weekend was Phil’s birthday and we had some of his family come and visit the new ranch house that we live in.  Then we had a combined birthday party (I called it the “Belko Birthday BBQ Bash” – I like alliteration.) with my family and his to celebrate both of our birthdays.  It was so fun & we had a blast just getting to enjoy time with family.  No better way to spend your birthday, right?!

Here's me...being a birthday girl.

Here’s me…being a birthday girl.

philly

 

Praying for Oklahoma

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Oklahoma.  My heart is heavy for the people in Oklahoma.

Today my world is just as it was yesterday, but I know that for many, their worlds have been turned upside down due to a tornado.  And while I won’t pretend to understand their pain, I will promise to uphold them in my prayers because that’s all that I know how to do in times of trouble.

oklahoma

Psalm 46:1 says, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”  There are many other verses in the Bible that promise us that God is our rock and our fortress, that he is our comfort and our peace.  God really is our all in all.  And I’m thankful for that truth during times like this, when our world as we know it crashes all around us.  We don’t have to be afraid because we are confident in his promises.  So today, and in the days & weeks to come, I will pray for those who are affected by this tragedy and I encourage those of you reading this to do that same.

“So I pray that God, who gives you hope, will keep you happy and full of peace as you believe in him. May you overflow with hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.” -Romans 15:13

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Rose Farm

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This morning on his way to visit a dairy, Phil happened to drive past a rose farm.  Yes, ROSES.  I’m assuming that because he knows that my love for flowers runs deep, he decided to capture a shot of the rose field and text me the picture.  I, of course, got very excited and he responded that the picture didn’t even do it justice!  Amazing.

Someday I hope to see the rose farm in person, but the picture was beautiful enough for me for today.  Beautiful things are forever a reminder to me of how beautiful and creative my God is.  I found this Bible verse in Isaiah and felt that it was an appropriate pairing with the picture.

“It will burst into bloom;
    it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
    the splendor of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the Lord,
    the splendor of our God.”  -Isaiah 35:2 NIV

glory

I hope that your Monday is as beautiful as this field of roses and I pray that today (and everyday) you will see and know the majesty and glory of the LORD.

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Flying Cockroaches

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Recently Phil & I moved to the calf ranch.  What a crazy couple of weeks it’s been!

One thing that’s been particularly er, fun, to deal with living in the country is the bug issue.  There are a lot of bugs (go figure) and I am not really a fan.

The first week that we lived in the house we dealt with flying cockroaches.  Did you know such a thing existed?  I sure didn’t!

roach

They were everywhere.  And there were thousands of them.  At night while we ate dinner, these roaches could be seen flying all around our house.  One night in particular, I turned off all of the lights in our house & walked down the hallway toward our bedroom.  In order to see in the dark, I lit my phone screen to be my guide & as I walked with my lit phone, 2 roaches crashed into my phone screen.

Every time we would open up the shower door, there would be 5-7 dead roaches.  Roaches would get stuck in Phil’s bar of soap.  Roaches EVERY.WHERE.  And their life spans were incredibly short as they would usually come into our house just long enough to die.  Every morning when I woke up, I’d awake to find hundreds of these things in our front entry, not to mention a few hundred more scattered around the house.

Our front entryway....the morning after I had vacuumed the night before.

Our front entryway….the morning after I had vacuumed the night before.

We talked to a dairyman who lives across the street from us and asked him about the roaches.  He said about once or twice a year for 2-3 weeks at a time, these bugs just invade their house.  I’m happy to say that I think we’re coming close to the end of the 2-week mark because this week our cockroach numbers seem to be dwindling.  But let me just tell you, hundreds of flying cockroaches in my house were an epically unfortunate introduction to country life for a bug-hater like myself!

Besides the roaches, I’ve adjusted to life in the country rather well and I do quite enjoy it.  But how many people get to say that their house has been swarmed by flying cockroaches?  Not many!  I’m just lucky, I guess.  :)

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Beef Month Giveaway

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Beef month is HERE!!!!

And it’s also my birthday month.  So I think we should celebrate by having a giveaway!

Remember those sweet beef serving platters from Target that I showed you a few blog posts ago?  Well, I’m giving one of them away!

Boots

Yipee!

So, here are the details:

Giveaway opens May 2nd at 12:00 am EST and will close on May 13th at 12:00 EST.

There are just three things that you need to do to enter:

  1. “Like” the From Heels to Boots Facebook page (Worth 2 entries, and mandatory to enter the contest)
  2. “Follow” From Heels to Boots on Twitter (Worth 1 name entry)
  3. Comment on a FHTB blog post, or on the FHTB Facebook page telling me why you love beef!  (Worth 1 name entry)   And I know that there can be more than 1 reason why a person loves beef, so you can comment once every day to get multiple name entries in!

And that’s it!  Easy peasy.  I chose to close the contest on May 13th because it’s the day after my birthday ;)   Have at it, ladies & gents!

You can find the link to the giveaway on the right side of my blog, underneath the “Search” box.  It will also be on the FHTB Facebook page.

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Studded // Ankle Boots

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Ahhhh….Target.  Or as I sometimes like to call it, “Tar-shjay.”  Did you read that pronunciation correctly?  It makes sense in my head, it’s kind of Frenchy sounding.  Anyway…Target.

I love it.  I need to stop loving it, but they just keep producing such good products!

Like these ankle boots:

ankle boots

Super cute, right?  And they were on sale.  Even better.

Today was one of those days where I woke up and thought to myself, “Life is too short to wear boring clothes.”  So I put on a skirt, my ankle boots & a denim shirt and headed off to the ranch.  My outfit might not seem so bold to you, but when you work on a ranch, a skirt is a risky thing to wear.

BriOutfitDenim Shirt:  Target //  Skirt:  Bar III  //  Ankle Boots:  Target

I didn’t regret my decision to wear a skirt…although I will probably keep my skirt-wearing days to a minimum when working on the ranch.  ;)

That’s all for now.  Oh, one more thing, tomorrow starts Beef Month.

I smell steak…  and a giveaway.  Stay tuned!

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