Awesome Giveaway from Utterly Chaotic Designs

I wanted to take a few minutes to tell you about this amazing giveaway that is going on over at Utterly Chaotic Designs. Brea is giving away a complete blog makeover. So if you are bored with your blog look or have simply just been wanting to do something new, fun and exciting, head on over to her page and enter for a chance to win the blog makeover! I know I will be entering! 

Thanks guys and I hope that you are having a great week so far. Be on the lookout for a few updates here soon!

And The Winners Are...

Happy Monday everyone! As promised, I have drawn the winners from the giveaway and it is now time to announce them. First up, the glitter flats!

And the winner is...

Mrs. McDancer from McDancing Through Life. 

Congratulations! I have already sent you an email, so as soon as I hear from you, I will get to work on your glitter flats.

Next up, the 6 pack of cupcakes from Stay Calm Cupcake! And the winner is...

dfraley3 from Great Blog Giveaways

Congratulations! I have sent you an email and as soon as I hear back from you, I will email Jill at Stay Calm Cupcake with your flavors and address. 

Congratulations to our two winners! And thank you to everyone who entered!

-Megan

Just an Update

I wanted to give everyone an update on a few things. First off, I am sure many of you are super anxious to know who won the giveaway, well I will be announcing the winners tomorrow. Sorry it is taking me a few days. We are in the process of packing/moving and it has just been craziness around here. I will draw the winners tonight and announce them tomorrow though, I promise! 

Today we have to kick things into high gear with this whole moving thing. We are going to go get a storage unit and start moving the things that don't require a truck. There is still so much to be packed, even though it doesn't feel like it, I know there is a ton more stuff. Our rooms are really what needs to be tackled today. There is so much stuff in them that I have a feeling it is going to take us hours just to pack up our two small rooms. Ugh! Have I mentioned how much I hate packing/moving. I absolutely hate it! Luckily, we have some awesome family and friends who have been helping with the process. 

Well, that is all I have for you now. I am off to try and find more boxes and a ton of paper to start wrapping up dishes and other breakables. Hope everyone is enjoying this beautiful summer Sunday!

Last Day for the 100th Post Giveaway

Happy Friday everyone! I hope everyone is having a great Friday! Mine so far has consisted of nothing but packing. Sounds fun right? Haha, Not! 

I just wanted to remind everyone that today is the last day to enter for my 100th post Giveaway. If you haven't seen what I am giving away, you can check that our here. Please don't forget to enter and don't forget to tell your friends!! Happy entering everyone! And good luck!!

Megan

Packing, Packing, & More Packing

Happy Wednesday everyone! I hope that everyone's week is going well. My last day of work for the week is tomorrow so that is very exciting for me. What isn't exciting is that my day will be sent packing up the contents of our apartment. No fun! We were finally able to find a new apartment, but it isn't available until the first or second week of July. So, we get to pack up the entire apartment and move it into a storage unit for a week or so and then move it all out again and into the new apartment. Sounds like fun, huh? Not!

Luckily, I have some amazing friends and family who offered for us to stay with them while we are waiting for our apartment to be ready. But of course now the not so fun part begins with us packing up everything in the apartment, and not to mention cleaning it as well. So far it is going pretty slow. I am hoping to put more of a dent in it tonight. I hate moving so much and I hate packing even more. I never seem to have enough boxes and then I have to go find more at a grocery store or somewhere else, but it never fails. I am very OCD about packing too because I hate not knowing what is in the boxes or what rooms they go in. So you could say that I get kinda label happy when I am writing on the packed up boxes. I try to write a few of the things that are in there and then I will also label it with which room it should be going into. I know, I have a problem, haha!

Oh moving, I hate you! Haha! Well, hopefully this double move thing will go pretty smoothly. If it doesn't, I may just be a big ball of stress by the time that it is done. Let's hope that isn't the case! I hope that everyone has a great rest of the week and don't forget to enter my giveaway that is going on until Friday. I will be drawing the winning numbers this weekend so make sure to get your entries in. You can read about the giveaway and how to enter here! Happy entering and good luck!

Megan

Fill In The Blank Friday

It is Friday! Whoo hoo! Time to fill in some blanks with Lauren over at the little things we do. Don't forget to link up if you join so that others can read your answers. 

Fill In The Blank Friday

1.   The last movie I saw was  X-Men: First Class. It was awesome! I am a sucker for the comic book movies, haha! Can't wait for Green Lantern. Hello Ryan Reynolds, haha!

2.  I want to  have time off. Like an entire week just to do nothing. That would be nice.

3.  Surprises are   not surprises if you know about them. That is one of my biggest pet peeves. If you have a surprise for me, don't tell me until you are ready to give me the surprise. If you tell me before and then make me wait, it isn't a surprise anymore. But if I don't know, then it is awesome!

4.  The best accessory is a great necklace or earrings. Purses and scarves are cute accessories too.

5.  My favorite warm drink is  hot chocolate. Yes, I know that is pretty lame, but I'm not a big coffee person. 

6.  My favorite cold drink is  sweet tea.

7.  Currently loving  that I am losing weight again, yay! And yard saleing on the weekends! I love finding killer deals on things.

P.S. Don't forget to enter my giveaway before next Friday! You can check out the details of it right here! Happy Friday everyone!

100th Post = My First Giveaway!

 Today's post is my 100th post!! Yay! I never thought I would have this much to write about, haha! Thank you so much to everyone who has been reading them. It means a lot to me to have people out there who are interested in what I have to say and what is going on in my life. So without further ado, here are the items up for grabs.

1st Giveaway:

A pair of handmade glitter flats made by me! You even get to pick the color!

The pink pair that I made for myself

2nd Giveaway:

A 6 pack of cupcakes from Stay Calm Cupcakes. You get to pick the flavor of the cupcakes and the frosting to go with them. 

You can pick from the following cake flavors:

Milk Chocolate

German Chocolate

Strawberry 

Double Berry

Red Velvet

Vanilla

French Vanilla

Orange

Lemon

Funfetti

Lime Zest

Butter Pecan

Spice Cake

Coconut

Brown Sugar Cinnamon

And choose from the following frostings:

Chocolate

 Buttercream

 French Vanilla Buttercream

Double Berry Buttercream

Coconut

Strawberry Whip

Creamcheese Frosting

Orange Creamsicle

Peanut Butter

Cookies and Cream

Mint

How To Enter:

Must be a follower of Butterfly Dreams N' Things Blog-1 Entry

Follow me on Twitter @mdvervaecke-1 Entry

Like my Facebook Page-1 Entry

Leave a comment with the cake and icing flavors that you would choose-1 Entry

Tweet about my giveaway(make sure to leave a link)- 1 Entry

Blog about my giveaway(make sure to leave a link)- 3 Entries

Please make sure to leave one comment on this post for each entry. Don't forget to leave me your email address on at least one of your entries as well. 

This giveaway is only available to those that live in the United States.

The deadline to enter the giveaway will be Friday, June 24th. I will be drawing the winners randomly by assigning each entry that I receive with a number and then I will be using random.org to generate the two winning numbers. I will draw for the glitter flats first, and then the cupcakes second.

Good luck everyone! I can't wait to see who wins these lovely items!

P.S. If you are having problems commenting on this post because Blogger is still acting up, you can email me your entries at mdvervaecke@hotmail.com

I want to be able to give everyone a fair chance so again, if you are not able to comment on this post and you want to enter please email me!

Updates On Everything and As Promised, A Giveaway!!

Happy Wednesday everyone! I hope that everyone's week has been amazing so far. I thought I would give you guys a few updates on things that have been going on. A week or so ago I posted about how horrible of a time we are having with finding a place to live. Well, that has not changed. We still do not have a place to live and it is really starting to stress me out. We have been looking at all kinds of places. And yes, I realize that I shouldn't be so picky right now, but I am not going to live somewhere where I don't feel safe and where myself or Aran have to worry about our cars getting broken into or possibly being harmed walking to and from our door. I understand that this can happen at any place, but there are places that are more prone to things like this happening here in this city and I refuse to live there. I don't think that is being picky. That is just being smart/safe if you ask me.

The whole pet deposit thing is still an issue as well. I'm still not sure why people are asking so much money for two cats. But any who, right now the plan is to move in with family or friends for a few weeks if we haven't found anything yet. There may be something in the works right now for a place, but I am trying to not get my hopes up so I am not going to say anything else about it right now.

In other news, we are still moving full steam ahead on the wedding plans. Here within the next month we are going to be meeting with our florist and the people who are doing our cake. I think Aran and I have almost come to a decision on what the cake should look like. At first he said he didn't care about what it looked like, he only cared about how it tasted. Well then I told him how I wanted them to decorate it and he told me no, so we were back to square one. But, I think we are pretty close on reaching a compromise. I don't really want a white cake with decorations. That is just to plain for me. I want it to be colorful and catch everyone's eye. I don't want it to just blend in to the background. So I was thinking of doing a pink cake with brown and teal accents and that idea was nixed. So we are thinking about doing a brown cake with the pink and teal accents which I like just as much.

As far as flowers go, I am pretty set on what I want those to look like, it will just be a matter of how much they are and if they can get them in January. I have also decided that I want a Wishing Tree at the wedding, so I am currently getting ideas for that. Laura over at Saying I Do had a really cute one and that is where I got the idea. If you are looking for some great ideas, you should head on over to her blog.

And now for the biggest news, this post marks my 99th post which means that my next post is my 100th!! Yay!!! So my next post will hold all of the details of my giveaway so please keep an eye out for that! I will say that I have a few prizes for the winner and they may just include a pair of their very own glitter flats made by me and possibly some sweet treats. So please be on the lookout within the next few days for all of the details.

Well, that is all of the updates that I have for you today. I hope that everyone is having an awesome week and I can't wait to see how many of you enter the giveaway. Happy Hump Day!

Yard Sale Loot

As I told you guys previously I love yard sales. This past weekend Lacey and I went to a community yard sale that a friend of mine told us about. All I can say is that we scored some awesome things. I think Lacey made out better than I did. I would have to say that her best purchase is a toss up between the Dog Igloo that she bought for $10 or the marble rolling pin that she got for $5. They were both great buys.

As for me, I had some great buys too! Wanna see them? I thought you might, so I took some pictures.

One of my favorite finds of the day was a painting that I bought. We have been looking for artwork to put up in our place so when I walked up and saw this one, I was just praying that they didn't want a ton of money for it. When I asked the man how much he wanted, my jaw dropped when he said $6. I couldn't believe it was so cheap and I said I would take it. There was another painting there as well that Lacey really like so he gave me both of them for $10. I gave that one to her and told her it was her house warming gift, haha!

Another thing that I got a great deal on was a bunch of baby clothes for a blog friend who is having a baby next month. All of the clothes that I bought were all brand new and some of them still had the tags on them. I bought like 12 onesies, a couple of outfits that had pant legs and sleeves and then one of those sleeping bag outfits. If you aren't sure what I am talking about, let me explain. It is like pajamas that you put on but there are no leg holes. That way the baby is snuggly and warm. See the picture below if you are still confused. I bought all of these clothes for $5. Crazy!

I also found some games for my nieces. They are both Disney Princess games which they are obsessed with and I was able to get these for $1 each. I almost kept one of them for myself because it is the Cinderella version of Pretty Pretty Princess, and that was one of my favorite games when I was little. I couldn't believe they had a Cinderella version. I wish they would have had that when I was little, but I did decide to give it to them because I don't know that I would ever actually play it. 

I also found a few other odds and ends. I found some more Christmas ornaments. I also found some really cute Halloween hand towels. I paid $2 for both of these combined. I also was able to find a really cute metal wall hanger that has a slot for my mail and three hooks on the bottom for our keys. I have been looking for something like this for a long time, so I was very excited to find this. I spent $3 on this. 

I also picked up two Detroit Lions Mugs for my brother. I paid a quarter a piece for them. I also bought a Chuck Wicks CD for $2. I was so excited about this. I have actually met him so it was really cool to find this.  I also picked up these two little tent looking things for our cats. I paid a $1 each for them and the cats love them so far. 

Well, those are all of my finds for this weekend. I am so excited about all of them and I really didn't spend that much money. It was a great day and Lacey and I had a blast. It was a great day with a great friend and we had some pretty hilarious moments at times. Okay, I have to tell you one real quick. So when she bought the dog igloo we were so sure that it would fit in my car that we didn't even worry about it. Well when we got the car back to pick it up, it definitely did not fit. We ended up having to go back to my place and pick up her Jeep. We had to take the top off to make sure that it would fit and it definitely did. And because of this, we realized that the only way to ride in her Jeep is with the top down. We felt like such bad asses, haha! It was a lot of fun. I got a little sun burned though. 

Well, I hope that everyone else had a great weekend and if you went yard saleing, I hope that you found some great deals too. Have a good week everyone!!

Yard Sale/Garage Sale Season

It is that time of year when getting up early on Saturday mornings to score a killer deal is okay in my book. I usually try to sleep in on Saturdays, but it is summer and that means that is is Yard Sale/Garage Sale season and I couldn't be more excited. I know technically they have been going on for a few weeks, but this is the first free weekend I have had to be able to actually go and what better way to start the season then to go to a community sale. A friend of mine at work lives in a community where they have a huge sale every summer. Well it is this weekend and I am really excited. Hopefully they will have some awesome stuff again this year. I walked away with a lot of really great stuff last year for really cheap.

My haul last year included a couple of board games like Apples To Apples that I got for $1(the only thing missing was the instructions and I was able to print those online), a huge Nerf gun for Aran that I paid $10 for and this is apparently like a $60 or $70 one in stores. Yes, I bought my fiancee' a Nerf gun, haha! I also got a softball glove, some dolls for my nieces and a couple of other things for them and some baby proofing stuff for a friend of mine. I think I spent $20 all together if that.

If I ever saw a Yard Sale sign like this,
I would stop for sure!

So hopefully this year I will find some great stuff too. Yard sales are like a sport to my family. Yard saleing I guess you can call it. We like to get up early and we like to barter with the people to get the price that we want. One year I went on base with my sister-in-law and her mom Linda, and this lady was selling a LoveSac. She wanted a ridiculous amount for it. Well Linda kept trying to get her to go down on it and the lady wouldn't budge. Well finally we said okay never mind and were about to leave and the lady finally caved and gave it to us for like $50 or something ridiculous like that. What was even more ridiculous was getting that thing into the vehicle and then unloading it. What a freaking pain, haha! I am an expert at spotting the sale signs. Most of the time people make them pretty bright so that you can see them, but some don't and I am pretty bad ass at spotting them, haha! We are also those mean people that will drive by a sale really slowly and see if there is anything that catches our attention and if not, we drive away. I always  hated when people would do that to us when we had our own sales, but I guess I understand it now.

So tomorrow morning Lacey and I and possibly my sister-in-law will be up bright and early to go to this community yard sale. It starts at 7 so we need to get there around that time. We are on the lookout for a bookshelf for Lacey and I'm sure there are some other things that we are going to find. I can't wait and hopefully we will find some other sales going on tomorrow too.

Are any of you going yard saleing this weekend? What are you hoping to find? Please share in the comments section below! Happy Friday everyone and Happy Yard Saleing!

Megan

P.S.

It is National Iced Tea Day, so if you like tea you should go try Wendy's new Wild Berry Iced Tea! It is delicious if you like sweeter teas!

Free Fishing Weekend

This past weekend was Free Fishing Weekend here in Colorado. So my family decided to head up to Manitou Lake for a day full of fun, lots of laughs, sunburns, great company, some food, and lots of fishing!

Now this post is going to be a little different then my normal post. I'm going to do this post in an awards style fashion. Here goes!

Award for the most fish caught:

My big brother Brent. At the end of the day with all of the ones that he kept and threw back, he probably caught about 12.

Award for Biggest Fish of the Day:

ME!!! That's right! I have bragging rights for the next year!

Award for Best Temper Tantrum:

My little sister Rachelle! She was having such a hard time getting her fish on to the shore. The first five fish she caught all jumped off the line before she was able to get them on the shore. She was getting so pissed off. It was quite funny. She finally got one towards the end of the day!

Award for Best Freak Out Moment:

The besty, Lacey! When she caught her fish, she didn't want to touch it. It was hilarious and cute at the same time. 

Award for the Cutest Nieces Ever:

Well, duh!! MaKenzi and Kelsi! 

The Award for Best Sunburn:

My brother Brent hands down!! When he took off his shirt, it looked like he still had it on, haha!

Award for the Best Aha Moment:

This one goes to me! My brother was so busy setting up everyone else's poles that when he got the chance he just got his pole in the water. Well, he was using a lure while the rest of us were using power bait. Well, he was the only one catching fish and so I finally said screw it and switched to a lure and within the first three or four casts, I had my first fish! I'm a genius, haha! Not really, just made an observation.

I'm sure that I could come up with more, but right now I am suffering from writers block. We had such a great time though and I hope that we can do it again soon. The best part of the whole day was when we got to go home and clean the fish and then grill them. I cleaned my own fish for the first time ever and it actually wasn't that bad. Then we grilled them and they were DELICIOUS!! It was an awesome day with awesome family and friends and I can't wait to do it again!!

Fill In The Blank Friday

It is Friday and that means that it is time for Fill In the Blank Friday over at the little things we do. This Friday's questions are a lot of fun. Remember if you want to join in, don't forget to link up. Happy Friday everyone!

Fill In The Blank Friday

1.   I love  life because  I have recently realized that life is way to short to take it for granted. With all of these horrible tragedies happening and all of the lives lost, it really makes you appreciate your life and the things in it more and more. 

2.  A time that mama knew best was  when she told me that I would meet someone when I least expected it. She was definitely right. I met my incredible fiance' on summer break from college when I was least expecting it. I definitely thought I would meet the man of my dreams at college, but I actually met him at home. Funny how that works, huh?

3.  My first kiss went a little like this   is it sad that I don't really remember how it was? I remember it happening, but I don't really remember what I was thinking afterwards or how it was. Haha!

4.  My celebrity crush is  a lot of people, haha. But recently, I have had a small crush on Scotty McCreery. Weird, I know! He is only 17, but his voice makes me melt every time I hear it. He is so cute and I can't wait for his career to take off.

5.  My splurge of choice is  different all the time. Here recently it has been clothes and Scentsy stuff. 

6.  My biggest accomplishment is   finishing college. A lot of people in my family have not finished so as of right now, I am one of the few. Pretty cool when you think about it. 

7.  My dance jam of choice is  different depending on the day. The Glee version of "Baby" by Justin Bieber has had me dancing quite a bit lately and really anything upbeat and I am down for dancing. It must be the cheerleader in me!

Blogger Really Hates Me

Hey everyone! Blogger must really hate me because I have been having nothing but problems with it tonight. I was trying to rearrange a few things and somehow my background was erased. I'm not quite sure how it was, but it was. So I found a new one that I like and I threw it on there for now. So please bare with me because I have recently (yesterday) decided to have my blog re-designed. So this was the final straw tonight. I will be contacting the lady that I want to use to redesign my blog tomorrow. I can't handle it anymore. I hate the blogger templates and I can't stand how you have to adjust things. Nothing ever works the way that it should. It is quite annoying. So again, please bare with me and I will try to get my new design up as soon as the lady can do it. Thanks everyone and I hope that you guys are having a great night!

Renting Blues

Aran and I are currently looking for a new place to live, and let me tell you what a nightmare it has been. There are so many factors that go into looking at a place and so far we have had no luck finding anywhere to live. Our lease is up at the end of this month and we have already given our 30 day notice, so I am hoping that we find something soon. And of course, I stress about things like this, so I have been super stressed out. I just keep praying that something will come up, but so far no luck.

What sucks right now is that it is definitely not a renters market right now. And by that I mean that the person trying to rent does not have the upper hand. There are so many people trying to rent right now because of how crappy the economy. With that being said, places being posted are going like hot cakes. I will call on a place that was just posted the day before and it will already be gone. That is something that annoys the crap out of me. If the place has already been taken, THEN TAKE THE POSTING DOWN!!! Don't make me make a ton of pointless calls. It just pisses me off even more.

If dealing with places being snatched up left and right hasn't been enough, then there is the issue of our cats. We will find a place that we really like and then we look down at the pets section and it will say no cats. Or if they do take cats they want a deposit. Now I understand that I am going to have to pay some type of a deposit. I get that, I truly do. But then people start tacking on pet rent and not to mention the last few places that we looked at they make you pay more for the pets if they are under a year old! So for Aran and I we would have had to put down a pet deposit of $600 and then a regular deposit of $695 plus first months rent! That is just insane. Why should I have to pay more just because my cats are under a year old? They have both been neutered and they are litter box trained. They are considered adult cats. It is such crap!

I am about at my end with this whole thing. I mean one apartment complex makes you rent the washer and dryer in the apartment for an extra $20 a month. Really? Why not just include it in the rent so when someone calls they know exactly what they are getting for the price that you quote them? Can you sense my frustration?   It just gets worse with each call that I make.

I keep asking myself why we are putting ourself through this. And why don't we just stay where we are at? And then I remember it is because they hiked our rent up from $765 a month to $820 a month on the place that we are currently in. I wish we could afford that, because I would be a lot less stressed and agitated at this point. But none the less, we can't afford that and so the search continues. We have our names down to look at these apartments down the street from work, so hopefully those work out. The only downside is that there is now washer and dryer in the apartment but they have hook ups and they have an onsite laundry facility so we could work with that.

Well everyone, wish us luck! I will keep you updated on our search as things start to figure themselves out. If any of you have any advice on house hunting or apartment hunting, please share them in the comments below. Thanks in advance! And remember...it is almost FRIDAY!! Woo hoo!!

Happy Birthday!

Okay, it isn't my Birthday, but today is the birthday of two of the most amazing people in my life. Today is my Mom and my niece Kelsi's Birthday! Odd thing about my nieces, one was born on my Mom's Birthday and the other was born on my Step-Dad's Birthday. Crazy, right?!

Miss Kelsi

Miss Kelsi is 3 years old today! I can't believe how big she is getting. I feel like she was just born yesterday! I have loved watching her grow up though. She is such a cutie and says some of the most adorable things ever! I mean we are related so I see where she gets it from. Haha! Just kidding. I am so blessed to have such an adorable and sweet little girl in my life. She always puts a smile on my face and I can't imagine my life without her and that sweet little smile that she has. A lot of people say that she looks just like me, which I don't really see, but she does have freckles like I used to when I was younger. She is just too much fun and I can't wait to see the look on her face tonight when she gets to open all of her presents and eat her very cute butterfly cake that my sister-in-law made for her. Happy Birthday to my adorably sweet niece Kelsi!!

Me and my Mom 

Happy Birthday to the best Mom on the planet! My mom, Sara turns 49 today. I have the best Mom in the world and I am very thankful for that. My Mom has always been there for everything. Even being hundreds of miles away at times, she is always there to help. I love her so much and I am so blessed to have her as a Mom. I wish that she were here today so that we could celebrate her Birthday too, but she is Washington right now with my Step-Dad's job. I miss her so much! I can't begin to thank her for everything that she has done for me these past 23 years. She has taught me so much and helped me to become the person I am today. Thank you Mom for everything that you have done! You truly are amazing! So this is me wishing her a Happy Birthday all the way from Colorado! I love you Mom!

I hope that everyone has a great day!