In case you hadn’t heard… we’re expecting!! A baby boy is set to join us in February and we are over the moon excited to meet him! Additionally, we’ve had lots of other life updates so I figured it was time for the latest installment of Life Lately…

Moving

In late May we left our beautiful apartment in South Carolina to move back to Kentucky. We rented a very modest place in Kentucky until we were able to find a house to buy. We were blessed to a find a home that fit our needs quickly and moved in late August.

Moving was an adventure… both from SC to KY and then from KY apartment to house. We stuck to a budget (and thankfully came in way under budget) doing everything on our own and entrusting the help of family. We may have beat up the couch a bit getting it into the U-Haul late one night (the only way to beat the heat was early in the morning or late at night) just Darrell and myself. First, wrangling it into the elevator was quite the marriage building exercise. Then came loading it up the U-Haul ramp. Have you seen us? Not exactly weightlifters lol. So the couch now has character…

Pregnancy

Just a couple days after leaving South Carolina, I found out I’m pregnant. This came as a very pleasant surprise. I wasn’t expecting the results on the stick and therefore had no idea how to keep a straight face crawling into bed that night and immediately told Darrell… So no cute story there lol, I know, I know, I wish I had been able to keep it together long enough to tell him in a cute way or at least capture his reaction on video. But that didn’t happen! He was also in shock. I took another test, and sure enough, it was also positive.

And I’m just not the gender reveal party type, so we didn’t do anything flashy for that. We just wanted to learn the results privately.

We told “the world” (aka social media) with personalized Coke bottles, because what else would you expect from us?! (Coke bottles have a lot of significance for us as a couple!)

Work

This summer, I accepted a job in my hometown, a PR/social media role. It has been nice to be back in the area where I grew up and to be helping my small town in this way. After almost two of years of working for myself, it is nice to have a change of pace with an office and coworkers haha.

Darrell is still working his same job and loving it. He’s also taken on other projects as we continue to hustle our way out of debt and prepare for the baby.

Etsy and Photography

I’m continuing to grow Grace & Grandeur, the Etsy shop I started last November. This has been such a fun creative outlet and way to support our family.

As we forgo our follow up contentment challenge to get our ducks in a row before Henry’s arrival (read the Contentment / Debt Challenge Recap post), I’ve started a photography business, Sarah Stillwell Creative, after casually shooting photos for my sister’s family and friends - something that’s naturally grown out of all the photos I take for the blog and the Etsy shop. I’m really excited about this opportunity to help us achieve our goals and I love the creativity it involves. Find Sarah Stillwell Creative on Facebook and Instagram.

Blogging

You’ll also notice a return of more affiliate links in my blog posts going forward. This is not to encourage any materialism, but rather to provide a resource and develop more of a revenue stream from the time I invest into the blog! We greatly appreciate your support! As a reminder, if you purchase something from one of the links, I will earn a commission. Shopping via these links does not increase the price you pay for an item and clicks do not earn commission, only purchases. I will always disclose at the top of blog posts when affiliate links are included.

Health Coaching

We completed our health coaching journey in May and we were amazed at the experience. We took away so much from our time with Liz and it has really changed our thinking on the foods we eat, the ways we move our bodies, our mental health and so much more. I can’t recommend her enough. I know it has really changed my thinking about my eating during pregnancy and I’m so appreciative of that. I feel more informed and better suited to make smart choices for me and for Henry. I have no way of pointing directly to health coaching and saying “that’s why we got pregnant when we did” but I have no doubts that we are better off for having done health coaching when we did and I know for certain it’s a positive impact on our pregnancy and overall health. Pregnancy obviously presents a host of new challenges with food and I’m rolling with the punches, giving myself grace where I can. I’m able to look at this time and the future ahead knowing that life doesn’t have to be a roller coaster of experimental diets but rather a holistic approach to fueling my body with what it needs.

Anniversary Photos

For our first anniversary, back in March, Darrell gifted me with an anniversary photo session by a photographer friend of mine (who actually took our engagement photos) at the venue where we were supposed to get married. For those who don’t know the whole story, the cliff notes version is this: We were supposed to get married April 17, 2020, and with COVID, our venue had to cancel our wedding. Since Darrell had already moved to NYC when the world shut down in mid-March, and 90% of my belongings went on the moving truck with him while I stayed in KY, we didn’t really see rescheduling the wedding for a later date to be an ideal option. We chose to get married in my sister’s living room just a few days later with our guests watching via a private livestream in a closed Facebook group. As beautiful, sentimental, and intimate as it was, it was honestly heartbreaking too. So many things we’d planned just couldn’t be pulled off on that short notice and in that way. So this anniversary photo shoot was a way for us to get some photos with a few of the key details I hadn’t been able to have that day (one of which being my bow on my dress being the appropriate size). This was incredibly meaningful and romantic, and provided a lot of closure for us. This post includes some of the photos from the session which happened over the summer. Below, I’ve included the caption from the recent IG post I made about the photos. There’s also a reel with behind-the-scenes from the session on my IG!

I can’t quite put into words how glad I am that we chose to do an anniversary session at what was meant to be our wedding venue.

For starters, there’s something about images of us in those special clothes a little over a year after saying our vows that packs a punch. So much joy to celebrate after what was a wild ride for a first year of marriage. So much to PRAISE GOD for in what looks to the outside world like we were dealt a crappy hand.

But it also brought so much closure. It didn’t hit me until we were walking through the park over halfway through the session when I kinda lost it emotionally as the beautiful bells chimed out “My Old Kentucky Home.” I cried like a baby! It was okay in my soul at that moment. All the heartache of the wedding was gone and I just felt God’s presence wash over me.

We ended the photos with our first dance song and @katiegallagherphoto even got emotional. By the end I think we all cried. Seriously. I had let her in on the secret that we already knew we were expecting and she reminded us that our sweet babe was with us in that special moment! I can’t wait to show Henry these photos one day and say “You were there!!” 💙

Thank you, Katie, for these priceless photos! I cannot thank you enough!!!