A so-so start to the week ended with an awesome long weekend in St. Louis visiting my family.  I’d like to share some tidbits from my life last week as well as an accompanying photo recap with selections from my Instagram with you.

I woke up Monday morning with a sore throat, which usually means I’m coming down with something.  This made sense after how tired I had felt all weekend.  I must have been fighting something.  Fortunately, it didn’t turn into a nasty bug but just a mild cold.  Nothing that a little hot water with lemon and honey and Don’s homemade chicken soup can’t cure!  Don also felt a bit under the weather, but never really got a cold, which meant he fought the bug off effectively.  Thank goodness for that!  I certainly don’t like being sick, but I really don’t like it when my loved ones don’t feel well.

I’m so grateful I felt well enough to continue enjoying the absolutely glorious fall weather we’ve had this October.  I so enjoy and look forward to my twice daily walks with my pup, Winnie.  We took a stroll in Evanston by the lake earlier in the week during the most beautiful sunset.  On Sunday evening after a long drive home from St. Louis I let her romp around the park while I admired the almost full moon bright and shining at dusk.  I can’t get enough of this kind of beauty!

I also am very much enjoying working on Baby Girl’s nursery with more progress to show this week.  We had the walls painted in Benjamin Moore’s Lambskin, which is actually a bit less pink in person than in the photo above and more of a soft almond color.  It changes slightly throughout the day depending on the light, but maintains the warm glow I was aiming for.  I love how cozy it makes the room feel!  I also ordered some rug and window treatment swtaches from RH Baby & Child and hope to narrow down those choices this week.  We still have to wait quite awhile for the furniture to be delivered, but I think the room is coming together nicely so far.

I’m happy Don and I felt well enough to keep our plans to drive down to St. Louis for a long weekend spent with my brother and his family.  Winnie and her cousin Oscar, my brother’s pug, were reuinted with Gertie and Mercedes, my sister-in-law’s brother’s dogs, who were also in town visiting with their humans.  My parents drove down as well to fill out this mini family reunion.

The main purpose of our trip, aside from wanting to spend time with the family of course, was to attend our nieces’ open house day at school, which is something we’ve done before and enjoyed immensely.  It was so interesting and fun to spend time with the girls at school.  Jaidyn (on the left) is in 4th grade and Emma (right) is in 6th grade now.  They’re both extremely smart, funny, and beautiful girls that we treasure!  It was great to be able to interact with them in their school setting.

The rest of the weekend was spent relaxing with the family and enjoying creature comforts like playing in the leaves outside and eating hot-off-the-press Krispy Kreme donuts.  I just love how comfortable and at home I feel around my loved ones.  We ate tasty food, played with the girls outside, watched A League of Their Own, and talked and laughed together.  It was such a relaxing, fun weekend!

I decided to try something a bit different this year and am snap-vlogging every day for the month of October over on my Snapchat.  It’s a way for me to vlog in a super casual way daily for a change of pace.  You can follow me there at prettyneatlivng if you’d like to see live posts.  I’m also compiling that footage into a weekly vlog in case you’re not on Snapchat.  Here’s my fourth weekly compilation:

I hope you enjoyed this peek at my week!
I’d love to know what made your week special if you care to share.
Happy (almost) Halloween 😀

* This is not a sponsored post.  All opinions are genuinely my own. *