Birthday Shoes

It's been a minute since I've posted. OK...it's been more than a year and a half. There were a lot of reasons I stopped posting, and I don't know how often I'll post now, but I've been having the urge to do so for awhile and figured I'd give it another go. Plus, my mama gave me some money for my birthday and I got new sandals, so clearly this is a reason to post!

They aren't anything fancy, but they're comfortable and they'll be great for summer (which is already here...it's been almost 90 the last 2 days). I also learned something interesting with these shoes: You know how I HATE the thing between my toes on flip flops. Welllll...apparently the heel strap helps mitigate the annoyance. Who knew?

In other news, I have a post-Easter cold. I got a nasty sore throat on Tuesday and now I'm coughing gunk out of my lungs. I used to almost always get sick after Christmas and Holy Week when I was a pastor, but maybe my body just doesn't like high holy days, even as a lay person. 😄

Any Color as Long as It's Blue

I helped teach Sunday School this morning.  It wasn't my morning to teach, just to be the extra person, so I got to hang out with the kids without planning a lesson.  This church tends to have mostly girls in Sunday School (I've only had 1 boy, 1 week when I've taught).  Today it was a group of 4, and I had a lovely time chatting with them while they did their craft.  During the time the head teacher complimented me on the necklace I was wearing (a sapphire surrounded by diamonds (it's paste, don't go thinking I have crazy expensive jewelry) that the hubby gave me for Christmas a few years ago.  She asked me if I was born in September.  I said no, my birthstone is diamond, but blue is my favorite color.  To which one of the kids piped up with "well, yeah, you wear it ALL the time!"  Observant little thing, eh?  Anyway, it gave me yet another reason to do a post on blue shoes!  Tonight's shoes are blue, but also springy because the trees are starting to bud out here and it's got me thinking about spring.

Do you think your toes get stuck in all of the strings when you put these on?  Or is that just me and my kluztiness?  I love this color.

Blue, strappy, AND t-strap.  Hooray!

Blue, polka-dot Mary Janes?  Also hooray!

I like these in theory, but I feel like my feet would swell and then I'd have weird shapes on my feet when I took my shoes off.  Yes, I have issues.

 

How much more spring-like can you get?  I might need these for EAster.

Or these.  

Ahhhh...I do love me some blue.  I like other colors, too, honest, but my mom likes to tell me that I like any color as long as it's blue.  Silly mama.  Except that everything I'm wearing at the moment, except for my bra, is blue...

Ahhhh

I actually got out of the house today!  The puppies and I went to hang out with SKD, and had a fabulous time soaking up the sunshine and splashing in the river.  It was the first day under 100 in something like 10 days, so it was lovely all around.  I posted this to my Instagram and Facebook pages when we first got there:

Several people commented on the sign of the apocalypse that is me in flip flops.  I do wear them occasionally, especially for watery events.  I had my Keene's too, but wore my flip flops.  I don't know, y'all...I have issues.

Anyhoo, this got me thinking about water shoes.  When I was in college and working at bible camp Teva's were what the cool kids were wearing.  I was never a cool kid and I had knock-offs that never fit quite right and definitely weren't cool  So tonight I went looking at Teva's just for the sake of nostalgia:

These are all the happy medium between my Keene's and my flip flops.  The auntie actually gave me a pair of similar sandals when I was home last time but they broke the first time wore them, sadly.  Oh well.  It was a delightfully lovely day despite my lack of cool-kid footwear.

Cute Auntie Shoes Day 3

Last day of new (to me) shoes from the Auntie!  How adorable are these?

They're a fun, sea-greeny color.  Sadly they started to rub my toes on both feet, but that's OK...

...because I have Jane Austen bandaids!  You can't really tell from the picture, but the flowers are the same color as the shoes.  Yep.  I'm just that cool.  Let's take a gander at some more sea-greeny shoes with flowers, shall we?

 

This is really pretty despite the fact that it's a slingback and has that thing between the toes.

I think I'd prefer if the flower was a little less floofy, but otherwise I'm on board.

I think I've posted these before with multi colored flowers? Who can remember any more?

Yes please.  I'll take a pair in each color, thank you.

OK, so these are a little bit off-theme, but there ARE flowers and sea green, so I'm including them because I think they're fun.  And because it's my blog.

Oh man, I definitely could not get my poop in a group this morning.  I woke up late, which threw everything off, but then I was just scattered.  I went to get the dragons out of the tub and realized I hadn't fed the dogs yet, so I detoured to do that.  When I got to the cupboard with their food I realized I hadn't finished cleaning up from making juice, so I detoured again.  I did manage to get everything done eventually, but I was definitely out of my usual rhythm and I almost forgot the poor dragons in the mix.  The day got better after that, but man my brain is full.  My hat is off to you who have children thrown into that morning mix.  All I have are dogs, dragons, and a husband and I'm a mess.

Memory Lane: 2013. 2014.

From the Brain of the Bean

Tonight's post is brought to you by inspiration from the Bean because I couldn't come up with anything and I didn't take pictures of the kiddos' cute shoes today.  So she suggested I type in all of the nieces' names + shoes, and then she helped me pick a pair for each niece:

DJ.  She likes black, she's not terribly girly when it comes to shoes, and apparently she wants a Harley.

 

Double A.  These aren't real, they're for a doll, but she loves green.  She wouldn't actually wear these, though, because they have heels and she's strictly a flats girl.

The Bean chose cute sandals for herself, which is kind of funny as she loooooves heels.

Flower.  We like the colors.  Not sure if they look like Flower or not.

Laughter didn't have a lot of choices.  These were the best of the bunch.  At least they're blue!

Speaking of blue, Pippi gets awesome blue wedding shoes.

This is actually a little sedate.  Tink loves color and crazy patterns, but The Bean and I thought this was really cute.

And that's it from Montana.  I'm tired and the 6 girls who are having a sleepover tonight are probably going to wake up much earlier than I am prepared for.

Memory Lane: 2013.

Happy Birthday, Brother

Yes, today is April Fool's Day, but it's also my big brother's birthday. There are jokes to be made about him being the biggest fool of them all, but I'll just leave that alone.  My birthday present to him.  I looked to see if there were any shoes with his name (actually his middle name as that's what he goes by) and it turns out he has a line of sandals.  Let's look:

And they're rather cute sandals, too.

Apparently they're quite comfortable as well.  I don't like these quite as much as that first pair, but they're still cute, and comfy heels are always a nice thing.

 

The color is good, but these are my lease favorite so far.

I couldn't help it.  They're so cute I just had to give you more colors.

And then there are these.  Still this same line, same creator, and really really ugly.  I'm sure they have great arch support and are probably very comfortable.  But they are not cute at all.

So the brother is another family member who has shoes named after him.  Some of them are even quite cute.  Not that they're men's shoes, but it's my blog so he can just deal, even on his birthday.  I'm also the little sister, so it's my job to be as bratty as possible to my big brother.  It's my birthday gift to him.

Memory Lane:  2013 (I was in Montana.  Jealous of my past self). 2014. 2015.

Happy Birthday, DJ!

Today, as I'm sure you've deduced from the title, is DJ's birthday!  She's 19, in the Navy, currently stationed in San Antonio, TX, and wants to be a nurse.  It's hard to believe I was 2 weeks shy of being legal drinking age when she was born.  Where the heck did the time go?  And how can she be 19 when I'm only 25?  In exciting news, she's currently in Montana, and I got to talk to her today while she was at Mom and Dad's house!  And then the silly phone started ringing off the hook and I had to get back to work.  Don't people know I'm trying to talk to my niece?  Oh well.  In honor of her new career in the Navy, here are some navy blue shoes:

That's an odd and interesting detail on the toes of these.

I had to include these after the old lady post the other day.

Another interesting detail.  Maybe a little fancier than I would tend toward, but still pretty.

I'm fairly sure I've posted these before (I've decided to stop caring if I have or not and post anyway...if your memory is better than mine you can tell me when and where the shoes were originally!).  The details are a little funky, but I like them.

 

Simple.  Classic.  Yes.

Shiny patent leather Mary Janes!

Sigh.  Ankle straps.

You know I hate the thing between my toes, but how perfect are these?  Dang, now I wish I'd gone in a more nautical direction.  Next year, I guess.

Happy Birthday, DJ!  Love you to the moon and back!

Memory Lane: 2013 (poor kid had a Good Friday birthday). 2014. 2015 (a Palm Sunday birthday is much more cheery).

3rd Anniversary Adventures

Yesterday was the hubby's and my 3rd anniversary (5th anniversary of our first date).  Traditionally, the first anniversary is paper, the second anniversary is cotton, and the 3rd anniversary is leather.  Not to say I can't do it going forward, but I totally dropped the ball with the first theme of paper, so I haven't done traditionally themed gifts for our anniversaries.  I didn't do a themed gift again this year, but at least I can do a themed post? 

Before we get to the leather shoes, though, yesterday was also quite the day because it's the day our new employees started (apparently we like to keep our anniversaries simple).  OK.  The new adventure.  Some of you know, and some of you don't, so I suppose it's time to stop alluding to it and actually tell you what's going on.  The hubby's job of the last year-and-a-half was challenging for many reasons; too many to go into in this post. In June, though, the weirdness became even weirder:  the local office in San Francisco started acting like they wanted to get rid of him, but the corporate office wanted to promote him.  In fact, they set up a couple of options for him, and it looked like things were going to work out, so the hubby turned down 2 other opportunities with other companies.  But then the lovely VP of the SF office sabotaged 3 separate attempts by corporate, and the hubby decided enough was enough and it was time to head out on his own.  Starting in June we began the process of starting a new business.  We got the office the first part of August and started getting everything set up, and new employees started yesterday (which is another story of insanity...ask me in person some time and I'll share that drama).  So I'm working in an office again.  I have no idea what my title is, though.  I'm the receptionist/gopher/office manager/janitor/keeper-of-Quickbooks, and whatever else each day might bring.  I've also lost the ability to walk in heels, a skill I must get back since I now have a place to wear them again!

Speaking of heels, let's move on to the shoe portion of today's post.

And of course they're going to be blue leather since it's my favorite color and our wedding color.  I'm not terribly fond of the shape of this just sitting there, but I know it would look cute under jeans.

Better shape, and would also look cute with jeans.  Or possibly a long dress.  But not a short one.

These are neither cute nor a good shape.  Maybe they look better on, and I'm sure there are women who could rock the style, it's just not a style I'm terribly fond of.

Does patent leather count?  It's my blog, so I say it does.  I love this!  So shiny and blue-y and Mary Jane-y!

Love this, too.  Probably a better heel height for the office, also, as opposed to the 5 inchers I'm wearing today.

I have these in black!  They are soooo comfortable.

I know it's not shoes, BUT, I told the hubby that when we make our millions :-) from this new adventure that we need to buy each other leather jackets, and I want this one.