(fun with…) photos

fun with hair…

mommy thinks it’s funny…

Atti’s not so sure…

going for the Flock of Seagulls look…

again, Atti’s not so sure…

and last but not least ~ fun with Papa, mowing the yard…

pumpkin patch slideshow

I put a few of the pictures I took yesterday into a slideshow. I took over 100 pictures, but I only chose a few of the best ones for the slideshow. Somehow I managed to catch some really funny looks on the teenagers’ faces ~ these kids are wonderful, kind and a joy to be around. They also crack me up…

keep praying

Thank you all so much for the comments and emails letting me know you’re praying for our family. You have touched my heart in a way that only God could do through others. I (we) appreciate your continued prayers. 

I apologize if it seems I’m being cryptic or secretive. That is not my intention at all. I’m hoping in the coming days to be able to write out the full story and share it with you. I am comforted to know that God knows our story (our whole story, all the way to the end, because He wrote it), and He knows exactly what you’re praying about when you pray for us.

I have been encouraged by your words, and I thank you all for them. Please continue to pray for us!

a day out

Today we joined our homeschool support group/co-op on a trip to the pumpkin patch. I know, I know ~ Sawyer’s 15 years old, and we’re going on a field trip to kiddie land? Surprisingly enough, this particular pumpkin patch isn’t ONLY for little kids. There’s a corn maze that the teenagers absolutely love. Even Sawyer said the corn maze was fun and challenging. That’s saying a LOT if you know Sawyer!

Here are a few pics from today:

your prayers

Right now our family is going through some very difficult trials. I covet your prayers for us. Because these are family issues, I am not comfortable going into details here on my blog. But I do desperately want your prayers ~ when you think of it, if the Lord brings us to your mind, please pray for us. I sincerely do appreciate it.

goodbye hollywood nobody (f.i.r.s.t. book summary & review)

It is October 11th, and FIRST is doing a special tour to ‘Say Goodbye to Hollywood Nobody’.

Today’s feature author is:

LISA SAMSON

and her book:

Goodbye Hollywood Nobody

NavPress Publishing Group (September 15, 2008)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Lisa Samson is the author of twenty books, including the Christy Award-winning Songbird. Apples of Gold was her first novel for teens

These days, she’s working on Quaker Summer, volunteering at Kentucky Refugee Ministries, raising children and trying to be supportive of a husband in seminary. (Trying . . . some days she’s downright awful. It’s a good thing he’s such a fabulous cook!) She can tell you one thing, it’s never dull around there.

Other Novels by Lisa:

Hollywood Nobody, Finding Hollywood Nobody, Romancing Hollywood Nobody, Straight Up, Club Sandwich, Songbird, Tiger Lillie, The Church Ladies, Women’s Intuition: A Novel, Songbird, The Living End

Visit her at her website.

Product Details

List Price: $12.99
Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: NavPress Publishing Group (September 15, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1600062229
ISBN-13: 978-1600062223

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Monday, July 11, 6:30 a.m.

I awaken to a tap on my shoulder and open my eye. My right eye. See, these days it could be one of four people: Charley, Dad, Grampie, or Grammie.

“’Morning, dear!”

Grammie.

Oh well, might as well go for broke. I open the other eye.

“Did you sleep well?”

I shake my head and reach for my cat glasses. “Nope. I kept dreaming about Charley in Scotland.” We sent her off with her new beau, the amazing Anthony Harris, two days ago. “I imagined a road full of sheep chasing her down.”

“That would be silly. They would have to know she hates lamb chops.” Grammie sits on my bed. Yes, my bed. In their fabulous house. In my own wonderful room, complete with reproductions of the Barcelona chair and a platform bed of gleaming sanded mahogany. I burrow further into my white down comforter. I sweat like a pig at night, but I don’t care. A real bed, a bona fide comforter, and four pillows. Feather pillows deep enough to sink the Titanic in.

She pats my shoulder, her bangled wrists emitting the music of wooden jewelry. “Up and at ’em, Scotty. Your dad wants to be on the road by seven thirty.”

“I need a shower.”

“Hop to it then.”

Several minutes later, I revel in the glories of a real shower. Not the crazy little stall we have in the TrailMama, which Dad gassed up last night for our trip to Maine. Our trip to find Babette, my mother. Is she dead or alive? That’s what we’re going to find out.

It’s complicated.

The warm water slides over me from the top of my head on down, and I’ve found the coolest shampoo. It smells like limeade. I kid you not. It’s the greatest stuff ever.

Over breakfast, Grampie sits down with us and goes over the map to make certain Dad knows the best route. My father sits patiently, nodding as words like turnpike, bypass, and scenic route roll like a convoy out of Grampie’s mouth.

Poor Grampie. Dad is just the best at navigation and knows everything about getting from point A to point B, but I think Grampie wants to be a part of it. He hinted at us all going in the Beaver Marquis, their Luxury-with-a-capital-L RV, but Dad pretended not to get it.

Later, Dad said to me, “It’s got to be just us, Scotty. I love my mother and father, but some things just aren’t complete-family affairs.”

“I know. I think you’re right. And if it’s bad . . .”

He nods. “I’d just as soon they not be there while we fall apart.”

Right.

So then, I hop up into our RV, affectionately known as the TrailMama, Dad’s black pickup already hitched behind. (Charley’s kitchen trailer is sitting on a lot in storage at a nearby RV dealership, and good riddance. I’m hoping Charley never needs to use that thing again.) “Want me to drive?”

He laughs.

Yep. I still don’t have my license.

Man. But it’s been such a great month or so at the beach. So, okay, I don’t tan much really, but I do have a nice peachy glow.

I’ll take it.

And Grampie grilled a lot, and Grammie helped me sew a couple of vintage-looking skirts, and I’ve learned the basics of my harp.

I jump into the passenger’s seat, buckle in, and look over at my dad. “You really ready for this?” My heart speeds up. This is the final leg of a very long journey, and what’s at the end of the path will determine the rest of our lives.

He looks into my eyes. “Are you?”

“I don’t know,” I whisper. “But we don’t really have a choice, do we?”

“I can go alone.”

I shake my head. “No, Dad. Whatever we do, whatever happens from here on out, we do it together.”

“Deal.”

I have enjoyed the Hollywood Nobody series by Lisa Samson. If you’re looking for a good read that has a sense of humor, grab one of the books in this series. You’ll thank me later.

win a free hand bag!

I just signed up to win a free hand bag at Handbag Planet. You can enter, too! Just go to www.handbagplanet.com to register ~ it’s free, easy, and quick!

more pictures

(everyone should have at least one embarrassing picture of their cute little baby cheeks!) I took this photo and a few more of Atti naked on Ashley’s bed. Silly me ~ I should have known Attison would pee on the bed if she was left naked for too long! Now I have to take the comforter in and have it dry cleaned…

those photos i promised

regarding my absence

Well, now that I’ve had a nice long (albeit unscheduled) absence from the blogging world, here’s what’s been up:

The world has turned upside down. That’s the only explanation I have! Things have been topsy turvey around here, much like a roller coaster ride. Jacob and Ashley broke up a while ago, and Jacob moved in with a friend temporarily. Things went along, not well, but not horribly, for a while. A lot of things happened, which I won’t publish on the internet for all to see ~ their private lives and relationship should remain private. Attison and Ashley have been well-taken care of living here with us. This past Monday, Jacob decided to go back to Minnesota. He packed up the car (which we bought for him, and which he was supposed to be paying us back for) and just took off. I’m not too happy about the decision he made, but it’s done and overwith, so there’s not a lot I can do about it.

That has been the majority of the topsy turvey-ness. It has been difficult, as you can imagine, but we’re coping well overall.

Attison is growing like a weed, and is such a little cutie. She has a major attitude at times ~ especially if you dare to take the bottle out of her mouth to burp her! ~ but she has a sense of humor, and her little belly laughs are just too funny.

Ashley and I have been sick, and we think Atti may have caught our cold as well. We took her to the doctor yesterday, and she said Atti’s ears and lungs are clear, so we’re good for now. She hasn’t been coughing all that much; mostly she just fusses.

Patrick is at college, and seems to be doing well. We are expecting him home this weekend. He wants me to take him clothes shopping. Can you imagine ~ an 18 year old male WANTING his mother to take him clothes shopping?! I’m pretty psyched. Ariel may be coming for the weekend as well ~ we’ll have a very full house.

Sawyer’s working away at school. We decided on Sonlight’s civics and government curriculum, as well as Apologia’s advanced biology (anatomy and physiology), and Teaching Textbook’s algebra II. The Bible part of Sonlight’s program is pretty hefty, but Sawyer seems to be enjoying it. We’re still involved in co-op; Sawyer’s taking Spanish and a leadership class. He’s also involved in choir, taking French horn lessons, and active in 2 youth groups. Oh, and let’s not forget the newest addition to an already over-crowded schedule ~ hapkido. He voluntarilly goes to hapkido 3 times a week to get his butt kicked.

Ashley is studying to take the GED as well as studying for the driver’s license test. Once she finishes her GED testing, we plan to enroll her in college. With a baby, she’ll probably need to take online classes, but that would actually work well for her.

I have some pictures from last week that I need to get off my camera’s memory card onto my computer. Once I’ve done that I’ll post them. Attison is definitely a little red head. Her eyes are still blue, but they may be changing to green. I don’t know yet. She’s a cutie, that’s for sure.

That’s about as summarized as I can get about the events that have taken place during my (what seemed to me to be forever) absence. I’m hoping to have time to catch up with all of my bloggy friends!

cd winners

I apologize for not posting the winners of the Ayiesha Woods CD drawings on Sunday. I was not feeling well yesterday, at all…

The winners of the Ayiesha Woods CD drawing are Delaney and Patty! Congrats, ladies! I will send you each an email and get your mailing addresses.

I have another great giveaway coming, and some really fantastic news to pass along, too ~ so check back soon!

cd giveaway

Gotee Records has graciously sent me two CDs of recording artist Ayiesha Woods’ new release, “Love Like This”. To hear some of her music, select a song from the box below, and be sure to turn your speakers up, ’cause Ayiesha’s good!

I will be giving away both brand new CDs ~ if you would like to be entered in the giveaway, just send me an email. You’ll find my email address on my profile page here.

I know I do giveaways a little differently than most, but I have found that if I do it this way ~ by having you send me an email ~ I receive less spam. For some reason the spammers seem to love giveaways! I realize going to my profile to get my email address is just an extra step you have to take, but I do appreciate your efforts ~ and hopefully you’ll be rewarded by winning one of these fantastic music CDs!

This giveaway is open to everyone, worldwide ~ and it’s free (I will pay the cost of sending the CDs to the winners, no matter where they are). The drawing is open now through Saturday, September 27. I will draw two winners on Sunday, Spetember 28.

wild goose chase winner

Congratulations to Lindsey ~ her name was drawn as the winner of the Wild Goose Chase giveaway.

Don’t worry if you didn’t win this time ~ I have some pretty exciting giveaways coming up over the next month, so check back often!

wild goose chase (summary and giveaway)

Book: Wild Goose Chase 

Author: Mark Batterson

Summary:

Most of us have no idea where we’re going most of the time. Perfect.

“Celtic Christians had a name for the Holy Spirit–An Geadh-Glas, or ‘the Wild Goose.’ The name hints at mystery. Much like a wild goose, the Spirit of God cannot be tracked or tamed. An element of danger, an air of unpredictability surround Him. And while the name may sound a little sacrilegious, I cannot think of a better description of what it’s like to follow the Spirit through life. I think the Celtic Christians were on to something….

Most of us will have no idea where we are going most of the time. And I know that is unsettling. But circumstantial uncertainty also goes by another name: Adventure.” –from the introduction

Author Bio:

Mark Batterson is the lead pastor of Washington, DC’s National Community Church, widely recognized as one of America’s most innovative churches. NCC meets in movie theaters at metro stops throughout the city, as well as in a church-owned coffee house near Union Station. More than seventy percent of NCC’ers are single twentysomethings who live or work on Capitol Hill. Mark is the author of the best-selling In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day and a widely read blogger (www.markbatterson.com). He lives on Capitol Hill with his wife, Lora, and their three children.

Giveaway

 I have one copy of Wild Goose Chase to give away. A drawing will be held Tuesday, September 2 ~ if you would like to be entered to win, please email me with your email address, and Wild Goose Chase in the subject bar.

http://draft.blogger.com/profile/14302337343097746314

EDITED: Again, please send me an email (simplescrapper AT gmail DOT com) rather than leaving a comment on this post. I re-did this post so the people who have already commented are entered into the drawing, but I need everyone else to send me an email. The way I do drawings works much better when done with email addresses in hand rather than scrolling through comments hoping the person whose number was drawn left me a way to contact them……I know most everyone else does drawings through comments, but I have found it works better if people who want to be entered send me an email. Thanks!

we’re on the lpm blog!

Ashley, Attison and I are back from our trip to San Antonio. We sat 8 rows from the stage at the Living Proof Live conference (Living Proof is the name of Beth Moore’s ministry). Beth came down onto the floor to introduce her in-laws and spotted me holding Attison. She made a beeline for us ~ and we got our picture on the jumbotron in front of 10,000 women! Yikes! Even better (or worse…) is that the picture of me holding Attison while Beth petted her head and blessed her is a still pic on the Living Proof Ministries Blog. Ack! Ashley was sitting next to me, and I thought for sure she would crawl under our seats when Beth headed for us.

It was a long trip, but we had a great time. We’re going to rest and recover for the next couple of days. I loved seeing Joanne and Holly ~ I wish we would have been able to spend more time with them.

Speaking of Holly ~ she and I still have something in the works…..hopefully we’ll get that completed soon so we can make an announcement.

graceland

Today Ashley, Attison, Maggie, Tyler and I are going to Graceland. It’s about a two and a half hour drive there, and we’re leaving very early in the morning. So why am I still up at 12:22am, writing a blog post, no less? Mainly because the Ambien hasn’t kicked in yet ~ but also because I haven’t written a blog post in quite a while.

You’re probably wondering who Maggie and Tyler are. Maggie is Ashley’s best childhood friend. They’ve know each other since they were 5. Maggie is here visiting until Wednesday. She’s an extremely talented artist; she’s also the person who took all of those pictures of Ashley I initially had before I met her. Maggie got her camera out tonight and took a few pictures of Attison on her changing table being mesmerized by the Classic Pooh mobile. I’m hoping that over the next few days she will take lots and lots of pictures.

Tyler is a new friend, I guess you could say. His family owns the Mountain Mudd kiosk in the little town where I live. It’s pretty close to my house, so I go there ~ a lot. I’m sort of addicted to vanilla breves. And Tyler makes really good vanilla breves. He’s Ashley and Maggie’s age. He and Ashley were talking one day and she mentioned that she has always wanted to go to Graceland ~ she’s a huge Elvis fan. Tyler said he wanted to go too ~ so Ashley invited him to come along with us! LOL We’re taking off in the Suburban six and a half hours from now. I sure do wish that Ambien would kick in so I could go to bed!

It will be a fun trip. Well, that is as long as Attison doesn’t decide she doesn’t want to be in her car seat. She’s usually really good about going places in the car. She just falls asleep, and doesn’t wake up until after we get home, no matter how many places we stop and go into along the way. As long as Atti is cooperative we should be fine.

all about popularity…..

You know, I’ve been thinking…..

(Hush, Roger ~ I can hear your “Oh brother, here we go” thoughts!)

Last week Sitemeter had a major problem ~ people’s sites/blogs were crashing in IE7 because of some code changes Sitemeter made. And it got me to thinking ~ why do I use a service like Sitemeter, Statcounter or Goggle Analytics? I’ve found myself getting caught up in the “rat race” of being obsessed about how many hits my blog is getting.

In some ways it reminds me of being in high school. Wanting to be one of the popular kids, having lots of friends, and being the center of attention. But I’m a grown up. And this blog for personal reasons, not professional. Does it really matter how many people are reading my blog?

I love to go to Sitemeter and see who’s reading my blog, though. I am fascinated that there are people all over the world who take the time to stop by here and read my thoughts, see my pictures, and even watch the occasional video. I would love to hear from each of you personally.

I took the Sitemeter code down last week but didn’t reinstall it, even though Sitemeter fixed the problem. But to tell the truth I’ve missed popping in to Sitemeter just to see who has been visiting. I haven’t been able to post very much lately, so I just want to say that I do appreciate your persistence in stopping by to check if I’ve written anything new.

I’ve been examining my motives behind having a hit counter here. And after some thought about it, I’ve decided that I’m going to go ahead and reinstall the code for the counter. Not because I want to run the numbers game, or because I’m concerned about how many hits my blog gets each day. I’m reinstalling the code because I love to see where the people who are reading my blog are living. In a strange way, I think that’s a bit like my life. It doesn’t really matter to me how many friends I have ~ I just want the friends I do have to be interesting. And you all are very interesting to me!

guard dog

Jake has decided that Attison is an acceptable new member of “the pack” (the family). I haven’t been able to get a photo of him giving her a great big doggie kiss, but I did find him guarding her while she sat in her bouncy chair this morning:

my 95 lb. dog is afraid of thunderstorms

she’s got the temper……

of a red head, that’s for sure! One of Jacob’s sisters has this absolutely amazing strawberry blonde hair ~ the kind with highlights and lowlights that women pay hundreds of dollars at the salon to imitate. Attison may very well have inherited that strawberry blonde hair!

jubilate video

There’s a video on Facebook of our church’s youth choir performing at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Kansas City, Missouri, but I can’t figure out a way to transfer the video to Blogger. If you follow the link below you should be able to see the video, but if you don’t have a Facebook page you might have to sign up for one. I don’t know. Here’s the link if you want to give it a try:

http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=1683240107&k=Y5LZ5V63SY6M51MARBW4UT

The cathedral has good acoustics, but on the video it sounds like a whole lot of echoing.

Remember that these are kids ranging in age from 11 to 19 years old. They sound amazing, and really should be a recording group!

I’m going to email Pastor Eddie, who posted the video originally, and see if I can get a copy of it to put on my blog for everyone to see.

big sisters

These photos of Sawyer with two of his “big sisters” were taken while our church’s youth choir was on tour in Colorado. I think Sawyer enjoys having the older girls dote on him!

i’m mellltttiiinnggg

Wednesday, Jul 30

High: 96 °F RealFeel®: 102 °F

A blend of sun and clouds with a shower or thunderstorm around; hot

Wednesday Night, Jul 30

Low: 74 °F RealFeel®: 79 °F

Partly cloudy with a shower or thunderstorm around

Thursday, Jul 31

High: 93 °F RealFeel®: 103 °F

Clouds and sunshine with a thunderstorm in the area

Thursday Night, Jul 31

Low: 72 °F RealFeel®: 73 °F

An evening thunderstorm in the area; otherwise, partly cloudy and humid

Yes, I’m whining about the weather again…..

the one where i try to make a long update short

We have been very busy around here just trying to keep up with all of the necessary items of having an infant in the house. It’s a really good thing that Ashley had a friend give her boxes and boxes of little girl clothing. Atti tends to go through about 6 or 8 changes of clothes a day. I know that’s normal ~ nonetheless, it’s a lot of work! Since we’re using cloth diapers as well, there are at least two loads of laundry to do every day. Atti may have to change her clothes several times a day, but what’s worse is the number of burp cloths we use. My goodness! I’ve given up on making pretty burp cloths. Sure they’re cute, but when it comes right down to it, a plain old tri-fold Gerber birdseye cloth diaper is just as good as one that has had fabric sewn down the middle and ribbon added to the sides. They’re not nearly as cute, but they serve their intended purpose just as well.

It’s amazing to me how stubborn a 6 week old baby can be. We’re working on her attitude already! We’re all born with a sinful nature, and to be honest that sinful nature is quite evident in babies.

Ashley and Jacob have been attending church with us. Ashley has gone for several weeks now ~ Jacob has joined us the last 2 weeks. Our church is doing a series on “The 7 ‘I AMs’ of Christ”. Yesterday’s message was “I am the way, the truth and the life”. After church Jacob told me he felt as though that message was spoken directly to him. Jacob has struggled with Christianity ~ and there have been plenty of people along the way who have called themselves “Christians” ~ who weren’t very Christ-like ~ who have helped him form a bad opinion of Christians and Christianity as a whole. So when he agreed to start going to church with us, I was thrilled. He’s full of questions, which is good, and full of doubts, which I see as opportunities to teach him.

I have seen the Holy Spirit working in Ashley ~ His work is very evident to me. He’s working on her heart, and she’s beginning to feel His calling to her. She and I are going to San Antonio in a month to attend a Living Proof Live conference (Beth Moore), and she’s very excited about it. So am I. We even volunteered to be greeters during the event ~ that was something we both wanted to do, and we felt it would give us an opportunity to serve. My friends Holly and Joanne will be at the conference, and I am so excited about seeing them again! We’ll be staying with my friend Stacey, who I haven’t seen in a very long time, and I can hardly wait! It’s looking like this will be a very fun trip. Ashley and I will celebrate her 20th birthday on our trip as well, so it’s going to be a really big deal.

We’ve been working on choosing a curriculum for this coming school year. Sawyer will be in 10th grade, and this could be his last school year at home. He’s considering attending the residential high school Patrick just graduated from. I can’t even begin to think about what it would be like to have absolutely no children in the house come next fall. For this year, I think we’re going to go back to Sonlight. We’ve tried all kinds of other curriculum, but we always seem to come back to Sonlight. We’ll be studying American Government/Civics, which is Sonlight’s Core 400. We’ll also be doing Apologia Advanced Biology, Teaching Textbook’s Algebra II, and at co-op Sawyer will attend Spanish and leadership classes. There’s lots of writing involved in Core 400, and lots of reading as well. Sawyer wants to be challenged this year ~ that won’t be a problem! He’ll also continue to sing with our church’s youth choir, take French horn lessons and attend youth group. I’m starting to look forward to the routine of the school year!

author chat on abunga.com

I haven’t posted any book reviews in a while. I was taking a bit of a break from reviewing, since it seemed like my life just sort of exploded (albeit in a good, God way) in February. I received a press release from Abunga.com today that I feel is worth sharing. I’m in the process of reading My Soul to Keep by Melanie Wells, and since she’s the first author to be interviewed at Abunga.com, I feel it’s appropriate to post the press release here:

PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER AUTHOR TO CHAT
ABOUT WHAT LIES BETWEEN THE LINES:
Melanie Wells Joins Readers on Online Bookstore Chat

WHO:	Melanie Wells, author of the critically acclaimed Dylan Foster series – “When the Day of Evil Comes,” “The Soul Hunter” and the newly-released “My Soul to Keep.” Wells will join the family-friendly online bookstore, Abunga.com, to discuss her insights on the fiction series, writing, building story lines and using one’s creativity and imagination to shape character development.
WHAT:	“Authors at Abunga” Chat with Melanie Wells Wells’ Dylan Foster trilogy is packed with both humor and suspense. Each thriller tracks the mayhem surrounding Wells’ unlikely heroine, college psychology professor Dylan Foster. Wells, who is also a psychotherapist and accomplished musician, will provide insights into her writing style, how stories are created, and where characters come from.
wheN:	Wednesday, July 16, 2008 11 a.m. – Noon PDT / 1 – 2 p.m. CDT / 2 – 3 p.m. EDT (LIVE) At www.Abunga.com/AuthorsAtAbunga
DETAILS:	Wells is the first author to be featured on the newly-created “Authors at Abunga” chats by Agunga.com. A Texas native, Wells is an accomplished musician (she’s a fiddle player) a licensed psychotherapist, and the founder and director of Dallas-based LifeWorks counseling associates (www.wefixbrains.com). Beginning with “When the Day of Evil Comes,” each of Wells’ novels weaves a gripping tale in which the quirky, likeable Dylan Foster wrestles with her own personal demon — Peter Terry – “a spiritual and emotional stalker,” Wells says, ”Peter Terry is a compelling character who rings true for all of us. He is a metaphor for the opposition we all have in our lives. And we can all relate to Dylan, who often feels like she’s fighting forest fires with a squirt gun.” More info found at www.Abunga.com/FeaturedAuthorWells. Abunga.com is an online bookstore founded to provide families a protected shopping environment. Headquartered in Knoxville, Tenn., Abunga.com offers more than 1.6 million family-friendly books, savings through distributor-direct prices and support to nonprofit organizations by donating 5 percent of each transaction to a customer-selected charity. For more information, visit www.Abunga.com.

attison, week 5

I’ve created a new photo album:

Attison, Week 5

Have you ever played with the online digital photo editing tool Picnik? I’m having so much fun with this thing ~ and it’s super easy to use. Give it a try ~ the Create tab has some really great options!

at the peabody

Last night Roger and I had a romantic evening at The Peabody Hotel in downtown Little Rock. We were celebrating our 19th anniversary a week early. Roger had today off as a “family day” so we took advantage of the opportunity to go have a night out together.

The Peabody Hotel is very nice; The Capriccio Grill is in the hotel, and it’s a wonderful place for a romantic steak dinner. Their filet mignon is the best we’ve found in the city. And they have amazing desserts.

I forgot to take my digital camera with me (are you beginning to figure out that this is not an unusual occurrence with me?) so I had to take pictures with my cell phone. By the time The March of the Ducks happened, my phone was dead, so there are no pictures of that. I did get some decent pics of our room, the champagne and chocolate strawberries which greeted us in our room, and the cute little soap duckie in our bathroom.

Peabody 19th Anniversary Night

By the way, incase you’re wondering about Roger’s lopsided smile, it’s because the muscles and nerves in the left side of his face still have not recovered from the surgery he had August of 2006. In January of 2005 he had a non-cancerous lump removed from his left salivary gland. It had wrapped itself around the nerve bundle, and by early 2006 it had regrown to the point where Roger had to have another surgery and removal. I’m not sure the left side of his face will ever fully recover. Here are some pics I took after the second surgery ~ but I want to WARN YOU: the pics are not graphic, but they were taken a day after the surgery, so they’re a little gross. View them at your discretion.

Roger’s Surgery 8.2006

so much for that idea

Well, we didn’t quite make it to the fireworks last night. Actually, Jacob and Ashley did, but Roger, Attison and I stayed home. It was just way too hot outside for me. Which means we didn’t hang out outside yesterday, which in turn means I didn’t take a bunch of pictures. The beauty of the whole thing is, it was even HOTTER outside today, so ~ you guessed it ~ we didn’t hang out outside today either. I did get a picture or two of Attison, but they’re just more pics of her sleeping, and I’m fairly sure everyone has seen enough of those for now. I need to do a better job of finding the camera while she’s awake. She really does have alert periods, I promise!

Sawyer is on his trip to Colorado with our church’s youth choir. They’re touring all over the state, giving concerts and performing mission-type jobs at churches. Tomorrow they’ll be singing at the US Air Force Academy’s Cadet Chapel in the morning (at the Protestant service), then at a church in Colorado Springs in the evening. After reading my friend Meredith’s blog about her town’s parade, I’m wishing I had gone to Colorado with the kids! She’s wearing a JACKET, on the 4th of July! I haven’t worn a jacket on the 4th of July since 2004, when we were still living in Alaska. Sometimes living in the south is just too much for me.

My friend Holly loves the beach. I love the mountains. (I’m pretty sure Holly loves the mountains too, since she lives in Colorado ~ I’ll just clarify that I don’t love the beach. Too sandy and all.) I miss the mountains. Truly, truly miss the mountains. And cool weather. And tree lines, which will only be found on ~ again you guessed what I was going to say ~ mountains. Not those hills that people in the south like to call mountains. Real mountains. And snow. I miss snow. Real snow, not that gloppy stuff that people in the south like to call snow. Snow does not go “SPLAT!” when it hits your windshield. Good snow even has to be packed with just a touch of melted snow on your mittens to make good snowballs. Alaska has amazing snow. And fantastic ski hills. On real mountains. People in the south just don’t understand why I miss Alaska. I think it has to do with the fact that winter in Arkansas is that bone biting, bone chilling kind of cold you get in really humid climates. Winter in Anchorage, Alaska is just not that way. I’ll be completely honest ~ 40 degrees below zero is stinkin’ cold. That’s true. But 40 degrees below zero is not the norm for Anchorage, Alaska. Besides, I stand by my old adage ~ you can always put more clothing on. When it’s 104 degrees with a “Real Feel” of 114, and 10,000,000,000% humidity, there’s only so much clothing you can take off. Really. I’d much rather have on 15 layers of clothing…..

I think it’s just about this time every year when I really start lamenting the fact that we had to move away from Alaska. But don’t worry, the complaining will most likely continue for at least another 20 years. We have no plans to leave Arkansas. God could throw a monkey wrench into our non-plans, which I would probably jump up and yell, “Halleluia! Praise God!” to, but I think there’s a lesson here for me. Most likely it’s something along the lines of bloom where you’re planted (that’s in the Bible, isn’t it? No? Hmmm, I thought I’d read that somewhere…)

A long time ago, when we were living in North Carolina, Roger received an assignment to Japan. Now, I know there are a lot of people who would love to go to, or even live in, Japan. I’m just not one of them. I was horrified. For two weeks I cried, wailed, moaned, groaned, bargained and cajoled with God about it. I promised this and begged that, but He pretty much just kept telling me no. So, finally I gave in, breathed deeply and said, “Ok God. I give in. I’ll go where You send me, and I’ll go joyfully. I know You have a plan, and it’s for my good. So look out Japan, here I come.” And wouldn’t you know, 3 days later Roger’s assignment to Japan was canceled. Wow. You’d think I would have learned a valuable lesson from that, wouldn’t you? Well, I guess as is evidenced by all of my complaining about living in the south that I haven’t learned that lesson as well as I probably should have.

Now, please don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that if I just gave in and stopped complaining about having to live in the south, God would move us back to Alaska. It doesn’t work that way. God knows my heart. He knows that even if I stopped complaining outwardly, I would still be complaining inwardly. I truly do dislike the heat and humidity. And combined, they make my fibromyalgia about 1000 times worse. The humid cold of the south doesn’t make me feel much better than the humid heat. But again, I know God has a plan. And His plan is for my good. I don’t always know what His plan is, or why His plan is the way it is, but I do know my God. And He is good. I’m a hard-headed lumux, so sometimes it takes me a while to catch on. But of this I am sure ~ God is good all the time, and all the time God is good.

So, if that means I have to live in the south for the rest of my life, I will try to do so joyfully. It most likely won’t be without the occasional complaining. But with the complaining I usually remind myself that God put us here (in Arkansas) for a reason. Many reasons, most likely. And while I may not know what all of those reasons are, I do know that they’re good reasons. God reasons. And those are the best reasons anyone could ask for.

3.5 weeks

I uploaded a new album to Picasa ~

Brittney’s Visit

Roger is home for a 5 day weekend starting tomorrow! With the weekend being a holiday weekend, I’m pretty sure we’ll be taking pictures, so there should be more to come…..

goin’ to san antone

My friend Holly is in charge of The Siesta Fiesta Cookbook and has been doing a fantastic job. It’s a lot of work, but Holly is such a gracious and kind person, and she has been working very hard to make this cookbook something special.

Holly and I first established a relationship in the blogosphere ~ I don’t remember who first contacted whom, but we emailed back and forth and quickly became friends.

When we took a family trip to Colorado this past March, Holly and I were able to meet in person. Joanne and Meredith were there also, and we all had an absolutely wonderful time together.

This August, Ashley, Attison and I will be attending the Living Proof Live convention in San Antonio, as well as The Siesta Fiesta. Holly was instrumental in my decision to try to attend this event ~ she’s the one who told me about it, and she asked me to consider and pray about attending. After some prayer and discussions with Roger, I decided I would like to go. The only problem was the cost of the hotel ~ it was WAY more than we could afford. But, as is His way, God provided an alternative to the expense of staying in a hotel.

We have good friends who live just outside of San Antonio. Ed (Tex) and Stacey have been back in the San Antonio area for less than a year, but they’re all moved into their house (after living in their 5th wheel for 6 months!), and they’re ready for house guests. Plus, Stacey is a young grandma herself, and she just happens to absolutely L.O.V.E. babies ~ so Ashley, Atti and I are going to stay at their house while we’re in San Antonio for LPL and The Siesta Fiesta. Stacey will be attending the events with us, so we’re sure to have a good time. Stacey is an absolute kick ~ never a dull moment with her around!

I’m really looking forward to this trip in August. It’s the same weekend as Ashley’s 20th birthday, I’ll get to see my friends Holly and Joanne (Mer, I wish you were able to go too!), I’ll be able to catch up with my friend Stacey, attend a Beth Moore/LPL event (my 2nd), and hang with my “siestas” at the fiesta. It should be an amazing trip!

atti stats

Just for the record, my daughter may be a tiny little whisp of nothing, but Attison is shaping up to be quite the little porker! She was born June 6th, and weighed 6 pounds even. When we left the hospital June 9th, Attison weighed 5 pounds 8 ounces. June 18th Attison weighed in at 7 pounds. Last Monday, June 23, she was up to 7 pounds 4 ounces. Today she weighs 7 pounds 10 ounces. That’s about an ounce a day in weight gain. My goodness! And Ashley was concerned she might not be able to produce enough milk to breastfeed Attison ~ I’d say she’s doing a rather good job!

a surprise is coming

I just HAVE to get a little teaser in here: my friend Holly and I have been working on something very special for Christian homemakers. We’re hoping to “go live” with the debut in late July or early August. The goal is to be up and running before The Siesta Fiesta in August.

I can’t wait to tell you all about it! But for now, all I can say is that we’re working hard, and we’ll get things running smoothly (hopefully) as soon as possible. Watch for the upcoming announcement!

where have you been?

I have been all over the place lately!

Sawyer was a teen leader in our church’s Music & Drama Camp last week, so I was busy taking him to and from the church every morning. And since we live over 20 miles from the church, I just couldn’t justify making 2 round trips for a 4 hour camp, so I just stayed at the church and enjoyed watching the kids learn from and work with the adults (and teen leaders). This year the “drama” was Life School Musical. I haven’t seen High School Musical, but from the name I would guess it’s a Christian take-off of High School Musical. I was at camp every day, watching as the adults and teens gently but firmly guided and instructed the kids ~ ages kindergarten through 6th grade ~ and taught them the lines, choreography and music of Life School Musical. The performance Friday night was fantastic. Everyone involved in our church’s Music & Drama Camp do an amazing job. Pastor Eddie tells the kids that perfection is not the goal ~ excellence is. Both of my sons were involved in MaD when we lived here last time, and Patrick even had a major speaking role in one of them. It’s so cool to see the kids who were in kindergarten all those years ago now working as teen leaders.

I took pictures:

Music and Drama Camp ‘08

After MaD, Sawyer and I would rush home to make lunner (lunch + dinner = lunner), then head BACK to the church for choir practice. Every night ~ except Wednesday, when Sawyer had youth group AT THE CHURCH, and Friday night when the kids performed Life School Musical AT THE CHURCH. So, as you can see, I spent a lot of time AT THE CHURCH last week!

This week Sawyer has a couple of hours of choir practice tonight and tomorrow night (AT THE CHURCH, imagine that), then he will pack up and head to Colorado for 10 days with the youth choir. They’ll perform at a large cathedral in Kansas City and several churches all over Colorado. They’ll also perform at the Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel on Sunday for the Protestant service. I can’t even begin to express how HUGE of a deal performing at the Cadet Chapel is. NO ONE gets to perform there. I’m not sure how Pastor Eddie managed to pull that booking off, but I have a strong suspicion it has something to do with a friend of ours, a retired AF colonel, who lives in the area. (By the way, we miss you, Brian and Sherri!) I seriously considered volunteering as one of the adult chaperons for this choir trip ~ I miss the mountains, and I would love to be somewhere that has lower humidity. But, having my daughter move in and being present for Attison’s birth took precedence over a trip to Colorado this year. Maybe next time…..

I haven’t taken any pictures of Attison this week, but here’s one from last week:

Other than being a little fussy now and then, she’s really an angel baby. She’s working hard on holding up her head, and she is beginning to show some personality with occasional smiles. Of course I will be taking pictures this week ~ and you know I’ll post them!

roger’s birthday

Yesterday was Roger’s 41st birthday! We celebrated with a yummy lasagna made by Jacob’s mom, and a heavenly peanut butter chocolate ganache cake made by my friend Kathryn. Everything was wonderful, and we had a lovely time!

Happy birthday, Rog!

hotm conference

My friend Tamara @ Training Hearts is giving away 5 chances to win a ticket for the Heart of the Matter online’s virtual conference:

Shhhh! Do you hear that? It is the comfort of your home calling you. PJs, coffee, or tea (your flavor), and five fun filled days just for you!

In Heart of the Matter Online’s
(http://heartofthematteronline.com/) quest to bring you the absolute best home school resource online, they have listened to your requests and are providing you with a fun filled online adventure! On July 30th through August 3rd, they will be hosting Heart of the Matter Online’s first annual Virtual Homeschool Conference! They will be providing the attendees with motivational speakers, video tutorials, free products, question and answer sessions, and a vendor hall – all ONLINE! Just log on and listen live during that time or log in at your convenience and download the audios.

This conference will be less like a “seminar” and more like a bunch of close friends in a chat room. Just wait till you see what some of your favorite home school personalities (http://www.hotmconference.com/2008/03/2008-speakers.html) have done to educate and entertain you! At the end you will join in to chat with them, ask questions, and they will answer.

{Click on graphic above to get the Early Bird Special!}

To ensure your spot in the conference room and to take advantage of the early bird special. Simply, visit the Heart of the Matter Online Conference (http://www.hotmconference.com) site and click the “pay now” button. At $19.95 these prices won’t last long! This $19.95 includes a fabulous $30 package from Currclick: curriculum in a click! Currclick (formerly HomeschoolEstore) is the largest one-stop shop for electronic lapbooks, affordable curriculum, and homeschooling resources.

If you would like to be entered in Tamara’s drawing, click here.

another comparison

Edited: Just for clarification, the picture on the left is me at about a week old (February, 1968), the picture on the right is Attison, taken yesterday (6/15/2008).

more pics…

Ariel came to visit Friday to see Attison: (you can click on all of these pictures to see a larger version)

Miss Attison finally decided to have a long alert period and pose for the camera:

Mommy and Papa both enjoyed Atti being awake long enough to play with and talk to:

good screams

Click on the photo to see a larger version….

Me:

Ashley:

Attison:

chickens

Alright all you chickens who won’t make a commitment on whether or not those 3 baby pictures show serious resemblances or not……..

Please take into consideration that Ashley’s father is about a quarter Native American ~ that accounts for the difference in skin colors and noses. In the winter Ashley’s as white as a white girl can be, but in the summer she tans to an amazing mahogany brown in about 5 minutes of sunlight. Also, Ashley’s nose is a combination of my nose and her father’s. Her father has a rather flat-ish Native American-ish nose ~ my nose is very much a European mutt kind of nose (so is my skin color!).

Also, please remember that the picture of me was taken in 1968, so the color isn’t all that great. I had to scan in the pictures of myself and Ashley ~ Attison’s picture is digital.

As soon as I can get my hands on a baby picture of Jacob, I’ll post it. We’re just really joking around about the resemblance thing ~ Attison is pretty much a 50/50 baby. There are some definite maternal aspects, but there are paternal ones as well. No worries ~ we’re not concerned about Attison’s heritage/ancestry one bit, but I do appreciate all of the kind comments!

family resemblance?

There has been a little debate (all in fun) around my house lately over who Attison resembles more : Ashley or Jacob. I don’t have any of Jacob’s baby pictures scanned into my computer, however I do have these pics, which I offer as support of my position that Attison resembles her maternal side:

Me:

Ashley:

Attison:

What do you think?

here she is….

Attison was born yesterday, June 6, around 5:30pm. After a day of laboring it was decided that a C-section was necessary. Attison’s heartrate crashed, and within 3 minutes the doctor had Ashley in the operating room. It was the best decision, truly. Momma and baby did very, very well. The cord was wrapped around Attison’s leg twice, which is probably what caused her heartrate to bottom out as she decending farther into the birth canal.

Atti weighed 6 pounds (on the nose) at birth, and was 19 inches long. She’s beautiful, and absolutely perfect. She fusses when she’s hungry or needs her diaper changed….that’s it. She is an absolute champ at breastfeeding ~ I’ve never seen a baby latch on immediately and simply KNOW what she’s doing. Amazing.

I’m completely in love! Here are a few photos….. (click on the photo to see the album)

Attison’s Birth

at the hospital

Ashley’s pain level with the contractions increased significantly this morning, so I took her back to the doctor’s office. She was dilated to 4, which was the magic number, so they sent us over to the hospital and admitted her to L&D. Right now she’s getting an epidural, and after that will probably start getting pitocin. Which means ~ I’m going to have a grandchild today!

new photo album

Ashley and I spent some time today out taking pictures. We wanted to get some good ones before Attison is born. Take a look……

Ashley June 5, 2008

i think she’s ready

couch monkeys

My couch monkeys and their favorite sidekick….

waiting for baby

Yesterday was a very long day. Ashley started having contractions Sunday evening around 8:30. They were a little uncomfortable, and anywhere from 5 to 7 minutes apart, so we didn’t think too much about it. I just kept giving her water (after all it IS my Windex) and told her to try to get some sleep. surprisingly enough, she was actually able to sleep, even though the contractions continued through the night.

I called the doctor’s office yesterday morning, after the contractions had been going on for over 12 hours. The nurse told me to bring Ashley in so they could hook her up to the monitors to see what was going on. Once we got there and they did their little test, they determined she was dilated to 2, and sent her over to the Labor & Delivery floor of the hospital for further observation.

The contractions were pretty good ones ~ spiking off the chart about every 2 minutes. After 4 hours, though, there was no change in dilation, so the doctor decoded that since Ashley has just reached the 36 weeks point, it was time to stop the contractions and not let her go into what is still considered “early labor” at 36 weeks. So, they pumped her full of drugs (that none of us were happy about, but the benefits of waiting at least another week before delivery far outweigh any short-term side effects Ashley was made to suffer through because of the drugs) and eventually the contractions stopped. We were at the hospital for about 12 hours before we were finally able to go home.

Ashley got up this morning and said she was having contractions again, but she didn’t know how regular they were because she had been sleeping. She went back to bed, so they must not be too intense right now. The doc said the contractions are fine, but unless she dilates to at least a 4 he’s not going tolet her deliver before 37 weeks. She has a regular doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning, so we’ll see if she has dilated any more by then.

false alarm

Ashley had a couple of hours of contractions last night. They were irregular, so we didn’t feel the need to rush off to the hospital ~ although if it were up to Ashley and Jacob (oh, alright, I confess, me too) she would have Attison today. We’re just a bit tired of waiting for Miss Atti to make her appearance, but obviously she’s not quite ready yet, so we’ll keep waiting.

Ashley’s visiting the OB once a week now. Last week he commented on her lack of stretch marks. She has been doing a remarkable job with the stretch mark cream ~ lots and lots of cocoa butter. She has gained about 35 pounds so far. But that’s actually GOOD ~ the doc told her to keep eating, pretty much whatever she wants and as much as she wants. When you start out at 89 pounds, I guess you’re allowed to gain more weight! She will probably have lost the majority of her pregnancy weight a month after Attison is (finally) born. Her metabolism is that fast ~ lucky little stinker.

Ashley was finally able to go to bed around 11:30pm and fell right to sleep. I slept for about 3 hours, but I’m up again ~ I’m having lots of fibromyalgia pain, and surprisingly enough, sleeping tends to make it worse. But I’m glad Ashley was able to get to sleep ~ since she hasn’t been up in several hours, I’m guessing the contractions finally stopped.

toby mac ~ live?

Yep ~ Toby Mac live. Well, a recording of a live concert, anyway. In the theater. And you could win a DVD and CD of the live performance. Free. Intrigued? Go here for a chance to enter!

5 weeks and counting….

prom ‘08 pic

I’m finally getting around to posting a picture of Patrick and Ariel from this year’s prom:

I’m still amazed that Patrick wore a white tux with a purple tie and purple vest, but it looked good on him!

time to relax

Now that graduation and all of the parties are done, we have some time to relax. We, as a family, plan on doing absolutely nothing for the next two days, except maybe watching a few movies and gorging ourselves on left-over brisket and other goodies. We’re all exhausted, but we’re happy. And we’ve had a great time just sitting around relaxing since our open house ended.

they did it!

Yesterday Patrick and Ariel graduated from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts ~ hip, hip, hooray!! It has been a long, hard 2 years for them at ASMSA, but they have done exceedingly well.

Patrick already has over 40 college credits, so he will be entering college technically as a sophomore who is half way through the school year. He will be a freshman, of course, but since he has lived in a dorm for the past 2 years and has already experienced what it’s like to live away from home, he is way ahead of the game.

The graduation ceremony was nice. It was held in the convention center in Hot Springs ~ no outdoor graduations here (it’s too stinkin’ hot!). Governor Mike Beebe was the key note speaker. I enjoyed his speech much better than I did President Bill Clinton’s speech last year. At least Governor Beebe addressed the graduates in his speech ~ he reminded them that no matter where they go for college, Arkansas is their home. He encouraged them to return to Arkansas, or stay here, whatever the case may be, and help to improve their home state. It was a fairly political speech, but like I said, at least Governor Beebe addressed the graduates and didn’t just talk about himself and his career/life like Clinton did.

After the graduation ceremony, we had a barbecue/party at our house.

Ariel, her parents, and 2 of her friends joined us. The Arkanbloggers were able to come too ~ Kathryn made an amazing from-scratch cake with whipped cream icing.

It was probably the best cake I have ever had. (I had originally ordered a cake from Kroger, but when Kathryn heard I had done that, she scolded me and told me to cancel that order, because SHE was going to make the cake for Patrick. LOL )

Today we had a brief open house for friends and neighbors. Of course we had WAY too much food, so we’ll be snacking on fresh chocolate-dipped strawberries, sweet Hawaiian bread and spinach dip, and left-over brisket and cake for a day or two. That’s not a problem as far as I’m concerned!

subway and scholastic discriminate against home schoolers

I’m not really sure what Subway and Scholastic were thinking when they decided that home schoolers should not be allowed to participate in their latest essay contest. See here for details. Using their form, I kindly let them know I will no longer be supporting their companies. If you have an opinion about this, why not let them know?

graduation day

Well, today’s the big day. Patrick will graduate from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts this afternoon at 2:00pm. The guest speaker will be Arkasnas Governor Mike Beebe.

Ariel and a few of her family members, as well as our “framily” the Arkanbloggers, will join us for barbecued brisket sandwichs and a cook-out at our house after graduation. Roger’s mom and step-dad are in town, and of course Jacob and Ashley are here as well. It should be a fun evening.

Tomorrow we’ll all head to church in the morning, then come home and prepare for a graduation Open House. I have no idea how many people will come for that ~ I usually get responses like, “Oh, that’s right, you live all the way out in ……….” Really, we only live about 20 minutes from where we go to church, but for some reason people seem to have it stuck in their heads that where we live is out in the boonies. But we’ll see. Even if no one else shows up, I know the Arkanbloggers will be here ~ they’re enough to make it a party! LOL

Patrick bought Ariel a bike helmet as her graduation present. Isn’t that a funny gift? His thought process was, “Well, she’s going to be riding her bike to work all summer. I want her to be safe.” So, it’s a rather thoughtful gift.

He also bought her a little promise ring. It’s very pretty ~ white gold with a small diamond. He took a picture of it:

They have been wearing sterling silver bands that have “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved it mine ” written in Hebrew on them. Patrick gave it to her for Christmas in 2006 right when they first started dating. It was his way of telling her that their relationship was based on God’s principles of courtship, and that they would be waiting, remaining pure, until they get married.

Patrick and Ariel will be attending different colleges, so I think Patrick wanted to reassure Ariel that their relationship is important to him, no matter how far apart their schools are. And honestly, they’re not that far apart. Ariel will be about 45 minutes away from where we live; Patrick will be about 4 hours from our house. He will be able to come home on long weekends. And Ariel’s dad is going to move to Fayetteville, where Patrick will be going to school, so I imagine Ariel will be going there fairly often as well. There will be plenty of opportunities for them to see each other. And they talk on the phone, e.v.e.r.y. s.i.n.g.l.e. e.v.e.n.i.n.g as it is ~ I’m pretty sure that’s not going to change.

While the house is still quiet this morning, I’m going to go enjoy some blueberry coffee cake with my chai tea, and try to just enjoy and relax in the quiet. It won’t be that way for very long, with people getting up and making preparations for today and tomorrow!

personalized diapers

Oh gracious ~ take a look at this:

Is that the most precious thing you’ve ever seen or what?! That, my friends, is a personalized cloth diaper. My sweet friend Tamara, who is making the cloth diapers for Attison, decided she wanted to learn to use the embroidery function on her sewing machine. This is what she “came up with.”

Much, much, much too precious!

the end of another school year

As we near the end of another school year, I’m already thinking about next school year and what curricula we will use. I have to admit, I am a curricula junkie ~ so is Mama Archer, so at least I know I’m not alone!

This year we tried a new curriculum ~ new to us anyway. We used Beautiful Feet Books’ Ancient History Senior High package. To be honest, Sawyer hated it. It was just too boring. Sawyer loves to read, so the number of books involved in this package wasn’t the problem ~ the books themselves were the problem.

In the past we have had great success with Sonlight Curriculum. We started using Sonlight when Patrick (who is now a senior in high school and will officially graduate May 24th) was in 3rd grade. We really loved all of the books ~ readers, read-alouds ~ how can you go wrong with lots of great, rich, enriching books?

I’ve been looking at the high school levels Sonlight offers. I’m considering using their civics course for next year. Sawyer will be in 10th grade, and it could very well be his last year at home. He wants to follow in his brother’s footsteps and attend the math and science residential high school Patrick has attended the past 2 school years.

We will most likely stick with Teaching Textbooks as Sawyer’s math program. He seems to do well with TT. Our homeschool co-op will be offering high school Spanish and a leadership class, as well as a science class. This year Sawyer tackled 2 science classes ~ biology and chemistry ~ so I’m not really sure what we’ll do for science next year. Assuming Sawyer will attend the math and science high school, we’re not planning to move on to physics because the school requires the students take physics there.

Sawyer has done well this year, especially considering he really disliked the history program we were using. After the first semester we scrapped it and just sort of made up our own history program. I have absolutely no intention of ever writing my own curriculum ~ that’s just not my cup of tea. I much prefer letting someone else figure out all of the details for the curriculum and then taking what they’ve put together and tailoring it to suit our needs, likes, dislikes and schedule.

I’m looking forward to having a little break for the summer, especially considering the upcoming arrival of our first grandchild, and the fact that Patrick will be home from school. He has a summer job lined up, but at least he’ll actually be living at home for the summer. I’m not looking forward to moving him to Fayetteville, Arkansas, for college, but that’s still a few months away so I try not to think too much about it. Fayetteville is about 4 hours from where we live. That’s more than twice as far as where he goes to school now.

Sawyer will continue to do math over the summer, with a two week break in July while he goes to Colorado with our church youth choir on “tour.” They’ll be singing at a Colorado Rockies game and the Air Force Academy cadet chapel, as well as doing some mission work and singing at churches all over the state. He’s really looking forward to it.

This summer will be filled with all kinds of exciting events, but I know next school year will be on us sooner than we think. It will be wonderful to have the whole family home for the summer (including welcoming our family’s newest member). Roger, Sawyer and I have some big decisions to make concerning our curricula for next school year. It’s time to start digging through all of the new curricula catalogs and figuring out what our options are!

mother’s day recap

For Mother’s Day, my family took me shopping and out for lunch, then gave me the rest of the day to do whatever I wanted to do. I spent most of the day in my craft room playing with my new sewing machine and all of the sewing tools I received as gifts. I started making burp cloths and cloth wipes for Attison. I’m still learning how to sew a straight line, but I’m having fun learning.

A picture of some of my Mother’s Day loot:

By far my favorite tools are the Gingher rotary cutter, self-healing cutting mat, and the Omni Edge ruler/cutting guide.

And, as promised to Lynette (Jacob’s mom), a picture of Ashley and Jacob from lunch that day:

(I believe I mentioned earlier that my camera was acting wonky that weekend. I hope I can figure out what the problem is before Patrick’s graduation!)

birthday slideshow

For some reason my camera was acting up today, so a lot of the pictures I took at Patrick’s surprise birthday party are blurry. I managed to snap a few decent ones though ~ we had a really good time. He truly was surprised! He wrote a post about it here.

Ariel and Patrick’s friend Justin were in on the secret. Ariel set it up so we could use a room at the school, and Justin agreed to keep Patrick busy until we were ready to surprise him. We invited Patrick friends ~ unfortunately most of them went home this weekend because of Mother’s Day, but we had so much fun it didn’t matter how many people were there. We had the family and several friends, and it was enough.

The theme was “cheesy” ~ we did it up like a little kid’s birthday party on purpose. We had Transformer party hats, Spiderman blowouts (they didn’t have kazoos in them, though ), sparklers on the cake, 2 big jugs of punch, matching plates, napkins and tablecloth, bubbles, and goofy gifts. Roger and I got Patrick several things he needed ~ they were all grooming-types of gifts! LOL I’m not saying his personal hygiene is lacking ~ because it isn’t ~ we just decided to get him his own shaving/overnight kit, fingernail clippers, beard trimmer and such because a young man going off to college really should have all of those things, but Patrick didn’t. At long last Roger will finally be able to get both of his shaving kits back from Patrick!

Anyway, here’s a slideshow of a few of the pictures that weren’t too blurry. You can see by the look on Patrick’s face he was surprised, and he loved it!

surprise party

We had a surprise party for Patrick at his school today. He’s a little stressed about finals and AP tests, so he decided to stay at school and study all weekend rather than come home for his birthday.

This morning we woke up to find an email from Patrick saying he had started blogging again. You can click here to read the post he wrote about his birthday. Basically, he was feeling a bit sorry for himself because he pretty much thought we weren’t going to do anything for his birthday until after his graduation (2 weeks from now). He had no idea we had already arranged to have a surprise party for him!

I have pictures to post, but the weather is getting nasty here right now, so I’ll have to post them later. With the way things have been going around here, I’m concerned that if I stay on the computer it will get struck by lightning! LOL

18th birthday

Today is Patrick’s 18th birthday! Gracious, where has the time gone?

Patrick’s birth was difficult ~ the cord was wrapped around his neck three times. He tried to push his little nose out first, which really just won’t work very well! Poor little thing. See the bruise in the middle of his forehead? That’s where he would push against my pelvic bone every time I had a contraction!

That sweet little boy, with downy-soft blond hair and a nasty bruise between his eyes has grown into this handsome young man:

This fall Patrick will be heading off to the University of Arkansas as an Honors College Fellow.

Happy birthday, son ~ we love you!

18th birthday

Today is Patrick’s 18th birthday! Gracious, where has the time gone?

Patrick’s birth was difficult ~ the cord was wrapped around his neck three times. He tried to push his little nose out first, which really just won’t work very well! Poor little thing. See the bruise in the middle of his forehead? That’s where he would push against my pelvic bone every time I had a contraction!

That sweet little boy, with downy-soft blond hair and a nasty bruise between his eyes has grown into this handsome young man:

This fall Patrick will be heading off to the University of Arkansas as an Honors College Fellow.

Happy birthday, son ~ we love you!

cloth diapers

I know, I know ~ I can hear the groans and picture all of the rolling eyes. The response to Ashley’s decision to use cloth diapers has been less than well received. Everyone seems to have the opinion that cloth diapers are just “too” something ~ too messy, too smelly, too much work, too inconvenient…….they’re just too much.

But have you actually seen cloth diapers lately? They’re incredible! They’re so much like disposable diapers it’s amazing. They have an absorbent inside and a waterproof outside. And they can velcro on! No more nasty soggy prefolds, diaper pins or plastic pants. The new cloth diapers are seriously fantastic. A friend of mine has graciously offered to make a dozen newborn cloth diapers for us at a wonderfully discounted price. Since most people don’t believe me when I tell them cloth diapers are akin to disposables these days, I thought I’d show you a few pictures:

These images are used with permission from Hope Chest Creations (meaning they’re the property of Hope Chest Creations, so please don’t steal them!).

****Note (added later) ~ I forgot to mention, these cloth diapers are called All-in-Ones, meaning they have a soft, absorbent material inside and a waterproof material on the outside. No wraps or rubber pants needed ~ they’re so much like disposable diapers it’s amazing, and yet they’re so much better for the baby and the environment. Yep, I’m one of those ~ when my boys were babies, if I had known exactly what I was putting on their precious little bottoms, we would’ve been an exclusively cloth diapering family, even though those were the dark ages as far as cloth diapers go. I did use cloth diapers with Sawyer, but only about half the time. I’ve had plenty of experience with Chinese prefolds, diaper pins and rubber/plastic pants! They weren’t really that bad, although I will admit that it was much easier to use disposable when we were away from home. Nowadays that’s just not the case ~ the all-in-ones have revolutionized cloth diapering!

nana blanket

I like to make baby blankets for my friends. I’ve done about a jillion of them ~ for friends who are having babies themselves and friends who are being blessed with grandchildren. I made a “Nana blanket” for myself ~ and since there’s so much baby pink in my house (see post below), I thought I might as well go ahead and stick with the color scheme.

pooh, in nana pink

The other day Ashley and I were out shopping, and we found a terrific deal on a crib bumper set. It included the bumper, comforter, and diaper stacker. It’s a Winnie the Pooh theme set. You know, I have never seen a bumper set that was as high a quality as this one. There’s nothing flimsy about any of it, not even the diaper stacker. Ashley snagged it up; I think she managed to get it for half price or less.

I told her I didn’t think she really liked the Winnie the Pooh theme. Especially when the set contains so much pink. But she loves it. I told her I might just get too attached to it that I won’t want to let her have it when they move into a place of their own. She said that was fine ~ she knows I’m a Winnie the Pooh fan.

I’m also the one who’s going to have a Pepto-Bismol pink baby room. Not the walls ~ they’re going to remain a lovely beige ~ but until we have a grandson, the baby room will be littered with pink, pink and more pink. I’m not really a huge pink fan necessarily ~ it’s just turning out that we have more pink than we know what to do with!

Here are a few pictures of the bumper set:

Ashley received a pink Classic Pooh blanket at the baby shower, which will fit right in with the Pooh-bear theme:

Do you see the little Classic Pooh and Piglet that has been embroidered onto the blanket? This blanket is so soft ~ it has fleece on one side and satin on the other.

We found a good deal on Pack ‘N Plays while we were looking through Sunday’s ads and coupons. Yesterday we picked up the Pack ‘N Play ~ it’s Classic Pooh as well!

blog make-over complete

Well, so, what do you think? It’s totally different from anything else I’ve ever done, with any of my blogs. And to be honest, I really, really like it!

Thanks goes out to Michelle @ Shabby Creations for her amazingly quick work and efforts. I love the girly flourishes, the signature she made for me is absolutely lovely, and the divider is perfect. I probably made things a little easier for her by choosing one of her stock template designs, but she was very gracious in changing the header just a bit for me, and making all of the sidebar buttons. Plus, she installed most everything, which was really a big help.

I also need to lift a shout out to Amy @ Split Decisionz for her tutorials on blogging hacks (tricks). She has a search bar in the left hand sidebar ~ if you’re confounded on how to place a signature in your posts, or how people get those really cool scrolling texts on their blogs, just search on Split Decisionz. And if Amy doesn’t already have a post on how to do whatever it is you’re wanting to do, send her an email. She’ll help you figure it out!

I’m very pleased with the way the make-over has turned out. I worked on another template for well over a week, and just couldn’t get it quite right. It’s totally different from this one, so perhaps you’ll see it here someday. But Roger was so tired of me being on the computer trying to figure out that template that he readily agreed to allow me to ask Michelle for this template. Thanks hon!

please excuse the mess…..

There’s a lot of work involved in changing my blog template ~ I apologize for the confusion here right now. I’ll get it cleaned up as quickly as possible!

tornadoes and lightning and fire…oh my!

Yesterday Arkansas was hit with another bad weather system. Tornadoes all over the state, tragically killing people and destroying homes and other properties.

Ashley, Sawyer and I were out running errands when the nasty weather started. I’ve lived in the south long enough to know when a storm system is most likely just going to produce thunderstorms or when it’s likely to produce more, like hail or tornadoes. I wasn’t too worried about our house being in a tornado’s path ~ the tornado-producing winds and activity were going to move away from us. I figured we’d just get a big downpour of rain.

The rain was very heavy as we made our way home after completing our errands. As we were nearing the exit off the highway going towards our home, we saw a huge flash of lightning and a few seconds later heard and felt the thunder from that lightning bolt. All three of us commented on what a large crack of lightning and thunder that was.

As we rounded the corner in our neighborhood, Sawyer looked out his window then said, “Something’s on fire back there” meaning back behind the houses in our neighborhood on our side of the street. There are fields and lots of trees back there ~ I figured something in the field must have caught fire, and we’d check it out once we got home.

I pulled up to our mailbox, and as I was reaching for the mail, I saw a huge plume of black smoke rising from what seemed to be our backyard. I quickly pulled into our driveway to investigate, and sure enough, the plume of smoke WAS from our backyard. Our shed was on fire!

By the time we got out of the car and called 9-1-1, we were able to see not only huge plumes of black smoke flowing from the shed, but we were also able to see the fire threatening to engulf the shed. The shed held all of our lawn care equipment; Roger’s John Deere riding lawn mower, the push mower, gas weed trimmer, edger, hedge clippers, gasoline jugs, an assortment of yard and gardening tools, and a plethora of yard necessities like fertilizer, grass seed, and even potting soil.

The worst part was that sitting on the front area of the shed (sort of a little porch/potting area) was our old 100lb. propane tank. It was still mostly full of propane. I had visions in my head of that propane tank catching fire, exploding, then taking off like a missile and crashing through my house.

The fire department finally arrived, but they were too late. The fire, fueled by the gasoline inside the shed and inside the gas tanks in the riding mower and trimmer, had completely consumed the shed and its contents. The propane tank sitting outside the shed finally got hot enough to start venting ~ every so often there would be a woosh noise, and flames would shoot into the air.

Once the fire department was (finally) able to get the fire put out, all we had left was a huge charred mess. Anything and everything within the shed was completely gone. The firemen were able to deal with the propane tank and get it under control so it wouldn’t blow up. One of the firemen located 2 gas containers sitting outside the shed and moved them away ~ and managed to catch the leg of his fire suit on fire! Roger said the guy calmly turned around and said, “Uh, guys, could you give me a little help here?” LOL They put the fire out quickly and no one was hurt. The fireman whose suit had caught on fire continued to work next to his buddies!

Once the fire was out, we figured out how it started. A tree standing right next to the shed was struck by lightning, and the lightning then arced through the tree and jumped over to the shed. Ashley, Sawyer and I are convinced that the huge bolt of lightning we saw while exiting the highway is the very same one that hit the tree.

While the fire was going, several neighbors came over to see if we were ok and if they could do anything. Basically what we all did was stand around getting soaked in a heavy downpour and watch as our shed burned to the ground. I’m thankful that at the time there was such heavy rainfall ~ otherwise that fire might have burned quickly enough to have taken over the yard and make its way to the house before the firemen arrived.

So ~ we’re all ok. No one was hurt, and the fire did not touch our house. I’m sorry to have lost the shed, riding lawn mower, push mower, edger, trimmer, and everything else that was stored in the shed. But I am so thankful that, if we were going to lose something to a lightning strike, it was only the shed and 2 trees. The tree the lightning struck is going to have to be removed, as well as a tree that was damaged by the fire.

Here are a few pictures of what remains of our shed and its contents:

In the last picture you can see the tree that was struck by lightning, and how close it was to the shed.

So, that’s my doosey of an experience God gave me to keep me from getting too cocky about how everything is SO fine in my life that it’s a bit boring and I have nothing to blog about. He cured my blogger’s block!

it’s been a while since I blogged because…

well, honestly, because I’ve had a serious bout of blogger’s block. And I have a family. And a pregnant daughter. Who now lives with us.

BUT, just when I’m starting to think my life is truly boring and I have nothing worthwhile to blog about, God gives me a doosey. He does have a sense of humor, that’s for sure.

I have a sense of humor too ~ warped as it may be. I now have something to blog about……..but it’s late and I’m too tired to blog about it right now.

SO, what you get is a bit of a tease: here’s a taste of the “doosey” I now have to blog about…….another day…..

today’s projects

Ashley and I stopped at the little farm down the road and bought some fresh strawberries……

After we ate about half of them, we covered some in dark chocolate……

Yum, yum, yum! Ashley said, “Every pregnant woman should have a stash of dark chocolate-covered fresh strawberries.” LOL

Ashley asked me to make a blanket for her…….she chose the yarn.

This is the purse Ashley is working on…….

Here’s a link to the pattern she’s using: http://stitchesoffaith.blogspot.com/2007/03/anatomy-of-strapping-young-lad.html

razorback fans

The first time we moved to Arkansas was 1993. Sawyer was about 7 months old, and Patrick was 3 years old. The day we pulled into Jacksonville, Arkansas, the temperature was a balmy 114 degrees. For a Montana girl, 114 degrees is H.O.T. Not to mention the ever-present humidity of about 98% (or so it seems to me). The real bonus was that the apartment we were moving into had no electricity. And was on the second floor. The electricity had been off for at least a week. Which meant there was no air conditioning. For at least a week. And did I mention the apartment was on the second floor?

Let’s just say my first impression of Arkansas left a lot to be desired.

Since that first day in July of 1993, we’ve spent quite a bit of time in Arkansas. As a family, I think we’ve spent about 7 years or so here. Roger has spent even more time here going through different types of training for his job. And while I can honestly say that, given the chance, I’d move back up to the northwest in a heartbeat, I must admit that Arkansas has begun to grow on me a bit.

When we moved (back) to Arkansas after 3 years in Alaska (heaven), Roger and I decided to buy a house here. We figured this would be Roger’s last assignment in the Air Force, and his best chances of getting a decent job after retiring from the AF would be here as a C-130 simulator instructor. So we made a conscious choice to make Arkansas our home for a while. We’re figuring the next 30 years or so.

When my dad became too ill to really be completely on his own without someone around to help when needed, we decided to move him down to Arkansas. And when my daughter and her fiance’ just weren’t quite making it on their own in Minnesota, we decided to move them down to Arkansas.

Our first grandchild will be born in about 2 1/2 months ~ here, in Arkansas.

And if all of those things weren’t enough ties to keep us firmly rooted in Arkansas for the next few years, we now have one more reason to stay.

Patrick will graduate from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts at the end of May. That’s not the added reason for us to stay here, though. This is: Patrick was offered a fellowship to the Honors College at the University of Arkansas.

A fellowship.

And, he was awarded the Arkansas Governor’s Distinguished Scholar award ~ a scholarship on top of the fellowship.

Today Patrick notified the UofA he would accept the fellowship. He also accepted the Governor’s Distinguished award. He has notified the other schools ~ a couple of really good schools that also offered him good scholarships ~ that he will be attending UofA. The deal-maker (or deal-breaker, depending on how you look at it) was the fellowship. “Honors College Fellow” just looks so much better on a resume’ than anything else he was offered from any of the other schools.

Now for the sticky part. Do you know what the University of Arkansas chose as their mascot? A razorback. A hog. A big, wild pig. And do you know what their school cheer is? Woooo, pig! Sooie!

No, I’m not kidding. “Woooo, pig! Sooie!”

So……….needless to say, we’re extremely proud of Patrick. He has done an amazing job of keeping a high GPA at one of the top high schools in the nation. He will graduate from high school with over 40 college credits; he will be entering college this fall academically as what he calls a-sophomore-and-a-half. Everything will be paid for by his fellowship ~ tuition, room, board, activity fees, books, a new computer, a semester abroad ……. and more. The Governor’s Distinguished award is just icing on the cake.

It’s a good thing Roger and I had already decided that we were going to stay in Arkansas for a while.

Now if we could just do something about the University’s choice of mascot and school cheer ~ because really, there’s just something W.R.O.N.G. about wearing a big red pig snout on your head, yelling, “Woooo, pig! Sooie!”

do hard things drawing

Congrats to Beverly ~ she won the free copy of Do Hard Things by Alex and Brett Harris!

quick service

Wednesday night I ordered 52 wallet-size prints of Patrick’s senior picture to be sent out with his graduation announcements. Yesterday I received a notice from Shutterfly that they had been sent out to me. Wow! Now that’s fast service! The order was small, so I paid the extra $5 for USPS Priority Shipping. I think we’ll be ordering digital prints online from now on. I’m kinda diggin’ this!

finished before bedtime

Just as I expected, Ashley finished her hat ~ her first knitting project ~ before bedtime yesterday.

It’s an adorable hat, and it looks really cute on her. She was thrilled with it. And it ONLY took her all day to do it!

We she and Jacob first moved down to Arkansas, Ashley was telling me about an afghan she had seen somewhere that was $300. She was outraged that someone would have the nerve to ask so much for a blanket. Well, now that she has had some experience with how long it takes to make a simple item, she’s a little less indignant about the cost of that afghan! LOL

learning to knit

Ashley has taken to knitting like a fish to water. I have never, never, in my 31 years of knitting, seen ANYONE pick up and take off with knitting like she has. She is the easiest student I’ve ever had!

She found a pattern for a really cute floppy bohemian-like hat that she has decided to make. It’s in 2×2 rib, and she started it this morning. If she keeps working the way she has, she’ll have the hat finished before she goes to bed! (She has been able to spend a large majority of the day sitting on the couch knitting because we both feel yucky today. I talked to Sawyer this morning ~ he’s still at a baseball tournament in Texas, and he said he’s not feeling well ~ neither is Roger, so it’s obviously something going around our home. I blame Patrick for bringing it home………he came home with a sore throat last weekend, and he left the rest of us a yucky little bug!)

ebook giveaway

Lisa at Homestead Originals is giving away a copy of her ebook Homestead Simplicity: A Primer. Head on over and check it out! (If you haven’t been to Lisa’s site before, you will have to register in order to leave a comment. It’s a painless process, and takes about 2 minutes tops. It’s worth the effort. )

and the winner is…….

This is the one Patrick has chosen as the senior picture to be sent out with his graduation announcements. Personally, this is my favorite of the whole bunch, so I’m pleased he chose this one.

Tomorrow I will continue to address the envelopes for the graduation announcements. Sometime next week the photos will be delivered to my home, and I’ll be able to put them into the announcements and get the whole kit and kaboodle in the mail. I’ll be glad to have that done; I know Patrick wants them to be sent out as soon as possible.

By the way, have you seen Shutterfly? I know Snapfish’s prints are less expensive, but from the other scrapbooker’s and photographer’s blogs I read, Shutterfly’s prints are better than Snapfish’s. Either way, I got 52 wallet-size prints for MUCH less than I would locally, including shipping!

more baby clothes than i know what to do with!

Just before Ashley and Jacob moved to Arkansas, one of Ashley’s friends gave her some baby clothes. Actually, Ashley’s friend gave her a LOT of baby clothes. Five or six boxes full of baby clothes, in sizes from newborn to 18 months.

One of the projects I tackled once we got Ashley and Jacob all moved in and settled was to take the baby clothes out of the boxes, sort them (keep, give away, throw away ~ then sort them by size), and wash them. I washed load after load after load ~ it took me 2 days to get everything washed, dried and put away. That’s a LOT of baby clothes. I have a high efficiency front-loading washer and dryer; I can wash and dry a king size down comforter in my washer and dryer. Just imagine how many baby clothes I can fit into one load. Now multiply that by 5 or 6 ~ that’s how many loads I can reasonably get done in one day. So, using my math skills, I come up with somewhere around 12 loads of baby clothes. In my INDUSTRIAL SIZE washer and dryer! I will admit, those loads were the most fun I’ve ever had doing laundry (one of the dreaded household chores that Roger and I usually share because I thoroughly dislike doing laundry). Baby clothes are so cute ~ especially little baby girl clothes!

Once I started getting the clothes folded or on hangers, I realized I had a problem. There were a lot more clothes than I was prepared to store. So, I confiscated half of Patrick’s closet ~ he’s at school until the end of next month, so he’s not really using his closet right now ~ and I went to the store and bought a plastic storage tall boy-like thing. Oh, and I also confiscated one of those large plastic storage drawers that was not being used.

I filled up half of Patrick’s closet with baby clothes:

I filled up the plastic storage tall boy-like thing:

And I filled up the plastic storage drawer:

And even all of that wasn’t enough storage. If you’ll notice in the picture of the tall boy-like thing, there’s a box on the floor to the right. That’s a regular size moving box ~ it’s full of baby clothes. Next to that, which you can’t see in the picture, is a regular kitchen size garbage bag that’s also full of baby stuff, as well as an additional regular size moving box! Good gracious!

Attison is going to be the best-dressed baby in all of Arkansas, and maybe even the surrounding states. We’re not going to have to buy her any clothes until she’s almost 2 years old ~ and if she’s as small as we’re thinking she might be, it may be even longer before we have to buy any clothes for her.

Don’t take me wrong ~ I’m thrilled to have so many baby clothes. Ashley’s friend was SO generous. She also gave Ashley 2 infant car seats, a johnny jump-up, a small swinging basinet, and a crib set (bumper, 3 sheets, comforter and matching pillow). Kathryn has said she has an older child’s car seat she wants to give to Ashley, and just this morning a lady at co-op offered to let us borrow her hand-crafted cradle. I’m so amazed at how giving people have been with this baby!

I’m thankful beyond words to all of you who have been praying for Ashley, Jacob and Attison. And I can’t even begin to express my thanks to those who have so generously given Ashley baby clothes and other baby items. We’re fairly well prepared for Attison’s arrival ~ now we just have to wait until it’s time for her to be born!

my newest toy

Well, I’ve finally taken the plunge. I bought a sewing machine. And I fully intend to learn how to use it. No, really ~ I do!

Growing up sewing never held any kind of appeal for me, so I never learned how. And to be honest, until about a month ago I didn’t really have much of an interest in learning how to sew. But for some reason, lately learning to sew has become just slightly less than an obsession for me. Maybe it has something to do with finding out I’m going to be a grandparent in a couple of months ~ oh! the cute little dresses and outfits I’ll be able to make for my granddaughter!

Now I just need to learn how to do more than wind a bobbin. But, I have successfully wound my first bobbin, so I’m on my way.

do hard things

With over 10 million hits to their website TheRebelution.com, Alex and Brett Harris are leading the charge in a growing movement of Christian young people who are rebelling against the low expectations of their culture by choosing to “do hard things” for the glory of God.

Written when they were 18 years old, Do Hard Things is the Harris twins’ revolutionary message in its purest and most compelling form, giving readers a tangible glimpse of what is possible for teens who actively resist cultural lies that limit their potential. Combating the idea of adolescence as a vacation from responsibility, the authors weave together biblical insights, history, and modern examples to redefine the teen years as the launching pad of life and map a clear trajectory for long-term fulfillment and eternal impact.

Written by teens for teens, Do Hard Things is packed with humorous personal anecdotes, practical examples, and stories of real-life rebelutionaries in action. This rallying cry from the heart of revolution already in progress challenges the next generation to lay claim to a brighter future, starting today.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I have a brand new copy of Do Hard Things to give away. If you would like to be entered into the drawing, just send me an email. Please put “do hard things” in the subject box so my spaminator won’t eat it!

I will draw a winner next Monday, April 21 ~ entries will close at 12:00pm (noon) CST that day. Because this giveaway came with a postage-paid envelope from the publisher, the drawing is open to residents of the lower 48 contiguous US.

baby shower slideshow

Here are a few pictures from the baby shower my friends held for Ashley and Attison last month. I’m still combing through all of the pictures the photographer gave me ~ these are a few to get you started, though. As you can see, we had a fantastic time. One of my favorite pictures from this group is the one where there’s a line of ladies sitting in chairs in front of a window ~ if you’ve read my blog for a while you’ll recognize my friend Kathryn in the middle of them ~ they’re laughing (I like the word chortling to describe their belly-laughing) and having a great ol’ time!

the "new" car

Yesterday Roger bought us a new car. Actually, it’s a used car, so it’s a “new-to-us” car. I L.O.V.E. my Suburban, but have you noticed the price of gas lately? Geez! It’s ridiculous. So, Roger found us a nice used car that is bigger than our 1999 Honda Accord but smaller than the Suburban, gets pretty good gas mileage, and will seat 5 or 6 people in a crunch ~ it will seat 4 comfortably. As much as I hate to give up driving my Suburban everyday, for now I’ll be driving the new-to-us car. Roger and I chuckled because, quite honestly, the “new” car is a total granny car ~ a 2001 Buick Custom La Sabre, V6, automatic, white with gray interior. It has decent mileage for a 2001 model, and when Roger had our mechanic check it out the guy said it was in good shape. And for the asking price, it was a good deal. Roger even managed to talk the guy down $500 from his original asking price, so Rog did pretty good!

The best part was Roger’s suggestion for a vanity plate: Go Nana. LOL!

weather, weather, weather

I think Ashley and Jacob brought all the bad weather we’re having with them when they moved here!

Actually, I know that’s not true. Poor kids ~ we’ve had 2 days of tornado warnings in the 10 days they’ve been here. They’re certainly getting a crash course in Arkansas spring weather ~ we’ve had wet, chilly days, warm humid days, rainy days, days with tornadoes, and days with nothing but sunshine. At least the pretty flowers and trees are blooming (even if Ashley is allergic to everything in bloom!).

We’re expecting more bad weather over the next day or so. Tonight the whole family is together though. Roger drove down to pick up Patrick and Ariel who each have a scholarship interview at the University of Central Arkansas tomorrow. Prayerfully the weather will cooperate and they’ll be able to get to Conway and back without any problems.

elefante giveaway

photo by Susan B. Anderson

Is he the cutest little knitted elephant you’ve ever seen or what?! This little guy was knitted by Susan Anderson, author of Itty-Bitty Hats and Itty-Bitty Nursery. Susan is having a giveaway right now ~ you could win this elephante! Just go to Susan’s site and leave her a comment. The contest ends Friday, April 11 at 12:00pm Central time.

auntie em! auntie em!

Well, Jacob and Ashley have had their first taste of spring in Arkansas. What do I mean by that? Why, tornadoes, of course! And lightning that lights up a lovely green sky.

There are possibly more tornadoes in store for us this evening/early morning. The tornadoes that hit in our area didn’t hit in our neighborhood, but that’s the best that I can determine for now. Kathryn called to let me know they’re ok, too. They live about 30 miles south of us, and they were also in the direct path of the storm that passed through earlier. We’re still under tornado watches and warnings, so there’s more to come.

about ashley

My daughter Ashley is my child from my first marriage. Most people don’t know that I was married once before I married Roger. I was 18, young, foolish, and honestly I was in complete rebellion towards my parents.

As you can imagine, it’s a very long story. The short version of the long story is that by 14 months into the marriage, my (ex)husband had been involved in several extra-marital affairs. At that point I felt it was best that I end the marriage. I will not bash on my ex-husband ~ it was a LONG time ago. God has forgiven me of my sins, and I have been given the strength and mercy to forgive my ex and move on.

About a week after I left that marriage, I found out I was pregnant. I don’t know that words can adequately describe the emotional flood and turmoil I experienced. I felt caught between a rock and a hard place at that point in my life ~ but in the end, it was decided that adoption would be best for the child. It was without a doubt the most difficult thing I have ever done in my life.

On August 22, 1988, I gave birth to an amazing, perfect, beautiful little girl. I spent a couple of days in the hospital with her, then had to give her over to the attorney who was handling the adoption. I was able to see my daughter one more time before she was given to her adopting parents. Since then I have had no contact with either her or her adoptive parents.

My heart has always ached to know where my daughter was, how she was, who she was ~ but I thought finding her would be very difficult. Recently Roger began urging me to find my daughter ~ she’s 19 years old now, and Roger knows how much I’ve wanted to find her. Patrick and Sawyer have known about Ashley all of their lives, and they were (and are) also very supportive of me finding her.

I contacted a couple of Search Angels who have the birth records for Ohio and asked if they could help me find my daughter. They were able to locate her, and passed the information along to me.

I fretted over contacting her, because obviously I didn’t really know anything about her situation or how she would feel if I contacted her. But I went ahead and sent her a message, praying that whatever her reaction would be, I would handle it well and that the Lord’s hand would guide me.

Shortly after sending her a message through her MySpace page, I heard back from Ashley. She sent me her phone number in an email and asked me to call her. She was as excited about being found as I was about finding her! God worked this whole thing out so amazingly well ~ and I am so incredibly thankful to Him.

When Ashley told me she is pregnant with her first child, I was over-the-moon elated. Not only have I found my daughter, but I’m going to be a grandmother in late June or early July! Wow ~ and I just recently celebrated my 40th birthday. It has been a lot to digest.

Roger and I arranged for Ashley to come to Arkansas in March. At that point I felt that it was appropriate to let people know about my previous marriage and the adoption. The warm reception and love my friends have shown since I began telling them this story has been incredible. When I told Ashley that my friends, who don’t even know her yet, want to give her a baby shower while she is here visiting, she was overwhelmed.

As is my habit, please allow me be frank and upfront. Ashley is not a Christian; she does not know Jesus as her Lord and Savior. She currently lives with her fiancé Jacob, and they plan to marry sometime after the baby is born. While this is, of course, not the ideal situation, I pray that you would see her through the eyes of Jesus as one of His precious children who He loves and with who He desires to have a relationship. Ashley and I have begun conversing about God and about Jesus. I want Ashley to know the love of God, and to see Jesus in me and my family. I’m praying that the seeds will be planted, and that the Holy Spirit would move and work in her life in order to bring her to Him.

Ashley had an ultrasound last week which revealed she is going to have a girl. She and Jacob have decided to name the baby Attison Cole Lloyd. Roger and I are absolutely thrilled about being grandparents, and are thrilled to be receiving a granddaughter. We truly love Ashley, Jacob and Attison, and we are praying that our love for them will be apparent as well as transparent.

That, in essence, is the basic story. I would be more than happy to answer any questions you might have. I can be contacted by email at simplescrapperATgmailDOTcom if you would like to get more information from me about our story.

I am truly humbled and feel blessed beyond measure by the sweet welcome and love my daughter and soon-to-arrive granddaughter have received from family and friends alike. Roger and I covet your prayers as we enter this new phase in our lives.

There are so many more details to our story ~ it would take pages and pages to relate them all. But more than anything we look forward to watching as God unfolds this miracle in our lives, and how He uses it to His glory.


To read updates about our story, please click here.

new winner

Karin won a copy of The Family Squeeze on another giveaway, so I’ve drawn a new winner. Congratulations to Abi!

book drawing winners

Congratulations to Cyndy and Karin. They’re the winners of the book giveaways ~ Cyndy gets a copy of Death of a Six-Foot Teddy Bear, and Karin gets a copy of Family Squeeze!

on their way

Roger and Ashley have both called me in the past 30 minutes to let me know they’re all loaded up and heading this way. Roger opted to get the bigger UHaul trailer (the 6×12 rather than the 5×8), and he said it was a good thing he did. They filled up the trailer and the back of the Suburban with all of Jacob and Ashley’s belongings.

Jacob’s mom and step-dad were there to meet Roger. After the trailer and Suburban were loaded up they all went out to lunch together. Lynette (Jacob’s mom) made sandwiches to send with them for the trip ~ the “kids” got peanut butter and jelly; Roger got ham and cheese. LOL

Ashley sounds exhausted. She got sick while she was here 2 weeks ago, and whatever the virus is, it has hung on this long. I think between being pregnant, the stress of moving, working 2 jobs, and simply not being able to get enough rest, she’s just about worn her poor little body out. Good thing for her she’s coming to Mom’s house ~ Mom will take care of her with plenty of hot peppermint tea and lots of sleep.

Patrick and Ariel were on spring break this past week. Patrick went and picked up Ariel on Wednesday. They’ve spent their time watching movies, doing homework, going bowling, and playing games with Sawyer. (Patrick plays games with Sawyer, anyway. They’re getting pretty good at Halo.) I will drive Patrick and Ariel back to school tomorrow and get home just in time to greet Roger, Ashley and Jacob when they arrive.

Today has been wet and chilly. Not a good day for me fibro-wise. It’s nice to have older kids who can take care of themselves, and even take care of me when necessary. I haven’t done much today. As a matter of fact, I think I’ll go back to sitting on the couch and reading a book.

mama archer’s blog

Mama Archer’s Blog has been added to the Fruit of the Spirit blogroll. Stop by and say hello to Kristine!

flower power blanket

I finished my first no-sew fleece blanket today. The front is the side with the flowers, and the back is the side with the rainbow stripes. For a first effort I think it turned out pretty well.

My next fleece blanket will be Classic Winnie the Pooh on one side and plain apple green on the other. I also have a pink and white big granny square blanket in the works.

Attison is certainly going to have enough blankets!

9 phrases women use

I received this in an email ~ the author is unknown (but obviously, the author was a man!). I’m posting it because….well, because it made me laugh. And to be honest, it’s mostly true!

9 WORDS (OR PHRASES) WOMEN USE

1) Fine: This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up.
(2) Five Minutes: If she is getting dressed, this means a half an hour. Five minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given five more minutes to watch the game before helping around the house.
(3) Nothing: This is the calm before the storm. This means something, and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with nothing usually end in fine (refer to #1).
(4) Go Ahead: This is a dare, not permission. Don’t Do It!
(5) Loud Sigh: This is actually a word, but is a non-verbal statement often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you about nothing. (Refer back to #3 for the meaning of nothing.)
6) That’s Okay: This is one of the most dangerous statements a women can make to a man. That’s okay means she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.
(7) Thanks: A woman is thanking you, do not question, or faint. Just say you’re welcome. (I want to add in a clause here – This is true, unless she says ‘Thanks a lot’ – that is PURE sarcasm and she is not thanking you at all. DO NOT say ‘you’re welcome’ … that will bring on a ‘whatever’).
(8) Whatever: This is a woman’s way of saying Yeah, ok you imbecile ~ I’m tired of dealing with you. It’s usually preceeded or followed by a loud sigh. (Refer to #5)
(9) Don’t worry about it, I got it: Another dangerous statement,meaning this is something that a woman has told a man to do several times, but is now doing it herself. This will later result in a man asking ‘What’s wrong?’ For the woman’s response refer to # 3.

* Send this to the men you know, to warn them about arguments they can avoid if they remember the terminology. Consider taping to the refrigerator! *
* Send this to all the women you know to give them a good laugh, because they know it’s true. *

do hard things

I’m getting to this a little late in the day, but I wanted to tell you about a new book coming out in April ~ you still have several hours to participate in the “book bomb” for Alex and Brett Harris’s Do Hard Things. Click here to learn about the book bomb.

Amazon.com has a long description/review of Do Hard Things. If you’ve never heard of Alex and Brett Harris, click here to see their site, The Rebelution.

death of a six-foot teddy bear

A while ago I posted a review of Death of a Six-Foot Teddy Bear by Sharon Dunn on my book review blog. I enjoyed the book ~ it’s what my friend De’Etta calls a “cosy mystery.” Fun to read, not too deep, but the characters are intelligent and easily likable.

Well, with that said, I do believe I owe Multnomah Press and Sharon Dunn an apology. As I was moving my book cases and books around today, I discovered I have a second, brand new, unread copy of Death of a Six Foot Teddy Bear. Oh dear ~ I think I was supposed to have a giveaway when this book came up for review. And there I dropped the ball.

So, I’m going to have that giveaway now. If you would like a copy of this charming book, just send me an email. I’ll draw a winner from all of the emails I receive on Tuesday, April 1st. No foolin‘!

(Due to rising postage costs, this giveaway is limited to the lower 48 states.)

slowly but surely

As you can tell, I’m feeling a little better today. Not well enough to do housework, mind you, but well enough to sit at my computer and type up a few thoughts.

By this time next week my daughter and her fiance’ will be living with us. I’m excited about it, but I’m also a little scared. I didn’t raise Ashley, so obviously I don’t really know exactly what to expect as far as living with her goes. When we made the decision to move them down here, and to give them a place to live until they can get back on their feet, we set out a few initial “rules” or guidelines. They are:

1. Jacob must actively look for a job; not the first $10/hr. job that comes along, either. He must look for a job that will pay enough for him to support his family. They won’t live like royalty by any means, but at least Ashley will be able to stay home with Attison.
2. They must help with the housework. That means Ashley’s going to learn how to cook and clean, and so is Jacob. I understand that not every man does housework, but in my home they do. Roger has always helped with housework, and we’ve taught our sons to do the same. It will be no different for Jacob. And since Ashley was never taught the art of homemaking, she will be doing a boat load of learning. After Attison’s born Ashley hopes to be able to stay home with her and be a stay-at-home-mommy and wife. Homemaking will be her career, just the same as if she were working outside of her home somewhere.
3. Ashley will not work outside of the home or seek a job while living with us. I can’t teach her the art of homemaking if she’s running off to a “job” all the time. Besides, she’s 6 months pregnant ~ the chances of her finding good employment at this stage in her pregnancy are pretty slim. Since Roger will be paying all of the bills, putting a roof over their heads and food on the table, I see no need for Ashley to do anything but learn how to be a stay-at-home wife and mommy. This is not an easy task by any means ~ it takes instruction, time and practice. She’ll get that here during the last few months of her pregnancy.

My friends have all been so dear and so supportive ~ up to this point. Since we decided to move Ashley and Jacob to Arkansas, a few friends have questioned our motives, and a few have warned us not to get in over our heads. They are, after all, only 19 and 20 years old; they’re having their first child together; they’re not married yet; and they’re going to be a long, long way from the place where they grew up, and where the majority of their families live. We’ve talked about these issues ~ over, and over, and over ~ and for now I’m satisfied (dare I say confident?) that we’re doing the right thing.

Having Ashley and Jacob living in our home will give us a chance to witness to them without shoving our beliefs down their throats. All we have to do is be who we are ~ live our life as a family the way we always do ~ and let the Holy Spirit do His work in their hearts. Who knows? Maybe by the time they’re living in their own place they’ll understand the difference between no god and knowing God, and between religion and living as a believer and follower of Christ. I pray it will be so.

new fruit of the spirit blogs

I have fallen so far behind in my upkeep of the Fruit of the Spirit blogroll! I’ve decided, at least for now, it will be easier for me to announce new member blogs as they’re added rather than keeping them all until Friday. So, in an effort to simplify things, I want to tell you about 2 new members to the Fruit of the Spirit blogroll.

SweetCharity @ Sweet Charity
Charlotte @ Honour and Love Your Husband

Please stop by and say hello to these lovely ladies!

winter reading challenge winner

Congratulations to Gretchen of Good Enough for Now! You’ve won the $25 Amazon.com gift card!

And congratulations to all of you who participated in the Winter Reading Challenge. There were many, many, many books from other participants’ lists that I have added to my “to be read” list. I hope you took a look at other’s lists as well. If not, it’s not too late! Here’s the link to the original post with the Mr. Linky ~ just click on a participant’s name, and the link will take you directly to their Winter Reading Challenge book list.

If you just can’t get enough of great reading challenges, skip over to Katrina’s Callapidder Days and enter her Spring Reading Thing 2008.

experiencing the resurrection winner

Congratulations Terri from Teachable Spirit ~ you’ve won a free copy of Experiencing the Resurrection by Drs. Henry and Melvin Blackaby! I’ll be in touch with you by email.

family squeeze (book review)

Family Squeeze by Phil Callaway

You’re in the “Middle Ages”–sandwiched between the “greatest generation” and the “gimme” generations, busily juggling both with no relief in sight. Children are driving, and parents are not. Money is tight and so are your favorite jeans. And things that never ached before are beginning to give you trouble! For every baby boomer who wonders if it’s possible to navigate the Middle Ages with grace and style, Phil Callaway offers plenty of hope and a little hilarity, too. Because there’s nothing like a smile to make wrinkles less noticeable.

Described as “Dave Barry with a message,” author, speaker, and television host Phil Callaway has written twenty books, many of them bestsellers and is a popular speaker at conferences, camps and marriage retreats, coaxing laughter and tears from audiences worldwide. Of his personal accomplishments he rates the following highest: shutting off the TV to listen to his children’s questions (twice), taking out the garbage without being told (once), and convincing his high school sweetheart Ramona to marry him (once).
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Trish’s Take

Phil Callaway has written a gem titled Family Squeeze. He relates stories from his own life, and answers questions other people have asked him, with a funny yet honest point of view.

I’m in those “Middle Ages” ~ sandwiched between aging parents who need care while raising teenagers and expecting my first grandchild from my grown daughter. Phil writes about situations that, if you have older parents and children who are still at home, you’ve probably experienced. He’s able to find the humor in life’s situations ~ and we all know laughter is good.

Family Squeeze won’t tell you how to solve all of your problems, or how to invest so you’ll have millions of dollars when you retire, or how to get your teenagers to listen to you. What it will do is help you to see the different situations in your life in a new light. You’ll find yourself chuckling ~ maybe even laughing ~ as you read what Phil has written about his own life, and compare them to experiences in your own life. You may even find the grace to not only laugh at an event that previously perturbed you, but to also forgive and move on. I love the way Phil constantly and consistently looks to God and His Word, and refers his readers to both.

Family Squeeze is a book worth reading. And on that note ~ I have a copy of Family Squeeze to give away! If you would like to be entered in the drawing for a free copy of Family Squeeze, just send me an email. I’ll draw a winner on Monday, March 31.

Due to rising postage costs (and the fact that I pay to send out a lot of these free books myself), this drawing is open to people in the lower 48 states of the US.

sick

I have somehow managed to pick up a really nasty bug ~ I think it’s flu, but I’m not sure. I’ve spent the majority of the past 2 days sleeping or vegging on the couch watching TV shows I don’t even remember watching. I’m exhausted, dizzy, nauseous, achy, and just generally feeling yucky. Believe me, when a person who has fibromyalgia says they think they may have the flu, it’s bad.

I have a book review that will be posted tomorrow, but until I’m feeling well again I probably won’t be communicating much.

A quick run-down of what’s been going on, while I still have the energy to write it: Roger is taking leave this coming Friday through Monday to drive up to Minnesota and move Ashley and Jacob down to Arkansas. Yep, that fast, that easy. We were able to get a 5×8 enclosed trailer from the Air Force base’s Outdoor Recreation center for $15/day. UHaul wanted $250 for the same type of trailer! I’ll take $60 over $250 any day.

Patrick is home on spring break this week. He’s applying for summer jobs in several places while he’s home. So far all he’s done is play Halo with his brother, but hey, at least they’re getting along! Tomorrow he’ll start the job search.

We will be doing some rearranging in the house in order to have room for Ashley and Jacob. We’ll have to move everything out of the boys’ TV room, but that’s ok. We have plenty of space. Once Ashley and Jacob have their own place, I’m planning on turning that particular room into a baby room, so the rearranging would have to be done anyway.

I’m working on save the date reminders for family members and friends regarding Patrick’s graduation. His graduation ceremony will be the Saturday before Memorial Day. I know lots of people make plans for that weekend, so I want to make sure that they’ll try to make their plans around Patrick’s graduation (or at least fit Patrick’s graduation into their plans).

We received Patrick’s graduation announcements, name cards, cap and gown, guestbook, and pen. I’ll have to work on addressing the announcements soon. I also have graduation party invitations to work on. Sounds like I’ll be spending a lot of time printing thing off and addressing envelopes over the next few weeks!

For now, I’m heading back to the couch. Roger’s already asleep in bed, and Patrick’s watching TV in the living room. I think I’ll go join him ~ I may end up just sleeping right there on the couch if I’m too tired to make it to the bed!

These are a few of the pictures taken at Ashley’s baby shower last week. There are more to come (the photographer has gone on a week-long mission trip to Mexico, so I imagine she won’t be getting any more photos to me until after she returns!).

These are a few of the pictures taken at Ashley’s baby shower last week. There are more to come (the photographer has gone on a week-long mission trip to Mexico, so I imagine she won’t be getting any more photos to me until after she returns!).

winter reading challenge wrap-up

I finally have a chance to wrap-up the Winter Reading Challenge. Thank you for being patient with me on this. When I started the challenge I had no idea so many things would happen in my life in such a short time! Good things, very good things indeed.

I thought I had lost The Hand That Bears the Sword, but I found it when I was packing for Colorado. I had tucked it into one of my knitting bags to take along with me when I went somewhere, and I had completely forgotten it was there. I have started reading it again ~ I really do enjoy (George) Bryan Polivka’s stories. I won’t be able to finish The Hand That Bears the Sword by Monday though, so that one goes unread as far as the challenge goes.

The other book not crossed off my list is Running Scared. I will try to concentrate on getting it read over the next few day since I need to do a review on it as well as a couple of other books. But, being realistic, I won’t have it read by Monday.

Only two books on my list that didn’t get read; that’s pretty good! A couple of people have already sent me links to their wrap-up posts. I’ll try to get those links posted for them on the Mr. Linky below. If you would like to leave a link to your wrap-up post, I would love to read it! It’s not necessary or required ~ but it will be fun!

I’ll draw a name from the original participants’ links on Monday.

moving at the speed of lightning

Well, things are moving along a LOT more quickly than I had expected them to. I’m thrilled, to say the least.

Ashley and Jacob have decided to move to Arkansas ASAP ~ as in probably next weekend! We’ve worked things out so that they can stay with us for a few weeks, until Jacob has a good job, and maybe even a paycheck or two in the bank. They’ll need enough money for a deposit and first month’s rent upfront before getting an apartment, and Roger and I are more than happy to give them a place to live until they can get back on their feet. They won’t live here forever, mind you, but a few weeks (or maybe even a couple of months) is fine with us, and should be enough time for them to save up the money they’ll need to get started on their way.

I’m excited to have them here, and thrilled that they’ll be so close by when Attison is born. Thank you, Lord, for the abundant blessings You’ve showered down on us in the form of a mother’s heart’s desire and new family members!

free language program

Rosetta Stone has been the #1 foreign language curriculum among homeschoolers for a while — next week they are unleashing a brand new curriculum, and you can WIN the *all new* Rosetta Stone Homeschool Version 3… FOR FREE!

This is a $219 program (and believe me it’s worth every penny!) and the winner gets to pick from any of these 14 languages: Spanish (Spain or Latin America), English (American or British), Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Irish, Hebrew, or Russian.
This will also include a headset with microphone, and students will participate in lifelike conversations and actually produce language to advance through the program. Rosetta Stone still incorporates listening, reading and writing as well, in addition to speaking. Many homeschoolers requested grammar and vocabulary exercises, and with Rosetta Stone Homeschool Version 3, they’re included! For parents, the new Parent Administrative Tools are integrated into the program and allow parents to easily enroll students in any of 12 predetermined lesson plans, monitor student progress, and view and print reports.

To win this most excellent program — in the language of your choice — copy these (blue) paragraphs (highlight, then hit Ctrl C to copy) and post it in (or as) your next blog post (hit Ctrl V to paste) — then to enter the contest, go to the original contest page HERE: http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/JenIG/501132/ and leave a comment with the link showing where you blogged about it. And please make sure the link works to get back to the original contest page when you post it. And good luck! The winner will be picked randomly on March 26, and will be notified thru the link they left to their blog pg. And if you have more than one blog, you can post them and enter those separately for more chances to win. Yay for free stuff!

wrap-up

Well, Ashley got on the plane and flew back to Minnesota today. We had a fantastic visit though, and there’s lots of good news to go with it!

She and her fiance’ Jacob are looking at possibly moving to Arkansas before Attison is born. The main issues are getting Jacob a job and making sure Ashley and Attison have prenatal care. Finding a place to live shouldn’t be a problem ~ there are several apartment complexes within a 5 mile radius of my house that have openings. Ashley and I spent a day apartment hunting, and the number of apartments, duplexes and townhouses we found in their price range was encouraging. Of course, their price range is pretty much a guesstimate at this time since Jacob doesn’t have a job here yet ~ we just went by what they’re paying now in Minnesota now.

The baby shower my friends held for Ashley on Sunday was so wonderful. There were about 50 people there total. The guest book registered about 30 moms and 20 young ladies (ranging in age from 19 to 4). I stole Barb’s scrapbook idea and modified it a bit (and I totally forgot to take pictures!). I found a scrapbook at Barnes & Noble that is held together by a ribbon that runs through the back cover and the pages, then ties on the cover. I took the scrapbook apart so all of the individual pages were loose and put them on a table at the baby shower. Then I laid out different colors of cardstock and patterned papers (cut to fit the scrapbook), gazillions of stickers, alphabets, markers, scissors and different types of adhesives. I let people know the supplies were there and encouraged them to make a scrapbook page for Ashley and Attison. I asked the moms to write some “mom advice” on their pages as well.

At first the ladies were very hesitant and shy about making pages. Then all of the younger girls showed up, and they of course were absolutely enthralled with all of the fun little stickers, alphabets and doodads. The table technically only seated 4, but I think there were probably 6 or 8 people crammed into that space once the younger girls took off with making scrapbook pages. A lot of the moms were so impressed with what the younger girls were making ~ and I think they realized how easy it is to make really cute scrapbook pages ~ that they started getting in on the act. By the time the shower was over there wasn’t a single page that wasn’t decorated on both sides. They turned out SO cute! And I’m so disappointed that I forgot to take pictures. I’m hoping the young lady I hired to take pictures at the shower got some good shots of the pages. If not, I’ll photograph them once Ashley moves down here.

After the shower Ashley told me that she had never had a group of people gather together just to love on her before. It about broke my heart. I’m not sure the ladies who hosted the shower, and those who attended, really understand how extremely grateful I am to them for making my daughter feel loved, accepted and appreciated. The love of Christ was so evident in the faces, actions and words of the ladies in that house on Sunday. And my daughter experienced it in a way that she never had before.

Ashley and I did some shopping while she was here, and that was definitely a lot of fun. I didn’t really realize how much more fun it can be to go shopping with your daughter than by yourself or (heaven help us) with your sons. We definitely had a great time together. Toys ‘R Us and Target should NOT let people loose in their stores with zappers (little handheld machines that read barcodes and add the item to your gift registry at that store)! Oh my goodness, Ashley and I had an absolute ball with those zappers. There are so many things on her registries it’s ridiculous. But boy did we have a fantastic time populating those registry lists!

One day last week my friend Kathryn and her daughters Caitlin, Paige, Elizabeth and Grace joined us for lunch at Olive Garden. Ashley fell in love with all 4 girls immediately. They were so wonderful ~ they made Ashley feel at home and comfortable right away, and I know she definitely felt loved. Paige is in the performances of Sing, Dance, Repeat at The Rep right now, so she wasn’t able to join us for the baby shower. Kathryn and I arranged the lunch get-together because Paige was so disappointed that she might not have the chance to meet Ashley. (By the way, thank you Kathryn and girls for not making me/us go to Victorian Gardens! As much as I love to take each of you there for your birthday lunches, I’m pretty sure Ashley would not have been as comfortable as she was at Olive Garden ~ Mr. Keyboard Player aside (that’s an inside joke ~ sorry I can’t explain it!)

I was able to feel Attison moving around quite a bit. She even had a few really good hard kicks for Nana, since Nana kept poking at her and disturbing her sleep. Ashley actually had a prenatal appointment this afternoon after she got back to Minnesota. She was able to hear Attison’s heartbeat again, and everything is going as it should. She’s even growing exactly as she should, although how the poor little thing has room to move around in there is beyond me! Ashley has the smallest bone structure I’ve ever seen ~ and she sure didn’t get that from me!

We had a very busy, extremely wonderful week together. I miss her already, and I’ve talked to her three times since she got back to Minnesota! LOL

As soon as I get the pictures from the baby shower I will post some. We also had pictures taken of Ashley and me together, and the two of us with Kathryn and Lisa (who hosted the baby shower). I’m really looking forward to seeing all of them.

book giveaway

I have a brand new copy of Experiencing the Resurrection (see post below) to give away! If you would like to win this free book, simply send me an email (simplescrapperATgmailDOTcom). Please put Experiencing the Resurrection in the subject box so my email spaminator won’t eat it!

I will hold a drawing from all of the email entries next Monday, March 24.

experiencing the resurrection

Experiencing the Resurrection

What does the resurrection of Christ really mean for us? What does it reveal about the heart and mind of God? And what real differences can the miracle of the resurrection make in your life today?

Discover answers to those and other questions as you examine God’s Word with this companion study guide to the book Experiencing the Resurrection by Henry Blackaby and Melvin Blackaby.

Packed with practical notes, advice, and questions for reflection, this highly interactive guide—ideal for small group or individual use—shows you how to witness Christ’s resurrection in and through your life. Each chapter of the book is explored in a flexible one-week format with “life change objectives” that arise from applying the truth for each day to your life.

Dr. Henry Blackaby, president emeritus of Blackaby Ministries, is the author of more than a dozen books, including the best-selling classic Experiencing God. He has spent his life in ministry, serving as a music director and as a senior pastor for churches in California and Canada. Today he provides consultative leadership on prayer for revival and spiritual awakening on a global level. He and his wife make their home in Atlanta, Georgia.

Dr. Melvin Blackaby coauthored with his father, Henry Blackaby, the Gold Medallion winner Experiencing God Together. He travels extensively as a conference speaker. He and his wife and their three children live in Cochrane, Alberta, Canada, where he serves as senior pastor of Bow Valley Baptist Church.

introducing miss attison

Trust me, it’s a girl ~ I have proof, but it’s not something I can show on a family-friendly blog! If this one turns out to be a boy, well, then wow, we’ll be shocked!

I have a couple of pics in 4D. They’re really cool, but…….I don’t know ~ they sort of remind me vagely of a creepy movie I may have seen (when I was young and thought those things were fun) or at least saw advertised………..that’s enough details……

our moment

18 hours and counting…..

In less than 18 hours I will be meeting my daughter at the airport for our first visit since she was 6 days old. I think my stomach has either turned into a great big Celtic knot or maybe just a plain old stone. I have butterflies and feel nauseous, all at the same time!

I imagine I will be absent from the blogging world for a while. Ashley will be here for a week, and I doubt I’ll be spending very much of this next week sitting in front of my computer. I’ll probably check email, and I may take a quick glance at my Bloglines. But I think I’ll wait until after Ashley leaves to post pictures and such.

Next Sunday (March 16) is the date my friends have put together a baby shower for Ashley and Attison ~ please pray for us over the next week, especially next Sunday. As one of my friends said, “We Southerners are a huggy bunch ~ I hope she’s prepared to be loved on!” So do I……..

hard choices made harder

Why is it that sometimes good things make difficult choices even more difficult?

This morning Patrick was notified that he was selected as a University of Arkansas Honors College Fellow ~ he got an Honors College fellowship, which pays basically for everything. That’s HUGE!

So why is it that now he feels his choice of where to go to college is even more complicated and tough?

Since he was selected as a National Merit Scholarship finalist, he’s coming up on a deadline to choose a college to list as his #1 choice. UofA doesn’t care whether he lists them or not ~ he already has the fellowship. If he lists University of Tulsa as his #1 choice, he may still end up with a juicy offer from them as well. We’ll just have to wait and see.

He has as much as he’s going to get from Texas A&M (we think), but it doesn’t cover the full cost. Same thing with Drury University. University of Oklahoma offered him a nice deal and he didn’t even apply there ~ he still can, and he can still take them up on their offer. Same goes for Arizona State.

If he is selected for the Arkansas Governor’s Distinguished scholarship there are a couple of smaller colleges in Arkansas he can attend for free. I’m not sure when the release date is for that scholarship.

So, the poor kid is really coming down to the wire now, and he has some really tough choices to make. There are a lot of things to take into consideration. Choosing a college or university is a major decision that, quite honestly, can affect the rest of your life. When did we decide that 17 and 18 year old kids were mature enough to make these kinds of decisions?! And what, exactly, were we thinking!!?

Roger and I are of course helping Patrick wade through all of the choices ~ and we’re also trying to help him deal with the emotions that are involved in this decision. He may already attend school away from home, but he’s only an hour and a half away. He knows if he’s sick and needs Mom, I can be there very quickly. He can come home on the weekends. If there’s a problem with a teacher or another student (which we haven’t had, but nonetheless) Mom and Dad are not so far away that they can’t come to his rescue ~ although I doubt you’d get him to admit that’s a comforting thought!

I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed with the whole thing myself………

snow? in arkansas? in march?

It has been snowing for hours and hours, and it’s finally starting to stick. Last night Roger said the prediction was anywhere from 3″ to 9″ ~ wouldn’t that be a hoot? In Arkansas, in March?!!!

Jake would be extremely happy ~ he’d have enough snow in the backyard to play “bury the tennis ball”!

what’s in a name?

When I told my friend Kathryn that Ashley and Jacob had decided to name their baby Attison, she asked me what Attison means. Heck if I know was pretty much my reply. Since then, I’ve done a little bit of research (not tons mind you ~ I just looked through a few baby name books at the bookstore).

I couldn’t find Attison (with 2 t’s) in any of the books, but I did find Addison. Are you ready for this? It means “awesome”! It can also mean “son of Adam” but I didn’t think that really applies when it’s a girls name.

So, “awesome” it is!

fellowship interview

Patrick wasn’t able to go to Colorado with us last week. There’s just no way he could miss that much school and still hope to graduate with a decent GPA (or graduate at all, for that matter).

While we were gone, Patrick drove up to Fayetteville and interviewed for a fellowship at the University of Arkansas. He dressed appropriately for the occasion, and even went to the interview clean-shaven!

When he walked into the room for his interview, there was an older lady and a man waiting for him. The lady said, “Now Patrick, I just have one question for you. But you MUST answer my question completely and totally honestly. Do you understand?”

Patrick replied (a bit apprehensively), “Yes ma’am.”

The lady asked, “Did your mother pick out your suit for today?” LOL

Of course, Patrick answered, “Yes ma’am, absolutely!”

(If only that were all it takes to get a fellowship to the Honors College at U of A ~ he’d be a shoo-in!)

major finds

It’s amazing what you can find at outlet stores. There was an outlet mall close to the hotel where we were staying in Colorado, and of course we just HAD to hit it. We went to every baby store looking for great baby clothes at decent prices. We found the absolute best deals at Gymboree. We bought close to $300 in Gymboree baby clothes for less than $82. Amazing!

(The photos are horrible but trust me, these clothes are super super cute!) There are 2 outfits that aren’t pictured. One’s just a plain little pink onesie. The other is a newborn jumper that was full price but much too cute to pass up. Ashley likes Graco’s “Deco” pattern ~ little brown, pink and blue polka dots. Gymboree had a newborn jumper with matching socks in a pattern very similar to Deco, so I bought them. I have already sent them off to Ashley. I used them as filler in the package that contained the “Waiting for Baby” journal and another journal I mailed to her from Colorado.

And, of course, every little baby should have some OshKosh B’Gosh!

At the Bath & Body Works store I found the cutest little pink plushy lamb. Attison’s room is going to be decorated in Farm Friends, and this little lamb will be perfect in her room!

(In case you can’t tell, I had a GREAT time shopping for Attison!)

birthday in review

Well, it started out a little yucky, but all in all my birthday was very nice. I got the sterling silver charm bracelet and birthstone kids I wanted, and I got the grain mill I’ve been asking for. (Sorry, Mer! But I don’t have the Bosch yet ~ does that make it any better? )

I also received several gift cards for Bath & Body Works and Barnes & Noble. Roger gave me some amazing 100% Portugese flannel sheets (2 sets, and they coordinate very nicely with our Pottery Barn quilt). The bracelet arrived before we left for Colorado, and the grain mill was waiting for me when we got home.

[Now, before you start thinking I should hit Roger over the head with the grain mill and/or the flannel sheets, let me say that I DID ask for them. When we were newly married, I told him he WOULD get hit over the head with any appliance or household item he bought me as a gift for any sort of day it's traditional to give gifts on ~ my birthday, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, anniversary, Christmas, Woo Pig Sooie Day ~ we are in Arkansas, afterall ~ Groundhog Day, National Talk Like a Pirate Day etc., etc. (What? You don't get a gift on Groundhog Day? Well, what about National Talk Like a Pirate Day? You get a gift then, don't you? Don't you?! Oh ~ well, don't tell my husband that. ) I've had a change of heart regarding the nature of gifts since I was a newlywed. Besides, I got girly stuff too, so it's all good!]

Let me throw in here that My Charmed Life has really great charms at reasonable prices, so I’m looking at adding to my charm bracelet already ~ thanks for the link, Joanne! She has the most amazing charm bracelet, but I digress……

When we picked up the mail from our neighbor who had been collecting it while we were on vacation, I found a package from Ashley. She had sent me a birthday present. The package contained a little book about how to cheer yourself up when you’re feeling blue (it has really cute pictures of animals in it), and 2 chocolate bars (yum!).

Also in the package was a birthday card. This is my very first card from Ashley!

The outside simply reads: Mom . The inside reads: Because you give so generously, and care so deeply, you deserve a day that’s beautiful – like you. Happy birthday Mom, with Love Always.

Wow. I can’t even begin to describe how I feel about this card.

If you click on the picture you’ll be able to read what Ashley wrote inside.

We haven’t had our traditional birthday dinner yet. We’re saving that for while Ashley is here and both boys are home. Our traditional birthday dinner consists of going out to eat wherever the birthday person wants to go ~ it’s almost always a Japanese steak house. That reminds me, I need to ask Ashley if she likes Japanese food ~ I know she won’t eat sushi……

safe and sound

We’re home ~ we’re safe ~ and I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed. I’ll post as soon as I can, I promise! But for now, I have to unpack, do laundry, clean my house, get Patrick’s room ready for Ashley’s visit, go grocery shopping, pick up my car from the shop (yet again), take Sawyer to his usual activities, and prepare myself to meet my daughter face-to-face!

on the road ~ day 3

The day’s not through yet, but I just have to write a quick post about meeting Meredith, Holly and Joanne. We met this morning at the hotel where I’m staying, and decided to go to Java Guru for coffee. My goodness ~ to be honest, you’d think we’d all been friends for a million years. There was no awkwardness or hesitation at all. How lovely to meet in person and find that these 3 ladies are exactly who they say they are on their blogs!

We sat at Java Guru for about 2 hours and just talked about whatever came up. Then we decided to go to The Black-Eyed Pea for lunch ~ Holly’s favorite (thank you Holly for suggesting it ~ lunch was very good!). We talked and talked and talked ~ I think we touched on just about every subject under the sun. It was fantastic ~ a wonderful time with sister believers. I don’t think I’ve ever met other women with whom the conversation so easily flowed.

Joanne gave us really pretty Moleskine notebooks she had sewn some material onto ~ I’ll have pictures of the ladies and the notebook Joanne gave me when I get home. Joanne has the most amazing charm bracelet ~ she said there’s about 75 charms on it, and she has had it since she was 7 years old. What an amazing collection of memories she carries around with her every day. I imagine she has people ask her about it often. I have only read one of Joanne’s books (so far), but her “voice” in her books is the same as in real life.

Sweet Meredith has been fighting an illness alongside her daughters. I’m thankful she felt well enough to come today. She has lost most of her voice, and I’m praying that she will feel 100% soon. Mer, next time we get together we’ll let you talk more than the rest of us, I promise!

Holly is just as dear and sweet as I expected her to be from reading her blog. What I didn’t expect was her sense of humor! She had us all laughing frequently. Sometimes she was even in danger of one of us laughing so abruptly that we might accidentally spit our coffee or food on her ~ I’m pleased to tell you though that we managed to keep the drinks and the food in our mouths.

You know, I have to marvel at the power of the internet, and the amazing way our awesome God uses it for His glory. There I sat with 3 ladies who I had never actually met before, and yet I felt comfortable, and the conversation was easy. If you know me, you know I’m not a big social person. I don’t “do” squadron wives’ get-togethers, and I don’t usually do any of the officer’s wives’ things, and participating in Bible studies can be difficult for me when there are too many people involved. I can be uncomfortable in groups. To me, more than 2 is a group!

Anyway, thank you Meredith, Holly and Joanne for making today a pure joy. I enjoyed each of you, and I truly enjoyed the time we were able to spend together. God is good all the time ~ He blessed me tremendously today with your sweet company. And I can’t wait to do it again!

on the road ~ days 1 & 2

We left Little Rock Tuesday morning and arrived in Denver safely. Our flight was direct from LR to DIA ~ I always forget how BIG Denver’s airport is. It seemed like we walked for miles just to find the baggage area! But, we found all of our luggage and we were off on our adventures.

We did a little shopping and nosing around Denver and Castle Rock, then headed to the hotel to call it a night. It was a long but pleasant day.

We spent yesterday at Winter Park. While Sawyer and Caitlin hit the slopes, Roger and I sat in the lodge and chilled. We ate lunch at a restaurant, then the kids went back to the slopes. The lifts closed at 4:00pm, so we headed back to the hotel. We had dinner, then called it an early night. This thin air up here really takes it out of you!

Today I’m meeting Holly, Meredith and Joanne for coffee while the kids are with Roger at Winter Park again. We’re having dinner with Roger’s mom and step-dad this evening. Tomorrow we’ll take in the outlet malls ~ watch out Gymboree, OshKosh and Baby Gap, here I come! I hope you have lots of cute little pink clothing in stock! LOL

congratulations, nana! your grandbaby is……

a girl! Attison is right on schedule ~ a little over 1 pound at 21 weeks. We still have a due date of July 1.

Ashley is so impressed with the prenatal care she’s receiving. Her ultrasound appointment today included genetic counseling, and the ultrasound itself is 4D. Yep, you read that correctly ~ 4D. Ashley told me Attison’s face is as clear as a bell. They gave her print copies AND a CD of the entire ultrasound. She’s sending me a print and a CD. I won’t be able to see them until after we get home from Colorado, but that’s ok. I’m thrilled just to know we’re having a girl!

i’m gone :)

I’m going to be gone from the blogging world for a little while (although I will most likely post on Monday after we find out whether our grandchild will be an Attison Cole (girl) or Jonas Allen (boy)!). We are leaving for Colorado next Tuesday, and I don’t plan to blog while I’m on vacation. I will post about our trip after we get home, though.

For now, I’m working on baby shower invitations. My sweet friends from church and homeschool co-op decided they want to have a baby shower for Ashley while she’s here visiting. I checked with Ashley before agreeing to it ~ she was in tears, humbled and amazed that these ladies would want to have a baby shower for someone they don’t even know yet. The love of Christ is a powerful thing.

Before we leave I will be doing laundry and cleaning. I like to come home to a very clean house when I’ve been gone for a while. We were going to hire a lady to come in and do the spring cleaning before we left, but I haven’t heard from her and I don’t have time to look for someone else ~ so, I will be doing the cleaning myself.

Patrick is sick ~ his right tonsil is swollen to the point of blocking off almost half of his throat. He was supposed to go to the doctor this morning, but the Residential Mentor who was supposed to drive him to his appointment overslept (great mentoring there, don’t you think?). I’m angry about it because Roger is supposed to be taking Patrick and Ariel up to Drury University today for Trustee Scholarship interviews and a tour of the university. It’s probably not the best thing to be whisking our sick son off to Missouri, but we figured since he has made it through the past 2 weeks with this thing (we had no idea his tonsil was so swollen; he thought it was just a cold sore on the back of his tongue that was irritating his throat) he’d be able to make the trip just fine, especially after seeing the doctor. So now we’re in a pickle as far as getting the kids up to Drury in time for them to participate in the tour and so forth. The interviews are Saturday, and Ariel has a choir scholarship audition as well as a Trustee Scholarship interview……..(major sigh) what a mess. I’m letting Roger handle the whole thing ~ if I called the school right now and chewed someone out because Patrick missed the doctor’s appointment and may possibly miss a scholarship interview, and therefore possibly lose a very prestigious scholarship, well, let’s just say Patrick’s school administration might not want him as a student there anymore! (I’m very angry, so it’s best that Roger handle it.)

So, in a very cynical tone, I say happy birthday to me, welcome to a new decade! LOL Ok, really, at this point I’m just going to have to laugh, and remind myself of all of the really great, amazing things God has blessed me with, especially lately. Truly, today is my 40th birthday ~ I have a fantastic husband, 3 (!) great kids, a roof over my head, food in the pantry, a regular source of income (that would be Roger’s job, but his job is still a blessing to me), I’ve been given the opportunity to develop a relationship with my daughter, and I’m going to be a nana in less than 5 months! I’m not about to let the enemy have any part of my joy.

I’m still hanging onto the Rock and looking for the rainbow ~ and that’s a joyous thing!

doctor’s visit report

Ashley had a doctor’s appointment yesterday morning. The baby’s heartbeat was strong. The little bugger decided she (he) didn’t like that fetal heart monitor pressing into her space so much, so she kept kicking it! LOL They drew blood and will do the whole battery of tests. No cause for concern, just routine stuff. Ashley loved the staff at the clinic; they were friendly, gentle, and told her everything they were doing and why they were doing it.

Next Monday morning ~ 8am to be exact ~ Ashley is scheduled to have an ultrasound. So, you can expect to find out whether this baby is a boy or a girl next Monday. I’m certainly looking forward to that ~ I think Ashley is almost as excited about it as I am! LOL

so many projects……

so little time! I was a busy little beaver this past weekend. Friday I decided to clean up, clean out and rearrange the craft end of my office/craft room/sunroom. It took me most of the day, but I’m very pleased with the way it turned out.

I consolidated my stock (stash) of candles that are left over from my candle business ~ we officially closed the business December 31, 2007, so all of the unsold candles now belong to me. When I consolidated the candles, it opened up a lot of space on the rack where I keep them, so I moved all of my rubber stamps to that rack. I also stashed a few other crafting items under that rack.

Then I rearranged the rack where the rubber stamps had been, opening up some room for my smaller canvas bags full of yarn. I moved the wire cubes I use to hold my 100% wool yarn (for felting) over next to my desk and rearranged a few other items.

(This picture makes my craft area look so small ~ just realize there’s more space on the right hand side once you get past the bookcase and white cubes. The wall cuts back an extra 2 feet or so ~ there’s a steel shelving rack full of scrapbooking materials and yarn just past the white cubes that you can’t see in this picture.)

The wooden cubes where I store my 8 1/2″ x 11″ cardstock as well as scrapbooks waiting to be filled had been sitting on one of my 6′ craft/work tables. I decided that really was not a good use of precious work space, so I moved them over next to the bookcase. Now I have 12′ of working space for crafting, scrapbooking, stamping, cardmaking and whatever else I can come up with.

Thanks to Barb @ A Chelsea Morning, I have started another new project. I’m going to make my grandbaby some nice burp cloths. Barb posted a tutorial here. The thing is, I don’t own a sewing machine. And even if I did, I wouldn’t know how to thread a bobbin, much less sew a straight line! So, I’ve enlisted the help of a lovely young lady who loves to sew. I’m going to do the majority of the work, then pass them along to her for the sewing-up part. It should be a fun adventure for me to even get them ready for her to sew. I’m just going to follow Barb’s tutorial ~ I’m pretty sure I can do that. I’ve decided to do a LOT of burp cloths ~ 12 for Ashley to keep, and 12 for Nana (that would be me) to keep at her house. I’m adding micro fiber cloths under the fabric, and I’m using flannel rather than cotton fabric.

I also started a recipe book for Ashley. When I got married, I had absolutely no idea how to really be a housewife/homemaker. None, whatsoever. I took 1 home ec class in high school, and the only thing I learned in that class is how to cook scrambled eggs. Now, don’t get me wrong ~ Roger loves eggs, but we couldn’t live on JUST scrambled eggs! So, I put my nose to the grindstone (so to speak) and started learning the hidden art of homemaking. I’m still learning ~ and I am so thankful to those precious ladies out there who are willing to share their know-how and mentor the rest of us! Since my daughter is 19 and pregnant with her first child, I figured it was time for me to step up to the plate and share with her some of the things I’ve learned. I bought this 3-ring style recipe book for her (I found it locally at Mardel for $18)

and I have written down a few of our family favorite recipes to get her started.

When she comes to visit in March I will give it to her. I made a few minor changes to the recipe book itself. The front cover had this little dollhouse-like set of silverware, a plate and a little napkin glued to it. Personally, I thought it was rather ugly ~ I love the recipe book itself; the 3-ring style and the red leather are beautiful and exactly what I wanted. But that place setting on the front cover just didn’t do it for me. So, I removed it, and replaced it with the bottom right-hand corner of one of the recipe cards I bought to go along with the pretty red leather book. I cut out the corner of the recipe card, glued it to a piece of black cardstock, then glued the whole thing into the place where the ugly place setting had been. I think it turned out beautiful.

I also found some cute little fleece sweaters and pants for my grandbaby. I’m not usually a fan of yellow or green when it comes to baby clothes. But these were just so cute ~ and they were marked down so much!~ that I just had to buy them. They’ll be perfect when the baby is 3 to 6 months old and the weather begins to cool off a bit.

I still have to finish the wedding afghan I’m making for our niece and her groom, and I have a couple other small projects to complete before we go to Colorado. I have plenty of time though ~ I should be able to get all of the crochet projects done, and maybe even have my part of the burp cloths finished so I can pass them off to be sewn before we leave. That means I’ll be spending less time on my computer. I’m enjoying the craft projects though ~ I’ll post pictures as I get projects completed.

you know you married the right guy when…….

he knows that roses are NOT your favorite flowers, so instead he sends you tulips on Valentine’s Day ~ because tulips ARE your favorite flowers!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

changes on the horizon

My friend Meredith wrote this post about the calm before the storm. You know, I’ve been thinking about that a lot over the past two weeks.

I’ve had some pretty big drama in my life. But that was years and years ago ~ truly, I have lived a nice, quiet, calm, unremarkable, satisfyingly content life for oh, I don’t know, about 15+ years now. Once I figured out that I was the cause of most of the friction in my life ~ I caused my own problems by my own sinful choices ~ things turned around pretty quickly. I’m not saying there haven’t been consequences for those sinful choices; but God has used those consequences to show me His love and mercy, to draw me closer to Him, and to help me understand my need for Him. Even with the bad stuff (what I call junk) God has been good.

Finding my daughter and discovering that I’m going to be a mother-in-law and a nana soon are some pretty big events. I see evidence of God’s handiwork in every aspect of my life, especially right now. I am not a drama queen ~ when my life was one big drama after another I was completely miserable. I know some people who thrive on drama; in fact, I know some people whose lives make better soap operas than the ones they show on TV! I don’t know how they do it, running from one major life event to the next, never taking the time to really slow down, listen to God, and then just obey.

There are some really big changes in my life on the horizon. And not just my life, but but in the lives all of those whose are close to me ~ my husband and children especially.

I used to think that change was something to be feared and avoided at all cost. Change can cause major drama, and I have a tendency to shy away from major drama. But as I have grown older (and perhaps a touch wiser?), I have been able to see how God orchestrates the changes in my life. Most of them have happen slowly and quietly, mainly in my heart and my attitude. But there are some big events coming, and I’m doing my best to rest in the Lord and not be afraid.

God is my rock and my foundation ~ winds can blow, seas can roar, mountains can crumble ~ none of that can shake my home. Unless, of course, I let it. How would I let it? By stepping outside of the safety, covering and security of the Lord’s arms. I can choose to step outside and let the winds blow me around, the seas wash me away, or the mountains pile on top of me. Or, I can choose to trust the Lord with every tiny detail of my life, resting in the knowledge that He holds my life in His hands, and He is ultimately in control.

The changes that God has brought into my life over the past two weeks have been amazing. I know I’ve probably said it a million times, but I can’t express my joy in finding Ashley enough. I know she’s in a tough situation right now ~ being 19 and pregnant, living with her fiancee and feeling she had no one to turn to for the past 2 years has been very difficult for her. I’ve been there, and that’s what I mean when I talk about drama. But you see, for Ashley it’s different than it was for me. She has me and Roger now to look to as parental figures. And she even gets a couple of brothers thrown into the bargain too.

So while I can see the storm clouds moving toward me, I know that I am secure, and nothing can shake my foundation. Maybe some of the useless stuff will blow away ~ the wind and the seas can have the junk. I’m hanging onto the Rock and looking for the rainbow.

thank you

Look what my sweet secret sister sent to me! This little book is a devotional style guide “with inspiring meditations and practical how-to’s” for “simplicity God’s way”. I’m really looking forward to reading it and gleaning what God would have me to learn from it. Thank you, Secret Sister!

lots of goings-on

I’ve been pretty busy lately (for me, anyway). With Sawyer’s activities ~ choir, youth band practice, homeschool co-op, French horn, youth group, and baseball ~ we have something going on every day. Not to mention the fact that we do homeschool! We have a church Valentines “Loves, Laughs and Lasagne” dinner to attend Friday night. On Sunday Roger will take Patrick up to the University of Tulsa for scholarship interviews. I’m trying to get things that we don’t need cleaned out of the house, schedule a lady to come over and help me with (read:do) the spring cleaning necessities hopefully before we leave for Colorado, get things ready so we can go to Colorado, AND have things mostly ready for when we get back from Colorado and Ashley comes to visit! Whew!

I apologize for being absent ~ but thank you for your grace and understanding while I work through what to me is a whirlwind of activity.

about ashley’s adoptive parents

Thank you so much for all of the well wishes and interest in the process I went through to find Ashley. I’ve had a couple of people ask me about her adoptive parents, so I figured now would be as good a time as any to tell you about them.

Ashley’s adoptive father, R., passed away in June of 2006. He had some serious health problems that had not been diagnosed, and he died in his sleep.

Ashley’s adoptive mother, E., lives about 10 minutes away from where Ashley’s living right now. They have a very strained relationship. R. and E. separated when Ashley was 11, and by the time her 13th birthday came around they were divorced and living in different states. Ashley chose to live with her dad.

Ashley has a younger sister, A., who is also adopted. A. has lived with their adoptive mom all of her life. Ashley has a good relationship with her sister, but it’s difficult for Ashley to be around A. because A. lives with E.

I don’t really want to go into too many more details in order to protect their privacy. Let’s just say that Ashley’s relationship with her adoptive mother has been difficult and strained for quite a few years. The fact that Ashley and I are in contact with each other now isn’t really a major issue in their relationship. Ashley has told E. she’s in contact with me. E. isn’t thrilled with that, but she told Ashley years ago that she’s on her own. This whole thing isn’t really a major contributing factor to the decline of their relationship.

I would love to have the opportunity to talk to E. ~ I would love to tell her thank you for raising Ashley as her own daughter, as if she were her own flesh-and-blood. Whether adopted or biological, a mother loves her child, and I know that Ashley’s adoptive mother loves her. So did Ashley’s adoptive father.

I wholeheartedly believe God brought Ashley back into my life, and therefore brought me into Ashley’s life, for a purpose. I continue to pray for Ashley, Jacob, Ashley’s adoptive mother and sister, and for Ashley and Jacob’s baby. Jeremiah 29:11-14 continually runs through my head:

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and I will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

i’ve known her for a week

Wow ~ what an incredible week this has been. Over the past 7 days, I have begun to forge a relationship with my daughter that I pray will last a lifetime. We’ve literally spent hours and hours talking on the phone. Roger and I bought Ashley a plane ticket to come to our house in March. I wanted her to come sooner, but between Valentine’s Day and Jacob’s birthday (both of which Ashley would like to spend with Jacob) and our trip to Colorado, getting her to Arkansas before March just isn’t going to happen.

There has been a small bit of confusion around my house ~ with my daughter and Roger’s niece’s husband having the same name, and my future son-in-law having the same name as my dog, we’ve had to do a little bit of clarification! LOL So, from now on, when I refer to Ashley, I mean specifically my daughter, unless otherwise prefaced by the words “our niece’s husband” or something that clearly indicates that I’m NOT talking about my daughter. As for my dog and future son-in-law having the same name, I’ll try to refer to my dog as Jake and my future son-in-law as Jacob. No promises, but I’m pretty sure you’ll be able to tell when I’m talking about my dog Jake or my daughter’s fiancee Jake. But I really will try to use Jacob when referring to Ashley’s (my daughter’s!) fiancee.

Ashley told me that she and a friend of hers are going to Target and Babies ‘R Us to start baby registries. I’m still so amazed that I’M GOING TO BE A GRANDMA ~ or in my case, a Nana! Goodness. You know, it’s strange to have actually only known Ashley for only a week ~ there are so many similarities between us…………it’s actually kind of freaky. Who knew that fish-phobia (as I call it) is an inherited trait? I have this unexplainable fear of ocean/water creatures. I won’t swim in lakes, or even rivers, because they have water creatures (mostly meaning fish). There’s no way, let me repeat that, NO WAY anyone is ever going to convince me to go swimming in the ocean. I DON’T CARE of there are “beautiful” fish and other sealife living in some incredibly blue tropical waters. I’m not going in. Period. And I do mean period. No way. Uh-uh. Don’t even bother to try, because it won’t work. I don’t like fish ~ any fish, of any sort. I’ll deal with spiders and cockroaches all day ~ just don’t put me in even ankle-deep water with creatures who live there. As amazing as that is, Ashley shares the exact same sentiments. Roger, ROGER, pronounced the whole thing “freaky” when I told him that. And that’s just not a word my husband uses.

Who knew I would be so incredibly thrilled to be told I’ll be a Nana in 5 months? (Well, ok, besides you, Barb, and you, Bev…) Angie’s wedding afghan is on rush order now that I’ve found my daughter ~ I have baby blankets and hats and sweaters and toys to knit and crochet!!! Oh my goodness. I went to Target yesterday and looked through the baby aisles ~ I had more fun, all by myself in the baby aisles, than a barrel full of monkeys! All those things I wished they’d had when I was toting babies around, like car seats that transfer into strollers and wipes warmers and microwave baby bottle and pacifier sterilizers and bags that keep baby bottles chilled while you’re away from home ~ someone has actually invented them. ALL of them. Duh! Why didn’t I do that myself? I knew there was a market for them! Nonetheless, they’re invented now. And did you know there are baby monitors that also have real-time baby video cameras? When I had babies in the house, we were just thrilled that there were baby monitors to begin with ~ they had just been invented when Patrick was a baby. I don’t think I ever dreamed that baby monitors would have little video cameras on them so you can watch as well as hear your baby. Wow. This is why I’ve decided NOT to rent an extra car while we’re in Colorado ~ I have baby stuff to buy!

I’m pretty sure I must sound crazy to most people. But truly, I’m thrilled and I feel blessed beyond belief to not only have found my daughter but to have a grandchild coming so close in the future. I’m excited and anxious for Ashley to come for a visit. I’ll be going up to Minnesota for the baby’s birth. I’m hoping to find out next week whether Ashley’s having a boy or a girl. I’m not one who wants to wait until the baby’s born, although I understand why some people prefer it that way. I’m just not one of those people. I want to get started on buying blue or pink ~ I’m not fond of yellow or pastel green.

The rest of my immediate family seems to be as thrilled about the whole thing as I am. My previous marriage and Ashley’s birth have never been a secret ~ Roger was a part of my life when I gave birth to Ashley and released her for adoption, and our sons have known about her since they were old enough to understand they have a half-sister (although we don’t refer to her as a half-sister; she’s their sister). And from what I can tell, Ashley is just as thrilled about all of us as we are of her. She told me the other night she feels like she has hit the jackpot ~ not only has she gained a birth mom, but she has gained an entirely new family and friends. So cool ~ just so cool.

more acceptance letters

Patrick has received two more college acceptance letters this week ~ Tulsa and UCA (University of Central Arkansas). Things are moving right along in our quest to discover which college is right for him.

martha’s homemade holidays

It arrived today ~ the Martha’s Homemade Holidays DVD I won from Barb during the big bloggy giveaway! I’m hoping to have some time this afternoon and/or this evening to watch it. With all of the changes my family is going to go through this year, I think it will be wonderful to add some new traditions ~ I’m sure Martha has some really great ideas I can incorporate into our winter celebration and rememberance of the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

he made it!

Patrick received notification this afternoon that he has been selected as a National Merit Scholarship finalist! We’re pretty excited about this ~ the scholarship itself isn’t really any big deal, but the recognition is huge.

When Patrick became a semi-finalist, we started receiving offers from colleges saying if you are selected as a finalist, we will offer you such-and-such amount of money (usually the full cost of 4 years of tuition) if you name our school as your #1 choice. We’re just not sure yet which school is going to be his #1 choice.

Roger and Patrick are going to tour Tulsa University and Drury University this month. After that, we’re going to compare all of the schools Patrick is interested in based on academic environment, the campus and housing, cost of tuition, room, board, books, activitie fees, etc., and the amount of money the college has offered to off-set those costs. Patrick has received a few scholarships from a couple of schools already, which can be combined with their National Merit Scholarship finalist awards.

We have some very important decisions to make over the next few months. Roger and I are so thrilled for Patrick that he has been able to attend this school, get enough college credits that he will effectively enter college as at least a sophomore if not a junior, and that he has been selected for some pretty high honors. He has worked very, very hard ~ and the challenge has been very good for him. He is growing into an independent young man ~ independent from his parents, but closer in his relationship with God. I’m a bit stunned that high school is almost over for him, and he’ll be moving on to college in 6 months!

P.S. I wonder if he can use his rock star status in his favor on his college and scholarship applications? LOL!!!

charm country

I know it’s kind of early to be thinking about Mother’s Day, but nonetheless it has sort of been on my mind lately. I found the cutest little boy and girl birthstone “charms” (for lack of a better word) ~ I’m enamoured with the idea of a Mother’s bracelet. The birthstone kids are here. They also have birthstone babies that I especially love, but they’ve discontinued them ~ once they run out of what they have in stock it’s all over. So, birthstone kids it is…….

reminder

Don’t forget ~ if you want to be eligible to win the $25 Amazon.com gift card, you have until next Monday, February 11, to get your Winter Reading Challenge list posted. I will be coming around and checking out everyone’s list ~ I always find such great books on other people’s lists! You can sign up, and leave a direct link to your Winter Reading Challenge book list, here.

If you miss the deadline to be eligible for the gift card, that’s ok. Play along with us anyway. It’s always fun, and can be quite motivating, to post your goals and let others hold you accountable.

parody on "glamorous"

LOL Ok, if I ever needed any proof that my oldest son is a total goof, I definitely have it now.

He and the other kids at his high school who live on the 5th floor made this video ~ a parody on Fergie’s “Glamorous”. My son is the white boy on the left gettin’ his groove-thang on right towards the beginning of the video. Towards the middle of the video (if you last that long) is a white girl in a light colored shirt ~ that’s Patrick’s girlfriend Ariel.

You wouldn’t think these kids would have enough time to come up with something like this since it is, after all, a “smart kid” school ~ shouldn’t they be DOING calculus rather than singing and making a video about it??!!!

Let me add this disclaimer ~ since this video is on YouTube, I have no control over what ever else may come up on the page.

more info

I have had so many wonderful comments and emails about finally locating my daughter who I released for adoption nineteen years ago. Thank you all.

I’ve also had a couple of emails inquiring as to the circumstances of my divorce from my daughter’s father. You know, usually I’m an extremely private person. It’s not that I feel I have anything to hide or be ashamed of ~ to be honest, I’ve just sort of felt that things that happen in my life that are of a private nature should stay private.

I opened the door on this one though, so I’m going to answer the questions as best I can. I will not bash on my ex-husband ~ it was a LONG time ago. God has forgiven me of my sins, and I have been given the strength and mercy to forgive my ex. The short of the long story is that we got divorced because he was involved in extra-marital affairs. Yes, affairs. Plural.

Please understand, that time period of my life is still very painful. I think it probably always will be, no matter how much time goes by. I’m not bitter ~ in fact, I’m thankful that God has been able to use that part of my life to mold me into who I am now and who I will become in the future. He is the potter, I am the clay. He has used everything in my life for my good ~ sometimes it takes a good schwack across the head with a boat oar to get my attention. But God always uses a good schwacking within the context of disciplining me, teaching me, drawing me closer to Him, and showing me His mercy and His love.

And so, I am eternally thankful that I have had life-altering and life-changing experiences. And just look at how God is redeeming them for me ~ not only do I now have the opportunity to have a relationship with my daughter, He has also given me the opportunity to have a relationship with a grandchild! I’m beside myself in thanks and awe to my God Who knows exactly what I need, and Who continues to work in my life, shaping me into the image of His Son!

thank you

Thank you to everyone for the kind words in comments and emails ~ you all have greatly encouraged me, and I’m thankful for all of you!

but i’m too young……

I think the reality of finding my daughter and being told I’m going to be a grandma in 5 months is just now really starting to sink in. Especially considering I haven’t even celebrated my 40th birthday yet!

Roger and I have been looking at plane tickets between Minneapolis and Little Rock ~ I think we’ll get Ashley a ticket to come visit in March. I’ve been walking on a cloud ever since I received that note from Ashley with her phone number and her request that I call her. It feels kind of strange………

answered prayer

This has been a long time in coming……

Most people don’t know that I was married once before I married Roger. I was 18, young, foolish and, quite honestly, in complete and total rebellion towards my parents and authority in general. As you can guess, the marriage didn’t work out so well, and we got divorced.

About a week after I left that marriage, I found out I was pregnant. I don’t know that words can adequately describe the emotional flood and turmoil I experienced. It’s a very long story ~ but in the end, I decided that adoption would be best for the child. It was the absolute most difficult decision I have ever made in my life.

On August 22, 1988, I gave birth to an amazing, perfect, beautiful little girl. I spent a couple of days in the hospital with her, then had to give her over to the attorney who was handling the adoption. I sobbed nonstop for 3 days. And I mean sobbed ~ it was awful.

I have always wanted to know where she was, how she was, who she was ~ but I thought finding her would be very difficult. Recently Roger began urging me to find my daughter ~ she’s 19 years old now, and Roger knows how much I wanted to find her.

I did a quick search on Google on adoption, and found an article on About.com that explained about “search angels”. Search Angels are people who have access to birth records, and will do a search for you to help you find your child you released for adoption. I contacted a couple of Search Angels who have the birth records for Ohio and asked if they could help me find my daughter.

Within hours, I knew my daughter’s adopted name ~ Ashley ~ who adopted her, where she grew up, and I even had a means of getting in touch with her. Wow. I was amazed at how easy it was…..

I fretted over contacting her, because obviously I didn’t really know anything about her situation or how she would feel if I contacted her. But I went ahead and sent her a message, praying that whatever her reaction would be, I would handle it well and that the Lord’s hand would guide me.

I decided to set up a MySpace page, since I was trying to contact Ashley through her MySpace page. While I was online, I noticed that one of Ashley’s friends, Maggie, was online. So, I sent Maggie an IM asking if she knew how I could get in touch with Ashley.

Once I assured and convinced Maggie I wasn’t some wacky nutjob, she agreed to try to get ahold of Ashley and let her know I was looking for her. Maggie and Ashley have been best friends since they were 5 years old ~ God worked this whole thing out so amazingly well!

Within 30 minutes of my last IM with Maggie, I had a message waiting for me from Ashley. She gave me her phone number and asked me to call her! She was as excited about being found as I was about finding her!

I can’t even begin to describe how it feels to have finally found my daughter. And guess what ~ I’m going to be a grandma in July! LOL Can you believe that?! When Ashley told me she’s pregnant I was beyond overjoyed; I’m getting a two-for-one deal here! LOL

Here’s a picture of Ashley…….

Anyway, thank you all for praying about my unspoken request. If you would, please lift up Ashley, the baby, her fiancee Jake, and the rest of us in your prayers. This is such an amazing time for us!

P.S. If I seem to be very straight forward about this, it’s only because I’m trying to not jump out of my skin and run around yelling and jumping for joy! Truly, the past 24 hours have been so amazing……

martha stewart

Woo hoo! I won! I won!

Barb at A Chelsea Morning participated in the huge bloggy giveaway hosted by Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer. Barb was giving away a copy of Martha’s Homemade Holidays ~ a Martha Stewart DVD ~ and incase you didn’t get the message in my first paragraph, let me reiterate ~ I WON!!

Thank you, Barb; you’ve totally made my entire week! I can’t wait to watch this DVD ~ I know there will be tons of great projects and information on it!

a little time away

I haven’t been posting a lot over the past week or so ~ mainly because of that unspoken prayer request. It’s taking up a lot of my time, energy, and brain function. No worries ~ I’m doing well. Please just continue to pray for me when you have a moment. I really do appreciate it.

The other thing that’s taking up some of my time is a book I received the other day. It’s a new Ted Dekker book, titled Adam. The book hasn’t been released yet, but I received a review copy from the publisher. Oh. My. Goodness. I’m totally absorbed in this book! The Christian Fiction Blog Alliance will be doing a blog tour of the book February 20-22. I’ll post a review then. But, unless for some reason the book bottoms out towards the end, it’s going to get a major thumbs-up from me.

By the way, if you have a blog and you’re interested in receiving books to review (the books are free from the publisher), check out The Christian Fiction Blog Alliance. I’ve received some great books from them. You can find the qualifications for becoming a CFBA reviewer listed on this page. Another great group to join is the Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy ~ they operate in a different genre than CFBA, and I’ve received some great science fiction/fantasy/speculative fiction from them. And thirdly, you might consider joining F.I.R.S.T. (Fiction In Rather Short Takes). They do one book a month, and ask that you post the first chapter for that month’s book on your blog (the first chapter is provided for you ~ you don’t have to type the whole thing up! LOL). All 3 of these groups have been wonderful, and I really enjoy reading and reviewing the books they offer. I don’t read and review ALL of the books they offer each month ~ I wouldn’t have time to do anything else if I did!

I’m off to read a few more pages (or chapters) of Adam………

P.S. I’ve posted a couple of new reviews on my book review site Books & Book Reviews (how’s that for a catchy blog name?!) ~ enjoy!

need your prayers, please

Right now I have some things going on in my life that I really can’t talk about ~ yet. Hopefully someday day soon I’ll be able to write all about it. But for now, would you please pray for me when you think of it? Basically I’m asking for prayer regarding an unspoken request. I really do appreciate your prayers!

pocketmod

Check out this nifty little device ~ it’s called PocketMod. It’s ingenious ~ really! Here’s part of the description from the website:

The PocketMod is a new way to keep yourself organized. Lets face it, PDAs are too expensive and cumbersome, and organizers are bulky and hard to carry around. Nothing beats a folded up piece of paper. That is until now. With the PocketMod, you can carry around the days notes, keep them organized in any way you wish, then easily transfer the notes to your PDA, spreadsheet, or planner.
The PocketMod is a small book with guides on each page. These guides or templates, combined with a unique folding style, enable a normal piece of paper to become the ultimate note card. It is hard to describe just how incredibly useful the PocketMod is. It’s best that you just dive in and create one.

For folding instructions and a short instructional video, click on the “older version of PocketMod” link at the bottom of the page.

the one where sawyer runs away

I finally found the picture of Sawyer running away! He was 2 1/2 years old. We were living in Fayetteville, North Carolina, in the first house we ever bought. Sawyer was mad at us for something ~ I don’t even remember what. But he decided he’d had enough of whatever it was. He went into his room and got out his little suitcase (you can see part of “Going to Grandma’s” on the side of the suitcase ~ too cute!). He packed his footie pajamas, blankie, teddy bear, a couple of books and some Hot Wheels. Then he declared, “I’m going to live with Miss Christy!” Christy was our next door neighbor. She loved our boys and spoiled them rotten. Sawyer figured if he went to live with her he’d get his way all the time (which was pretty much true!).

Somehow I had the presence of mind to grab the camera as Sawyer stood on the front porch and told us good-bye. Then he marched across the yard, knocked on Christy’s door, and got his way. He “lived” with Christy for 2 nights before he decided he would come home. (Of course, Christy knew he was coming because we had called her, and we had arranged that he could stay with her for the weekend).

I couldn’t remember where I had put this picture. I found it this evening while looking for another picture (which, by the way, I have not found yet). Oy ~ he was just so stinkin’ cute. How did we ever manage to actually say no to him?!

excellent blog award

Kristine at MamaArcher’s Blog has graciously passed the Excellent Blog Award to A Joyful Heart. Thank you, Kristine!

The rules read: By accepting this Excellent Blog Award, you have to award it to 10 more people whose blogs you find Excellent Award worthy. You can give it to as many people as you want but please award at least 10. Thank you out there for having such great blogs and being such great friends! You deserve this! Feel free to award people who have already been awarded…

There are so many wonderful, excellent blogs out there ~ I have about 45 blogs in my Bloglines reader that I read at least once a day ~ and that’s only the blog I read everyday! There are many, many more I visit when I’m able. Choosing 10 to pass this encouragement along to isn’t easy ~ I could select more than 10, but I don’t want to totally flood the blogosphere with all my picks, either!

Taking into account the blogs I read that already have this particular badge has helped narrow things down just a bit. So, here are the blogs I would like to pass the encouragement along to:

Choosing Joy

Life at 7000 Feet

Crown Laid Down

The Simple Wife

Scratchin’ the Surface

In Pursuit of Proverbs 31

Training Hearts

Mama Bug’s Mountain View Christian Academy

The Potter’s Hand

Christian Homekeeper

If you would like to display this badge on your blog and have the opportunity to recognize other blogs you think are excellent, then I pass this award on to you, too. Feel free to click on the graphic at the top of the post, then right click on the graphic in the new window. Save it to your computer, upload it to your blog, and pass the love around!

so ready for colorado

I am so ready to just fly off to Colorado ~ I’m really looking forward to actually seeing real SNOW ~ even if it’s only on the mountains ~ and being in a state that is dry. I miss the cold weather, believe it or not; that’s an incredibly difficult thing for the Arkansas natives to believe. I miss the cold that doesn’t hurt. Someday we’re going to move back to Alaska. The winter months may be darker there than they are in the Lower 48, but they’re not humid, which actually makes them more comfortable than the so-called “winters” in the South!

almost spring?

Could it possibly be almost spring in Arkansas? In the past 2 days I have seen the bluejays and cardinals returning around my bird feeder, feasting on the goodies we leave there for the bird. There are jays and all sorts of colorful birds flitting around my yard, but I haven’t heard our owl for a while now. I’m not quite ready for spring ~ although the daffodils in my yard assure me they ARE. I was hoping spring would wait just a little longer ~ I would be happy to have another couple of freezing spells ~ when we don’t have enough freezing, the ticks, fleas and mosquitoes are horrendous during the summer. And if you’re one of our friends or part of our family who intends to come down to Arkansas for Patrick’s high school graduation, trust me, you’re hoping for a few more freezing spells here as well!

bountiful weekend

This past weekend was quite bountiful. Patrick was home from school ~ he came home Friday, spent the weekend hanging out with us, playing Halo with his brother, and working on college admissions and scholarship applications with his dad. He has to go back to school today (he had today off in observance of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day); it was nice to have him around all weekend.

In the mail I received several packages. One was a lovely mini scrapbook from my bloggy friend Tamara at Training Hearts. I haven’t had a chance to take pictures of it yet, but when I do I’ll post them. It’s the cutest little scrapbook, cleverly made from corrugated paper, covered in fabric, with neat little slip-in/pull-out tags. It has a country/farm/rooster theme. Thank you, Tamara ~ it’s simply adorable!

Another package in my mail box was the pattern book The Bumper Book of Knitting I ordered a while ago. I’m thrilled it arrived in plenty of time before we head out to Colorado ~ I have time to go through the patterns to decide which one I want to work on, and gather all of the materials. The Yuletide Gnomes and Cheeky Monkey patterns are much too cute to pass up! I was flipping through the book right after it arrived, showing Sawyer the cute patterns (poor kid ~ he’s the only one around most afternoons, so he gets to do fun things like listen to his mom rant and rave about cute knitting patterns!) ~ when I got to the Cheeky Monkey pattern I showed the picture to Sawyer and told him, “All of my grandchildren are going to have these cute little monkeys!” His reply was, “All of your grandchildren? What about your children?” LOL In Sawyer speak, that means, “Hey Mom ~ make one for me, too. They’re just goofy enough that I’d like to have one. “

The third package to arrive was a book I requested from Paperback Swap. I have enjoyed using PBS to find books that I would like to read, and passing along books I no longer want or need to other people who want to read them. It’s a fairly simple concept ~ you set up an account where you list all of the books you have that you would like to pass along to someone else. Then you make a list of the books you would like to read. When a book you’ve listed is requested by another member, you’re notified, and you send the book to them. When someone else lists a book you would like to read, they send it to you. You get a point for every book you send that’s received by another member, and every book you receive costs you a point. For people who read a lot but don’t want to keep every book they read, it’s a pretty good deal. The sender has to pay for the shipping, but you can print a label right from the PBS site that tells you how much postage to put on the package, and you can choose to send it Media Mail, so it really doesn’t cost that much. It has worked great for me ~ you would not believe how pitiful our local library system is. I’ve had much better luck finding books on PBS than in my local libraries.

Roger’s hard at work figuring out our plans for traveling to Colorado. At this point we’re thinking it might be good to fly ~ driving across Kansas in the middle of the winter can be a little scary sometimes. So, Roger’s working on that, and hopefully we’ll have everything figured out soon.

Jake had to go to the vet this morning. He has been having seizures off and on over the past couple of years, and they’ve started happening more frequently. The past few months he has had one every other week. We’ve been watching and keeping track of his seizures for a while ~ the vet was aware of them, and she had asked us to keep an eye on it. Today the vet said we should go ahead and put Jake on some medication for the seizures. I hate to do that, but it concerns me that Jake may have a seizure when we’re not around (I don’t even like to think that it may have already happened a few time). The meds will probably make him Dopey Dog for a few days, but after that he should adjust to the meds and be fine. It would be nice for him to not have the seizures ~ everything I’ve read about them says the seizures don’t hurt, they’re just confusing and scary for the dog. They’re scary for the dog’s humans, too!

Overall, our weekend was very productive and bountiful. I love having the whole family together ~ and surprise packages in the mail are always fun! I’ve made some headway on the afghan project, and our trip is almost planned out. We’re off to a great start this week!

abc’s of living simply

My bloggy friend Joanne Heim has written several books. I’ve mentioned her book Living Simply in several posts. In conjunction with this particular book, Joanne has posted on her blog The ABCs of Living Simply. They’re downloadable ideas to print on 4×6 cards for living simply that you can put into practice. Just click on the button at the top of this post to see Joanne’s wonderful ideas!

how i learned to knit

Sherry wrote: I do counted cross-stitch (self taught) and I kind of know how to crochet. My sister taught me when I was a teen. Together we made an afghan for my sister and her husband. This was when I was in high school. It was for a king bed. My parents loved it so much they asked if we’d make one for them. So we started. Unfortunately my sister died of cancer before it was finished and I had to finish it alone. To be honest I haven’t crocheted since then. Just too many sad memories I guess. But I would like to learn to knit. Do you think I can teach myself? I sure hope so I have a book on order! How did you learn to knit? Thanks

I learned to knit when I was 9 years old. My mother’s cousin came to stay with us for a visit, and she was a very experienced knitter and crocheter. She took the time to teach me how to do both. By the end of her visit she had taught me all of the basics and helped me complete a couple of projects. After that I just kept practicing. I would check books out of the library and follow the instructions and patterns for different projects. As I got older, the projects became more advanced. I don’t know that I’ll ever be as good of a knitter and crocheter as my mom’s cousin, but I do enjoy them. I cross stitch as well ~ I have 2 big projects just waiting to be completed. (I’ve got to get the afghan for my niece and her husband done first, though!)

Sherry, since you taught yourself to cross stitch, and you already know how to crochet, I think you can probably teach yourself to knit as well. It would really depend on how well the book you bought explains the process. I wouldn’t go out and buy a bunch of equipment yet ~ wait and see if you like knitting first. Do a couple of basic projects and see how quickly you pick it up. If you enjoy it, then by all means pursue it.

I teach knitting and crochet from my house. I know there are a lot of people who do that as well. You might look into getting someone to show you the basics if you have a hard time learning from the book. Look for elderly ladies in your neighborhood or church ~ there are several elderly ladies I know who love to have the opportunity to teach another lady how to knit. Not only do they get to share something they love, but it also gives them some company and interaction that they might not otherwise receive.

Let me know when you get your book ~ I’m interested to know how it goes for you!

news from germany

Our friends the S. family visited us for a quick 2 days in early November. After they visited with us, they went to Colorado to visit with family until it was time for them to head over to Germany (their new assignment). We finally heard from them ~ I was beginning to wonder if they’d fallen off the end of the earth! Actually, they were just waiting for an internet hook-up in their home. Cheri sent several pictures, but I wanted to share this one. Don’t they look great?!

where I’ve lived

MamaArcher asked, “Where have you lived that was your favorite place and why?!”

Well, let’s see. I’ve lived several places across the country, and I’ve traveled extensively within the United States. But, I would have to say that my favorite place has been Alaska. It’s so incredibly gorgeous there ~ words just don’t do it justice. I loved growing up in Montana, and of course Colorado is beautiful, too. But there’s just something about Alaska that really appeals to me.

I have lived in Texas, New York, Montana, Oklahoma, Ohio, Colorado, Texas (#2), Arkansas, North Carolina, Arkansas (#2), Alaska and back again to Arkansas. The northwestern states appeal to me ~ although I was born in Texas, I’m really a northwestern girl at heart. Someday Roger and I hope to be able to be snowbirds ~ live in Alaska during the summer months, and Arizona (or someplace that’s not humid!) in the winter.

Thanks for the question, Kristine!

wedding pictures

You can view a slideshow of some of the pictures from Angie (my gorgeous niece) and Ashley’s wedding here. I’m really looking forward to our trip to Denver next month!

first prayer journal on its way

At the end of my post “prayer journal how-to” I wrote that I would be pleased to make a prayer journal for anyone who would like one. Well, the first prayer journal to be requested is on its way to its new home. Lynn sent me an email and asked about getting a prayer journal ~ she said she liked the journal I made as the example journal in my post (photographs). I sent that journal off to her today.

If you think you would like for me to make a prayer journal for you, just send me an email.

Speaking of prayer ~ how may I pray for you? I would be honored if you would consider sending me an email with your prayer requests. Prayer requests will always be treated with the utmost of privacy ~ I truly do consider praying specific requests for others a privilege never to be taken lightly.

blogger’s block

Not much sleep and a whole lot of nothin’ out of the ordinary lately has given me a case of blogger’s block. My bloggy friend Meredith is having the same problem. I like her solution ~ ask me a question. I’m pretty sure my answer will be fairly ordinary, but ask anyway. I’m interested to know what you want to know about me. Who knows ~ maybe I’ll be able to make you question into a journal entry starter!

how to look good naked

I’m one of those people who have difficulty sleeping. I’ve tried all kinds of methods to try to get better rest ~ the only thing that works for me is Ambien CR. Seriously. The. Only. Thing. But Ambien CR works well only for a short time ~ at some point I have to stop taking it in order to allow my body to readjust. After a few nights off the Ambien CR I can start taking it again and it works like a charm.

During those times when I’m resetting my body and taking a break from the Ambien, I’m up until all hours of the night. That’s just the way it is. No amount of warm milk, exercise during the day, soft sleepy music and low lights will help me sleep. It just doesn’t happen.

That’s when I turn to the TV. I record shows with my DVR so I have a selection for when I’m not sleeping much (if any). This week has been one of those weeks when I haven’t been sleeping. Last night I realized I had gone though my reserve of TV programs ~ I had nothing recorded to watch. So I clicked on the Guide and found an old rerun of Frasier. When Frasier was over I went to the computer to check my email, and the next TV show started.

After I checked my email, I went back into the living room to sit down and watch another show. And there, on my TV screen, was a guy in Times Square stopping people to ask them what they thought of the picture of a woman in her bra and panties that was being projected onto a tall building. The thing was, the woman was not what we in America would call in “good” shape. She wasn’t obese, but she was what I call a Real Woman. She had curves, she had flesh, and she wasn’t a size 0. The people being interviewed on the street were saying things like, “She has nice legs,” or “She has nice curves,” and my personal favorite, “She has pretty feet.” All of this happened in the time it took for me to walk from my desk to the couch. By that point, I was pretty intrigued.

After a couple of minutes of watching this show, I figured out it was the new Lifetime series How to Look Good Naked. I had seen the commercials for this show (again, during my late-night recorded TV show bonanza) ~ and to be honest, I had rolled my eyes at the commercial and reacted with an, “Oh, please!” The host, Carson something-or-other, is just about as goofy and effeminate as a man can get. I don’t know if he’s gay ~ I don’t know anything about this man ~ but it wouldn’t surprise me. I have never watched Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, but this Carson dude reminded me of one of them.

The thing is, I was really, honestly, truly touched by the way Carson treated the lady (Leila) who was the subject of the show. He was kind, sweet, and very gentle with her. His entire objective was to help this lady change the way she perceived herself. He wasn’t giving her a make-over, he was giving her a new self-image.

I ended up watching the entire show because I was so taken with the way Carson interacted with Leila. Sure, he put on his fruity California homosexual act now and then, but when he was talking one on one with Leila he was really quite incredible. He showed her that the way she perceives her body is not really the way her body is. For example, he had 5 women line up in their bras and panties (people spent a lot of time in just their bra and panties on this show!) and asked Leila to take a really good look at these ladies’ hips. They were arranged from smallest to largest hip size, ranging from 34″ to 54″. Then Carson asked Leila to position herself into the line of ladies where she believed she would fit in the progression of size. Leila put herself between the two women at the largest end. But in truth, as Carson showed her next, she really fell between the first and second ladies ~ the two smallest of hip sizes in the line.

By the end of the show Leila had begun to see herself not as a fat, frumpy, cellulite-ridden, unattractive woman, but as a woman who is attractive even though she doesn’t have the body of a super model. Watching her transformation was quite beautiful.

I won’t say How to Look Good Naked is something I will watch every time it comes on ~ I don’t even know if I’ll ever choose to watch it again at all. But last night ~ late last night ~ when I did watch it, it felt worth watching. I think every woman has self-image problems when it comes to their bodies. Have you ever been in a group of ladies where the skinniest girl in the bunch makes a comment about needing to lose 5 pounds to fit into her jeans? It’s infuriating to the rest of us who don’t have the luxury of fitting into size 2 jeans, even on a good day.

But isn’t that a sad statement about our society? That we value our looks, the shape of our bodies, rather than the condition of our hearts? I’m not saying it’s ok to totally let yourself go and not even try to look nice, because really it’s not ok. But it is ok to have whatever body the Lord gave you. We have to take care of our bodies because they are a temple, the residing place of the Holy Spirit. That means doing things like eating right, getting some exercise, and not doing things that harm our bodies (like smoking or doing drugs). But when our focus is strictly on the body itself rather than the heart, it’s the heart that looks ugly. A beautiful body that contains a hard, blackened, ugly heart is an abomination to the Lord and a stench in His nostrils.

Is it as amazing to you as it is to me that this man Carson, who gave absolutely no indication that he is a Christian or that he is saved ~ really implied the opposite through his effeminate behavior ~ concerned himself with the interior thoughts and misconceptions Leila held about her body before he concerned himself with the actual external conditions of her body? He wanted to help her get her thoughts right before he worried about how she looked on the outside.

Has the Holy Spirit been working on your thoughts and your heart? Or are you more concerned with how you look on the outside ~ the right clothes, the right Bible, the right pew in church? At this time of year, millions of people make resolutions to eat right, go to the gym, and lose some weight. But God sees our hearts ~ our spiritual hearts, the interior of our being. How does your heart look to God? Is it a hard, black, solid mass of rock? Or is it in a healthy state, clean before Him, washed white as snow by Him, and lovely to Him?

At the end of the day (or life), that’s all that really matters.

prayer journal how-to

To make a prayer journal, you will need:

From Prayer Journa…

pretty 12×12 patterned cardstock and some embellishments

3-ring binder, loose-leaf paper, self-stick index tabs, and labels (for your journal sections)

a paper cutter, a hole punch, and page reinforcements (if desired)

First, decide what kind of sections you want in your journal. My sections usually include Praise, Confess, Requests, Thanks, Listening, Memorize, Wisdom, Proverbs, Reading and Reminders. You can put as many or as few sections in your journal as you desire.

Print your section labels onto the index tab inserts that came with the tabs, or onto mailing labels you can cut to size to fit the index tab inserts. Put your section labels into the index tabs.

Next, carefully cut your patterned paper to fit in your 3-ring binder. I use 8 1/2 x 5 1/2 loose-leaf paper and the smaller 3-ring binders that paper fits into. Doing this, I can get 2 section divider papers out of each of my 12×12 patterned cardstock sheets.

Using some patterned paper and embellishments, make a title page for your journal (if desired).

Using the hole punch and a piece of your loose-leaf paper as a guide, carefully punch 3 holes into each of your section divider papers.

Apply the self-stick index tab (section labels) to the section divider papers, staggering them so they’re easy to read.

Once you have all of the section labels on their respective section divider papers, place your title page on top and put them into the 3-ring binder.

Place some loose-leaf paper behind each section divider, and you’re done!

You can take this journal with you everywhere. It’s very convenient ~I can pop a piece of loose-leaf paper out, hand it to a friend, and let them write down their prayer requests for the week. Then I place that paper in the Requests section. Every time I open my journal to write down requests, I’ll see the page my friend wrote her requests on ~ it’s a wonderful reminder to pray for others often.

This journal is pretty and easy to make. However, if you don’t have the time to make one for yourself, or you don’t have access to the supplies needed, I would be happy to make one for you. Just send me an email and place “prayer journal” in the subject line ~ we can then communicate about making your prayer journal!

uncle!!!

I’m not just crying uncle, I’m screaming it from the rooftops!!! Remember Angie and Ashley’s wedding afghan (here)? All those beautiful shells and the openwork edges where a ribbon can run through……..have me screaming and pulling my hair out. I’ve made this afghan before, but I don’t remember it taking so blasted long to complete ~ nor do I recall it driving me absolutely batty. I’ve stopped and started on this particular pattern about 15 times ~ I’m finally giving up. The problem is probably mostly the yarn I chose to use for the wedding afghan, and the fact that it’s big enough to cover 2 1/2 people (well, 2 1/2 skinny people like Angie & Ashley, anyway). I’ve decided if I want to have an afghan to give them as a wedding present before they celebrate their first anniversary, I’d better ditch this pattern and choose a different one. One that is beautiful, but will go a little more quickly.

I’m finding that there’s a definite lack of gorgeous wedding afghan-type patterns out there. The really beautiful ones I’m coming across are all knitting patterns. And while I enjoy knitting, I can complete a crochet project in less than half the time it would take me to knit that same project.

I have a baby afghan pattern (crochet) that I like. If I use a heavier weight yarn than the pattern calls for, and a larger needle, I can adjust the pattern to make a nice-size adult afghan with it. And the great part is that not only is it a pretty afghan, but the pattern repeats the same row once you get to row 3 ~ Rows 3-76 are exactly the same! That makes it very easy to memorize and then just whip the project out.

So, I’m off to work on this new afghan pattern. Hopefully I’ll be able to get this one made up before we leave for Colorado!

what the wild west would’ve been like……

with shetland ponies. Oh my goodness ~ I laughed so hard I snorted when I watched this short video……..Enjoy!

my winter reading challenge book list

Last year I took on a new hobby ~ reading and reviewing books for publishers and authors, and posting a review on my blog. It’s a lot of fun ~ I get free books to read, then I actually get to tell other people what I thought about that book! Very fun for me, let me tell you.

The only problem with writing reviews is that there are deadlines. And the deadlines mean I have to have certain books read within a certain timeframe. That has messed with my pleasure reading. So, for a little while I’m going to stop taking book review assignments and actually read all of those books I intended to read last year before I took on the review gig.

That’s really the main reason why I decided to host a Winter Reading Challenge ~ completely selfish on my part! I figured other people might want to join in, especially when there’s the opportunity to win a $25 Amazon.com gift card.

I will probably be adding books to this list as time permits. For now, here’s the start of my list:

The Hand That Bears the Sword by George Bryan Polivka ~ I started reading this book, but I somehow managed to either lose it or misplace it! So for now I’m taking it off the list.
Passionate Housewives Desperate for God by Jennie Chancey and Stacy McDonald
Mr. Inside by L. Frank James
The Mom Walk by Sally Clarkson
Death of a Garage Sale Newbie by Sharon Dunn

All totaled, that’s 1,398 pages ~ I’m pretty sure I can average more than 140 pages a week, but we’ll see. I still have an afghan to finish for Angie and Ashley (my niece and her new groom) as well as a couple of other projects to complete by the end of February.

Thank you to everyone who’s participating in the Winter Reading Challenge. I’m really looking forward to seeing everyone’s reading lists ~ I always get so many good ideas for books to add to my list when I look over what other people are reading!

If you’re interested in or curious about the Winter Reading Challenge, click here to read all about it!

1/10/08 I love MamaArcher’s idea of including the books of the Bible she plans to read to her list ~ I couldn’t resist adding them myself:

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Joshua

Judges

Ruth

1 Samuel

That takes me through March 17 on my “read through the Bible in a year” outline ~ I will probably do a Bible study too. If I do, I’ll add it to the list.

January 15, 2008

The Maker’s Diet by Jordan Rubin

January 17, 2008

Death of a Six-Foot Teddy Bear by Sharon Dunn

January 28, 2007

Running Scared by Edward Welch

Book of the Dead by Patricia Cornwell (We’ll see about this one ~ if the language gets foul then I’ll skip it) ~ Just as I suspected, foul language, so this one’s off the list. What is it with authors thinking they need to use language like that just to sell books??!!! I really hate it…….

Adam by Ted Dekker

The South Beach Diet by Arthur Agatston

Wow. I think I’d better stop adding books to my list ~ I’ll never get them all read AND complete all of the crochet projects I have in progress! There are days when I would just much rather read than crochet or knit…………

a necklace, a book mark and a key ring

Just look what I received in the mail today:

A necklace, hand made Bible bookmark and hand made key ring ~ from my Secret Sister! Thank you so much, Secret Sister ~ they’re all absoutely beautiful!

chill out, josey! book review

I’ve posted a new book review on my review blog ~ check it out, then click on the link at the bottom of the post for a chance to win a Chill Out, Mom Spa Basket!

winter reading challenge

The Winter Reading Challenge is now closed, but scroll to the bottom of the post to see the links to the participants’ reading lists.

As I mentioned in my goals for 2008 post, I have books sitting on my bookshelf that were on my reading list for 2007 and never got read. Seeing as I’m a huge reader, that’s a very sad, sad statement ~ and it must be rectified!

So, I’m hosting a Winter Reading Challenge. Winter officially started December 21, 2007 ~ I’m running a little behind.

Katrina has in the past been gracious enough to host a Spring Reading Challenge; she may be gracious enough to do it again this spring (love ya, Katrina! ), so the Winter Reading Challenge will have to end before the official start of spring, March 20, 2008.

Here’s what I propose: the Winter Reading Challenge begins today. Don’t panic ~ I’ll leave the Mr. Linky up so you can sign-up for the challenge once you’ve had a chance to make a list of the books you intend to read between January 7 and March 17, 2008. That’s 10 weeks total for the challenge, so if you’re able to get your list together and sign up, oh say, 2 weeks from now, that still leaves you with 8 weeks to complete your reading list!

Everyone is invited to join in!

I have put a Mr. Linky at the bottom of this post where you can submit a link to your own Winter Reading Challenge blog post. All I ask is that your post include a list of the books you want to or plan to read this winter, and include a link back to this post that contains the Mr. Linky, so we can spread the word.

Start compiling your list of the books you want to read during the Winter Reading Challenge. Once you’ve got your list together, write a post about your goals with a list of the books you intend to read. Then come back here and sign up under the Mr. Linky at the bottom of this post.

Note: PLEASE BE SURE THAT THE LINK YOU PUT IN THE MR. LINKY GOES DIRECTLY TO YOUR WINTER READING CHALLENGE POST, NOT YOUR GENERAL BLOG PAGE.

Don’t forget to add a link back to this post so all those great people who read your post about the Winter Reading Challenge can join in the fun, too!

In Katrina’s words:

• *Be creative. Are there books you want to read to your children? Put them on the list! Want to stack up your books and post a picture of your goal along with your list? Go for it! Want to promise not to buy any more books until you read all the ones on your list? Do it!
• *Be ambitious. The important thing isn’t whether or not you are able to cross off every single item on your list. It’s reading more, reading things you want to read, and enjoying the books that you do read. So don’t list every book you ever want to read in your entire life – the challenge is just ten weeks, you know. But make a list that will challenge you to go a little further than you might have done without these goals to spur you on.

As an added incentive, I will be sending one lucky participant a $25 gift certificate to (where else?) Amazon.com. I’ll do a random drawing from the names of everyone who posts both an initial list by Monday, February 11, 2008 and a post about their results at the end of the challenge. The drawing will be held Monday, March 17, 2008 sometime in the evening. The winner’s name will be posted after the drawing.

You can save the Winter Reading Challenge graphic by clicking on it at the top of this post. Please save it to your computer, then upload it to your blog. You can put it in your sidebar, at the top of your Winter Reading Challenge post, or both!

Go for it ~ and happy reading! I can’t wait to see everyone’s reading lists!

P.S. In order to qualify for the Amazon.com $25 gift certificate, you MUST have your Winter Reading Challenge post up and sign-up under Mr. Linky (at the bottom of this post) no later than Monday, February 11, 2008.

However, you’re welcome to sign up to participate in the Winter Reading Challenge at any time, even after February 11!

Click here to see my reading list!

1. MamaBugs 2. Jen @ nyisutter\’s Scribbles 3. Lisa @ The Berry Patch 4. Linda 5. Sheri 6. Nicole @ The Sparkling Dragonfly 7. D 8. Tricia 9. Mama Archer 10. Amyswandering 11. Robin 12. Laura 13. Jenny 14. Denise-mominpa 15. Jacque-seekingrest 16. Tons of Sons 17. Bev 18. Heidi @ Reviews by Heidi

19. ruralmomma (Lesley) 20. sprittibee 21. Monique 22. dianne-bunny trails 23. gomomyourock 24. Christy 25. Amy Bayliss 26. Terri Sue 27. Cindy aka gooblink 28. Page 29. Brittnee 30. Renee@Count It Pure Joy 31. Denise 32. Sherry -Best of all, Books! 33. Alicia 34. Karen W 35. Renee\’ 36. Eyebright

37. Renee\’ (Family reading list) 38. Andrea 39. Sweetpotato 40. Abi B. 41. Amanda 42. One-Tired Mom 43. De\’Etta 44. Dawn @ My Home Sweet Home 45. Lisa @ Me & My House 46. Melissa (Between the Trees) 47. Gretchen 48. Nise\’ 49. Cyndy 50. Tina Awakened…to know 51. Becky 52. Janis 53. preciouspeas 54. Laurie

Powered by… Mister Linky’s Magical Widgets.

ccc and chchc

I am desperately trying to clean up my blog and sidebar. There are so many really great blinkies, pics and links that I would love to put into my sidebar, but when I do, the sidebar seems crowded and overwhelming to me. I am trying to keep it to a minimum ~ and in order to do that, I’ll have to post about the really great things I find instead of just putting a blinkie (like the one at the top of this post) into my sidebar.

The biggest decision for me so far this year (and since it’s only January 4th I’m sure other, more monumental decisions will come along) has been to clean out all of the extra stuff we have in our house. So far I have managed to find a place for everything and put everything in its place (for the most part), but God has been working on my heart regarding all the extra stuff, and I know it’s time to act on that conviction and be obedient to what God has been telling me.

Our home is a lovely 2600 square feet (approximately) ranch-style home with 4 bedrooms, 2 3/4 baths, a sunroom and a screened-in porch, in a very open and large-roomed floor plan. There’s lots of room. And I have lots and lots of bookshelves, armoires, RubberMaid buckets and other shelving units. These provide ample space for keeping/hiding/storing tons of “stuff”. In my sunroom alone I have a large oak desk, oak credenza, 2 six-foot tables, a smaller crafting desk, 2 large metal shelving units, a bookcase, shelving for cardstock and unfinished/unopened scrapbooks, buckets full of scrapbooking paper (one bucket for patterned paper, one for 12×12 cardstock), large and small storage canvas bags full of yarn, 2 large RubberMaid buckets full of yarn, filing cabinets, “cubes” full of yarn, and a small stand-alone storage box of drawers full of yarn. And that’s not everything I’ve managed to fit into my 24.6′ x 10′ sunroom! And the thing is, it doesn’t really feel all that crowded in the sunroom (aka the office and/or the craft room). The rest of our home is the same way. It would be almost overwhelming for me to go into detail here about how much storage space we have ~ and it all has “stuff” stored away in it. Not to mention the closets, garage and attic space ~ we won’t even go there!

So, as you can tell, it’s time to clear things out. It almost gives me a panic attack just thinking about it! But, it must be done. Roger wants to hold a huge garage sale (or two or three ~ however many it takes to get rid of the majority of the “stuff”) after we get home from our trip to Colorado in March. The weather in Arkansas is usually nice enough in March to hold garage sales.

The thing I have to remember, and continually remind myself, is that I’m getting rid of “stuff” in order to be obedient to God. That is absolutely the most important part of everything I do. I tend to collect things ~ books, paper, yarn, stamps, embellishments, ink pads, crafting accessories, etc., etc. ~ and I really LIKE collecting things. It has been a major work of God on my heart for me to come to the understanding that stuff is just stuff ~ it has no real meaning or lasting value.

If you click on the blinkie at the top of this post, you will be taken to a site called A Clean Heart, and a post titled “The Colossal Clutter Clean-Up”. Amy of Dandelion Seeds has written several devotional items geared towards turning the reader’s focus from stuff (clutter) to a clean heart before God. And once the reader’s heart is clean, so her home should be clean (and clutter free). Roger saw me reading Amy’s material the other day, and he commented that we should go through Amy’s study together. Amy has also written the 52-week devotional, the Clean Heart Clean Home Challenge. She has been given the gift of teaching through her writing. If God has been speaking to you about cleaning out “stuff” ~ whether in your heart, your home, or both ~ I recommend that you take a look at Amy’s Colossal Clutter Clean-Up and Clean Heart Clean Home Challenge. They may just be what the Lord has been guiding you toward.

So, while I find my home comfortable, and have been told by others that my home is comfortable and soothing (without being prompted to say so!), I really do feel strongly that the Lord is leading me to down-size. In a world of super-sized everything, isn’t it just like God to lead in the opposite direction?

I have other really great links to share, so I’ll be posting about lots of different sites and links frequently. As much as I would love to put all of the blinkies, pics and links in my sidebar, I’m going to keep the excess stuff in my home AND on my blog to a minimum. If I come up with a way to have all of the blinkies, pics and links handy in the sidebar rather than spread out in different posts I’ll be sure to implement it. But for now, I’ll label all of these types of posts “good stuff” ~ the labels can be found in my sidebar.

upcoming wedding

Our niece, Angie, is getting married on Thursday! She and Ashley have been together for several years now ~ he proposed on her birthday in 2006 with roses and a miniature wedding cake. (You can just barely see the cake in the very bottom left-hand corner of the picture below.) They’re getting married in Costa Rica ~ Roger and I are heartbroken that we’re not able to attend the wedding ceremony. But, we ARE going to be able to go to the reception they’re holding in Denver February 29. We WANT to go to Costa Rica, but it’s just not going to happen. So, we’re excited and thankful that we’ll be able to be in Denver for the reception.

Congrats, kiddo ~ we love you, and we can’t wait to see you in February!

acceptance to tamu

Patrick went online this afternoon to check his application status with Texas A&M. His application was accepted! He’s thrilled ~ he spent a couple of days at A&M this past summer during an honors invitation program and was very impressed with the campus, faculty, and students. He has applied to several colleges, and so far has received acceptance confirmations from Drury University and Texas A&M. Now we just have to wade through all of the scholarship applications and the battle for the best scholarship package.

We will find out at the beginning of February whether Patrick has been selected as a National Merit Scholarship finalist or not. Once we received notification that he was a semi-finalist (back in October) we started receiving scholarship offers from colleges and universities. A couple of them were pretty good offers. If he is selected as a finalist, the chances of his getting a full-ride scholarship increase significantly.

I still think there are a few additional colleges Patrick should apply to ~ we’re considering and weighing all of the options. We want him to go to a college that he wants to attend ~ but how do you convince a 17 year old that he would do well to consider colleges in Colorado, New York or Massachusetts when he’s really very much a homebody and doesn’t want to be more than 8 hours or so away from home? (And even though I want him to go to the best college he possibly can, how do I convincingly tell him it would be ok with me if he DID attend a college as far away as Colorado, New York or Massachusetts?!)

P.S. I forgot to mention ~ Patrick was invited by Drury University to attend a special weekend at the university held for students who qualify to compete for their Trustees’ Scholarship. You can’t just apply for the Trustees’ Scholarship ~ you have to be invited to attend this special weekend and interview for it. It’s very competitive, but it’s a fantastic scholarship.

We were a little concerned that Patrick might not be able to attend because the weekend the interviews are being held is the ONE mandatory weekend for every student at the school he currently attends. It’s the weekend where the seniors turn in their FIRM projects that they’ve been working on since the middle of their junior year ~ sort of like a college thesis. It’s a huge deal, and a major part of their final GPA.

Roger sent the dean of academics (at Patrick’s high school) an email telling her that Patrick had been invited to interview for the Trustees’ Scholarship at Drury. He asked her for permission for Patrick to be excused from the school’s mandatory weekend. She replied that as long as Patrick and his FIRM advisor can assure her that his FIRM project will be completed and handed in before that weekend, she would grant permission for him to be excused. That’s really good and really HUGE for us!

more about goals

After writing my post yesterday about goals, I was tickled once again by God and His timing when I read this post by Holly at Crown Laid Down and this one by Kristine at Mama Archer’s Blog. I’ve been making notes for the past week or so as to what God has been speaking to my heart because, as I explained yesterday, making goals at the beginning of each new year just really isn’t my thing. I usually laughingly chalk it up to being a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of girl. That’s not completely accurate, though. I’m not so much fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants as I am a let’s-ask-God-what-to-do-at-this-moment kind of girl.

Psalm 90:12 reads, “Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.“

In her book Living Simply, Joanne Heim writes:

The word number in this verse means pretty much what you’d think – to count, assign, appoint. Makes me think of schedules and calendars and to-do lists. I’m pretty familiar with all of those; how about you?

But the word gain in the Hebrew doesn’t mean that when we do number our days correctly, a heart of wisdom automatically appears. The Hebrew word in this verse means to grasp, take hold of, seize. It’s active, not at all passive.

We need God to help us number – schedule – our days aright so that we can seize wisdom. If we don’t learn this skill, presumably we won’t be able to take hold of the wisdom God offers……………

When we don’t number our days aright, we’re too busy, too tired, too scattered to pursue wisdom with the determination and energy it requires.

This next part is the part where, like the V-8 commercial, someone should have smacked me on the forehead ~ I knew what Joanne was explaining, I had just not paid attention like I should have:

Can you imagine not living by a clock? What freedom! Never running out of time, never worried about wasting time, never running late, never showing up too early…

But we are creatures of time by God’s design. We are the created, not the creator; He knows us inside and out. We are bound by time and it passes all too quickly. “Our days…quickly pass, and we fly away” (v. 10).

So what are we to do? What makes the difference to those days as they pass?

Wisdom. Knowing what to do and when to do it. Using what we know to make wise choices and godly decisions.

I love how Moses ends this psalm. He asks God to “satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days” (v.14). When we start the day with God, asking Him to schedule our time and tasks, joy is the result. And days full of gladness and joyful song are what I want – for myself and my family.

And so we begin our day, confident of God’s unfailing love, and ask Him to “establish the work of our hands for us – yes, establish the work of our hands” (v. 17). The Hebrew word for establish means “to prepare, to arrange, to order.”

I love how this verse reads in the King James Version: “And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us; and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.”

Satisfy me each morning with your love and establish the work of my hands today, Lord God. Order my day, arrange the tasks to be accomplished, prepare me for the conversations I’ll have. Help me sing for joy as I clean my home, read to my children, spend time with a friend. Number my day aright and help me pursue and grab hold of wisdom.

A beautiful life, lived one day at a time. That’s the kind of simple life I long for.

Joanne, I couldn’t have put it any better myself (so I quoted you! )

So that’s my thing. As I look forward to this new year and all the possibilities it brings, I know one thing for sure ~ I want to seek God’s face, live within His will, and grab every bit of wisdom He allows me. God’s the one who orders my days. He’s the one who sets my path. I want only what He has for me. My goals, my intentions, my wants and desires are nothing if God is not the author and director.

My prayer for 2008 is that with the apostle Paul I might say, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20). God numbers my days, and I wish only to live according to His plan, His purpose, to love Him and bring glory to His Name.

Simply Living by Joanne Heim quoted with permission. The portion of Joanne’s book quoted in this post may be found on pages 42-45.

what’s a hokie?

Regarding the Virginia Tech mascot ~ anyone know what a Hokie is?

goals, goals, everybody’s goals

It’s that time of year again ~ the beginning of every new year is the time to make a list of goals one hopes to attain over the next 365 days. As I read through what I call my Daily Blog Tour ~ those blogs I read on a daily (or at least regular) basis ~ I have found a mixture of goal-making approaches. It has been fun to read about the things my friends, both IRL and bloggy, hope to change, add, or eliminate from their lives.

Every year I struggle with this tradition. There’s something about making a list of the things I want for my life that bothers me. It may be that I don’t care to make a list of goals simply because listing goals that aren’t attained within the next 365 day period would seem like a failure to me. I don’t like failure ~ in fact, I usually try to avoid it.

My children would tell you I don’t make a list of goals because I’m “OCD” ~ by that they mean I’m too much of a perfectionist. In truth, I’m not a perfectionist, but they think I am. Admittedly, I am particular about things ~ like vacuuming, doing the dishes, and cleaning the bathroom ~ but my children fail to appreciate the difference between particular and perfectionist. If a job’s not done well, it’s not done at all ~ and my sons would say the same line of thought would apply to any list of goals I may make. If I take the time to make a list, everything on my list would have to be done well, or it would be considered not done at all. There may be some truth to that…….

This year, though, I’m going to break from my tradition of not making a list of goals. I have tried to make my list as realistic and attainable as possible ~ it’s the only way a list of goals is going to work for me. This is my list of “practical” goals (not in any specific order):

1. Declutter, dejunk, and downsize ~ there’s too much “stuff” just sitting around my home that I don’t use, don’t need or don’t want. Get rid of it!
2. Make meal planning a priority. I tend to stop and start with this ~ I need to work on it.
3. Learn to manage my fibromyalgia well ~this alone will improve not only my quality of life, but the quality of life for my family as well. This may mean I have to eliminate some commitments that add stress to my life (even though I enjoy them) ~ stress + fibromyalgia = one unhappy Trish.
4. Complete all half-done and/or already promised projects before taking on any new ones: make Christmas stockings for Norma, Larry and my dad that match the stockings I made for Roger, Patrick, Sawyer and myself; complete Angie and Ashley’s wedding afghan and get that sent to them (asap); finish those 2 cross stitch projects I’ve had sitting around for a while (Celtic Winter Cross and 1997 Christmas Angel); curly-twirly scarves and hat for Meredith, Joanne, Holly and their girls
5. Keep up with the filing (ugh! but Roger will be glad to see this one……)
6. Read all of the books I intended to read last year but wasn’t able to (which means I’ll have to stop receiving new books to read and review, at least for a while)

I have some things I hope to do this year as well, but I haven’t listed them as goals simply because I have to be realistic about goals. In my mind, hoping to do something is different than making it a goal.

• finish putting together recipes and write the “Family & Friends Heritage Cookbook” I started while we were in Alaska
• entertain/invite people over more
• find an exercise method that actually helps rather than aggravates my fibro
• keep in touch with family and friends better (although that’s really one of the main purposes of this blog…….)
• go on vacation (in addition to going to Colorado in February)
• go to Canton, Texas (craft fair/flea market heaven!)
• go to Branson and Silver Dollar City with the Arkanblogger family

There are some spiritual goals I want to continue or attain as well:

• read the Bible every day
• choose a Bible verse each month to memorize
• study apologetics with Sawyer
• seek God’s will for my life, and follow His leading in everything I do

I have more that I want to write about concerning goals, but I think I’ll wait and do that later, maybe tomorrow. God has really been speaking to my heart about this subject, and I’m anxious to share those thoughts! But for now, I must get off the computer and begin working on my second goal ~ plan out (figure out is more like it) what we’re going to eat for the next couple of days!

happy new year

Happy New Year everyone! Roger and I celebrated the ushering in of a new year the way we always do ~ we were in bed fast asleep by 11:00pm! LOL New Year’s celebrations have never been a big deal at our house. When the kids were little they always wanted to stay up until midnight ~ they would fall asleep on the couch by 10:00pm. I have a picture of Sawyer fast asleep on the arm of the couch on New Year’s Eve somewhere ~ I’ll have to see if I can find it.

Goals ~ haven’t really thought much about them yet. I’m just enjoying having everyone home. When we get back to our regular schedule next week I’ll spend some time thinking about my goals for 2008.

Gray hair ~ I’ve read posts on a couple of different blogs lately about coloring/covering up gray hair and wrinkles. To tell the truth, I really don’t worry much about either. I have a skin care regimen ~ I’ve bought good skin care products since I was about 25. My skin’s in pretty good shape, considering the tanning fiasco I had when I was 16. I take care of my skin, but I’m not too concerned about those little crow’s feet lines that are beginning to show up at the corners of my eyes. As for gray hair ~ I found my first gray hair when I was 21. I was pregnant with Patrick. I colored my hair for years, but a couple of years ago I just got tired of all of the maintenance and upkeep. Not to mention the cost! So, I let it grow out, then cut off all of the colored hair. My hair’s all natural now ~ I’m about 35-40% gray. I have what I call a Cruella DeVille streak over my left eye. I laugh about it because really the gray hair doesn’t bother me a bit. It doesn’t really matter to me how old people think I am. It’s funny to me because now that my gray hair shows, people seem to think I have more wisdom than I did when I was coloring my hair. I don’t know ~ it’s a strange reaction to gray hair.

Other things ~ Angie’s wedding afghan is about 1/3 done. I should have it finished in plenty of time to mail it so she and Ashley receive it when they get back from Costa Rica. We’ll be going up to Colorado towards the end of February to attend Angie and Ashley’s wedding reception (since they’re getting married in a remote location, they’re having a reception for everyone in their home town). I’m SOOOOO looking forward to that trip! I’m going to have the privilege of meeting several of my bloggy friends ~ Meredith, Holly, and Joanne, and maybe others ~ while I’m up there. And did I mention that Caitlin is probably going with us? Much, much, much too fun!!

Patrick went to Ariel’s house after the Trans Siberian Orchestra performance ~ she and her mom had tickets to the same show we attended. Roger drove up to pick him up and bring him back home today. He’ll have to go back to school on Sunday.

Sawyer has been a little social butterfly lately, arranging to “hang out” with his friends at their house, at the mall, at the movies………this time next year he’ll have his driver’s license and we won’t have to drive him all over when he makes all these plans! (No worries ~ we know who he’s hanging out with, where they are, what they’re doing, and which parents are chaperoning ~ he doesn’t go anywhere unless all the criteria are met.)

I’m planning to go “hang out” with several of my favorite young ladies and their mother (click on the link to see a video post by Paige, Caitlin, Elizabeth, Grace and their cousins Joy and Marie. Lovely voices and harmony, ladies!). Kathryn and her family have been off visiting family the past week and a half ~ they’re expecting to be home today. I’ll be visiting with them on Thursday ~ I’ve missed them all and I can’t wait to see their pictures and hear their stories about spending the holidays with their extended family! I did have a small panic attack the other night about them ~ actually, it was about their cat who I call “Neurotic Cat” instead of her given name Ellie. Kathryn mentioned in passing one day that she might need me to stop by and take care of Neurotic Cat while they were gone, but I didn’t hear anything else about it from her so I forgot about it. Then the other night I remembered that I might have been responsible for Neurotic Cat while they were gone ~ you can imagine the images going through my head of what they might have found when they got home! But thankfully someone else was given the task of taking care of Neurotic Cat ~ whew! I was quite concerned about it for a little bit!!