Tuesday's Tidbits

The days are getting shorter and cooler. The trees are starting to put on their autumn coats. With many hues of orange, red and yellow, they make us smile. The smells remind us of simpler times when our only job was to make huge piles of leaves and then jump in them until we were completely out of energy. Only to come home to find our mother waiting for us with freshly baked cookies or pie and something hot to drink.
With autumn finally starting to show her beautiful face, I thought that would be a good topic for this, my first Tuesday's Tidbits.

*Now that it's getting cooler, it's time to bring out your winter clothes and put away your warm weather wear. Pull out your boxes and tubs and get to work! Put away all your summer clothes, nice and neat where ever they are to be stored and with them place a sachet of your favorite scent. Lavender and cedar work well, because not only do the smell wonderful, they do a good job at keeping away the moths. While you're at it make (or buy) enough sachets to put some in your dresser drawers and hang in your closet too!

*On a cool autumn evening, pull on your favorite cozy sweater and make your self some spiced tea. (recipe to follow) Go outside and enjoy the cool night air. Close your eyes and just take time to appreciate the scents and sounds of the changing seasons. If you have a fire pit (I highly recommend them) light a fire in it. Nothing is quite as cozy and comforting as a crackling fire on a cold night!

*Before the days get too cool, take the kids to the park. Let them run themselves silly while you sit and enjoy a new book (or an old favorite).

*Go on a walk and pick up colorful fallen leaves that you see. They can be a beautiful touch to your seasonal decor.

*Why save those leaf piles for the kids? Go on ahead and jump in yourself! People might look at you funny, but who cares! You'll be having lots more fun than they are!

* Go for a trip to a local orchard or pumpkin patch. Or both! What better places to find autumn decorations and flavors. Buy your self some cider and apple and pumpkin butters. And get some pumpkins and gourds to mix with those leaves you collected.

*If you have a fire pit, now is a great time to have a wienie roast! And after that grab some marshmallows and make yourself some ooey-gooey s'mores!

*If you have a fireplace, now is a great time to make sure it is nice and clean to prepare for all the cozy fires you will be burning when it gets nice and cold outside.

* Go shopping for new comfy sweaters and throws and get your cozy on!

*Open up the house and let that gorgeous fall air in!

*Eat candy corn and candy pumpkins. This is the best time of year for candy!

*What better time can you think of to learn to knit?

* Then go ahead and knit yourself a scarf and hat!

*Go to your local fall festival and have a look at all the arts and crafts. Even play some of those games! They might be rigged, but you'll at least have fun trying!

*Buy some fun, colorful socks to keep your tootsies warm!

*Bake some cookies....then bake some pie.....then bake a cobbler....bake, bake bake. Save some for yourself and take the rest and surprise your friends and family with it!

Recipe for Spiced Tea (this is my favorite autumn drink!)

1 cup Tang
1/4 cup instant tea (unsweetened)
3/4 cup sugar
1.5 ounces lemonade mix
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves

Put all ingredients into a container, put the lid on and shake. Continue shaking until well mixed. Use 2 heaping tsp mix (more or less depending on taste) to 1 cup boiling water. Stir and enjoy!

Monday's Martyrs

I imagine you are wondering why I chose the most tiresome day of the week to post about my saddest topic. At first, I wondered if it wasn't a good idea. Then I decided it was the perfect day. It's the perfect day, when all of us that are free to live our own lives and have so many worries and complaints, to read about people who have it so much worse off than we do. These people are imprisoned, tortured and killed all because of their faith. I think it puts things in perspective. Makes us see that our problems (in most cases) are so much smaller than we think they are. Be thankful for what you have and try not to dwell on the bad and aggravating things in your life. I'm talking to myself first and foremost. I have a bad tendency to complain about trivial things. I always have. I have been working on that and I pray this will help me put things in perspective as well.

Today's martyr is Li Ying.

She is in her early thirties. She is now serving a 15 year sentence for helping in the publishing of a magazine of an underground church in China. She and 16 others were arrested in April of 2001. And in December of 2001 she was condemned to death. She is not allowed to have a Bible and she is forced to work 15 hours a day making things that are to be exported out of China. She had been allowed visits from her mother. But those visits have been stopped because Li refuses to admit to being a member of a cult.

Lord God, I pray right now that you strengthen Li Ying. That you give her courage and endurance in her time of great trials. Give her peace and hope. And have mercy on her and cause her captors to have mercy as well. May her conviction be overturned and she be set free. In the name of Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.

Our Weekend

The Rock and Gem show we were in was this weekend. Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It's been a long weekend! Although we had fun and did pretty good! We bought a few rocks for cutting and Pat bought me a ruby ring. It's actually a man made ruby. It's actually called an aluminum oxide ruby. But it's still a ruby and it's so pretty. I'll post a pic of it once I can get a good one.
Here are some pics from the show. I need a new camera. These aren't very good, but they give you an idea.
These next two were of our table.

This was my view for the whole show. We had a good spot right at the entrance. But it meant I had my back turned to everyone else.

Like I said, we did pretty good. We are going to start putting our gemstone beads on etsy here in the next couple of days.

Anya's birthday was Saturday! She's three now! It's so hard to believe! Unfortunately we were at the show most of the day that day. So I don't have those pics yet. I'll try to get them loaded up and posted soon. She got a few babies and some dress-up clothes. And my grandma got her a set of little Disney Princess books. She's very happy with her gifts!

Here's a something I heard at church yesterday that made me think differently than I had before. A friend of mine quoted this verse as she prayed.

"if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." 2 Chronicles 7:14 (NIV)

Now I never thought of this correctly until last night. I always thought it meant this country needs to come to Jesus. The unsaved ones. Which they do! But that's not what this verse is talking about. The world, or the unsaved, are not HIS people. They are not called by HIS name. It's not them who need to humble themselves and turn from their wicked ways so that our land will be healed. It's the Christians. It's those of us who already think we're okay. We are the ones who have to do it. The ball is in our court. Think on that.

Well, maybe I'm slow and the rest of you had already figured that out. But it struck me last night and I thought I'd share.

Stay tuned for Monday's Martyrs. TTFN!

Next Week

Next week I will be adding new blogging topics for each day in addition to my regular blog. They will be as follows:


Monday's Martyrs: Every Monday I will bring you the names, and possibly faces, of people around the world that are under severe persecution for their belief in Christ. I will ask that you all be in prayer with me for these specific people and all who endure terrible trials for living for our Saviour.


Tuesday's Tidbits: Every Tuesday I will give you little ideas to add a touch of beauty and/or whimsy to your home and everyday life. This will also be the day I talk about ideas for the season and upcoming holidays.


Wednesday's Winners: Every Wednesday I will bring you a story of an everyday hero. Someone who stands out and has done something special for someone else. Maybe it will be a specific solider fighting for our country. Maybe it will be a neighborhood kid who gave his coat to a stranger in need. I just want to give recognition to people who deserve it.


Thankful Thursday: Every Thursday I will tell about things I'm thankful for. I'm sure she's not the only one who does this, but I got this idea from Amy at The King's Table. We all too often take our blessings for granted. We need to take time each day to reflect and thank God for the blessings He gives.


Friday's Favorites: Every Friday I will give a list of websites and blogs I find fun, useful or unique. I look forward to scouring the web for you to bring you new and interesting sites!

As for Saturday and Sunday, I'm usually not online on the weekend as it is our family time.

I'm so excited about this! This is what I wanted this blog to be when I first started it. I just never put enough effort into it besides using it for a journal of sorts. I hope you all enjoy! TTFN!

Finally!

Well I liked the header I made for it yesterday until I added it to the blog. It just didn't look right. And the name was akward. Now I think I FINALLY have it right! Tell me what you think!

Whew!

That took long enough! Yes I have been online ALL DAY looking for a good template. I had a pink one up, but I didn't like it much. But I finally have one I love. And the winner is..............



She has ALOT of AWESOME designs! Go check her out!
I still have alot of work to do on here. Arranging and what-not. But I'm happy with it for the moment. TTFN!!!

Itchin' For Some Switchin'!

I'm planning a revamp of my blog. I'm still searching for the right template. I'm hoping that maybe I can get hubby to buy me a special one. I just feel like I'm changing so it's time for a change of my blog. I'm possibly even going to change the name.
It's still going to be mostly the same stuff you see here normally, but with extra features. Like I think I'm going to combine it with our business blog. Plus, I'm going to try to search out other sites that I like and maybe you would too. And I'm going to post about them. Plus, any advice that I come across as useful and little things that I think make life more beautiful.
I'm still in the planning stages rightg now. But hopefully, you will see the change soon!
If you know of any good blog design sites, let me know! I just hope blogger will let me change mine. It's been giving me trouble with that lately.
Anyway, talk at ya later!

Busy Week!

It's been a crazy week already and it's not even half over yet! Yesterday, I had to go buy groceries. That is always fun. I have two little kids who want EVERYTHING! I swear I say the word no more than any other word. Anya stays in the cart fine most of the time, but Noah's always got his head in the clouds. I'm constantly reminding him to pay attention and watch where he's going. That's usually when I almost run into somebody. I think, maybe, he gets it from me.

After that, I got home and decided to finally try out my food dehydrator I got for Christmas last year. Apples and bananas. So, I cut them all up and layed them in there nicely. I plug it in and that thing sounds like a vacuum cleaner. I'm thinking, "I have to listen this for 8 more hours?"
So, I decided to make even more noise and help out my hubby by mowing the back yard. He'd been able to mow the front but hadn't had time to finish. It's the first time I've ever mowed in my life. I got out the mower and started it just fine. I've seen it done enough times. Mowed about 1/5 of the lawn and it died. I tried and tried and tried to get it started back up. I wore myself out trying. Finally I gave up and put it away. About half an hour later I decided to give it another shot. Got out there and tried a couple more times. Then it dawned on me. Check the gas tank. Honestly, I'm not a dumb person. Just sometimes I can be a little slow. I always miss the most obvious thing. So I put in some more gas and finished up the lawn.

Then I cleaned up some, had supper and went to church. I was working the nursery. Luckily there weren't a whole lot of babies. I didn't have much energy left.

Last night, after church, Pat tore out some of the wall and put our dryer in. Only to find out the plug didn't match the outlet. So, I went to Lowe's today and got a new outlet. He'll have to put it in tonight. Hopefully before he goes to the men's meeting so I can get started tonight on this mountain of laundry that's growing in our bedroom.

Today I still have to do school, dishes and vacuuming. Plus I have to make cookies for Pat to take to the men's meeting at church and I told the kids that we could paint little pumpkins today.

Tomorrow I have to go work at the old house for a while. Then the rest of the week will be getting ready for the annual gem and mineral show. We've had a booth there for the last 6 years. It's so much fun! It's Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I will be working most of Saturday by myself. Our church worship team is doing a "gig" for a community service project our church is involved in. And Pat plays the guitar for our worship team. He may be debuting one of the songs he wrote there!

Oh, and to top it off, Anya's birthdya is Saturday. She'll be three! And we have yet to get her a present. Gotta get that done!

Anyway, I guess I've gone on long enough. Take care!

A comic all of us moms can relate to!

Just had to share!

This is my hunky hubby's newest creation! Yes ladies, hot AND talented! Aren't I lucky girl? :)

He designed and made it himself. It took forever too. He's been working on it since before we moved! The thread wouldn't cooperate and kept getting knotted up. But he finally finished and I am so proud! He's selling this one and is custom making me one in green and brown! Celtic colors for a Celtic girl! I'm very excited! He's got this one up for sale on etsy.com if anyone is interested. You can find it here.
Just had to gush! TTFN!

Part one of house pics

It's been a long weekend that went by too fast. If that makes any sense. I will write more about it tomorrow. I just wanted to get some pics posted tonight.
Anyway, I don't have pics of the bedrooms yet. Their not "ready for their close-ups" so to speak. that's why this is only part one. But here's the tour so far. Keep in mind that I have yet to do any decorating.
This is the front of my dream cottage!

Come on in! Don't be shy!
I'm skipping the entry way as it is still full of boxes. But here we are coming into the living area.

Our big marble fireplace that I can't wait to use!

The living area from the other end....
Here is happy fridge! I still hug it every now and then. No really......I do. My sweet and lovely kitchen!

This is our school/craft room. Or will be once we get more organized.

I can't wait until we sell the old house so I have money to decorate with!

A bunch of fish and a possible buyer.....

This is a Rainbow Trout. I will be seeing TONS of these little slippery things today. Unfortunately, I can't eat any of them.....maybe with a little almond cream sauce....mmmmmmm....................... ANYWAY! Our homeschool group is going to a fish hatchery today. We will be able to see them swarming around eachother. We'll even get to feed them. The kids are very excited! After that, we're going to the park for some run-a-muck time. The kind that makes mommies very happy and wears the kiddos out for the day. Quiet afternoon and early bedtime. YAY! Yesterday afternoon, I got a call from our realtor. Wondering how close our old house was to be put on the market. Getting there. She said she has an investor who's very eager to buy a property. That lit a fire under us. Tomorrow, my mom is watching the munchkins and we are going to work our tails off at the old house all morning and early afternoon. We're going to get it DONE! Then our realtor is going to bring the guy over to look at it in the afternoon. Please pray that he wants to buy it! We need it GONE!!! Two house payments is not good for the checkbook. On a side note, Pat thinks the camera cord is at the old house. So keep your fingers crossed for me! Okay well I will see ya'll later. LUVS!

Bummer Dude!

I got my house all nice and cleaned and prettied up. I took my pictures. I came on here, all excited to get them loaded up and out to you. But, wait! I feel like I'm missing something. Could it be the cord that connects the camera to the computer? Why, Yes! That's it! I have no clue where it's at. It could still be at the old house. No telling. But I'm going to search for it, and then I'll get back to you with some pics.

This is the day we clean the house!

All this week, up until now I've been too busy to do much cleaning around this house. (got some done at the old house yesterday) So that is my day today. It's starting to look TOO "lived-in" around here.

Dishes are in the dishwasher already waiting to run. The bathrooms are in need of a good scrub. The floors need swept and vacuum. And goodness, I need to take that trash out! Besides that, just a major tidying-up should do it.

It really doesn't sound like much when I type it out like that. But I'm sure I'll work up a nice sweat on this cool September day. And once I get things nice and neat, I will take those long promised pictures.

But before all that, I need to catch up online and get our school done for the day. Thankfully, right now school is only taking about two hours. Most things we're going over is just review from Kindergarten, so he's breezing through it pretty fast.

Anyway, I best be going. Take care!

,

Good Morning All!

I got a busy day today. I'm getting ready to do our school, which will be over before noon. Then we are meeting Grandma (Pat's mom) at Chic-fil-A for lunch. The kids are all excited because they have an indoor play area. Then after that, grandma is taking them for the whole afternoon! She'll be dropping them off at church at 6:00.
Of course, I'm not going to have much playtime. This is my turn to work on getting the old house ready to sell. Pat is the one that's always over there working on it. But now that I am going to be kid-free, it's my turn. I wasn't the best housekeeper when we lived there so there's still alot of cleaning to do. I hated that house. I wasn't sad at all moving. Thankfully, because I love this house so much, I've been doing pretty good at keeping it clean. I can't wait until I have the time and money to decorate!
On another note, I have exactly 4 weeks until I go down to Alabama for my baby brother's wedding! It will also be my first time ever to go to a beach. I've never seen the ocean before in real life. I can't wait!
I just can' believe my punk of a baby brother is actually getting married. And also now has a 6 week old baby girl too! Okay he's not so much of a punk as he is a hippy. I like to call him "The Beach-Dwelling Mountain Man". I really am so proud of him! Here's a pic of his happy family.

Kayla, David and Little Wren

Kayla is sick right now. The doctors weren't very clear about it. It has something to do with scar tissue from her c-section. That's all I know. So if you could keep her in your prayers that would be great.
Anyway, I better get to some schoolin'. Take care all!

Happy Tuesday!

Yesterday was a typical Monday. So today has to be better. Had to go to the laundry mat. FUN FUN....We can't fit our dryer into the laundry closet. It will fit in the closet itself (we've measured), but it just won't fit through the doorway. You can tell that the previous owners had to bust out part of the wall to get theirs in. They drywalled back up. So I guess that's what we're going to have to do.

The kids seem to think that a laundry mat is really a race track and proceeded to run circles around the tables. Telling them to stop only stopped them temporarily. Just until they think I'm not looking.

It's not the cleanest laundery mat either. But it's the closest. I washed the clothes at home in 3 loads. Then at the laundry mat it took 4 dryers and $4.50 to dry. Last week I had close to $10 in quarters gone to it. It's getting tiring and expensive.

Then I didn't get anything else done except school and dishes. Which I guess isn't bad, but I have alot left to do. Pics will have to wait until I've had time to clean. Then last night Anya got feverish. So....good day!

But today's going to be better, even though I have cleaning and groceries. Anya is feeling much better. She says her throat still hurts a bit but she's acting fine. So I need to get school done and then Hi-ho hi-ho it's off to Walmart we go! Then cleaning. THEN I will take some pics!!! And if I have time I will post them! So TTFN!

Hey!

Well the batteries are charging so I should be able to get some pics of the house up sometime tomorrow.
Wow! These past few months have just flown by! It's seems like it was just a few days ago that we came and looked at this house for the first time! And we loved it from the start. There's so much room in here! Actually, it's 800 square feet bigger than our old house. Both kids have their own room and so do we! (Anya used to be in our room) It's in a quiet country neighborhood. We have neighbors on both sides but none in front or back of us. It's so quiet. Except the sound of the occasional fire truck. The local fire department is only about a block away. But I've gotten used to it. We were smack dab in the middle of town in our old house. I heard tons of sirens. We have a really big yard. Which is awesome! There's even a small bricked-in fire pit in the back. Which I didn't even know was there until about a week after we moved in! I plan on using that alot this fall. I am so looking forward to this holiday season in our new home!
We've started homeschooling. After the first week I was ready to put him in public school though. And that's something I really didn't want to do. I was working with a modge podge of partially used hand-me-down curriculums...(or is it curriculi?) I was getting frustrated and he wasn't learning. Anyway, thankfully I decided to seek out the advice of an experienced homeschooler before doing anything rash. She told me I needed more structure. So I invested in a brand new curriculum. I got the first grade curriculum from Christian Liberty Press and I am LOVING it! It's layed out so nicely so I'm not getting confused and Noah seems to like it too and is doing really good! And it was under $200 for the whole kit!
We've also started our homeschool group at church. We're called the Kingdom Builders Homeschool Group. This is the first year they've done it. Before the school year started we only had about 17 kids in the group. Now I think we have 24. It just keeps growing. It's so awesome! We have prechool age to, I think 10th grade is our highest. We meet every Friday and do something fun and educational. Actually our first meeting was a community service one. The kids helped clean up around the outside of the church. Everyone down to the kindergartners helped out! Then we went to the park and had a picnic. It was alot of fun! Last week everyone got to paint a ME-shirt. They all painted t-shirts to represent who they were. It was so cute to watch the little ones and the big ones are really talented and creative! Next week we're going to a fish hatchery, which should be interesting. And in October, we're going on a day trip to the Tulsa Zoo. We're all very excited about that!
Oh yeah, And I think we're going to try for another baby.....more on that later. TTFN!!!

I'm back!!!

We now have internet at our new home now. I will be resuming regular blogging on Monday. And once I find my camera batteries and charge them up, I will get pics posted of the house! I am LOVING IT!!!