101 - 120 & My Princess' Birthday

This past weekend was my first time baby-sitting. Now I have "baby"-sat when I was a kid,  in fact that was my first job. But this was my first time with an actual baby! Dennis and I went over to Hollie and Marty's and we got to watch my little prince all by ourselves! Dennis' allergies are really really bad, so we just watched TV and ordered pizza. We had a good time, Deklin is such a good baby, he hardly fusses and when he does it is for a good reason, hungry or gassy. Both happen quite often :)
I snapped a couple pictures of him when I could, if only I had a third hand I would have gotten more while he was sleeping in my arms! The best feeling in the world by the way :)

Today is also my little Princess Gizmo's birthday. Since my pets are my babies, and hopefully I always treat them that way, I also give each one a little birthday celebration. The cats are easy, they never want anything more then a little pat on the head. But Gizmo loves tuna fish, if you were to open a can she comes running and cries! For her big 8th birthday, she got a can of tuna! Well 1/4 of a can this morning and maybe some more tonight.

So that her little brother Burton didn't get it, she got to eat it on the counter!

Yup she loves it that much! I tried and tried to get a good one of her liking her lips but she kept following the light from the camera!

Okay on to my thankfuls! These are the moments in a regular day that I am thankful to be alive and witness something. Sometimes I'm touched, I'm moved, and sometimes it just makes me smile.

101. Finding the perfect item to finish a project.
102. When Dennis tucks me in after kissing me goodbye in the morning.
103. Watching my dad smile.
104. My crazy loud family
105. Reading someone else's story and feeling moved.
106. My dad and husband hugging.
107. Laughing til you cry
108. Watching father and daughter get baptized together.
109. Watching the movement of strings as a harp is being played
110. Knowing that your lost loved one is on a walk with Jesus.
111. Hearing someone say they just accepted Jesus.
112. Watching a widow clutch her bible and cry for the loss of her husband of 59 years.
113. Crunch of snow under your feet.
114. Watching Dennis and Burton cuddle.
115. Roar of thunder
116. Beautiful sunrise on a snowy morning
117. Legwarmers and buttons
118. Watching Deklin sleep in my arms
119. When a friend calls
120. Organizing

Chores

I love checklists, I make them quite often, love checking them off, they keep me focused and on schedule.
At work I have many check lists, even for my daily items, the excitement is a little unexplainable and slightly disturbing when I check something off, I have a feeling of accomplishment!
Since we are 7 months in to trying to move, we slowly gave up caring about our house, which in turn makes us hate it even more. I can't live like that, it drives me crazy, but with no motivation to actually do anything makes home not feel so "homey". So what motivates me? Since we rarely get any visitors that isn't it, but getting the wave of feeling accomplished? Oh that that motivates me! At our last Growth Group our discussion led to Pinterest and how we can use it in a good way. Someone suggested a daily cleaning list they found. I was instantly intrigued. In fact I went home that night and found what she was talking about.
Here is the blog for her Housekeeping Daily Chore List. This is a great list, but doesn't really fit our house.. plus its just for one person, I like to share my chores. Maybe if you are stay at home mom the single chore list responsibilities will be on your shoulders. Dennis and I are both working full time and love to serve each other in the house. Dennis is fantastic at helping out around the house, but he needs structure, if he doesn't have a "To Do" list, straight to the couch it is. Otherwise he makes sure to get it all done before I walk in the door.
When I first suggested this list to Dennis he was game, I updated her list to fit us, then we went over it and split up duties, he picked the ones he wanted to do, and I got the left overs :) We are almost a week in to our chores list and I'm loving it! Super duper Type A, I printed them in color, laminated them and got some erasable markers to check off our list!!!
This original list was designed to do about an hour of cleaning each day, only Monday through Friday, so that you can enjoy the weekend! Which I love the idea, as I get up every morning over an hour before I have to go to get ready for work and normally find myself playing on the internet and not doing anything that I should be doing. (Hence why I haven't updated my blog in awhile!)
In the beginning it took us much longer then an hour to clean, but I can see how from now on if we stay on our daily chores it will take us an hour or less every day. I'm so looking forward to this! Plus this will give us the structure that we need for when we get a bigger house and more responsibilities we are able to handle those too!

Here is my chore list, you can see I got all the dusting and organizing :)

I hate vacuuming and cleaning the bathroom, and luckily I have a husband that covers all the things I hate! 

Here is the original list off of Pinterest

Also, here are the blank ones and headers:

 Let me know if you need any help making a list of your own!

The End

Last night, sadly, was the end of the Me, Myself, and Lies Growth Group.From the first day that I walked in, I knew I wouldn't want to see this group end. Through this book, through these wonderful women, and through our glorious God I found hope. At the time I didn't realize I was seeking it, but oh did I find it.
There are so many things that I struggle with that came in to light through this book, I know that doesn't sound good, but it is. Because with out recognizing them, I can't work on them. I have a whole list of homework to continue to work on, to be intentional about.
We know that everything can be comforted in the Word, but do we actually seek those affirmations or answers? Most of the time, I think that answer is no. When I know I'm struggling I do, but what about those day to day times when we are telling ourselves lies about us, and we begin to believe them. I'm not good enough, I'm not skinny enough, I'm not worthy. Those are the times we should seek his Word, in reading and in prayer.

Preserve my soul; for I am holy. Psalm 86:2

I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Psalm 139:14

But by the grace of God I am what I am. 1 Corinthians 15:10

In this book we have learned what is in our thoughts (she calls it our thoughi closet because we end up wearing all of our thoughts), how to recognize truths, how to seek wisdom, guarding our thoughts, keeping God in the center of our thoughts, and how to find hope. Along with the DVD series you have so much room to grow. They both were great, but what I loved the most, was the ladies that I met, the wonderfully real ladies.
Through these ladies, I was able to open up my heart, pour out my soul and feel comforted. We had a mix of lovely ladies, great leaders that opened their home and their thought closets! I could find comfort, something in common, and a friend in many of these ladies. I can not wait to see where God brings everyone of them. I know he has big plans, and I know he is working through them and through me.
I will be intentional, in my devoted time for and with God. I will be intentional in my relationships. I will be intentional in my future. I will be intentional in what I think, and what I say, and I will be intentional in our next steps.

Scentsy Flower Magnets

I'm always looking for new Scentsy marketing ideas, if it s decorating my table for shows, hostess gifts or just something to give away with my name on it. I love making samples, I just need to be better about giving them away! :)
On one of the forums I'm on I found this awesome flower magnet project, after some tweaking, I was able to make one this morning in less then 4 minutes!

I got colorful stemmed flowers and mod podge from JoAnn's, bought a package of magnets at WalMart (heard that some dollar stores have them too), got JUMBO clear gems from Hobby Lobby (with a 40% off coupon). Used my trusty glue gun, and made my own template with my name, phone, website and Scentsy Independent Consultant logo.

Cut our the template, and just paint the writing side with mod podge and stick to the flat side of the gem. (there is something about the smell of Mod Podge in the  morning that brings me right back to my childhood).

I chose to pop the center out of my flower (I had to glue my petals together), I liked the nice clean look.

Glue the gem to the top of the flower

Glue the magnet to the back

Done!!!!



Display it on your fridge, give to your customers, you can put in their package when you deliver, leave them on every ones fridge, I have also heard of consultants putting them on the metal stalls in bathrooms!
Marketing! :)
I had a ton of fun making these and can't wait to give them out!


UPDATE!!!:

Here is the link to the template: Google Docs Template
You can also use a 1 inch crafting paper punch like this:  Martha Stewart Crafts Punch Circle
That will make it much easier! Good luck!

Chunky Minty Green Cookies

Well today is the color of green! (Well technically the color should have been blue, but modern society has associated green with it instead) Happy Saint Patrick's Day!
I love to partake in any holiday, I'm not bias, I just like any reason to celebrate. Our boss' birthday is today so we always have a big celebration for him at work, yesterday we had green cake, wore our flashing shamrocks and had a Limerick Off! We had a contest to write a limerick about the shop and the best one won a gift certificate to Scott's Bar and Grill. Only 2 of us participated, and because our boss wants everyone to win we both got the GC's! Here is my limerick:

There was a young boss name Bruce
He loved to make any excuse,
To be on his boat
He just loved to float
To kick back and dance to footloose

Yup uber cheesy, but totally worth the gift certificate! :)

In honor of his birthday I wanted to make him some green cookies, back to my best friend Pinterest and found a delicious recipe. They called them Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies, but I renamed my batch :)

The recipe called for creme de menthe baking chips, but I couldn't to find those anywhere, went to 2 grocery stores and came up empty handed, so I just decided to buy a 28 count package of Andes Mints. Just chopped them in to chunks and it worked perfectly!

The rest of my simple ingredients, soften the butter, mix all these ingredients and then fold in the chocolate.

Roll those pretty little green babies in to little balls.

Bake them for 8 minutes at 350 degrees, let them cool



And then enjoy!!!!

Chunky Minty Green Cookies

1 pouch of Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix

1/2 cup of butter, softened

1/2 teaspoon of mint extract

8 drops of green food coloring

1 egg

1 cup of creme de menthe baking chips (I just chopped up a package of 28 ct Andes Mints)

1 cup of semisweet chocolate chunks

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In large bowl, stir cookie mix, butter, extract, food coloring and egg until soft dough forms. Stir in creme de menthe baking chips and chocolate chunks.

Drop rounded teaspoon of dough 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until set. Cool 3 minutes; remove from cookie sheet to wire rack. Enjoy either warm or completely cooled.

Please down some green beer in my honor, until lent is over, no green beer for me :(

Green Dinner

In an attempt to be more "festive" for the the upcoming St. Patrick's Day, I decided to make something green for dinner. In so many ways this went wrong! But I will tell you my attempt, and mind you, I have made this before and it was delicious!
There is not a lot of green things my husband likes, unless it is green candy. But I on the other hand love green stuff, he is the carnivore, I prefer veggies over a steak. Most meals, either I just eat what he would eat (hence the weight gain) or I have to make separate meals. It is clearly unfair that men (at least my man) can eat almost anything and still look the same.
I decided to make chicken tacos and cilantro rice. Last year at our Uganda Mission Group Reunion we had a Mexican theme and I made this rice and it was a huge hit, very yummy, yet very green. But this time you will read my mistakes.

First I started with two of my favorite green items, cilantro and limes!

Cilantro Rice:
Cook white rice as usual (I use a rice cooker)
 For EACH cup of rice:
2/3 cup cilantro, loosely packed
1/3 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped scallions
1 jalapeno
1 tbsp lime juice
1 tsp olive oil
Puree the above in a blender and to the cooked rice, stir well.

Super easy and very tasty, unfortunately I forgot my recipe before hitting the grocery store. I forgot the onions and scallions, then when I tried to blend up the ingredients, my magic bullet broke, like half way through it threaded and wouldn't grind anymore! So now I have a chunky mixture. Because my kitchen is so small I don't have enough counter space to make everything and use my stove, so I couldn't warm up the corn tortillas in a pan. I was in a different grocery store, not so familiar with it, and I bought green avocados, they are green right? Oh my, not sure if they were not ripe yet or supposed to be like that but they were the consistency of a cucumber, no good!
I still thought that it was yummy, but of course Dennis was not happy. He  just got plain white rice because the green mixture was too chunky (its a texture thing for him!). He didn't like the corn tortillas and he would have rather had his chicken shredded. But he got a warm home cooked meal... it was better then a hot pocket right? :)

Here is our final "green" meal. Since I have plenty of rice left over, I will attempt to do it again!
After dinner I made green mint cookies for my boss (St. Patty's day is his birthday), they were delicious, I redeemed myself! I will get that one up tonight!

Illumination

I would have to say two of my new favorite obsessions are mason jars and lace. Can you tell I'm liking the country look? When I went to the Goodwill the other day I found exactly what I was looking for. They had mason jars (for only 20 cents!!!!), lots of dollies and lace. But after this project I did decide that I needed more doilies, I need smaller ones and prettier ones.

Just take a doily (or lace by the yard) and spray with craft adhesive, then place on the mason jar, yup that is it! I rolled my mason jar on the doily to get a nice wrinkle free fit. My doily was also a little bit bigger then the mason jar so I left the top to go over my ribbon. Next time I will use twine and burlap. I just keep using what I have at home, since I am already buried in craft items!

 I just love the way the little battery operated tea light makes the whole jar glow and the reflections the lace puts on the wall. The idea is to make about 5 of them and put them on a shelf in my room for a nice country look when off, and a soft romantic light when on :)
Off to Value Village I go for more! Love the excuse to raid their stuff!

Eggs in a Muffin Pan

If you know my husband, you know picky he is, I don't mean just a little picky, I mean off the charts ridiculous picky! Breakfast is probably our favorite meal, I think because it always occurs on the weekends! Even though I love going out to breakfast, eggs are a whole nether level of crazy pickyness for Dennis. He wants his eggs a very specific way, over hard with the yolk broken, sounds easy, but he wants it extra hard, and not touching anything else. He wants it to resemble an egg mcmuffin. Some restaurants can fill this tall order, some fail and his attitude towards the poor wait staff gets worse.
I have attempted to make his perfect eggs at home, every time they turn out not to his liking. He wants them perfectly round too! How am I supposed to do that?
Then the wonderful world of Pinterest came in handy, it can turn anyone in to a craft goddess and a chef. I found a recipe to bake eggs in a muffin pan. Pure ingenious!
Yesterday Dennis stayed home from work because his allergies were getting really bad, so I used that opportunity to try out my new egg trick.

Simple enough, I slightly greased my muffin pan

(thinking we would sell our house alot sooner we packed up a ton of stuff, including my real muffin pans, so the foil ones will have to do for now!)

Cracked the eggs in and stuck them in the 350 degree pre-heated oven for 20 minutes.

For normal people 15 minutes will be plenty of time, I just had to make sure they were extra hard.

About half way through I was instructed to make sure the yolk was broken, I don't think I needed to, but I would rather be safe then sorry, thanks hunny!

In the mean time I toasted some english muffins, put some ham and provolone cheese on top.

(Remind you of dinner the night before?)

After eggs are done, pop them out (I was super surprised how easy it was to do this)

Place them on top of the muffins and bake again until the cheese melts (approx. 5 minutes).

I thought they were delicious, just like a non greasy egg mcmuffin, and even better then the Starbucks breakfast sandwiches. But the ultimate tester to please is the hubby....

So did he approve? Yes he thought the egg was perfect and very good! Phew!

You can enjoy them right away, or stick the left overs directly in the freezer (still on the cookie sheet) for an hour to freeze all the moisture off, then take them out and wrap them in freezer safe bags.

They will last over a week. I froze my extra one and took it to work. The biggest thing about reheating them, is don't use a microwave if you can avoid it. We have a little Otis Spunkmeyer oven at work, I stuck it in there for 15 minutes, and it was even more delicious then the first time, all warm and crispy. Mmmmm. In fact I'm making one for me right now!







Ham Roll Ups

I must have been hungry at lunch time, and I was even eating! I found myself pinning a ton of food to Pinterest. Motivated to make something different, on my way home I hit the grocery store.
This is the original pin Ham and Cheese Crescent Rolls and here is m y variation:

Very simple, very yummy

Take a package of crescent rolls and keep two triangles together

Add slices of ham and a slice of provolone (or any cheese of choice)

Okay here is where I did my own variation

I added a sauce on before I rolled them:

 1 stick butter (softened)
1 Tbls brown sugar
1/2 Tbls yellow mustard
1  Tbls poppy seed
1 Tbls Worcestershire

(this was plenty of sauce, you can make double the  rolls and have enough)

I didn't want it melted so I just softened the butter and spread it on top

Roll them up with the seam on the bottom

Bake for 12 minutes at 375 degrees

Served with sweet potato fries

They are a little messy so you probably want to eat with a fork,

but they are Dennis approved, and if you know my husband that is not an easy task!

Enjoy!









Knots

I am very familiar with back pain, not quite sure why but I get pain in my lower back alot. This has been happening for for almost 10 years now. I can't sleep to long, I can't lay in a funny position, I can't wear too high of heels, otherwise I'm in pain for the next day.
But the back pain I had the last few days, now that is new to me. I have had pain in my shoulder for about a month now, but this weekend it got worse and worse. I could actually feel a large lump under my skin, I can touch it, but when I do the pain shoots down my arm and makes my elbow numb. Of course in my true fashion I started to overreact and go straight to the worse case scenario! Surprise!
I started googling what it could be and was disappointed to keep coming up with just a muscle knot. As I have never had one before I didn't think you could actually feel the knot.
Dennis of course knew that I was in crazy mode and blamed the pain in my shoulder with the new "exercise" equipment we got.

We got an As-Seen-On-TV over the door pull up bar! And Dennis looks just like that when he uses it! :) I can't even pull myself half way up, how could I have injured myself?
So to humor him, I decided to treat it as a muscle knot. Off to the store I went.

I got heat wraps and Aleve, after the first patch I was still in pain, the darn knock off brand didn't even get hot or actually stick on me.
But when I woke up this morning the pain was way less. I can still feel the large knot, but when I touch it, it doesn't send any pain down my arm. Still not positive if I really injured myself on a wimpy attempt at a chin up or not, but at least the pain has subsided.
So off to work I go, I will still monitor my large lump, but hope that it goes away. If not, I do still have a free 1 hour massage gift certificate, what a good time to take advantage of that. I'm sure they can tell me if that is normal. (Cheaper and feels better than the doctors!)

Man of God

After attending an amazing celebration of life for a friend's Grandfather on Sunday, I felt moved. As I didn't know the late Reverend when I walked in the door, I felt like I was apart of him after leaving.
Everyone continued to refer to him as a Man of God. We celebrated his legacy, his life, and what he left behind for his family, a chance to follow Jesus.
It was the most beautiful, heart wrenching funeral I have ever been to. Watching the intimate and sad moment that his wife of 59 years had to say her final goodbyes. The way she clutched her bible and sobbed. She knew where he was going, but in that moment it doesn't make it easier.
Hearing that at his bedside right before death, his grandson accepted Jesus Christ for the first time. Learning of his life, Reverend, Navy, Missionary in Mexico for 10 years, Doctor of Theology, Pastor, Chaplain, Father, Grandfather, Faithful Husband, and Man of God.
I can't help but think, how will I be remembered? What legacy will I leave, will I be thought of as a Woman of God. It makes you stop and think of everything you are doing, is it significant? Are you living your life fully, are you living it to the Glory of God. That is the life I want to live. The legacy I want to leave behind, and I want to be referred to as a Woman of God. But what does that look like?
All I know is that you can only live in today, but make sure that everything you do, you do it to the fullest.
I don't have the answer to this question, I'm just pondering it, but writing it down always help me to think it through, it is in writing, now I can truly live up to it.
So ask yourself that question, how will you be remembered, its not about what they say at your funeral, its about the life you lived, the impact you left, and your legacy to follow.

My first yarn craft!

I have been at it again! I have always wanted to learn how to crochet or knit, but today is not the day. I did however have some yarn experience for the day.

Yarn Monogram:

Cheap and easy project, all you need is Paper Mache Letters, one skein of yarn, I used Jiffy Yarn

and my favorite tool the hot glue gun!

Glue the tip of the yarn around the base of the letter and wrap very tightly around, once you wrap the whole thing (the corners won't be fully covered), go back and wrap it again, you should only need two times around

I added a left over flower from my Felt Flower Scarf and a little bit of ribbon for color

Hang it on your door, put on your mantel, or use as a wall decoration.

I really liked this project, I foresee these as gifts :)



Melted Crayons

Since I have this overwhelming addiction to Pinterest, I have made an effort to actually do all the crafts I have been pinning. Some turn out good, some are a bust, I think this project was fun, but I would love to do it again and perfect it.

We did a melted crayon art project, super easy!

For this project I had a little helper, I swear he wanted to be there, he just hates his picture being taken :)

First we organized the crayons, Dennis picked the colors, he wanted dark blues and purples, but if you were to group more colors next to each other it would have worked a little better

Hot glue each crayon to the top of the canvas, the easiest way to do this is to glue the canvas then put all the crayons on it, but we had to learn that :)

Thanks hunny :)

Dennis is a perfectionist, he wanted to make sure all my crayons were lined up correctly

After all are glued, turn a hair dryer on high and hot and start melting

Again, we learned some lessons, you only want to heat the top of the crayon, the lower you go the more you will spread the existing melted crayons and merge the colors together

Get the hair dryer nice and close to the crayon top and just melt, you ca also move the canvas around to get the desired drip

It looks like a mess and it sort of is, but I know the next one we will do a little better :)

I'm almost embarrassed to show you the pin that I got the idea from! But here you go:

Its perfectly melted, perfectly straight and all that! A. she used lots of the same colors in a row (good idea), B. she melted from the top, C. she did this before. D. she is just way better at it then us!

But we had a good time doing it together and will do another, why not we have extra canvas' and lots of crayons left! (and next time I will control the hair dryer, Dennis didn't let me hold it once!)