Well, several weeks late, but here is my Ali E "this month" challenge. I had such fun doing this. I am such a calendar/planner kind of a girl that this was right up my alley. Had some fun with the "office supply" look and my new 7 gypsies stickers and rubons. Those are SO COOL!

Gonna run for now and watch "The Amazing Race" (tivo'd from earlier) with my husband.

Blessings!

Did some baking today. While I was mixing up my Pumpkin Bars I realized how much of my kitchen stuff is antique and how much I love that...so of course what does a scrapbooker do, but take a picture. I just love finding vintage kitchenware. Love old pyrex bowls too. The one in the photo belonged to my Mamaw. The canisters were hers too. The other things I have picked up at flea markets, antique shops, etc. Love the old spice jars but man they are expensive! It's like $20 for one. Most of what I have has small chips or cracks, but are still useable. That helped with the price. It makes baking even more fun for me to get to use my vintage stuff. I know, I'm weird right?

The Pumpkin Bars are for a "Fall Harvest Luncheon" at church tomorrow. Since we are 2/3 into our new building and have our lovely large Family Life Center (multi-purpose room/gymnasium) our Special Events Committee has planned some kind of get together/fellowship for each month. I am excited about this. I don't think we had done enough fellowship in this kind of setting in the past. Now that we have the facilities it is so cool to see them used to the fullest extent.

This is what my husband has been doing today! We have finally started on the remodel/rennovation for our bedroom!















The house we live in belonged to my grandparents. My Dad was actually born in this room that you can see thru the doorways in the photo. My huband and I always loved to come here so when my grandparents had both passed away, we decided to buy the house. It was built sometime in the 1920's. It is small, only about 1000 sq feet. That is fine for us though since its just the two of us. It had 2 bedrooms, but they were both so small and neither one had a closet. So, we knocked out the wall between them and convereted it to one bedroom. My husband then built a nice size walk in closet. Since it was 2 bedrooms, it had 2 doorways of course. So, we are closing up the 2 original doorways and opening a new one that is more central to the room. This will give us more room for our bed so the door won't run into it. It will also help with wall space in the living room. Rather than having all but one wall interrupted with doorways, etc., this will give us another long wall that will fit the sofa. So, once the doorways are finished, we have some old front porch windows to take out and from there we will drywall! We are hoping to get thru as much of this as possible in November. For one thing we don't want to drag this out like we did the kitchen remodel, and for another, with Christmas coming, it would be nice to have room to put up a tree without all the bedroom furniture in the kitchen and living room! Ha.

Don't forget to set your clock back tonight. I always enjoy this day because all day long I'm like it's 2:00, oh wait, it's really like it's only 1:00 because we get an extra hour today. Ha. Ha. ha.

Blessings!

Just a quick post to add a layout I finished last night. I talked about this on my Blog several posts back and it's just taken me forever to get this done. I am SLOW. ºÜº I changed the journaling a bit from what I posted here so in case you are interested it reads:

I love this picture. For as long as I can remember, it hung on the wall in my Mamaw's house. It was a gift to her from my parents for Christmas. I would look at it when I was a little girl and Mamaw would tell me that it was a picture of Jesus knocking on the door to my heart. It's one of my earliest memories of hearing about Jesus and how I could ask Him to live in my heart. Mamaw also got me my first Bible. She had a white one that I just thought was so beautiful so I asked for one for my birthday. She sent me a Bible for my 7th birthday. She couldn’t find a white one, so it’s black, but I loved it and I still have it. My Dad used to tuck me in at night and write verses from the 23rd Psalm on my chalk board and teach them to me. My Mom accepted Christ when I was a child and the change in her life was always a huge witness to me. Mamaw told me stories of her Mother taking her and her brothers and sisters to church and how they walked there from their home at Iron Bridge out in the country.
When I was 7 or 8, a man came to our church and he drew beautiful chalk pictures with this great gospel music playing. I didn’t miss one service. Every night he gave an altar call and I remember other kids going forward while I thought about it. The next day I decided I wanted to go to the altar when he asked that night. When the time came I went forward. My Dad came with me and prayed with me as I asked Jesus to come into my heart.
From that night forward I have wanted to live the life Jesus wants me to. I have always strived to follow His teachings and to grow in them. Most days I still feel like I have a long way to go. I think the important thing is to continue to grow and mature and move forward in my faith.
My faith in Christ is the very core of who I am. It started from being born in a family that took me to church and told me about Jesus. The faith I and my brother and sister have, and now their children have started in generations before us.

Papers are the cool Cosmo Cricket "Wanted" and also their chipboard.

Have to run eat dinner so we can get back to church tonight.

Blessings!

Here she is...the Birthday Girl! This is my niece Lindsay. She is 9 years old today. Hard to believe that she has grown up so much! Isn't she cute?

We spent yesterday at my brother's house celebrating her birthday. We had dinner together and got to visit. Uncle Darrel played ball with the kids. Grandpa rode bikes with them. The weather was beautiful. It was a really nice day.

We also got to see my Dad. I was so happy to see him. He has been away for work since May. It was nice to be able to hug him yesterday. It touched my heart so much when my little nephew Ethan came running out of the back bedroom yelling "Pappa!" He ran straight for Pappa's arms and I thought I was going to cry. I hope it shows my Dad how much we all love him and miss him when he is away.

Recognize these people? Ha. Darrel and I were having some fun trying to take a picture of me that I would actually like for a layout I want to do about turning 40. I of course was not happy with how any photos of me were coming out. So I said something about how I see a lot of the ladies on the message boards just holding out the camera and taking their own picture. That resulted in one of me that I don't hate, and this one which I thought was fun. You know what? So what if I wish I didn't have quite so much chin and that my face didn't still break out. This is me. This is how I look. This is my handsome husband whom I love so much. This is how other people see me every day. So I am asking myself why should I be afraid of a photograph? Or afraid of what someone else will think? I actually like this one because to me it looks fun and happy and its just us, "warts and all" as they say and I am happy with that. Wow, accepting me for me, what a concept huh?

I am going to go work on a LO a bit before bed. I'm going to need to get some work done from home tomorrow or I will never be caught up and done by the end of the week. That is OK though. I am so blessed to have a job where I can do that. I just absolutely LOVE it. So often I am just stunned and amazed at why God blesses me so very much. Wow.

Blessings!!

Well it must be fall because I got to spend yesterday at the Covered Bridge Festival! We had a great time. It was very rainy the day before we went, and even in the morning when we were heading there yet we were blessed with a day of no rain as we walked the festival.

I had heard about the Covered Bridge Festival for years. Where I used to live, several ladies I knew would book a hotel room a year or more in advance just so they could come to "Covered Bridge." Well once we moved here we were considerably closer to the festival and I attended for the first time when a girlfriend from church invited me. I think now I have attended for the past 4 years. This year my Mom, my sister and my husband also went. We spent the day walking the festival, shopping, eating some yummy food (can you say deep fried twinkie? Have you had one of those? YUM!) I didn't buy tons, but did find some nice things. We picked out some antique kitchen items. I LOVE that kind of thing. Love vintage/retro kitchen stuff. I found 2 small glass pie dishes, and 2 antique glass measuring cups, one with a chopper in it. We also bought some candles from Home Interiors and a birthday gift for a friend. Then of course there were the fuzzy pink lounging socks that I got two pair of. Couldn't pass those up right? Oh! and also some Watkins vanilla. I always stock up on Watkins real vanilla and their cinnamon whenever I can. (Yes, I am picky about using the "best" ingredients when baking.) We had a nice dinner on the way home at TGI Friday's and then a lot of fun just getting to laugh, talk and visit while driving. I mean for some reason at one point my sister and I were saying to each other in our best Arnold Schwarzenegger voice.."It's not a tumor"....(hopefully you have seen Kindergarten Cop and Arnold says he has a headache and one of the little boys says it could be a tumor....? OK, maybe you had to be there. Ha! )





Today I worked and was supposed to head for choir tonight. Choir was at 7 PM tonight though and I didn't even leave work until after 6:00 so it was about impossible to get home have dinner and go back. Work was hectic but good. At one point I had the Network guy, the phone/voicemail guy and the copier/printer guy there all at the same time. They all needed me too - Ha! Didn't get much done that I have planned but am thankful I can do a bit of work from home tomorrow and get caught up.

See that "Big Picture" logo? I just signed up for my very first Internet Scrapbooking class!! It is with Heidi Swapp and will run for the full year of 2007! I am so excited. I think it will be great fun. We are going to complete a "calendar" album thoughout the year. Well, calendars are right up my alley, definately my thing so I think that will make it even more fun. Can't wait to share my first layouts.

I had my 3rd church crop this past Monday night. It was very rainy out and no one came. I am a bit sad and frustrated about this, but am trying to just keep a level head about it and give it some serious prayer. I really felt like God had lead me to start this group so I am trying to check with Him and see if I got that wrong, or if I am just supposed to keep trying and waiting it out? I just am not sure right now. I might stop for Nov/Dec. with the holidays and then try again after the new year. I am going to be taking an Internet Accounting course for work for 8 weeks, possibly starting in Nov. too so this might be another good reason to drop a thing or two for a time.

It was so cool at church today. The contractors that are finishing our new building left for the day and I noticed they had not boarded up the new sanctuary like they usually do to secure the building. It turns out they finally have the sanctuary completely enclosed! How cool. It seems we have been waiting for and looking forward to this for so long. I am hoping maybe Friday I can post some photos to the church site. If you want to see the current building progress, just click on the link over on the right that says MCFCOG and then on "building progress." It is pretty cool to see how far things have come since the fire. God is good!!

Remember a ways back when I mentioned doing the 90 day Bible? Well I fell off the 90 day Bible wagon in a big way. Things got really busy a month or so back and I got out of the habit of getting my reading done. If I had stuck with it I would have been finishing about now. Bummer. I really wanted to do that. So, I am going to make a commitment to pick it back up and get thru it. I've been struggling a bit lately with feeling scattered and not focused and feeling like I am not getting anything done well. I really feel like that is Spiritual so I am making a point to get focused and re-connected with God. I know God, Christ are the answer to all things in my life. I believe that with all my heart. So, if you don't see me talking about how I am doing on the 90 day Bible I give you full permission to bug me about it and hold me accountable. ºÜº

Better head for bed. Lots of plans of "things to do" for tomorrow!

Blessings!

Ok, have you ever been to a fondue restaurant? If not, run, do not walk to your nearest location!! My husband and I got to have dinner today at The Melting Pot Restaurant. It was sooooo good and so fun. I loved the restaurant the second we entered. First of all it was quite early for dinner so we practically had the place to ourselves. Big plus because it was just so relaxing. This place has great atmosphere. Most every table was an intimate booth with the coolest pendant lights over the table. They played the best music too. I would have loved to have had a CD to go of everything they played while we were there. It was a mix of like Michael Buble', Tony Bennet, Sinatra, etc. My kind of relax, enjoy and unwind music. We had a great waitress too. She put us right at ease and explained everything so great. She also had just the right ratio of coming around often enough but not too often where it gets annoying.

We picked the "Big Night Out" 4 course dinner for two. First you pick a cheese foundue for your appetizer. We picked the Fiesta cheese. It had kind of a spicy mexican flavor. There is a burner (like one of the new flat top stoves) in the center of your table with a fondue pot on it. So the waitress brings back all the fixings for the cheese fondue we picked. Cheddar cheese, fresh salsa, hot peppers, etc. She mixes it while you watch and then leaves us with bread chunks, tortilla chips, veggies and apples for dipping. I forgot to add that when you sit down, wrapped in your napkin with your silverware are two fondue forks. Everyone has different colored handles. I made a joke about having plain, boring white ones and my sweet husband switched mine with the red handled ones from a different vacant table. (there weren't any pink ones! ha.) The cheese fondue was very good. My favorite thing to dip was celery. The tortilla chips were good too. Then you get your salad. No fondue dipping here, but a yummy chef type salad with a great house dressing. Next comes the entree'. We had chicken, filet mignon medallions, shrimp, marinated beef, marinated pork and vegetable ravioli. All of this comes raw. You then get a new fondue pot which is filled with broth, scallions, garlic, etc. for your cooking liquid. You spear the meat, dip, cook for like 2 minutes and then try your meat with one of the many great dipping sauces they bring you. Our favorite was the shrimp (they were so good!) and the caribbean marintated pork. It had great flavor. The steak was great too. For dessert you pick a chocolate fondue. We got the pure milk chocolate. When she brought this new fondue pot, she brought pineapple, bananas, strawberries, brownie chunks, pound cake chunks, cheesecake, and 2 kinds of marshmallows. One of the marshmallows was covered in oreo cookie crumbs. You should try that dipped in chocolate. YUM! The strawberries and chocolate were the absolute best. Wow. (for my sister....just imagine the best chocolate you could have all warm and melted and then having brownie chunks to dip into it.....you need to try this! ºÜº)

This place was pricey! But, we knew that going in, and it was just a once in awhile kind of treat. it was a fun date with my husband and we got plenty of delicious food and wonderful atmosphere. I think it would also be great fun in a group where you might get different fondues to try together.

We stopped at this restaurant on our way to pick up my Mom at the airport. She has been away for over 9 weeks and it was so good to see her walking thru the gate at the airport! My Dad has been away even longer and will also be home this week. I am excited to see him too. Love you Mom & Dad!

Archiver's has a new location near where we were so we stopped there first thing today. I bought 2 sets of the new American Crafts mini MARKS rubons in the accents book 1 & 2. I also got a set of Rhonna Farrer "messy dates" clear stamps. They look pretty cool, but most anything Rhonna does is pretty cool right? Might have some time for scrapping tomorrow although the next several days promise to be pretty busy. Might be able to catch my breath about next Thursday! Ha.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!
Blessings!

Wow- can't believe a week has gone by since I've posted. I've been struggling with a bad cold for at least 1/2 the week so that hasn't helped. I hate that when one moment you're fine, next moment...sick! No fun.

We finally got the fall decorations up. These are some of the mums we bought and then a photo of the back porch all decorated. I just LOVE it. It is one my my absolute favorite things to do and enjoy each year. We have had several fall temp. kind of days, but 2 days this week we actually needed the A/C it got so warm and muggy. Give me a cool, crisp fall day anytime! My sweet husband pressure washed the porch and porch furniture as well as most of the house before we decorated. It made a huge difference.

We went TV shopping last night. Our main television was purchased back in 1987 when we got married which makes it almost 20 years old. It seems to be dying a slow death. The color goes all green occasionally and if a picture is too dark, like something happening at night time, you can't make out anything. My husband is quite the researcher when it comes to new purchases so he checked things out pretty well before we actually bought anything. We ended up with a Sony Bravia LCD . It is pretty cool and it looks so different when you are used to a 20 year old zenith console TV. Is it weird that now I can't wait to see how all my favorite shows look on it? Ha. That's ok, I'm fine with being weird! Ha.

I'm going to head to my scrap room for a bit I think. Ali E. has a cool new challenge up to scrap a month in your life so we are supposed to do September. I've enjoyed the layouts posted so far and want to give it a try. I also need to finish my faith LO for my all about me book. I purchased a few new "bin" type containers 1/2 price at Hobby Lobby last night to put some of my rubber stamping stuff in so maybe I'll do a bit of reogranizing as well. Probably also weird that I actually enjoy reorganizing right? ºÜº

Hope you have a blessed weekend!

Well, this is what I have been up to today! I thought the "five fabulous favorites" challenge on Ali E's Blog sounded like fun! Here is my take on the challenge with my current 5 favorite things, my computer (Internet, Blogs, message boards...), Fall (LOVE fall), Buttons ( I don't know why I suddenly cannot resist a bag of the Foof-a-la buttons!), All things pink and my Crocs! (The chocolate brown pair just arrived today!) This little mini book is from the Cosmo Cricket Wanted line. Aren't these papers gorgeous?

My sweet husband get the porch all clean and ready for decorating. He even started by wrapping the posts with the leaf garlands. Isn't he sweet? I am looking forward to finishing the decorations tomorrow with some mums, pumpkins, gourds and hay bales. Is it goofy that it makes me so happy just to walk across my porch each day when its all decorated for fall? Don't answer that! ºÜº

I am off to bed! 8:30 for church will come earlier than I'd like!

Blessings!