Happy New Year!

Wishing you and yours a HAPPY and HEALTHY 2010!☺

Valentine's Day will be here before you know it

Today I put away the Christmas decorations and put out the Valentine's decor.

Oh my goodness-it took me such a long time to do this and I didn't even have that much Christmas decor out. But it's done now, and I'm glad.

My glittery strawberries (from Goodwill-0f course) were missing in action and it was bothering the heck out of me. (I hate when I can't find stuff!) But eventually I found them and all is right with the world.

You know, it seems early for Valentine's Day stuff-but it will be here before you know it-seriously.☺

Ribbon wreath

Today during The Young and the Restless, Jacques and Julia, and part of As the World Turns-I made this ribbon wreath from my stash of grosgrain ribbon, pins and a foam wreath from Goodwill. (I buy foam wreaths cheap and ugly-then I strip them.)

I think I like it....very colorful-that's for sure.☺

We live in the age of texting

She's in bed. I'm downstairs. I get a text.

Thank you, Lord, for giving our children thumbs-otherwise they may not know how to communicate effectively.

Note to self-teach child how to spell hungry!☻

Okay-gotta go make some pizza.

Gifts

Here is just a small sampling of some of the gifts I received for Christmas. I am one spoiled lady!

This lovely necklace from my lovely daughter "Hope".
This faith love hope bracelet from my beautiful niece, Jessica! My two girls know me!
My sister, Jodie, made me this sheet of thumbnails of some of my favorite people in the world and framed it in a lovely black frame. (I took it out to photograph it.) See the cute captions underneath? (Click on pics to enlarge.) She changed the names of the photos to match up with the pic-I imagine that took a while!
Look at this "Mug of Tea" from my sister Kim. She got Jodie "Mug of Coffee". Does she know us or what? Oh, this is "sew" cute. I love this bag from Kim. She got Jodie one that says Peace Love Photography. Again-does she know us or what?
I guess I would say that this was a Christmas gift to myself.
When I went to Amish country with my mom and Kim-I picked up this rustic Amish-made cabinet for myself. I'm afraid I have a cabinet fetish!☺

I got a ton of other stuff, plus money and a gift certificate to our local coffee shop (from my mom). I can't wait to use that-I love their flavored lattes!♥

Thanks everybody-I love it all (and you)!

Did you get any Christmas gifts you'd like to share about in the comments? I'd love to hear if you'd love to tell!

Who says fruit cake is yucky?

Not this Ice Box Fruit Cake. It's some good eatin'.

Now to me, it's kind of pain to make-but Larry's aunt makes it every year and sends some home with me, so I get to eat it every year without making it. Score!

Ice Box Fruit Cake

1 1/2 cups coconut

1 pound raisins (golden or regular)

4 cups pecan halves

1 large bottle marachino cherries (cut in half, drain on paper towel and blot)

1 box vanilla wafers (crushed fine)

1 bag miniature marshmallows

1 can sweetened condensed milk

Melt marshmallows with the sweetened condensed milk in a double boiler. Combine all remaining ingredients together, pour melted mixture over, mixing very well. Prepare 2 bread pans by lining with waxed paper, greased with butter. Shape cake into pans pressing firmly. Refrigerate after cutting. Can be kept 4-6 weeks in fridge. Keep sealed in plastic wrap. Makes two loaf pans.

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And don't forget the reason for the season-JESUS!

Veggies-before and after

Before.
After.

My contribution to Christmas Eve supper.

Cooking may not be my forte, but I make a mean veggie basket!

Have a lovely Christmas Eve, everybody!☺

Everything's betta with butta

Doncha think???

I was surprised with these cute little butter eighths-not quarters, when I dumped them out of the box. I didn't know they came like this. So cute, I think.

I think I'm going to make another batch of Russian tea cakes and include some with my niece and nephew's Christmas gift. (They love them.) Patrick's gift-4 pack of Monster and money. Jessica's gift-list taker, personalized note pad, pen, address labels, calendar, 1 monster, coin purse and money. (I don't think they read this.)

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And, oh yes-MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Shlop for sup-sup

We had a red letter meal at our house tonight (meaning we didn't have cheeseburgers). We had goulash (only made with a mixture of macaroni and ziti noodles-actually, exactly how I make spaghetti-only different noodles and soupier).

Anyhow-my sister used to ask me when we were on the phone-what's for sup-sup? and I'd answer-shlop, because it always seemed like we were having some sort of mish mash of this or that.

So-what's on the menu for tomorrow's sup-sup? Leftover shlop, of course!☺

Tell me-what did you have for sup-sup? And was it a hit?

Winter wonderland...kinda

I'm a little disappointed at the wimpy amount of snow we have received-but beggars can't be choosers.

***Please note-it was too cold for me to go out-so I took these from the doorway-otherwise there would be prettier pics. And, if I actually had to work out in the snow and cold-or was stuck indoors with small children, I would probably be singing a different tune! Ya know what I mean???

Off to church-Brrrrrr!!!!

Been married 22 years today

Wowzer-I'm still wondering how it is that I've been married this long.

This is our engagement photo-we were babies. I was just 18 and he must have been almost 21.

(And no - Larry is not a converted Amish man!☺)

I found a good use for Le

Le Creuset that is.

Take water, citrus peels, and cinnamon and boil er up for a few minutes. Then turn off the heat and smell Christmas throughout the whole house.

PS-My husband just walked over to the stove and asked me-what is that? I said-clementine peels and cinnamon. Doesn't it smell great? He says-Weirdo! and walks away. Well dear-I think you're the weirdo!

PSS-Make sure you don't forget to turn your stove off-you wouldn't want to ruin your pot. (I know I wouldn't.)

Another cut and tie fleece blanket

My daughter tells me she's into orange and purple together-so that's what she's getting. This is a Christmas gift. Hope she likes it. My mom gave me one of these blankets for my birthday, except the material said hope, faith, love, ect.-I love it-my goodness it's warm!

Have you made any Christmas gifts this year? If you can, please share!☺

Getting there

How 'bout you?

I made cookies!

This was the extent of my holiday cookie baking. After about an hour and a half I had 3-4 dozen cookies and I was ready to be done. Russian tea cakes and gingerbread (my mom had given me a packet of Betty Crocker-very good, by the way).

I know many of you spend hour upon hour (sometimes-day upon day) baking cookies and I really admire you. But that's just not me. I think it has something to do with my small kitchen and small family-or perhaps I'm just lazy.

So, how long do you spend making cookies for Christmas and what are your favorite kinds to make?

They say it's your birthday...

deer neer neer neer neer neer,

well, it's my birthday too, yeah!

(Gotta love the Beatles.)

Today I'm 42-yes, I've caught up with friends-Rhonda and Dawnie!

***I've gained some poundage and gray hair over the years, but I like to think that hopefully I've gained some wisdom, compassion, empathy, patience, and forgiveness too!***

It's freezing rain here today-so, looks like I'll be staying home. That's okay-it's my favorite thing to do!

We wish you a merry Christmas...

we wish you a merry Christmas,

we wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy New Year!

::Crocheted poinsettia doily by my mom.

::Tractor wreath given by Dawnie in lieu of flowers for my father-in-laws funeral.


All photos were taken this morning by me while on the phone with my sister (Jodie)! She kept asking what that noise was.

Have a great Saturday, everybody!☺

O' Pencil tree, O' Pencil tree...

How lovely are your branches,

Not as nice as a real green tree,
But still as cute as you can be,

O' Pencil tree, O'Pencil tree,

How lovely are your branches.

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Santa-please stop here!☺

Grandma got run over by a reindeer

...walkin' home from our house Christmas eve.

Oh-I love this song-it ranks right at the top of my list of favorite Christmas songs.

Now-the video, it's kind of creepy, in that 80's music video way-but I love it anyhow!

Nanner muffins

I had 5 small bananas that never got eaten. They were black. Instead of chucking them in the garbage like I do a lot of the time-I made muffins. There were 12 but now 10, since I already ate 2. Yummy! I used this recipe. (I used 1/2 cup sugar not 1 cup like she said she did. It was PLENTY sweet.) This website was at the top of the list when I googled banana muffin recipe. This looks like it might be a good website for you cookers out there.

Since I don't do tons of baking-I feel I need to document it when I do. So that's what I just did.

Now I must go clean my house-before the Board of Health pays me a visit!

Ta ta!☺

It's beginning to look a lot like...

hristmas! Well-not a lot, but a little.☺

Easy peasy sewin'

I cleaned up my HUGE mess of material, scraps, pins everywhere down in the basement-over the last couple of days. Now I actually feel like going down there.
When Dawnie and I visited a fabulous, little quilt shop a few weeks ago-I picked up a charm pack of Mary Engelbreit Christmas fabric. (A charm pack is a bunch of coordinated fabric already cut into squares-I think.) So this morning I whipped up a simple runner. It was easy and fun. I just laid the squares on my cutting table (aka-freezer) in the order I wanted them. I stacked the squares, brought them over to my machine and sewed them together, then sewed the rows themselves together. Make sense? Probably not. Anyhoo-I'm not finishing this off-I just pressed it and voilá-a runner. Good enough for me.
Now, I just have to muster up the energy to get out my Christmas decor.

Nope-don't have it out yet.

But I will-soon.

I hope.

Have a great day! I'm gonna try.☺

Say hello to my little friend....

Ever since I saw one of these little Acer netbooks last year at Christmastime, I've wanted one. My goodness, they are cute, light, bright little netbooks. They are affordable too, as far as mini-laptops go. And let's not forget they got good reviews. But-I just didn't go ahead and order one-I guess I was holding out to see if the price would drop or whatever, but I was always talking about wanting one.

Well.......yesterday I finally got one-from my sister and her family-Jodie, Dave, Patrick, and Jessica. Of course, I was laughing and screaming around when Jessica presented it to me. It's my birthday/Christmas/doingcleaningandlaundryandpuppysittingforthem gift. And I'm thrilled. The little bugger does a good job. I'm not going to bog it down with a lot of "stuff"-I want it to keep running as smoothly as possible. Oh, and I can't wait to take it down in the basement and listen to some Craftsanity podcasts while I sew a little. Yeehaw!

Thanks Jodie, Dave, Patrick, and Jessica. You know I love it and I love you!♥

I love my bedroom even more

...now that I've made this wreath from my new stash of vintage sheets.

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And........... the above is fleece.

And this is a fleece cut & tie blanket that my daughter asked me to make for one of her friends.

I love fleece-so soft, and man-it holds the heat.☺

That's what I've been up to. What have you been up to?

Class o' 1985

Yep, 1985, year of the big hair and I can't remember what else.

Nope, I didn't ask for permission to publish these photos-hope they don't hate me after this. (I will take your photo down, if you would like-so let me know, kay?) Actually-I think you all look quite lovely.

Donna at Quiet life gave me this idea. She posted her senior portrait from 1975 and thought it would be fun for others to do it too and link back to our blogs in her comments to compare. I'm always looking for blog fodder, so I thought this would be fun. And while I was at it I dug out some of my friends that I talk about quite frequently on this blog. Sure hope we're still friends! Also, I know they are faithful readers. Love you guys! (Oh, and by the way, they are all now 42, but I'm only 41. He, he.)

So, let's compare my daughter (Class o' 2010) and me (Class o' 1985). Wow-times change-thank goodness! Wonder where Hoper got her good looks. Hmmm-don't think it was from me.☺

Thanks, Miz Booshay, for the idea!

Light makes me happy

It's no secret that I love winter-but the dark days do get to be a little much. So-it's nice to have a little light shine in the darkness. My husband goes around turning off lights constantly and it drives me nuts! But I go around plugging in lights and lighting my candle on my stove (I only burn candles on my stove-I don't want to burn my house down) constantly and it drives him nuts! But I can't help it-I need light-it's good for my state of mind. So if the dark days are getting to you-give it a try.

This is my pencil tree-not my Christmas tree-it just looks that way. The little lamp in the back ground was a gift to my sister-but after a couple years-I took it back. (If she remembers why-she can say so in the comments.)

A battery operated candle-a gift from my lovely neighbor, Ethel.

Another battery operated candle-it flickers! A gift from my lovely cousin Michelle (Melsie).

A gift from my lovely secret sister (Keli). I get lots o' gifts-don't I? I love how this little lamp projects a star.

And finally-this is an outtake-but I love it!☺