Saturday, May 26, 2012

Libby and I Get our Craft On

Libby and I like to work on craft projects together.  We also enjoy spending large amounts of time walking around Hobby Lobby together.  So, she recently saw this "Menu Board" idea on Pinterest and wouldn't rest until we had made one for our kitchen.  Here is our finished product.  If you want to see the original and/or order a kit to make your own, go here.  Libby and I chose to make our own just from looking at the picture.  We did use the templates available at that website for the placards. 
 What was amazing was that we started our exploration for a magnet board at Schoolcraft and found this "Classroom Conduct Chart" which was the perfect size and came with  20 magnetic strips that would have ordinarily been used to write students names... but were the perfect size for writing our meals on.  It also had two perfectly placed holes at the top for hanging! When we found this board, Libby said, "God really wants us to make this".  :-)  I don't know whether I would go that far.

 Love me some Mod Podge.
 First we covered the magnet board with scrapbook papers by gluing them down with Mod Podge.


 I made a little pocket from some colorful, coordinating paper, while Libby glued on ribbon.  The pocket holds the strips that have the names of potential meals.
 These were the templates we printed from the website.  Our printer insisted on printing them in pink, so I went over them with red marker.
 We employed the hot glue gun for the ribbon.

 And the button flowers.
 These are blurry, but we purchased white bottle caps at Hobby Lobby and glued the days of the week to the tops.  For our menu board, we just stuck them to the board, since our meal cards are magnetic.  Another way to do it would be to make these bottle caps into magnets and the meal cards just out of paper or card stock and then you stick the meal to the board with the day of the week magnet.
We were very proud of our pretty and practical creation.  This morning, we planned our weekly menu and went grocery shopping.  Oh, the only thing still missing from the board is a sticky note pad in the lower right corner for a "shopping list" pad.  We forgot to get one at the grocery store.  But we will glue one on as soon as we get one.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

New Hair

I made the picture extra large.... not so my double chin would be that much more visible... but so that it would be more obvious that I got my hair colored today.  This should be good for lots of fun posts because my dear friend Tammy is in hair school and I was her FIRST REAL CLIENT TODAY.  She had to do a color for a grade.... so I am now a couple shades lighter- a very pretty strawberry blonde.  I have had highlights, but never an all-over color change.  So it was a first for us both!  She did an awesome job.  And then when she was done coloring, she spent some time playing with my hair and the curling iron.  Enjoy it because you will probably never see it this curly again, as I don't have enough time to do that to it myself.  :-)  Next week.... she will be cutting it.  I'm a little more nervous about that!  :-)

June 1 she will be officially on the floor and the prices are really super good if you want your hair done and want to help her out!!!  Just let me know and I will hook you up!


Monday, May 14, 2012

My Mother's Day Gifts

Praise the Lord, this was the first year in ages that my kids didn't make me a bunch of (very special and heart felt) construction paper signs and cards and tape them up all over the house.  While beautiful and while I certainly appreciated the love and thought- I never knew what to do with those things when the day was over.  I have a dresser drawer full of them.  This year I got some real presents. Yay! (Well, Libby couldn't resist and made ONE folding card with a glittered "I love you"... I can handle ONE- I know that girl loves paper, glue and glitter!)



Sarah made me this gorgeous scrapbook with pictures of me and the kids- I really love it!


Japanese Cherry Blossom is my favorite fragrance from Bath and Body Works.  And Libby knows I love to color!  (We both love to color, actually).

 Each one of them painted a pot for me.  These are going in my bedroom as soon as I clear a space for them!!!

And they bought me some roses.

And this gift was from Jacob!  I asked him if he picked it out himself and he said, "Well, the girls let me pick from three things and sign my name".  :-)

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Nova, Cucumbers and Life

Meet Nova Leigh.  Tammy's three month old German Shepherd.  Cute, huh?  Don't let her fool you.
 This is what she has done to my back porch.  (WHY did it have to rain THIS weekend???)
 And she dug at least one, if not two green pepper plants right out of my garden!  Not to mention several other holes she has dug in the yard.  And the two flowers she has knocked over.  And the water dish she chewed up. And the scratches and mud all over my back door from her begging to come in. She is lucky to be alive at this point.
BUT I did find my cucumbers!  It was cucumbers that were being hidden by the squash and not zucchini.  I didn't plant zucchini.  See the little yellow flower?  That is the cucumer plant.  It has sent out tendrils to get out from under the squash plant and so I am hoping to get some cucumbers after all.  I have learned a lesson for next year... no squash plants in this tiny garden.  Squash isn't even in the top 10 of my favorite veggies, so it will be no big deal to leave it out.

So, life is about living and learning.  And once you learn a lesson, you shouldn't need to learn it again.  Right?  Well, it always seemed like it should be that way with my kids.  I thought a slap on the wrist should be enough to make them never, ever want to repeat a behavior again.  Ha.  Even after 1,000 slaps, they would still try to get away with it. (Please do not call DHR on me for child abuse.  My children are nearly grown, happy, well-adjusted children).  And not to mention those BIG infractions with BIG consequences.  That was no guarantee of future obedience. 

I see this with the people I work with who are addicted to drugs or alcohol.  For example, I know that withdrawals are horrendous.  One of my dear friends from my previous job described it to me in detail once.  He had to detox in jail, which only added to the "discomfort".  So I wonder... once you have gone through that... faced the natural consequences of your addiction... and it is out of your system.... and it was THAT crappy... why do you want to go and put the drugs in your body again?  It doesn't make sense.

Or why, after you have been in school for 17 years of your life already and know better, would you wait until 2 hours before an assignment is due to start working on it?  And then be surprised when the internet goes down in your house and you have to rush to Starbucks?

Or why do I keep eating crap and not exercising when I KNOW that losing weight means eating better and regular exercise?

We are slow learners.

And we want what we want.

To our own destruction.

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Where Are My Cucumbers?

As was suggested in the comments of my last post.... I really don't know much about gardening!  So, what grew in the spot where I *THOUGHT* I had planted cucumbers were actually Sugar Snap Peas.  I do remember planting the peas, as well, so no worries on that.  However, I have searched the garden (all 16 sq ft of it) and I don't see anything resembling what I now know to be a cucumber plant (thanks to Google Images). 

The thing is... I know I planted cucumber seeds!  For one thing, the seed packet is open.  For another, CUCUMBERS ARE MY FAVORITE.  Why would I plant all this other stuff and not cucumbers???!!!!  And if I did, indeed plant them, where are they?  Because that garden is not that big.  I took advantage of all the space possible.

So.  Either:
-I am not seeing them and will be pleasantly surprised to find cucumbers in my garden one day
-I am losing my mind
-I am not going to have cucumbers this year
-OR.... it's not too late and I still have time to grow cucumbers!!!  It's only May the 9th.  Surely I still have time????  I have to find the answer to this.  I will plant a whole pot full of them!

More to come on the mystery of the missing cucumbers!


Monday, May 7, 2012

My garden and how it grows

No one out there will be as excited about this as I am, but the truth is, people, you don't have to read my blog.  That is entirely your own choosing.  I don't know whether you read it or not. I don't even know who you are.  Frankly, I don't even really care that much.  I write it for myself because it makes me feel good.  And I know my mom reads it and likes whatever I write.  :-) Having said that, look at my lucious garden!!!!!!!!! 
I don't know why it is amazing me so much that it actually works... you can actually put seeds (or seedling plants you buy at Home Depot) into dirt.... keep the dirt watered.... let the sun do its work... and.... food grows!  God is simply amazing.  And if you have never grown a vegetable in your life, well, I highly recommend it.  It is a very satisfying endeavor.  I feel kind-of funny saying this because my first husband loved to grow a garden and I always hated it when he did and complained about it constantly.  I don't even know why.  I was really wrong about that!

Anyway......  that was certainly a side-track I didn't mean to take!  Ha.  Look!  Tomatoes.  This tomato plant looks as though it will be very prolific!  I counted like  20 tomatoes growing!
The squash (yellow) plants have pretty much taken over with their HUGE leaves.  You can't see it, but I think they have smothered the zucchini, so I am not expecting any zucchini.  In the lower right corner is some cilantro and frankly, I just planted that to be hip.  I will probably never use it, and Rufus likes to go out there and eat it... so I let him.
Little flowers on the green bean plants!
 Squash growing!  I simply cannot wait until these are ripe and I can fry some and grill some!
 Cucumber plants.... I love me some cucumbers from the garden!
Not pictured are some green peppers.  Whenever I finally get to actually eat any of this.... I will surely be back to blog about it!!  Very exciting stuff!

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Life, Death, Other Light Topics

Another Sunday night comes to a close.  And I should have mowed the lawn today.  But I didn't.  The weekends go so fast when I work all day Friday AND Saturday.  That just leaves Sunday and that, my friends, is not much of a weekend.  I shouldn't complain.  I got alot of quality (i.e. laughing) time with friends this weekend.  So it's all good.
Friday morning it happened.  Sarah reached another milestone.... she is now a licensed driver (and boater, for another $5.... and we don't even own a boat?). 


And here's some other life highlights:

-Carrying a basket of cleaning supplies to the car today, I tripped over my own feet and fell to the ground (wearing shorts) and skinned my knee just like I'm a kid on the pavement.  Jarred my back and hip as well.  Hello???
-Been neglecting my dog.  But he has a friend coming to spend the weekend.  He doesn't know, yet- it's a surprise.  Tammy's German Shepherd puppy, Nova, is coming to stay.  I can't wait!
-Two classes down, one final exam to go on Wednesday!  My summer class (just one class) starts May 30, so I have a little break.  (Yay!)
-I had some other topics to discuss when I sat down here, but I lack the necessary concentration skills at the moment.  So check back later!

Thursday, May 3, 2012

Sarah's Mandatory Birthday Post

Apparently my mother, Bonnie Sue, has it in her mind that I must make a post on my blog every time one of my children has a birthday.  So.... to make her happy, here we go.  Sarah turned 16 on April 28.  Above is a picture of her after being inducted into the National Honor Society a few days before ... with her baby sister, who I do believe is taller than both of us now.

And below is a picture of her at her birthday party with her friend Mary.  This is one of the few good pictures I got of her on her actual birthday.  Isn't she so grown up and beautiful?  Tomorrow she gets her drivers license.


Happy Belated Birthday Sarah!