Easter and Baby Gifts

Happy gorgeous Tuesday! Hope you all enjoyed your Memorial Day. I for one am so thankful for all the men and women that served and are serving our country. I have a nephew who recently got out of the Marines and one of my dearest friends is serving in the Navy. I know I could never do what they do to protect our country so God bless them!

Speaking of serving others...I would like to update you on our Easter. I know Easter is well passed but I thought I would share with you some pictures of Easter since I am playing catch up on posts. I always love Easter. It always seems to be a crying day for me. I simply am over-whelmed with God's love for me. I certainly do not deserve such unconditional love and I pray often that God would help me to love Him and others like that.

Adaliah was a good sport and let me sponge roll her hair the night before Easter.

And the finished result on Easter morning......


I thought she looked simply adorable. I had great fun dressing her up. Nicole bought her the dress at Goodwill and the hat and gloves at Target, Katie K. got her the sweater at a Mom2Mom sale, and I got her the purse at Target.

We can see where she gets her looks from....=)

My big girl and myself
After a time of remebrance of what the Lord has done for us we went over to Nicole's house and had a wonderful Easter dinner. Keb and Jaydn also came over with Jason's best friend Austin. We did a little candy hunt with all of the kids. Maria did a little lesson before hand talking about the reason Jesus came to earth was to find His lost treasures....His children. Then she told the kids that is what you guys are going to do...find some treasures. The kids were so cute and were finding the "treasures" and putting it in their cousins baskets. Warmed our hearts!

This is the best shot we could get of the 5 grandkids. Jaydn was not feeling well and wanted Keb to hold him and Micah wanted to take the picture not be in it. lol

As I am sure you are all aware of...my two sisters are due this summer. I finished the babies' presents this week. Maria is doing a zebra print with hot pink accents. So I took this......

I painted the inside white and I used the printed duct tape and covered the outside of it. Then I put a black and white ribbsons (with help from hubby since I didn't seem to have enough hands to hold it all straight) at the bottom. Around the silver part I put black "gemstones" and this is the finished product.

Maria can use it as a toy box or storage. When the decide on a name for baby girl I am going to put it around the middle in hot pink.

Nicole is doing baby boy Murray's room in a barn theme. So I took a steamer trunk that I had (I went through a phase and picked them up ALL the time at garage sales so I ended up with more than I needed) and I spray painted it red with metalic silver trim. Then I put decals and stickers I printed off the computer around of various farm scences and animals.

They certainly are not perfect but I hope my new neice and nephew will know I was thinking of them and loved them before they were even born.

Well there you have it. Another post trying to get you all caught up to the present. Hopefully my next post I can show you what we have been up to with our outside projects. I am sooooo excited. God bless you all!

Humbled

Well dear readers, you are in for a treat! Almost two months without an update and now you will get two in one day. You see, I am humbled to admit I was given a blogging award by my friend Lindsey from www.mrsbucks.blogspot.com and my sister Maria from www.nehemiahsmommy.blogspot.com. Also the little one is taking a nap so I thought I better seize this chance. Thanks guys for the award. Really appreciate it. So I now have to tell you seven facts about myself and list my favorite seven bloggers.

1. I am living my dream. I always wanted a loving husband and children with my own house and gardens and animals. =)


2. I love to travel! I have been to numerous states and to Scotland, Ireland, London, Paris, Canada, and Mexican. I still have many other places I want to go see.


3. I secretly dream of having some of my writings published some day. (Ok now it's not much of a secret) lol


4. I hate to put laundry away. It usually rivals Mount Everest before I MAKE myself fold it and put it all away.


5. I still dance around the house to music when I clean or work on projects


6. I love to browse around Forever 21 but I have only bought something there once when I was like 16. (Its the thrifter in me....I can't pay $25 for a shirt no matter how much I like it)


7. God is STILL working on me and showing me things that are not like our perfect example Jesus, so please be patient with me!

And now my 7 picks are in no particular order................

www.mrsbucks.blogspot.com Lindsey always has some interesting thought or some beautiful pictures

www.nehemiahsmommy.blogspot.com Maria is such a faithful updater and has great pics of beautiful people (my neice and nephew)

www.trippingoverflatsurfaces.blogspot.com Jeanie is always so down to earth

www.theagapetree.blogspot.com Jen makes me laugh out loud

www.missamericaandmisterbelgium.blogspot.com I love to see Leahs adventures overseas and get slightly jealous with all the countries she has visisted. =)

www.gensiscostner.blogspot.com Gen is always so uplifting

All the decorating/ home improvement blogs I follow that have like 10,000 followers so they won't even know I gave them this award. lol

Have a great day everyone!

Two Months Worth

Ok my friends, I come and humbly beg forgiveness again for my lack of updates. I do have a good excuse.....I'm back working. My stay at home mominess didn't last long. Let me explain. We have had this problem with our water since we moved in almost 5 years ago. Say if I do a load of laundry and some dishes, I am out of water for 2 hours or so. Kinda annoying people. Do you know how fun it gets trying to coordinate showers, laundry, dishes, watering the garden, etc? So, I finally broke down and called a plumber and................ wait for it people................God's still teaching me something...............they were drilling a well the next day. Yep, our well was 84 feet deep and they said that should have be plenty deep but we only had about 12 feet of water, hence why we would run out. So they had to dig a new well 182 feet. Needless to say, this took almost every cent we had been saving for our anniversary trip to Hawaii and for my new kitchen. Then my SUV has been acting up AGAIN and Miguel said he was tired of sinking money into something that we don't even wanna drive since gas is $4.15 a gallon. God sent someone to us the next day who bought it. Then hubby decided to use that money and the rest of our saving and he bought a scooter. This is what it looks like.... Miguel's work also has slowed down. We are so very grateful that he still has a job, just went from working around 60 hours a week to no overtime. With all of this in mind when I got the call that my one job needed someone to cover for the night secretary temporarily, we decided that this was a good thing for right now. That job ends this week though, so I am hoping to stay on top of everything better.

Since we have had a few warm, non rainy days...and I do mean a few, we have been trying to get our outside projects finished. Miguel is building me a formal English Herb Garden and we have relocated my veggies garden. I can not wait to show you the end results. Its gonna be beautiful. Here are a few projects that I have finished over the best two months.

~~~~~~~~~~~~Took the basket on the right and took off all of the fall colored yarn and spray painted it and added new ribbon to match Adaliah's room. Did this to four baskets.

Only cause I love you all do I show this next set of pictures. We have a lot of storage, but some of it isn't finished yet. I am trying to get better organized so I decided to start with the closet under the staircase. This is where the bulk of Adaliah's toys are and it seems like everything gets dumped into it. As can be seen by the following picture.

Isn't it awful!?!?!

All of this was in this.........

I am shuddering. So I took everything out, sorted through it and got rid of some and put others in their proper place. Then I painted the paneling and shelving, ripped out the carpet, sanded and stained the floored and here it is..........

She's excited about this too.

So that's about two months worth of updates. We are about finished with several other projects that I will share with you all soon. I will leave you with a thought that God has been dealing with me lately from a thought from William Branham. A water lily labors to get up into the sunlight from the muck and mire at the bottom of the pond. You would think that it could now just kick back and relax. It labored hard and now it should be able to enjoy the sunlight it worked so hard to get to. But do you know what the lily does instead? It opens itself up and let's any insect draw strength from it. The insects all take from the lily that worked so hard to get to the top. But you know what? The lily lets them willingly. We as Christians should do no less. Yes, life is so hard. Yes, it seems like the battles are more frequent. But no where are we suppose to curl up and say that's it. I can't help anyone. I have nothing to give. Christians, that's our job! To tap into Jesus' strength so people can draw from us. It doesn't stop until we are home with Him. Please do not think I am rebuking anyone. I am talking to myself. I have felt so much in survival mood lately. Yes, this year has not been easy. Yes, I have suffered some deep wounds. But you know what...there are other hurting people and I just feel Jesus whispering to me, "It's time to focus on them, not yourself. Cuz when you are so wrapped up in your own hurt you can not see others' pain. Be like the water lily." God bless you all. You are loved by me and God. =)

Decorating on a Budget

I have a problem..... I can not pay full price for anything. I love going to thrift store and garage sales. It is like a treasure hunt for me. I love to find great deals, make something new out of something old, or on occasion pay next to nothing for something and then turn around and make money for it on ebay or amazon. Well, I believe my family feels I have finally went over the top. Remember Miguel and I started a pretty tight budget? Now I have to get creative. So I saw a really cool idea on http://www.fullofgreatideas.com/. If you go to this blog she also links you up to other blogs that have done this idea with different patterns. Please do NOT compare mine to hers!!!!!! This was my first attempt and it is not near as perfect as some of these other way more talented than I ladies.

<~~~~~~~~~~~So I asked my family to start saving me these

And these were cut in strips and became this.....

Adaliah grapped my camera while I was cutting the strips and snapped this before I even knew what she was doing. Not bad for a 2 year old! lol Notice how intensely I am concentrating on cutting the tp rolls. Serious stuff people. (Laughing at self)

And after much patience, super glued fingers, and several coats of spray paint, this is the end result. I think I am going to do another coat of spray paint but you can get the general idea. I have started another one with a different pattern. I will let you know how it turns out.

Who knew you could use tp rolls and make wall art. I am seriously having fun doing this! It warms my thrifty heart to use something I would have tossed into the burn pile to make something unique and interesting. Anyone else done anything crafty lately? I would love to hear about it! Enjoy your day and God bless you!!

Gatlinburg

Well...this is going to be a long over due post. Miguel had been talking about going to Gatlinburg for a while. Well, back in October he received a profit sharing check from work that we were not totally expecting. We decided to use it to take our first real family vacation. We had such a great time and it was amazingly beautiful. Adaliah was such a great traveler for the whole 7 hours it took us to get there.

Our cabin......

The view across the street from our cabin.

One of the things we did was visit the aquarium. It was spectacular and Addie loved the "fishies" very much! Here she is looking at an iguana.

This was the cutest thing. This penguin was minding it's own business when it spied Adaliah up there looking at all the penguin. So, it preceded to waddled over right up to the the glass and just stood there looking back at Adaliah.Downtown Gatlinburg was really neat. It had some of the most unique shops I have ever seen. This picture was taken in a courtyard of shops that was called "The Village". It was beautifully laid out, but we couldn't afford a single thing there. =) It was fun to browse though. We took a tram up 1000's of feet to the top of a mountain. Miguel wanted to take the open tram that was like a ski lift. I told him I would probably have heart failure taking a not quite 2 year old up 1000's of feet in one of those. So, we compromised and went in an enclosed one. At the top of the mountain it was kind of like a carnival with rides and games and shops. They also had a little zoo of sorts that showed animals native to the TN area. One of those animals has now become one of Adaliah's favorite animals.

This was some of the view going up the mountain. The white house at the top left was designed to look like Barbie's dream house. Some of these houses also belong to celebrities but for privacy sake they could not say who's houses they were.

One afternoon we went and listen to a presentation on time shares. They didn't sell us on it but we did get $75 cash and a $50 gift card to a steak house that we ate at that evening. Overall it was a neat experience that we got some cool perks out of. This is the view from the balcony of one of the cabins. The resort itself takes up an entire mountain.

We also did a bit of hiking. Not as much as we would have liked but our time was limited. We left early Monday so we arrived in TN in the late afternoon and we left at around 11 on Wed. Also it would have been too hard on Adaliah to do a lot of hiking. What we did was beautiful though and we hope to go back when she is older and can appreciate the scenery more. It was such a great first family vacation for us! Adaliah was awesome the whole time and we can not wait to do it again.

Miguel and I truly thought that the Gatlinburg was one of the most beautiful places we both have ever seen and we would love to have a second home there. (Hey...like my mom says "Dreams are free!") But for now it was nice to come home.....

Smart Sister and Staircase Redo

Well I have a smart sister. She said the reason I may not be able to upload pictures to the blog is because there were too big. Well sister was correct. So I now can post pictures. Yippee! So of course I started with my beautiful little girl. She is two now. How time flies. She is almost potty trained and talks quite a bit. (Not sure where she got that from.) =) She really likes Barney, animals, her family and is just generally a happy, busy girl. Now that I can post pictures I will be adding some more through the next couple of weeks so you can all be updated on her.

Well we are almost finished with the upstairs of our home. 3 out of the 4 rooms are drywalled, electrical work finished, flooring in and most of the moulding in. We (which means Miguel with help from me when I know what I am doing) just have to finish putting up some moulding and the last room needs to be mudded, painted, flooring installed, and moulding. It is feeling soooo good! One pretty big project was our staircase. Have you ever seen a staircase that is over 100 years old? Well get ready people, it is not pretty!

Lovely huh? The front part of the stairs were breaking off, there were cracks, not to mention drywall mud, primer and paint all over them. It w

as simply a horrible sight. And then enters my talented husband. We had to buy all new risers and treads because they were just in too bad of shape to save. So I painted the risers white with free paint from Me

nards. Seriously any home fixer uppers out there.....watch Menards ads. They do rebates A LOT and one they do semi-frequently is paint that ends up being free. Then I stained the tread parts with Jocobean stain. I sanded and stained the banister in the same color. Now it was hubby's turn to rip up all of the old and install new. There is still some parts we need to fill in with wood filler and some more moulding, but over all I think the end results is a far cry better than what we started with.

I am loving it! Also, notice my cute helper who loves to "help it mom". I have to give credit to a really neat blog that my sister referred me to.

Its thriftydecorchick.blogspot.com. She also redid her staircase and inspired me with the look that she went with.

So, that is one project we have been up to. Of course there will be more to follow, especially since you can now see pictures. And I shall leave you with another of my Miss Adaliah....

After Affects of Joy in the Journey

First off, I know I have been promising updated pictures of Miss Adaliah Ruth but I can not get them to upload to this blog. Not sure what is up with that, but hopefully I will figure it out soon.

I usually enjoy the changing seasons and I do not even mind winter or snow or cold. But, my dear friends, I am finished this year! Adaliah asks to go outside and play every time I let the dog out. We are down to about 20% left in our propane tank and the propane people can not get to our tank because the drive has about a foot of snow with ice on top of it. So I am finished with winter. I am ready for the sun, and green, and my vegetable and flower gardens. With that in mind I have been pouring over gardening books and online sites. Has anyone every ordered plants online? Did you have much luck that way?

A few months back I posted about "Joy in the Journey", about how God was dealing with me to just "Be still" and enjoy the journey through where He is taking me. Not to always be worrying about just getting there. (Yes, I know I just wrote about not enjoying winter any more, He is still working on me people!) Well, amazing things have been happening in my life personally as God has been dealing with me about this. I have started to change my eating habits and do some (and its kinda of little some) exercising. I have been shocked to see 15 pounds drop off. It has just been little things like switching to skim milk and not putting handfuls of cheese on everything and watching my portions. I go to bed full every night and it has been so easy. I have been so amazed and happy. I also have more energy and just mentally feel better.

Other area of my life that has been personally affected is my finances. Anyone who knows me knows I have always been a saver. But, it seems like we were always wondering where our money went to. So I decided it was time to enjoy the journey more by getting our finances under control as well. I tracked what we spent for three months. We saved EVERY receipt and I imputed them into an excel file according to the category it fell under like, house expences, gas, eating out ect. Then based on that I could set up a realistic budget that we started at the begining of this month. We are doing the envelope system which means I get X amount of dollars for groceries and that cash goes in an envelope. Thats all I get for two weeks. So it means I make up menus and have to shop with a calculator in my hands. Its amazing when we take the debit card away and have cold hard cash how much harder it is to part with the cash. So far so good. We are hoping by being more diciplined with our finances we can accomplish some goals we have in our life, like getting this house finished, doing some traveling, and being completely debt free in 12 years or less (this includes our house). So anyone else have a budget. Any tips? Rememer as you go about your day that God has come to give us life more abundatly. So enjoy your day. Sing while you do the dishes. Thank God that you have all of these nice clothes to wear as you fold them and put them away. Just have joy today! God bless you all!