Up My Sleeve

via on Pinterest

I found an old door along the road about a year ago. I had been waiting to find something to do with it. I think I have found my inspiration. We could use an extra place for seating/sleeping in the front room, and now I have something up my sleeve ;)

Merry Christmas

Wishing you all a crazy happy holiday season!! Enjoy your loved ones and remember He is the reason for the season!

Close to Home

I am making a point to stay close to home this week, in the hopes of making it a habit. Since I put the kids in school I have been in the van more than in the house. Maybe it was the freedom of it all, who knows. I am finally sick of running around. The colder weather may be helping with me wanting to stay in. I am welcoming it. This house of mine needs some attention. I often get defeated with how quickly it gets away from me, or how it only takes Sat and Sun to destroy all the work I did the previous week.

I will admit one of my faults is accepting defeat too quickly....In my mind this house is so crazy organized I would put Martha to shame, but in reality it is lacking. I am human and I don't have a fleet of workers to get stuff done. Goodness a lot of the time I don't even have a partner to help thanks to his crazy job. I am not complaining because it keeps us fed and a roof over our head and clothes on our bodies....he just has to leave...a lot!!!

With all that being said I came to the conclusion that I need to try to stay home and get into some sort of routine. Some of the days have been spent on the couch crocheting gifts and trying to get a few items together to put in the shop. A lot of laundry being put away is taking place...vacuuming and throwing away bits and pieces of trash. It has been a breath of fresh air.

Piper is not complaining either....

My Hooks Have Been Working

A gift for my girlfriends new nephew. My hands have been busy with little projects like this. I have another to show of a crazy cute black/white/hot pink hat with matching ankle booties for my Misters friends new baby girl. These tiny projects are always so satisfying because I can finish them up in a jiffy.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and now are geared up for Christmas! We had a nice relaxing day at home with just the fam. The Mister and I even got a starbucks run in :) That always makes me happy!!!

Possible Christmas Photos

It is not easy getting everyone to cooperate for family photos. Add to that the fact that we take them our selves with a tripod every year. And sadly my #1 complainer is the hubby....here are two possibilities. I think I need to go back in and fix the brightness of number one though....

I Love These Girls

For my Birthday these ladies and my hubby planned a night out for all of us.

It was the night all the restaurants were celebrating Halloween...Don't adjust your computer screen that is fog engulfing us...hahahaha!!

I have known this lady for over 10 years. She's the sister I never had.

These people make up some of my family away from family. I can count on them for anything and I love them to death. God blessed me with some pretty awesome people in my life.

Another Year....

Today was my birthday. This is what I got from my husband and kids. A Franchi .20 gage over and under. Yes friends, I was actually excited about this gift. The Mr and I have been shooting skeet/trap together. It is a lot of fun and I enjoy the time we get to spend together doing it!

Love Them

Crazy Big Crochet Flower

In your hair:

Or on your shirt:

You really cant' go wrong.

If you want one you can go here.

Funny #3

He sure does crack me up!!!

"Mommy I can tie my shoe like you"......."Um yeah that's just like mine"

Crocheting Again

I've been crocheting again. I have a lot of girls I know having babies this fall and a hat is an easy thing to make. I just love this little appple. I have also made a few pumpkins. I made an apple for Avery's new teacher who will have her baby at the end of the month, I thought it was fitting for a teacher. I am having a lot of fun with these....

New Project

So now that I have the two older kids in school daytime life has shifted a bit. The time I am having with Tripp has been great. He is a different kid without his brother and sister around. I am enjoying finding his personality, something I was missing out on when the other two were home and needing so much of my attention.

One of my missions while the kids are at school is getting my house back in manageable order. Taking care of things that have been neglected while my focus was so much on the kids. I want to become a housewife/mom again that has somewhat of a grip on the house and daily life/routine. I had lost that somewhere along the way. I had become lazy. It was my own fault. I am okay with this.

Now onto the project that all this "extra" time has allowed for. Below are pictures of the toy room, also known in this house as a FROG (free room over garage). This room once served as the school room when we first started homeschooling, but I quickly discovered that being upstairs for a chunk of the day was not conducive of getting much downstairs work done. In the beginning of spring I ripped out the construction grade carpet that was here when we bought the house 5 years ago. It smelled BAD. I painted the subfloor to help seal out the odor and make it look okay until we could decide what to do with it. Well I have finally figured out what I want done with this room off the upstairs bedrooms/and bath. I am turning it into a room for me!

My goals for this room are:

*to stick to a budget 200-300 dollars max (not including the carpet which is off the roll at HD)
*have a comfy place to sit/relax
*still have a place for some of the kids toys
*move all my crafting/sewing supplies to this room instead of downstairs in the laundry room.

When my Mr is gone away for work I often sit on my bed to watch TV. Being alone downstairs just seems too, well, lonely. So I want a place that has me close to the kids even if they are sleeping and still close enough to my room without being in it.

Wish me luck. I am going to post as the changes start to happen. All the while I will also be plugging away at getting the rest of the house organized again.

~~Lisa

Wedding Date With The Mr.

Last night the Mr and I went to a lovely wedding. It was a perfect night for it. The details were so cute. Sadly I was only able to photograph a few, since my new replacement camera doesn't let me old SD card hold as many photos. We had a great time. I danced my butt off in heels that weren't made for dancing, but anything for style right?!

* getting ready to leave

*sending off butterflies as they walked down the aisle (do you see the hay bales? that is what we sat on)

*The spunky bride in her short in the front long in the back dress and blue satin shoes

*cupcakes instead of cake. I am bummed cause I was so busy dancing I forgot to get one :(

*Mason jar mugs that held our beverages all night and where then taken home as a gift. Mine might become my new favorite Southern Sweet Tea glass.

*wanted to show a photo of my dancing shoes...and the fact that my neighbor had a wedding on the exact same night, just a different venue. We were joking that it looked like we were ready for prom ;)

First Day of School Re-do

Well my homeschool friends,our year started out great, loved all the curriculum, the kids were eager to do work (at least most of the time), I finally got a handle on what was enough. THEN my Mr came to me with the news that he would be traveling A LOT for work over the next year. My husband has a job that takes him away from home quite a bit so I live a lot of the time as a single parent. I am 6 hours away from my family and steady help. We live in a larger home with a decent sized yard. I have a lot on my plate. Something had to give. I have been overwhelmed by house work, yard work, my garden is non existent this year. I was starting to lose myself in all of it. I was taking it out on the kids. I had stopped appreciating the time we had together. It was making me pretty sad. So I started praying. Then I started waiting for answers.

There are a few blogs that I check daily, other moms of kids my kids ages. Some are homeschoolers some are not. A few weeks back I read this post from Crunchy Peas. I have always enjoyed seeing what she was doing with her girls in their homeschool. And I was surprised when she posted that her girls were going to public school this year. I loved her honesty. The things she wrote were the very things I had been praying over. I kept my thoughts to myself and continued to wait on Gods answer. Then last monday I read Erens post from VintageChica, and again she put words to my thoughts. God was giving me answers through others words and I finally listened. Last Friday I signed the kids up for school. They met their teachers and saw their class rooms. We bought a few supplies that we didn't have on hand already.

Yesterday I dropped them off at their class rooms and walked out of the little school with peace in my heart. They got off the bus yesterday afternoon glad to be home, and I was glad to see them. They had stories to tell and papers to be filled out and a bit of homework to be done. I love that God answers our prayers. That he speaks sometimes not like a hurricane, but like a soft breeze. We will take this one year at a time, the same way we homeschooled.

I Might Be Crazy

But we let my mom and dad bring a bunny down for Avery. The thing is cute!!

This Past Weekend

The neighbors had a cornhole tourney. See the lady in the white shorts?! She was my partner, she had never played cornhole before...needless to say we didn't last long in the tournament.

My man made it to the final three. That's part of our house next door.

I truly do love my other two kids, but this guy seems to be the only one cooperative when I want to take a photo!

The sky was amazing

We had family movie night under the stars. I HEART doing this big time. Okay so the movie was not the best selection of the night, but still so much fun!

I found out I wasn't half bad at shooting skeet. We may have created a monster!

All I wanted was for this boy to sit still for a quick photo....no luck. But we did have a great date while his brother and sister were at the aquarium with their Grandma.

**We made a big decision with our schooling. Not ready to talk about it yet, but soon. Please keep me in your prayers for peace about our decision!

RIP Canon Power Shot

Soon after this photo was taken my beloved point and shoot was drowned by a rogue wave. booooooo

**photo by avery

School has started very well this year. I feel a little more settled with it. I finally realized they are doing enough, even if my enough isn't every day!! Kids learn no matter what environment they are in. We had a small hiccup with Averys math. We started with Switched On schOOlHouse, hated it after just two days, and found Rod and Staff instead! She was using them for grammar already and when the hs bookstore didn't have the math I was looking for I decided to give them a try. I found a gigantic blessing in that unanswered prayer!! I am loving R and S more and more, they are no nonsense cut and dry facts only, and we love it!!

So now I just sit back and let the school year unfold, and roll with the punches. Because I have finally figured out it's not about me or them at all...its about Him, and he never fails :)

School Photos

A great start to the new school year. Thanks so much for the support Ladies!! It warms my heart more than I could ever say!

Getting Ready for School 10-11

Tomorrow marks the start of the new school year. We are still waiting on Averys math and the teachers book for ETC for Keegan. I have been praying over our school year that our enthusiasm is maintained throughout the year and our hearts and minds are open. I am really excited about the Apologia science we will be doing this year. I was considering getting myself a notebook to do it along with the kids!!

Don't Hate Me Because My Bike Is Beautiful.....

I think I am in love......have two other "baskets" to switch to when it strikes my fancy. A wooden crate that needs sealed first and an aqua plastic crate too.