Happy New Year

Happy New Year, may the new year be filled with blessings, peace, joy and God's love. I pray for our military families to have their loved ones home safely, and for our country to bow its knee to our God and repent. I pray for God to bless our country and our homes. May we always look at others through God's eyes and heart. Blessings to you all.

Disney

We just got back from an absolutely wonderful trip to Orlando to meet none other than Mickey Mouse himself. It was busy but probably not as busy as it had to be after we left on Christmas Eve. Our entire family including grandsons took this trip except for our son who lives in Las Vegas of all places. We flew on Air Tran and I must say it was a very nice flight extending from pilot to flight attendants. Noah and Jonah met Mickey and Minnie and Noah was so overwhelmed meeting Mickey, he just fell on the floor.  I tell you these boys were a blast to be with. Oh don't get me wrong, I enjoyed being with my own kids as well but you know how it is with little ones especially little grandchildren. Their faces and excitement are priceless. Just look.

We went to all four parks. Whew!!! I'm not sure I still have feet. I sure would like to know how many thousands of miles we walked this week. It had to be thousands...surely. Anyway, we rented a house which was awesome allowing us to do a lot of our own cooking. Jamie made Mickey pancakes one morning.

Now just for some random photos. Enjoy!

 Ice cream

My girls

I think Jonah has a crush on Princess Aurora.
We took so many pictures there is no way to put all of the best ones on here but we made lots of memories that will last forever.
Also linking up to whistlestopcooking for Traveling Tuesdays.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to you all. From the babe in the manger to the man on the cross, we have so much to be thankful for. Jesus has done for the world more than anyone could ever imagine.

Cake Pops

Jessica had given me Bakerella's Cake Pop book so this weekend we attempted to make some Christmas cakepops for a party. We made them with two different kinds of oreos, the regular ones and the new berry ones. Those berry oreos are wonderful by themselves. We followed the instructions in the book and I must say they are very good instructions and here is the end result. Not Bakerella's for sure but still cute and very yummy!

My dad

Today would have been my dad's 84th birthday. He went home to be with Jesus and Mother when he was only 67. He was a great father, husband and grandfather. My dad grew up in a very abusive home but he never used that as an excuse to be abusive to his children or become a criminal or go down the wrong road in life. Instead he chose to live above that childhood and was a very successful man both in business and in life. My father was a rich man with many friends, a loving wife and children who adored him. When I was 10 years old my dad gave his heart to the Lord the same time I did and we were baptised together the same night. I cherish that memory very much. I am so absolutely blessed to have such a heritage in Godly parents. I thank God for that and what was passed on to me and my children. Happy Birthday, Daddy. We love you and miss you and Mother so much.

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Can you guess where we are going next weekend?

Annual Christmas Trip

Every year our youth group travels to Tulsa for shopping and lights. Yes the youth enjoy this, they really do. The lights are at Rema which is a Christian College and are amazing. There are thousands of them. Since Jenny lives there I usually hitch a ride with the kids and this year Noah went with me. We started out at Incredible Pizza. That place is really a cool place for kids of all ages. They even have go-karts in there and bowling. So fun watching Noah bowl.

Decorating done

I guess my age is showing. Is that a good thing or a bad thing, I don't know but I really thought about not decorating at all this year. We are going to be gone for a while during the season and I usually don't decorate until about the second week of December so we wouldn't really get to enjoy it. But I decided I needed to go ahead and decorate and do it early. I haven't decorated this early in years but it is all done. At least all that I am going to do. In years past, I have decorated every room in the house including little trees in the kids rooms. This year that is not going to happen. Just the front rooms and door. (Sorry the pictures are not good. Took them with my phone.

Let Christmas Begin



My goodness gracious, what a black Thursday/Friday! Yes I'm one of the crazies that goes shopping on "Black Friday" but this year with some of the stores opening on Thursday night, the people that won't get up in the middle of the night to go shopping WILL go shopping the evening before and made for a very crowded few hours. I talked to quite a few people that said they had never gone before. And because they had never gone before they didn't know you should get there early just to get a place in line for the item you want. Some were disappointed, some were mad but some just joined right in the madness. It will be interesting to see what the stores show in sells this year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I just want to take this time to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving. The following is Source Unknown but I read this on Between Naps on the Porch blog which I absolutely love and can totally relate to.

Dear Family & Friends,

1) Our driveway will not be lined with homemade, paper bag luminaries. After several trial runs and two visits from the fire department, it was decided that, no matter how cleverly done, rows of flaming lunch sacks do not have the desired welcoming effect.

2) Once inside, please note that the entry space will not be decorated with swags of Indian corn and fall foliage. Instead, we included our dog in decorating by having him track in colorful autumn leaves from the back yard. The mud was his idea.

3) The dining table will not be covered with expensive linens, fancy China, or crystal goblets. If possible, we will use dishes that match and everyone will get a fork. Since this is Thanksgiving, we will refrain from using the paper SpongeBob dinner plates, the leftover Halloween napkins, and our plastic cup collection.

4) Our centerpiece will not be a tower of fresh fruit and flowers. Instead we will be proudly displaying a hedgehog-like decoration hand-crafted from the finest construction paper and pine cones. The artist assures me it is a turkey, albeit one without wings, legs, or a beak.

5 )We will be dining somewhat later than planned. However, our daughter will entertain you while you wait. I’m sure she will be happy to share every choice comment her mother made regarding Thanksgiving, pilgrims, stuffing choices, the turkey hotline, and, especially, her husband. Please remember that most of these comments were made at 7:00AM upon discovering that said husband had only remembered to pull the turkey from the freezer at 6:00 AM, and that the thing was still hard enough to cut diamonds.

6) As an accompaniment to our daughter’s recital of these events, I will play a recording of Native American tribal drumming. Curiously, the tribal drumming sounds a great deal like a frozen turkey in a clothes dryer, but that only enhances the holiday appropriateness. If our daughter should mention that we don’t own a recording of Native American tribal drumming, ignore her. She’s only nine; what does she know?

7) A dainty silver bell will not be rung to announce the start of our feast. We have chosen to keep our traditional method of assembling when the smoke alarm goes off.

8) There will be no formal seating arrangement. When the smoke alarm sounds, please gather around the table and sit where you like. In the spirit of harmony, we will ask all the children to sit at a separate table. In a separate room. Next door. And I would like to take this opportunity to remind our younger diners that “passing the rolls” is neither a football play nor an excuse to bean your cousin in the head with bread.

9) The turkey will not be carved at the table. I know you have seen the Norman Rockwell image of one person carving a turkey in front of a crowd of appreciative onlookers. Such a scene may occur somewhere in America , but it won’t be happening at our dinner table. For safety reasons, the turkey will be carved in the kitchen at a private ceremony. I stress “private”, meaning Do not, under any circumstances, enter the kitchen to laugh at me. Do not send small, unsuspecting children, or older, helpful grandparents into the kitchen to check on my progress. I have a very large, very sharp knife. The turkey is unarmed. It stands to reason that I will eventually win the battle. When I do, we will eat

10) For the duration of the meal, we will refer to the gravy by its lesser-known name: Kraft Cheese Sauce. If a young diner questions you regarding the origins or makeup of the Kraft Cheese Sauce, smile kindly and say that you know the answer, but it’s a secret that can’t be revealed to them until they are 18.

11) Instead of offering a choice among 12 different scrumptious desserts, we will be serving the traditional pumpkin pie, garnished with whipped cream and dog tongue marks. You still have a choice: take it or leave it.

That concludes our list of alterations. Again, I apologize that Martha will not be joining us this year.

Source unknown

Hope you holiday is a blessed one!

Bass Fishing Hall of Fame

A few years ago, my father was inducted into the BASS Fishing Hall of Fame in Birmingham, AL. This was such an honor and I really would have liked for this to have happened to him while he was living. He would have been so excited...worse than a kid at Christmas time. Anyway my sisters and I along with members of our families went to Birmingham to receive the plaque honoring my father. It was a fun time just because we seldom all travel together.

Linking to Sandi at Whistle Stop Cafe

Come see us!

Just thought I would throw a couple of pictures in here of our booth at Remember When Antique Mall. My sister and her sister-in-law are "partners" with me in the adventure. Our favorite thing to do is to shop for junk and either just clean it up or fix it up as in painting it. Come see us.

Sailing the Nina and the Pinta

The boys spent the night and the next day with us and so we took them on a little sailing trip on the Nina and the Pinta. Although they are too young to realize it, it was also a history lesson. Actually we didn't do any "sailing" but we did get to explore both ships. I'm not sure who built them but they were exact replicas built to the exact size of these ships that once sailed to America. These ships sailed into our area and will be here for a while before going on to the next port. They also sail on the ocean. So cool. I never dreamed they were as small as they were and sailed all the way across that huge ocean with all those people. How cramped and crowded they must have been. Our ancestors made a dangerous journey in search of a new land and new way of life on really small ships. But I think they boys really had a good time.

Sorry about the quality of the pictures, made with my phone and the sun was extremely bright. It was not foggy at all. Oh and I'm linking to Sandi's Traveling Tuesdays .

Christmas help.

Can you believe Christmas is just around the corner? Again? Already? Wow. I have been reading some blogs about planning for Christmas such as a budget, time managment, etc. A lot of the comments I have seen are from young mothers stating they wish the "grandparents" wouldn't go so overboard on buying for the grandchildren. As I have two young grandsons, my question is this...what would you like for me to do for my grandchildren? As a grandparent, I really enjoy buying for my boys but I look at everything they have (and it's a lot) and I see that they need NOTHING! But I can't not get them something for Christmas. So any suggestions would be appreciated. What do you do for your grandchildren?

Traveling Tuesday back in time

In the spirit of joining Sandi at whistle stop cafe  for Traveling Tuesdays, let's travel back in time and let me show you my country roots Hee Haw style. Today we are going to take a peek at the cast of Hee Haw as they again entertain us with lots of corny jokes, good music and lots of good comfort food.

 Now, I don't know how this happened. Superman must have taken a wrong turn on his flight and looks like he brought his little brother too.

 Oh No!!! More celebrities.  There's Lois Lane and Clark Kent in person. Wow! You just never know who you'll run into at Hee Haw.

Chex mix and giveaway

I was contacted by MyBlogSpark and was asked if I wanted to do a Chex mix party change. Of course, I love Chex Mix. What I did was have a Chex mix party where we exchanged different Chex Mixes like you would do for a cookie swap. I made one with the wheat, corn and rice Chex Mix, pretzels and garlic crackers mixed with butter, poweded ranch dressing and worchester sauce and then toasted it. It was so good. We also had a buttered rum Chex Mix that tasted like Christmas, if you know what I mean. Then there was  caramel, chocolate made with the honey nut and cinammin Chex. I never knew there were so many differents kinds of Chex Mix. Oh and we made ours into a party at the park. The weather was beautiful and the kids played while we ate. Love being outside.

 

If you want to have your own Chex Mix Party Change, just enter my giveaway and you will receive five different boxes of Chex cereal, some really cute containers, recipes for different flavors and a $20 gift card to purchase the extras. To enter just answer this question: Do you shop on Black Friday and why?

The giveaway will be open until Friday November 4 at midnight. I'll try to post the winner Saturday.

Hope you win and have as much fun as we did.

Chex Party Mix-Change product and information were provided by Chex through MyBlogSpark.

Fall events

October is such a busy month for our family but we love it because most of it involves family time. Jenny and Lana had a booth at War Eagle this year and did great. It was so much fun to go up there and see them doing so well plus I love going to fairs like this in the fall. My daughter and daughter-in-law went up there with me on two separate days. We love it. And Kacee really loves the turkey legs.

Then we have Noah's birthday and so far we have gone to Chucky Cheese. The boys love going there as I'm sure most kids do.

Next weekend is Noah's birthday party. Superheros!!.Going to be fun. Then just before Halloween, we have Hee Haw at the church. Such a fun time for everyone with food, music and trick or treating for the little kids. October is a good time to kick off the holiday season.

OMGosh!!!

Where has the time gone??? Can you believe it????? Noah is 3 today.