New project

I have finally finished another piece of furniture. I love this table even before I painted it but I love it even more now. I just wish I was better at this sort of thing and had more time. It takes me forever and I never think to take before pictures so if you come here for before and afters...well that's probably not going to happen. I'm going to try harder to remember before pics. I got the graphics from The Graphics Fairy. She has the best blog and offers all kinds of free graphics.

Finally pictures

Well, it's not but one picture but it's a start. I have finally gotten some of my projects finished and will start posting pictures. BUT...I have no before pictures. I'm terrible at thinking to do that. Oh well, here is the first one with more to come. Our business name is Junkin'for Joy but our facebook page says More than Sisters which was our name but we are not able to change it because we have to many "likes". Imagine that.

Winner

First I want to thank everyone that entered my giveaway. I wish I could just send you all the prize but since I can't I wanted to let you know that Daniela won. Congratulations Daniela.

Happy Valentine's Day and other stuff

Happy Valentine's Day! What do you do on the day of love? My family doesn't really have any "traditions" for this day except maybe just being together. Oh I have gotten the boys some valentine treats and will make some valentine brownies tonight, a card for the hubs (he is so good to us) but that's really about all. When the kids were young we of course did the valentine thing for school and the parties so now that they are grown it sometimes leaves me wondering if I shouldn't do something more but I guess not.
Being a mom of four, I know that mothers often times get majorly overwhelmed with all we have to do. Again, I am linking to Gracefull Mama because she is saying exactly what all us moms need to hear and she is saying it much better than I ever could. Please go and see what Joy has to say and be blessed.
Yesterday if finally snowed here in good ole Arkansas. Only a couple of inches but at least if felt like winter. I love the changing of the seasons but winter never fully arrived here until yesterday. The snow is pretty much gone now and it is supposed to be warm tomorrow but the grandboys did get to finally wear their snowsuits I got them for Christmas and build a snowman. I love the pictures their mom took.

More reminicing...the other grandmother

After spending time with my dad's mother, we would then travel over the mountain to my mom's grandmother's house. There were two houses...one where my greatgrandmother lived and the other one was where her daughter and husband lived. Here we would spend the weekend I think mainly because that is where aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers, sisters and anyone else that might be related would gather. I don't have any idea what the adults would do during the day because we were always outside, in the woods, down at the creek or maybe even in the chicken houses. We built forts, played in the school bus (my uncle was the school bus driver and they took the buses home) waded in the creeks, played in the "smoke house". There was so much to do. We never had to ask "could we do this or that", we just did it. There was always a ton of cousins to play with. The women, I think, must have cooked most of the day on Saturday because there were tables and tables of food on Sunday and I don't remember them doing much cooking on Sunday so they must have done it on Saturday. I do remember that my mom would do the women's hair from all up and down the valley. She would cut hair, perm hair, color hair and she was not a beautician. She always wanted to be but never got the chance to go to beauty school but she knew how to do it anyway. At night, the adults would gather at my greatgrandmother's house to play cards or get the instruments out and sing while the kids (mainly when we were older) would go to my aunt's house to watch a little tv but mainly just hang out. There were no video games or anything like that. Those were such good times and it makes me sad that my kids have never had experiences like this. We have gone back to my greatgrandmother's house only a couple of times through the years my kids were growing up but most of those people are now gone. But oh the stories I could tell about the "fox" suppers, the chicken houses, the bus that became a space ship, cooking on a wood stove with no adults around and so many more. Maybe I will do that another time.

Time for another giveaway

Who likes Star Wars?
Who is going to see the new Star Wars in 3D?
Who likes cereal?
Who likes freebies?
If you answered "yes" to at least one of those questions (and you should have) then you need to enter this giveaway. I know my oldest daughter would if she could just because she is such a Star Wars nut. She loves anything to do with it and either has the action figures, seen the movies a dozen or so times and is now trying to teach my grandsons to be Star Wars nuts too. If you win, you will receive the two boxes of specially marked Big G cereal, four Star Wars character pens, two Star Wars magnets and Star Wars stickers. There are actually 8 of the character pens and if you win, you will already have four of them. Now how can you pass this up. To enter just leave me a comment  between now and February 16th about which Star Wars movie is your favorite and which character is your favorite. I will pick a winner on Friday morning.

"Disclosure:  Prize pack, information, and giveaway have been provided by General Mills through MyBlogSpark."

Just a little reminicing

I was just reading Christy Jordan's blog at Southern Plate and what her mother wrote brought back so many memories. Things I wonder if I have ever told to my kids, things I want them to know about me and my growing up in the South. We went to my grandmothers's house most weekends, both of them for the entire weekend. We would stop at my dad's mother's first and she would always have fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and biscuits in the oven waiting for us no matter what time we got there. I couldn't wait, the food was so good. We never ate in the dining room that I remember but always gathered in the kitchen. It wasn't a very large kitchen but it was large enough for a booth-type place for us to sit with chairs on one other side. The cushion on the bench seat was red and the chairs were red and white, I now have those chairs. Also not sure why but there was a rocking chair in the kitchen, and again I now have that rocking chair although it is in pretty bad shape. There was only one room in the house that had air conditioning and that was the living room but I don't remember thinking the house was hot. I'm not sure kids pay that much attention to things like that. As I look back on that house now, I remember there were no hallways, you just went from room to room walking through the first bedroom to get to the other two bedrooms and bath. Outside she had a huge red barn and she lived in town not out in the country although this town was and is very small. There was so much to explore in that barn even though we weren't allowed to go up to the second floor of the barn. Daddy didn't think it was very safe but also that was where my grandmother would lay out the peanuts to dry for her famous peanut brittle. She lived just a block from "downtown" and we could walk downtown to all of the stores that were which weren't very many. But it was fun all the same because we were without adults. We didn't spend the night at my dad's mother's house just usually a couple of hours but the time we were there, we really had a good time.

Two in one day

Wow, two posts in one day. That's not like me but I have this amazing recipe to share and what better time to share it than now.
My daughter-in-law came over for dinner last night with the boys like they always do on Tuesday nights. My son was busy and couldn't come, we missed him but glad we got to spend some time with Kacee and boys. She brought the most awesome cupcakes I have ever eaten. And NO I didn't take pictures......I just don't think of that when eating awesome cupcakes and playing with grandsons but I did find the recipe and a picture on this blog passthesushi. The cupcakes were pancake cupcakes with maple syrup frosting and candied bacon. That's right CANDIED BACON!!!! I love bacon. At first I was a little skeptical of combining the two foods but it was incredible. Be sure to go over to passthesushi for the recipe.

YUMO!!!

Still no pic...except of grandsons

I still have not been able to finish any of the furniture pieces we have been working on either because of the weather or because I have been taking care of my grandsons. Guess which comes first...furniture or grandsons. Right! You're so smart. But I have got to get busy because the flea market where we will be set up is just a little over a month away. But in the meantime here are more pictures of the boys when we were at the park over the weekend.

Going down the slide made his hair stand up. He is just electrifying.