should be...

I should be chopping celery and onions and making cranberry sauce but I got a bit distracted. Two of my friends just had momentous birthdays. They both live far away so I had to send a special card.

The inside of the card says..."looks good on you! Happy Birthday!" These were so easy to make that I got a little carried away. I always liked spelling in school, using chipboard letters makes it even more fun.

I have a zillion more ideas: happy, sweet, jingle, ho ho ho....but I must get back to work on more pressing matters. If you're wanting a quick card this holiday go to Joann's and pick up these:Even though the box says "Christmas", the colors could be used anytime of the year. If you use your 40% off coupon, you've really got a good deal. I used chipboard letters and scraps of paper to add some more fun. Have fun creating. Oh and have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Praise!

Can't believe that Thanksgiving is this week! I've been busy here doing all the pre-holiday stuff that you are doing there. Grocery shopping, cleaning, washing sheets, choosing the best looking towels for our company, hiding piles that I don't want to deal with and baking. We put "The Beast" to sleep for the winter. The leaves are all up until next spring's clean up! I attended a baby shower this weekend and we had a wonderful dinner with some friends who are visiting in the area! I also got a neat answer to prayer this weekend.

Last spring, John and I got a new mattress and box spring for our bed. We moved our old mattress and box spring into the guest room, where we'd previously had a full size bed. I love the headboard that we have in there because it was my grandma's from when she was a young newlywed, so we decided to use it and the mattress and box spring just sat on the floor in front of the headboard. But I really wanted a queen bedframe to get the mattress and box spring off the floor. So, this summer, I prayed and asked the Lord to bless us with a queen bedframe. I really didn't want to spend money on one, I know people are always trying to get rid of stuff like that. I just didn't know anyone who had one. So I kept praying on and off about this bed frame. I checked Craig's list, I looked on ebay for our area, I drove slowly by yard sales scanning for one all summer long but,...nothing. I really wanted one for this upcoming weekend when our close friends would be coming to visit. Last week, as I was talking to the Lord, I told Him that I knew He wanted to bless us with a bedframe and it would be really great for Him to bless us with it soon! You know, time was ticking away. Well, Friday and Saturday went by in a blur and I really meant to go by a mattress place and check out what kind of bedframes they had, but I just never got around to it. Then on Sunday, my neighbor brought me over some material to make her son some Lounge Pants for Christmas (I know...I know) and we got to talking and for "some reason" I asked her if she happened to have a queen bedframe she might be looking to get rid of. Her mouth dropped open and she asked me if I was joking? I assured her that I wasn't and asked why she thought I would joke about something so random. She said, "We have one on our side porch laying there ready to go to Good Will." You could have knocked me over with a wet noodle. Can you believe it?! I screamed and told her my whole prayer saga and she cracked up! She was certain I had seen it laying on their porch and that I was just teasing her, that's why she thought I was joking. So, Sunday, John walked across the street and picked up the answer to my summer prayer! (for free!) Isn't God so good!!

Lest you think my house is perfectly neat and tidy, here's a shot of the other end of the bed...

be a blessing

It's better to give than to receive...right? Well, here's your opportunity to be a blessing. Kathy at Irisheyes Knitting Blog is asking knitters to knit some pretty hats to bless the less fortunate in the Illinois area for this winter. I read about it over at Wool Windings. You can read Kathy's original post with all the details here. I think this is a great idea. Whenever we have the opportunity to bless someone else, we should. I know that my house is overflowing with hats and gloves and scarves. Some I've made, some have been made by friends and some are purchased...but no matter, we have plenty. I knit this hat a little while ago and I'm so excited to know that it will be going to someone who will really be able to enjoy it. This hat is one of my favorite hats to knit for gifts. It looks great on everybody and the novelty yarn in the brim really is fun. It's called Dory's hat and the pattern was written by Toni Minkel, a local knitter from my area. I used Aussi wool in Misty Blue and combined that with Bernat's Bling Bling for the brim! So, maybe you have an extra hand knit hat that you worked up just in case...or quite possibly some extra stash yarn just screaming to be knit into a hat! If so, I encourage you to join in the fun of giving and be a blessing to someone!

a souper day

Sunday my little guy had a fever. He just didn't feel like eating much of anything. Yesterday his fever was gone and his appetite was kicking back into gear but he still wasn't totally back to normal. It was a cold, gray day and soup seemed in order. I knew the crowd would love Chicken Noodle, but I wanted some Pumpkin Curry soup. (I'd had it at my mom's church's Thanksgiving Tea and I craved more) So. I made both. My mother-in-law who lives in an apartment off the main house loves Pumpkin soup so I knew she'd enjoy that as well. They were both big hits! Chicken Noodle Soup

Cook chicken in a pot of water until it falls off the bones. (I cooked 3 breasts and used the extra chicken for chicken salad). Remove the chicken, so it can cool and you can debone it. To the chicken stock add, 1/2 cup each: chopped celery, onion, carrots and parsley. Add 1 clove of minced garlic and 1 packet of chicken broth boullion. When the vegetables are soft, bring your soup to a boil and add your egg noodles. Cook noodles according to the package directions. Add the shredded cooked chicken and season with salt and pepper! Yum!

Pumpkin Curry Soup

Melt 2 Tablespoons of butter in large saucepan over medium high heat. Add 1 cup chopped onion and 2 minced garlic cloves. Stir frequently for 2-3 minutes. Stir in 1 1/2 teaspoons of curry powder, 1/2 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper. To this, add 3 cups chicken broth, and 1 15oz. can of solid pack pumpkin. Bring to a boil and then reduce to low. Cook, stirring occasionally for 15-20 minutes. Stir in 1 12oz can of evaporated milk. Transfer the mixture to a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. Serve warm with a dollop of sour cream. Delicious!

Now, those soups were delicious and they really hit the spot, but the thing that truly made this a super day was this note my little guy gave me. He knows how to make my day! I hope your day is a souper, super day too!

my purpose

We've been studying the shorter catechisms as a family this year. Don't freak out on me, catechism is just a fancy word that involves teaching with questions and answers. You do it all the time...When you're at the dinner table and your little one asks for dessert before he's eaten all his vegetables, you say, "When are you allowed to have dessert?" and he (hopefully) responds, "I can have dessert when I eat all my vegetables." That's what catechism is...a question and then an answer. Our goal in teaching with the catechisms is to learn foundational truths and have basic Biblical truths instilled in our children. If we don't purposely teach our children what a Biblical Worldview is, they will develop a worldview on their own. We really want to make sure that the worldview that they take with them is a Biblical one. So we've been working through the shorter catechisms talking about them and learning them as a family. The first question is "What is man's primary purpose?" The answer. "Man's primary purpose is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever." That's been rolling around in my head for weeks now and it has been life changing. You see, I don't have to try to be something I'm not in order to fulfill my primary purpose. That's so easy to think when you compare yourself to others. But the fact is, I just need to glorify God - (take every opportunity I have to acknowledge Him and give Him the praise and honor He is so worthy of in my life) and enjoy Him - that's the part I kept skipping. I was so busy doing for Him and for my family; checking things off my lists that I missed the "enjoying Him" part. I was missing my primary purpose and I was focusing on those things that should be secondary. I saw this truth when we went to the zoo on Monday. John took off work and we all took a field trip to the National Zoo. We took the Metro down. It was a great time to go, the temps were cool but not too cold and the crowds were non-existent. The animals were out playing and gave us some really good shows. But what I noticed was that we enjoyed the animals because they were doing what animals were supposed to do. They were just being what they were created to be. I think God gets that same kind of pleasure from us when we are doing what we were created to do - when we glorify Him and enjoy Him. Those two things are so much easier for me to attempt each day than the list I had in my mind prior to learning what my primary purpose was.

So enjoy your weekend and make yourself a new to do list: 1. glorify 2. enjoy! oh and 3. laundry

ready

Baby hats are not nearly as fun to photograph as babies in hats. But I have no baby to model this baby hat. I don't even know of any little babies to borrow. Thus the empty hat. Soon however there will be a baby. not mine. A friend at church is pregnant with her first. They are telling her that she is having a boy. She and her husband have already picked out a darling name. Samuel. (I am partial to the name, Samuel.) Anyways, there's a shower for her in a week or so and I am ready. I knit the Simple Baby Hat from Itty Bitty Hats by Susan B. Anderson. It was a quick knit and a lot of fun. I modified the top in order to do the knot. I'm really happy with how it turned out. The other part of my gift is this book. It's a great one for any parent to have. I use my copy everyday.

The nitty gritty:

Pattern: Simple Baby Hat by Susan B. Anderson

Needles: size 7

Yarn: Tahki Cotton Classic in lime, baby boy blue and white

(I just used some from my stash...it really didn't take much at all)

Mods: I added stripes as I knit to add some variety. When I got down to the last 9 stitiches in my decreases, instead of pulling the yarn through, I kept knitting for about 3 1/2 inches. I then pulled my yarn through the stitches and secured it. Finally, I tied the knot. It kinda reminds me of an outie belly button.

Oh, and just in case Samuel turns out to be Sami I've got a back up! You can check out the specifics on my Ravelry page.

forecast: 100% chance of leaves

We have a lot of leaves here...

See what I mean? That's just the back corner of our yard. The rest of it looks exactly the same. Brown everywhere. It's a sea of cruchiness. Every weekend until the first snow we will be getting up the leaves. It's a never ending battle until the last leaf drops. Thank goodness we have "The Beast". It sucks up the leaves and turns them into leaf mulch.

My guy drives "The Beast" around the yard sucking up the leaves in his path. I use the blower and blow them out of all the beds and into the yard so he can mow over them and vacum them up. The kids help empty "The Beast" and they kick the leaves out into the woods our neighbor lets us use. Everyone helps. I crack up when some of my friends complain about how many bags of leaves they raked.

It takes most of a Saturday to finish the yard. When we're done we're wiped!

So today, after church I made some homemade chocolate chip cookies. Everyone needed a treat. This is my mom's recipe. I grew up eating these cookies and I still love them. She puts chopped walnuts in hers....my crew likes them minus the walnuts. We watched football and enjoyed munching on cookies! Warm cookies and cold milk! Two of my favorite things.

Oh, and when we looked out the window. This is what we saw.... no joke! They're coming down like snow.

change you can believe in

Barak Obama can't bring it. Neither can John McCain. If we are really getting down to it, no one is able to bring the change that makes any lasting difference. Except the Lord. I have been thinking about this all week long. To have any change effective and lasting it must happen in our hearts and in us as individuals. "Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Phil 1:6. No matter what your political leanings or how you feel about the outcome of the election, our hope is not in man. "Our hope comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth." Psalm 121:2 "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure." Hebrews 6:19 When we allow Him to work in us and rework us that is when real change occurs. That's change you can believe in. He's promised it...you can believe it.

mystery socks solved

I finished my mystery socks! yeah! These are the first pair of socks I've knit. This summer I did knit a pair of pedi socks... they went much faster than these. I'm still not sure how I feel about the whole knitting of socks. Perhaps if I had dainty size 6 feet I might feel differently about knitting socks. I learned a lot though and I did love the pattern. Taking it in chunks each week was a great way to do it. I also liked that I was working on both socks at the same time...not sure I would have finished #2 otherwise! Thanks Kirsten! I will definitely be wearing these socks. a lot. They were too much work to sit in my sock drawer! They are comfy and I like the fit...I also love the colors in this yarn. It's Sock Hop from Dancing Leaf Farm. Dalis is right up the road from me....dangerous stuff in her shop.


Thanks to Maggie for taking such great shots...we got our posing ideas from Tiennie! Isn't it funny how everyone's socks turned out so differently? I love that!

go now!

If you haven't voted...step away from the computer screen and go. Go now! (use the bathroom first...the lines might be long) Let your voice be heard. We are so blessed in our country to be able to participate in the election process. (don't talk to me about the electoral college and how that all translates) Others have fought hard for the opportunity for you to cast your vote. Help your neighbor to vote by watching her kids so she can cast her vote. See if anyone near you needs a ride to the polls. Do what you can where you are. And remember when it's all done and the votes are being counted, this fact will never change: "and the government will be on His shoulders. And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." Isaiah 9:6b





"Leadership (the king's heart) is a channel of water controlled by God; He directs it to whatever ends He chooses." Proverbs 21:1
You can get your "I voted" button here.

hello november

How did we end up in November? October went by in a blur. The weather man said that this weekend the autumn colors would be at their peak. He sure was right...it's been glorious. But somehow in the midst of all this beauty, I totally missed October slipping by. It's easy to be distracted by such outrageous displays of God's handiwork. Perhaps that really isn't a distraction at all....

Anyways, yesterday morning, I realized that because it was already November, I was late with my monthly quote gift. Let me explain...this year for two of my friend's birthdays I gave them a quote holder and the promise of quotes all year long. The quote holder is one of those huge wooden clothespins. They can clip the quote in their clothespin holder and display it throughout the month. So each month I make them a quote to display in their quote holder. Usually the quotes are seasonal and I get them in the mail before the next month begins. I am late this month. Sorry guys! The quotes are going in the mail today. Here's the quote you are getting for November:

And because we're heading into a busy time of year, I went ahead and did December's too. So depending on how you look at it, I'm either late or ahead of schedule.

It's been a fun gift to give. (It would make a great Christmas gift if you're starting to think about people on your gift list) I hope they've enjoyed it as much as I have. Here's a couple of the other quotes that have been sprinkled throughout the year. (Thanks Kristyn for taking these pictures for me! Love you girl!)