Fall fair 2010

[Green shirt photo] we just told him that we're going to the fair

Tuesday Photo

October fun cookies!!!!

Halloween Frame..DIY..small fun project

My remake of a cheap Ikea frame. This is our Frame for our October crafts...I have a full list of crafts for K and I to do for the month. Yes, daily craft projects. Have to have some art in our life.

Anyways each week I change out the list for the current weeks crafts. Even though I have a master list this just makes a cute way to list our list for the week that makes it really easy to see which craft I need to set up 1st thing in the morning.

Make your own

Supplies

Cheap frame

mod podge

glitter (I used Martha Stewart's fine glitter)

Ribbon

Scrapbook paper

wooden character

glue (tacky glue)

hairspray

Stamps if you want

ink pad or stamp markers or washable markers also work

Step one the frame take out the glass and paint the frame with mod podge and cover in glitter shake off and let DRY.

Step two repeat step one this should fully cover the frame

Step three spray with hairspray to hold glitter in place..works pretty good at keeping the glitter in place and not all over your house.

Step four cut scrapbook paper to fit the frame

Step five mod podge on ribbon around the sides

Step six put the wooden character on the frame and let dry

Step seven put the frame back together and now your DONE..

Enjoy :o)

Weekly Menu

Monday - Lasagna, Green Beans, Garlic bread
Tuesday - BBQed Chicken, Potato Salad, mix veggies
Wednesday - Homemade Pizza, Salad
Thursday - Homemade Chili, corn bread
Friday - Steak, Baked potatoes, Corn
Saturday -Hamburgers, baked beans, corn on the cob
Sunday - Make your own omelets night

New Bed

K got a new bed with trundle.

His pillow case are in the wash so he had mama's pillows on there. He has the fire truck theme happening in his room.

He's loving the new bed so this is one HAPPY mama :o)

Sorry Been a BAD blogger

WOW! it's been a LONG time since I've posted on here. Things became crazy over the summer break. K finished Kindergarten right on track on everything besides for Math and he finished the year already finishing the 1st book of 1st grade Math. He's a Math nut yet he still at times will say he doesn't know something even when you know he knows it. We are working on his self confidence. He's like his mom and well it's not always the best way. What I mean by that is I have a hard time showing something/saying something if I'm not 100% sure it's correct or perfect in the gymnastics world. Yeah I know not the best place but I have gotten so much better about it esp. when working with K. I saw this trait right from the early years. He never pushed up to all fours to crawl and do that whole rocking thing. He pushed up only when he was ready to roll. One day at his Aunt Leslie's apt he pushed up and crawled away fast making it into 2 rooms before we got him...note wasn't a huge place but he was GONE just like that. The same thing happened with walking he stood up and was just a pace shy of running (that was a week later). So yes he showed the trait from a young age.

Both Isaac and I enjoyed our 30th birthdays. One of us was bummed about it and the other was out right excited to start a new chapter in life. Isaac I planned a secret trip to a resort that had a water park right on the grounds, Dinner (Joes crab shack) and cake and Beer of his choice (I don't drink so I guess it's always beer of his choice). We had a ton of fun floating in the lazy river, watching K play in the pools and watching Isaac go on the water slides oh yes and relaxing next to the pool laying out. For my Birthday getaway we spent it at Disney World (Hollywood/Magic) and had my dinner at one of my favorite quick eats (Pei Wei) and then shopping at the outlet mall but it was so HOT that I had a headache so cut it short and went home. We had some scary moments but test where done and everything was PERFECT. We found the most amazing doctor for the family so in the long run a huge fear that was had is being worked on. God is good he knew what needed to be done to kick the fear even through it was scary. We were never alone and we felt that.

Now things at the home front are starting to settle down and get back to normal. for no reason that I am aware of I am suddenly deep cleaning all the nook and cranny's. Some call it nesting but what am I nesting for??? We are heart ready is it gods timing now??? I'm not sure but each and every day that goes by we start to feel more and more ready to move fwd in the process of bring home a brother/sister for K. Right now we can only have a boy unless it's a baby as we only have a teeny tiny house with 2 bedrooms but a room that could be converted if our landlord would allow (which there is a chance she LOVES US). She even came in and sat with us when the medics/fire dept was at the house doing all the vitals. Yeah scary stuff.

Well that pretty much sums up the summer for us. School just started after our month off summer break and it's going pretty well. I will start updating the school page shortly I am currently having a designer design our page to fit our school program.

Hugs to all

Testing out windows live

This is just a test.  I am setting up windows live and seeing how this works for writing on my blog

Garden Update

Week 5

We have little corns in the making

Look I see something RED

Our Texas sweet onions are getting big.

See ya next week

When 1 gets bored

They make

CUPCAKES..Red Velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting

Garden Update

Week 4

Things are coming along.

How many tomatoes can you find??

Our Corn..it's coming along

Leaf bunching the start of a cauliflower head

And here is the Orange tree with it's new buddy. K wanted to plant a seed as well. Well that seed didn't seem like it was going to sprout. Well last week it finally did. Only took the 2nd seed 3 weeks to figure out what it wanted to do. Next week The trees will say good-bye to each other as I need to get the 2nd tree it's own pot now. The neat thing is that both seeds came from the same orange and yet they are growing differently. Should be fun to watch over the years.

Garden Update

Another update. Things are growing and growing and growing. K is have a blast learning about where food comes from. We just planted some carrot seeds in the far back corner so watch out for carrot sprouts in the next update.

And we have fruit...We hope to get more but if not 3 works for us.

And here is our orange tree..look over to the new sprout that K wanted to plant. Going to have to pull out another container and move it over so it'll have it's own seeding pot. Our Orange is 3 wks old. seedling is days old. sprouted yesterday

*Seedlings are doing well. Getting ready for transplant into bigger pots for the next 3 weeks of indoor growing time. in 2 weeks we will start the Harding them off to go outside full time. Wish me luck for a nice crop of tomatoes,cucumbers (lost most from them from a dropped lid)

and Peppers

I'm reading...

I am reading this. Not because K is bad because I want to learn more as a parent. I firmly believe that a parent should always want to learn so that we can approve on our parenting skills. One thing I know for sure is that with a growing child that no 2 days are the same. With knowing that I want to keep learning for K and our future children and future grandchildren etc..

Sometimes we call it a night

Sometimes things just don't get picked up at the end of the night.

(I haven't taught our pooch to put away her toys yet)

Getting REAL with Love times two

Garden update

Look how things are growing.....

The cucumbers have been moved to larger pots..

4 more weeks for the cucumbers, peppers & tomatoes (below) and they will start the move into the garden.

The orange tree is growing..1 full week sprouted

Things are growing. Onions now have a 3rd leaf growing, everything else is just getting bigger

My point of view..touchy subject read with an open mind

Isaac and I were talking money tonight and we started talking about the difference of living paycheck to paycheck and we both agree that it's a choice of lifestyle. In both situations there are choices that YOU have to make for your money. Your money is just that YOUR money and you have to tell your money where you want it to go. Do you really need those sports channels? is it a want? so many people these days aren't connected to the difference of WANT and NEEDS. I know the past 5 years have been a huge learning experience for us but the last 2 years were a true wake up call when hubs job was threatened. It was the 1st time when we we're thankful for our choices that we made the 3 years prior. We didn't have a ton saved and lots of prayer but we had enough to keep us from not drowning. We had to start all over again but even when we had unemployment we set aside something. Yeah maybe it was $10 a week but it was a start. I am happy to say that we are past what we had back at the start in savings that helped us make it through our 1.5 years worth of FURLOUGHS. We are because we Choose to live paycheck to paycheck with our savings being 1 of our bills..........................................



There is a difference between living paycheck to paycheck... Let me explain there is a HAVE to and then there is a CHOICE to.

Now these are my thoughts and only my thoughts................OK Hubs as well.................

Living paycheck to paycheck because you have to = your bills are MAXED out or your living a lavish lifestyle for your income. Now don't get me wrong there are times when things pop up and we have to live paycheck to paycheck (illness/unemployment) because we have to but there better come some downgrades in some of the WANTS so you can lower your bills to income ratio.

Living paycheck to paycheck by choice = Basically living with a budget that includes setting money into a savings fund for emergency but never touching the emergency unless it is truly an emergency. And No going out to dinner or buying those cute shoes are NOT an emergency.

But do make sure to include an spending allowance even for the adults. Hubs and I are not ashamed to admit that we both have allowances

Garden Update

Just another update on the garden

Week 3 for seedlings

And here is our New growth..What do you think it is???
Yup your right it's an Orange tree sprout

Here is the garden right after I got the 1st of the plants in. More have since gone in; you'll see in the next updated photo

Getting ready for the garden

Check out our seedlings

Week 1

Week 2

Well the garden bug hit me last year but it was late in the season to really plant much. So this year I had a little more planning but I still got my seeds started a couple weeks later then I wanted to. You see FLORIDA got insanely cold this winter and so I waited until we had at least 2 weeks of warm weather before I got the seeds started. So what's the problem your planting inside to start. Well our heaters in this house are not the greatest so we had a ton of bundling going on for months until the cold vanished. Well it finally did and now we have our little seedlings.

Yes I start my seeds in egg flat cartons. I find it easy to start them and then I can just tear off each pod and plant them. I will pot plant these in about 2 more weeks (4 weeks) and give them some more room and makes it easier to hard them off for planting outside. WISH me luck that we'll get something from all this work.






in this bunch we have Cucumber, Peppers and Tomatoes

Look who lost a tooth

His FIRST tooth that is.

Chill'n out showing off his NEW smile in my sunglasses

Showing off his cash from the tooth fairy.

K your growing up so fast but each and every day you make mama and daddy so proud of who you are. We love you KK.

Dog + short fence = TALL FENCE INSTALL

Well since Bella can jump the fence we thought now would be a good time to get that fence up for safety for K and also Bells at the same time keep the two of them out of our garden. More on the garden later.

This was going to be a weekend project but due to a rain storm that lasted FOREVER (hours) we had 1 day to get the post set before the storm and then it was wait time until we could move on. Finally Monday once hubs got home from work he got busy with K finishing the fence. Enjoy!

*Fence was in the plans before this just hadn't gotten around to it yet. As the side yard was turning into our garden space <-- Watch out for garden updates

DIY project..Simple and cheap

On a trip to IKea I found this paper roll holder for $5.99. Which I thought would be perfect for K. So I grabbed it and added it into our school area. Well as time went on I thought I wanted to paint this and add it to his desk. So on a trip to the hardware store I picked up some paint and got busy.

Before

I grabbed a can of Krylon spray paint (Satin Oxford Blue) $2.25 and got to work on the project. This spray paint works awesome. Dries fast and was easy to control the spray.
Now this paper roll holder finds it's new home on K's desk. Now next project PAINT K's room as part of his room makeover

AFTER

At our house

Things got really nuts in December but it's a new year and now we are making more changes in our home. Growing every day brings changes to our life always.

This blog being one of the things changing...
I am going to start blogging books I am reading and my thoughts
Religion
Parenting
homeschooling
Being Frugal by CHOICE
Projects (crafts, home decor)
Gardening
Baking/Cooking
Family events
and the list goes on. Look forward to sharing with you OUR TRUE LIFE.

Making Soup.. Split Pea

Making Split Pea soup for the 1st time. So part of our life changes that has been going on in our home now for about 6 months involves eating better. Now don't get me wrong we have never been the people who just open up a box of chicken nuggets and toss them in the oven not happening at our house. Just not my thing to do that. I was the to be mom (years before K came) vowed to feed our babe healthy and smart from the start. From years in gymnastics I just grew up watching what I ate until a few years ago and then stopped. Well after thinking about things and feeling unhappy about food I figured out my problem was I wasn't eating what my body needed. I was eating more fat then I was used to and not really thinking about it. Now I still made our meals just didn't think much about it like looking at it from a pyramid point of view. Now K was a different story I have always kept up with his calorie needs for his proper growth. Well now it was time to get the whole family eating better again and knowing what we are putting in our bodies and knowing that we are feeding ourselves with what our bodies need verses eating food just because it's dinner. So we are becoming one with our food. Yeah that sounds weird but it's true we are what we put in our bodies. So here goes with Photo's one of my favorite dishes.

Yes I will post more as I think about it but not going to be a weekly thing.

I started with going to whole foods to gather my Organic Split peas but I forgot to look at how much Pea's I was going to need. Yes I ended up getting more then needed but I have since made this again.
I had the hubs chopping a bag of organic whole carrots and celery and onion while I put in the chicken broth, water and tossing in leafs. Use whatever leafs you have for an outdoors flavor if you like but I used Bay leafs. a little of marjoram and added the pea's and tossed in the Ham bone. put the lid on and let the cooker do it's thing.

The Start


About 3 hours of cooking..almost done

in my bowl about to be enjoyed. I LOVE ground pepper in mine so added a loveable dash.

my bowl above is a serving of this dish (300 calories) it's really thick and filling.

K and Hubs enjoyed the dish with grilled cheese. Don't have a photo but it was Bread sprayed with olive oil lightly and then a thin slice of cheese (2 oz) and grilled and cut in half (363 calories)

Total cost per serving
SOUP $0.87 Cents <-- That's with using 75% of organic things
Grilled Cheese $0.13 Cents <-- whole wheat made from scratch bread non-organic block cheese and oil

Disney PARKS Christmas Parade 2009

We we're blessed to receive tickets to such a special event. The event was to be filmed inside the park but due to weather conditions filming was moved indoors. So we hopped onto the Monorail and went to the grand Floridian resort for the filming of??? Look below to see who we had the privilege to see perform. We got to the hotel and we went up a couple of floors as K can become restless so this gave him a little room to play while waiting. We we're entertained by a some Disney staff until the performer was ready to film. Nick Cannon walked right past us heading down stairs to do his intro for the mystery guest (Not a mystery for us we knew who was performing). This event was a great learning event for K to take part of. There was a TON of questions mainly on the cameras that we're used. K had a great time. OK enough said hope you enjoy our photo's of this special event.











After we watched the filming we jetted off for a fun filled day at Disney World. Yes even in the rain as it sure did RAIN. We came prepared for the rain. Change of clothes, umbrellas and tarp things to wear..Ponchos I think is what they are called. Felt like a trash bag with a hood if you ask me. Even in the rain we had fun. Alot of rides are inside. We did hit some of the wet ones but fun was had by all. At the end of the night we stopped at the bakery and had a huge cinnamon roll (will put cinnabon to shame) $3.95 and a large cookie $1.95 to warm up a little bit before heading out to find our car way out in the Pluto Lot. OK well enjoy some of our photo's from the end of our day at WDW.



Yes I know the photo is blurry but was taken while spinning in a teacup and you can see the enjoyment on K's face