:MeRrY ChRiStMaS:

MeRrY ChRiStMaS

The tree is trimmed, the stockings hung, presents wrapped, birthday cake made... It's time for the celebration of our Savior's birth. Roderick and I are looking forward to enjoying a Christmas celebration with just the two of us this year. However, the Lord has worked it out for us to go home to Colorado later. We both wish you a very Merry Christmas. May you have a very joyous time celebrating with family and friends.

I'll leave you with our favorite

Christmas carol this season...

When Love Came Down To Earth

Stuart Townsend

When love came down to earth

And made His home with men,

The hopeless found a hope,

The sinner found a friend.

Not to the powerful

But to the poor He came,

And humble, hungry hearts

Were satisfied again.

What joy, what peace has come to us!

What hope, what help, what love!

When every unclean thought,

And every sinful deed

Was scourged upon His back

And hammered through His feet.

The Innocent is cursed,

The guilty are released;

The punishment of God

On God has brought me peace.

Come lay your heavy load

Down at the Master's feet;

Your shame will be removed,

Your joy will be complete.

Come crucify your pride,

And enter as a child;

For those who bow down low

He'll lift up to His side.

Christmas Tour of Homes

ChRiStmAs ToUr oF hOmEs

Here's a little tour of our home all ready for the holidays. This year in lu of a wordy post, I decided to do picture post and save us both some time! Hope you enjoy!

As I mentioned in my last post I hope that you are finding ways to remember the true meaning of the season. (Well, actually every season!) Jesus Christ - a perfect God in human form- humbled himself and became a slave for us. (Phil. 2) He did not stay a baby. He came for the express reason of dying a horrible death on the cross to save US from our own depravity. However, he is no longer dead, he rose from the grave and is currently at the right hand of God!

I was reminded on Sunday that we can reflect in the wonderful gift of salvation in all the sparkling lights of the season. John 1 tells us that Jesus was the light of men. He came as a light into the world so that everyone who believes in Him would not remain in darkness. (John 12:46)

If you are visiting from the Nester's Christmas Tour of Homes, be sure to leave a comment telling me where you are from. I'd love to see how visitors I have from different states. Plus I've decided since there are SO many different homes to pick from I'll just visit the "homes" of my visitors. =)

These are calling my name....

I'm not sure why, but these M&M's are calling my name. I've eaten way too many of them. I'm usually not a huge fan of candy. It typically sits around my house for WAY too long uneaten. At one point about 2 weeks ago the container held 2 bags. I'd venture to say it holds about half of that now. I've eaten almost a bag worth! WOW!!

I thought the color of these little wonders would add to my decorations this year and be a nice touch for visitors. The fact that I could get a whole bag for $1 made them seem like the perfect choice for a candy dish. However, I think it's about time that I use them in monster cookies. That way I can give them away rather than eating the entire container myself! I want to try to avoid gaining the 9 lbs. Pastor Dan said the average American gains between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

What is wonderful treat is calling your name?

:Polka dots: Lime Green: Red: Korker ribbon: Love:

Christmas tree last year....

This year's Christmas tree...

We decided to change up the colors of the tree a little bit. The inspiration....

... made for one of the craft fairs last year. This one did not sell, but that's okay it looks great on our tree! Who knew last year as I was planning the new tree in my mind that the look would be so popular this year. I've tried to severely limit my purchasing and only use what I have on hand. It's been hard because there is some extremely cute lime green/red stuff out this year. (Even some really cute polka dotted stuff!). I've made it for the most part and only have new things that were purchased from garage sales or I receive as gifts.

We really had fun making the korker ribbon accessories. Korker isn't just for little girls hair. It's for big girls trees! I created them in my mind for this tree last year, even went as far as purchasing all the supplies, but didn't get to until we were actually decorating. Around here we don't refer to them as Korker ribbons though, they've been dubbed "dingle hoppers." I think they add so much to the tree. I think they are my favorite part.... or maybe my favorite is all the little words like Joy, Hope, Peace, Noel scattered throughout the tree or..... I guess I just love it all!

Hope you are enjoying this Christmas season and remembering to celebrate the reason for the season. All the colors and decor are fun, but the true gift is Jesus Christ coming as a babe -perfect God in human form - to save us rotten sinners from ourselves and our depravity. What an amazing gift!

Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

... in the house at least.

Here's a look outside today...

Definitely a no coat kind of day. I guess I'll just have to listen to songs about having a white Christmas without experiencing one.

It was SO nice having my parents here for the last 10 days! It is a ton more fun to decorate with someone else. They left today and although I see their handiwork everywhere.... on the computer that has been updated, "cleaned" etc by my Dad, the curtains and pillows my mom taught me how to sew in our bedroom, the Christmas music that has been loaded painstakingly into the computer by my dad is playing, the decorations in every room that Mom and I did together are sparkling.... however I'm certainly missing my parents presence and company tonight. Mom and Dad come back right now... before this keyboard is drowned by tears!

A Great Reminder

A visit from Grandma and Grandpa

A couple of weeks ago, my Grandparents were in town. (Okay, maybe it wasn't a couple of weeks ago. I think its almost a month ago now! WOW, time sure does fly by.) We had so much fun together, even though they were only here for the weekend. They are from Oregon, so I was so surprised when I got the call that they were coming to "my neck of the woods." They had never been out "East" so they decided to take a bus tour starting in Philadelphia and going up into Canada. They rode the bus for 2 weeks and it seems they had a blast from all the stories they told. I'm so glad they decided to stay a little longer and visit me in Virginia! They also took the extra week to do a little touring. They went back to visit Washington DC and New York City on their own. They even took tour of the White House and went to see Phantom of the Opera in NYC.

Here's the highlights of the trip according to Grandma:

1.) Seeing my Number 1 Granddaughter. (Lest my sisters get mad... I'm their first grandchild so although they don't have a favorite, but I'll always be the Number 1 grandchild! )

2.) Niagara Falls

3.) New York City (Grandma was so surprised this made it into the top three. She's not fond of big cities and was VERY leery of going even after going through it on the tour bus. But she loved it!!!)

4.) .................................................................................................................................................

While they were here we took them out to our favorite local restaurants, 3 Amigos and Chesapeake Pizza. We also took them to the beach and our favorite Starbucks along the boardwalk. Unfortunately it was dark by the time we got there, as we neglected to consider the fact that it was time change Sunday! They still got to see some of the sites and we all enjoyed some Starbucks.

Now that they have a taste of our side of the country I think its going to be easier to convince them to come out here. Grandma was already talking about a return visit!! (Yeah!!!)

Grandpa takes his first taste of Starbucks....EVER!

I guess he liked it! It's only fitting that we introduced Grandpa to the treat. I did the same with Grandma several years ago and she's LOVED Starbucks Strawberry Cream Frappuccinos ever since!

Grandma and Grandpa thanks for visiting us and come back soon!!

Recent Projects

I've been busy painting and crafting recently. It is so much fun to put scripture around the house, give gifts to friends and even sell your creations! Sometimes I do need a little "kick" to get started though. I recently got that "kick" in the way of a craft show. Last year you may remember Melody and I made wreaths....this year we are still selling them! We decided to only do one "show" this year and we prayed diligently that the Lord would sell our wares. We left with nine wreaths and returned with only three. Thank you Lord! Ironically the three were the ones that we thought were the best and would sell first! One of the wreaths has been my absolute favorite from the start...so it's mine now! The other two, the two blue elegant ones, will be put on Craigslist to hopefully find a new home before Christmas!

We decided to add a few other craft items this time. I made up some chunky crayons and even did a few paintings. I thought I'd see if they sold after several friends thought I should. I really wasn't expecting much, but they all sold! Of course they were only 8 x 10's and I did price to sell!

Long Awaited Update

Okay, that was by far the longest hiatus I have taken from the blog since I started it. Almost 6 months! I find that one of my last saved drafts to post was a Resurrection day one! Wow, guess I won't be posting that one! (AND I've had this post in the works since August!!!) Life has been busy, but not overly so. I'm not quite sure why I've been neglecting to post. Maybe it's that I spend so much time looking at all the "saving money" blogs and their plethora of posts that I decide I'm tired of staring at the computer. (Yes, I am still into coupons and getting the savings! That's definitely another post or a bunch of posts! =) ) So, in lu of trying to recall everything we did during the past few months I decided to give a picture overview. I'm almost to the point where I'm wondering if it's worth it, but I guess I'll post this anyway. Hope you enjoy...the few of you who still check this blog. (Thanks Mom for not giving up on me.... I see lots of regular visits to my sadly neglected blog that have surely ended in disappointment!)

April

Beautiful Spring Azaleas

Our first trip to the beach this year!

Ice cream at Bruster's!

Trip to NC for a nice get-away! This one's for Bruce - Roderick's Step-Dad North Carolina farmer's market. We got some great Lemon Chess Pie here! I certainly would have picked up more had we not been so far from home. We got "lost" one day while we were in Raleigh, NC and we found a On the Border. This is one of our favorite restaurants in Colorado so we just had to go there. Thankfully we hadn't eaten dinner. Boy, was it a nice treat!

May

"Sunshine" Flowers from my wonderful husband!

Another trip to the beach.

June

Beautiful hydrangea's at the Davey/Estes wedding.

They had quite the spread!

My birthday celebration Roderick picked up the best ice cream cake from Coldstone! Can you guess how old I am?? Yet another trip to the beach!

July Our treat for the 4th of July Bake-off. We didn't win, but we certainly had fun making these together. We never get to work together in the kitchen. We ended up making them again for Roderick's Birthday treat in September, but I never got a picture.

Our second anniversary. We ate at a Steak and Lobster house in Richmond. It was okay, but I think we'll stick to our tradition of going to the Melting Pot next year!

Very nice outdoor mall near where we ate dinner. I've never been to one like it before. So nice! I'd certainly go back. We also went and saw a 3D movie for our anniversary. Our first and only full tomato of the season. Boy was it good! I'm going to try again next year and hope for a better harvest! AUGUST Another beach trip... this time to Sandbridge.

I'm sure there's lots more, but this will have to do for now. I still need to add pictures of our vacations to DC and Aruba in October, but I'll save that for another day and another post. Hopefully it won't take me another 2 months to get back. I'm no longer working so I shouldn't have any excuse!