Honduras Missions

Hello, All!

As some of you know, my husband Brandon has been to Honduras on one misisons trip with our church and is going again this coming June. We have raised most of the money, but we still need a little more support. God has been so good to us and now Brandon is going to share that love with others.

Brandon took this photo on last year's trip. I added the Bible verse Psalm 46:10, "Be still and know that I am God." Brandon went out every morning and stood on a bridge watching the sun come up, reading and praying. In this picture is a man in a small boat fishing. The setting is so quiet and serene. Could we even imagine life like that? We are always so busy. Not that that's a bad thing! But God reminds us to take time for Him. He wants us to stop, to be still, and know that He is God, He is in control of everything.

We are offering this photo for a $15 donation to the missions trip. Last year, the group worked with a children's church, helped the kids paint, traveled to churches doing dramas and praying for the congregation, handing out care packages at a children's home and more. Your donation will show someone God's love.
If you would like to see what last year's trip was like, we put together a YouTube video for you to watch. Just search "Honduras 2011 Brandon's Trip."

Thank you and God bless!

Book to Read: Heaven Is For Real

I got the book Heaven Is For Real for Christmas. I read it in a little over 2 hours. It is soooooo good! The little boy in the book left his body during a surgery, spent 3 minutes in heaven, and this book tells of what he remembers.

I am a firm believer in Jesus Christ, and this book, along with countless other stories, confirm the belief that there is life after death. If you accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, you will spend eternity with Him in heaven :) If you do not, there is another place you will go :(

This book is close to my heart as well because the little boy in this book was around 4 years old when he had this experience. My little boy just turned 5. I cried once while reading this book and it was when the mother was holding her little boy in her arms and she looked up at her husband and said, "I think this is it." Boohoo! I couldn't even imagine the heartbreak she went through. God is so good to get us through the unimaginable.

If you have time, read this book. It is so nice to read about Jesus who loves us soooooooooo much :)

Thank You Cards

I make and print my own Thank You cards. I know that there are drug stores and big stores and websites who can do that for you, but I like to make my own. I use Adobe Photoshop Elements for all of my photo creations. I got my copy at a Black Friday sale really cheap.

My favorite card so far is my daughter's 6th birthday Thank You card. I wanted to make sure that I got all of her friends that attended her party onto the card. Family members made it onto the card as well.

I think it is really nice to have such a personal touch to things! :)

Happy 50th Anniversary

My grandparents are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary this year! That is awesome to me. I pray that by the grace of God my husband and I will be able to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary (as long as neither of us goes to meet the Lord before that). I will be 69 years old and he will be 70! I'm looking forward to it!

I took a photography course back in 2006 so I am the family photographer. Because of that, I was put in charge of the photos for the evening. The first thing I had to do was make an invitation. I took my grandparents' wedding photo, scanned it into the computer and made an invitation out of it. I use Adobe Photoshop Elements to make all of my photo creations, and then I order them through my local Sams Club.

It turned out great! The party was a complete surprise and there were so many family and friends who showed up. Congratulations, Mema and Grandaddy!

PARTY BOX!!!

I have a party box! This box holds most things I need to have a party. It is a plastic tub with a lid and it has gift bags, tissue paper, balloons, paper plates, paper cups, streamers, decorations, birthday candles, napkins and tablecloths.

Every time I have a party I put the extras and leftovers into my party box. My daughter had a "Luau" themed birthday one year, so I put all of the leftovers into one gallon size storage bag.

I use gallon and quart size storage bags to keep things organized. I keep all the tissue paper in gallon size bags, napkins in gallon size bags, and candles in quart size bags. I also keep and re-use balloon weights. I haven't bought one of those in years!

I also keep scissors and scotch tape in my box to help with putting up the decorations. It comes in handy to leave a roll of aluminum foil and a box of extra storage bags so you can pack up as you clean up without having to hunt down supplies.

I love my party box! I hope this idea has helped you. May your family be filled with joy and happiness from this day forward! :-)

Babies

Howdy, howdy! I have 2 children. One is 6 years old and the other is 4 years old. When I was pregnant, my friend Carrie gave me a book called Preparation for Parenting by Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo. (www.gfi.org)

As it turns out, I had perfect children! I just needed the book to show me that. I didn't know anything about having babies. I had only heard that they cry all the time and you lose a lot of sleep! Well, not if you use the schedule they have figured out. By six weeks, both of my children were sleeping 12 hours every night with 3 naps during the day and they were the happiest babies you had ever seen. They never cried! But if they did, I knew it wasn't because they were sleepy or hungry. I knew it was probably gas or some other uncomfortable thing going on. I swear by this book. I have bought it for every one of my friends who gets pregnant. The science behind the method is true and the results are remarkable! Even now, my children sleep from 9:00pm - 8:00am. They have always slept in their own bed and we always went and laid them down and they went to sleep on their own. There really is nothing like having perfectly happy babies. It also helps babysitters and family members when they watch the children. I know that I don't like to watch children that I know will be fussy. So I have peace that when I leave my children with someone, they will be perfect angels. Now that they are older, they do have disagreements but they are the best of friends. Seriously, GET THE BOOK! You will be much happier that you did.

Baby Shower!!!

So, my sister is having twins! Yay! She is due in a few months so it is time for me to plan her baby shower! I am so excited about these babies and about helping my sister in any way possible. I looked around in the stores to find some invitations that she might like. They were cute, but there was no way to personalize them. I know that I could have ordered some custom ones off the internet but it was too late for that. So I made these:



Aren't they cute?! I uesd my Adobe Photoshop Elements to create the invitation, then I ordered them from Sams Club. I had the small envelopes so I had to create it in a 3.5"x6" size so they would fit in the envelopes. Then I had to place them on a 4"x6" photo so I could order them. They are photos that I cut the extra .5" off of. I got 30 of these for $5.00. Talk about a good deal!
I wanted to add a little something extra so I looked for stickers to go on the top. Not the regular stickers, but the scrapbook stickers that stick up a little. I looked at Michaels and Hobby Lobby but all of theirs were too expensive and too big. Once again, I ended up at Walmart. I'm not crazy about Walmart but sometimes they have exactly what I'm looking for. I found a page of 34 baby stickers just the right size for $1.00. So I bought 3 packs and let my kids play with the extra ones.
I love doing these kind of things! And, congratulations to my sister! She's gonna be a great mother!