Pumpkin Carving

 I love fall.  The beautiful colors of leaves, crisp air, apple cider, pumpkins & the excitement on the 'lilbucks faces when they talk about what they want to carve on their pumpkins. 

First, the scooping out of the pumpkin.  Everyone complains (including me) about this because it's slimy, but we still enjoy it. 

 

This year, Collin decided to use gloves.

After we scooped out the pumpkin, we had a pumpkin chunkin' contest.

They threw the seeds & slime all over the yard.  If my husband stopped cutting the grass, we may have a pumpkin patch in our yard.

Last year, we started doing character pumpkins.  They would pick a picture of what they wanted to carve.  We would print it out, tape it on the pumpkin, use a hammer & nail and trace along the outline with punched holes, then carving the design out. 

Faith had fun hammering away with her hand and a small screwdriver.  Unfortunately, her fish didn't turn out right because of the shape.  So we did a "F" on the other side.

 

Angry Birds was Will's choice.

:Faith's Pumpkin:

:Will's Angry Bird:

:Collin's Clemson Pumpkin:

Faith & I decided to paint our toenails like candy corn.  I found this cool idea on Pinterest.  It takes 2 coats of each color & you can only paint 1 section at a time.  Very time consuming, but love the final product.

Free IHOP

IHOP offered free scary face pancakes on the Friday before Halloween.  So thankful for this little free treat.

:Faith:

:Collin:

:Family friend, Jacob:

:Scary face, Will:

Father's Day Gifts

This year for Father's Day, the kids & I  decided to make a goodie basket for Daddy.  He & the boys love Star Wars.  We were excited when we came across a site for a Star War Kit.  The kids could not wait to get started on this present.  Poor Daddy, I don't know how much he got to eat.  The kids were helping him eat his goodies.  I hope that he got some of it before they devoured it.

                               Pepperidge Farm Cookies                        Trident Gum

                              Slim Jims                               Rolos                                                               

                                    Gatorade     Pringles      Sprite                                

                         Tic Tacs                             Reece's Pieces

I know this last one has nothing to do with Star Wars, but the kids wanted to let Dad know that they love him to pieces.

For my father-in-law, we found some drinks that he loved when he was younger as well as Reece's Pieces like Daddy's.  We printed off labels that say, "Pops, you are one suh-weet dude!"

Mother's Day

Thank you Lord for choosing me to be Mama to Will, Collin & Faith. You knew my strengths and weaknesses long before you gave them to me to raise for You & yet You still chose me. I am soooo loving the most important job on earth that You have given me ~ being a mom.  

 Me & my babies on Mother's Day morning.  Several ladies from our church decided to wear hats to church.  I love hats & wish they would come back in style.

Saturday before Mother's Day, we went to Lowes for their Build & Grow workshop.  The kids made Heart Flower Vases for Mother's Day.

 

The idea for this project, I totally took from A Bird & A Bean blog.  It is the kid's thumb print in clay.  I got a lot of complements on it.  We made one for my mother-in-law too.

Pre-Easter Festivities

Some sweet friends invited us to their church's egg hunt.  The kids had a great time.

All 3 kids were on different fields, so I was only able to get a picture of Faith hunting for eggs.

Hanging out with our sweet friends listening to music & to the story of the resurrection.

After the egg hunt.

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Our second egg hunt.

Playing hot candy (hot potato).

Getting ready to take off.

Will finding an egg. They were really excited about this hunt, 

because they hid money in some of the eggs. 

(Oh how I wish someone would do an adult egg hunt & hid $20 or $50 in them.)

I just missed Collin climbing in the tree to get an egg.

The boys riding on the golf cart with Mr. Harold.

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A girl at our church did this last year & I couldn't wait to do it

for my lady's Bible study.

Sunflower with peeps.

So much fun dyeing Easter eggs.

Resurrection Rolls

The Crescent Rolls represent the tomb, a marshmallow to represent Jesus

Dip the marshmallow into the melted butter. This represents the oils of embalming. 

Then roll the marshmallow in cinnamon & sugar.  This represents the spices used to anoint His body.

After they are baked, the marshmallow is gone.  HE IS RISEN!

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We also enjoyed doing the resurrection eggs as well as studying the Crucifixion & resurrection story today.

A Life Lessson for Valentine's Day

We had a great family Valentine celebration, for the most part.  Tony took us to Yamato Japanese Restaurant.  We love watching them cook & send up the fire.  (One of our favorite songs is Send Down The Fire by the Primitive Quartet.  We sing it every time we see fire. :)

Then we went to H H Gregg to look at televisions.  While we were there my cell phone got stolen.  Collin used my cell phone to call Tony about a cell that was at the front of the store. I took Collin & Faith to the restroom. Collin took it in the stall with him. A lady came in talking up a storm, she seemed real nice. She went in the stall after Collin. I asked him where my phone was & he said that he left it in the stall. (She could hear us talking.)

After she came out, I went in to look for it, it was gone. I checked Collin's pockets & jacket one more time (cause I thought "I know that lady didn't take it, she was so nice.) By the time We got out the restroom, I scanned the store, no sign of her. I went to both desks asking if someone turned it in., Nothing.

We told Tony, he started calling. She answered 2 times, but didn't say anything & hung up. To make a 2 hour story short, we talked to the police & deactivated it.

We prayed for that lady several times, because she either isn't saved or is so far away from the Lord. Collin feels like it's his fault. I assured him that it was not.

This was a huge teaching lesson about why I won't let them wonder off in a store alone. Thieves don't always look scary & may be very kind. I praised God that it was only my phone that was stolen & my babies were safe.

After this eventful trip, Tony took us to Starbucks.  The kids got a "milkshake" & we got coffee & just had fun talking. 

Needless to say, I praised God some more & I hugged my kids just a little tighter & longer before going to bed.

Valentine Crafts

God always meets our needs.  At times, He meets our wants as well.  We didn't have to make our teachers Valentine gifts, but we wanted to.  He provided an idea as well as the resources.  Money is tight & we didn't have a lot of money to spend.

We used Snapple bottles that we already had, printed off these labels & filled them with Smartie candies.

The teachers loved them.

For the men AWANA teachers:

My in-laws stock up on Dasani water.  Faith decided (on her own

to call Papa and ask if he could bring us a case.) We used card stock 

paper that we already had from Faith's B-Day party, found a fish template on the internet

for the tags & used some Kool-Aid packets that we had.  We printed off labels 

that said Fish Bait, attached it to the packets & tied it along with a straw onto

the bottles with ribbon.

 For the lady AWANA teacher:

We did the same as above, but found some Valentine wrapping paper at

Target in the dollar aisle.  We used some diet pink lemonade drink mix that we had.  Printed off

labels with Love Juice on them.

These were ideas that I found on the internet.  I apologize to the 2 blogs where I got these two ideas from.  I did not save the site so that I could give them credit.  

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Quilling

 

My friend, Melinda introduced us to Quilling.
We were blessed thatshe gave us some supplies to get started.
It's an old craft dating back to the 1600's.

My sister-in-law had a heart attack on Valentine's Day last year.  I wanted to make her

a card to celebrate her year since the attack.  This card started our love for quilling.

(For some reason, I can't get this picture to turn like it should) 

Here is one that I made for a friend for Valentine's Day.

 Another card.

The kids have picked up on this craft as well.  It is 

inexpensive, fast & fun.

Celebration of America

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AMERICA!

We had a wonderful time celebrating the 4th of July.

Collin & Will went to a music camp at another Baptist church in the area for a week. They performed "Joseph, From the Pit to the Palace" on Friday night.

Before the play, the boys and a group of children played a few patriotic songs using boomwhackers.

:Will's speaking part:

:Collin's Solo:

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Saturday afternoon, Tony was invited to play 3 solos with an Orchestra that was performing on the lake for a concert and firework show.

We enjoyed playing Uno Attack and Farkle while waiting for the concert & show:

Collin & Faith dug and dug to get this huge rock out of the ground.
They didn't give up until they succeeded.

We met lots of sweet people as we waited for the concert to begin.


:Tony playing the Battle Hymn of the Republic:

We were treated to a beautiful display fireworks.

Faith was plum tuckered out after the show.

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Sunday morning, Collin, Will & all the camp kids were asked to sing for the Sunday morning service at RHBC.

Our children's choir did a wonderful job singing "I Like the Sound of America," Sunday night. Afterwards, we enjoyed dinner & fellowship with our church family.

Faith, Laural & Campball playing foosball in the church gym.

Luke, Collin & Will playing foosball against the girls.

God has blessed America so much. I am so thankful to live in a country where we can worship our Lord freely. America is not perfect, but it is still the best place on earth to live.