It's the leg lamp all over again

Lots of excitement on this first day of May!

Storms are coming through and the tornado sirens have been serenading us all morning. In the midst of us preparing to take cover, Bear steps out the front to take a look at the sky. A large box was sitting at the front door, and packages are always exciting. I remember that I had won a prize from an online contest. And it was here. An email had alerted me that I had won a sauce pan a while back and I totally forgot. (I know - a sauce pan.) But upon opening the box I had a flash from the classic movie,  A Christmas Story, when the father gets his precious "fishnet leg lamp". I'm a bit excited to get something new, but a sauce pan? Exciting.



















As I opened the box I see the nice packaging with a guy that I recognize from the Food Network. I'm impressed. Instead of the worn and well loved sauce pans that we have, it was a very heavy, art like pan with a glass lid and it was very pretty! Take a look-

Good weekend

We decided to head east to see family/friends before Bear starts his next formal training class at work. For the next few months his focus will be on this, so no 3-day weekends to travel on.

Headed out Thursday morning and he was going to his folks house and he dropped me off in P-town. I met up with my good friends that I haven't hung with since last summer.

We went down to Thomasville, GA to a cheese dairy called Sweetgrass.

Come to find out, this is the dairy that my Grandmother mentioned several times, saying that the owners were distant relatives of ours. My Mom did some research and gave me the background and sure enough, I looked up the owners on their site and confirmed that they were cousins of ours. My Mom gave me 2 photos of my Great-grandfather and his brother, to give to our relatives at the dairy.




















The trip was fun and the food was great. Had good laughs and got to play with goats - big & small. Ate cheese, country Mennonite cooking & baked goods. Hugged a huge 329 year old oak tree, made fun of each other and did I mention laugh?

Got home later on Sat. hung with the PS family

and made it to SSchool to see all of our missed church friends.

It was a good weekend.

Happy Anniversary my Bear!

It's been 3 years today! Looking back it seems shorter than that, it really feels like its been a year? Some things have changed, jobs, house & location. But not the important stuff. The stuff that anchors us together like God's love, our love and the fun we have helping each other. These are the things I look forward to each day and if God gives it - many years to come!

I love you.

Update: Sewing the seeds of love

So here's the finished project:

I worked on it Friday and I probably put 5-6 hrs into it and I finished everything but the coordinating fabric hem. The pattern was pretty easy the fabric is 100% cotton so it took a lot of pressing. I think the next one I might try a cotton blend so as to get more ease in the fabric.

My favorite isle

I'm a day late. I kept thinking that for a St. Patty's day post I'd show some pics of my trip to Ireland.

My mom and I went in 2005 and had a great time. We went in May and we saw tons of green pastures and the most rock walls, buildings and basically anything one can build with rock.

I want to go back soon, I'd like to see the northern country.

Old photo of the week

I'm working on backing up all of my photos and archiving them. Labeling CDs and copying them to an external hard drive. This process would move a lot more efficiently if I didn't have to look at every single photo. It's been so much fun.

This has been my favorite find:


This is summer 1976 or 1977 - at the horse stables in Powder Springs, GA. My dad boarded our horse there - either Grey Boy or August Fog. My sisters would know. So that's Dad, Paige & myself in the bed of his truck. Guessing Paige is around 9. Love my Dads hair. (ha!)
This one is a classic.

EC's bedding

So while Paige was here we had an agenda to find or make EC a new duvet and items for her bed. Paige said that she wanted to change out her room for her B-day gift this year. We made some successful trips to some higher end outlet shops and JoAnns for fabric and trimmings.

Paige worked on the window treatment panels that she added pink ric-rac to. Then she made some buttons and placed those at the bottom.

I made a small pillow with green fuzzy ball trim. And we monogramed her pillow cases.

Here's the pics she sent:

Paigies visit

So last week Sista P arrived on Sunday and boy was I excited! She had been to our house before but it was when we came out to look for a place to live. I was anxious to see her.

We had a great week. We talked, laughed, cooked, ate, shopped & sewed! What was great was that we both kinda took our time in the mornings getting up and started. She had her coffee and elliptical and I had my cream of wheat & diet coke. We had an over all agenda of shopping for EC a new bedding ensemble. We headed to Pottery Barn outlet & found exactly what she was looking for. We found accessories and then made some custom items like monogramming pillow cases & pillow with the little ball fringe.

I think I may have overwhelmed her with all the creative burst at night - did I mention we used the Cricut cutting machine my Mom gave me for Christmas for B-day invitation's for EC? Yeah - I got that thing out late at night a couple of times. Like I said - ideas = crack for me.

We did make it to the Art museum and we took her to eat at Commissary BBQ to get ribs. But my favorite memory was just giggling with her on the sofa and seeing her in my kitchen.

Bonnie girl vs the snow

Early yesterday morning we awoke to a nice thick blanket of snow. I love snow. I was so excited I grabbed the camera an ran out to play with the doggies in the back yard. The snow was so powdery and made the back yard look pristine. Well, you know what new pristine snow needs...3 dogs and their owner to go tromping through it of course.

While running a muck in the backyard like a school kid, I found a frisky snow lover in our furry pack. Our Bonnie girl loved the snow. She pranced and pounced and my favorite part - she aggravated the snot out of Satchel and Clyde. She'd run up on them - tag them - then just encourage then to come after her. I had no idea she could run that fast. (She's a bit heavy in the backside - not gravities best friend) This activity went on for most of morning and was a hoot to watch.

Going in for the tag - Clyde looks scared

ice ice baby

Some photos I took while roaming about in the yard this evening.

Check out some of the images of the ground a few pics down. It looked like an alien gem field.

Old photo of the week

This awesome picture is of my grandfather. Mom's dad. This was made on the porch of home in Dallas, GA. That is a squirrel on his head. It was his pet.

Wish I could tame a squirrel like that. Maybe he was a squirrel whisperer - looks like it.

Snowy Street

The white stuff has hung around. Our little nook is frosty.

Ta-da

Playing with my new toy that I got for Christmas/Birthday was very exciting. After reading the instructions (yuk) and watching the intructional Flash movie (yea) I have completed my first embroidery!

Pretty soon, even our undies will have our name in them.

Meanwhile, back in Georgia

On the 24th, 25th & 26th we had lots of fun with family. We got hugs, kisses, food & good times.

Stayed in my old basement apartment at my sister's home.

They even let the smelly hound dog stay. Most everyone was healthy. Some of our family was very under the weather so we said prayers and gave thanks.

We celebrated the birth of our savior and many of my thoughts went to the events of that faith ful night. Peace, joy and grace.

Niece on the radio

My youngest niece's school chorus was on the radio this morning. Listen below.

Christmas decorations

Sweetgum Studio ~ the blog

So I followed the advice of my husband and made a blog just for paintings and art projects. I'm going to try to keep life updates and thoughts on this blog site. Please check out my new blog Sweetgum Studio!

Thanksgiving in O.B.

Hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving. We did. This was a first for us. a right of passage - I guess. We decided to brave the holiday here in our new town instead of trying to get home and back. We sure did miss our family, but we got to see them via video chat. I even experienced the love from my BIL, they got to harass me a bit. Felt a little like home.

The night before TG, I dreamt of cooking the turkey. I guess it was like they tell a pro sports player to "envision your goal". I walked myself through the pre-game press and then the game itself.

We had a lovely couple that Bear knows from OK training and now he works with him out here. They are really far from home and were not traveling either. It was nice to have company and be able to prepare food for others.

Here are some highlights from the menu including The Bird.

Elsie Mae's pan dressing:

Mom's Apple cake:

We are beyond blessed with the love of our Savior, family & friends. We are thankful.