I am now blogging over at my new home…

It felt like time for a new look…and a fresh start…

I will forever be grateful for how this blog supported me through cancer and the mess of feelings that came with it…

The support I received from comments from total strangers was beyond amazing!

Please come visit me at my new home!

I have been on vacation since the 15th and got to first spend a few days with my best girl friend and her children (my niece and nephew)…my goal for this visit was to make memories, so I came prepared with some ‘activities’ that we could do together…

The first night we made heart garlands and it is a great idea for valentines day…

I first asked Kenzie and Cole their favorite things about each member of their family…Kenzie wrote her own answers on the strips of paper and I wrote Coles answers for him…most of his answers were “when they play outside with me” and it melted my heart when I saw when Kenzie wrote when asked what her favorite thing about me was…she just wrote “love”

Then I gave each of them a stapler, which is a dangerous with a three year old! “Can I go now (click, click) now? can I use it now? (click, click, click)…

Here they are with their finished product…using ten strips made for a decent length for their garlands…

Here is Kenzie showing off the heart shape really well…

Another fun time together was picking them up from daycare and brining them home…we got to watch a fairy princess Barbie movie…and then I just sat on the floor in their room and watched them play…

a great action shot…SHHHHHHHHHH they are not supposed to be playing on that…

dancing together…

hiding under the bed…

a few pictures Kenzie took of me…

Look at his face! it SO encompasses his personality!

I love this pictures but it came out really blurry…

Playing at the mall play park…a great way to spend time talking with Jeri and let Cole run and get some energy out…

another thing I had brought with me were little chef kids I had got on clearance…the kits came with hats, aprons, a very small cupcake tin, a small pie tin, a brush and and little roller…

so we made some cupcakes…here they are sharing the stirring responsibilities…

Mr. Man putting the batter in his tin…I just let him do it no matter how much of a mess he made, and it was so much fun watching him figuring out how to do it…

Kenzie was VERY CAREFUL in putting her batter in and had every one filled perfect with almost no spills…I think this may show their personalities really well…

Jeri using the extra batter to make a little cake…

This is the best picture you can get from a three year old shaking the camera as he is pushing the button!

My last night there I stayed until late so that I could go to Kenzie’s cheerleading practice…it was super fun to watch her learning her cheers…

the only thing I could think the whole time was

“Ready? OK!”

which they never said…I was a little disappointed…the program she is in is pretty cool…the kids have a devotional at the end of every practice and can ear stickers for learning their lessons…

Here she is a few days later in her official uniform! I love how texts from Jeri can keep me in the loop of their lives…

I find that some of my favorite times with the kids is early in the morning…

Grumpy…

What do you want?

ok ok…

let me stretch…

SMILE!

We were out to lunch and Cole had a rare moment of being cuddly…so I embraced it!

and Jeri! a moment when both of us felt picture ready…we are picky like that

I stayed for two nights and three days and had a great time…I hope to be able to visit more regularly…

One of my goals this year is to ‘make memories’ and that is going to simply require more planning and work but the reward will SO be worth it…I have few close heart friends…and all of them live at least three hours away so it can be easy to say “That is too far” or “I would only be able to stay a day.” This year I don’t want to use those excuses…people are what is important…kissing little one’s faces while they are still young and will let you is important…moving beyond “how was your day” relationships are important…and I am committed to making that happen this year…

Until Later…

I have not been blogging at all lately, maybe I needed a break who knows, but I would like to get back into it…since I just finished a project I thought it would be the perfect way to say, I am going to try to be back!

I just finished a captured fairy jar for a swap on Swap-Bot and am super excited with how it came out…

This is what is looked like part way through…

The finished product…

Let me introduce you to Daphne…

She likes sitting with the reindeer…

I used a ragu sauce jar…snow scrapbook paper, and added the reindeer and snow flake stickers, I used fabric and tulle I found a Wal-Mart…Daphne came from a seller on E-bay…I made my own fairy (that you will see at the end of the post) but she ended up too big for the jar so I am saving her for another project…and I used ribbon, lace, and misc. items I already had…

Here is a close-up of the top…It a butterfly on some snowflakes…

The back of the jar…

I am not overly enthused with how her name plate came out, my handwriting did not come out good and there wasn’t a way to fix it so it was one of those things I had to be ok with…

One last shot…

This is the first fairy I made, I thought she would be small enough but she was not…I love the monopoly piece hat on her…She will find a home soon enough…

Until Later…

Here are days 5-12 from the journal challenge…

Journal Prompt:  What do you believe in?  A simple prompt that shares so much. 

All I could think if when I thought of what I believed was from a poem written on a wall by a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp...on the second page I did is the rest of the poem...

I printed an 8.5x11 photo I found with Google images and then used letter stickers, stickers, and a label maker...

remainder of poem...I found it here

it is also used in one of my favorite Barlow Girl songs...

I am probably going to add a private third page with just journaling...I've been thinking about a lot of things and this poem really churned stuff up in me (which is good right :) )

I used glitter sticker boarders, colored pencils, felt black pen, and goodies from my stash...

Journal Prompt:  What does summer feel like?  What does summer look like?  What does summer smell like?  What does summer sound like? and What does summer taste like?  Use all of your senses to describe this wonderful season.  Have fun!

well I took a bit of  of a change to this challenge because summer doesn't feel, look, smell, or taste like anything but hot...give me spring or late fall any day...so I just wrote what I REALLY feel about summer and how maybe I can take this summer to challenge that cynical view...

Journal Prompt:  What is happiness?  What defines your happiness?  What makes you happy?

My happiness consists of:
1. the freedom that comes with knowing Christ
2. a clean car and a full tank of gas
3. creating
4. singing
5. making mom laugh
6. Quality time with loved ones
7. a blingin' iphone case
8. the love of a dog
9. manicure and pedicure
10. random texting
11. having a flexible work schedule
12. peanut butter M&Ms when PMSing
13. clean reports from the oncologist
14. watching others reach the peak of their God-given talents (Olympics, so you think you can dance)
15. seeing a client understand a concept
16. "couch-time" (this needs explanation...I do not like to sit next to people on couches...it seem so intimate to me, and so there are very few people I am comfortable enough with to really chill out on the same couch with)
17. laughing with Jeri
18. being an "Auntie"
19. accepting your unique self
20. being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion...

Journal Prompt:  On this day in 1867, Frank Lloyd Wright was born. Wright was a well-respected architect. He designed a number of famous homes. If you were able to design the house of your dreams, what would it look like?

my dream home is not a place but a feeling...so I printed a coloring page of houses in a row, and journaled what I felt...This is two 8.5x11 sheets side by side...
here is what I wrote...

Community is what my dream home looks like. This home would be not one home but 3 or 7 or 10 homes. Homes occupied by these soul/heart friends and family you wish you could have dinner with once or twice a week, those houses would be unlocked, freedom to visits always welcome... nieces and nephews free to run to their aunties house for after school snack...large games of scrabble would be played often and scores kept public...laughing will be heard always above the birds singing...

Journal Prompt:  If you could scream something at the top of your lungs right now, what would it be?

I accept and embrace it more every day...

the shadows on the page are from the scanner...

Journal Prompt:  Another List ( I looooove lists).  Today we will make a list of all of the projects we would like to accomplish this summer.  With the weather nice, and the extra sunshine, it seems like such  perfect time to start checking those things off of our lists right?

Summer Goals
-drink water
-buy nothing at a yard sale unless I know for sure where it will go at home
-create and send more cards to friends and family
-start going to church again
-have a family trip with mom and Christopher
-paint cart in craft area, paint mom's room, touch up paint in bathroom

Journal Prompt: How do you love?  Through dating, and marriage, I had always heard talk about the five love languages.  I never thought much about it because I was pretty sure I knew exactly how I loved :)  Once, I read the book, it made so much sense to me!!!  What is your love language, how do you love?

I found an image of a lung on Google image, traced the outline and then made it my own...I firmly believe that you can only give if you are filled up so I wanted to depict lungs, without which we cannot survive...these love languages are like breath...

I am good at giving
-words of affirmation
-acts of service
-and gifts

I receive love as
-quality time
-physical touch
-and words of affirmations

Journal Prompt:  What are some of your favorite places or spaces?  Document them.  Add brochures, use photographs, doodle, sketch, etc.  Show us some of your most favorite places and spaces.

my home
where I
live
create and
relax

and Jared's my best friend since I was 12...anywhere he lives has always felt like home to me and it is a place I run to when I need peace or a break...

the dining hall at the university I attended almost TEN years ago!

inside the churches in Moscow...I was privileged to go for a few weeks after my Junior year in college and walking into those churches was one of the most powerful things I have experienced...I was literally unable to speak the entire day because of the majesty

and of course anywhere my best girlfriend and her children (my niece and nephew are)

Until Later…