Photo Hunt #138 - Metal

It's been a while since I've done the Photo Hunt, but finally I'm back. Today's theme is metal and the first thing that came to mind was my beautiful Haynes flute! Instead of a complete photo, I thought I'd go macro....









Have a happy day!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

May your day be filled with happy memories!!! We all have so much to be thankful for...remember to spend time thanking the Lord for all his blessings!!

Celebrations!

I feel so bad...I forgot to mention our 'little' Cody's birthday the other day. He turned 2 on November 21st, so we got him a few new things of course...what decent dog owner wouldn't!?!

Here he is with his new hot dog squeaky toy. We're not sure what his problem is with it though...he carries it all over the place, but every now and then he cries when playing with it. Maybe he's bummed because it doesn't taste as good as it looks?!?!? Anyhow...he enjoys playing and we love watching him!

Here he is, licking his chops as if he's ready to take a bite!


Today was my own birthday too. Another year older, wiser, more mature, and closer to the grave! ha! Seriously though...I was feeling a bit sorry for myself last night. This is my first birthday without either of my parents and I was feeling the sadness of it all. I think I'm just emotionally drained from all that's gone on in our lives lately...but still...I hated to 'let go' and cry!

My dear husband came home from work today and gave me the most beautiful flowers...they really cheered me up from the night before and I was ready to celebrate. There are over 3 dozen roses...they smell wonderful! He's so romantic, even when it's not our anniversary. "Woo hoo, way to go honey!!! I sure do love you!"


Besides the flowers, he gave me a brand new Bible. I've been wanting the ESV Version in a study Bible, and finally they came out with one, so that's what he got for me. I can't wait to spend time in God's Word...not that I didn't before, but now it'll be even more exciting!

Our whole family went out to dinner at an awesome restaurant...Longhorn Steakhouse. I love the rustic atmosphere and the boys love their steaks! Sweet-Pea just goes 'cause it's fun to eat out! She gets a hot dog. = ) After that, we came home and we had this for dessert!



It was a good day, a difficult day, and a happy day, a sad day all in one... I'm glad it's over!

Open House!

Well, tomorrow is our first Open House. We are cleaning like crazy today in hopes that our home will be welcoming enough to any potential buyers that come by. It sure is nerve-wracking. We have been so caught up with the whole house thing, we totally forgot that today Lionel was supposed to go out of town on a quiz team meet with church!!!! I realized it about 30 minutes ago and instantly felt sick to my stomach. Not one of us remembered, and we just talked about it last night! See how stressed we are??

Lord willing we will get back to our normal life soon enough. Trying to sell a house is crazy, especially in today's market...I don't know how any of you have done it. This is our first time. Thank goodness my husband isn't in a job where he'd be transferred often...I'd end up in the nuthouse, that's for sure.

Anyhow, please pray for a good turn out tomorrow, and that we'd even get offers on our home. I'm realistically doubtful, but God is the one in control, so who knows what will happen!!! Even if this is what our open house looks like tomorrow...that one man may turn out to be a serious buyer! Keep praying!!!!

This 'n That...

It's been a week since my last blog post...that's totally unlike me!!! I guess time has simply slipped away. We have been busy with listing our home and keeping it clean. Boy, it's not easy to keep a house spotless with 2 children and a dog!!! As I already mentioned in a previous post, we listed it last week and in the first few days we had 3 families look at it...not bad for the market we're dealing with these days. One family was particularly interested in it because we have 5 bedrooms and they have 5 children. So far no offer though. This weekend we will be having our first open house, so PLEASE be in prayer with us that the Lord would allow us to sell it on Sunday!!

I also mentioned that we found a home we fell in love with. It's a new home and in a town nearby. We did put an offer on it, but in the mean time we're still looking at what's out there. Well...we found another new home in the next town over that's only $2,000. more than the first home, but is much bigger! So, tomorrow we're going to look at it and then make our final decision. The great part about it is that it's the same exact builder, so he could simply transfer our deposit from one home to the other. Here are the main differences between the 2 homes...

Home #1

4 bedrooms, living room, dining room, laundry room, 2 1/2 baths, big kitchen (eat in), deck and .23 acres...2 car garage. Close to in-laws. 15 min. to hubby's work, 20 min. to church. Totally flat property, on cul-de-sac...2nd home in the development. Only 7 houses on street.

Home #2

4 bedrooms, living room, dining room, laundry room, 2 1/2 baths, kitchen (not eat in), den, deck and .33 acres...2 car garage. 10 min. from in-laws. 15+ min. to hubby's work, 25 min. to church. Flat in front yard, slopes down in back so it has a walk out basement, then flat back there, on a cul-de-sac...2nd home in the development. Only 7 houses on street, but 12 in development altogether.

They're pretty much the same, but the 2nd home has that extra room and a walk out basement which is highly appealing...but yard does slope a bit. The den would be our school room. In the 1st home, we'd have to use the dining room as our school room which really wouldn't be ideal. There's also a firehouse in the back of that home...it's a volunteer firehouse so no sirens...but still.

So...do we pick #1 - smaller but closer location to things in the smaller town, or do we pick #2 - larger but further away and up a hill in the bigger town? Tough call huh?!? Send your thoughts...and I'll let you know what we decide once we make our final decision....that is IF we even sell our home on time!!! We may not get either of these homes if that's what the Lord wants. It's hard to wait on the Lord but we're trying to. There aren't many decent homes on the market these days, so to find two homes we really liked was a surprise.

OK, enough house talk...I do get tired of talking about it and thinking about it. It's draining on the mind!!! We just need to let God take control and lead us to where He wants us! Where ever He wants us to 'hang our hat' is where we'll live...but if it's one of these 2 houses, we certainly will be thankful to Him for His added blessings!

What else are we doing with our time? The kids are doing school...on and off...it's been difficult. Summer school here we come. That's OK, we started so early this year, we will just have a few weeks of make-up in June and we'll be fine. Lionel took a math test the other day and aced it. He and I went on a field trip to a local college and had a great time! We were there for over 2 hours and he was engrossed the entire time. I think he saw what lies in his future and he's excited about it. Only 3 years more before college - gulp!

Sweet-Pea is mostly working on her reading and writing these days. She is still studying about horses and we are reading through the Beautiful Feet curriculum together. Those books are fantastic!!! I only wish I had more time to read out loud - or when I do have time, that my throat lasted longer. I wish they'd put more books on cd...then we could sit together and read along in the book while someone else reads it.

Sweet-Pea has been sleeping in these jammies quite a bit lately....just so she could sleep with Nellie. She's a trip! Maybe I could teach her to sew her own matching clothes...only I'm not that good at sewing. (Hey, Christine...care to come give me some pointers!?!?! ha ha)

Here they are in their matching American Girl jammies...




Lionel has been busy building more airplanes. Here's his latest, complete with cockpit suitable for his old aviator Pooh from when he was young!


Close-up of Pooh with his aviator hat on...


Let's see, what else....I took the kids out to Cracker Barrell the other morning for breakfast just to escape from the craziness at home...not to mention the fact that we had nothing to eat in the house either! ha ha We had a great time...the only thing missing was Daddy! He had to work. The fireplace was roaring and it felt so cozy inside!!


Of course I had to get photos of the kids on the rocking chairs outside. If you've never been to Cracker Barrel, they line the front porches with these beautiful wooden rockers (to buy) and they're very comfortable. We have one on our front porch which the kids gave to me for Christmas one year...best gift ever!


So, that's been our week...sort of. I left out all the cleaning, all the car trips to the dump and the many trips to my in-laws to drop boxes off to get them out of our home for the open house. The house never looked better, but I have no idea where anything is anymore!! I finished reading the 2nd book in the Lori Wick 'Rocky Mountain Series' and am anxious to start book #3, only I packed it away and it's in the basement of my in-laws. UGH! Yet another good reason to sell this house quickly. ha ha

Well, keep praying for us and for the quick sale of our home. It truly would be a blessing. We aren't having time to grieve the death of my father due to the whole house ordeal...in a way it's good, but in another way it may hit us harder once our lives settle down.

Have a great day!!

Total trust...

Is it possible for us to have total trust in the Lord? I mean TOTAL trust?!? Of course it is, but with our own human nature, we tend to doubt God even when we know that He is in control of every detail of our lives. Why do we do that?!? With the sale of our home up in the air, it's really been on my mind lately.

It seems that everything is working out so far for us to purchase the new home in a nearby town. We stumbled upon the house by driving a different way home than we usually do, the home is in our price range, and it's only minutes from Edward's parents, church and his job...the perfect location! The house has been sitting there for almost a year with no buyer, and the builder said he'd hold it for us for 3 months in hopes that we sell our home by then. The only detail left is the biggest one....to sell our house. Here's where the whole trust factor comes into play.

I know that God is in control, so why am I so anxious about selling our home?? Why am I feeling that it's never going to happen? God can do ANYTHING! He can sell it whenever He sees fit. It's been on the market for only 3 days and we've already had 3 visits by potential buyers - something that is unusual in this horrible market! I need to let it go and totally leave it in God's hands...it's just SO HARD!!!! There's nothing I can do though, so as of today, I'm going to lay it at His feet and simply wait...let Him do what He does best...lead my life! He does it better than I ever could!

As a family, we are praying about it...praying that God will clearly open doors that we should take and close doors that we shouldn't. Alone, I'm praying for the buyer...that God will send the perfect person along that will see our house and will instantly feel at home when they walk in. Continue to pray for the sale of our home, and pray for me to have a peace about the whole thing. I'm getting there, but it's not easy!

Proverbs 3:5-6 "Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths."

Isaiah 26:3 "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee."

We don't know what the future holds...but we know who holds our future!

Where will He lead us next? Only time will tell....

Lamentations 3:22-23 "It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness."

Equal time

Since I have written quite a bit about Sweet-Pea lately, I decided to post a sequel to Lionel's "Boys and their Toys" post. He has been building planes for a while now, but they seem to be getting bigger. That last post showed the smaller planes...here are some of his larger ones.


Sopwith Camel













F6F Hellcat










Brewster Buffalo














Messerschmitt ME109












Focke Wulf FW190










So there you have it...more planes in Lionel's ever growing collection. His next venture is to built wooden model planes with Grandpa. Some day I'll snap a photo of Grandpa's garage - the ceiling is literally FILLED with models that he built himself. I think the two of them will have a great time building a model together. You can be sure I'll add more photos of the process...Lionel will see to it!! (I apologize for the swastika symbols in this post, but those German planes are the real deal and there's no avoiding it...it's history...unfortunately!)

Dancin' Diva!

The other night Lionel and Edward went to rehearsal at church for orchestra, so Sweet-Pea and I decided we'd have a bit of fun in her room. I was ready to pull out a game or play with her American Girl dolls, but no...we had to dance! Oh my....what a night we had! She did most of the dancing - thank goodness, it's what she does best. Me? I sat and took tons of photos...what I do best!

Here are a few...



Of course Cody thought we were crazy...but he just ignored us most of the time and chewed his bone. Once in a while though we'd get this look....










She's a trip isn't she? Well, if any of you have boys that would like to marry her in the future...this is about the size ring we'd expect them to buy her...


....we'll settle for nothing less...she's simply worth every penny!!!

We're getting there...

As you probably know from my previous post, we are getting our home ready to sell. This market is not the best time to be selling, but we are totally trusting in God about it, but I must admit...it hasn't been easy. We found a home that we truly fell in love with. It's a new house, but we're not sure if the builder would be willing to sell it to us with a contingency...that we sell our home within a certain period of time. Most people would think it's a crazy idea, but we have complete trust that this is God-lead. If God wants us to have that house, He will sell ours in that time period. We're walking out in total faith.

In the mean time, a Realtor came to our home, gave us the price we should begin with, and then told us they'd be back Monday afternoon to snap photos for the listing. We have been going CRAZY trying to de-clutter, clean and paint for tomorrow. What I want to know is:

"WHERE DID ALL THIS STUFF COME FROM AND WHY IS IT IN MY HOUSE?!?!?!?"

Seriously...we have way too much stuff. We've made several trips to the dump and have given away a ton of stuff. Ah...the urge to purge! I can't even begin to tell you how good awesome it feels to be rid of the clutter and junk. We took many of our own family photos down (as suggested by the Realtor) as well as a few decorative items.Most of the painting jobs have been simple touch-ups, but our kitchen was only half painted. It's been that way for almost a year now...yeah, pretty pathetic, huh? It just goes to show how busy life gets lazy we are. One project gets started and then something gets in the way and it's forgotten about.

Well, today we finished painting the kitchen. Yahoo!!! Now that it looks nice, we have to leave it...how sad though, huh? Here it is...what do you think?


A few of the other rooms we've completed are:

The dining room (we never did finish that fireplace...it looks so ugly!)...


...the music room (Dad's old bedroom in the in-law section of our home)...




...and the family room (Dad's old living room in the in-law section.


Once we're ready for things in the morning, I'll snap a few more photos. I can't wait to get this house listed. Now that our minds are pretty set on it and we're used to the idea, we are excited about the new changes that are around the corner...we think. It's all bittersweet!

Please pray for us and with us. Pray that the house would sell quickly and that the house we found will be available for us to purchase. If that house sells in the mean time, we have to start looking all over again and I know it'll be a BIG disappointment for us all, especially the kids.

Thanks and I'll keep you posted.