Easter Weekend

This Easter weekend, 

I am thankful for all of the blessings in my life.  

I'm thankful for the love of family.

For family gatherings and celebrations. 

For Spring time and budding trees.

For longer days and warmer weather. 

But I am especially thankful for a Savior 

who walked among us, died on the cross, and rose again 

so that we may have eternal life.

His love for us, fully demonstrated on the cross. 

His resurrection, victory over death.

Lovely weekend wishes.

Happy Easter!

 

# Love One Another

Is hashtag still a thing?

Well if it is, I have one for you.

 I don't have any resolutions for this new year.  I am not a resolution making type of person.   I've also read how some of you have adopted a new word for the year, where you focus on implementing the meaning of that word in your life, which I think is a beautiful idea.

 Well, I don't have one of those either.

I do, however, want to share with you that this past Sunday at our church, my husband introduced our new scripture verse for the year.

By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
John 13:35

Many times we tend to think about love as an emotion, and it is, but it's also more than that.  It's an action.  

A wise man (my father in law) has often phrased it like this...

 "love with shoes on"

We have to choose to love people. 

 Some people are easy to love and other people are much harder, but it's an effort on our part none the less.

We plan to order some banners with that verse printed on them and hanging them in the church. What a good reminder that we are put on this earth for a mission.

 May we never become too content in our Christian walk that we cease to grow.  I'm thankful for the challenge and the encouragement from my pastor husband to be ever mindful of the needs of others and our need to put our faith into action.

#loveoneanother

Unboxing Succulents...

Sometimes I think I do my best thinking when I'm supposed to be sleeping. 

I often wake up very early in the morning, not because I want to, but for some reason I'm just wide awake at 2:00, 3:00, or 4:00 in the morning.  At that time it's really too early to get up and start the coffee so I just stay in bed and scroll through my favorite apps on my phone. 

That particular morning I came upon some lovely photos that sparked some inspiration.  They were photos of plants and succulents looking all pretty in their "not so traditional pots".  I think the hashtag I follow is "junkgardening", and that's when my idea hit.

These would make beautiful Mothers Day gifts for our church ladies.  

random Google search photos

 (Gift ideas are something a pastors wife is always thinking about.)

So I did a mad search online and found these succulents for sale on Amazon, 10 clippings for $13.  I had Prime membership over the holidays so shipping was free.  Not a bad price considering how large these clippings are.  There's no root system but they came already callused and ready to plant.

  

I plan to use other plants as well.  I have a few houseplants I can propagate that I think would work well for this purpose.

From here on out I will be on a mission to find all kinds of fun, vintage containers to use as planters.  I'll be shopping the thrift stores looking at things in a whole new way. 

 From box to planter, here they are in their new temporary homes.  

They're looking pretty already.

The trick will be keeping them alive.  I've had some experience with succulents and I think I've figured out how to take care of them.  A few years ago when I bought my first succulent I watered it like a normal houseplant.  Big mistake!  The leaves plumped up full of water and they all fell off and died.  

Then I was told to not water them at all, also big mistake.  They hold out for a while but then they dry up and die too.  So the key is to water sparingly, letting the soil dry out before watering again.  This may be a "duh" moment for some of you but I don't have a natural green thumb and this whole learning phase took a little bit of experimenting.

Many succulents had to die for me to get the hang of it, but hey, you live and you learn.  Besides, I am fairly confident that I've learned from my mistakes.

But, we'll see how this goes. 

Wish me luck.

Cheap Books...

I shopped a book sale the other day...

and it was fun.

Is that a mark of getting "old"?  When you eagerly anticipate the local annual book sale at the public library?  Well if it is, then I suppose hubby and I have both reached that stage in life.

The nice thing was the place was packed.  We've gone in years past but we've always shown up a day or two into it.  This is the first time we've gone on opening day.  It was supposed to start at five and we arrived at 5:20 and it was super crowded.  

Shelf after shelf of books.  All the reading you could ever want.  I remember looking around and being pleasantly surprised about how many people still enjoy picking up a book.  With everything going digital these days I didn't think that many people would show up., but they did, and the excitement of the thrill of the hunt was in the air.

Hubby is the real book worm in the family.  His job as a pastor requires him to do a lot of reading, but he enjoys it as well.  There is always a small stack of books on his nightstand and on the end table beside his reading chair.  It usually consists of a Bible and two or three other Christian books.  That is mostly what he reads and that is what he was hoping to find.

I went mostly for company.  I used to do more reading when I was younger.  It's something that has  gotten away from me as the kids have grown and life has become fuller.  I'm hoping that one day I'll get back into it. In the meantime I'm collecting a assortment of fun reads for when that day comes.

So maybe enjoying the annual book sale is not a sign of getting old.  Maybe we've just learned to appreciate the little things in life.  Maybe we've come to understand that there can be joy and contentment in the "daily" in buying a little twenty five cent book.

It's the little things.
♥♥♥♥♥

Chilly Autumn Days...

It's a "soup and grilled cheese sandwich" kind of day.

There's a cold front blowing through and the temperatures are set to stay in the thirties today.  It's a good thing I don't have to go out.  I'm planning on staying home where it's nice and cozy.  

I have enjoyed watching post season baseball all this month, but it all ends tonight.  It's game seven of the World Series and I'm a little nervous my team's not going to pull it off.  I'll still be rooting for them but I'm not too confident.  I may live in New Mexico but I'm a Texas girl at heart.  That should tell you who I'll be cheering for.  It was a great season.  Hopefully we can come away with a win.

Any other baseball loving mamas out there who understand my distress??
ha ha :)

Stay cozy my friends!

Crochet Pumpkins

Blue is a Fall color right?

Well, it is at least in my world. 

Blue happens to be one of my favorite colors.  As far back as I can remember I have been fond of this cool tone.  Something so soothing and calming about it. Besides, pumpkins don't only come in orange.  There are a few blue pumpkins out there.  I've seen them. 

Orange, blue, and harvest gold...

these colors go so good together.

The pattern calls these coasters but I've also known them to be called mug rugs.  Either way they make your coffee or tea look extra appealing.

I made a few of these pumpkins a few years ago and every year around this time I notice on my side bar that they are trending.  For some reason that post is very popular and gets many, many views every year as Fall approaches.  

I thought I'd look up the pattern and try them again.

They are quick, simple and easy to make.  I made all three of these one evening while I watched a baseball game.  

I think these would make beautiful teacher gifts.  Those school holiday parties are just right around the corner.  Don't forget your Sunday School teachers too.  They are just as important.

As you can see the printable gift tags I included in my previous post looks great with these.  If  you missed those you can click the following link to take you there.

Printable Fall Gift Tags

For the free pattern click HERE to visit my post from six years ago.

Til next time friends,

post season baseball is calling my name.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Free Fall Gift Tags Printable...

Fall arrived this week and brought with it lots of rain.

Oodles and oodles of rain.

It's wet, gloomy and cold and I haven't seen the sun for a few days. 

I'm hoping it will peek out from behind the gray clouds this afternoon.

Please, please, please...

I need some sunshine.

So while I've been cooped up in the house I've been spending some time in the kitchen, like most people tend to do on rainy days.  I've been thinking about baking and making good, yummy food to make us feel all warm and cozy inside.  

I've also been thinking about this season we're entering.  The season of giving and setting our hearts toward thankfulness and gratitude...

about counting our blessings and in turn blessing others...

and so with all that in mind I made this, 

gift tags to spice up all of those packages this season.  

Freely available for anyone to use.

Just think of all those special people you can bake for...

your neighbors, your coworkers, your church friends, your pastors family.

To print these tags simply right click on the file below and save to your computer.  From there you can easily print at home at your leisure.

From me to you,

enjoy!

Visit my Etsy shop for other Fall gift tags and remember to use code FALL19 for 20% off any item.

Pretty Cookbooks...

Don't judge a book by it's cover, they say.

Wrong.

I always do the exact opposite. 

I'm always drawn to the pretty ones.  

I found both of these cookbooks within one week of each other.  Both of them thrifted, or as I like to call  it, rescued.  I found the blue one first and I was thrilled.  Then the following Saturday I found the yellow one.  These are so pretty.  

All those pretty bouquets of flowers..

The bright, happy colors...

swoon....

I'm a big fan of hers. 

I love her style. 

I also think her recipes are practical, not too fancy that no one would ever want to try them, like some other famous cooks.  Besides, I've been following her for years.  Since way back, when she only had her blog and wasn't famous yet.

  

I know she has a pretty red cookbook out there too,

which I'll be keeping my eye out for as well.

Til next time, friends

🌺🌼🌸🌺🌼🌸🌺🌼🌸🌺🌼🌸🌺

September...

I am a sunny and 75 type of girl so seeing pumpkin spice everything at the market always makes me a bit sad but what are you gonna do?

Here we are in September already.  

Just go with it.

Pumpkin spice season it is folks.

On another note, we've been enjoying the overflow of my parents in law's garden.  They brought me a bag of really ripe tomatoes one day which I quickly turned into salsa.  Mild, just the way I like it.  It was really good with a bag of  tortilla chips. 

I'm hoping to catch up with all of you soon.

Happy Pumpkin Spice Season!

♥♥♥♥♥