Fall Table!!

I found two new fall decor items that I fell in love with! One was a tiny bowl - about the size of a large scoop of ice cream - in the shape and colors of a beautiful Fall leaf. The second item was a simple place mat of Fall colors. I bought 4 of each and added them to my mostly white table and it looks great!! This is our first tastes of Fall decor in the house! I'll have to pull out more of my "harvest time" items and set them out! But I wanted to go ahead and put this out there for those wanting something different - a change in your decor - just go out and find one or two new items and use them! These were very inexpensive and they look great!!!

I LOVE FALL!!! The colors are soooooo beautiful!!!!

Stephen's new Recliner

We finally got a new Lay-Z-Boy recliner that fits our new living room colors better. We've had it for 2 weeks now and Stephen is happy with it! We really enjoy all our new stuff!!!!

Leaning on the Lord (poem)

My beautiful, sweet friend, Christy, read this in her devotional Sunday morning (from Streams in the Desert) and shared with me and I thought it was beautiful and wanted to share with others that may be in need of this type of encouragement!


Child of My love, lean hard.

And let Me feel the pressure of your care;

I know your burden, child. I shaped it;

Balanced it in Mine Own hand; made no proportion

In its weight to your unaided strength,

For even as I laid it on, I said,

“I will be near, and while she leans on Me,

This burden will be Mine, not hers;

So will I keep My child within the circling arms

Of My Own love.” Here lay it down, nor fear

To impose it on a shoulder that upholds

The government of worlds. Yet closer come:

You are not near enough. I would embrace your care;

So I might feel My child reclining on My breast.

You love Me, I know. So then do not doubt;

But loving Me, lean hard.

Virginia's Baby Present

Preface: Stephen and Emily Prather came to the house Saturday night for our September night out - although our night out was actually at our house. Stephen Wickwire made gumbo and jambalya and I made bread pudding; and we ate, watched football and visited all night. Emily is expecting a baby girl, Virginia, soon!



So for those that don't know, I crochet! Yes, me! I have made 5 adult afghans and now....I've made my very FIRST baby blanket!!!

This was a very special blanket! I had a MUCH smaller needle and thread than I usually use! I had to really work hard to learn how to hold that tiny thread and grip that much smaller needle! It made me accutely aware that I was making something very special. The whole time I was crocheting it, I kept thinking, "a tiny little baby is going to be wrapped up in this to keep her warm on cold nights", "she's going to snuggle up so cozy". Every stitch was so precious to make! I learned that there is truth to the idea of there being "love in every stitch" because I felt it first hand. This is probably the most perfect blanket I've ever made. All the adult ones I've noticed at some point - too far to go back and fix - that I missed a stitch or left one out but made compensations to correct the error for future rounds...but on this pattern, everything HAD to be perfect. If you missed one stitch or added an extra one, you messed up the the perfect dainty lines of the patterns. I counted and re-counted and re-counted again to make sure it was perfect. There were several times I noticed errors and had to undo 2 or 3 rows to correct it - but I did it with so much hope to make it perfect for Baby Virginia!

Virginia is due October 15th to Stephen and Emily Prather. Both of the Prathers went to Owen Graduate School at Vandy with my Stephen. They knew each other but we didn't become close until after graduation when a common friend, Rachel Pike Wade, told us we just had to meet and get to know them. That was in about April of 2007 and every since then we've met at least once a month to have dinner or for them to come to the house to watch football and have gumbo and jambalaya! The Prathers are the ones that we share our CSA veggies with! They are such dear friends and our lives are so much brighter just getting to see them once a month! Stephen and I look forward to spending many more moments with the Prathers in our future!

Most of all right now, we can't wait to meet Virginia! If she's anything like her Momma, she'll be one of the most beautiful, sweetest, Christian women I will meet! Stephen and Emily will be wonderful parents!

Here are pictures of my very first baby blanket!!!

This is me and Emily!

Back to Louisiana

Mrs. Nell, Tristan and Anelise left Friday morning, the 5th, going back to LA! More proof of God's perfect timing... Richard and Marie were ready for the kids to come back home; so even though there was no power yet, Mrs. Nell packed herself and the kids up Friday morning and left to go back home. About an hour or so before she arrived home, Mrs. Nell's power got cut back on! Perfect timing!!

These were our "Goodbye" pictures Friday morning!

Playing around with Uncle Stephen

Thursday night I took some pictures of Tristan, Anelise and Uncle Stephen...You can tell in each picture that Anelise is literally saying "CHEEEEEEESE"...cause when you say "cheese" it automatically makes you smile! :-)

Can you tell that even Uncle Stephen is saying "cheeeeeeese"?!

Anelise - dancing for Uncle Stephen!

Anelise saying "cheeeeeese" very strongly and loudly!

Mrs. Nell's Birthday Party

Last Monday, Labor Day, was Mrs. Nell's birthday! However, with them arriving Sunday afternoon and Monday being our first full day together, everyone was still in an adjustment period. I had hoped that we could have a mini birthday party for her but we just lost the time on Monday. We got out of the house late that morning and drove over to Chick-fil-a. Stephen and I wore our LSU t-shirts because Chick-fil-a was having a special that if you wore your favorite sports team apparel you got a free order of their new chicken strips. After lunch we drove over to the trail at Percy Priest - by the dam - and took a stroll for about a mile and a half but it was so hot...we headed back home and hung out the rest of the night.

Tuesday, while I was at work - back in my normal routine and thinking straight - I was able to get back on track and was able to plan and execute Mrs. Nell's birthday party - although a day late! On my way home from work I stopped and bought a German Chocolate cake mix (because that's what she said she liked). I bought a can of the German choc icing but knew that me and Mrs. Nell would be the only ones that would eat that (I think Anelise ate some of it because she'll eat just about anything). I knew that the "cake" of a German Choc cake and a regular choc cake weren't terribly different so I also bought a can of chocolate icing. I picked a set of those sugar candy decorations - the set that spells out "Happy Birthday" and has balloons and streamers - I've always loved eating those - but I thought they would be easy for Tristan to decorate with. I also bought some beautiful flowers that Tristan and I could arrange in a vase for her.

When I got home, I set up two tv trays side by side to make a working table that would be the right height for Tristan as the bar and our table is too tall for him. I let him help wisk some of the lumps out of the dry cake mix, then I let him pour in the water and the oil...I added the eggs (which he and I left out of the cake we made her last year) and I used the mixer for the most part. Afterwards I gave him a spoon to finish "mixing" the batter. And of course he made sure that there was plenty of batter left on the spoon for him to lick off once we got the cakes in the oven.

I decided to split the batter into two 8" round cake pans - instead of one big pan - so that we could put German Chocolate icing on one and regular Chocolate icing on the other - basically have two small cakes. I VERY CAREFULLY let Tristan help me put the cake batter in the oven.
After dinner, and after the cakes had cooled for a while, I put them on large plates and Tristan came to help me spread the icing. The German choc icing was sort of thick and hard to spread so I let Tristan spread the choco icing - so that cake became his cake to decorate. I remembered I had some red, blue, yellow and green decorating tubes of icing from a previous cake so I got those out and let Tristan have at it on the chocolate icing cake. Of course by this time Anelise wanted to be in on the project so I decided to let her put all the candy decorations on the German choc one. So each one got to do a cake for Grammy. We put candles on both and she blew candles out and we sang Happy Birthday to her for each cake!

As you will see in the pictures, Tristan's cake has a face on it. Green icing for hair, yellow for the eyes, red for the nose and lips (Uncle Stephen helped him with the lips). Then Tristan spelled out at the bottom of the face "G-R-A-M" (short for Grammy). And for the final touch, he added blue poka dots to her face! Anelise's cake had all the letters that spell "Happy Birthday" but I let her put them wherever she wanted - so you have to hunt for the letters...some even got pushed into the cake when she decided to see how far down she could press them into the cake!

Then, we all enjoyed yummy cake with beautiful flowers decorating the atmosphere!