Decorating for Christmas

I try to wait until the day after Thanksgiving to start decorating.  I won't say that Christmas music and movies aren't on before then, but decorations are not out until the day after.  Today, while having nothing to do, I got down a few boxes, and put some stuff up.  I have been scanning Pinterest to find some banners, and I found a few I liked.  I made it my own, with Ruthie's help, and I love the way it turned out!  It's not "Christmasy" but I like the fact that it can work year round, and it's a good motto to live by.  We shouldn't just praise Him during Christmas, but all year.

Here are a few photos of my decorating for the day!

I like to put what we are thankful for on my scrabble tiles.  For some reason I didn't get a pic of Randy's.  His says "food." This is mine-

 This is Ruthie's. 

 This is Randall's.  (No, I didn't tell him to put that!)

I am looking forward to getting our tree on Tuesday and decorating it together as a family!

You can see my previous post on my scrabble tiles here and here.

A weekend of thanks

What a great holiday weekend we had! I hope everyone enjoyed family time, eating, and just relaxing inside where it was warm! It was sooooo cold over our break, but it was the right weather for the holiday!

Thursday, my side of the family celebrated Thanksgiving together. It was nice to see everyone again. I only get to see that side of my family during Thanksgiving, weddings, or funerals. It's sad, but true. It's so hard to get us all together. There was about 50 of us I think. Randall had to work, so the kids and I loaded up and enjoyed some good food and company!

Saturday, we celebrated with Randall's side of the family. We had everyone at our house. Randall's side of the family is a lot smaller. Thank goodness b/c I could never fit 50 people in my house! It was just our family for four, his sister, brother-in-law, 2 daughters, and Randall's mom. We had so much fun just sitting around chatting. Afterwards, Ruthie mentioned that we should play charades! Boy was that funny! All of us adults had more fun than the kiddos! It was a blast!

Having Thanksgiving at my place meant I had to clean.... I didn't have a choice, which was actually pretty nice. It felt soooooo good to have a clean house. Randall even said so. I wanted to do a little decorating. I have never purchased any Thanksgiving decorations, so I decided to make my own. The Scrabble idea was in this month's Country Living. I took my own idea and painted them red and added things we were thankful for. The jars have scrapbook paper inside, and vinyl sayings and cut-outs from my Cricut.

Here's a couple of photos:

Cards-

I know there are few people who read this blog, but I wanted to share it anyways.

I have been making homemade cards recently. I have started trying to sell them locally in barber shops & flower/gift shops. My sister said I should throw it on here as well, so here it goes. (I know a few of you scrap too ;) )

Anyways, I was goign to let everyone know that if you would like me to make some greeting/sympathy/b-day/holiday/invitations for you, I would gladly do it. I am not sure if anyone is interested, but if you are- email me.

sadieruth_7@yahoo.com

Here are a few samples. Some of these I made quickly, but I am putting them in here anyways.

What a weekend-

Whew. We had a crazy weekend.

I'll start with Friday. I had my niece Josie (my 8 mo old niece) for a while. She was super cranky on Thursday and Thursday night. Friday she wouldn't stop crying. She was really upset and nothing I did made it better. I called Alisha (her mom) and told her. She came and picked her up and took her to the pediatrician. Turns out, she has pneumonia and they admit her to the hospital to give her an IV of fluids and antibiotics. My brother leaves work and heads up there.

Friday night, my 2 sisters, my mother, my SIL, and me were headed to a Mother's & Friend's Banquet at my church. My BIL was scheduled to keep Ruthie. My SIL, BIL, and niece were all sick, so I had no babysitter. My dad was keeping my nephew (Simon), but he wasn't feeling good enough to keep Ruthie and Simon. So, I asked Randall to see if he can go into work late. He gets a guy to work for him late. So, we all headed for the banquet. We didn't get to stay and eat b/c Randall had to get back to work, but we had a really good time.

Saturday, we had a graduation party to go to. My brother needed me to keep Alexis, while they were in the hospital. I kept her for a little bit, but he came and picked her up b/c he found out his dog was hit by a car while they were at the hospital. Things just weren't looking up.

Sunday, Randall and I head to church, and truly enjoyed ourselves. It was a wonderful sermon, and my mom joined us as well. It was my mom's first Mother's Day without her mom, so it was tough on her. She told me that Grandma "told" her she needed to go to church with me, so that touched me dearly. I miss her so much, and I can only imagine how hard it was on my mom. We had all planned to head to the lake and cook out for Mother's Day, but that changed since Josie was in the hospital. Randall and I visited his mom and his sister to give them their gifts and cards. Then we went to the hospital and saw Josie. She was looking much better. Afterwards, we headed to my mom & dad's. I missed my other sister's while I was at the hospital, but I felt I was needed there more. They hadn't had any visitors the whole time they were there. We FINALLY got home about 7 pm. Poor Randall had been awake since 3 pm on Saturday. He was up for so long and so worn out. He still did up the dishes for me and we ate dinner and headed to bed.

As you can see, it was a crazy weekend, but we had a good time visiting with family. I just received a phone call from my brother saying they just released them, so they are headed home. Praise the Lord. I just hope that Josie can continue to stay healthy. She's had pneumonia 2xs already and she's only 8 months. Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few posts back, I mentioned I was making "chipboard" albums for Mother's Day. Well, they didn't turn out as well as I had hoped, but I did enjoy making them. I made 7 different ones.

I took cereal boxes and cut out the squares with my Cricut. Then I just made these little albums. I don't have ink in my printer right now, so I just wrote them by hand. I don't like my handwriting, but they are okay. I hope everyone who received one enjoyed them! Here's a few photos.

Have you heard the song-

"Stealing Cinderella?" Oh my goodness, talk about tears. It doesn't matter how many times I have heard it. I still cry like a little baby. I see Randall & Ruthie together and it melts my heart a thousand time over. She loves her Daddy so much. She has him WRAPPED around her little finger. I hope so much that they don't lose their special connection.



Here is a scrapbook page I created today. I am making a yearly scrapbook and giving it to Randall for New Year's Eve. He has only seen a few pages so far, so I hope he will enjoy looking at it. I think there are somewhere around 40 different pages. I have worked pretty hard on it.