Just See What I Did!

I was reading a blog yesterday which provided a link to this site. Oh my goodness! I don't know anything at all about photo editing, although I wish I did. But on this site, even I could follow the directions and create something cool. Now, I don't think I would use this very often, but I want to share with you my first attempt. I used a photo of beautiful glowing Ashley taken last weekend and turned it into a cartoon style photo! As you can tell, I'm very impressed with myself...

the actual photo

the cartoon version



VNSA Book Sale

Yippee! It’s that time of year again… time for the VNSA Book Sale in Phoenix. This year it is being held Saturday, February 12th 8 am – 6 pm, and Sunday, February 13th 8 am – 4 pm. All books are half price on Sunday (except rare & unusual books). It takes place at the Exhibit Building at the Arizona State Fairgrounds in Phoenix. There are more than 600,000 books and other items for sale. It is a book lover’s dream come true!

The proceeds from the sale are used to support two nonprofit human service agencies: Arizona friends of Foster Children Foundation, and Literacy Volunteers of Maricopa County.

Last year Jessica was living in Ohio and flew in for the sale. This year JD & Janel, who live in South Carolina, are flying in for the sale. I’ve started making my list and planning my strategy. They post a map on the website each year showing the layout of the sales floor. I’m checking everyday to see if this year’s map is up yet so I can plot my way through the sale.

2010 The line when we arrived

In previous years, we’ve gotten there about a half hour after the doors open and generally stood in line about 60 – 90 minutes. Last year, we got there 30 minutes before the doors opened, stood in line 45 minutes, and entered the building in the 2nd wave. Needless to say, we’re going to try to repeat that experience this year. We take our own cloth bags and rolling suitcases to put our books in. They do hand out plastic bags at the door, but they are small and your hands will be numb in no time from carrying them.

Once we enter the building, we split up to shop our individual lists. We meet up in an hour, compare notes, and then split again for another hour. When we join up the 2nd time, those who have completed their shopping help those who still are looking for items. We’re generally in the building 3 – 4 hours. At the end, we find a corner to sit on the floor, sort through our stash one last time and then make our way to the cashiers.

 

If you’re not a reader, you’re thinking we’re nuts. If you are a reader, you can understand what a great adventure this is! Check out the website for additional information. Leave me a comment if you plan to attend and I’ll keep an eye out for you!

What a Weekend!

What a great weekend! On Sunday, we met Zach and Ashley at the Tempe Marketplace for a quick visit. Ashley is doing great! My new granddaughter will be here in about five weeks. I can’t wait.

Sunday evening, my folks and Gabe, Katie, and Sunny came over for dinner. Sunny was super excited to see the Greats and squealed with delight as they walked into the house. I’ll let the photos tell the rest of the story.

But first I’m starting off with a photo of Duke enjoying the comfort of the Hippo…

Finally... Duke gets a turn at napping on the Hippo

Zach and Ashley

Look at her glow!

Great Grandpa reading to Sunny

It started off nice enough,

Great Grandma reading...

...and then, wham! Out of the blue Sunny

gives grandma a head-butt. Ouch!

Fortunately, Grandma recovered swiftly

The Farmer, the Hippo, the Duck, the Park

Tuesday – One farmer is driving the tractor, the other farmer is being slashed to death by the combine. Oh well, what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her! She believes the other farmer is just enjoying a ride in the wagon…

Wednesday – Enjoying a few minutes of Sesame Street with Gramps before he has to go to work…

Daisy is Sunny’s favorite dog right now. She enjoys trying to boss her around. The fact that Daisy is blind and deaf doesn’t deter her. Sunny has observed that I clap my hands to get Daisy’s attention, so she does the same while shrilly squealing, “Daisy, Daisy!”. I wonder if that’s what I sound like?!

In these pictures, Sunny calls for Daisy to sit on the Duck with her. Once Daisy painfully pulls herself up on the Duck, Sunny moves to the Hippo and calls for Daisy to join her there. On it goes, back and forth…

…until I take pity on Daisy and get them settled in the reading chair, along with Father Noah to watch the Mickey Mouse Club.

Thursday – Gramps was off all day! We started the morning with breakfast at Village Inn. Sunny ate French Toast Stix and grapes. Then we headed home for some play time and nap time. After that we went to Culver’s for lunch where she had grilled cheese sandwich, cucumber slices, and french fries all dipped in ketchup. And then it was off to the park!

Gramps providing advice on the best way to feed the geese

Sunny pointing to the goose that will take the bread right out of your hand

Wow! I can't believe I got this shot of the goose taking

the bread out of Dan's hand.

And so ends another fun week at Grammy Daycare. Next week we’re working Art into our daily curriculum… Stay tuned to see how that works out!

Confident – My One Word for 2011

I have heard a lot lately about “My One Word”. I finally googled it and found this website. It states:

“’My One Word’ is an experiment designed to move you beyond the past and look ahead. The challenge is simple: lose the long list of changes you want to make this year and instead pick ONE Word.This process provides clarity by taking all of your big plans for life change and narrowing them down into a single thing. One word focuses on your character and creates a vision for your future."

Hmmm, clarity? Sounds like something I need! The website then goes on to explain that resolutions seldom work because we focus on who or what we want to become, rather than on who or what God wants us to be. Makes sense to me! Check out the website for the process of choosing your word and other information.

So, I’ve been thinking about my word for a few weeks and in the end I’ve chosen the first word that popped into my mind…

Confident.

I want to be confident by the end of 2011. The website states that at the beginning it may feel awkward or unnatural to live out your word. Gee, ya think?! I’m excited though, in a cautious sort of way, and eager to see how God is going to re-shape me to be confident. I’ll let you know how it’s going, in the meantime I’ll leave you with some verses I found about confidence. And, as always, if you’ve picked ONE WORD for 2011, please share it with us by leaving a comment.

For you have been my hope, Sovereign Lord, my confidence since my youth. Psalm 71:5

The fruit of that righteousness will be peace; its effect will be quietness and confidence forever. Isaiah 32:16-18

But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. Jeremiah 17:7

My January 15th Scripture Memory Verse

Although I chose my 1/15 memory verse, I neglected to post about it. My verse is:

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11
 
I finally got around to getting a journal to write my memory verses in. I’m hoping that this 2011 challenge will be the start of a yearly goal – to memorize 24 verses per year. I kinda know lots of verses. Bits & pieces. Not many addresses. Just enough to really screw one up if I try to repeat it to someone. That’s why I’m focusing on learning, really learning, the verses that mean a lot to me.
 
I’m also trying to not beat myself up for all of the verses I memorized when I was a kid and then promptly forgot when I was a young adult. What a waste of brain power. Oh well. Fortunately, the Lord has plans for me. Plans to prosper me and not harm me. Plans to give me a hope and a future!

Monday Miscellany

Take a few minutes today to revisit Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have a Dream" speech. You can find it in its entirety here. It is a great yardstick for how far we've come, and how far we've yet to go.

If you're praying for Joanne of "The Simple Wife", check out her blog today. A group of her friends have come up with several suggestions for helping and encouraging her and her family. Please remain in prayer for this young wife and mother.

I'm feeling so thankful today. Thankful for all the blessings God has given me. Thankful for my husband, my kids, and my grandchildren. Thankful for the roof over my head, the clothes in my closet, the food in my pantry, our sources of income. Thankful for my friends, those I know personally and those I've made through this blog. Thankful most of all that God is ever-present in my life. He's always with me, just waiting for me to talk with Him, waiting for me to be quiet enough to hear His voice.

Enjoy your day...

New Shoes, Sesame Street, and more...

Last week I was able to get some good pictures of Sunny. These are from Wednesday, another fun day at Grammy Daycare!

Sunny and Daisy watching “Sesame Street”

“Elmo!”

Time for shopping… see the doggie hanging from the handlebars?

I just think that’s so cute!

New shoes

Why do I waste my time and money buying toys…

…when a Rubbermaid tub is just as much fun?!

For some reason, she loves to play on the inside door step

Have I mentioned how much I love this child?

She’s giving the Noah’s Ark animals orders

See the doggie and kitty cat next to her?

They’re her constant companions

Pray for "The Simple Wife"

Please join me in praying for Joanne at The Simple Wife blog. She is in a hospital in Colorado, fighting for her life. Isn't it amazing that we can connect through the Internet and come together in faith to pray for each other? God truly works through all things...

I Can't Wait...

One month from now JD & Janel will be here. I am so excited! I haven’t seen them since Christmas 2009 and I miss them dreadfully. In the meantime, I plan to store up enough memories with them during this visit to hold on to until the next time I’m with them.

We already have a jam-packed weekend planned. They will arrive on Friday around lunch time. We’re going to pick them up at Sky Harbor Airport and then drive down to Mesa for lunch and a visit to Attic Needlework to check out the latest in cross-stitch patterns and supplies. Janel is a cross-stitcher, as is Jessica. I just love that the three of us have that in common.

On Saturday morning, we get to the real purpose of their visit. The VNSA Book Sale. Oh my goodness. If you’re a reader, you have to attend this sale. There are over 600,000 books for sale, along with games, magazines, DVDs, CDs, maps, and more! If you have kids, you need to attend this sale. The children’s area is awesome. Of course it helps if you have long arms and good eyesight so you can reach over the three people in front of you to sort through the books on the table! But, more about the book sale in another post. Back to JD & Janel. After several hours at the sale, we’ll come home to gloat over our purchases and relax. JD & Janel are going out Saturday night for their Valentine’s celebration since they’ll be flying on Valentine’s Day.

Sunday afternoon, my entire little family will pose for family portraits. After that, we’re joining with the rest of our extended family for pizza and wings at Katie’s house. I’m sure I’ll bore you to tears with way too many pictures on my blog of their visit.

What can I say? I’m a proud mom…

My Days With Sunny

I wish I had a video camera that I could mount on a tripod and have running throughout my days with Sunny. So many funny, cute events occur each day that I know I won’t remember.

Yesterday we went over to my friend Joanna’s house to play with her three-year-old twins and one-year-old daughter. I love her kids. They are so cute and sweet. Since I’m not related to them I think that means I’m allowed to have a favorite and right now my favorite is her oldest daughter. She is hands-down the sweetest little girl I’ve known for a long time! She’s also beautiful, precocious, and does a great job of playing with Sunny. After we’d been there for quite a while yesterday, it occurred to me that Joanna and I were actually carrying on a conversation! This was because Sunny was not interrupting me after three minutes. She was playing! So she only interrupted me every seven minutes or so… plenty of time to complete at least a few sentences in an hour and a half.

Sunny loves dogs. All dogs. Real dogs. Stuffed animal dogs. Dogs in books. Dogs on TV. Puppet dogs. Cartoon dogs. Today she brought one of her dogs with her and she was walking around my living room saying, “doggie?” “doggie?” and shrugging. I said “there’s your doggie”, pointing to her stuffed dog. No, that was not what she wanted. I finally realized she was asking me where Rascal was. I said “are you looking for Rascal?” She answered yes, and I called his name and he came walking out of the office. As soon as she saw him she squealed “Doggie!” and ran up to hug him. She can say “duke” and “daisy” and she knows Rascal’s name is Rascal, but she can’t say it so he’s doggie.

She likes to put the small animals and babies on the handlebars of her grocery cart. She’ll put the larger guys in the seat, but the small ones she always carefully balances behind the handle.

Daisy laid all day today in the dog bed on an afghan. I think she’s having a bad day. Sunny left her alone all day until after lunch, when she kept covering her with a pillow and the pad I lay her on to change her diaper. Here’s poor, patient, long-suffering Daisy!

One of Sunny’s favorite books right now is “Go. Dogs. Go”. I’m sure you can guess why. She tries to read it to Rascal and Duke all the time, but they’re not a very good audience. Today, she put her baby in the reading chair, climbed up, and proceeded to read to the baby. I don’t know if it was more satisfying or not, but she looked like she was having fun.



Today Was So Much Fun!

Today Katie, Jessica, Sunny, and I drove down to Spectrum Mall in Phoenix and got on the Light Rail (#94 on my 101 list) to ride it down to the Bridal Show in Downtown Phoenix. What a blast! The Bridal Show was a madhouse. It was fun, and Katie got lots of ideas. And, as you can tell in the last few pictures, she made a very important purchase while we were there! Yes, we rode the train back to the Mall with her wedding dress in the pink bag…

Katie and Sunny getting ready to get on our train

Katie, Jessica, and I on the train

“Get me out of here!”

Every time the train started up, Sunny exclaimed “Whee!”

I was so excited I wanted to exclaim “Whee!” when the train started up

Transporting a wedding dress on a train… now that’s different!

Heigh-ho, Heigh-ho...

…it’s back to work Dan goes. Bummer. We had a lot of fun on the six days Dan was absent from Sam’s Club. Don’t get me wrong, we are grateful for the Sam’s Club job and it has literally saved our financial lives. However, now that the appraisals are picking up it’s getting to be too much for Dan (and me!) to handle. We’re hoping that in the next week or so he can go to the boss with his intention of stepping down to part-time. In the meantime, he’ll continue on at his full-time status and we’ll try to juggle everything.

Good news! Dan got his first appraisal order of 2011 yesterday. He wasn’t expecting any orders this week, and I said I wasn’t, but secretly I was starting to worry. Well, probably not so secretly. Anyway I’m glad the order came in. He used that opportunity to start to teach me how to pull comps. I’m glad to be in a position to help him.

Katie invited Jessica and I to attend the Bridal show down in Phoenix with her tomorrow. I’ve never been to one so it should be fun. The thing I’m really looking forward to though, it that we’re going to ride the Light Rail! I’ve wanted to do it since it began operation. As a matter of fact it’s on my list of 101 in 1001. I’m taking my camera so I can record the event for posterity!

I’m doing good on my Crazy January Challenge. I have started a project each day this year. I’ll be interested to see how long it takes me to finish all 15 of them.

My Bible verse is memorized. I wrote it on a sticky note and move it from room to room throughout the day. Last time I checked, more than 8,000 comments were posted on Beth Moore’s blog for the Memory Verse Challenge. Isn’t that cool?! I’ve read some of the comments, there are some really good verses that people have chosen to memorize.

Enjoy your day…

R & R

Janel picked this sign out for me as a Christmas gift. One side of the little shingle at the bottom says “open 24/7”. That’s the side I normally have showing. Yesterday after Sunny left for the week, Dan suggested that I turn it over the “Closed for R & R” side, so I did! Isn’t it cute?!

Dan has two more days of vacation from Sam’s. He goes back on Friday. Today we’re going to the movies to see “The King’s Speech” and then run some errands. We have been to more movies at the theatre in the past two weeks than we have in the past three years. Seriously. It feels so weird, yet is so fun!

I may be going to the Bridal Show with Katie this weekend. She invited Jessica and I to go. I’ve never been to one, so it would be fun.  If we go, I’m taking my camera…

I have managed to start a x-stitch project each day this year. I told Janel that it’s a little overwhelming, having that many unfinished projects hanging over my head. Some of them are quite small and the past two days, I’ve started the new project barely, and then switched back to one of the smalls which I should finish today.

I’m still plugging away at Katie’s Quilt. I just have to get that thing done. It really hangs over me.

I am very tired of the cold weather. I saw a 70 in the long range forecast. I’m just praying that it gets here sooner rather than later. Of course, I know that in six weeks or so I’ll be whining about how warm it is…

I’m off to enjoy a day with my husband. Hope you have a great day too.

A Fresh Start

Here we are, the first day of 2011. It stretches before us like a blank canvas, waiting to be filled with the portrait of our lives. I used to find New Year’s depressing when I was younger. I think it’s because I focused too much on what didn’t get accomplished instead of on what I did do and the blessings of the year. The past three years have changed that for me completely. I am so thankful for the blessings of 2010, and completely confident in the blessings that will come in 2011.

This morning I posted my memory verse on Beth Moore’s blog. The verse I chose is:
“I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth.” Job 19:25
I am excited to memorize this verse, and I already picked the verse I want to memorize beginning 1/15. I think the hardest part about participating in this is going to be seeing the verses everyone else picked and thinking, “ooh, I should have picked that one!”

I have been working on my 101 in 1001 list for a month as of today. I’m enjoying it so much! Every once in a while I find myself trying to think about accomplishing the list in a sprint, but I know that the list is really a marathon. Slow and steady is the key. If you want to see how I’m doing, click on the “101 in 1001” tab at the top of this page.

To end, I say “welcome 2011”, can’t wait to see what’s in store for this year…