Thanksgiving With Old Friends & New

This Thanksgiving was a little different for us. We usually either have family in town, go to visit family, or have a family over for Thanksgiving dinner. This year some new friends invited us over to their house. We have known them for a while but have just become "good friends" over the past several months. We went to their house for snacks and then we all piled into our cars and went to the lawn of a local plantation to take family photos of each other's families. We had SO much fun goofing around outside together. We headed back to their house and ate, and ate, and ate! We had such a great time with our new friends!

Friday we went to a nearby park to meet up with one of my old high school friends from Texas and his family who were in town visiting his grandmother for Thanksgiving. He found me on Classmates.com a few months ago and then we realized that they would be less than an hour away from us this week. The kids all ran and played and we got to visit for a little while. It was neat to reconnect after 20 years!

Our Thanksgiving was wonderful, we were able to talk to our families on the phone and spend time with friends. We are thankful for our God, family, friends and our freedom.

Heavy Metal Funder (yes, funder)

Last night we went to a homeschool Thanksgiving Feast and Talent Show. I was amazed at all of the super talented kids (and parents) we saw last night. From a 2 year old little girl quoting Scripture to kids doing skits and playing instruments.
Cody is like me in that she does not really like to speak in front of large groups. She had decided ahead of time that since her talent is art, that she would show one of her paintings and describe it. I figured I would have to carry her to the stage and describe the painting while she held it in front of her face.
So the show begins and several kids go up and "do their thing". Then a little boy named Max hits the stage. Now, Max is 5 years old and ADORABLE! He takes the microphone and the background music starts to play, just the music, no words. This little guys sings Born To Be Wild, in it's entirety, with pure Rockstar quality. I wish I had the video because he was too cute, especially the part that evidently says, "heavy metal funder". In the middle of his "concert" I lean over to Joe and whisper that I bet Cody will have to follow Max. As he ends the song, on his knees with both arms over his head, all of the kids clap and hoot and holler for him.
The MC announces the next child..... Cody. Well, she walks up to the stage, takes the mic and proceeds to describe, in great detail, but without fist pumping excitement, her beautiful painting. As she finished the kids in the audience gave her as much applause and yelling as they did for little Max. It was so touching and sweet.
When it was Casey's turn to play The First Noel on the piano there was a small technical difficulty. Someone had accidentally removed the piano bench from the small (as in low to the ground) electric piano. The piano was behind a half wall so we could not see exactly what was going on. But Casey, never one to cause a scene played the entire song consisting of 2 verses and the chorus twice, standing, stooped over the piano playing and using the foot pedal. When she finished everyone clapped and she sat down. Then, the guy running sound (who is also a keyboard player) walked up the aisle and announced that everyone should be extra impressed because she played standing up, bent over, which is twice as hard, so she got another round of applause.
Overall it was a pretty great night! I so enjoy our homeschool group!

Stalker

(This is dedicated to KSue, but you can read it too!)
So, I am at Target yesterday and I see this guy, Travis http://www.traviscottrell.com. He is a Christian artist who lives around here somewhere. As it happens, I follow him out the doors and to our cars (parked a few feet away from each other). I pull out of my space and am, again, right behind him. Since I am on my way to take Casey to piano lessons and only know one way to get there from where I am, I end up having no choice but to continue following him. Out of the parking lot, turn left, turn right at the light. Continue down the road, left by the church, right into a neighborhood. I am nervous that he thinks I am stalking him so I turn off and go a slightly different way to piano lessons.
I am not a stalker, I promise. It was kind of weird though.

Cinnamon Ornaments

For those of you who asked, and those of you who didn't, here is the recipe for cinnamon ornaments. They smell SO GOOD! And are SO EASY!

1/2 Cup Cinnamon
1/2 Cup Store Bought Applesauce (homemade may be too watery)

(Or any equal parts of cinnamon and applesuace)

Stir together until dough becomes stiff.
Then use your hands to make a ball of dough.
Put the dough on waxed paper and flatten a little with your fingers.
Put a second sheet of waxed paper on top and roll out to about 1/8 inch thick.
Remove top sheet and use cookie cutters to cut out shapes.
Remember to put a hole at the top!
Let air dry at least 24 hours.
They look great with a gold or silver ribbon through the hole.

ENJOY!!!

Christmas Activities!

We end our school semester on the last day of November and this year I want to try something a little different for the month of December. I want to come up with at least 1 Christmas project or activity for each day in December!
I NEED YOUR HELP! Below is the list of things we have come up with so far, but we need more ideas! Let me know some things your family or friends have done. Here is what we have so far.

Decorate the tree & house with music playing & hot chocolate
Make a Christmas Town out of our recycling, using boxes, cans, bottles, etc.
Go to the Gaylord Hotel to see the lights
Make cards for families we have "adopted"
Make paper chains with blessings written on each link
Let each of the girls purchase an ornament for this year
Make spiced tea to give as gifts
Read How The Grinch Stole Christmas & do related activities
Christmas Movie Marathon - Elf, The Santa Clause (1,2, &3), The 12 Dogs of Christmas
Make microwave s'mores
Make Gingerbread Houses
Make cinnamon/applesauce ornaments
Pajama Board Game Night
Make Christmas cards for our friends
Wii Competition
Learn the meaning of The 12 Days of Christmas Song
Fondue Party
Make birdfeeders
Make ribbon angels
Drive around and look at Christmas lights
Make and Advent Calendar (use post-it notes and have clues on where to find the treat)


That's only 21! Give me some ideas, PLEASE!!!

Ultra Frugal

As you may know my husband will be looking for a new job to begin around April so we are now trying to save as much money as absolutely possible over the next several months.
I have been "couponing" for a while now and think I am finally getting the hang of it. I only buy what is on sale, buy one get one free, and/or things I have a coupon for. It really works well to use 2 coupons when getting a buy one get one deal! So far in November I have spent $200 on $340 worth of merchandise. Yes, I have brought home $140 worth of FREE STUFF! Now, I am not the expert that my friend is, she paid $3 for $101 worth of groceries the other day!!!
Check out http://www.thegrocerygame.com/ you can get a $1 trial for 8 weeks and she tells you which coupons (and how many) to use for the different grocery store deals in your area (she also includes places like Walgreens & CVS).

We also got rid of cable TV this week. Joe bought a digital antenna thing for $40 and we now get 5 channels. I thought it would be difficult on the girls because we are in such a habit of having it on, but if there is nothing to watch they read, play with play-doh, or make up games to play. They are actually much happier without cable (but I doubt they would ever admit it!).

Prescriptions

As part of our frugal living lifestyle we have recently learned about some great deals from both Wal-Mart and Kroger regarding prescription medications.
They offer LOTS of prescription medications for $4 for a one month supply or $10 for a 3 month supply. It is a much better deal than our company's prescription plan which charges $20 for a 3 month supply. Wish I had known about it sooner! You can check out their lists on their websites.

Cow Hearts

As you may know, both of my daughters are homeschooled.
Yesterday at our homeschool group they got to experience something really cool. In their Zoology class they were able to pet a pig and a goat since they had learned about them that week. They have both milked a goat and fed baby goats with a bottle. Cody learned, through hands-on experience, that pigs have hair and that goat's eyes have rectangular pupils. Goats also chew their cud, or as Cody says - they swallow their food, then spit it back up then swallow it again.
Casey had the chance to dissect a cow's heart in her class. She thought it was awesome. She also thought it was cool that she was not grossed out, but some of the boys were! Evidently, dried cow heart fat looks very similar to Feta cheese. Who knew?
Overall, yesterday was another great day of homeschooling!

Laundry Soap Recipe

I have used my homemade, super frugal, laundry soap in a couple of loads and cannot tell any difference between the loads washed with my store brand and my homemade. So, here is the "recipe":

4 Cups hot tap water
1 Bar Ivory soap
1 Cup Washing Soda
½ Cup Borax 20 Mule Team Powder (laundry aisle at Publix next to the previous item)
A 5 gallon bucket with lid
Saucepan
Empty laundry soap container

- Grate the bar of soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves.
-Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add soapy water, washing soda and Borax. Stir until dissolved.
Fill bucket to the top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight.
-Stir it up well (it will be "gloppy") and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser half full with soap and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use. (will gel)
-Top Load Machine- 5/8 Cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)
-Front Load Machines- ¼ Cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

Even though you use a 5 gallon bucket, it makes 10 gallons because you fill the empty container half full of detergent and fill the rest of the way with water.
The washing soda and borax cost about $5 and I used only a fraction of each. Buckets are about $5 as well from Lowes and can be reused each time. I love homemaking!

Dave, Part 2

So, Joe and I went to hear Dave Ramsey speak last night and really enjoyed what he had to say. He talked about the "economic crisis", the media, mortgages, his faith, and Biblical principles for managing money. He was AWESOME!
One thing that really struck me was that he talked a lot about the spirit of fear and how it can cause people to react with such panic. I am praying that God will keep the spirit of fear away from me and my family and that we will make our decisions according to His will, not out of random, raw emotion.
I would HIGHLY recommend Dave Ramsey's books if you are in debt, or just want to better manage your money.
We were frugal before reading his book, and now we are choosing to be ultra-frugal!

Dave, Part 1

Tonight Joe and I are going to hear Dave Ramsey speak. We are really looking forward to it because Dave helped change our lives. My parents told us about Dave after we had incurred quite a bit of debt. I bought his book, Total Money Makeover, read it, and implemented his strategies. Within about 8 months we became COMPLETELY debt free (other than our home mortgage). It will be exciting to hear what he has to say tonight as we are facing some potentially uncertain times.
We do know that God was the main factor in getting rid of our debt because He really convicted us of the fact that living with debt goes against what He wants for our lives. We feel He uses people like Dave Ramsey to further help us down His path.
I will write again tomorrow and let you know how it went!

HAT TRICK!

Our 5 year old, Cody, is the tiniest girl on her soccer team. She is also generally the smallest girl on the entire field during games. However, she has an advantage she has Super Speed (she will tell you that is her super-power). And she is right. Those little legs can run!

During today's game she scored 3 goals. Not three accidental goals either, these were dribble the ball down the field, around the other teams' players, to the middle, shoot and score goals.

It was fun to watch her go!

October 31

Casey & Cody

Beaver & Snow Princess

Our family walked around the neighborhood last night with a bunch of our neighbors, many we had never met before. The girls had fun and it was cool to get to know people a little more. One neighbor friend of ours was giving away free hot dogs and drinks and their driveway became a great gathering place. That was the point. To get neighbors together to meet each other.

We normally don't "do Halloween", but it was a wonderful opportunity to get out and visit.