Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Happy '"Just Because I Love You" Day

That was the words out of Andrew's mouth when he finished his latest honey do project. All my life, I had wanted a fireplace (pay no attention to the fact that the flash on the camera makes mine show how badly it needs cleaned- it doesn't look that bad in real life). Ever since we moved in, I have been in the process of making my living room perfect and someplace to spend more time in. Our major problem was there was no light in the room and it was too dark to do something like sit and read--Andrew put in a ceiling light, which I love when we have family and friends over but it still wasn't right just to sit on the couch, in front of the fire and read. Sooo, yesterday, Andrew put a Ground Fault outlet in the floor under my sofa. It had to be strategically placed so any way I wanted to rearrange the furniture, it would be hidden--yes the man has the patience of Job, because I ran through every scenario I could think of and I actually moved the furniture around until I found the perfect spot, then when that wasn't the easiest spot for him, he did it anyway.



Thank you again, Honey! I love you too!

Little Brothers and "Dirty Magazines"

Our Pastor's wife has just posted on her post about getting a magazine in the mail wrapped in brown paper, she had ordered a Journal of Christian Nursing and got a Journal on Genital Disease. It reminded me of a story.

When I was growning up, my sister was ten years older than me and then the three boys down the road, the Fulton boys, were 2, 4 and 6 years younger than me. Of course, this is Jon, Grant and Jason. They were the closest things to brothers I ever had. Grant's birthday was in February, and there have been many memories randomly popping in my head. Reading Melissa's post brought back the day when 3 or 4 of my friends were at my house and we were all laying on the bed and floor in my room looking at "Seventeen". Grant had came down for a visit--we did that a lot growing up, I lived at their house that much too. Anyway, Grant went home and told his mom he was looking at dirty magazines at my house. And as any good mom would do, Grant's mom, aka Nanny Fulton, called my mom. Okay, so to a 15 year old girl, looking at bras and underwear in a magazine ad isn't a big deal but to an 11 year old boy---- (from then on, I hid my magazines from him!) then there was the time we were skating in my garage, my mom had put up black lights and a disco ball and all that- Grant was the first one to point out that all of us girls were wearing white shirts and that you could see our bras right through them. He was definately the life of most of my parties- Man, I miss him but I am sure glad I have all those great and funny memories.

"Honey"

You know how they tell you when you are young parents that you are training your children in how to have relationships. Your actions towards each other shapes your child's view of what a loving relationship is supposed to be. Well, I have seen that come to fruition in a couple little things I have notice with Robert. The main one being his "pet name" for Tika.

Andrew and I very rarely call each other by our first names, if we do, it is usually because we are in a crowd and have already said "Honey" or "Sweetheart" and the other one hasn't heard us.

A few weeks ago as Robert was hanging up the phone, he said, "Goodnight Honey". At first I was a little shocked and thought "I'm not sure I'm ready for them to be calling each other "Honey" and then it occurred to me, we taught him that... He was watching and listening and taking it all in and honestly, with so many bad relationships in the world, it made me realize how thankful I was that he got to grow up in a loving home.

Barbecue Beef Filled Biscuits

Here is another quick recipe-- it too, came off of the Kraft website. Sunday nights are crazy at our house because Andrew has to be at work at 8, Robert and I have choir practice at 5 and church at 6, which Andrew tries to make church at 6 so we are all running different directions. I can make these Sunday afternoon, bake them in time for Andrew to get up at 4:30 and then reheat them for Robert and me when we get home from church. I actually change a couple of things, I use a couple spoonfuls more meat, which I use lean ground turkey instead of the hamburger and that way I use all 10 biscuits. This meal is EXTREMELY cheap, especially if you have time to make it to Aldi, where the biscuits are 29 cents a can. It's one of those "sneak veggies in" recipes. I have used different BBQ sauces and it was fine, of course, since it is the Kraft website, they recommend their own brands,but it is good with others too. This has been a favorite Sunday night meal around here for a long time!

1/2 lb. extra-lean ground beef (remember just a couple spoonfuls more)
1 medium green pepper, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, shredded
1/3 cup BULL'S-EYE Original Barbecue Sauce
1 can (7.5 oz.) refrigerated buttermilk biscuits
1/2 cup KRAFT 2% Milk Shredded Mozzarella Cheese

BROWN meat in medium skillet; drain. Add green pepper; cook and stir 5 minutes or until peppers are crisp-tender. Remove from heat. Add carrots and barbecue sauce; mix well.
SEPARATE biscuits. Press 1 biscuit onto bottom and up side of each of 10 medium muffin cups sprayed with cooking spray. SPOON meat-vegetable mixture evenly into biscuit cups, pressing filling into cups with back of spoon. (Filling will be mounded.)
BAKE at 375°F for 10 minutes. Sprinkle with cheese. Continue baking 3 to 4 minutes or until biscuits are golden brown and cheese is melted.

Enjoy! I know I should have taken my own picture, but I took the easy way out and cut and pasted. They really do look like the pic above though- they were gone before I thought about it!

Basket Bingo Anyone???

Basket Bingo has been postponed to February 27th.




Okay, a little plug (and an invite) for the Jr. High Band-aids and PTO's annual Basket Bingo. This coming Monday night, the 9th at the Jr. High. Doors open at 5:30, Games begin at 6. This is one of the PTO/Band-aid's biggest fundraisers of the year. The profit is split between the two so some of it goes to help all the kids and some of it goes to help the band.

If you have never been to one of their bingos, this one is always one of my favorites. I am going to assume they still do things the way they did a couple of years ago and buy all new baskets. They have thrown Pampered Chef in the mix since I have left but that would be good too. The theme baskets are made by the classes at school and they are always over the top! I won a scrapbooking theme basket year before last and it was unreal! I won a Longaberger Workaround Basket- valued at $199 the year before that.

So, what is everybody doing Monday night and would anyone like to meet me for Basket Bingo?

The Party

Well, the party ended up to be a little on the small side. I'm not going to say it was a flop because we had a good time but some of the kids who on Friday thought they were coming found out their families had other plans for them and that was fine. Tika and Trygve were here so the five of us ate, played games, ate, won Dairy Queen gift cards, ate, watched the game, ate.....well, you get the picture. There was definately plenty of food.

As far as the game goes, most of us were rooting for the Cardinals. When I was in high school, I marched at a St. Louis Cards game and of course, Andrew's dad now lives just outside of Phoenix so we both had a little sense of loyalty there. Tika was rooting for the Steelers, so that meant Robert was too. I think Trygve was rooting for whoever was winning.

Trygve actually broke his arm Saturday and hasn't had it looked at by a surgeon yet, he goes today. We kept him on pain medicine and he acted like he had a good time but on the way home I could tell he was pretty quiet and had probably had a very long day. I am glad he felt up to coming though.