Day 51 - 55 Boy does time fly!

It's hard to believe that it's been a week since I last posted any pictures.  I guess the week must have been busy but I'm not really sure what we've been doing.  Things are pretty hectic at work with certain tax forms being due by the end of February.  I've also got one big project and a few little ones sitting around.  Sometimes it really seems like 3 days a week isn't very much.  However, I wouldn't trade my four day weekends for anything.  It's really great getting to go to Mom's group on Thursday mornings and I love to have Friday at home just to do very little and hang out with my two boys!!  I didn't get to really do that well Friday as I had an optometrist appointment in the morning.  I try to schedule appointments for my days off so that my 3 days of work is really 3 days of work but I don't enjoy having to get up and get going on a Friday morning when we could be lazing around!

I have made further progress on my kitchen.  There is now colour on the ceiling!  I was hoping to get the second coat up today but I only managed to get one up because Jason & I went out for supper.  It's really nice to have an evening out and Jason's sister took the boys so they had a ton of fun.  We went to this really cute restaurant in an old house.  It is a little bit upscale but very relaxed.  I miss going to that type of place.  Jason and I are what I call "vacation cool".  We're only cool and hip when we're on vacation.  Then we stay at cute little places and eat at trendy restaurants.  We even once ate at a restaurant where the line wasn't long unless it was out the door!  However, now that we have kids, our vacations look a little bit different.  I miss that.  However, we have started finding the places in this city that we would hang out at/eat at etc. if we were on vacation.  It kind of makes me feel like we have taken a little trip!

Thursday morning Mom's group was really good.  We're doing a study on our conversation and improving it.  It's surprising just how little we actually talk about conversing in a conventional sense.  Really, everything comes down to the motivations that are in your heart.  Anyway, Thursday morning we covered patience and anger and topics like that.  Eventually, it lead to our children (this group is moms with young children) and how we talk to and discipline them.  I know that I yell at my boys way too much when they are misbehaving.  I also used to think that I was a patient person...and then I had kids.  Anyway, Friday was a challenge because my boys decided to test almost everything we discussed Thursday morning.  I hate to admit this but I failed all over the place!  At least I see it now and recognize it.  Now, with a lot of prayer, hopefully we can change it.

Anyway, here are a few days worth of pictures.  They're not up-to-date because that would be A LOT of pictures.  I'll post the rest later.

Day 51:

On Friday we got to go see some of my nieces.  They were in town visiting their other grandparents so we went over for a visit.  It was a nice time.  The boys love their cousins and have a lot of fun playing with them (even if they are girls ;)  I also had fun visiting with their grandma.  Xander has decided that he's scared of their puppy but his big cousin protected him and closed the puppy in another room.  Eventually, he did decide to let the puppy lick his hand and feed it a treat but he still is scared of it!

Day 52:

On Saturday we went shopping.  We bought this stuff for Xander.  He is growing up so fast!  He's grown out of a lot of clothes and we are reaching the point where there isn't much for hand-me-downs anymore.  We're starting to have to actually buy him clothes.  It won't be long before he's all grown up!

Day 53:

This is Xander right before going to bed.  At night we read stories, pray and then sing some songs.  Since Papa (Jason's dad) bought him the NASCAR press guide, we have to go through the drivers EVERY night and at EVERY nap time.  He likes to look at certain ones and we have to go through their name and what car they drive.  Then, we have to go through the race tracks that Daddy has been to.  Above he is looking at Joey Logano.  He is notable because he drives Tony Stewart's OLD car.  (Tony Stewart is Xander's cousin's favourite driver so, of course, Xander likes him, too).

Day 54:

We had blueberry pancakes for supper this evening.  Of course, both my boys love to eat the frozen blueberries (wild, organic ones so they are tiny and taste like the blueberries we got from the bush!).  Both of them would just sit there and eat a whole bowlful if I let them.  This, of course, is what Evan looks like after I let him loose on a bowl of blueberries.  Xander does look similar.

Day 55:

It was Tuesday night.  Cleaning night around our house.  Xander just loves to help me do dishes and that is exactly what he's doing here.  He gets his own sink of water and then he washes dishes and passes them to me to "check".  It actually works really well, as I get all the dishes pre-soaked.  I really cherish the times that he likes to help because I know that it likely won't last.  In fact, I marvel at how I now think like my parents and understand why they said things like "you could have had it done in the time you've spent complaining" and "it only takes 5 minutes, just do it"!  Oh, isn't hindsight 20/20!

Well, I think that is all of the updates for now.  I also want to say congratulations to my sister-in-law and her husband on purchasing their first home (and all the fun? that comes with it)!  You'll love it!

Until next time...

Unsolicited Advice

You know, as I've been talking to or reading communications from people, I've realized that it seems like February has been a difficult month for many of the people I know and love. I don't know if it's been unusually so or it's just been the severity or what. As I was sitting at my computer last night, I was really feeling weighed down by the many cares and concerns. For me, life has generally been good and easy so I wasn't really sure what to do with all this. I just want to share the verses that God brought to my mind:

"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." James 1:2-4

It's not easy and gives no concrete answers for the problem at hand but it does assure us that God is in control and has our perfection in mind!

Until next time...

Days 47-50 And on I go...

It's been awhile since I've blogged but it seems that life has been hectic.  There are all the usual things plus it has been stressful on Jason since his uncle went into the hospital.  Also, I found out on Wednesday that my aunt has breast cancer.  It does run in my father's family but still, it's just another one of those situations where there is nothing to do but pray and trust God!  I did manage to get a bit of my kitchen primed.  It's very exciting to see things changing colour.  I bought all my paint so hopefully I'll be able to get a fair bit of work done on the weekend.  I've just been somewhat drained this week so I haven't done much.  I have still managed to take a picture every day.  I'm really proud of myself for sticking with this.  It's really not that big a stretch for me, though, because I take a lot of pictures, anyway!  It's really just made me try to come up with clever ideas for pictures.  I have gotten a bit more scrapping done and I'm really enjoying the fruits of my labour.  Although, as Jason points out, I have a couple pages of many albums done, but I really do plan on finishing them!

This one is from a speed scrap at DDBN Forum.  I'm happy with it given that I kept getting interrupted and wasn't concentrating too hard!  We also got to learn how to make the picture bendy like that.  It took some figuring since I use different software than everyone else but it was fun to learn something new!

Kit used: Reflections by Farrah Smith Designs

Curled border paper from Autumn Dream by A Work in Progress

Tag from My Guy by Stacey Towers

Alpha from After Dusk Collab by Digi-Designs by Nicole

Word Art by Lara's Digi World

This next one is from our trip to Pine Cove again.  It was for a template challenge on DDBN forum.  I did flip the template (which I usually don't do) so I like how i've started thinking beyond what I usually do.

Kit used: Watermelon by Digital Candy Sweet Tart Team

Blueberries from Fruit Cocktail Collab by Malily

Template is Template #6 by Nibbles Skribbles

I also did the very first page that I can put in our wedding album when I get to it.  I figured out how to make text follow a squiggly line and am very excited about it! 

Kit used: Purple Passion by Stacey Towers

Photo mask is template_by_malina4 by Malina

Butterfly is from Love in Black & White by Bidouille

Frame is from Nuit Magique by MOI

I have also finally got week 3 of my project 365 stuff scrapped.  These are a little more modern than I usually do, but I liked them.  I couldn't figure out where to journal on these so it took me a long time to finish, but here they are:

Both pages used Just You and Me by Petit Moineaux

Both used Template 080712 by Dumpty

Notepaper on page 2 is from Express Yourself by Ronna Penner

Looking at this now, I guess I did do a lot of scrapping this week.  Oh well, it will pay off when I finally get some books printed!

Now here are my pictures for the last few days (I haven't done them up to date because I can't decide which picture to use for day 51!!)

Day 47:

I finally got around to putting together some shelves I bought last summer for the boys room.  I painted them and just hadn't gotten them together.  Since Jason wasn't at home the boys were "helping" me.  Evan mostly did this by walking from board to board as they were laid out on the floor.  Xander pretended to build with his tools and, let me tell you, it was so cute when he pretended to read the instructions for the shelves before going to do something!

Day 48:

This picture really has two reasons.  First, the lights were very pretty reflected in the icicles hanging from our house.  Second, it shows how I am just a little lazy in that it is the end of February and I still haven't taken down my Christmas lights.  In fact, I don't actually take them down, I just unplug them and consider that "down" so I really have been lazy this year!

Day 49:

My sister and her husband stopped by for the night the other day.  They just had an errand that they needed to do in the city.  It's nice that we can see them a little more often, even if it's just an overnighter here and there.  Xander was very excited when I told him in the morning that Auntie Michelle and Uncle Tyler were here for breakfast.  The book they are looking at is a pop-up Star Wars book that Jason got for his birthday.  It's more like paper art and the light saber in this picture really does light up green.  I think that's what Michelle is amused by.

Day 50:

Thursday the boys and I went out for lunch with a friend and her three kids.  While it was a little crazy, the kids were really good at the restaurant.  Also, I really needed that.  I was just fried on Thursday and it was nice to just chat and have someone else cook.  We went to Johnny Fox's which is in a hotel nearby.  The nice thing is that, with each paying adult, you get a kids' meal for free!  For the price of fast food we could actually eat a sit down meal!  The kids were getting a bit antsy by the end (it was 1:30ish or so), hence the venturing out in the above pic.  The restaurant was empty by this time, though, so it was all good!

That has been life for now.

Until next time...

Days 42-46 A mish-mash of things...

As I promised earlier, here are my pictures for the last few days.  I'm going to try to get this posted before I go hem a couple of pairs of pants.  Today was not quite as productive as I had hoped but they never seem to be.

Day 42:

This was taken right after care group Wednesday night.  This is my massive Bible.  It was a mother's day present a couple years back.  There wasn't much to choose from so Jason (I mean Xander) got me the large print NIV study Bible.  I wanted a large print one because my eyesight is just not so good and it is so much easier to read than the tiny print they make most Bibles in.  Now, since about half of it is study notes, I figure that they could take those out and make the print twice as big and then we'd really have an easy to read Bible!

Day 43:

Here is Evan sitting at his high chair, praying for supper.  It's so very cute now that he's learned to clasp him hands and bow his head (or at least slink down in his chair in some approximation).

Day 44:

This is my arrival at the church for departure to Shekinah and the ladies' retreat.  This was our charter bus (and we took a few vans).  It seemed to be a really new bus as it looked fresher and the style was a bit different than I'm used to.  Also, the TV screens were huge!  Not something you used to see on a bus.  It's very nice not having to worry about driving to the retreats anymore!  It was an enjoyable ride until the hill into Shekinah.  It's steep and narrow so the bus has to work hard at getting around the corners.  There were a few ladies who were motion sick and I was even starting to not feel so well.  We all made it, though, and eventually recovered!

Day 45:

This was Valentine's Day at the retreat.  As such, there was plenty of chocolate floating around.  On Saturday evening there was even chocolate (and caramel) fondue.  It was so incredibly yummy and the ladies did a really beautiful job of arranging the fruit.  I thought this was definitely worth a picture!

Day 46:

This is the view from the main lodge at Shekinah.  It is in the river valley and has such a lovely setting.  There is a serious tubing hill (and dangerous given the number of walking wounded we had on the weekend), a luge run and a skating pond.  I mostly did indoor crafting but I did manage to go for a short walk Saturday afternoon.  It really was a beautiful day but still a bit on the nippy side.  I also snuck out for a (very) brief time Saturday night just to look at the stars.  It was clear and you could see the amazing sky like you don't get to in the city.  It was really cold by then, though, so I didn't stay out too long.

Anyway, I guess I should go hem pants now.

Until next time...

Contrasts...

Well, this has been quite a weekend.  I went with a group of ladies from our church to Shekinah Resort (up near Saskatoon) for a retreat.  Before I left, I did get to do a quick speed scrap and here's the page I made.  The boys didn't let me work in peace so I wasn't really sure how it would turn out but I think it turned out quite well.

Kit used: About a Boy by A Work in Progress designs by Vicki

Frame is Grungy Frame 6 by Kylie M Designs

Greenery is from Love in Black & White by Bidouille

Anyway, the retreat was really good and I enjoyed it thoroughly.  In fact, I'd say it was likely my favourite retreat out of all the ones I've been on.  I just had a really good time crafting and visiting with people I don't get to see much.  I also found the sessions very challenging.  They were related to trading up to what God has for us, rather than spending our time in our own little worlds.  We need to step out of our comfort zones and surrender everything to God.  Surrender was a really big theme and God brought several things to my mind that I've been trying to do myself (with little or no success) and need to surrender to Him.  Several ladies gave stories of their surrender and it was so encouraging to hear the struggles that finally ended in surrender and God's peace and blessing.  Since it was Valentine's Day weekend, the chocolate also flowed freely at the event and that is always a good thing!

However, on the bus ride home, Jason's sister got a call from her husband that Jason's uncle (his dad's sister's husband) had fallen off a roof on the weekend and was severely injured.  This was the uncle that Jason worked for for many years.  It was a fairly big shock.  This is also only about three months after Jason's grandpa died (his dad's dad).  (Coincidentally, while I was at the prayer retreat).  Anyway, this couple has two grown children, one who is out of the country on vacation and can't return until Wednesday.  Jason's aunt and other cousin do have family around to support them (both physical family and spiritual family) but things are tough.  They need much prayer so if you think of us and/or them, please pray.

I will return, likely later tonight with pictures from the last few days.

Until next time...

Days 37-41 I finally got here!

Hi all!  I guess the time has just gotten away from me and I meant to blog sooner but I'm here now!  Things have been good around here.  We didn't do too much this past weekend.  Our play date went wonderfully on Friday!  Xander didn't even really play shy.  I had expected to have to help him warm up to the other kids for the first 20 or 30 minutes but he and the other boy (who is a year older than him) just took off playing right away.  I had to walk Xander upstairs but then I was free to go.  They had so much fun playing together and it was a really good morning.  (It turned into lunch, too, because my kids always want to stay for lunch...thanks Neysa for letting us impose!).

Saturday we had a few errands to do.  We took Xander to get some blood drawn for some routine tests...nothing major.  However, Jason had tried to do it the weekend before and they couldn't get a vein so he left.  This time, I had to hold him.  Now, he's very good with his immunization needles - no crying, no nothing (even while watching them) but he'd already had a bad experience here, so he freaked out when she was just feeling his arm.  He also made them take the blood from the arm they hadn't tried the week before!  They got it the first time this time, though, so it was all good.  After that, we went to Home Depot to pick up some bolts and ended up with flooring.  They had boxes of bamboo hardwood flooring for about half the price I've ever seen it for before.  This is what I want for our bedroom.  Jason suggested that we pick some up as this is a project we can do ourselves (we did the laminate).  He had to go back without the car seats in to get the 14 boxes that we needed!!  The car was full but our next project is now sitting in my bedroom and it is pretty!

Work is getting quite busy for me.  We're starting to have tax forms due and there are a couple of major projects that we have going right now.  I'm not really sure how it will all get done, but it will.  Jason's really busy at work this week, too, so we've been pretty tired.

I have managed to do a little bit more scrapping.  These are for more challenges on the Digi-Designs by Nicole (DDBN) forum.  They're also pages for photo books I'm working on so I can kill two birds with one stone.  Yay!

This is from our family gathering in Pine Cove last summer:

Credits: Kit is Blissful Morning by Raspberry Road Designs

Alpha is Dandelion Dreams by A Work in Progress by Vicki

Template is Template 05 by Schadow

This layout is for a book I hope to do for Xander but I thought the quote and the pictures went together so well.  Just remember the friendship is not father and son but boy and machines!!

Credits: Papers & wire from Big Top by Stolen Moments

Elements (except screw) from Built Tough by Raspberry Road Designs

Screw from What Little Boys are Made Of Mini-kit by Fairytale Studios

Alpha is Dirty Boy Alpha by Misty Cato

Template is Blog Template 15 also by Misty Cato

I really like how both of these turned out.  Participating in this forum and the challenges and seeing what others do has already improved my scrapping, I think.  It's much better than some of the pages I just threw together for my Mexico scrapbook!

Now, here are my pictures (there are five of them today so get ready for a long list...).

Day 37:

This is the playpen where my wonderful child, Evan naps.  He woke up from his nap one day and was quiet so I didn't realize it.  However, with him, quiet is always trouble.  Sure enough, when I heard some rustling, Jason went to get him and found this.  Somehow, he had reached the Christmas wrap that was an arm's length or more away and unrolled and tore up a bunch of it.  Oh, the antics of children!

Day 38:

This is my car full of flooring.  It just barely fit in there, but that is 14 boxes (enough to do about 330 square feet of bedroom).  Yay!

Day 39:

This picture was also a challenge on the DDBN forum.  The challenge was to take a picture of your favourite drink.  I went out to the store, bought the ingredients and made a strawberry daiquiri (non-alcoholic, of course).  This is my most favourite drink.  I think pina colodas are second.  I don't have either of them very often because they're a lot of work to make.

Day 40:

Here are Evan and I.  He has been a bit of a picky eater lately.  All he seems to want is fruit.  Granted that's better than junk food but still not a balance diet, even by my standards!  He absolutely loves bananas and just stuffs his mouth full when he eats them.  It's actually pretty cute.  I was trying to get a pic with him stuffing the banana in his mouth but he just kept sitting on my lap (probably to look at the back of the camera, as he always does).  So, this turned into a self-portrait, too.

Day 41:

This is my new vacuum.  I got it about 3 weeks ago.  My old one was dying (I had bought it about 12 1/2 years previous) and then I made the mistake of vacuuming up some drywall dust with it.  Well, after that, all it did was spew drywall dust.  So, we went out and got a new one.  I kinda wanted one of those Dyson ones, but $650 is a little steep.  Instead I got this Hoover Windtunnel.  It's still a bagless, which I am really enjoying, and it works very well (especially compared to my old one).  The carpets looked entirely different after the first vacuuming and we've had to use the scissors on the shag carpet downstairs because the suction keeps pulling up strings.  It's really great!

Anyway, it's getting late and this is long.  I probably won't be back on here for a few days because I'm heading out to our church's ladies retreat this weekend.  It is up at Shekinah, near Saskatoon.  I think it'll be a lot of fun.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Until next time...

Days 34-36 Ramblings (It could be a long post)

Well, I'm proud of myself for getting to blogging today.  Thursday and Sunday were kind of the two days I was hoping to do it each week but that doesn't seem to be really happening.  Oh well.  Today was somewhat productive.  I washed down some of my cabinets in preparation for painting.  I used TSP to get the grease off but I think it may have taken off most of the finish, instead.  Since I'm painting, I don't really care.  Painting is getting closer and closer so I'm getting excited about it!!

The crazy busy part of my week is over and now we can relax a bit.  We have a play date tomorrow morning, which I think will be fun.  We don't do many of those because the kids get their interaction at Auntie's and church.  I'm looking forward to this, though.

I've done some more more scrapping so I've got several layouts to post.  The first two are ones I did for challenges at the Digi-Designs by Nicole forum.  I joined this and am having a lot of fun (and actually doing some scrapping!)

Credits: Sable Brule Collaboration by Mere Poule

Flourish from Sable Brule Collaboration by Joey

Alpha is Plain Alpha by FlowerScraps

Credits: Terre de Feu by Flolinette

Campfire outline created from Digi-Designs by Nicole Outdoor Adventures

These next pages are my week 2 pages from my project 365:

Page 1:

Credits: Hot Chocolate Collab by Digiscrapbooking.ch

Single frames from Charming X-mas by Delicious Scraps

Greenery from Ete a la Camagne by Bellissa's Scraps

Alphs is Rusty Alpha by Cottage Arts

Page 2:

Credits: Hot Chocolate Collab by Digiscrapbooking.ch

Greenery from Ete a la Campagne by Bellisa's Scraps

Did you know that since I posted that picture of Evan and Xander in their winter clothes, and commented on how Evan HATES his winter clothes, he has completely flipped.  He hasn't cried about them since that picture and now he even sits down and WANTS to get his boots and jacket on!  Go figure.  (I'm not sad about the change, though.)

Now on to my current pictures!

Day 34:

This is me at my gas station, filling up with gas.  Since I've started dropping Jason off for work at 8 a.m., I have a bit of time before 8:30 when I have to be at work.  This means that if the gas light comes on at the beginning of the week, I just fill it up on my way to work.  I go to the Shell station (for the Airmiles).  It is not very busy at 8:15 a.m. but let me tell you it is CRAZY at 5:15 p.m.  I went after work once and the only open pump was one where you had to pay at the pump.  You know, I really like that.  Ever since then, I don't bother going inside.  It's a little cold in the winter but oh, well.  This also proves that I do now know how to pump gas.  Other than the one time my brother made me do it in high school, I've never really done it much until now.  Full serve is harder and harder to find!

Day 35:

This is a series of books that I'm currently reading.  I'm actually almost done the second last book.  I borrowed them from my mother-in-law and have really been enjoying them.  It is a Christian author and the books are set in pre-WWII Nazi Germany/Europe.  I love books from this era and I find they really make me think.  It's so hard to imagine yourself in those situations but I always wonder what I would do.  There are only two choices, darkness (the way of Satan) or light (the way of God).  Would I be the one who bravely fights the darkness regardless of the cost?  Would I be the one who tries to fly under the radar and go unnoticed?  Would I try to sit on the fence even though there is no gray?  Would I be deceived by the lies told?  I have no answers.  I know what I hope I would do but I've never been in that situation (I am thankful to God for that!).  It's very convicting to try to put yourself in these situations and then realize how there are battle between dark and light going on around us every day and we need to stand firm in those small battles, too.  It also makes me ponder current world events.  My husband has studied WWII history a significant amount and from our discussions, the author seems to have done her homework.  It is sometimes discouraging to see how a little backbone from England and France could have prevented WWII but, rather, they wanted to practice appeasement, in an effort to not inconvenience their citizens too much.  In the end, suffering increased and they went to war, anyway.  I'm not a huge fan of going to war, but it makes me wonder where that kind of thing may be happening today.  Anyway, I've rambled on long enough for this picture.  One more to go!

Day 36:

This is our house in wintertime.  I'd like to try to take a picture of it in each season (I'm not so sure spring and summer will look much different, though).  I took this from across the street.  Notice how you can barely see our hedge because of the snow on the boulevard (and this is after they took at least half of it away!)  I love our house, even though it has been making strange noises lately.  It's just those things that all houses do.  We have been so blessed by this house and the location that we were able to purchase in (several years ago before the boom, thankfully).

Anyway, this has become a really long post so I'll stop rambling now and let you get back to whatever it is you're doing (surfing the internet, maybe?)

Until next time...

Days 30 - 33 Ah, the music...

The weekend has flown by.  It really doesn't seem like I got much of a weekend because I spent Thursday and Friday trying to recover from my cold.  In fact, I slept all of Thursday afternoon.  It was a very unproductive couple of days.  However, Saturday was a really good day.  Jason and Xander went running errands in the morning.  This left me at home by myself with Evan.  It was a nice change.  It's not very often that I get to spend time alone with Evan.  We had a lot of fun just being silly and enjoying the uninterrupted time together.  I get alone time with Xander because Evan naps and sleeps more than he does so it was good.  Saturday night we ordered in (which is nice because I didn't have to cook) and the boys ate wonderfully.  Then, that evening, Jason and I went to the symphony.  It has been a couple of years since we have gone and we used to go a couple or so times each season.  This is what having kids will do!  I didn't realize how much I missed it until they began playing the first song and I was just captured.  Blair Lofgren (a distant relative of Jason's whose parents used to own our house) was one of the guest trio that was playing.  That's what really spurred us on to get tickets to this show.  I saw that he was coming when I checked the season out in September and figured that if we had gone to see him in Quebec, we should surely do it here!  It was a violin, cello and piano trio.  The first half was also all Beethoven.  I am a sucker for stringed instruments and Beethoven so I had an absolutely delightful time!  The second half was very intense but also amazing.  They played a song that hadn't been played here since before I was born.  In theory this is because the strings always rebel when told they have to play it.  I could see why.  It's amazing what they can do with those instruments!

Sunday was a less happy day as Xander had stayed up late and was really in a mood.  However, a nap rectified that and we all spent the evening watching the Super Bowl.  It was a close game so that was good but there were an obscene number of penalties that really shouldn't occur when you're supposed to be two of the best professional teams around.  Oh well, what can you do?  I'm rather indifferent to who won this year so it was all good.

Now, I am back at work.  It's getting busy because February is now upon us.  This starts the tax season off and running.  Hopefully things don't get too crazy too fast!  Here are my last few days of pictures:

Day 30:

This is what we had for supper Friday night - bacon and eggs.  I make the eggs scrambled and add Cheez Whiz in.  It is really, really yummy.  It is also one of the few meals that my entire family loves.  I made eight eggs, thinking that should be lots for 2 adults and 2 toddlers but we could have used a couple more, I think!

Day 31:

These are our symphony tickets from Saturday night.  Oh how I miss the music.  Sometimes I wish I still took violin lessons but I have no idea when I'd ever practice.  I need to dig my piano out again and sit down at it.  That I can at least pick up again with a little bit of practice!

Day 32:

I have made it through a whole month of a picture a day - yay!  I'm excited I've gotten this far.  It's been really fun.  This here is Super Bowl Sunday.  February 1st.  This is what I call Super Bowl Supper.  We've done it the last couple of years where we just pick up some appetizers (and this year pizza) from the grocery store and eat supper in the basement.  It's actually a lot of fun.

Day 33:

I saw this on my drive to work today and it was so beautiful.  Jason tells me this is the oil refinery but it's amazing how, in the cold and the sunrise, the stuff pouring out of a refinery can look so beautiful.  I drove facing this and the picture is actually taken from the back parking lot of my office building.  I just wonder at how beauty can be found anywhere!

That is the end of my weekend (and start of my week).  Work promises to keep me busy for a couple of days, so...

Until next time...