Desert Island, Halloween Style

In honor of Halloween, name your top five Halloween treats.

In no particular order:

1. Butterfingers

2. Twix

3. Candy Corn and Pumpkins

4. Snickers

5. Milky Way Dark

However, I also love 3 Musketeers, Almond Joy, Rasinetts, Peanut MnM's. I think I would be happy with any form of chocolate! What candy will you be sneaking out of your kid's bag tonight?

Five Foods

Name five foods for your desert island adventure.

1. Bacon - if I have bacon, anything will taste better.

2. Strawberries

3. Coffee - what else do I need to say

4. Dark chocolate - I could do great things with the strawberries and chocolate, not to mention spice up my coffee

5. Sharp cheddar cheese - kind of like bacon, can make anything taste better but can also stand alone as a meal

What would you bring? I love reading your comments, thanks for posting them!

Five Tunes

If you could only download five songs to your i-pod for your desert stay, what would you choose??



1. I Love Rock and Roll by Joan Jett (this was my all time favorite song growing up in the 80's; I felt very tough when I listened to it)

2. Louisiana Saturday Night by Alabama

3. Son of a Preacher Man by Dusty Springfield

4. Creed by Rich Mullins

5. Mighty to Save by Hillsong

This is a hard one because I love so many different styles of music. I could have easily listed 20 more. What are yours??

Desert Island

This week I am going to have a theme, desert island. I will post a different possibility everyday with my top 5. I hope that you all will post your top 5 in the comments!

Oh yeah, for people like my mom, the idea behind the game is you are going to spend the rest of your life on a desert island and you can only bring ...

Five movies

Steele Magnolias
Wizard of Oz
Any season of The Office
An Affair to Remember
Napoleon Dynamite

The Shining came to mind but since it's the rest of my life and I'm by myself that's probably not a good choice.

As soon as I post this I will think of others or when I read yours I'll go "why didn't think of that". I can't wait to read your list!

Halloween Spice Cake

I made this Halloween spice cake tonight. Richard LOVED it. He said it was one of the best cakes I had ever made, I disagree. Anyways, since he loved it so much, I thought I would share the recipe. It was super easy; all you need are two bowls, a spoon, and a hand mixer (and the obvious measuring utensils). I baked mine in a bundt pan instead of a loaf pan. Hope you try it, let me know if you do.

Gratitude

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. - Thorton Wilder

A couple of weeks ago, our church began a church-wide Bible study called One Month to Live: 30 Days to a No-Regrets Life. Like the title implies, the study gets you to focus on how you would spend your life if you only had 30 days left. Richard and I have been reading the book together and discussing it with our small group.

Many things have changed in my life but most directly my relationship with Matt. I tend to get caught up in house duties, keeping him "in line", or other things that I miss the big picture. The study has helped me focus on my little boy and realize, that's what he is, my little boy. I catch myself trying to rush his "growing up" and not savoring the moments. Since I began the study I have become much more aware of this and when these moments arise I savor them and praise God for them.

You are probably thinking, good grief what kind of mother are you? You didn't do this before? I thought I did, but now it's different and it's not just with Matt but with everything. Anyways, today's chapter focused on gratitude. Here is an excerpt:

If you only had one moth to live, you'd want to make the most of it.

To laugh and fully engage with the people you love.

To appreciate the little things, the ones that might seem silly to others

but that delight your soul, and to give God thanks for allowing you to experience them.

At the end of the chapter you are asked what you are grateful for and/or what you take for granted. I have to say, something I take for granted but love and will miss dearly one day is being able to hold Matt's little hand all the time. I love how his small fingers curl around mine and how he just automatically reaches for my hand when we are walking. One day, he will be too big to hold Mama's hand and I will miss that so much.

So what about you, what are you thankful for?

After reading, go get one

I just got back from a morning at Chuck-E-Cheese. Whew! My neighbor and I left at 9:30 this morning; who knew the giant rat welcomed customers this early. You might think we are crazy for going this early but it worked out perfectly. We were the first ones there, the only ones for about 30 minutes, tickets were hanging out of all the machines, and the food was fresh. I thought the ticket thing was a fluke but soon realized the employees will go play all the games every so often to make sure they work and leave the tickets hanging! We finally wound up following the guys around grabbing the tickets. Classy huh?

After that we went to The Children's Pace and I bought Matt's Christmas outfit. Woo Hoo! By the way, Jana F., you need to check it out because they had super cute big girl and baby girl clothes! Actually, any of you who like to coordinate Christmas outfits, this is the place to shop!

For Karla, I found a Willie's Ice House close by. Now you guys have a reason to come and visit.:)

Finally, the other night, when we had our date, we went to Starbucks after dinner all by ourselves! I wasn't going to order anything but then I saw the Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate...If you like getting a box of Valentine chocolates then this is the drink for you. It taste like someone melted a box of chocolates then blended it together. It is absolutely sinful.

Enjoying the Day

It's me. I finally made it back to the land of blogging. Things are good here. Very good at the moment; Matt is spending the night at Nana and Pawpaw's and we are having a date night later! That's probably the only reason why I am able to blog at the moment, Matt's gone.

Did I ever mention that he doesn't go to Mother's Day Out anymore? The building was flooded thanks to Ike. Since I only experienced one mom day, I am loving the alone time right now. I have painted our two small hallways, watched a ton of Food Network, walked around Hobby Lobby and Michael's and it's only 4 p.m. I feel like I could conquer the world.

I should mention that we called last night and he refused to talk to us. No surprise. Then I waited until this afternoon to call and he refused to talk again. Still not surprised. The only way he got on the phone was Karen made him ask me if he could eat some candy.

Now down to business; an update on my mom. After her appointment, she was told the hole in her heart had reopened. They needed to look at it further to see if they could operate and close the hole so they scheduled two test to be done the following Monday. We drove up to my mom's on Saturday and my brother flew in on Sunday. My mom failed to mention until we were leaving that she was also very anemic and they wanted to give her two pints of blood after the tests.

After her test, the cardiologist told us that the hole was much smaller than they anticipated. He said it was about the size of a pin hole. Since it was so small, they did not need to do anything at the moment, just monitor. However, she did have some other issues with the pressure on one side of her heart but they are going to give her medicine to deal with it. He also wanted to look into the anemia and begin a program addressing that and the fact her body is not making "healthy" blood. Instead of getting two units of blood she wound up needing 4!!

Overall, this is good news. The hole was not what the doctor's thought and her blood problems are getting treated. Once again the Lord has taken care of my mom and I praise him for that. I am reminded of the old hymn "Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus":

Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus

And to take him at his word

Just to rest upon his promise

And to know"Thus saith the Lord"

Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him!

How I've proved him o'er and o'er!

Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus.

O for grace to trust him more!

Request

My mom has been having some issues lately with her meds and heart. She is going to her cardiologist today for an EKG test. Please lift her up in prayer today.

Pics from out trip

Here are some pics (finally) from our trip to Minneapolis. Enjoy.

Matt loved watching the airplanes. Make yourself comfortable kiddo.

This was at the Mall of America. There was a whole Nickelodeon amusement park in the center of the mall. Did I mention we spent 9 1/2 hours there? We still did not see the third floor.

Matt enjoying marshmallow roasting in Uncle Earnie's backyard. By the way, I don't know what kind of grass they have but I could have wrapped myself in it. It was the lushest and softest grass I have ever walked in. OK, sounds a little weird but you would have felt the same way. Karla, for the record, I only ate two s'mores.

Grandma and Matt on our paddle boat ride down the Mississippi. Who knew you could do recreational things on the Mighty Miss like fish and kayak? The water was so clear unlike down here where it looks like mud.

The whole group.

Aunt Chrissy and Uncle Earnie with Mr. Lewis. By the way, they spoiled him so much that they had to ship a box of toys to our house because we couldn't fit them all in our suitcase! But that is what aunts and uncles are for. Right?

Playing at a park in a very cool area called Linden Hills. Through those trees one of three lakes in Minneapolis. If I had (at least) half a million dollars, I would buy a house there. For those of you from Dallas, it reminded me of the White Rock /Lakewood area.

Back at the Mall of America. Uncle Earnie and Matt at the Lego superstore. Did I mention no sales tax on clothes and shoes?!

Heading home. Matt and his new friend Buddy. He made Buddy at Build-A-Bear thanks to Aunt Chrissy. This monkey has more clothes then Matt.

We had a wonderful trip. I was surprised by the beauty of the state and enjoyed all of our outings immensely. I had such a good time hanging out with my brother and sister-in-law and I miss you guys so much.

Our son

Matthew calls me mom now and for some reason that makes me sad. The other day I asked him to call me mama and he said no. I asked him why not and he said mama had disappeared. At this point I wasn't sure what to say so I asked what happened to her and he said she's mom now!

Interesting.

Last night he wanted to honk the horn in the drive way but I told him no because it was too late ( 9:30 p.m.). He of course asked why and I said someone could be sleeping. At this point, he asked his favorite question, "then what happens?" I told him they would come outside and yell at us for waking them up. He said that's OK because I will get a sleep machine and make them go back to sleep.

The kid is 3 1/2. Where is he getting this stuff?

That's our boy and we wouldn't change him for anything! Hope this brightens your day :)

Political Entertainment

I watched Bill O'Reilly last night and had to share this clip from the show. He interviewed Dem. Congressman Barney Frank about his position and comments on the economic crisis. Many people find O'Reilly obnoxious and out of control; I think he calls it like he sees it. Sometimes I agree and other times I disagree with him. Just so you know he is not a dem. or rep. he is an independent.



On the debate last night, what did you think? I would love to read you thoughts. I thought they both did well but I was very relieved for Gov. Palin; I loved her closing remarks, very clever.