Has it really been a month?

I've been working in Alabama for a month now. Time seems to have flown by but I am sure that has to do with the fact that I am working 12 hours a day and have only had 3 full days off since I got here.
I miss blogging so much! I try to at least read some blogs but I have not commented faithfully at all. Thankfully, Honey(Heather) brought her laptop down here with her and she is sweet enough to share it with me. That's right. 3 Clegg girls all working down in Mobile together. :) Our town home will be ready this coming Friday and I am SO beyond excited about not living in a hotel.
T has been able to come down here to visit twice and I am so thankful that on his days off that he is willing to drive 4 hours to be with me, even when I still have to work. Those are precious moments that I absolutely cherish. I asked to have this upcoming weekend off so that I could go home and move some things back for our apartment but it was not approved. I haven't been able to go home since I got here and I am having withdrawals. I miss T, my family and my friends but I know that this is temporary(even though it is a long term temporary). Hopefully there will be some normalcy in my schedule and routine once we move into the apartment.
Some things I appreciate:
- T. He is so sweet and so supportive. This is by no means easy but we both know it is necessary. He is forever patient. He had about an hour to teach me to drive Heather's standard car and, though I am by no means good at it, I did it!
- My job and work family. This job has and will enable us to not struggle so much financially. If you have been around this blog for any amount of time, with both of us in college and working average paying jobs while in school, money has been a serious issue. My first paycheck was for a week and a half and, basically, equalled what T and I were making together in a month at home. I still can't even wrap my mind around it. But I am very grateful and blessed.
- My parents and siblings. My whole family was together on the 4th of July since I was graced with having the day off thanks to watermelon. :o) Then my mom came back and spent some time with us "big girls". More moments I cherish. My sisters, Rachel and Honey, are an ultimate support system. Rachel and I work the same shift but on completely different areas of the site and she is still living with family friends while I am at a hotel. Heather is working night shift so we only catch little moments together every once in a while. Despite not seeing them consistently, I am so grateful to have them here with me.
- Jade. After working 12 hours with all men, it is SO nice to have a female to hang out with after work. I met Jade through her brother, who works with me in the Boom Repair Shop, and we instantly hit it off. She works in the office for one of the subcontractors and she is basically the only female with that company. We are both starved for female companionship. ;) 

Some things I am looking forward to:
- Moving into our apartment
- A trip home, whenever that may be.
- Getting into a routine.
- Cooking, blogging, and making the most of my evenings.
- Getting a DVR. :) I have cable in the hotel but with our crazy schedules we can't really watch any shows consistently. I look forward to being spoiled and having it on hand again.
- Buying a brand new mattress and bedroom furniture for the bedroom that Honey and I will share.
- Having my dog Lady here with us once we're in the apartment. T and I decided that Lady should come stay with me so I can have some "company". He will be keeping Coach with him in Mississippi. Coach doesn't adapt to new surroundings as easily as Lady does and he enjoys the yard and being able to run free. So even though Coach is "my" baby, he will be staying at home with T and Lady will be coming here.
- Mani and Pedi with Jade sometime this week.

Happy Mother's Day, sweet Momma!

My mother is more than just a mom. She is my confidant, guide, mentor, dear friend, and role model of a Godly woman, wife and mother.
Not everyone has the type of precious relationship that we have. I know that it seems so cliche to rave about my mother on mother's day and so typical in this blog format. But this relationship is anything but cliche or typical. I know that I caused my mom much headache, heartache and gray hairs over the years(especially during those rough teen years). I absolutely adore my mother and I would love nothing more than to be just like her.
She has raised us to know and love God in a way that most children are only exposed to inside of the church. She made sure that learning the Bible and lessons from it were taught in a fun, real way. Growing up we were always listening to praise music, memorizing verses(through Awanas and Hide 'em in Your Heart), listening to Adventures in Odyssey. She taught us from home and invested in our lives in a way that very few parents are able to do. I cherish the memories I have of being homeschooled and hope to one day have those same sweet memories with my own children. She put up with me when I insisted that I would never read as a kindergartner and teased me kindly as a teenager because I would always have a book in hand. My mother lead me to Christ during a spelling lesson when I was in 2nd grade. There are so many more examples of how she has thoroughly imprinted my life through her love. My hope is to let her know daily how much I love her, appreciate her and want to be just like her. I want to make my mother proud of me because I know to reach that point I am becoming the type of person that my Heavenly Father wants me to be(my ultimate goal).

My parents have a precious, wonderful and beautiful relationship and have been a great example of what a Christ centered marriage is like. This morning our sweet family friend, Mrs. Becky Pearce, summed our family and my parents up better than I ever could. "Your family really, truly and genuinely loves and cares about each other. Not many kids, spanning that much in age, actually LIKE each other. Sure they love each other but you enjoy each others company. Each one of you glow around the other and it is obvious that the love your parents share has carried over into each of you. Your parents aren't afraid to gaze adoringly at each other in public, they are 100% living for each other and to make each other happy. And the weirdest thing? They like being around each other ALL the time. Most married people enjoy each other but also treasure their time alone." My parents take PDA to a whole new level but in a completely acceptable, sweet way. ;o) I just hope that years down the road T and I will still have such a wonderful marriage.

Psalm 127:3-5

 ³ Sons are a heritage from the LORD,
       children a reward from him.

 ⁴ Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
       are sons born in one's youth.

 ⁵ Blessed is the man
       whose quiver is full of them.
       They will not be put to shame
       when they contend with their enemies in the gate.

Proverbs 31:10-31

¹⁰ A wife of noble character who can find?
       She is worth far more than rubies.

 ¹¹ Her husband has full confidence in her
       and lacks nothing of value.

 ¹² She brings him good, not harm,
       all the days of her life.

 ¹³ She selects wool and flax
       and works with eager hands.

 ¹⁴ She is like the merchant ships,
       bringing her food from afar.

 ¹⁵ She gets up while it is still dark;
       she provides food for her family
       and portions for her servant girls.

 ¹⁶ She considers a field and buys it;
       out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.

 ¹⁷ She sets about her work vigorously;
       her arms are strong for her tasks.

 ¹⁸ She sees that her trading is profitable,
       and her lamp does not go out at night.

 ¹⁹ In her hand she holds the distaff
       and grasps the spindle with her fingers.

 ²⁰ She opens her arms to the poor
       and extends her hands to the needy.

 ²¹ When it snows, she has no fear for her household;
       for all of them are clothed in scarlet.

 ²² She makes coverings for her bed;
       she is clothed in fine linen and purple.

 ²³ Her husband is respected at the city gate,
       where he takes his seat among the elders of the land.

 ²⁴ She makes linen garments and sells them,
       and supplies the merchants with sashes.

 ²⁵ She is clothed with strength and dignity;
       she can laugh at the days to come.

 ²⁶ She speaks with wisdom,
       and faithful instruction is on her tongue.

 ²⁷ She watches over the affairs of her household
       and does not eat the bread of idleness.

 ²⁸ Her children arise and call her blessed;
       her husband also, and he praises her:

 ²⁹ "Many women do noble things,
       but you surpass them all."

 ³⁰ Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;
       but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

 ³¹ Give her the reward she has earned,
       and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

Show Us Your Life - How you picked your kids names/future names

Welcome over from Kelly's Blog. 

Of course, we don't have kids yet but we have talked about names.
Trevor is the 7th generation, first born son. Did that make sense? For 7 generations, the first born has always been a son. T's dad(first born and son), T's granddad(first born and son), etc. So there is NO pressure for us to have a boy first. ;) 
If we are blessed with a boy, first born or not, he will be named...

(Kit credit: Boys will be boys by Vicki A Work in Progress)

He would go by Trace, because that's a big name for a little boy. ;)

And if we were blessed with a girl, she would be named...

(Kit Credit: Pink Mocha by Vicki A Work in Progress)

Trevor likes the name Mary. Rainey is my mother's maiden name. Since I like double names and we both love family names, we though Mary Rainey was cute. I have literally fallen in love with this name. =)

Other family names that we would like to use...

Mac(after T's grandfather)

Lawrence(after my Granddaddy)

We have just toyed around with how to put the two of them together and I think Mackensie Lawrence is adorable(and could possibly) be changed around to suit either male or female. 

Any suggestions for using those two names?

More Doris Day Love Thanks to Swagbucks

Thanks to Swagbucks, I will be enjoying this little beauty tomorrow on the way to New Orleans. :)

48 songs of Doris Day loveliness. SO excited!
Thanks to Swagbucks giftcards, I only had to pay $0.58 for the album out of pocket.
Don't know what swagbucks is? Swagbucks is a way of earning points towards many prizes through your daily internet searches. It is a search engine just like google with the same results except you earn for your searches. Cool, huh? It is free to sign up. So far I have gotten over $30 in Amazon gift cards.

Tomorrow I will be driving my younger sisters to New Orleans where we will meet my oldest sister, Rachel, to see WICKED. We are going to be eating lunch at Ralph & Cackoo's and hopefully getting some beignets before we head home. I love spending time with my sisters, I love Cajun food and I love New Orleans. =) It should be a great day (especially with Doris Day keeping us company on the road). ;)

Christmas Traditions

If you haven't entered my giveaway, go check it out!

When we lived in Texas and Alabama when I was younger, we usually traveled for the major holidays. Now that we live in Mississippi, we are closer to our family(those here in MS and in Louisiana).

Generally we would spend Thanksgiving with my mother's side of the family and do our Christmas gift exchange then. Unfortunately, my mom's side of the family doesn't really get together for the holidays anymore.
My MaMa(grandmother) and Nanny(great-grandmother) always gave us the same thing, every year in addition to our presents. I won't mention what it is here because, since both MaMa and Nanny have been gone for several years, I have decided to carry on this tradition with my younger siblings. It wasn't anything big, just a little treat. We would get 2, one from each of them. So this year, if I can find these treats, my siblings will each receive 2. :)

We would usually stay home for Christmas. I remember a few years of doing the traditional Christmas morning opening of presents but most of my memories are different, my families non-traditional traditions. :o) We ALWAYS have Poppa's pizza on Christmas Eve. My dad takes orders from everyone and makes homemade pizzas. We each get our own personalized half of a pizza(translation: leftovers for most of us. Yum!). We usually open our presents after pizza. With 7 kids in the family there is a lot of chaos but we try to go in "rounds" and take turns opening presents. Many years the timing was worked around Christmas Eve services at church. I love candle light Christmas Eve services.

Christmas day was spent as a family. We have a time of praise and worship, and read the story of our Savior's birth. My parents decided when I was 5 or 6 to open presents before Christmas day actually hit so that, on Christmas day, we would focus on the true reason for the holiday and spend time simply enjoying our family.

A day or so after Christmas, we used to head to one of my favorite places, Ponchatoula. If you've read this blog for a little while you know of my absolute love of this small town. I adore it.
Since my Granddaddy's death, things have changed some. These days, Grandmommy is the one who does most of the traveling. She takes turns going to visit her children/grandchildren, as well as her siblings.

T knows that I love anything and everything Christmas. Last year was the first year that we didn't go to Bellingrath Gardens in Mobile, AL at Christmastime. It wasn't too disappointing since we were at Disney World at the time. I love going to Bellingrath to see all the Christmas lights, walk the gardens and tour the home.
T and I don't have too many Christmas traditions of our own yet. I am sure this will develop over time. :)

I love Christmas movies. Check out my previous post on Christmas movies. Strangely enough, half of the people who arrive on my blog through Google arrive on that post. I have been watching them for weeks now, though there are some that I watch year round. My DVR will most likely go nuts this year. I like Hallmark Christmas movies and especially like ABC Family's 25 Days of Christmas.

I also love Christmas music. My ipod has been playing Christmas music consistently since mid-October. It is the only thing I listen to while I am working at my computer at school.

We might not have as many traditions, special moments, or big things happening in our family at Christmas. But I love it none the less. It might seem simple to some, but it is precious to me. =)

Let me know if you dropped in. I love finding new blogs. ;)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

I could not wait to put up the decorations here at our apartment. But I was "good" and waited until Thanksgiving day to redesign my blog for Christmas. I kept putting it off and putting it off. I had every intention creating my background, header and tags beforehand but it is so much easier to play around with it and get the sizing right if you go ahead and do it all at once. While my casseroles were cooking this afternoon I decided I should go ahead design. So here it is.

I know it isn't marvelous and it most certainly isn't professionally or well done. But I have fun doing it. =)

T took me on a date last night. We started the night out by going to Wal-mart to buy a new kennel for Coach(the one he had was about 10 years old, literally) and a new bed for Lady. Totally romantic, I know. We stopped off at my parents to exchange a few things we needed to cook our dishes today. Then we headed back to this side of town for Olive Garden. Delicious.
After dinner we hit a late movie to see The Blind Side. Great movie! We decided to go to the smaller/older theater in our area because the tickets are cheaper there on weeknights and we wanted to steer clear of any crowds(such as crazy teenagers going to see New Moon for the 5th time. ha). The theater was so slow that they didn't even have the ticket office outside open. Before dinner we drove by and T went inside to buy the tickets. There was one girl operating the ticket computer and running the concession stand. He said that as soon as he walked in the girl said, "Mhmm, white boy!" When he got back in the car and told me, I couldn't help laughing. What was even funnier was when we came to actually watch the movie, the girl said, "Ugh. Of course the white boy is with a white girl." I almost lost it right there. Apparently they are used to white boys coming in there. Or maybe just not good looking ones. ;) 'Cause you know I'm not biased. At all. HA. Despite the fact that it is considered to be the "sketchy" theater, it wasn't all that bad. I'm all for saving money on movie tickets because then we can actually afford to go more often. :o)


I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I actually ate a lot less than I thought I would. We slept late (skipping breakfast), I ate my leftovers from Olive Garden for lunch and then only had one plate for dinner. It was a great evening of laughing, eating and spending time with many of my favorite people.

T is working tonight, 11pm-7am. :( I am home with the babies, candles lit all over the living room, Christmas tree and mantle lit and tackling the task of a homemade advent calendar. I'll have to post pictures when it gets done. Maybe I should have said IF it gets done. I am starting it so late and it is taking a lot longer to do each piece than I expected. Of course, I would be making more progress if I wasn't on the computer right now. ;)

Good luck to all of you braving the crowds for Black Friday shopping. I will be at my mom's baking away with the girls in my family until I have to go to work at 4.
Another thing I am thankful for? NOT having to open and work the breakfast shift tomorrow morning at Chickfila. In other words, not having to be there at 4:30am and working through the Black Friday shopping crowds!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Don't forget to enter my giveaway if you haven't already!

Last year, I didn't get to watch much of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. This was a first for me. I always watch the parade first thing on Thanksgiving morning. I love it!
And one day I WILL be there in person (freezing my southern behind off, I'm sure).

Instead, I spent Thanksgiving working alongside Mickey and Minnie. For a person that loves tradition, the holidays were anything but traditional for us last semester. But I wouldn't trade it for anything.
We had a potluck dinner with all of the other Sunset Market Ranch cast members. It was fun because all of the International College Program students went NUTS over our Thanksgiving tradition and all of the dishes!
We all worked super long shifts on Thanksgiving day but our "family" was together so we still had a good time.

This year, I will be back with my family.Trevor's parents couldn't decide on what to do for Thanksgiving so we will probably just drop by for a little while. Then in the afternoon we will pack up the Hashbrown Casserole and Corn Casserole that I am cooking and take it to my parents house.
I am looking forward to spending time with family, food, fun and making many memories.
I have so much to be thankful for! God has been good and provided so much over the past year! He is so good!

Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Life Happened... Again(My 99th post)

I didn't get to post last night on my night off because T was using the computer to get some work done for his online class. Yes, I failed again.

Tuesday night I got off work and went to the hospital to see my brother Josh(13). He is having an EEG done to try and figure out what is causing his migraines. The tests are supposed to last 24-72 hours. Hopefully they will be able to figure something out and give him relief. He is so young and has already had migraines for a couple of years.

Let me just say, that God is SO good. Yesterday, God provided us with a second car to use until T's car can (finally) be fixed AND a full-time job for T. T's car has been out of commission for so long. It broke down before we went to Disney (2 years in April-May). We saved up money while we were there, put almost $1500.oo into it, and had it running for all of TWO days before it blew another head gasket and the radiator cracked. Beautiful, right?

Since we were both working at the same place and going to school, it was fine for us to have only one car. Less money spent on insurance, gas, etc. But

1) I am now working in the completely opposite direction

2) since it is now "off-season", the cafe where T works isn't open many days meaning his hours are cut even more

3) T will be leaving sometime in the spring for the army - no date yet.

4) He will not be taking classes in the spring (obviously) so he needs something full-time until he leaves

5) I will still have to get to school (a 30-40 minute commute) next semester

T starts work today! They will be working around him finishing the semester out AND they hired him knowing he would be leaving eventually. With the extra income, we can now justify having 2 cars. His parents are letting him use one of their cars until he can get his fixed. The plan is to fix his car, he'll drive it to work and I'll have our car for school and work, and then when he leaves for basic training we'll put his car up for sale.

Unfortunately, his schedule is a little crazy right now. He works tonight 11pm-7am, Friday 5pm-5am, and Saturday 7pm-7am. Nuts, I know, but God has provided and I have ZERO right to complain. :o) Also, I work tonight 4-11 and Saturday 9am-5pm. So we won't be seeing each other much but we are still squeezing in a date tomorrow afternoon. I was supposed to work tomorrow night but one of the girls only got scheduled for 1 day this week, so I gave her my Friday shift. I got more hours than I was expecting, so I didn't mind sharing some of my hours.

Last night after choir, I went to Wal-mart to pick a couple of things up. I came outside and my driver's side door was standing wide open. I could tell someone had gone through it. My backpack was open and things were moved around, but NOTHING was missing. I was kind of scared to get into the car though. Ha.

Since this is my 99th post, I will try posting my giveaway tomorrow and answer any questions if you feel so inclined to ask any. ;)

Sisters, Sisters!

School this morning was rather productive. We are plunging headlong into working with AutoCAD's Inventor program. Since the class is Machine Drafting, today we created individual parts and then assembled them to make a machine. All on the computer. It was so cool watching it all piece together. Yes, I am that big of a nerd. And I embrace it wholly! ;)

Tonight, all 5 of us Clegg girls got to hang out. It happens so rarely these days. I honestly think the last time we all 5 were together for girl time was when the Hannah Montana 3d Concert came out in theaters. Terrible, I know.
We went to Mistletoe Marketplace(Hundreds of merchants from MS and several surrounding states with booths of Christmas decor, clothes, and gift ideas). We browsed through the entire building, sampling food, checking out Christmas decor ideas but we skipped over most of the clothing type booths. We were all working on a limited budget so we didn't stay for too long. It was fun nonetheless. And I plan to go back again. Hopefully when I have a little bit of money to spend, more time to enjoy it and less of a crowd.

We got one of the ladies working to take a picture of all of us together. This picture is much better quality than the next one, but Winnie's eyes are closed. Way to go, Win-Celine! ;)

Me and my 4 sisters - Heather, D'Lynn, Winnie and Rachel.

After Mistletoe Marketplace, we went to Keifer's for some delicious Greek food. We went a little picture happy while waiting for our food.

Heather (affectionately known as Honey) and Rachel (affectionately known as Rae). Apparently I wasn't very good at pronouncing my sister's names when I was little. That is what I called them when I first started talking and they have been that since. =)

Me and Honey - she loves me so much she was practically leaping across the table to take a picture with me. ;o)

The "lil" girls. Ok, so they aren't so little anymore. But considering there is an 8 year gap between myself and Winnie, they will always be the Lil Guys(what I call my 2 younger brothers and 2 younger sisters) to me.

Honey, Win-Celine(Winnie Celine but I pronounce Win-Celynn rather than Celean) and Rae

Winnie told us she won't be taking any more pictures until she has her braces off. We'll see about that.

D'Lynn Grace (named after my Momma, Debra Lynn) is my mini-me. She's so much like me that it is slightly scary, except for the fact that she is adorably precious where I am a sarcastic mess.

I thought Winnie was my own personal babydoll when she was born. It almost took away the serious pain, disappointment and hurt [;)] that I was no longer the baby of the family.

D'Lynn, Winnie and myself.

I adore my family, absolutely adore. But there is a special, unforgettable and unmatchable bond between sisters. Clegg Clones, I love you!

p.s. You can see the final product of Winnie and D'Lynn's haircuts. Isn't D'Lynn's hair absolutely fabulous? I wish my hair had that much body and natural curl/wave. She looks so much older. I don't know that Maxi-me can handle Mini-me looking older... this might develop into a full blown crisis. ;o)

Hairdos and Homecoming

Well, better late than never, right? The hairdo pictures will be 2 weeks old on Wednesday. Misplacing my camera, among other things, kind of messed up my plans to get the pictures posting sooner.

Winnie, D'Lynn and I went on a little mini road trip to get our hair "did". I am the type of person that when I find a hair dresser that I like, then I am sticking with them. Even if I have to drive an hour and a half for my haircut. ;)
Winnie and D'Lynn wanted their hair chopped off. I, on the other hand, wanted a trim. Literally. She took off the ends and relayered... and I was good to go. None of this 6-inch "trim" junk for me.

Here is my D. Grace waiting patiently for her turn. Her hair is ridiculously thick. Yes, I (with the straight/thin hair) am very jealous. But it is just too much my 10 year old (soon to be 11!) sister to style, manager, or even brush on her own.

D'Lynn got her hair cut short, layered and thinned out. It is now much more manageable for her now.

I didn't get any pictures of it after it was fully styled but our hairdresser, Adrienne, took advantage of D'Lynn natural curls. It is now short, curly and absolutely adorable!!!

Winnie had enough length to donate her hair.

This is basically the finished product. I would show you a picture of the front after it was completely style but I have a feeling that Winnie would kill me (the picture is really attractive). ;o)

It was a pretty eventful day - considering that we blew a tire almost as soon as we got to Hattiesburg. We had stopped long enough to eat lunch with my dear friend Ashley Paige, pick up our tickets for the Homecoming football game the following Saturday... and low and behold, my tire blows! It scared me to death, but thankfully we were only going about 10 miles an hour because we pulled out of the parking lot and the light had turned yellow ahead. =)

A few days later, Sweetheart T and I went back to Hattiesburg for the University of Southern Mississippi's homecoming game. I had a great time catching up with my sorority sisters, the lovely Alpha Delta Pi ladies. :)

This is my big, my lovely Diamond sister, Miss Lauren Rose! She was soo busy trying to finish up her last year of nursing school when she became my big - but she was amazing.

This is my Ime! Ila and I lived down the hall from each other our first year at USM. She went through informal recruitment for ADPi the next fall and once she was given her bid, she invited me to join in on the fun. =)

This lady is one of the reasons I fell in love with ADPi and realized they weren't the stereotypical sorority. Rachel Mowdy, I love you so much! You are such a strong Christian and inspiration and even though there is distance between us, I cherish our friendship!

T and myself. Sadly we didn't get any really good pictures of us, which seems to be a regular occurance. I will work on this. But it makes it a little difficult when he hates the camera. ;)

Football! Bleeding black and gold for my Eagles!

The sunset over the Admin building was beautiful! I love sunsets but it's even better when there is a lovely setting in the foreground.

After the game, we went out to eat at Chili's. Ok, so really we wanted to eat somewhere that T could watch the end of the State and LSU games. We picked a table that had a great view of the games and we were good to go. We spent the rest of the night hanging out with friends and catching up. We stayed the night at a state park. I love camping. Unfortunately, the air mattress that we had aired up that morning didn't get sealed properly (not pointing any fingers) ;).
Since we got back after quiet hours (10pm), T didn't want to re-air up the mattress. So we "slept" on the ground.

Ok. T slept. I didn't. ;o) And I even had a bruise the next day to prove that I was laying on a pinecone. Yup, a pinecone shaped bruise on my upper right leg. HA

That's my sweetheart!

The beautiful view from our campsite.

Me out on a log. Apparently T was as intent on taking pictures of me during my little quiet time as I was of taking pictures of his. :)

We packed up our tent and decided to go for a hike.

The woods were beautiful... (and I actually saw some fall colors!)

The weather was perfect!

On the way home, we stopped at the 49 flea market which was right across from the State Park where we stayed. It was surprisingly large and I found so many little things that I wanted. Unfortunately (or is it fortunately) we didn't have the money to spend this trip... so we'll just have to go again! ;o)

Ok. So there is my weekend wrap up... about a week late.

My 100th post is coming up. And get ready for a giveaway! Keep your eye open for it... and don't just stick around for the giveaway. ;o)

I will be doing another post tomorrow on my amazing Monday. Such a rare occurrence that it deserves it's own post. haha

Happy Birthday, love!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

to
my best friend,
my sweetheart,
the love of my life,
my Gilbert Blythe/Prince Charming,
my husband,
Trevor R.A. Spence.
I love you, Angel!

I went for the kill and tried 3 new recipes tonight. I follow The Pioneer Woman like a lost puppy dog. I love her writing style. And her photos, especially of food, are just divine!
So, in honor of T's 21's birthday, I made Ribs, Baked Beans, and Potato Bundles. Trevor loved it! I was so excited. It was a great day finished with a wonderful candlelit dinner. :o)

Disclaimer: If you want stunning photos, go to The Pioneer Woman herself. MY pictures do not do these recipes justice!

The ribs were outstanding! Of course, there are a whole lot left over but we got the larger pack at Sam's for the same prize as a small rack of ribs from anywhere else. :) We'll eat a couple of meals off of this. haha

The baked beans were great. I changed up the recipe to make it work better for me. This housewife only has one oven, likes to have a meal done at one time, and can't cook at 3 temps at once. ;)


The potato bundles were by far my favorite part of the meal... which is saying a lot. It was all amazing!
And the plate.

Labor Day Weekend Pictures - a wee bit late ;)

Friday night, Trevor had a home game to coach at CCA so we didn't head out of town until rather late. We got to my grandmother's house around midnight. This is the sight in the den that greeted us. Caleb was sleeping on an air mattress... but he was burrowed down and it just looked like a pile of sheets. You can barely see his head in this picture. Guess the poor little dude was tired. :)We spent Saturday working on Grandmommy's house. Some of the family had made a trip several weeks back and scraped paint from the windows and put fresh paint on them. There were a few windows that didn't get done so we finished those. We (meaning the men with Grandmommy, D'Lynn and I supervising) tore down a covering that my grandfather had built about 25 years ago. The wood was starting to rot, so Grandmommy asked us to just tear it down.
My dad and I couldn't think of what to call this thing. It isn't quite a gazebo. I think it could be categorized under awning, covering, etc.
I remember many, many summer mornings spent eating breakfast on a table under this covering. And hours curled up with books. Next time we go back we are putting bars on her dining room windows - the ones you can see on the right hand side of most of those pictures. Because of how the house is built, the garage is on the left hand side of this courtyard, making those windows the only windows that her neighbors can't see. She said she would just feel more safe if there was no temptation for anyone looking to break into her house.

We went to church with Grandmommy Sunday morning and then ate a delicious lunch before heading home. I took the opportunity to snap a few photos. Our family isn't very good about taking pictures together on a regular basis. For some reason the pictures didn't turn out the best quality, not really sure why. :(

My Poppa and Grandmommy.

Me and Grandmommy

Me and my youngest sister D'Lynn GraceMe and my sweetheart. :o)

Sunday night Winnie came over to spend the night. We stayed up watching Harvey Girls, Calamity Jane and the original version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's State Fair.

All 3 of us took advantage of the holiday and slept in Monday morning. I cooked breakfast and then Winnie and I settled in to watch a ridiculous amount of Dr. Quinn episodes that had accumulated on our DVR. All in all, it was a great relaxing, lazy day.

Tuesday was my birthday. I got my free Seattle Drip coffee in the morning on the way to school. That night Trevor and I went on a free birthday date. Because of the way things are for us financially, I knew that this birthday wasn't going to be anything extravagant. But it was perfect. :) Trevor bought me "The Last Song" by Nicholas Sparks which came out on my birthday. I love Nicholas Sparks' books! We used some of my free movie passes to go see Julie and Julia and used a coupon for a free pizza, brought it home and had a picnic on the living room floor. It was so nice to be able to relax and not worry about cooking or cleaning. Trevor set candles up all over my bath room and drew me a bubble bath. It was so nice and relaxing! He cleaned the kitchen and vacuumed the entire apartment while I was enjoying my bubble bath. :)

The rest of the week was rather "normal" with school, working here and there and getting a lot of things done around the house. Trevor's team played in Meridian last night. I had to miss the game because of Pinelake's choir retreat. We went to a camp about an hour away and had a practice session last night and two today to get a jump start on learning the music for our Christmas program. I am so excited! I can't wait to see what God is going to do with this program. :) Unfortunately, I got another headache and had to skip out on most of the rehearsal last night. It is so frustrating. Anytime I get a headache - migraine, sinus or otherwise, I throw up. Which means I have been throwing up an average of 2 days a week for the past 3 months. I hate missing out on this and I despise being unproductive. I am just praying for a solution and some relief.

Tonight we are going to my parent's house for a big birthday dinner to celebrate several birthdays in our family. BJ's birthday is Sept. 3, my birthday is Sept. 8th, Trevor's and Heather's birthday is Sept. 15, and Caleb's birthday is Sept. 19th. I can't wait for my Poppa's homemade pizza and for homemade Milky Way ice cream! =)