I finally tried Home Depot’s latest wonder.

Behr has come out with a paint & primer in one! Oh my goodness! Anyone who has painted over red or painted stained furniture will jump for sheer joy over this paint!

I had a color in mind and honestly I’ve been looking for this color for over a year. I’ve tried samples of bunches of colors and I’ve always been disappointed.

I went to my local Home Depot with this Easter egg and this gorgeous vase.

I gave them to the brilliant technician in the paint department. She took lots of time with me and although she couldn’t match the vase and egg because of the speckles on the egg and the sheen on the vase she pulled colors that were close. We found a perfect match but the more I looked at it I could tell it was too dark. So she mixed it at 50% …too light. She went 25% deeper and we tried again…BINGO! I could not believe how much time she took and how great of an eye for color she has…please look…

The Husband is helping me re-do my Fun-Room and we stole a couple of shelves from the basement. I got so excited I kept painting things!

The Husband wasn’t certain he believed the paint would actually cover without bunches of coats…

After one good coat and a second lite coat…The Husband is a believer.

I also painted a chair…and people, I’m not done. This is the BEST paint I’ve ever used and I’ve tried all the top Brand-Names.

(Almost finished with my Fun-Room! Can’t wait to show you !)

Behr Paint & Primer…you gotta try this on your next project Peeps. Seriously.

I’ll be linking to a few blog-parties this week…

Metamorphosis Monday,  I Made The World Cuter,  I Made it Monday,  So Very Creative , Twice Remembered Cottage,  Made by You Mondays

It’s about that time of year Peeps!!! Strawberries abound! Naturally, I took a perfectly healthy berry and sugared it up a little.  Time for Strawberry Cake!

The recipe is super easy, using a white cake mix as the base~

The icing is easy too! Just butter, confectioners sugar and mashed strawberries!

The mashed strawberries and jello in the mix make for a super moist cake.

This might be a great dessert for Easter!

STRAWBERRY CAKE

Preheat oven to 350*

1 package white cake mix 1 package (3 ounces) strawberry-flavored gelatin powder

1 cup vegetable oil

4 eggs, lightly beaten

1/4 cup water

3/4 cup mashed strawberries

Combine cake mix and gelatin powder in large bowl. Beat in oil, eggs, water, and strawberries. Beat on HI for 30 seconds~then on MED. for 2 minutes. Pour into 2 9 inch round greased and floured cake pans. (Pat bottom of pans gently on counter-tops to even the batter in the pans!)

Bake 350*  oven for app. 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

*******I use 3- 9 inch cake pans therefore adjust baking time…start checking with toothpick at about 20 minutes!*********

Cool and frost with strawberry icing…

STRAWBERRY ICING

1/2 cup butter

1 pound confectioners sugar

1/4 cup mashed strawberries

***** I make 1 and 1/2 recipes of icing~ I like to have LOTS of icing!!!)*****

Beat butter  and confectioners sugar together until smooth. Add strawberries. Spread between cake layers, then frost top and sides! Decorate with extra (washed & dried) strawberries!

I’m linking to Foodie Friday with Michael West and a brand new party!

My bud Cheryl at Tidy Mom is starting a Friday party, I’m Lovin it Friday! There will be recipes, DIYs, crafts, house projects!

Check out Tidy Mom!

I’m a reader. I devour books, both on my iPod and the delicious old fashioned way…page by glorious page. Every once in a while,  if I listen carefully, I hear about a book that has “changed” someone in a profound way.  That’s what I heard over and over and over about the book:

Crazy Love Overwhelmed by a Relentless GOD by Frances Chan.But not until my good friend Bill from the inspiring blog, Cycle Guy’s Spin,  told me to “GET THE BOOK!!!”, did I download the book from Audible onto my iPod.

This book is written to the American Christian. It’s a reality check but it’s done in love and in the most gentle way possible… considering the reality.

I’ve listened to it twice and read it in “real-book” form once. The Husband ordered 5 copies to give out and he’s NEVER ordered a book from Amazon. We kinda loved the message.

One of my favorite pastor-author-theologians, John Piper says:

“There’s no must-reads but the Bible. So how do you choose what to read before you die ? I do it largely by what is awakened in me when I read samples.”

With that in mind, I’m gonna let Crazy Love speak for itself. If you feel something awakened in you when you read any of this, get the book.  If not, that’s okay.

Concerning the parable of  the sower in Luke 8: “Do not assume you are good soil. I think most American churchgoers are the soil that chokes the seed…”

“Lukewarm people choose what is popular over what is right…”

“Lukewarm people think about life on earth much more often than eternity…”

“Lukewarm living and claiming Christ’s name simultaneously is utterly disgusting to God.”

“We show tangible love for God in how we care for the poor and those who are suffering.”

“…treat the poor and the desperate as if they were Christ Himself.”

“There has to be more to our faith than friendliness, politeness and even kindness…”

“My suggestion as you make decisions and discern how God would have you live is to ask yourself: is this the most loving way to do life? Am I loving my neighbor and my God by living where I live, by driving what I drive, by talking how I talk?”

“I urge you to consider and actually live as though each person you come into contact with is Christ.”

I felt a shift in my thinking after reading this book.  And it was a bit of an answer to prayer for The Husband as it helped him put into words a change he’s been trying to convey to me for months now. So perhaps it was just the right time. But I’ve heard so many people out here in blog-land say the same thing, so maybe it’s worth the read…

Would love to hear from you if you’ve read the book already…what’d ya think?

Love to each of you today~

I was in my Pa-Jay-Jays until 5:00. Hummmm. But I was uber productive in the fun-room!

Today I’m posting a few pictures from Ellie’s first birthday party…I was totally a slacker with taking pictures that day…

Do you love pom-poms as much as I do???

Our tiny girl wasn’t sure about eating a cupcake…

~Love to each one of you today…Happy Wednesday Friends~

I’m going to groom before 5:00 today…hopefully.

Being a cookie monster, I had to try out a cookie splash…

I’ve come to a conclusion about the proverbial cookie splash…

You can tell a whole heck of a lot about a person by how their cookie splash goes…here’s what I mean,

*Was it easy?(This tells loads about your skill level)
*How many times did it take to get a good shot?(This gives a hint about your hand-eye coordination )
*Did you feel nervous or giddy or nothing at all when you dropped that “cookie” into the milk?(This is hands down an indication of your personality. Are you a dare-devil or an overly-careful person. Or just don’t care either way
*How’d you feel about the mess?(If you’re neat and tidy you would have hated the mess or, if you’re more relaxed you’d have a: ‘who cares…just have fun’ kind of attitude!)

I used an egg for my splash and for the-love-of-Pete, I did it 15 times…I was, for some reason, as nervous about dropping the egg into the milk as I might be to say….jump out of an airplane.

And as for the mess…ohhhh, I thought my eyes were gonna exploded out of my head every time I had to clean up the milky mess…

So, I suppose my cookie splash confirmed what I already knew about myself…I’m a nervous, overly careful not -so-skillful (pretend)photo-taker, who has little or no hand-eye coordination and nearly implodes when there’s a mess in my line of sight.

If you want to see some really great Cookie-Splashes click HERE!

Happy Tuesday My Friends…xoxo

Last year when I changed this picture in the dinning room…

To this scrumptious stain-glass… I kept the huge picture thinking some day I’d figure out something to do with it!

Now in the middle of re-doing my “Creative-space” (aka: Fun-Room!) Here’s what I came up with…

So simple: I used a spray primer. Then sprayed Ballet Slipper pink over the primer. The pink is way too bright so I brushed on a pearl-creamy color (craft paint) over the pink…it turned out just like I hoped!

I took the glass off and covered the mat-board with a Shabby Chic pillow sham that I’ve never used! (I knew I’d be able to use that sham on SOMETHING!!!)

Then I added some trim so I could hang a bit of inspiration here and there!

But just as we started Emma, my pregnant daughter, called. She had fainted in the shower and hit her head! I rushed to get her and Emma and I spent the day in the emergency room!

She’s fine. Emma has SVT (See THIS for more info.). She can be standing still and her heart will jump to 180-200 beats. With her terrible morning sickness, she was terribly dehydrated. Add that to the SVT and the poor baby could hardly stand up.  Other than a goose-egg right in the center of her forehead, she seems to be fine now. We’re headed to her Dr. today to follow up.

(she insisted on covering up the bump on her head !)

Anyhoo…I missed the dragon fly candy making session!

So today I’m going with my photo of the day from Thursday…

our once feral kitty … Reba~

HERE is my favorite Reba story. HERE are links to several little stories about her background. (If you love cats, you gotta see this. She’s a miracle!)

Reba’s come a looooong way in 16 months, remember when she found us she lived outside and wouldn’t let us anywhere near her…

Like Reba, I too am learning to trust…

Love to each and every one visiting today.

Today is light and frothy…whew.

I’ve been pouring all my extra energy into re-doing my “Creative Space” (aka: Fun Room! I think Creative Space sounds so much more artsy!!!)

The entire upstairs looks like a bomb went off. But I found a little room to do some fun stuff for Elliot’s birthday!

Our granddaughter Elliot (Ellie) is a WHOLE year old! HERE is a post when she was 2 weeks old. She was 6 weeks early and had to stay in the NIC U for awhile. She’s come a long way since then, although our tiny girl is still…tiny.

I told you about a cupcake banner I put together for her party HERE.

I also put a little cupcake on a tee shirt for her to wear to her tiny party!

And made some blocks that spelled out her sweet name on one side…

Stephie may use them to decorate for her party~

(I found these on sale, they were black. I painted, sanded and glazed then used my favorite thing, Mod Podge to glue on the letters!)

And on the other side of the blocks…Spring!(Do you see the scrumptious color on these shelves? That’s a sneak peak at my Room make over! I have fallen in LOVE with this color… this shelf is the only neat space in the entire house right now!)

So excited about Ellie’s birthday party!

Love to each one of you and prayers today…for happy thoughts and cozy living…and again, heartfelt thanks for yesterday…

I said this last year on two different occasions about the same thing.

Can you see “it” coming?

I was referring to someone’s young, single daughter getting pregnant.

Last month our baby, Emma, told us she was pregnant.  Emma’s  actually not a baby. She’ll be 24 this year.

Emma’s not married. Now, when I said the silly thing about this not being my issue, Emma was engaged to a young man who had been in our family for 5 years. The Husband and I loved him like he was our own kid. So if Emma had gotten pregnant before they got married…well, moral issues aside, we would have very quickly been thrilled. Why? Because her life was on a certain course and a baby would have been in their future anyway.

But Emma ended her engagement and started dating someone on and off that we didn’t know very well. (Actually, not at all)

And at the time she got pregnant they were “broken up”. So this news  felt like I’d imagine getting hit by a tractor trailer would feel.  I’m not trying to be negative but the truth is, her life from all the information we had, was on one course when actually …  she was going in a very different direction.

I won’t go into any more details but after many tears,  lots of talking and many sleepless nights, we’re so very thankful that we’ll have another grandchild in October~

I’m sharing this for two reasons…

First, When I write from my heart I find it difficult not to be honest.  I’m drawn to and inspired by flawed people living with purpose in the middle of their not-so-perfect lives. My prayer every single day is that someone may come here and find a bit of inspiration or even hope  from my not-so-perfect life.

Second, so many of my precious online friends have reached out to me over the past few weeks, knowing something was wrong in my world but not knowing exactly what.  I’m so humbled by the love and encouraging words and prayers.

But I share this with fear and trembling…

Some of you reading this have strong beliefs about sex before marriage. Some of you have tiny tots running around and you are raising them with a strong set of morals. One of them being: no sex before marriage.

I understand completely. Because that’s what we did.

Please, not for my sake, but for yours…don’t judge. Take it from me…judging someone never ends well.

Others of you don’t have these convictions and may be thinking I need to just get over myself. (You’re probably right about that by the way) It’s Emma’s life. It’s Emma’s choice. Just support her.

I understand this too. And after a few rocky weeks, that’s just what I’m doing.

No matter where you’re coming from, can I just say thank you for your sweet support these past several weeks. I want to find a way to tell you how I’m encouraged and given hope by your words…but I keep coming up short.

Love from the bottom of my tiny heart. And hugs. I’m a hugger…so hugs.

Going forward there are many, many decisions that Emma has to make so a prayer here and there for her (and our new baby) would be so tenderly appreciated.

xoxo

I’m going to leave you with a song that my most precious blog-friend Sara (Gitzen Girl) sent me when I sent out an SOS asking her and a few others to pray. I’ve listened to this song every day since. It’s become a bit of a lifeline.

Chocolate Pie

First mix

~3 egg yolks

~1/2 stick butter

~1 cup sugar

~3 very rounded tablespoons plus 1 level tablespoon flour

~2 cups milk (whole works best but you can use low or no fat)

~Cook on low slowly until thickened whisking the whole time(otherwise you’ll have scrambled eggs in your pie!)

~ Add 1 teaspoon vanilla

Here’s where you decide what KIND of cream pie you want!

~For Coconut~add 1 cup coconut

~ For chocolate~add 4 tablespoons cocoa

~ For Banana ~ add 4 or 5 sliced bananas…

Put into cooked shell and chill

Use 4 to 6 egg whites and a bit of sugar to make Mile-High Meringue

Spread meringue over top …

Bake at 325 until the tippy tops of the peeks turn light brown!

Creamy dreamy…

ps…All my recipes are under All Things Yumalicious in the pull-down menu on the left!

Here’s a Chub-Free Chocolate Pie recipe if you don’t want the … well, you know. Chub!

Tasty Tuesday over at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam ~ Tempt my Tummy Tuesday over at Blessed with Grace ~ and lastly Tuesday at the Table at All The Small Stuff~ You’ll find links to a hundred recipes or more with these delightful blogs!

~Live yummy~