Little Black Dress Night

Paul and I were driving through Maryland the weekend before Thanksgiving, so we stopped to visit our family in the area.

I left Paul at the house with his brothers and headed out with my sister, two cousins and a dozen friends to head into DC for a night out with the girls. Nothing beats a night out with the women you love. It was wonderful being able to catch up with each other. As much as I love being with my huband all the time, it is important to have women in my life who I can share with in the way only we women understand.

We toasted, laughed, cheered each other on and just had a wonderful (and VERY LOUD) time!

Our joy was unmistakable! Everyone wanted to know what kind of a group we were and why we were celebrating. When we explained that we were just a group of friends who hadn't seen eachother in a while they couldn't believe it! They thought we had to be either a sorority or a Sex in the City party (??? yuck!) or a bachelorette party. They just couldn't imagine that we just wanted some girl time.

Men kept coming up to us, but we told them that this was a "GIRLS ONLY" night! What??? Beautiful women out on the town and NOT looking for men???? How could this be???

My beautiful baby sister (see picture above ;D ) had to break the heart of a handsome firefighter who dared to approach our group. We did have some fun with him though. One of our ladies gave him my sister's number, we'll that's what he thought it was...it was actually the rejection hotline which he listened to on speakerphone with us. He was good natured about it.

Boyfriends come and go, but sisters (and husbands!) are forever!

Time with the women in your life is so important. Enjoy every moment you have with them. Cherish them and never take them for granted.

I love you, all my dear sisters! Thank you for listening to me and being there for me.

Peggy and Maria, I am so blessed that God gave us to each other!

Detroit Science Center

Nov. 1st, 2009

Detroit Science Center

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2 Fun Loving Couples
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4 Really Big Kids!

Hubby and I went on a double date with one of our bridesmaid and her wonderful boyfriend. It was so nice to go out with another couple.

Especially a couple that is as mature and as deep as we are!

We had so much fun playing with the other kids...ehem! I mean, discovering and pondering deep, DEEP thoughts!

If you are ever looking for something romantic to do in Michigan, I would highly recommend this marriage strengthening outing.

And don't miss out on the IMAX. I learned so much about the Great Lakes and it was so, well- BIG!

Plus, you get to sit around like a Couch Potato for an hour!

Better Late than Never

We were invited to celebrate Halloween with dear friends!

Place: Canton, Michigan
Time: October 31, 2009
Theme: Yard Art!


Our friends were going as a nativity scene, so hubby dressed as a shepard. I was a Holly Hobby yard cut out. There were two pink flamingoes, a hitching boy, St. Francis statue, bird bath, election sign and my personal favorite, a gnome!

Most. Fun. Theme. EVER!

Best Part: Seeing my hubby looking like this:


Favorite Men of the Weekend (besides my ever lovin' hubby!): Aaron- I have never drank sooo many mimosas in my ENTIRE life! Thank you for the bubbly! Mike- Thank you for letting me carve the big pumpkin and allowing me to try crazy spices on the pumpkin seeds! Just for the record, your pumpkin was way cuter than mine, but I blame Mary and Kell for encouraging me to have all the mimosa that my little heart desired (hence my pumpkin's lopsided grin ;D).

Just another Ginger

Sooo, what do you think? Is RED my color??? :)

I know, it doesn't really look that different, does it?

My Tilly's Baptism

As I posted earlier, I was asked to be Godmother to my cousin's daughter. She was made clean and became a member of the church on October 24th. I have never seen a baby so happy to have her soul become as white as snow!

Thank you, Jesus, for another beautiful soul!

Getting in touch with my inner "Anne"

A few weeks ago I was able to spend several lovely days with my dear Diana of the Lake of Shining Waters and her sweet little family. We played with her babies, went shopping, watched movies late at night and drank tea together while giggling like school girls on her couch. Her dear husband even took us out to eat. It was one of the most enjoyable times I've had in a while. This "Ann-girl" was very happy to be reunited with her "Diana"!

When I returned home, my baby sister (who towers over me in stature!) came to visit. We had a wonderful time together while catching up on our sister-ly bonding. We are planning out some rather inspired parties over the holidays. Together we plotted out menus, gifts, decorations and an assortment of goodies for our guest. She went for daily rides on our horses and in the evenings we enjoyed the roaring fires in our dining room.

Notice Audrey's look of approval in the background? :)

One night we decided to roast hot dogs over the fire for dinner. They were wrapped in croissants and made for the tastiest and simplest of fall meals. My sister is also a big Anne of Green Gables fan, so when I told her about my scheme to "get in touch with my inner Anne," she agreed to help.

How does one go about getting in touch with their inner Anne? In my case it was a simple scheme that "Anne" had attempted herself (with less than pleasing results!). I wanted to dye my hair red!

Well, strawberry blonde to be exact. I have never dyed my hair and was more than a little nervous, but after a year and a half of living in a truck I felt I needed to do something drastic. I purchased a bottle of red hair dye as a teen in hopes of looking more like someone that Gilbert Blythe would be attracted to. Naturally, I asked my mother for permission before going through with my plan. She gave me a firm NO and that was that. It took over ten years (and looking daily at my husband red hair daily) for me to rehatch my idea.

My partner in crime did a wonderful job. Funny thing is that the color looks very much like my natural color. This is always a good thing though. I am glad that I my sister and I were able to enjoy this crazy and fun sister moment. And I am happy that I have gotten in touch with my inner Anne. I will have to post a picture of my strawberry blonde locks later since I have yet to get a picture of myself.

"You may tire of reality but you never tire of dreams." — L.M. Montgomery (The Road to Yesterday)

Best Research Project Ever

The farm that my husband and I live on has been in our family since before the Depression. It has always been a private family farm, but my brother and his wife are opening it up as a family business. This winter they will be opening a gift shop stocked with handmade wooden toys, Christmas ornaments, mugs, baked goods, home raised honey and Christmas trees. Next fall they will have a corn maze, petting zoo and hayrides. You can see what they are doing by following their new blog over at http://www.andrewsspringfarm.blogspot.com/

As we travel, we have been stopping at other similar farms to see what they are doing and what seems to be popular. I am more than happy to be a guinea pig for such research!

A few weeks ago, hubby and I went with my brother and sister-in-law to do a little "research." Here are some of the pictures of us hard at work.







May God bless the work of your hands!

Thanksgiving and Christmas have come early!

When I returned to the blogsphere last week I discovered that I had won a free Shutterfly book while visiting http://www.heavenlyhomemakers.com/ a few weeks earlier! I can't tell you how excited I was about this!!! I have wanted to try making a photobook, but honestly, I didn't want to bring up the idea to my hardworking hubby who has been so good about budgeting and saving. We have managed to pay off both of our student loans and credit cards in just over a year. Hubby doesn't have the same love of photographs that I do. He is always happy to make me happy, but as I said, I just hated to ask. Winning this book was a great excuse to get me started and Paul was very encouraging.

Creating my free photobook was so much fun! I was big into scrapbooking as a teen and even up until a few years ago. Sadly, I have less and less time each year to scrapbook and have started joking that I'm really just a scrapbook supply collector at this point! Living in the truck makes it impossible for me to scrapbook. I've been wanting to put our wedding and honeymoon pictures in to a beautiful book to show off and yet have not had a chance during the past year and a half to do so.

I made my free photobook using the pictures from my husband's bachelor party and all his pictures with his groomsmen. Its beautiful! I got so excited about having wedding pictures in a fabulous personalized book that I made more! Shutterfly has a 50% off sale on 7x9 photobooks that ends today (that's $8 for a 20 page book!) and for orders over $30 they have free shipping today. I made 6 books- 5 albums are of honeymoon pictures! I was so excited that this is all I've done for the past few days. It was easy, fun and so much cleaner than scrapbooking. And I made 6 books for a grand total of 43.50! Which is pretty cheap compared to the all the scrapbooking supplies I used to buy to create a book. Plus, I made all 6 books while riding in the truck. It honestly felt like Christmas and Thanksgiving to me.

I can't wait to get home and find my books waitingin the mail for me! Thank you Heavenly Homemakers for giving me a new creative outlet while riding in this Big Rig! I am incredibly grateful to you!

Hope you all find a fun new creative outlet this week. God bless you all!