Am I Prepared?

Today is Five Minute Fridays so lets link up and write

So I write for Five minute, no edits, no re dos and at the end I will see if there are pictures from my week Instagram feed that match the words of this week.

Topic: Prepare

 

Christmas time is here. It's crazy busy and schedules go haywire.

We've done the shopping. We've decked the halls.

The menu has been planned. Christmas cards are ready for the mail.

But am I prepared?

 

It's Christmas, am I ready.

As the second candle is lit, am I really ready

The second candle of advent "CANDLE OF PREPARATION" means His light and preparation. Preparation means to 'get ready'.

"Help us to be ready to welcome YOU, O GOD!" ~Luke 3:4-6

 

Is my heart prepared for the King?

In the fast paced life between holidays, the meaning is sometimes lost.

Prepare my heart Lord to celebrate your birth.

To remind myself that the Savior was born.

That I am saved and it all started with Christmas.

~Cassi

Pin It

Keeping Easter

I realized I never posted our Easter pictures. But posting a week later really fits with this years Easters theme. Keeping Easter beyond Easter.  The sermon was all about Easter was just a day but the actions of that day long ago is something to celebrate everyday. 

Christ conquered all when he rose again. But it is so easy for us to forget the importance of that when life continues on. We become like the disciples right after his death and hide. Its like the resurrection never happened. But there is more to the story then his death. 

The rest of the story is what happened next Christ conquered death, lets celebrate that today. Today, tomorrow, everyday. We need to become like the disciples after Pentecost. Live into the great commission and spread the word of what we know. 

Celebrating Easter everyday

 ~ Cassi

Pin It

Happy St Patty's Day

From me and my Grandpa

~ Cassi

Pin It

Beautiful for spacious skies

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain;
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood,
From sea to shining sea.

 O beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life!
America! America!
May God thy gold refine,
Till all success be nobleness,
And every gain divine.

 O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam,
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self control,
Thy liberty in law

Words: Katharine L. Bates, 1904.

~ Cassi

Pin It

Christmas Decorating

This year like so many other areas of my life. I went simple with the Christmas decorating. In fact I didn't even put ornaments on my tree. Instead I went for simple white lights and a few smaller trees of silver and white.

My favorite decoration this year is my updated coffee filter wreath. I added some letters from the craft store and the silver winter bird. I love the way it turned out.

For the kitchen table I also went simple and showcased my favorite nativity set. 

My other favorite nativity is the one my Grandmother cross-stitched for us years ago. I always make sure to make this a focal place each year.

Mouse, on the other hand, is never a less is more style decorator. She is always wanting to put all the ornaments on her tree. Thankfully I was able to scale her down a little bit too. This year we added two large bulbs instead of the angel to the top, due to height issues.  I think she did a pretty good jobs.

How did you decorate this year?

~ Cassi

Pin It

Merry Christmas

Pin It

Final Christmas Decor Pictures

I did make that coffee filter wreath I wanted. It hangs on our stairwell so people see it right when they come in. I might find a place to hang it year round. Or keep it there and add some changeable season details to it. It took a while to finish and I went through a TON of coffee filters. But I do love the outcome and have received a lot of compliments on it.

As I said before we did put up a tree and now you can see our Greens, gold/silver and white tree. I am not overly excited about it this year. Something seems to be missing but it will do.

Here is what happens every year. I have no idea where they sleep the rest of the year but as soon as the Christmas tree goes up they are under it. They will push the presents out of the way to lay there.

This picture only has one of the two cats because they are currently fighting.



Christmas-fied

We started the process of Christmas-fying our house the week after Thanksgiving and it is now down. This year I am working on a shades of green and gold color scheme. So taking so ideas from this post, I did this for the dining room table.

One of the areas in our house that I love is this area above our front closet. It is a huge ledge that I keep decorated for every season. This year I combined green, white and silver trees together on a bed of fake snow. Then I found these two reindeer at a local store, their vintage silver and gold coloring was perfect.

Another favorite holiday item we have is this great nativity cross-stitch. My Grandmother made this for a us a few years ago. Each year I find a new place to put it. But I think this with the wreath added to is my favorite.

This little area is by our tree. When we move our furniture to make room for the tree we move the side table to the wall next to the tree. This jar idea has been one I have been wanting to do for quite a while, I am so glad I was able to find these bottle this year at a garage sale.

What no tree!?! I know can you believe I have not taking a picture of the tree. I will I promise to get one up on here soon.

UnDead Walking

I was so excited for my tutorial yesterday, that I forgot to post pictures of our Halloween. And we went all out this year. Here is the topary I made earlier this season gracing our front walkway.

 As S said he went completely Martha this year. And I have to admit he kind of did. I only helped with a few things. He and Mouse love to decorate for this season. They made some beautiful luminaries. The first ones where made using mason jars and tissue paper and my favorite ModPodge! Then he cut out face he printed of the computer.

The next set of luminaries he made was out of a two liter bottle and poster board. He then cut out words, wrapped ribbon or glued on masks.

Then we carved some pumpkins. We did this completely last minute, this year just got away from us. Mouse hates the inside guts of the pumpkin. So she did one and that was about it. But she has fun picking out and designing the faces on them. We did a cat (every year), vampire and a smiley face. Then this year we did the word Boo on the white one.

 I painted the rotting one with a B since none of us wanted to try carving the mushy thing.

Grandpa and Mouse also filled pumpkin plastic bags with leaves. Our goal was to mark a clear path to the door so kids would stay off the patio. We have a fear of falling children with skinned up shins. We also have a small pond by our front door that we want to keep the kids away from. Since every year some child falls in it. Seriously it is three feet by two feet and not that close to the side walk but every year some kid takes a header into the pond. Our designed kind of worked, no one fell into the pond but the lighted patio was to much like a stage for some kids to resist. Here was our finished front yard: 

So you might be asking your self why was the post entitled "Undead Walking"... Well I haven't got to the costume portion yet. This year Mouse decided to be Frankenstein (which is her cat's name). I refashioned a boys suit with some rips and tulle. You can't see it in the picture really well but the back has tulle going from the neck to into tails with a red ribbon holding it down. Then I dyed a shirt green and added green and black striped socks. The hat was out of a Monster store bought costume set.

This year the whole family was invited to a Halloween Party. So S and I went as Zombie Prom Dates. So all of us where some form of UnDead Creatures. For our costumes I took a thrifted dress and turned it inside out the line was a sold grey instead of the floral print of the outside. Then I made some slits along the bottom and added strips of tulle, black lace and white lace. Then along the top I added some ruffles of the same fabric. For S costume I just took one of his old shirts and cut up the arms. For the black and red I used an ink pad. Then his pants were cut up on the bottom.

Hope you all had a fun Halloween too.