Snow Princess in South Texas

As many of you are preparing to take down all your Christmas decorations and stuff that fake Christmas tree back in the attic or shed, we will be keeping ours up till at least mid January. 

See Big Girls birthday is January 15 and she has set her mind on having a Snow Princess party after seeing Dora's Snow Princess movie. (thanks Dora) Actually it's going to be pretty easy I think, keeping up all the decorations from Christmas will obviously make the house Winter Wonderlandish since we decorated with white and silver this year. We will be making glittered snow flakes to hang from the ceiling and setting up some lit fake trees in the back yard since the party will be in the evening. The big push now is to make her Snow Princess dress! I have all the materials bought and ready to go, now to decide on the menu. 

So, as many are relaxing after a wonderful holiday season I will push on further with Winter Wonderland decorations, menu plans and don't forget that our school year starts in January too! 

Oy vey! I already feel like this poor woman...

The playdoh version of yours truly

My kids got their first Christmas gifts of the year and it was scented homemade playdoh from their best friends! They loved it and played for hours with it. If you have never made homemade playdoh before you really should try it, kids love it, especially if it is scented. They will just sit there and smell it over and over. 

Big girl decided she was going to make a replica of me .... 

What do you think? Let's get a little closer... 

I think it looks great! I look almost just like it too! Except that my head is actually attached to my neck and my hair is not a "piece". She wanted to make sure that I had all 5 fingers and that my high heels were just right. : ) 

Kitchen Mess!

This is the current state of my kitchen ...... 

What a mess!

Believe it or not, I know where everything is!

I have cookies here...

here....

here ....

and even here! And I still have about 30 dozen to go! 

This is the current state of my baby boy: ( 

He picked up a bug from a little boy at church and has been sick now for 2 days.  

Sweet baby : ) 

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

"Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all thing. Love never fails. " 

My devotion today really spoke to me and I wanted to share it. It is written by Lysa TerKeurst
    It's a gut honest look at love and uses the verse that we hear so often at weddings and anniversaries.    
Hope you enjoy it!

As the holidays approach, I have to be careful about developing an overly ideal view of love.  Sometimes I'm guilty of setting the expectations so high of what a 'love filled' Christmas should be that it dooms me to feeling disappointed and grumpy.  Ever been there?

Well, this year I am feeling challenged to look at love a little differently. I don't want to repeat a habit that I've had from the past where I expect unrealistic things from those I love.  I used to hold out the little cup of my heart to my husband, "Will you fill my empty spaces?  Will you do that one really romantic thing that makes me feel like I'm the most terrific and special woman in the world?"

Then I would hold it out to my children, "Will you fill up my empty spaces? Will you do something that makes me look really good as a mom so I'll feel a little more validated?"

Then I would hold it out to my friends, "Will you fill up my empty spaces? Will you provide something today that makes me feel more included and significant?"

Maybe Christmas is an odd time to consider such things.

Or, maybe this season celebrating Jesus is the perfect time to hit the reset button on my sometimes frail heart. Love is a tricky thing. Our hearts were created to crave it.  But misplaced expectations from love can wreak havoc in a person's heart.

God proclaims in 1 Corinthians 13:8 that love never fails. And in the quietness of my heart that verse makes me squirm a bit. I see love failing all the time. Or do I?

If my only view of love is what it will give me, love from others will fail me every time. It's not that love fails. It's that other people were never meant to be my God. Even a great husband, wonderful children and a thriving ministry can never truly fill me up, right all my wrongs, and soothe those deep insecurities.  Not at Christmas.  Not at any other time of the year.

No, I can't read 1 Corinthians chapter 13 with eyes hungry to see what love should give me and then demand it from those around me. I should read those steadfast Scriptures with the realization that this is the kind of love God gives to me.  And this is the kind of love I can choose to give to other people.

I can choose that my love will be patient. My love will be kind. My love won't keep a record of wrongs. (Ouch - that's a hard one, right?)

I can choose that my love will protect and persevere.

And I can choose to lay the cup of my heart at Jesus' feet and stop twirling, twirling, twirling...hoping- demanding- that those around me do things for me they were never meant to do.

Interestingly enough, when I read 1 Corinthians 13 again this morning I found an odd yet perfect verse toward the end of this chapter. "When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me" (verse 11).

Yes indeed.  How funny I never connected that verse about putting away childish things with 1 Corinthians 13 - known as the chapter of love.  Oh how we have the propensity to grow in other areas while keeping such a childish, selfish view of love.

Love isn't what I have the opportunity to get from this world. Love is what I have the opportunity to give.  And I guess there's no more appropriate time to remember this than Christmas.

Seriously, do all glue guns suck!

Okay so we are working on some Christmas crafts that the kids wanted to make for their grandma tonight and I am so frustrated with my glue guns I could scream ! 

I have three glue guns, yes three. 

One is REALLY old and I think came from my mothers house when I lived there. 

Another is about 3 years old and the other is less than 1 year old. 

They all suck! 

One won't heat up enough to do anything! One is cracked down the side cause it's fallen off the table so often due to  the cord being super short. Don't the people who manufacture these know that they make them with the cords too short!! Don't they have some sort of development team somewhere for this ????

The other glue gun  can only work if you hold it in one hand and use the other hand to push the glue stick into the back, it takes forever to get one drop of glue and by the time you get enough the first drop of glue is already cold and hard !! 

ARRRRRGGGGG!!!!! 

The one that's the worst is the one that's the most expensive too. I mean these aren't like dollar store glue guns. They are all good quality glue guns, the best Walmart has to  offer! Ha -ha - ha!!! 

That's just an oxymoron in itself! No really, one of them is from Hobby Lobby and was not cheap! Anyways... Just needed to vent! 

Mommy Tip Monday

Going to the library without ever leaving the house! 

This is something that we have to do sometimes given that we are a single car family and daddy has the car at work. When the children and I are not able to go to the library we simply log on to our local library website and download any and every book imaginable and listen to them on the computer. I find it  helps them to really utilize those imagination gears in their heads. 

They lay on the couch, close their eyes and listen to the story, even the baby does it sometimes just cause he is watching the other two and copying them. If you're really lucky they may even take a quick little nap. Unexpected bonus!!! 

Posting will be difficult this week. 

I have 42 dozen cookie orders to make and 28 cake orders to make so time will be limited! 

Gifts for children to make

My kids always want to make something to give their friends and this is a great way to recycle some Crystal lite and Wylers plastic drink containers. I didn't have to buy anything for this craft gift so that was SWEET.... literally. 

Have the kids wrap the  plastic container and lid

Fill with candy of choice

Tape the bottom of the ribbons so they don't fall off 

and

WAH-LAH ! All done! Have the kids make this for other kids at church, neighbors, anybody! 

It's good to make sure that the children understand it's not all about them getting gifts, it's about being a giver as well.

: )