Monday, January 31, 2011

Celebrating 35 Years of Marriage Today

That’s right, my hubby and I are celebrating 35 years today.

While thinking on this subject last night I happened to think about something I read in a marriage book a few years ago. I’m sorry that I can’t remember who wrote the book to give them credit because it’s a really neat idea!

You see it’s like a bank account, you are either withdrawing or you’re making deposits into your marriage account. If you’re treating your spouse like you would like to be treated, Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, you’re making deposits but if you’re constantly being ugly to your spouse, saying things that hurt them, or being ugly in other ways, you are making withdrawals.

A marriage can’t last when all it gets is withdrawals. You have to make regular deposits into your bank account or you wont have any money in there to use your debit card or write a check on. So it is with marriage. If you’re wondering why your spouse is not responding to you it may be you’re over drawn because you’re always being ugly to them.

The Bible tells us to leave family, Fathers and Mothers and kids if that be the case from other marriages, and cleave to our spouse. The spouse can’t be the last one that is considered because that is against scripture for one and second she or he wont feel loved because he or she is always last with you.

This is a good reason why you can’t live next to your family because the Bible says leave them and cleave to your spouse. You’re spouse has to feel important to you and not the last person you consider if you want to have a loving and lasting relationship.

Do you consider all the things you can do for your spouse? Do you like serving him or her? Does it bring you joy to always try to out do something good your spouse does for you, and do something better for her or him? OR are you always thinking of yourself and being selfish? God tells us in His word the last shall be first and He loves a server!!!!

Are you making deposits into your marriage account? If you can’t do it for your spouse do it for God and sooner or later the spouse will start responding to it because if you’ve mainly withdrawn from the account you are in the negative and it will take awhile for her or him to respond to your deposits because they’ve been hurt.

Sometimes we have to really pray and ask God to help us because we’ve been so hurt in the relationship and we don’t want to give and make deposits because we’re not getting deposits into our account. That’s when we’re really loving like Christ loves, when we’re not getting in return, loving like Christ loves because He loves us all the time, it doesn’t matter how we are He STILL loves us.

Make sure you’re making deposits into your marriage account even though you may not think they deserve it because that’s what Christ would do and that’s how we’re suppose to love. Just pray and ask God for His help if it’s hard to do. Satan is out to destroy the family and he can’t if we wont let him.

Make deposits and get a good marriage!

 

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Something Encouraging……..The Search is Over

Was listening to a CD I have of the New Hinson’s yesterday while driving in town and I sit and jotted the lyrics to this song from the CD. I had wanted to put it on my blog a couple months ago and got on here to look for the lyrics and never could find them. So while I waited for hubby in some of the places he had to go into I wrote the lyrics off it. The words to this song is soooo true and SO ENCOURAGING!

 

The Search is Over

He knows what you’re going through. He’s walked IN your shoes! And He’s felt the pain til His tears fell like rain, and His heart broke into.

He knows how it feels alone, when all of His friends were gone, and He walked up that hill, doin’ His Fathers will, to die for you.

The search is over, you found a friend for LIFE. He’ll lead you from the dark, into His heavenly light. The search is over, though your heart’s been breaking. Jesus is waiting, the search is over!

We all have a choice to make, there’s two roads to take. Have you carried sins load , went down the wrong road, have you lost your way? Now the Father stands at the door, and He looks down the road once more, He sees you coming home, you’ve wondered so long, now it’s home coming day!!!

The search is overrrr, you found a friend for LIFE! He’ll lead you from the dark, into His heavenly light. The search is over, though your heart’s been breaking. Jesus is waiting, the search is over!

The search is over, you found a friend for LIFE. He’ll lead you from the dark, into His heavenly light. The search is over, though your heart’s been breaking. Jesus is waiting, the search is over!

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Blogging Ladies

I sure hope you’re not growing weary of me posting some really neat blogs. I am finding all these neat blogs on The Inspired Home blog that I have shared the link to a couple times on here already. I decided to put a link on my blog of hers so you can find that on the left side of my blog.

Anyway this next lady has the VERY SAME PROBLEM I have with clutter or stuff as she calls it! I get it all cleaned up and organized and gave away and in no time it’s back again because like her I like to thrift store and bargain shop. You can read her blog about this subject since she says it much better than I do! See A SOFT PLACE TO LAND. I have also added her link on the left side of my blog so I can refer back to hers often as well as all the others.

Then there is THIS POST about clutter and I LOVVVVVE her idea on hiding unsightly cords to phones etc. We have to have them to charge our phones but we don’t have to have the clutter from them as this clever lady shows! See what mine looks like in the photo below. I just store them here on the cut out between the living room and dining room. Now I am going to hunt me some cans and then I’ll have to figure out just where to put them because they’re probably not going to fit into this area since it’s not very wide here. I don’t have many cabinets to store stuff on so I can’t put them there.

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Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Home Decorating, Beth Moore and Bedroom Re-do

I went today and bought the bright white paint for the ceilings in our dining room and kitchen. They’re in need of some paint so I figured before I paint the walls I need to do the ceiling in there. It hasn’t been refreshed since we built the house 21 years ago.

My sister and I did the living room a couple years ago and she painted the roof in there and then helped me do the walls. I don’t like heights so she got up high and I got the lower parts of the ceiling.

So one day real soon I hope to get the ceiling in the kitchen can dining room painted.

It’s raining today and so dreary. I lite a bunch of candles to make it nicer since it’s so dreary, oh and also drinking me some hot tea. I love the taste of Earl Grey and I found some that is organic that I wanted to try.

Am wanting to take a nap since this weather is like this all I want to do it go to sleep. lol

 

Now for the Beth Moore part………. I ordered a DVD of Beth’s (EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN and prayer)  and they gave 2 links on it that I am going to share with you. www.isa61.com (There are free study guides on this one that go with the DVD’s.)  and www.ewomen.net

I sure did enjoy watching her. I get so much from her teaching. I told my husband I wanted some more of her DVD’s because she teaches in a way that is encouraging to me and helps me to see things better and so much clearer. I am a visual person and she said she was as well. I learn things much better when I can see visual things.

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Beth showed a cup, and said only God can fill our cups, that people can’t fill them and satisfy us. We can get encouragement from people but when we let God fill our cups and then people encourage us, our cup is over flowing then and we’re fulfilled. We have a hunger for more and God made that in us and if we’re not careful we’ll get into things we shouldn’t trying to fulfill that hunger that ONLY God can fulfill. As she was teaching on the DVD I couldn’t help but think of the song below.

Fill my cup Lord, I lift it up, Lord!
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul;
Bread of heaven, Feed me till I want no more--
Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole!

Now this part of my post is about our master bedroom re-do…..

I don’t think I ever shared any photo’s with you on the bedroom re-do. I was in there last night on my laptop enjoying being alone and I just had a lamp on in there and decided to take some pix to share with you. It’s not finished yet but when I ever get it finished I promise I will share pix.

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I’ll see IF I can find some of the before pix of the bedroom. It is DEFIENTLY much better than it was! It was SO DARK before. We really like it now but it needs something and I can’t figure out what it is. I have some more of the seagulls and my daughter is going to paint them for me like she did these.

I saw something last night while surfing on Melissa’s site that I am going to do to the other wall. The girl did a trio of mirrors on a wall and I need to do that on the opposite wall from the window. That way it will reflect the light from the window to bring in more light to this room.

ahhhhh here it is when it was RED and you can’t see all the wood that’s stained in this room from this pic!  Please excuse the bed not being made. I was playing around trying to see which way I wanted the bed to be since I didn’t have a headboard on it.

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As you can see I moved the bed and also found a headboard for our bed. Actually I bought the headboard and we, R and I added the taller posts on the sides and I painted it country white.

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Here’s a pic of the color of the doors and the moldings before we painted them white. Sorry it’s blurry. We have 3 doors in our bedroom. I’d started painting the molding at the top of the wall already in this pic.

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When I took those mirrors off the wall in the pic above this one, there was pieces of the paint that came off to. Hunks in fact. What I had to do was completely PEEL this mess off my wall as you can see from the next two pix. The only thing I could think of is when we built the house, the folks didn’t prime the walls before they painted them.

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I had a MESS! It took me AWHILE to peel all these layers of paint off the wall! In the next pic you can see, it looks like leather! weird!!!!

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Pretty in the Winter and Projects

I don’t know about you but in the winter time I need some pretty things around me to get through it. I don’t like being shut up inside and I like bright colorful things. I decided to set my table with a pretty pink set of dishes my best friend bought me for my 50th birthday. Yeah I’m telling’ my age here. I need to get me some pretty little flowers to add to the center in the sugar dish.

We even ate out of the dishes at lunch time when we had taco’s. My friend totally surprised me with these dishes!!! My daughter told everyone that I loved pink. Oh by the way, it was a surprise tea party birthday! And man did they surprise me and THAT’S hard to do with me they say. I don’t have any forks or spoons or glasses on it yet. Still playing and tweaking.

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Ignore my yellow dining room. I painted it that color a couple years ago and never finished the rest of the kitchen because I didn’t like it. Melissa over at The Inspired Rooms had a pic on her blog that I dearly loved and I think I have finally made up in my mind what color I want to do the kitchen and dining room in. I wanted to paint my cabinets as well but needed to decide on a color for the room and also for the back splash. I’ve made so many changes to this house with paint colors that I didn’t like, I didn’t want to do it again. I had seen a photo in a magazine and I don’t recall which one now but the cabinets were green and I dearly loved them. I think they had a glaze on them and I’ve never done that before. Anyway I was afraid I’d get sick of the green and then it would be a chore to have to keep repainting them so I changed my mind. BUT I keep being drawn BACK to these green cabinets when I see photos of them. Melissa had a photo on her blog and the kitchen was a brilliant white and the cabinets were green and I LOVED IT! So I think I need to go with the white in my moldings and stay with the soft color that I like on the bottom of the dining room because I like that color. Just not wild about that yellow in there. Our living room is painted green and both hubby and I love the color. He says it’s relaxing to him and it is me as well. I think I have FINALLY found a color we both like!

In reading Alexandra Stoddard’s book, Feeling at Home, she says to write down some colors you like and are drawn to. I have two of her books I bought a few years ago and have really enjoyed reading and learning from her. Then last week or the week before I went to the thrift store and found this book of hers. Home decorating is so hard for me for some reason. I see it in my head and then when I finish it doesn’t look like I envisioned it. I am a perfectionist and I think that’s what the problem is!! It’s never good enough to me. I AM learning though that things don’t have to be perfect! UGHHHH it’s hard BUT I AM LEARNING!

If you have followed my blog for long you know what trouble I have had getting a color we could like in our bedroom. I went from an old dull white and the room being so dark with the one window in it, to a pepto bismol pink….. yeah yuck! And then RED. I chose that color because hubby LOVES red but he didn’t like it for the bedroom. THEN I decided ok, I love the beach and I’ll fix it in a beach theme and we like it now. The top half of the wall is sky blue and the bottom is white. We (my sis and I) painted the stained doors and molding because it was all stained and made the room sooooo dark. So now it’s really light in color and not so dark!

I’m STILL not finished with the bedroom because I need floor covering and still have to paint a couple more pieces of the furniture. Hubby tells me in the spring we will do the floor. I think I want the laminated hardwood floor in it.

Melissa has so inspired me with her blog with all the eye candy on it that I have all sorts of ideas rolling around in my head again and that’s so nice. When I get my energy back from this crud we’ve all had I am ready to tackle them again. I found some toile fabric at a garage sale back in the fall and I hope it will be enough to cover my dining chairs with.

While reading Alexandra’s book last night I had to stop and write down a few projects I NEED to finish. I have a half page but some of those hubby will have to help with. He’s retired now so I hope I can get some help from him to get some of this done.

Our master bath needs updating since the wallpaper has been on there for like 21 years now. It’s dusty rose, remember when that was so popular?  I want to paint the bath to match the bedroom with the beach theme. I love seashells and am trying to figure out just how to decorate it.

Be sure to visit Melissa’s site if you’re needing some inspiration for decorating your home. She gives some good advise and some neat eye candy to!

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Inspiration

I don’t know about you but I have so many things I dream of doing to our home. We built the home 21 years ago if I am remembering right and there’s some things that really need tending to with it. We have a pretty large front porch that faces the west and we don’t use it at all. I would dearly LOVE to close it in with windows and have a sunroom! I LOVVVVVVE sunrooms!!!! But hubby doesn’t share my dreams with our home. Sad smile He’s retired now as well.

 

I still dream though even though at times I get weary thinking I’ll never get what I dream about but it SURE IS FUN! So for the time being until I win some money I will have to just make me a place to sit and dream out of the front porch. I THINK I can screen it in by myself if I have to. That’s what I’ve thought about lately because we have 3 cats that stay on my cushions out back and they get them so nasty and I nor anyone else wants to sit where they’ve been.  I posted about what I’d like to do for now with the front porch so I will have a place of my own to sit and read and play on the computer.

Anyway the post is about a lady that has been very inspirational to me. I found her blog about 3 days ago I guess it was. I had done a search on decorating the home and she has soooo many pretty inspirational pix on her blog! I love the beach as she does and I love the Coastal Living magazine and I see she does as well.

You have just got to check out her blog if you like to decorate your home. I have fits trying to decorate mine. It doesn’t come easy at all for me. I know what I like, I just can’t get it all together to make it look like I want it to.

Her blog is called THE INSPIRED ROOM and you can click on that to go check out her blog. I just know you will enjoy her enthusiasm as I have! She and I are a lot alike it seems. Although she seems to have the gift to decorate and I have no clue!

I’ve also been dreaming of some built in book shelves for all our books. Hubby and I love reading and we need some book shelves for all our books. Right now they are in our closet on shelves taking up our closet space. I saw something several years ago I wanted to do on one wall in our living room. The wall where the fireplace is. We have a cathedral ceiling in there and I would have lots of space for books on that wall with some book shelves.

She also has a home on the beach! OMGosh I’d LOVE to have a home on the beach!!!!! I didn’t even know I liked the beach until about 4 years ago! lol Here I am in my, well lets say later years and I am JUST NOW finding out I LOVE THE BEACH!!!! I never in a million years would have thought I would have liked the beach! I hate sand in my bed and in my shoes! lol BUT I LOVE walking on the beach, seeing the sunsets and watching it come up as well AND picking up seashells.  PLUS I have no allergy problems when I am on the beach. SO there, it’s good for my health so I NEED a beach home! Winking smile

I’ve got to get after some home deco projects I’ve been needing to do!

Anyway check out her blog!!!!

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Bargain Shopping

I got to go to my favorite shopping spot yesterday and had to share some of my bargains with you.

I also found some of the little pegs for my ceramic Christmas tree while I was there.

First off, the pretty angel tree topper I found. By the way for all these things total was $1.84.

Angel tree topper

The price tag on her was 29.95 when she was originally bought.

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And Snow White lights……. Don’t have a clue what I will do with them but I am sure a niece will get them.

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And this Christmas fleece jacket for me.

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And these two pretty candles……

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There was also a large thing of cross stitching fabric I gave to my sister.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Re-arranging Things a Bit

Well I THINK I have all the Christmas decorations down and put away. Although the tree is out on the carport since hubby is still sick and couldn't help with the heavy lifting. I had to carry it all a few pieces at a time to the box. That box is mega heavy so I just drug the thing onto the carport and said when all this cold is over we can put it where it belongs.

It's like a breath of fresh air to me to have things moved around and changed up a bit.

I am sitting here looking at my mis-matched furniture which I LOVE mind you.  But am looking at the different colored woods thinking this lighter table needs to be with the lighter chair and this darker table needs to be with the darker chair etc. Cindy (My daughter) bought yet another table at the auction last night and I had to try to see WHERE I could fit it into our living room. I think she has a little table love like I have a lamp love. ;)

Anyway like I said before it’s very refreshing to me to get all the Christmas decorations down and put away and everything dusted and cleaned so I can re-arrange what-knots and furniture. I don’t know about your house but mine can sure get really dusty with all the Christmas decorations out on the mantel and the tables.

We wound up breaking quite a few glass balls this evening trying to get the decorations down because I didn’t secure them on the mantel for one and then I wound up dropping something heavy into the box I had some of them in. I broke like 5 I think and that was my new ones I’d JUST bought a few weeks ago. UGHHH

Now I’ve got all my boxes of what-knots sitting in here to put back out. I usually have to remove all my stuff for the Christmas decorations so it wont look soooooo cluttered. I think I am ready for some pretty things, in fact some FRESH flowers would be nice since it looks like I might be inside for a few days with this ice and cold they’re saying we’re in for. Sad smile 

I hope you all stay warm and snug in this mess and that you have all your decorations down and stored away.

Rose

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Auction

Yesterday my daughter and I shopped the antique stores and today we went to an auction. WOW had loads of fun BOTH days!

I took just a few pix so you could see what they had at the auction. They had some FINE antiques and I mean everyone I looked closely at had NO blemishes on them! I was floored at what some of these things went for. I mean they just gave some of them away! Sad smile It was from an estate and this lady had some beautiful stuff. Since my house is sooo small and FULL already I couldn’t get anything that took up any space. Sad smile

This was a tapestry they had hanging on the wall  that would have been soooo pretty in a frame.

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There were like 5 secretaries that sold.

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I LOVED this sofa and there was a chair to match. The chair wasn’t the same wood but the fabric matched on both and it looked brand new. The sofa sold for like 300.00 if I am remembering right and the chair was close to 200.00.

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This next piece went cheap to.

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These next few pieces were a bedroom set and the WHOLE set went for a little over 1 thousand. THAT blew my mind it went for THAT CHEAP! It came with this piece the box springs and mattresses, the night stands, the dressing table, the bed frame, TWO mirrors, the dresser.

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I mean this set was FINE! You can see part of the dresser there off to the left where the lady is standing. They were starting to auction it off so I didn’t get a pic of it.

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This next piece I really liked! I told my daughter you would be able to see my teacups and teapots all the way around in this one. Winking smile I was a little surprised because this one went for like 300.00 something.

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This was a really cool piece and they said it was for maps? Anyway it went for a fair price as well. There were lots of dealers that got some really good prices! Oh this came in two pieces and was mega heavy!

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Notice the trunk thingie in this next pic. It was carved like that on the top as well. There was something called a Monks bench that they said came from England and it was sitting close to this but I didn’t get a pic of it. There was also a side board that was from 1800’s that was something to behold and that piece didn’t even sell for 600.00. It was sold for 500 something.

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And this is what I came away with. I really liked this little jug with the handle and I got it at the very end of the auction. It reminds me of one me and my mother in law got a few years before she passed away. The one she and I got was for pickles and it doesn’t have the handle nor the lid but it is at least 4 times as large as this one.

At the end of the auction the auctioneer told everyone if they had something that wanted him to auction off to go get it and he’d do it for them because they still had herds of stuff to auction off for next week. I had seen this little jug and thought it was cute when I was looking around at everything earlier. I had checked to make sure it wasn’t chipped or cracked or anything but it never hit the table. Then he started auctioning off the things everyone had sit on the table and my sister in law and I were chatting. When she walked away I noticed this little jug was STILL sitting over there, so I got it and put it on the table. I won the auction on it and got it for 7.00. Someone started bidding against me but I was prepared to go at least to 20 bucks because I really like it!!! Hubby couldn’t believe I was prepared to go THAT high. lol

As you can see in the background on the pic I like the clear containers in my kitchen. I put the quart jar beside it so you could tell it’s size. I think it would make a cute little cookie jar. Hubby says it’s a pickle jar but I think stick peppermint was sold from it. He also said they used to sell pickled eggs out of them but I don’t recall those having the handle.

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I hope you enjoyed the tour of all the goodies I took pix of. There were LOTS more but I didn’t get pix of it all. To tell you HOW MUCH they had to auction off, they started at 2 this evening and went until after 8 tonight.

Friday, January 7, 2011

Goodies from Antique and Flea Market Shopping

Wanted to show you my finds for today. I couldn’t pass these up because I have a lot of dishes with the gold on it they will go with. Anyway the little cups weren’t but 18.00 for the set and the glasses were only 10.00 for the set. They all go together and I was only going to get the cups until my daughter pointed out the glasses and since she will be the one to inherit all my goodies when I’m gone I couldn’t split up the set.

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The little gold bands come off the little cups. I could use them for desserts or for a tea party etc. Then I could also use the glasses for desserts.

My Free Chair

Wanted to post you a pic of my new free chair. Like I said in the earlier post, it needs to be redone but I’m going to TRY to do it myself once I find the fabric I want for it.

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and another shot of it.

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I love the back of it and also LOVE the curvy legs!!!

My daughter and I went antique shopping today. We had planned this a couple weeks ago. We haven’t done anything together like this in quite a long time so we went anyway even though I still don’t have my energy level back yet. I had to sit down quite a few times but I made it. Smile Anyway I found a couple of goodies that I will share pix of later. We had a fun day together.