{ The baking, the cooking, the reading }

It's been a quiet day. It started with the sun coming up over the horizon and bathing the skies in a beautiful orange glow. There I stood, at my back door, in my robe, my coffee cup in hand and my pugs running around enjoying the morning air.

Thankfully it was one of those mornings where the kids were up and ready for school without any squabbling or me having to literally drag them into the car.

I think the beginning of your day always sets the mood for what will happen, it's like a snowball effect, if it begins badly you tend to be in that negative frame of mind and everything just goes wrong. Far too many times we forget to pray for a good day, we just expect it to happen and then wonder in amazement why things didn't exactly go as we wanted them to.

So yesterday, I refilled the cookie jar, you all know that Sunday's are my "refill the cookie jar" days, I sit in the kitchen for an hour or so and make a huge batch. And just as I place them on the cooling rack, they seem to disappear, little fingers slyly remove them, thinking that mommy can't see. But I do, I just pretend not to.

While the kids were at school today, I got the house clean and then I sat down at the kitchen table and started my menu planning for the next two weeks, I'm drawing a bit of a blank when it comes to meal ideas so I pulled out some cookbooks and Taste of Home Magazines and got completely lost in all the goodness on the pages, but while doing that, I had the Jets flying overhead, making this awful roaring sound that got the pictures on my walls shaking.

It annoyed me, it really started getting on my nerves, so I stepped outside for some fresh air and while I was looking up at the incoming rain clouds, I caught a glimpse of the F-16's flying above me and then it hit me. How can I get annoyed or upset? Who cares if they're making noise, the mere fact that they're flying means they're working, it means that the pilots and the crew chiefs are doing their jobs, it means they're training and practicing and keeping our skies safe. It means that I'm living inside a military base where my children can run around safely, where armed uniformed soldiers are at every corner, where I never feel scared.

It's far too easy to get caught up in the moment, to forget the big picture. I'm definitely guilty of that, so I've decided to stop and think before I go off and complain about anything.

Anyway, I had a knock at the door today and the Fed Ex man brought me a big envelope, when I opened it I found The Help by Kathryn Stockett, I'm doing a book review here on the blog on February 9th for Mom Central.com. Let me tell you, I opened the book, read the first two pages and am completely hooked, I can not wait to finish it and then let you all know what I thought, I can already tell that it's going to be one of those books that will be talked about everywhere.

Right now, I'm off to supervise bath time, help with homework and start our bedtime routine. After the kids are in bed, I plan to make myself some hot tea, grab a big chocolate chip cookie and curl up in bed with the book. I think it's the perfect ending to the day, but first I leave you with a photo of Jasmine and Lola. They looked so cute on the couch, I couldn't help myself, I just had to snap this photo.

{ Happy Homemaker Monday }

Welcome to my Monday feature, a place where I'll be writing about my day, what I've learned the past week, any new recipes I've tried, scriptures that made an impact and everything else in between.

Every Monday, I will post a Mr Linky, you are more than welcome to join me, all you need to do is grab the button, copy the categories and fill in your answers, then come back here and add your post so that others can come and visit you.





On my bedside table:
The Queen's Fool by Phillipa Gregory. I'm a huge fan of this author and have read pretty much all of her books, except for this one. I can't wait to get started.

On my TV:
Catherine Cookson's Anthology "Tilly Trotter"
The Women
Paranormal State


On the menu for tonight:
Fish Shepherd's Pie - will have the recipe up on the food blog tonight.


On my To Do List:
Laundry to put away
Bed linens to be washed and changed


New Recipe I tried last week:
Slow Cooker Barbecued Turkey Chili AND Slow Cooker Barbecued Ribs


In the craft basket:
Crocheted Granny Squares
Knitted Dishcloths


Looking forward to:
The tax refund coming in this week
A new laptop computer
The new Gooseberry Patch Cookbook


Homemaking Tip for this week:
Make giant ice cubes. Add layers of thinly sliced lemons, limes and oranges in muffin cups. Fill each cup halfway with water and freeze. So pretty floating in a pitcher of tea, lemonade or ice water.


Favorite Blog Post of the week (mine or other):
How's Andy Doing? by Mari at My Little Corner of the World. I loved this post because we get to see how the military members pass their days, it's not all about working long hours, they find time to make the most of where they are and have a little fun. The best for me was reading Andy's comment to his mom's post LOL


Favorite photo from last week:

Lesson learned the past few days:
That God loves you regardless of who you are and that we need to let Him be in charge. I know a lot of people out there are not thrilled with the way the election turned out...I'll be honest and admit that I was hoping McCain won, but one thing I've learned the past week is that though I may not understand the reason for President Obama to have been elected or why....I need to let God take over and let Him take control and work on it.


On my Prayer List:
Our new president
Curt - he will be testing for his next stripe in a few weeks
Troops overseas and at home


Devotionals, Scripture Reading, Key Verses:

Key Verse: Colossians 1:9 "Since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding"

Prayer pushes the light and hope into little dark corners of your life

{ What do you think? }

I know I seem to change my template a lot but this is the one I've been working on for about a month, on and off, when I had time. In between I've uploaded any old header and background just so I would have something to show, but this is it....this is the one I've worked on and am really happy with. Be prepared, you will see this one on here for a long time, so I hope you like it.

We spent yesterday watching movies. The weather was a little iffy and with Nicholas not feeling too well, all the plans that involved taking the kids outside, were scratched. Instead we had popcorn and chips and cuddled on the couch and watched "Hancock" and "The Incredible Hulk".

Now let me start by saying that I'm not a fan of those kind of movies, not really, I'm more of a Jane Austen, 1800's, romance, chick flicks kinda fan. But I actually sat through both of these movies and enjoyed them, of course later in the day I had to get my daily fix of my favorites with Catherine Cookson's Anthology "The Tide of Life". Loved it!

Unfortunately the problem is that I've only been able to locate 4 of these on Netflix, where the Anthology is an 8 part series. BUT, I did manage to find a whole bunch more Catherine Cookson movies and they're all at the top of my Queue.



I have to get my laundry all caught up today and while I do that, I'll make some chicken noodle soup for the sickies in the house. My kids love homemade chicken soup, it's the one meal that I can serve where they'll have seconds and thirds and still beg for more. Makes me smile :)

And yesterday I didn't get around to baking the cookies, and now I have a very sad cookie jar, it's empty, save for a crumb or two, so I think I need to get it refilled. The cookie jar in this house is used a lot, and I mean a LOT, it's our night time snack, a few cookies and a warm glass of milk, then off to bed.

Some of you asked me about the doily I made, the pattern I used is this one, it's super simple and it crochets up really fast, it took me just one afternoon.

Look what I got in the mail yesterday....

Apparently Gooseberry Patch is putting out a big cookbook "Family Favorite Recipes", it's a hardbound with over 200 recipes and color photos. YES YES YES!

You all know that I'm a huge cookbook lover and collector and I have quite a few of the Gooseberry Patch cookbooks so this is just wonderful, I'm dying to get my hands on this new cookbook. You should see some of the recipes included, Chicken Stew with biscuits, Farmhouse Pork & Cabbage Saute, Loaded Mash Potato Casserole and Cream Cheese cookie bars...and that's just a few, the previews alone are making me drool. I can't wait to try all these new recipes and share them with you.

I may just do a giveaway around the time the book arrives, maybe, just maybe...we'll see.

Alright, I'm out of here, I have two loads of laundry waiting to be washed, I have soup to make and cookies to bake and more movies to watch. It's such a great day today, it's 70º outside and the sun is shining.

Don't forget the Happy Homemaker Monday's tomorrow, if you want to join me, I would love it. I'll have the post up in the morning and Mr Linky available for any that are participating.

{ Saturday Chat }

It's been a pretty quiet week, not a lot going on, but I was still happy when Friday rolled around. Happy because the kids have been missing daddy and the weekend was upon us, they would be able to see him and play and go to the park and whatnot.

It's hard when the guys are working weird hours, Curt has been going in everyday at 1:30pm and not getting home until 2am.....12 and 13 hour shifts seem to be the norm right now. It's tough on him and it's tough on the kids who don't get to see him at all, they get up and he's asleep and they get home from school and he's already left for work, so yeah, weekends are always welcomed when these shifts are happening around here.

Nicholas came home from school yesterday not feeling too good, he ate a snack and then crawled onto the couch, snuggled under the crochet afghan and watched some cartoons. He's extremely energetic so to see him on the couch means he's really not feeling well. Poor baby. He has the sniffles and a runny nose, so I'm attacking this cold before it even gets a chance to set in. There seems to be a lot of colds, pneumonia and ear infections going on at their school. Bugger!

While he watched tv, Jasmine was in her bedroom, messing around with pen and paper. This child loves drawing and writing and could easily be entertained for hours.

Even though it was a friday night and I usually let the kids stay up later, by 8pm Nicholas was in my bed and asleep. Jasmine stayed up another hour or so but then realized that daddy wouldn't be home anytime soon, and off to bed she went.

With the kids asleep, I made my way to the kitchen, unloaded the dishwasher, tidied up a bit and then got into bed with my book. "The Yada Yada Prayer Group gets down" by Neta Jackson. I'm really enjoying this series, the first one was good and this one is too, I find myself learning something new with every page and being constantly reminded of the Lord's love and understanding and forgiveness for each and every one of us.

I also finished my first crochet doily, I can't believe I taught myself to crochet and actually made a DOILY....I'm extremely proud of myself :)

Curt wants to spend the whole day with the kids, apparently there's going to be board games, computer games, reading, movie watching, a quick trip to the park and hide and seek. I'm sure they'll all have a blast together and as for me, well, this means the rest of my day will include these things:

Watching movies from Netflix
Crochet or knit
Baking bread
Baking cookies to refill the cookie jar
Getting the ribs going for tonight's Barbecue Ribs
Reading
Laundry

I don't know about you, but looking at my list actually makes me smile, it's all the things that I love doing, I don't think I could have planned this day any better. What are your plans for the day? Are you staying in or going out? Anything interesting going on?

So I'm off, I need to make a quick trip to the store and some lunch for the hungry family.

{Rainy Day}

Peanut butter and honey sandwich

Barbecue Turkey Chili

Crochet

If you need me, I'll be on the couch snuggled underneath my afghan, either reading or crocheting.

It's a cloudy and dreary day here, we had rain yesterday and it looks like some more is on it's way, the perfect day to stay indoors.