Friday's Fun: Enjoying Raw Cookie Dough

Click to enlarge and for credits.
Want to know how I made the layout? There is a wonderful tutorial in the newest issue of The Artisan Notebook

This was about 6 months after JJ was released from the hospital. It was so good seeing him eat so well and so happily! 

I know that my girls love not only helping in the kitchen, but licking the spatula, scraping the bowl (not with their hands like JJ is in the picture - too CUTE!) with spoons and the like. Sometimes it is easy to be the adult and forget the fun I had as kid licking the spatula. So tonight we make cookies (gluten free and egg free) and everyone enjoys being a kid (me too!) :) Who knows, maybe we will add some small raw cookie cough balls to the ice cream! There is a benefit to so many allergies you know, no raw egg!! :)

I must be doing SOMETHING right...

That was the original title of this post. 

While all three girls are playing with playdough at the table, I overheard EE (6yr) say, "I have something to say. I am sorry for losing my temper with you AA, do you forgive me?"

My heart was touched and blessed. And so I came up to write just a short blurb to remember this moment.

But as I typed out the title, I was so convicted about the heart of PRIDE I had towards this moment. As if **I** was the one doing something right, when in fact, it is my daughter who had done something right.

I am nothing and can do nothing except through Christ who strengthens me. It is Him who has touched my daughter and His work in her heart that has caused this wonderful moment.

NSM: How's It Going

So far, for No Spend Month, I have spent:

$10 on food to donate to the homeschool fair (good deal since what was left over got to be brought home and fed to my family as a nice little snack!)

$33 on new shoes for JJ. Now that he is growing, he finally needing new shoes. Of course this prolly could have waited if he had not lost one of his shoes. We looked EVERYWHERE! It is GONE! I think he threw it out the window of the car while we were driving.

And what a temptation shopping at the mall is!! Who puts chocolate covered strawberries (yummo!) in the children's shoe section?!?! And Vera Bradley was having a 50% off sale!! I will admit I did look! But I was good and did not buy!

$48 diapers. This might have been able to wait too, except for the fact that the diapers were half off!! I was not looking for this bargain, but with the fact that JJ is not even near being potty trained, and the prices of diapers keep rising, I had to stockpile. I did not take as much as I wanted though, I was good.

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$209 left

I am frustrated that I have so little left and we have not even gone a week into this. Thankfully I have a lot of food already stockpiled. I might have to double the $250 used by Small Notebook to $500 instead of the $300 I had originally set out to spend. We will see. I am going to try my best to keep the spending under $300. This is much harder than originally thought!

I know beloved's birthday is this weekend and he has taken work off (a 4 day weekend) in order to celebrate. So I am not sure what money he plans on spending there. I know one of the days he wants to spend taking pictures (free except for the gas to get there). Another day he wants to go out to eat. All 6 of us.

It is also frustrating that the month we decide to do this, we have extra bills. I guess that is a good thing since we will have extra money to put towards the bills. But I was really hoping to put money into the ER fund.

I was reading a blog the other day where this family is trying to save 100 Dollars A Day in order to have $36,500 in savings by the end of the year. When you read her getting started post, you will realize that it is not as difficult as it sounds. :)

So I started thinking about it. I wonder if we really could do it. I mean, if we really changed the way we lived. I know we definitely could if we had not moved into this house. Our new house payment is stupidly three times what we were paying. We did it before our Dave Ramsey introduction, before our son's health issues and while in a mindset of needing more room and not thinking how can we make this house fit our needs.

I will have to think more about it and talk to beloved about it. I do know that this No Spend Month thing has really got me thinking about money and spending and SAVING in a whole new way. Which I think, if I am not mistaken, is the main purpose of No Spend Month.

JOY OF JOYS! EYES OF WONDER IS BACK!!

I can hardly believe a year has passed since Jewel said she would be leaving the blogsphere. But she is back!!! :)

Go and give her a hearty welcome back dear friend and enjoy her posts and grow in the Lord!
Eyes of Wonder

Elements of Time

I LOVE going to Living Historical Ranches. It is a dream of mine to actually STAY on a working ranch near Williamsburg (learning to hand quilt, milk cows, get eggs in the morning and all that FUN STUFF!!) while visiting the living ranches there. Anyways, my girls LOVE saying "the old time way" whenever there is anything from before 1930. :) They are too cute. Here is EE doing laundry "the old time way."

Elements of Time - Artisan Notebook Challenge

Click for credits as to make larger

Current Web Readings

Mood Changers For Kids
GREAT ideas for fun things to do with the kids whenever then seem like EVERYONE needs a break!

100 Things To Do During A Money Free Weekend
What PERFECT TIMING with the No Spend Month we are doing!!! HT: Small Notebook

Monica is doing a week long posting on simplifying life. I know that with all the decluttering we are doing, life will be much more simpler!

Goodbye Clutter
Another timely post!!!

Simplifying - Surrounding Yourself with Quality
This post also comes are a great time! Quality verses quantity. GOOD POST! HT: Small Notebook

30 Ways To Make Your Life More Simple
I printed out this list and want to try to do one a day during the month of August

House Cleaning

My house is a mess, AGAIN! It seems that no matter how many times I clean it and get the kids into cleaning their zone, we all fall by the wayside, and the house becomes a total mess again. It does seem especially difficult now that JJ has therapy TWICE a week (instead of once every other week).

I think we have all heard it by now. it takes 30 days to form a habit. Well, I am going to get the children AND myself into the habit of keeping this house clean.

Yes, I just said keeping it clean. Meaning that for my 12 year anniversary, instead of celebrating with romance and twitterpations, we all cleaned house.

I will write more later on how to get into the habit of cleaning. At least, what we are going to do and see if it works. I will write more on that later.

Forever Sweethearts: Forever I Do

Tomorrow, August 3, my beloved and I will have been married for 12 years! WOOHOO! Two years ago, before all the medical issues with JJ, I held a contest where other people scrapped my wedding photos. I never got the album finished or printed, so now that things are finally going well, I am finishing it up to print it out!

Here are some layouts I did:

(Click images for credits and to enlarge)

Front Page/Cover?

Will You Marry Me Forever?

Her Mother And I Do

Our Wedding/Marriage Verse


Bri and Mom Dance

Answered Prayer

I becomes to easy to forget when God answers a prayer. Even the smallest of ones. ESPECIALLY the smallest of ones.

So I am starting a new label. Everytime God answers a prayer, I am going to blog about it, no matter how small or meanial it may seem. That way I can look back on my blog and see all the times God answered my prayers.

Of course God has answered several more before this, including sparing the life of our son. But I will just start with today. Today God answered two prayers.

The first prayer God answered is one that I had prayed a lot in the past, but had forgotten to until recently. I started praying again a few days ago for God to cause my beloved to be praised in the gates. He does not get a lot of praise from co-workers. It is something he really needs. Well not only did a co-worker praise him BUT praised him before others in the company! It was an overabundant answer to prayer! I am so thankful to God for answering my prayer above what I asked for!!!

The second one may seem small, but yesterday there were no discounted bananas. I am in charge of bringing a fruit salad for several ladies at the Homeschool Fair tomorrow and needed bananas. So I prayed that God would provide some discounted bananas today (as the rest of the fruit had been donated by other members in the group). Sure enough, there were four bunches of discounted bananas when I went in tonight! Praise God!!! I am so thankful!!!

August, No Spend Month (NSM)

Well, I must admit that this is NOT the best time for **ME** to do this. We have a lot of wants that are pretty close to needs. But seeing there is a need for us to start putting more money into the ER fund (we have a potential emergency coming up). AND we ended up spending on the credit card last month (ICK!). So inspired by Small Notebook's No Spend Month of July, we are going to attempt a No Spend Month for August. This will be a bit difficult as our anniversary is this month, not to mention my husband's birthday AND two other events (which escape me at the moment).

She was very vague in her rules, (there are bills to pay of course). We usually have $600 to spend on groceries/vitamins for our family (JJ requires a lot of special foods and supplements. But as she allotted herself $250 to spend, we will allot ourselves $300 to spend. That is for gas (normally we spend $160 a month on gas) and EVERYTHING!

In order to keep us from spending on the credit card (now and forever!), we will be wrapping them up in gift wrap. And maybe wrapping in duct tape. This will help us to ONLY use the card in an absolute emergency (we are stuck in a different town and need a hotel for the night type ER, end up in the hospital for any reason, etc.).

I must admit this will be REALLY HARD for me as this is usually the last month of garage sales. But seeing as there is nothing we really NEED, I will most likely not be saleing this month. We will be having our own sales instead. Every Friday and/or Saturday that I can, I will be having a sale. This will help declutter the house (in case we have to move), as well as bring in some extra income. I am SO THANKFUL that I did the extreme frugality exercise recently. That will really help. All future posts about this will have NSM in the title (so you can skip those if you are not interested).