White Christmas 2010

Well, I had wanted to post a quick note to all my blogging friends and say 'Merry Christmas' but had no idea I would wake up to this!!

For some of you, this is probably no big deal, but for me, this is the Best Christmas E-V-E-R!!

I can't believe it, but I had snow on my birthday and now for Christmas.

I will take that as a good omen for things to come...

MERRY CHRISTMAS

~♥~

The Sunday Café - Corn Pudding

CORN PUDDING

1 pound frozen corn, 16 ozs.
½ cup milk
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp sugar
3 eggs, separated

In a greased baking dish, mix corn, milk, butter, sugar & beaten egg yolks. Beat egg whites & fold into other mixture. Bake at 350° for 35 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes.

*NOTE: You may substitute 8 lightly greased 8 oz ramekins and place on a baking sheet. Bake as above.

SOUTHWESTERN CORN PUDDING: Stir in 1 - 4.5 oz can chopped green chiles and ¼ tsp ground cumin.

~♥~

Monday Madness

Happy Monday to All!! As usual, I had every intention to post first thing this morning, but my overwhelming list of chores seemed to just suck me right in, and now, hours later, when Dane is finally home from school, I'm sitting down to make a quick blog post. It has just started raining, make an already overcast Monday a little more dreary. Think we might be making a fire in the fireplace tonight!!

Have any of you ever seen these things? I saw them laying on the side of the road. The first time I was in the car with my neighbor. I made her stop so I could pick some up. Then I went back with Hubby and made him pull over on the side of the road, so I could grab some more. After doing a little research, I found out they are Osage oranges. They do have a sweet, citrus smell, something like combining lemons with oranges. But I just love the color! I am going to attempt to harvest some seeds. Since I don't have a permanent backyard, I might send some seeds to my Mamma and see if she can grow some. She is the family green-thumb anyway, so she might have better luck than me.

And while trying to get some Christmas decorating done on a limited budget, I pulled these two funny guys out of a bin that had been in an outside storage shed for two years. Dirty and possibly in need of a little paint update, their smiles are still in tact!!


I appreciate all the thoughts and well-wishes from my last post! You guys are so sweet! Things are better now, I guess I was having a "moment"!! We can have those, can't we?

Well, I've gone from housework to homework time. Dane has started reading "The Magic Tree House" series. We are on Book 2 - Knight at Dawn.

And I will say, his reading has improved. But he still has a ways to go to achieve his reading goal in class. He is required to read 80 words per minute and right now, he's at 65. But just last week, his school acquired a new 2nd grade teacher and he got in the new class, so I'm hoping this might be a good thing.

~♥~

It's Starting to Look Like...

LEAVES!!

Everywhere

But at least they are a very pretty shade of yellowish gold.

I guess it's also the time to throw junk out.

So you know what I've been doing.

Rescuing said "junk" (can you hear the Hubby groan?)

Pink chair (notice how WELL it blends in with red carpet - LOL!)

One-legged rocking chair

A poor abandoned decoy. If it's any kind of animal, real or not, I'll be rescuing it.

And the one I'm most excited about, yet the one that I have no CLUE what I'm going to do with.

A cool wooden crate with a pallet-style bottom. There are two rows of sides and each side comes off and collapses. Cool!


And I just have to say a few personal words. Yeah, I know this is a blog and it's all mine and I can say pretty much anything I want, yet I know no one likes to hear (or read) about people's sad, boring lives. About their once-in-a-blue-moon personal little meltdowns. Well, you'll read about that now. Because I had one today. A meltdown. Not going to bore you with all the dirty little tid-bits, but it's wasn't fun. And I'm still trying to rise above it. And I would so love to talk to my Momma, yet she has a little to do with said depression. Because I haven't talked to her in almost a month. Because I'm too embarrassed to talk to her and tell her how much I screw up on something. See, I told you know one wants to hear all that.

So, I will end on a HAPPY note.

My son's Thanksgiving Project was to take an ordinary picture of a turkey and disguise him so that he wouldn't be eaten for dinner.
Dane's idea:

Chef Turkey-feathers

I loved it!

The Sunday Café - Manly Man Cheeseburger Pie

CHEESEBURGER PIE

1 lb. ground beef

1 cup chopped onion

2 eggs

1 cup milk

4 slices cooked bacon

1/2 cup whole kernel frozen corn

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1/2 cup buttermilk biscuit mix

Heat oven to 400°.

Grease 9" pie plate.

Cook beef and onion until beef is brown; drain.

Add bacon and corn, until thoroughly heated.

Spread in pie plate; sprinkle with cheese.

Stir remaining ingredients until blended.

Pour into pie plate.

Bake for 25 minutes.

~♥~

Veterns Day - 2010

While I do not have anyone significant in my life that is in the Military at the present time, I do have a grandfather that served in WWII and a son that is very much interested in the art of warfare. I chose the vintage postcard below because of Dane's love of eagles (which reminds me, I can't WAIT to show you what I am stitching him for Christmas!)

But I do know that the life that we lead today could very well be a lot different than what it is. And it's all because of the Few, the Proud and the Brave. Thank you, each and everyone. And thanks to the families that support these heroes.

~♥~
Kristal

Halloween 2010

Oh wow, it's been awhile!

But I've been a busy bee.

My Mama's birthday is in October, lucky girl.
I made a set of cross stitch pillows for her.

The design was from an old magazine, but I switched out the color combination's on both the witch's outfits and the cats.

My Mama's has blond hair and green eyes. Plus their mama cat, Alley, is a calico.

I guess this one was supposed to be me - reddish/brown hair and blue eyes.

And then brown hair and more blue eyes. And I just love all the cats!


Now for our Halloween!

Dane was a Swamp Monster, Gracyn was a witch and Charlie was a Kung Fu Instructor.



And yes, that's me in the Werewolf costume.

Our neighbors Brianna, Betsy and Chuck.

Spooky Nighttime

Hope you had a great time. Now it's time to start getting ready for the cold weather. And the Jolly Elf himself!

Grand Dead Dames

Thought I would share a few things I've been working on for the shop.

It's my Grand Dead Dames.... a series of great ladies...that are Dead!!! I was inspired by my love of Historical Fiction and the t.v. series "1,000 Ways To Die".

I had lots of fun creating these.

Esmerelda Ozera


Gladys Oberbeck

* ♥ * SOLD * ♥ *


BORN: 12-28-1890
DIED: 12-24-1912

Happy that her birthday was just a few days away, Gladys had planned for an elaborate Christmas party, complete with old-fashioned candle lights on her magnificent fir tree. But with all the party preparations, Gladys had forgotten to water her fir tree regularly. So when she lighted all the candle lights, they soon started a small fire on the dried out tree, spreading faster than Gladys could say "Eggnog".

Poor Gladys, her Christmas dreams went up in smokes.

Desdemona Guler

* ♥ * SOLD * ♥ *

Born: 11-27-1847
Died: 5-25-1870

Desdemona loved to read. One day, while on her way to the weekly book club meeting, she happened to come across some late blooming summer flowers. When she placed her book bag down on the ground while she gathered some flowers to take with her to the meeting, she unknowingly disturbed a nest of African Killer bees. Sadly, Desdemona was unable to escape her attackers and she perished with her bookbag in hand. The bookclub selection was "Hamlet" and Desdemona was fond of the phrase "To be, or not to be..." she just never realized it would become her undoing.

You can all of the ones for sale here

Bad Junk Interiors #1

Hi - Hello - Do you remember me? My name is Kristal and this is my little piece of blogland, but I seem to have vanished from it for awhile. Sorry about that. To say that things have been busy is an understatement. But I am putting my foot down and making things return to normal. Because I enjoy my blog and all the friends that I have made with and all the cool and interesting things that happen with it.

Just like now. Donna at Funky Junk is hosting a "Bad Junk Interiors" challenge on Facebook. How this woman knows that my house is a mess, I just don't know. But I could really use this type of encouragement.

So, are you ready to see a D-I-A-S-T-E-R

Okay, let me fill you in one one thing. One of the reasons I was gone so long was that we took a family vacation. My step-daughter is pregnant (I'm gonna be a grandmother!) and she was going to meet us in Mobile so that all of the family could see her before the big day gets here. While on this trip, I was loaded up with all sorts of goodies from just about every member of the family, hence all the assorted boxes and stuff in the living room. And add to that the fact that I'm still attempting to decorate for Halloween, and two kids, one being 2-years-old and a constant source of bundled up energy, well, it all combined to create this inferno.


Oh, and can I add in the two white/light colored dogs that are oozing hair everywhere...right into the lovely red carpet ( NOTE: If you have kids and dogs, don't E-V-E-R get red carpet!)


-*-*-*- And now after 24 hours -*-*-*-

As Gracie would say, "All Better"

Also, to let you know, Donna is hosting a fabulous giveaway on her blog. And I really do mean fabulous. Why I'm even telling you, I don''t know, because I really want to win something from her. So just forget you read that. LOL!!!

Thanks so much for bearing with me in my absence. I promise to get caught up with all my wonderful friends and their blogs. And to make up for lost time with LOTS of blog post!!

~♥~

One Down...

Sorry I haven't been blogging very much lately, but I have been super busy, accomplishing one of my goals for 2010. I'm not going to bore you with the whole list, but one of the things was to work on my shop, Grace Goods.

I had read that it helps if you break a larger goal down into smaller baby steps.
For this one, my three steps were:

1. Add new items twice a week
2. Have at least 50 items in the shop
3. Order business cards

Well, as of today, I have achieved the first two! Currently I have 55 items listed in the shop ~ Whew!!!
The last thing is to order some business cards, and I have a friend who will be helping me design and order these once her hectic schedule slows down with art shows.


This seems to be my biggest seller right now.


And this is what one person is doing with them.

You should visit Whysper Fairy and look at all the yummy stuff she has for sale!


And finally, I would like to show you a picture of my two kids.

Being crushed by Grave Digger, with smiles on their faces.

There was an event at Charlie's store, with lots of things to do with the kids.

Big kids and little kids


Tattoos


And I just had to take a picture of this little boy. He had the dirtiest face I have ever seen. But a big smile minus two front teeth .



Toddles my dear friends


~♥~