A Happy Birthday Photo Shoot! :)

So my sweet sugar lumps have birthdays this month!!!! I am so excited! Keagan will be FOUR!!! and Grady will be TWO!!! I can not believe it! where has the time gone? I needed a picture for their invitations (A little "money saving tip" for you, take a nice picture, edit it in a free service (like picmonkey) you are able to add text to pictures on a site like that, add the party info onto the pic... and then watch for cheap or free prints at different places!!!) I am getting our invites for free! (well minus the 6 bucks I spent on balloons for the shoot LOL) Walgreens has a deal right now for 25 free prints :)

Anyhoo, so today I took the boys out and we did a little photo shoot for their birthday, it turned out sooo cute!!! Here's a coupld that I took!!

Ha ok so there is a little more than a "couple"  but I couldn't choose :D and if you hadn't guessed by now, we're doing a Dr. Seuss theme for their double birthday party!!! I can not wait!!!!
Hope you have a wonderful day!!!!
~Brenda

Prayers needed

Today was fully intended to be a fun exciting day. As we headed to EnterTrainMent Junction we had fun, everyone was laughing and carrying on, never even expecting what happened 20 minutes into our adventure at the museum. Grady was acting perfectly fine, alert, laughing and enjoying himself. Then it happened, he was looking at a display when I felt him twitch, then fall back into my arms and his eyes roll back... I went into "the mode" frantically telling Connie to call an ambulance, asking mom what time it was over and over again.... 4 minutes passed and he finally stopped convulsing and started to cry, more of a whimper than a cry, minutes later, his eyes glazed over and he wouldn't respond to me or blink. Now I need to stop here and say that the staff at EnterTrainMent Junction were amazing... they called the ambulance for us, they were by our side the whole time while waiting on the ambulance, even giving us tickets to come back since we had just walked in the door... I look out and there is a police car, a fire truck (and not a little one either!! LOL) and the ambulance, goodness what a commotion such a little guy can make, they rushed us to Cincinnati Children's Hospital where they checked his temp it was 104 degrees, this was Grady's 5th Febrile Seizure in a year. My sweet Keagan was beside himself, he was sobbing and kept asking if his brother was dying, such a scary scene for a little boy, I feel horrible that he had to witness it. When we were discharged at the hospital, he came a running as fast as those little legs could go, just grinning ear to ear and squeezed the day lights out of his baby brother.

Mere minutes before his seizure

Worn out from it all

Thank you Lord for keeping your hand on my baby!!!
I sit here and weep, not fully understanding why my sweet ornery little man has had to endure the things he's went through and currently going through. I know my Lord has a plan for his life and there is a reason for all this, if it wasn't for my trust in God there is absolutely no way that I could make it through all we've went through... If you could, please remember us in your prayers!!!!! Thank you so much!!!!
God Bless!
Brenda :)

Olive Garden At Home

So, I adore Olive Garden, but sadly can't afford to eat there like I want to. Last year I went looking on their website and was amazed to find that they have recipes on their website!!!! Tonight I was feeling like eating "high on the hog" and since going to such a place is out of the question I went to their website and cooked up a meal :)
Here's a little "how to" :)

A jar of roasted red peppers thinly sliced  into strips

A zucchini cut into half moons

In a skillet, add oil and heat, then add black olives, zucchini, red pepper strips and  garlic 

After veggies have cooked, add 1 cup chicken broth and simmer for 2 minutes

Add cooked ravioli to veggies

mix the veggies and ravioli together

whip up some garlic bread (not as olive garden as I'd have liked lol)

And there you have it!! YUMMY!!! :)

http://www.olivegarden.com/Connections-to-Italy/Recipes/Main-Dishes/Cheese-Ravioli-with-Fresh-Vegetables/ Here is the exact recipe, I figure this would be easier than me just copying it down lol (plus you can check out their other recipes!!!)

A new project finally finished!!

Last fall I acquired this less than beautiful 3 drawer small dresser at a "free" garage sale that the church across from us puts on a couple times a year.

Before I began to sand it, broken and rather worn out.

After giving it a little sand, I scored some spray paint in the yellow I had been looking for, at 1.49 a can!! Thank you Hobby Lobby Clearance lol. I then found some really cute, knobs at Hobby Lobby half off!! After 2 cans of spray paint, some light distressing, and new knobs, out came a beautiful dresser all for around 10 bucks!!!!!

There she is!!! please excuse our mess LOL

Up close of the distressing and my cute knobs!!!

  As I was putting this post together, it came to me that I am like this dresser (bear with me and my off the wall analogies lol) a year ago I was like this dresser when I got it, in a spiritual sense. I was broken and hurting and worn out. but after some work and God's grace I've become something different! The distressed parts mean I'm not perfect and God is still working on me :)
Hope you have a blessed day and remember that God can take your worn out tired soul and give it a face lift :)

Rice Buddies!!!

As a child and now as an adult there is nothing more soothing than heat for an achy tummy or muscle aches. The other day Keagan was complaining of a tummy ache and then I thought to myself, I should make him a rice pack! (he has dubbed it his rice buddy LOL probably because the material I chose had Buddy from Dinosaur Train on it). So I went and picked up some fleece material but you could flannel, a sock or even an old towel. I picked fleece because its soft and I was making them for my youngins. So here is how you make them :) (please excuse the poor pictures, I was trying to work around little bodies LOL)

You'll need material, rice, scissors, and a sewing machine (or you could sew by hand, but thats way too much work for me LOL)

I used a dish towel to cut out how big I wanted it, now you can make them any size you'd like but I like them bigger  :)

I folded it in half, pinned the sides, leaving a small space in one of the seams open, I got a little carried away with pinning :/ LOL

make sure you're fabric is inside out! or you'll have a not so pretty pack lol, sew it up like so.

pull your material through the hole so the pretty side is out 

Now for the messy part lol, my children kept telling me to not make a mess

My funnel was too small so I had to improvise :) fill it however full you'd like it, I like mine a little less full to make it more "cuddly" 

Now, you can get fancy and sew up the hole by hand so your thread doesn't show, OR do like me because I don't have patience and just tuck in the material to match the rest of the pack and sew it on the outside, since its just us using them I did it this way :)

And there you have it!! Now I use these for my babies so I don't put it in the  microwave as long as mine.
Between a minute to 2 minutes for my kids, 3 to 4 minutes for myself :)

 Now if one of my instructions aren't clear enough for you, comment and I'll try to explain better :)
Hope you have a blessed day!!!
~Brenda

Giving Our Table A Face Lift

So our kitchen table had gone from being "distressed" to being IN distress. I had put a lot of work into painting it and making it just the way I wanted and I really didn't want to put even MORE work into it. Then I remembered seeing in a blog somewhere a year or so ago (before I had found Pintrest ROFL, I wish I could remember, I'd so give them credit lol) about using vinyl to "cover" the table. Not just you ordinary vinyl table cloth (well I suppose you could) but something like at hobby lobby on those big rolls. I chose a sort of leather looking vinyl that paired well with the distressed look of my table. So, here's how I did it!

Here is the "before" pic notice the extra out of place chipping? *sigh* 

I measured the table (well Hubby did :D) and bought the vinyl at Hobby Lobby 

You only need a staple gun and scissors, I needed to dismantle some of  my table  so I needed the screwdriver :)

Pull the vinyl tight, and staple around your table, tuck your corners nice and tight!,  and trim the access vinyl

And there you have it! cost me about 20 bucks to  cover it , but saved me from having to do all that extra work and  made me less cranky :D :D 

I hope you had a lovely Sunday!!!
God Bless!!
~Brenda

It's all about Zebra! Apparently?

I am far from knowing whats "in" and whats not, I generally do not go shopping because it's depressing to go when your broke. But the other day I got the nerve to put some zebra print material in a new skirt I was making, wore it out and guess what!? apparently zebra is all the rage! ha I felt so "in" and that NEVER happens ;p here's some pictures of my new skirt!!! (mind you this is only the fourth thing I've ever sewn in my life lol.)

I'm far from a model ;p

The back

My sis began snapping pictures constantly 

I had enough LOL

The front!

I love my mama!!!

My awesome sister, my wonderful mama and I :)

Well I hope you enjoyed, more skirt projects coming :) I'm currently working on a ruffle panel for a new skirt I'm excited about it!!!
God Bless!!
Brenda