James was a fisherman.

Three weeks ago I started teaching a series on the Apostles of Jesus Christ in Wednesday evening Bible class. I usually sing the Apostles song, talk about who we have studied about before and then tell a little about the Apostle that we are studying that night. So far we have done Peter, Andrew and James. The first four Apostles in the series were all fishermen so we have been doing a lot of hand work that includes something about fish. So last night we studied James and made fish out of cd's. The kids were thrilled with their creations! I used a hot glue gun to put the fish together after each child picked out the fins and eyes.
Next week we will be talking about John so I need to figure out one more fish activity to do and then we will be moving on. There isn't a lot of information for some of the Apostles so I also have to figure out how to make a 45 minute class out of the tiny bit of info there is on them. I hope the children continue to do well with the series and continue to learn!

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

It's Wednesday again and that means it's time to tell you what I'm loving this week!

I'm loving that Uncle Chris (CJ's uncle, my brother-in-law) is coming to hang out today. He is working in North Carolina right now and has a free afternoon/evening to visit and go Bible class with us.

I'm loving this Halloween costume I bought for CJ this week. She is going to be the cutest Little Red Riding Hood ever!

I'm loving all of the scrapbooking I've been getting done. These are some of my favorites:

As always I'm loving my sweet Chloe Jo!

I'm loving Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. We just got this book in the mail yesterday. Chloe Jo loves getting a book every month. If you are interested in your child (Ages 5 and under) getting a new book for free every month, check out the webpage here.

What are you loving today?

Still Plugging Along

Well, ya'll, I'm still plugging away at my scrapbooking. One of my resolutions this year is to get caught up with it. With everything else on my list, I think I may have bitten off more than I can chew. But, my pile of pictures is smaller. See?
I know. It's still huge and that is just the ones I have printed out up until 2005. Yikes. I am still trying to hit my goal of having them all done by the end of the month. Unfortunately, today I have been lacking in the inspiration department. I've been looking through a lot of magazines to find it. I was able to finish several pages that I'm happy with. I'm just ready to be through this stack and start working on the ones that I don't have printed. I'll probably get burned out before that happens, though! Anyway, here are the pages/spreads I finished today.
This black and white is my favorite from today. I'm in love with it.
I also really like this one. Simple and cute.
And because I had the camera out, Chloe Jo thought she needed to pose for me. Silly girl!

Music Monday

Russ and I will be celebrating our 7th anniversary on September 4th. In honor of this milestone I thought I would post a few of the songs that we played at our wedding. Russ introduced me to this song when we were dating and it became "our song." I still love it.


Michael W. Smith - The Other Side of Me

Fairy Tale Dress-Up

So I know we have 2 1/2 months until Halloween, but I also know that money is about to get really tight with Christmas on the way (which I've also already started shopping for). I always try to be ahead of the game when it comes to holidays so I started thinking about what Chloe Jo was going to dress up as this year for Halloween. Last year she was Raggedy Ann...
...The cutest little Raggedy Ann ever!

I love the traditional fairy tale Halloween costumes. I don't like ghosts, ghouls, devils or the like. I was thinking about making her a costume this year. Something like a fairy or a princess. But then I started searching. And I found this adorable Little Red Riding Hood costume.
It's precious. It's perfect. It's just as cute as last years costume. I'm so excited!!! She is going to be adorable!

I've made a dent

I feel like I've made a significant dent in my scrapbooking the last two days. I organized the pictures that were saved on my computer (I also backed them all up on an external harddrive when I bought my new computer) and I organized and went through the pictures that I had that were already printed. I threw away duplicates and pictures that I didn't want to scrap. I did two spreads yesterday and I've done five single pages today so far. My goal is to finish scrapping all the pictures I have printed except for 2009 to the present. I am not even going to try to get to the insane amount of pictures that we have since Chloe Jo was born at this time. Anywho, while organizing, I came across these gems that made me laugh. Pardon the bad quality. These are pictures of pictures. We don't have a scanner.

This was around 1990. I'm the short one...ahem youngest. I'm no longer the short one. This picture is without my oldest brother. I assume he was away at college at the time.

Bahahaha! My sister and I marched in the Ronald McDonald band. Okay, not really. Our school colors just happened to be crimson and gold which translated into red and yellow on our uniforms. I'm the one on the right.

A tie-dyed bejeweled t-shirt. It was one of my favorites. Not sure what year this was.

The last few pictures are the pages I completed today. I didn't take pictures of what I did yesterday because I had already put them in a scrapbook.
I have to say that even though I am feeling a little overwhelmed by how much I have to do, I have so enjoyed going through these old pictures and giving them a new life by scrapbooking. I wish I would keep up with it a little better. Maybe when we buy a house, I can have a craft room. Ahhh...dreams...

Mish Mash

*I know I've been neglecting my blog lately. We haven't been doing much besides staying home and I haven't had a lot to say. It will pick back up at the end of this month when Russ and I both have birthday's and when we have our anniversary at the beginning of September.

*I finally finished Russ' school scrapbooks. That is a big project that has been checked off the list. I also organized my pictures into year so I was able to ascertain how far behind I am. I still have pictures from 2005 to scrapbook. Luckily, Russ' school stuff is done, my pregnancy is already done and Chloe Jo's birth is done. All that being said means that I am not quite as far behind as I thought, but it's still daunting.

*There is a little boy who is around 6 months younger than Chloe Jo that has started coming to Bible class all the time. He is rambunctious and pretty loud {a normal toddler boy}. Chloe Jo does not like him at all! I think he scares her because he is so loud. She goes crazy when he comes to class. She cries and whines and only wants to sit on my lap. This makes it incredibly difficult to actually teach class so I haven't been giving in thinking that she would get used to him. It's been several weeks and Wednesday evening, she was HORRIBLE! I never thought I would have the bad kid in class. I have no idea how to deal with this because I'm the teacher. I can't send her into the auditorium to sit with Daddy because he teaches class. I tried having the little boy's mom come to help, but that didn't work out so well either. I'm at a loss.

*I finished up the 6th season of Bones. Now I just have to wait for the 7th season to start in November. While I'm doing that, I'm going to start watching the new Project Runway episodes.

*Love this girl.

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

It's that time again! Wednesday, Hump Day, The Middle of the Week. Here's what I'm loving this week:

I'm loving that my grandparents celebrated 59 years of marriage yesterday. My parents celebrated 40 years in July. I'm loving that I have such great examples in my life!

I'm loving taking Chloe Jo to the park to play. We like to walk to the park in the evenings and when we get home, we have a popsicle to cool down before bathtime and bed. Love it!

I'm loving my early birthday present! I've been needing a new computer for a long time now. I couldn't get on the internet without my old one locking up. The monitor would black out randomly all the time and it wouldn't properly shut down anymore. So Russ finally talked me into getting a new one. I love it! It's so fast and I can watch videos on it!I'm loving my current embroidery project. I'm trying to make several tea towels for Christmas gifts.I'm loving the show Bones. We don't have any channels on our tv so Russ found a site that streams shows so we can still watch a little now and then. I knew I enjoyed Bones before since I had seen a few episodes so I started watching it from the beginning. I love it now! I can't wait for the new season to start in November!What are you loving today?

{link up here}

Music Monday

I have always loved Taylor Swift. Ever since "Tim McGraw" was released I have loved her. I have all of her cd's and I listen to them all of the time. This is one of my all time favorites of hers. I even love the video. So cute!

At the Park

Music Monday

This week for Music Monday we are going to go back in time to the year I was born. That would be 1982. I love 80's power ballads! I picked this particular video (there wasn't an actual music video for this song) because of Richard Gere in a white uniform. Um...yum.

Up Where We Belong - Joe Crocker and Jennifer Warnes

Link up and share one of your favorite 80's power ballads!

Mish Mash

*I have a few things today so I'm doing a Mish Mash post...I think I usually call it something else, but whatev.

*My blogger has been messed up for the past several days. The upload picture button has not been working. I click it and it does nothing. I use Google Chrome most of the time, but I also have Internet Explorer on my computer. So I opened my blog on IE and the upload picture button works. I would rather use GC than IE. I tried to report the problem, but can't seem to find a place to do that. I see the message boards and the help center, but no where for me to report it. Help?

*I saw the video of how to curl my hair without heat here. It's a pretty long video but I was completely intrigued and she made it look so easy. Unfortunately, the hair band I used must have something in it that I'm allergic to. Do you see the red line across my forhead in this picture? It's still there. I took the headband out on Wednesday morning! It is tender and itches. Ugh! I hope it goes away soon!

*We finally got to see Uncle Chris! He decided to surprise us and come on down Wednesday evening to go eat and to Bible class with us! We were thrilled! We weren't expecting him until Thursday but he wanted to get home so he came early. He brought Chloe Jo a few things from her Granny Tiger and Pappy and her G-Jo and Grampy. Granny Tiger and Pappy sent her a Backpack from Dora the Explorer and a Dora doll that sings and dances. Grampy and G-Jo sent her this tent!

Isn't it super cute and fun! She loves it and it now has a pillow, a couple of blankets and a stack of books inside. I have a cute picture on my cell phone of her praying in her tent castle. Awwww. Her cousin, Brianna, got one too!

*Chloe Jo loves to go check the mail with me. I have to lift her up so she can reach the mailbox, but she will open it and grab whatever is in it and take it into the house. Today, before nap time, she asked to pray for the mailman.

*One last thing. Chloe Jo has started singing some lately. She won't say words, but she will sit in her carseat and babble along with songs. She will sing the long notes when we sing during church services. She loves it when we sing in Bible class especially if we are singing an action song. Here are a couple of action songs that she loves. Roll the Gospel Chariot is her favorite song right now.

*I hope you are all having a great start to the weekend!