I've really missed the community here at homeschool blogger.  I left because I was having trouble with my blog, but now it seems the issues have been resolved.  I think I'll give it a try for a while, and see what happens.  :o)

Last week we went up on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Here are some pictures from that trip:

We pulled up to this overlook, and discovered this gorgeous view through the fence.  This picture was actually taken from the car.  I absolutely love this place on the parkway though.  It about 30 minutes from our house, and someday I'm just going to go up there just to sit and relax. 

This is at the same stop as above.  Ben ran across the stones to climb on this big rock.  He looks so small standing over there, doesn't he?  I also like the reflection of the rock on the water.

Again, same spot.  Aren't the rocks cool?  The kids always enjoy climbing on these rocks.

Beth found a nice spot to sit down and pose for a picture.  Little did she know, that about 2 feet away from her was a snake!  After her initial shock and scare, she asked for the camera so she could take pictures of it.

Here he is!  I don't know what kind of snake it is, but he stayed put the entire time we were there.

Does anyone know how to back up blogs on disks or transfer blogs to another blog?  I went to the forum section, but I can't figure out what my password is in order to ask how to do this.  Any help is greatly appreciated!

I can't believe it's working now...my blog that is.  I've been trying for over a month to post an entry, but to no avail.  I was told I could download something that should help, but I didn't want to add anything to my computer that I didn't need to.  SOOOOO, I started a new blog.  You can find the new blog (with some entries) at:

http://vaqueenbee.blogspot.com

Please come on over and bookmark me.  I'm trying very diligently to keep up with my blog.

***You Are a Boston Creme Donut***

***Your Personality Profile***

Myrtle Beach, SC, that is.  :o)  A couple of weeks ago, my dear friend, Perri, extended a gracious invitation to come and visit her during her vacation to Myrtle Beach.  MB is only 6 hours away, and since she invited us to stay with her in her condo, we didn't have to worry about the cost, soooo, we said "YES!"  I'm glad we did.  We had such a good time visiting with her and her family and friends who travelled with her. 

My Mom went as well, but she stayed in an oceanfront suite.  The kids and I stayed with her on Saturday night, and then stayed with Perri Sunday and Monday nights, and then we spent one last night with Mom on Tuesday night, before travelling home on Wednesday.  Quick trip, but it was fun!  The kids had a blast swimming in the pools and floating in the lazy river.  :o)  Perri and I had fun playing Boggle and Rummikub. 

Oh, there was also this little football game on Sunday night.  Have you ever watched the superbowl with someone who is a HUGE fan of one of the teams?  Well, I got to watch it with 6 HUGE fans of the Colts Sunday night!  What a LOUD game that one was!!!  It was lots of fun though!

On Monday we went shopping at Broadway at the Beach.  This place has lots of specialty shops to browse through.  Our favorite, hands down, was the Discovery Channel Store.  We could have stayed in there all day.

Now back to the "real" world.  :o)  Laundry, cooking, cleaning, and getting ready for our Bible study tomorrow night. 

This weekend I'm also going away for a couple of nights with my daughter.  We're having a special girl time.  We're staying in a nice hotel, shopping, swimming, eating, etc.  We can't wait!  We'll be going through a cd series called Passport 2 Purity.  I can't believe my daughter's old enough to be having that talk with, but it's better that she hear it from me than from some other source.  So this is it! 

Have a great weekend!

Shortly after waking up this morning, I shuffled into the kitchen, flipped on the radio, and started the coffee.  After a few minutes my half-awake mind registered the fact that the radio announcer was calling off the schools that were closed due to snow and ice.  Every school in the area was closed.  (not us die hard homeschoolers though.  Snow?  Doesn't bother us...my kids can go to school barefoot for all I care!)

I digress...  After hearing the school closings, it brought to mind something from when I first moved from Ohio to Virginia in 1985.  I laughed sooo hard the first time I heard this on the radio one morning, "Today we expect to get 2 to 3 inches of snow.  Here are the school closings...."  I cracked up.  Back home it was nothing if we had 2 to 3 inches, we definitely didn't get out of going to school.  We would have never cancelled school for the threat of snow!  Granted we didn't have mountains to drive through, but still...it looks like it's going to snow, let's cancel???!!!

I'm so glad things have changed around here.  It would be embarrassing to cancel school and there not be any snow!

"Wheee!!!!!!!!!!"

"Look Mom, no hands!"

"This wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be!"

I made these last night down at my Mom's apartment.  My mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and I made something similar several years ago and I thought they were so cute!  We used those for gifts, but I'm using them for centerpieces this time. 

Next Friday night (2/9) we'll have our monthly single mom's Bible study, and we're having a Valentine theme.  I made these for centerpieces for the tables.

I don't like how the one on the left turned out with the tissue paper, so I'm going to redo it with larger paper or use two pieces.

Here's some more shots of the "candy arrangement."

I found this on Perri's blog and thought I'd give it a whirl...If you do it, let me know so I can check out your answers!

Aprons – Y/N? If Y, what does your favorite look like?
Yes...the kids and I each got one for Christmas.  Mine is a full apron, with roosters on it.

Baking – Favorite thing to bake
Cookies -- preferrably chocolate chip or peanut butter

Clothesline – Y/N? No, but I wouldn't mind having one.  I'd actually like to have one strung along my front porch columns, but even though we live in the country, I guess there's some things I can't bring myself to do.  :o)  Now, if my back deck had a place to hang one.....  :o)

Donuts – Have you ever made them? Yes, out of canned biscuits.  I fry them and then sprinkle powdered sugar over them.  Yum!

Everyday – One homemaking thing you do every day - Just one?  Hmmm, I guess I would say cooking.

Freezer – Do you have a separate deep freeze? Yes, we have a small deep freeze, and then a few months ago we purchased an additional side by side refrigerator/freezer to keep down in the basement.  It sure has come in handy!

Garbage Disposal – Y/N? Nope...never have had one.

Handbook – What is your favorite homemaking resource?   My cookbook that I write my favorite recipes in.

Ironing – Love it or hate it?  Ironing?  What's that?  ('nuff said)

Junk drawer – Y/N? Where is it? How about junk drawers?  They are in my kitchen...I've got two of them!

Kitchen – Color and decorating scheme. Tan walls (can't think of the fancy name for them, so we'll go with tan), linoleum floor with a mixture of tans and green...looks like ceramic tile, oak cabinets, and green countertops.  I have some roosters here and there, and I would also like to add in some chili peppers. 

Love – What is your favorite part of homemaking? Clean sheets!

Mop – Y/N? Probably not as often as I should, but I have my Swiffer mop and a sponge mop, and a lot of sponges and rags that are good for deep down cleaning!

Nylons – Wash by hand or in the washing machine? By hand...if they don't get a run with the first use!

Oven – Do you use the window or open the oven to check? I open the door.

Pizza – What do you put on yours? My favorite would be mushroom, bacon, and onion.

Quiet – What do you do during the day when you get a quiet moment? Get on my computer or read.

Recipe card box – Y/N? What does it look like? Yes, but I use my handwritten cookbooks more.  I bought it at SAMS Club, and it's wonderful!

Style of house – What style is your house? One story ranch (with partially finished basement) with tan vinyl siding and black shutters, a big front porch that goes the length of the house, a large deck for entertaining, and nice, comfy seats in the living room for talking to family and friends!

Tablecloths and napkins – Y/N?  Tablecloth - no, napkins - yes (but they're paper).

Under the kitchen sink – Organized or toxic wasteland? Organized -- now.  I finally organized it a couple of months ago.  Now it's not embarrassing to open in front of guests!

Vacuum – How many times per week? At least 6.

Wash – How many loads of laundry do you do per week? About 6.

X’s – Do you keep a daily list of things to do that you cross off? Yes, I love lists!  :o)  We keep an ongoing grocery list, and if I have a busy day I keep a "to do" list, and I have my homeschooling schedule that we check off.  I love to make those checks!  Makes me feel so gooood! 

Yard – Y/N? Who does what? Yes, large one.  Up until this past summer I did most of the mowing.  This summer I was babysitting an infant, so my wonderful husband ended up mowing a lot.  I think I only got to do it once or twice.  (I love to mow though!  Probably wouldn't if we didn't have a large riding mower!)  My daughter started mowing toward the end of the summer, so I may be replaced this year, too!

Zzz’s – What is your last homemaking task for the day before going to bed? Make sure the kitchen is tolerable to wake up to, sometimes folding clothes, or laying out frozen meat for the next day.

We had our kick off for our ladies ministry at church tonight.  There is so much involved in our ladies ministry.  It's not just a bunch of ladies meeting together and eating and talking (although that's part of what we did).  The ladies in our church have so many ministries they're involved in, a big one they emphasize is women helping women....counseling, mentoring, etc.  There are Bible studies on Tuesday mornings, Wednesday nights, and Thursday nights.  There's a ladies retreat every other year (and a men's retreat on the off years).  But in the past year there has been a push for ladies who are willing to mentor other ladies....ladies who you can say "I've been in your shoes and this is how the Lord got me through." 

God allows us to go through trials for a reason.  I just made a typo and I typed "God allows us to gro through..."  I guess that's what He wants us to do when he allows us to go through trials...He wants us to grow.  What better way to use what He has taught us than by helping others that are going through the same or similar things. 

The main ministry I'm involved in is with the Single Moms.  I've never been a single mom, so I can't really mentor them in that area, but I can be a listening ear, a praying friend, a friend to call on when they need help.  One of our moms had surgery today and we're watching her kids this weekend.  They're great kids...7 year old girl and an 8 year old boy.  They've stayed with us before and do well with our kids.  Beth enjoys having a "younger sister" for the weekend.  Tomorrow we're going shopping, and Beth wants to paint her nails do girlie things with her.  Ben enjoys playing with the boy.  They have fun together.  I enjoy helping my friend because I know it is a blessing to her and eases her mind that her kids are safe while she is recuperating.  Neal likes helping out as a male role model for both of the kids.

"Thank you Lord for allowing me to be a blessing to someone else today."

We had a blast Saturday night.  We invited four other families over for a game night.  The invitation said to bring a snack and your favorite game.  Let me just say one thing "I'm glad we didn't eat supper!"  I've never seen such a spread for "snacks."  We had a huge tray of chicken tenders from Walmart, homemade pizza rolls, a beautiful spinach dip in a hollowed out loaf of bread, bacon-sausage wraps, vegetable tray and dip, hot artichoke dip and french bread, brownies, chocolate crunch cookies, and a big chocolate chip cookie spread with cream cheese spread and chocolate pudding topped with nuts.  Can you say "Yummo!"  We were not hurting for food, but neither were we hurting for games.  We had about 20 games to choose from.  The guys ended up playing a game called The Settlers of Catan.  I'd never heard of it, but the guys all seemed to enjoy it.  They said the closest game they could compare it to is Risk.  The ladies played Pit, and then we played Scattergories.  The kids played Twister, played with puzzles, and just, well, played.  :o)  There were 10 adults and six kids.  Here's some pics from the night:

Playing PIT

The Settlers of Catan

Erin, Beth and Jaymee (Beth is at the bottom)

Can't leave Symon out.  He likes our green rocker.

We had our pictures taken Sunday for our church directory.  So, here we are two days ago. 

2007 has started off busy, busy, busy! 

I've been blessed with two handwriting jobs so far this year.  On occasion, I address envelopes at home for a local company.  So, in the past two weeks (actually less than two) I've addressed 2,000 envelopes!  It comes out to $10 an hour, so I figure that's not too bad for a job I can do in my living room while watching Anne of Green Gables. 

We started off the New Year with some friends of ours from church.  We spent New Year's Eve at their house and had a great time eating pizza and playing games.  We almost missed the ball dropping in New York City though.  When we turned on the TV there were just a few seconds left in 2006. 

Here are some pictures from our fun night:

Now that's a root beer float! 

Ben trying to decide which pizza he wants.

Teresa helping to make the pizzas

These are the same friends we went camping with last summer.

Here's a picture of Beth and Ben with the game Beth bought with some of her Christmas money:

Twister!

Okay, I got this idea from my friend Perri.  You take the first sentence from the first blog in each  month of the year and write it down.  I know I was bad and didn't even blog every month, but I'll do what I can.  Here goes...

January

I've been tagged by my friend Sara. 

February

It's been a while since I've posted anything here.

March

We got home this afternoon.

April

In January, Neal and I sat down and filled out our calendar...you know, birthdays, dentist appts, vacations, etc.

May

Why is it okay to be an athiest? 

June

When we came home from church the other night, my 8 year old son Ben ran back to our school room and said he had to write something down. 

August

I know...I know...

it's been a long time since I blogged!

October

Something new I started in September is planning my suppers for the entire month.

December

My mom, Beth, Ben, and I were able to go to the dedication ceremony for the steel beams for the new Freedom Towers on December 8th.

Okay, that was my year in review...pretty pitiful, huh?  Hopefully next year will be more exciting!

There is always so much build up to Christmas day, and then it's here and gone in a flash!  I have to say though, that we had a very enjoyable Christmas and December leading up to it.  We tried to do as many things that reflect the true meaning of Christmas as we could.  We made an Advent Kiss Chain.  Starting Dec. 1st, the kids had to come and give their Daddy or I a kiss and we then gave them a Hershey's Kiss from our Advent Chain.  On Christmas day they had their last "kiss."  I'm sure we'll keep getting ours though! 

This is a long sheet of plastic wrap with two kisses in each section about one inch apart.  A piece of curling ribbon is tied between each set of two kisses....25 days of Kisses!  :o)

We also made an Advent Candle Wreath (without the actual greenery...maybe next year).

This is on Christmas day..The Christ candle in the middle was lit Monday.  It's difficult to tell the colors of the candles in this picture, but there are three purple and one pink, and the white Christ candle in the middle.

Another thing we enjoyed this month was drawing names each morning.  We drew a name of an immediate family member and you had to secretly do something nice for them on that day.  It was fun guessing who had whom.

On Christmas Eve morning we went to church, and then had a friend, her two children, and my Mom over for Christmas Eve lunch.  Mom helped fix this meal.  We had turkey and ham, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, green beans, candied sweet potatoes, homemade (by Mom) stuffing, spinach casserole, homemade (by me) bread, and for dessert Mom made Coca-Cola Cake and I made Coconut Cream pie.  We had a really enjoyable lunch and then spent the afternoon talking to our friend and letting the kids play.  Then we went to the Christmas Eve service.  We should have gotten there early, but we arrived just on time for the service to start.  Therefore, we had to go to the overflow room which ended up having over 200 people in it!  We were disappointed at first, but it ended up being really cool because when it got to the candle lighting part, we could see the entire sanctuary (on screen) alight with candles.  It was an awesome view.  When you're sitting in the seat you can only see those candles around you, so having an "aerial" view was awesome!  I sat their and cried as we sang silent night and held our candles.  It was beautiful!  Then our pastor said "what if you don't share about Christ and let your "light" shine?"  Then he asked everyone on the right hand side of the room to blow out their candles.  Then he asked the question again and asked the left hand side of the room to blow out their candles.  That left just the middle section.  Then he asked again and had the middle section blow out their candles.  Then just his light was shining.  He said "What if the Pastor doesn't do his job?"  Then he blew out his candle.  Wow!  That was such a vivid illustration seeing all those candles go to darkness.  We need to let our lights shine for all to see!

After church, we went back home and on down to my Mom's apartment to exchange gifts with her.  She had already given Neal and I our gift earlier in the year...a new grill.  So, the kids had fun opening their gifts and giving Mamaw gifts.

Every Christmas Eve we sleep with the kids.  Up until last year we tossed and turned and kicked and grumbled slept in the same bed, but last year we moved to the living room!  The kids slept in their sleeping bags on the floor, Neal snored slept on the couch, and I stared at the ceiling slept on the love seat.  It's no wonder we got up at 5:00 am!

 Here is Symon waking up on Christmas morning.

After waking up, Neal read the "Christmas Story" from the Bible.  Then at 6:00 we turned on the TV (gasp!) and watched this year's performance from our church's children's Christmas program.  They put it on our local ABC station every Christmas morning at 6:00.  The kids had seen it in person (we don't participate just because it's such a huge production and we don't want to get involved in all of those practices!), but Neal and I had skipped out and gone Christmas shopping that night.  (another gasp!)  LOL  It was fun watching it from the comfort of our living room and not having to look around somone's head to see the stage!  Then it was time for gift opening!  This is a long ordeal in our household since we each take turns opening our gifts and oohing and ahhing over them!  Here's some pictures from our Christmas Day:

This is part of our Christmas Village in the living room.

Close up of Nativity from the previous picture.

Part of village in my kitchen.  The right side of this village are buildings from the movie "It's a Wonderful Life."  The signs says "You Are Now In Bedford Falls."

Last part of my village. 

Close up of Ice Skating rink.  It plays music, the ferris wheel turns, and the people skate.  This is a big hit with all the children who come to our home.

This is our 2006 ornament.  Each year since we've been married we've purchased or received an ornament for that year.  Most of these ornaments have the year engraved/printed on them, but this year I just wrote the year on the bottom.  This is the ornament I got at our Cookie Exchange/ornament exchange party.

Beth's gift to her Daddy:  D - Delightful; A - a good example; D - devotional; D - director of our family; Y - you're very fun.  He loved it!

Beth knitted me a scarf!  This was a huge surprise and I wore it all day long! 

These are the aprons I bought for the three of us.  Aren't they cute?  In case you can't see it that well, Ben's is John Deere tractors, mine is roosters, and Beth's is chili peppers.

After we finished opening gifts (around 9:30 -- I told you we drag it out!) I made my portion of brunch and then we went down to my Mom's.  She had one of her friends over to enjoy brunch with us.

Clockwise from the left:  Cheesy Date and Nut Goodies, Sausage Roll Ups, Bacon and Egg Strata, and Cinnamon French Toast Casserole.  Everything was yummy!

Mom on Christmas morning.

This is a beautiful Thomas Kinkade floral arrangement that my brother Darrell and his wife Jan sent to Mom.  She loves Thomas Kinkade (last year she got a TK framed painting from my brother Robert and  his wife Debbie).  She got a TK calendar from me.  :o)  You can't see it in the picture, but the house actually lights up!

Early afternoon I fixed a couple of casseroles and then at 3:00 we went to Neal's grandfather's house.  There were 27 of us there and we had a big potluck dinner and then we played "dirty santa."  The kids also had a gift exchange.  After that we went to Neal's parents house and we exchanged gifts with his Mom and Dad and sisters.  Then we played a game called "Battle of the Sexes."  The men have to answer "female related" questions and the women have to answer male questions.  Theirs were mostly clothing/fashion, celebrity, famous females, etc.  Ours were car questions, rock music, racing, political dates, etc.  It took forever to end the first game and then we switched and let the men answer men questions and the women answer women questions.  We finished that game in about 15 minutes!  It was funny!

The next day we decided to have a family day and play some of our new games.  That was fine until mid afternoon when Ben started throwing up!  :o(  So, the three of us played while he moaned nearby on the couch.  On Wednesday Beth and I joined Ben on the couch.  Fortunately we didn't get it as bad!  We're still feeling pretty yucky today.  As a matter of fact, I just realized that I'm still in my pj's and it's 3:15!  Here's one last picture from Christmas:

Symon wanted to play our new Star Wars Trivial Pursuit game that Uncle Darrell and Aunt Jan gave the kids!

Merry Christmas!

I had a lot of fun tonight.  A friend invited me to her house for a cookie and ornament exchange.  We each brought 10 dozen cookies!  Yes, I made over 120 cookies today!  I made my version of Nieman Marcus Cookies (I substitute some butterscotch chips for some of the chocolate chips.  So my cookies have butterscotch chips, mini chocolate chips, grated Hershey's bar, and walnuts.  I also use half butter/half shortening (instead of all butter), and I used 1 cup of nuts instead of 3.)  I thought they turned out really good.  There were 9 of us there all together because one of the ladies couldn't make it.  Two ladies brought Snickerdoodles, then some of the other cookies were:  buckeyes, ginger snaps, decorated Christmas sugar cookies, chocolate peppermint candy pieces, and one of the ladies brought cookies that I don't know by name, but you take two Ritz crackers and spread peanut butter on one and put the other cracker on top.  Then you dip the sandwich in melted chocolate and let it harden.  Oh man, those are some good cookies!  The other lady brought a "Christmas Tree" for each person.  The base was a sugar cone, and then it had melted green Wilton chocolate spread on it, and then some kind of cookies that look like leaves "glued" onto the cone to make it look like an evergreen tree.  They were really cute.

So, first we ate.  Marlene had some scrumptious appetizers.  While we ate we sat and chatted.  I didn't know everyone there, so it was nice meeting some new people.  After a while we had our ornament exchange.  I got a really pretty nativity ornament.  I finally left around 11:00.  It was a really fun, relaxing evening.  Here's a picture of six of us...two had already left before the picture was taken.

That's me in the bottom right hand corner.  The lady in the top left hand corner is my friend Jackie (the family we went camping with in August), then next to her is Kathleen (she and I were roomies at the homeschool conference), the next lady is Mary (she was Beth's volleyball coach), next to her is Eileen (I met her for the first time tonight -- very nice lady), bottom left is Maureen (I have just recently gotten to know her from church and our homeschool group), and next is Marlene who gave the party.  This is a great group of ladies and we all had lots of fun talking and laughing tonight.

My mom, Beth, Ben, and I were able to go to the dedication ceremony for the steel beams for the new Freedom Towers on December 8th.  It was a really great experience.  A local steel company is supplying some of the steel for the new Freedom Towers in NYC. The Governor of NY was there along with the Lt. Governor of VA, a local person (can't remember who), and a local police officer who was a police officer in NY on 9/11.  His father was also a police officer in NY, and he died on 9/11.  It was a very moving ceremony, but also had a definite celebratory feel to it.  After the ceremony we were able to sign the beam.  My Mom saw on the news this week where the family members of those who died on 9/11 were able to sign one of the beams in NY.  Here are a couple of pictures from that day:

That is the beam we signed behind the banner.

That is Don Banker (Owner of Banker Steel) at the podium.  Governor Pataki is the tall man behind him.  The man on the far left is the police officer.

It was good for the kids to be part of this historic event.  One day they may be able to tell their kids that they wrote their names on a steel beam that is underneath the Freedom Towers!  Cool!

Early to bed, early to rise, makes mama....tired!  LOL

Neal has been getting to work later and later and later over the past few months, soooo, even though he works through lunch and works late, we realized that we had to do something different.  We upped our wake-up time half an hour.  Instead of 7:00, we now get up at 6:30.  Our mornings are special to us as we like to have breakfast together as a family and then have family devotions.  So, in order to continue this we needed to change our alarm clock!  This morning wasn't so bad, but it's only 9:30 pm and I'm feeling pretty sleepy.  I'll be heading off to bed here shortly.

School went well today.  I got a bit of laundry done in between helping the kids.  :o) 

After lunch though, we went shopping!  I desperately needed some new clothes.  It's wonderful to lose weight, and it's great to get into clothes that haven't fit in years, but what do you do when they're too big?  SHOP!  ;o)  I was good though and I shopped at Goodwill.  Man, we you find good deals there it is such a "good thing."  I found 5 sweaters and a skirt and I only paid $18.90!  Two of the sweaters were Liz Claiborne, so I know they probably cost quite a bit.  I went to another Goodwill, and found Beth two Old Navy skirs ($6.00) and a pair of church shoes ($3.00).  I also found some dessert plates.  They are old and very pretty.  They were .40 each!  That was fun!  I love shopping trips like that!

Tonight I had a special treat, in that my sister-in-law brought supper to our house!  She made a homemade chicken pot pie and brought it over and had supper with us.  What a treat!  It was so yummy!  I had made some Chai tea mix and wanted her to try it and we had some salsa to give her, so she brought supper and got Chai tea and salsa in return.  Not bad (on our part anyway)!

Now I'm off to bed! 

It was rainy here all day Friday and Saturday.  We needed the rain, but sometimes it's difficult to be cheerful when you're having company and you really want the kids to be able to play outside and enjoy the playground!  But we are very thankful for the rain!

Friday night, as I posted earlier, Neal and I spent doing our monthly grocery shopping.  It feels so good to have a full pantry!

Saturday morning/early afternoon was spent cleaning house.  It's good for me to have company over periodically because it's a great motivator to clean the house really good!  I'm not too sure my family likes it when we have company over though, because they know Mommy goes into overdrive on  house cleaning!  It was rainy outside so what else would they have done anyway, right?!!!

We had some good friends over for dinner and fellowship.  They have four kids ages 5, 6, 13, and 15.  (girl, boy, boy, girl)  They are a homeschooling family, and we enjoy a lot of the same things.  The evening went entirely too fast!  The rain did let up a bit for us to grill out!  We grilled chicken breasts that had been marinated in Italian dressing, baked potatoes, nutty barley casserole, green beans, homemade Sally Lunn bread, and two Amish desserts...crunchy chocolate surprise and cracker pudding.  Both Jackie and I are into Beverly Lewis' Amish books, so I made two recipes out of Beverly's cookbook.  They were both delicious, but I especially liked the cracker pudding.  My favorite pie is coconut cream, and this pudding reminded me of it.  Jackie's daughter, Abby, made brownies with peanutbutter chips in them.  Yum!  Jackie and I looked at homeschool stuff for a while.  She brought over some geography materials I was wanting to look at, and I showed her my Analytical Grammar materials and our God's Design for Chemistry (put out by Answers in Genesis).  Love those!

Today was church, short trip to Sams (can you believe we forgot to get milk on Friday?) leftovers, church again, worked in library, and back home for more leftovers.  :o)  Now it's quiet in the house, and I'm ready for bed.

Have a blessed week!