30 Days of Gratefulness - Day 1

Last year, I did this and it was such a good exercise for me. I wanted to do it again this year. My post may not be long and weekends tend to get cobbled all together, but what a breath of thanksgiving {daily} in my life and a delicious reminder to look back on.

2010's 30 Days of Greatfulness

Day 1
I'm thankful for
- a gifted lady who offers to teach ASL for free
- for a child who loves it
- for friends who go too, so that we get to see them every week
- for said friends who'll share their iPad with my restless 3 year-old who finds our "talking hands class" less than desired
- gingersnap cookies
- hot stew on a chilly day
- good conversations with family, calls to encourage and to be encouraged (it all goes in a circle)
- the funny things my little ones say, like; "Please differentiate between a foul smell and a bird kind of fowl, momma." (spelling test) "Cookies are good for milk!" (eating cookies with a glass of milk after dinner)
- sunshine


Please feel free to join in on your personal blog, on FB, or Twitter. I know we are all busy and lives are crazy, but I can attest that a minute or two each day to record what we have to say "thank you" for is worth the effort. I promise.

It's not summer anymore

Well, the calender says it's not. :) We're still hitting the low 80's here in the Deep South, but truly, it is being a beautiful autumn. Mid 50's at night and mid 70's (generally) during the day. I'm getting spoiled have the windows open.

I can not believe how quickly the summer flew by. We spent several weeks of craziness doing strawberry jam, strawberries in the freezer, blueberry jam, blueberries in the freezer, blackberries in the freezer, canned tomatoes, oven-roasted tomatoes and then pressure canned, peaches, peach cobblers, and peaches for jamming all in the freezer. Sadly all the frozen fruit was eaten within 2 weeks. I can not even begin to imagine the size of freezer we would need and the hours I would spend picking to keep my family (Mike!!!) in frozen berries for a whole year.

After we finished all of that we worked on our summer to-do list. It was fun to sit down with Olivia and brain-storm these fun activities. Our list is still hanching on the wall and we're still working on it but I think, by and large, we have finished all that we can for this "summer." Totally time for a "Holiday Season to-do list." But, here is a little run down of fun things we did.

>paint sparkle toes
>take a hike
>see a waterfall
>go camping
>take a road trip
>make blueberry jam
>see the 4th of July fireworks
>have a cookout with friends (twice)
>pick strawberries
>take a nature walk
>play monopoly
>eat pancakes
>plant some herbs
>sew a play tent
>summer reading program at the library
>Celebration Towne
>popcorn and a movie at home
>do a puzzle
>make marshmallow structures
>go swimming
>blow bubbles
>learn the ABC's in sign language
>make s'mores
>make homemade ice cream
>play jacks
>VBS
>go to the beach
>bake cupcakes
>go ice skating
>have a family movie night
>start a new embroidery piece
>go to a beach birthday party
>make flower headbands
>finish Saxon Math2

sparkle toes for everyone except those yummy lil boy piggies)

oven roasted tomatoes ready to be made into sauce and pressurized

what the inside of your pressure cooker will look like if 1 of your jar lids wasn't screwed on properly and blows off during the cooking process

ice skating lessons

our yearly trip to the beach (samuel's 1st)

our vintage sheet tent
it looks cuter with a little girl in it