FAITH Glass Block

Here is the glass block that I made this evening:


I bought the block at a local building material store ($7.50) but I have seen them at JoAnn's in Portland and I hear that Michael's carries them from time-to-time. I used my Cricut to cut out the vinyl ($9 for 2 rolls of 12x24") lettering and picture. The dot lights I found on clearance at Fred Meyers (around $3) after Valentine's Day. I had to buy a glass drill bit ($28) and my wonderfully awesome husband drilled the hole into the bottom for me!

My friend Sarah has asked about how the Cricut works so I took a few pictures tonight during my vinyl cutting. I didn't want to put all my vinyl onto the sticky mat so I cut a 2x12" strip (my letters were only going to be cut at 1 1/2") and attached it to the edge of the sticky mat.


You put the mat up to the edge of the Cricut and hit the "load paper" button and it pulls it in (like a printer):


Each cartridge comes with a keypad for you to select what picture/letter/shape you want the Cricut to cut and there are buttons to pick sizes and so I typed in all the letters I wanted and the pictures and hit the "cut" button:


It cuts out exactly what you want, in the order you want it then I peeled the vinyl off the sticky mat so I could better get ahold of the letters. I then peeled each letter off the backing so I could stick it to the glass block.


It's intimidating at first and I still don't have it all figured out but I'm still super impressed with the Cricut and LOVE having it for stuff like this! Sarah, I hope that gave you an idea. Here's a link to a video clip of the Cricut's awesomeness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z74fevbqcC0

Magnets

I may be a little biased here but I personally think I have the best husband on the planet! LOL I got nailed with a horrible migraine yesterday that knocked me on my butt out of nowhere! Praise God that I have my grandmother close by that is all too eager to help me with the kids when I'm sick. I hate asking for help, it's one of those things that is REALLY hard for me to do but with having a migraine and a very loud toddler, they don't mix well together! I called for backup and grandma took the kids for 3 hours so I could try to rest. When hubby got home, he took care of dinner and took the kids out of the house for awhile and by the time he got back and the kids got put to bed, I was so sick of being in my bed or on the couch that I wanted to ignore the dull pain and light-headedness and do something! LOL Now I think Josh enjoys the Cricut almost as much as me but he won't admit it, wouldn't be manly! :O} Anyways, we've been wanting to spend some time together because life has been busy and with me working out in the evenings at the gym, we haven't seen much of each other so we busted the Cricut out, my new cartridges, a new blade and a roll of MAGNET!!! WAHOOOOO! We made 2 cards (see my scrapping blog Christina The Sassy Scrapper) but we also made the adorable magnets in the above picture! They turned out so cute and we all love them! What a great ending to a lousy day!! Now we're off to go on an adventure in the beautiful weather!

Spring has sprung, Taco Pie and *gulp* Weigh-In

I see signs of SPRING!!! WAHOO!


I took my little sweets to the park today to enjoy the FABULOUS sunshine and totally took the opportunity to get some cute shots in while we were there! Aren't they just precious?!





I also have a recipe that I got from the Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen blog. It's for Taco Pie which may sound interesting but it was so yummy! My son's Cub Scout Pack had their Blue & Gold Banquet tonight so I needed a casserole dish to take for the potluck and this was perfect! Sorry I don't have a picture, it was one of those crazy busy evenings and I was too rushed to even think about stopping for a picture!

Ingredients:
•1 pound Hamburger Meat
•1/2 cup Onion
•1 package (1 Oz. Packet) Taco Seasoning
•2 cans (8 Oz. Can) Crescent Rolls
•1 bag (9 Oz. Bag) Fritos
•16 ounces Sour Cream
•8 ounces Cheddar Cheese

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cook meat. Drain, and add chopped onion and taco seasoning packet. Add the water the packet calls for, and simmer as instructed on the taco seasoning packet.
3. Cover the bottom and sides of 13×9 casserole dish with the crescent rolls. Press seams together to make one continuous crust (you may not need all of the second package).
4. Cover the crescent roll crust with a layer of crushed Fritos (I use the larger scoops; you can all use tortilla chips instead of Fritos). Add your meat mixture to the top of your crushed chip layer.
5. Spread sour cream over the meat mixture.
6. Sprinkle cheese over the sour cream.
7. Top with another layer of crushed Fritos.
8. Cook for 30 minutes.

So, now for the bad news...I gained 0.8 lbs this week! *sniffle* Really, I'm shocked it wasn't more because seriously, I've been eating so much garbage and not tracking my points! BAD BAD BAD! The upside is I did workout 3 days this last week so that's probably what saved me the most! This week my goal is to count my points and journal everyday and workout at least 4 days!

Alright, I have a crazy toddler type child running amuck in the house so I need to close this! Have a great weekend blogland friends!

Taco Soup Warms the Soul

This is my favorite recipe for Taco Soup! Granted, this is the only recipe I've ever tried for Taco Soup but why mess with a good thing? LOL

Ingredients:
2 lbs fresh, lean ground beef
1 onion, coarsely chopped
4 oz. can diced green chilies
taco seasoning packet
Ranch dressing/dip packet
2 cans corn, undrained
4 cans stewed tomatoes, undrained
1 can pinto beans, undrained
1 can kidney beans, undrained
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro (optional)
grated Monterey Jack and/or cheddar cheese

Directions:
Chop onions. Brown meat and onions in 8qt stockpot. Add all the other ingredients (except cheese), stir and let cook over medium heat for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Top each bowl with cheese and enjoy! This makes enough for our family to have for at least 3 dinners. I can usually have enough leftover to fill 2 gallon size freezer bags about 3/4 full. To reheat all you have to do is let it thaw out and put it back on the stove til heated through. SOOOO YUMMY!

Happy Valentine's Day

Yesterday I started loading the dishwasher and got sidetracked for a little bit and when I came back, this is what I found:

A little someone must've thought her shoes needed a good cleaning! LOL Now I know to check it before I start it!

Yesterday I hosted a Craft Night at a local party room. It's just a fun thing we do to get us moms out of the house and we all hang out, working on our various craft projects. We order pizza and bring goodies to share and spend 5pm-midnight chatting and getting some stuff done that we might not be able to get done at home. Last night we didn't have a whole lot of ladies come, just 4 of us total but we had fun! I was able to get 3 tu-tu's made, one with red & white tulle:

One with hot pink & green tulle:



And the third had baby blue and yellow tulle:


I also got Valentine cards made for my hubby & kids:



I made a big rice krispy heart to take to Craft night and it was oh so yummy! The perfect amount of gooeyness!


I also made the Peach Crumb Cake that I found on Bakerella.com (my favorite go-to site when I want to whip up a super fun and yummy dessert!


Hubby and I agreed that the new gun and Kitchen Aid qualified as our Valentine's Day gifts to each other so we weren't going to get each other anything else. I already had a box of chocolates and cookies for him along with a card from the kids that when it got opened it made sounds like someone was farting (gotta love farting jokes, huh). I didn't expect him to get me anything else but he surprised me with this cute little guy!

It's a Love Turtle!!! How cute is that?! I really am a lucky lady!!!

Happy Valentine's Day Blogland!!!
1 Corinthians 13:1-8a, 13
The Excellence of Love
If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails;

But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

*~* One happy lady right here! *~*

Yes, I've always had bigger than normal feet for a girl. I remember being in 3rd grade and wearing like a size 6 in women, maybe bigger. I guess I've just gotten used to my ski length feet but boy howdy, seeing Bitty in my shoes really makes me realize just how big my clodhoppers are! LOL As an adult, I can fluctuate between a 10-11, depending on the shoe brand and style but man, it's like half the length of my daughter! :)

My hubby has a huge love of guns but always feels bad spending the money on them so tonight he said he wanted to talk to me about a compromise he had in mind! He asked if I'd be ok if he got a gun, if he bought me the red Kitchen Aide I've been drooling over for a VERY long time. Hello?! Do you think it took me more than 2 seconds to respond with "OF COURSE!"? I bet it was half of a second for me to answer! I'm sure as heck not gonna pass up that plan! LOL You should have seen how quickly he jumped up, grabbed his phone and called the gun store to try to work out a deal (gotta love the salesman in him, LOL) and flew out the door at 5:30 so he could buy the gun before they closed at 6pm. On his way home he got this *insert angelic rejoicing song*:



Hubby said I seemed more excited about the mixer than I did when he brought home the Cricut for my Christmas present....I don't know, I think it's about the same excitement! :) Let me just say that I love my husband!!!!!! He hasn't been the best about gift giving (definitely not his love language) but the last couple of years (we've been together for 10.5 years) he's really been steppin up and getting me some whopper of gifts! THANKS BABE-A-LICIOUS, YOU'RE THE BEST! <3>

I can't wait to whip up batches of goodies with that little miss as she's growing up and of course with my son too!

Isn't it so pretty??? Now all I need is a bigger kitchen so I have more room to whip up my yummy-ness!!!

Weigh-In and Valentines

Thursday night was my WW weigh-in from week 1 and I lost 3.8 lbs! Honestly I was hoping for at least 5lbs but sadly, I was a very bad eater on Tues & Wed so it was my own fault! This week I'm going to try very hard to do better and I'm on a mission to workout at least 5 times this week. I was going to go to a ZUMBA instructional class at my gym this evening but was wiped out and not feeling up to it. I am however going there tonight to workout with my friend Alisha. I LOVE ZUMBA!! :O)

Also, it was Valentine Party Day at co-op today so Keegan and I whipped up some Valentines for his classmates. I got the idea from Amy at The Idea Room (could've guessed that probably, if you've read any of my posts lately!) I adore her crafts! Honestly, it was a lot of trial and error and I don't know how many ended up being cooked too long, causing them to turn to pure liquid and although they looked really cool, they wouldn't work for our project so I put them in a ziplock bag to use for baking projects.



Here's Keegan's Valentine box he made last night! In case you wondered...it's an alien! :)


Well, I better close this, my CRAZY daughter is tearing the house apart! Don't you just love the terrible twos stage?!?! LOL

Freakish :O}

So for my birthday my hubby let me do some shopping around town and I found this A-DORABLE apron and fell head over heels in love with it. Seriously, never in a million years did I think that in my lifetime I would be that excited about an apron of all things but hello...it's FABULOUS! :) I was hoping they'd have one with red ribbon or even pink ribbon (my favorite colors) but this green is super cute too so I'm perfectly happy with it! My hubby thinks it's cute how excited I got over it...he's the best! Here are some pics (click on the pic to enlarge):



Fabulous, right?! :) LOVE IT!

It's getting close to LOVE DAY aka Valentines Day so I needed to get my hiney in gear and make up my Valentines for my Preschool/Kindergarten kiddos at co-op. I made 23 of these bad boys:


The wrapper says, "You're A BLAST!" The inside is a roll of the big, fat Smarties (you could also use lifesavers) and topped with a Hershey's Kiss and then I cut out "flames" from red construction paper and bada-bing, bada-boom: A VDay Rocket! Thank you to Family Fun for the idea, I think the kids will love it! I also bought some Precious Moments Valentines Day cards and stuck them in a sandwich baggie along with the rockets and I used some of the cards for all the moms (about 35) and attached a mini candy bar or bag of M&M's. I LOVE LOVE LOVE Valentine's Day! I pretty much love to celebrate every holiday...any excuse to decorate the house and do some fun crafts and bake some yummy holiday recipes is my kinda fun!

Now I'm off to make some of those yummy cinnamon rolls for our co-op Moms' Lounge! I feel kinda bad since we're all trying to eat better and lose weight but a yummy treat once in awhile isn't a big deal and this recipe makes like 33 rolls so it's perfect to feed the masses! :)
BYE ALL!!

What an awesome day! Beach & crafts!

It was such a GORGEOUS day in Oregon today and my family & I decided that although it was a little chilly, we were going to take advantage of the beautiful sunshine and head to the beach! Here are some fun pics to start my post off with:







I've been meaning to get a heart felt wreath made up for my mom for Valentine's Day but haven't had the time. My body needs a break from working out and we have our friend Nordy over and that means I'm banished to my crafting area while hubby & Nordy nerd it up on video games! Really, my crafting area is in the dining room, which is right off the living room so I can still visit with them while I craft and I usually turn music on or a movie. The boys just love listening to my music selection! LOL Anyways, my mom's favorite color is purple so I made her a purple heart:


The other day I bought some tulle from JoAnns and an elastic band so I could make my daughter a tu-tu. She seemed to be more drawn to the bright & sparkly pink so I grabbed a yard of it (note: you need at least 2 yards of tulle for a tu-tu even for a baby...learned that the hard way!) and I'll be going back tomorrow to get some more. I'll grab enough to do at least 2 more I think. I just love it because Tatym is such a girly little girl. She loves to walk around in my heels and wear her purple tu-tu I bought for her while I was preggers and even sport some fairy wings that I got at the dollar store when I was preggers. I hoped she'd like to dress up and be all girly and WOO HOO...she does! Here's a pic of the half-done tu-tu:


Just for fun, I'll toss in some pictures of my little dress up girly! This is dadd's favorite, his baby girl holding the xbox controller and wearing the headset...getting her started young! LOL


Wearing an apron that her great grandma sent for her when she was first born:


Wearing her big brother's swimming goggles! She seriously wore these for about 30 minutes, which included a trip in the van to the swimming pool, hanging out at the pool and a ride home! LOL


Here she is in her tu-tu and fairy wings:

Here I go again!!

Man-o-man I could just kick myself in the butt! Some of you know that I had started Weight Watchers last summer but after 10 weeks I had to quit going because of money and issues with getting to the meetings while my hubby was at work. Anyways, while I was on WW I ended up losing up to 19lbs at most but sadly, with the holidays and me just giving up, I gained back a lot of weight. In fact, I rejoined WW yesterday and paid for 6 months, so I wouldn't have a reason not to go and when I stepped on the scale, I was ashamed and mortified to see that not only had I gained back all that weight that I had lost, I actually weigh 5 lbs MORE than I weighed when I started WW last summer! YIKES!! Talk about a blow to the esteem! It sucks to have to start all over again and actually have even more weight to lose but I'm going to turn my frustration and disappointment in myself into motivation and determination to stick with it! I have signed up for my first ever gym membership at a local athletic club along with the WW and our homeschool co-op this semester is focusing on health and they've started doing an exercise class for the moms on the days we have co-op (first 3 Fridays of the month). I've also started going to ZUMBA class once a week which is by far my most favorite exercise to do! If you don't know what ZUMBA is, check out THIS youtube video! SO FUN and an amazing workout! Everyone is soaked in sweat halfway through this class!! Totally addicting!

So, as embarrassing as it is, here I go again, reattempting to get healthy! My starting weight is now 259.4lbs *GULP* and my goal is to be at least 175lbs by my 30th birthday (Feb. 2nd, 2011). "They" (whoever they is) says for my height I'm supposed to be around 150lbs but I want to aim for what I weighed in high school and judge from there whether or not I want to try to lose more weight. I want to look healthy, not like a stick!

I'll post my weekly weigh-in results just for more accountability! I had my hubby take a "before" picture yesterday so in a couple months or so, I'll take another picture to see how I'm progressing...that's when I'll share my pics on here!

The parents in our co-op are doing a Biggest Loser weight loss challenge so that's another thing that is holding me accountable and pushing me. I want to kick all their butts! LOL In a lovingly competitive way of course! :) Anyways...I'll keep my blog updated as I venture along this chapter in life!