Burrrr Gobble Buuuurrrrrr

Look who arrived at my house last night. Mr. Gobble Gobble....the cold didn't keep him away.
THANKGOODNESS!

Isn't he cute! He is here to remind us of all that we have to be thankful for -and that list is long {that's for a later post}. I have to say a special thanks to my friend Lindsey for picking him up for me at the Birmingham Junior League Market....I tried to buy him last year but they ran out. I was so excited to have him now! He is the perfect transition from Halloween to Thanksgiving.
But, whatever you do don't let him moon you... Ha!

Well, let me just share with you what my awesome husband did this morning. He got up early (and if you know how much we love to sleep in on Saturdays, you'll understand what a big deal this is - we value our Saturday sleep in time....yes we are loathing in it before Baby Hicks arrives to rock our world!) so he gets up extra early, bundles up in all of his thickest coveralls, toboggan and gloves(because its 30 degrees outside). He looked so stink'n cute too. He then picked up our neighbor and off they went to the wood place, piled the truck high and returned with a load of wood to get us through the winter. The best part is that we're going to enjoy a day by the fire today. Justin is the best fire keeper around. He likes to keep a roaring fire the entire time and he does just that... moving, arranging and poking the wood to have a perfect fire. I'll certainly be curled up by the fire tonight with my hubby and maybe with some yummy hot chocolate.

Also, in response to my previous post - since I last posted my feelings about how early Christmas has arrived (which I still agree), I think that I've gotten the Christmas bug and will probably begin some Christmas decorating inside before we head south for our Thanksgiving holiday. I've seen so many people with their tree's already up and it looks so pretty...oh well. With that in mind....before Justin built the fire he took me to mom and dad's to snatch a shelf that I want to use to display our Christmas Village. Christmas Elf is having nothing of it - but was nice enough to help me bring it home. Mr. Elf wants the Village on the mantle where it was displayed last year. But, with the village on the mantel I can't hang our stocking holders and stocking from the chimney mantel with care. Plus the Village is almost to big to put on the mantel. I'm going to try it and if Mr. Elf doesn't like it I will change it back. Because an unhappy Elf at Christmas time is no fun...When Elfy isn't happy no one is happy! But we're still going to try it.

In the midst of all of that fun....we even managed to eat pigs in a blanket for a late breakfast/brunch. YUMMY.

And now I'll leave you with my current view... I'll certainly enjoy the rest of my evening warm and cozy! Love yall.

What's Your Opinion?

Ok, so I am curious about what you think...Please do share. Do you think that Christmas has come t0o early to the commercial world?

Christmas is my favorite holiday of all time (Yes, fall is my favorite time of year). Plus my precious husband is a Christmas Elf himself. We both love Santa and await this season all year long. We put up our tree as soon as we can as we are sure to have Christmas Village and all of our other decorations up soon after Thanksgiving. Although Justin has already asked if I would start putting it up...needless to say I am hold off for now. All of this in remembering the true reason for this special season is to celebrate our Beloved Saviors Birthday - that is reason enough to put an extra joy in your life.

Knowing how much we love and enjoy Christmas, I just feel that the retail stores have started a little early. What do you think?

Monday Evening Fun

What do we do when Daddy is out of town?

.....................

We get new toys!!!!! I had to go and buy food for the pups today and decided to buy them new toys since they Brinkley has chewed them all up and they have nothing to play with. Doc loves new toys, he didn't want to eat so I had to take it away from him so that he would eat. I may be a little on the crazy side but listen to this...

{Be sure to pause my music so you can hear the videos}

Yes that is the monkey making that screaming noise.and yes I will pick up before I got to bed tonight to ensure no crazy toy playing in the middle of the night or early morning.

I had to buy Brinkley a ruff and tuff toy - it doesn't have any suffing. Just a squeeker and its made of a thicker material. Here is her entertainment, she does love to hear the sqeeking. But it won't last long because she'll either get the squeeker out or she will puncture the sqeeker so it doesn't sqeek but just clicks at her biting it. So, silly. She is the destructive one otherwise Doc would have lots of stuffed toys as he did BB {Before Brinkley}

And we wonder why toys don't make it around here!

On a different note. I am still feeling good. Still tired - I should be getting in the bed instead of blogging. I understand that I will only have a few more weeks before I regain energy. I must admit that most difficult issue is dinner and lunch. Trying to decide what I actually want to eat is almost an impossible task. Its hard when Justin tries to help and I shoot down his suggestions - I don't want to hurt his feelings but most of what I or he think of to eat doesn't sound appetizing. I hope that this will also change when I start to get my engery back. Other than that we're great - feeling good and certainly blessed with God's Grace, Love and especially His gift of life he is trusting us with.

I want to leave you with a thought that has been revealed/reminded through my Galatians study. Our eternal life, blessings, grace, love, hope all come from Jesus alone. Nothing more, it does not depend on what we do or don't do, it is simply Jesus alone and we inherit all of His promises! Praise God. Have a good night. Love yall.

Growing Family

Ok, so most of you may already know...but Justin and I are expecting a sweet baby to be added to our family. I am due May 23rd and we heard the heart beat today. It really was cool to actually hear the sweet little beating heart (or what I said sounded like the dog's panting) in my tummy. It really is amazing how God does knit us together and especially how He created our body to change and be able to handle the development of this gift of life! It really is awesome.

We told our parents last weekend and have shared the news with many friends and family this week. This is the picture that we framed and how we told our parents.

I've been feeling good but have had some pains in areas that I didn't know I could get pains. I'm sure that there is more of this to come. Since the beginning of this year, I've been praying that when the time did come for me to be pregnant that I would feel good and that I would enjoy this time in my life. God has greatly answered my prayer so far...I haven't been sick at all. I was nauseous for about 2 weeks with the urge and desire to be sick but never did. Although at times I wished that I could in hopes of relieving the aching. That has now passed and I am really tired more than anything else. The doctor told me I should start getting energy back soon. Meal times seam to be the biggest ordeal because I am starving but NOTHING sounds or looks good...I understand that this to will be over soon. Really, I've been greatly blessed and am feeling good and we are very excited about having a new member added to our little family. I'm sure that I'll have plenty more to share as I progress so stay tuned!

What do you do when you come across a pile of laundry?...

Doc says you lay on it and make yourself comfy!

Funny thing is that before Justin and I were married, Justin would and still does take his clothes off and leave them in a pile on the floor - never did the clothes make it to a dirty clothes basket - and so Doc would always just sleep on Justin's pile of clothes. I seperated my lights and darks to be washed lastnight and he suddenly made himself comfy...he just couldn't resist. Needless to say the clothes quickly made it to the washer! Silly pup.

Quirky

I was tagged to share 6 quirky things about me. I'm sure that Justin could do this without effort for me, but here is my first attempt.

1. I love my shoes off - I will take them off anywhere I go, except public places. If you invite me over to hang, my shoes will come off at some point. I love being shoeless
2. I actually like going to the dentist - how weird is that?
3. I think better and can process my thoughts best if I am holding a pen or pencil
4. When I have a plate full of different foods, I will have a bite of everything and decide what I like best and save a bite of that food for my last bite....nothing like ending on a good note right?
5. I read or look through magazines backwards to the front. But I never read the ending of a book before I should...My mom does this, she will read the end so that she already know what happens as she is reading the book. To me that is wrong.
6. I get frustrated when people take the last of something without letting you know that it needs to be replaced. I work with an office full of guys and when they take the last of something and don't tell me it frustrates me, especially when I go to get or use whatever they took the last of.

There you have it. Not sure that it is very exciting, but it is me!

I tag Lindsey and Steph.... BooYa.

I am loving this weather and I know that I am a broken record on this statement. All weekend we opened the house and just enjoyed the crisp air throughout our home. It is just so comfy and cozy and makes us want to snuggle on the couch. Well, we didn't exactly do that but I could have all weekend. We had a great weekend surprisingly full of football. Saturday we watched game after game after game until I finally crashed. Today, I was a little slow getting up and I didn't even shower until 5...shameful yet so wonderful. We also joined a small group with our church and we had our first dinner tonight (which is why I had to shower :))I was thrilled to meet new people and get to know more people in our church. Seems like a great group of couples and I am looking forward to getting to know them through this year.

We are wrapping up our study of Job this week. It is hard to believe that we have made it through Job in 7 weeks. It has been such a great study and I feel that what I have learned most about is how powerful God is. He has it all and knows it all. It is very easy for me to keep God in my 'big picture'. It is the small and tiny details that I seem to try and handle on my own and leave Him out of...which is wrong. I was greatly reminded of the infinite details that God is in. Again, He has it all and knows it all - that is simply amazing. He knows the grains of sand on the beach and the number of hair on my head...how does He do that? If you could see how much hair that I loose every day that is a task in and of itself. I have been fortunate enough that I haven't yet experienced the kind of suffering that Job went through. I just hope that, when a time of hardship does come my way that I will remain faithful and true to God.

Oh, I also wanted to tell yall that I tried to set up my bake sale at my local polling location and my county voting office said it was illegal to do a fundraiser on election day...WHAT? I think that is silly and I don't know the official law on that. So, I did start working to find another location and it isn't as easy as you might think. Needless to day, I'm still working to find a location and I may or may not make election day. My goal is sometime in November. I'll keep you posted. If you have any ideas of locations please let me know. I'm going to try WalMart on Monday...I called the Galleria and Publix and they both said NO.

I hope you have an awesome week. I'll leave you with one picture....she is so NOT supposed to be on the couch yet she seems to make her way up and usually in our lap! Are we suckers or what?

Cookies Anyone?

I'm not sure about you, but I personally love Blogging and my love started by reading others - long before I had one of my own. I can sit for hours reading blogs, and even of people that I don't even know. Someone coined this as "blog stalking" and I'm guilty! One of the blogs that I stalk is Darby Stickler. She and I don't know each other but I love reading her blog. I want to be like her when I grow up...she is so creative, crafty, not to mention she is a great mom and loves the Lord.

With that being said, she posted an amazing story on her blog this week. Click Here to read the entire post. It is all about Cookies for Kids Cancer - a non-profit organization dedicated to raising awareness of and funds for pediatric cancer research through local bake sales. What a great idea! The site for the organization is http://www.cookiesforkidscancer.org/. This struck a string and interest in my heart. I do not have kids yet - I love children so much - but I can not imagine what these precious children and their parents must go through when battling cancer. I look around at my family and friends who have children and how hard it would be if any of them were faced with such a horrible situation, yet our hospitals are full of them. I know that God is sovereign, but I also feel that if I can contribute just a little bit of time, effort and money that maybe it could make a difference for just one of these families. I do not personally know a family that is affected by cancer and for this I am blessed. I have been telling myself for a long that I need to volunteer or just contribute to some organization and this maybe just the one.

I am going to start tomorrow in contacting some people about doing a bake sale on election day at my local polling location. As I proceed and know more I'll add more details. Stay tuned and lets keep these families in or prayers in the mean time. Have a good evening.

On The Plains

Saturday we went to Auburn for the day. It was so much fun - even if the game was horrible and Auburn's football team is falling apart. It makes me sad that they are awful and it was honestly painful to watch the game...so painful that we left at the end of the 3rd quarter... and therefore we didn't even see the worst of it. That is all ok though, because I had a blast being in Auburn and seeing my friends. We made it to Tiger Walk, visited with so many people and even made it in time to see the Eagle Fly before the game. For those of you who have never experienced an Auburn game. To watch the eagle fly around the stadium and then land in the middle of the field - it really is awesome. I don't care who you cheer for, that is just really cool. I do want to give Justin some props because he was such a good sport for the entire day in Auburn. He went to Tiger Walk and the game and supported me in enjoying every minute of it. He of course was harassed by all of my friends (and their husbands) but it was a perfect and fun day. He even wore blue...NOT RED CRIMSON. How great is he!

It was honestly soothing to my soul to see and be with my friends. There is just something satisfying about being with girl friends....I'm talking about the girl friends who know you and even if you don't talk to them daily that you know that they know you and that they love you no matter what. You can just pick up wherever you last left off. As much as I love my husband, there is just something special about a girl friend. I am blessed with lots of wonderful girl friends. You know who you are ladies and I love you and thank you for being the friends that you are to me.

Sunday, I helped to host a baby shower for my dear friend Kristin. It was a beautiful shower and she got lots of great things. She is due in December with a precious little boy on the way. I also got the opportunity to see more sweet friends on Sunday. Over all it was a fabulous and fun weekend. It was a busy one, but I loved every minute of it.

Here it is....

Ok , so I finally finished. I have to admit that I always get great ideas...or should I say I fall in love with other peoples ideas...and then I get the thought of 'I can make that'. Well 90% of the time I get materials and then realize that I can not figure out how to pull it together or I just never finish it. I always have such good intentions and usually it is to save some money b/c the actual product is more than what I am willing to pay for it. In this particular case. I got the idea off of BHG.com and theirs was actually a ballerina - but I liked the idea of doing a witch instead!

So. I am really proud that this one came together and that I am pleased with the outcome.

So, these pumpkins became this.....

Yeah. Isn't she cute. The picture actually doesn't do her much justice, she is adorable sitting on my porch. I really do love her. It did take me several hours but it was fun - every minute of it! She needs a name...any ideas?

I hope that you enjoy her and if you can, stop by and say hello! hee hee. The sad part is that since we live on a busy street we don't get any trick or treaters. We love Halloween and seeing he precious kids dressed up in their costumes. But, we have to go to Mom and Dad's to see any Trick or Treaters. That's OK though, we still love the season. One last pictures to share of her with my handsome Doc.