Home Sweet Home

Every house where love abides
And friendship is a guest,
Is surely home, and home sweet home
For there the heart can rest.
~Henry Van Dyke

There are 26 people in this photo.  I can think of at least 5 who left before we took it, meaning at one point today there was 31 people in my house/backyard, and it was awesome.
Last night it was the 3 of us, cleaning my kitchen, buying stuff for cake baking the next day:

We hang out in my living room as the gang gathers early… always earlier than I tell everyone else to come because the more time together, the more we love life.
 

As people start arriving, the food is piling up.  Pulled pork, turkey burgers, baked beans.  I burned the queso dip, but stuck it in a different pan, added more salsa, and it was all gone anyway.  My new favorite desert is Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Pound cake, and considering how much was left, I think everyone else loved it too.

My backyard was a hit as well.  Everyone was awesome to see the work I have done and the potential to come, and not comment on how overgrown the back fence is.

 
 
And my porch?  it is the perfect party place.
I have awesome uncles.  They not only drive 2 hours to come to a niece’s party, they figure out how to make the light in my bathroom work and that the reason the attic fan won’t turn on is because the switch, not the fan is broken. 

It wasn’t the best organized party.  I didn’t put the food on the dining room table thinking people would sit there, but instead all the chairs got pulled into the breakfast room around a tiny table.  This would have worked except said tiny table is where the plates/silverware/napkins were, and the food indeed up spread all over the place.  Yet it worked out, things got rearranged, food was eaten in massive quantities and I will know better next time.

 
   

The biggest hit?  Sweet Tea.  Apparently I have a lot of southern transplant friends.
and now, for your information:
this is what happens when your cousin steals your camera…

  
this is what happens when you try to get 26 people gathered for a group picture

This is what happens when your life is filled with love


Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family.  Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.  ~Jane Howard

Linked with Sunday Citar

Mom!

My mom’s ringtone for her girls…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If I live to be a hundred
And never see the seven wonders
That'll be alright
If I don't make it to the big leagues
If I never win a Grammy
I'm gonna be just fine
'Cause I know exactly who I am

I am Rosemary's granddaughter
The spitting image of my father
And when the day is done
My momma's still my biggest fan
Sometimes I'm clueless and I'm clumsy
But I've got friends who love me
And they know just where I stand
It's all a part of me
And that's who I am

So when I make big mistake
When I fall flat on my face
I know I'll be alright
Should my tender heart be broken
I will cry those teardrops knowin'
I will be just fine
'Cause nothin' changes who I am

I am Rosemary's granddaughter
The spitting image of my father
And when the day is done
My momma's still my biggest fan
Sometimes I'm clueless and I'm clumsy
But I've got friends who love me
And they know just where I stand
It's all a part of me
And that's who I am

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My momma's still my biggest fan

Who I am by Jessica Andrews.

she loves me. she supports me.  she makes 12 baskets for my sister’s nursery and promises to make the roman shades for my kitchen. she volunteer to do whatever needs to be done in our family, without thought for what is going on in her life. she loves my grandparents even when they are crazy. she makes Ross and I biscuits and gravy on Mother’s day, because "I am mom and that is what I do. feed my kids"

I am turning into (a much less impressive version of) my mother, and I am totally okay with it.

 

Part of Sunday Citar

Kitchen, Pt 1.

A friend is someone who is there for you when he'd rather be anywhere else."
- Len Wein,

I say this semi jokingly (although I am fairly certain it is true for Ben at least, who managed to mention how much he hates painting at least once every 10 minutes) but when I sent out a facebook update on Wednesday something to the tune of “Would anyone please please please come help me paint because if I don’t get my kitchen back after 2 weeks of stripping wallpaper I might lose my mind!!!”  I got responses from some of my favorite people ever. Ben and Tiffany live an hour away, Riley from 2, and they converged on my house yesterday to save my sanity.

 

(Riley, Ben, Tiffany)

(Having guys to move the fridge and the piano? Priceless!)

(Tiffany is a very good overseer)

I have no pretty pictures from the day, these 3 are the only ones I took, but my kitchen is *almost* done and I have further confirmation that I have the best friends ever.

Finished pictures to come.

(linked up to Sunday Citar)

2 quotes and a goal.

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives ~ Henry David Thoreau



 
This weekend I spent at the Women Walking with God conference in Wichita.  The theme was leaving a legacy, and the speakers all talked about the impact we have on those around us, how the way we live our lives truly does impact others.  This kind of goes with some things I have been struggling with lately.  I have discovered that I am  negative in what I speak quite often.  I don’t even mean to be… but I am.  I do this in real life and especially at work. It has been something I have really been trying to work on this the past week, to learn to see the good, to speak on positive things.    I don’t want my coworkers looking at me as the complainer.  Now, some things that are wrong really do need to be mentioned, but there are ways to do so.  Complaining about it at 3am is  not the way.  However, as we all know we speak the thoughts that dominate our mind.  Therefore… maybe I need to change the way I think.  Not sure how I am going to do that, but my new goal…
Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever it noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things- phil. 4:8
 

 
Not sure I can live up to that, but I think it is worth trying. 
After the conference I took a long walk through Chisholm Creek Park. Pretty sure it is my new favorite thing to do.  It is easy to have positive thoughts when you get lost in the woods for an hour.



I wish you a Palm Sunday full of happy thoughts!

Linking up with Sunday Citar