Down on the Farm/Button Doll

Therese and Sophia went to a dear friend's birthday party a couple weeks ago.  The theme was Little House on the Prairie/Pioneer.  The little girls all dressed in period clothing.  It was so fun to see the different costumes each came up with - ours being thrown together that morning!

The girls painted walking sticks  & played many games - including marbles, Who's Got the Button,  and drop the clothespin in the milk bottle!

I have to say that the Ma - my sweet, dear friend - did such an amazing job with this party!  It was the talk amongst us all for a while - heck, it's still being talked 'bout!

Therese (standing)  having a chat in the party room  parlor with her great friend.  The girls are in a circle around one person to play "Who's Got the Button" -  the person in the middle closes her eyes, a button is put in the hand of one of the encircling girls, and once her eyes are open she has to guess who has the button.  It was very cute to see!  Giggles and smiles and giddiness!

This is when they each were in the middle being The Guesser. I can't remember how many times I heard, "You're peeeekiiiing!"  :)

A picnic for the feast of cake (in the shape of the Little House, I might add!)

 ~ Birthday girl in the middle ~

After presents... they danced!!  They had a blast! (I love Therese's lips.  I love Sophia's dimples!!)

Now to the button doll part of my post...

In the girls' goodie bags satchels included gifts of (going on memory here): marbles, old-fashioned candy, and a sweet craft.... Button Dolls. 

Therese and I (more I than Therese :::sigh::: -- "You can make a knot better than me." - plus lots of hot gluing... I burned my fingers.  I took on the suffering so she could have this doll!  LOL)... ahem.... Therese and I made hers today and here she is.... I believe her name is Meggie (from A Lion to Guard Us [great book btw, she LOVES it!!].... Meggie:

In the making...

Just be goofy today... like her!  It makes the heart lighter :)

And this is after I said, "Make a nice face."!

Sing It Sister!!

My sister just called me this evening letting me know that they (the sisters) were on TV. [My sister is in a convent.  She entered this amazing place in Sept. '08.  Those of you who have been 'round here for a while know this (family goes without saying, so if you're family and you don't know... SURPRISE!!! - that's assuming that you'd even be visiting my blog)]

The sisters are putting on a concert next Sunday the 28th to benefit something [cottages?] they're building.  Apparently they are already sold out (!!).  At any rate, the local FOX station came to their rehearsal to "do a piece" on them.  You can go here to see it.  We were all very excited to see this! 

Here's another video that a local newspaper has on their blog.  I love how my sister is cracking up during the drum solo!  She's a nut.

Actually as we were watching, Joseph asked me, "Why does Aunt Karen want to be a nut?"  We all cracked up.  Sophia said that she already is a nut.  And she's right  :) 

Third post for the day.... I think I'm done.  Although I do have some other things to post, I think I'll save it for another day. 

Rip-Off Alert

Do you know Clark Howard?  Financial whiz extraordinaire, consumer advocate, radio host of  The Clark Howard Show. 

On an errand today I heard him speaking of this despicable action by the HUGE MEGA MONSTER BANKS:


Feb 24, 2010 -- Banks trying to scare customers into allowing fees



RIP-OFF ALERT: Chase and Bank of America are both trying to trick customers into "opting in" for rip-off fees, according to The New York Times.


Beginning this summer, banks will have to get your permission before they're allowed to show you a false balance at the ATM or approve debit transactions that will make you overdraw your account. Good news, right? Yes, but these two techniques generate tens of billions of dollars in fees and the banks are doing everything they can to get you to opt in.


To that end, Chase is sending letters to customers designed to scare them into allowing themselves to be ripped off.


"'Your debit card may not work the same way anymore, even if you just made a deposit. Unless we hear from you,' the message, emblazoned in large red type, warns," according to the Times' report. "'If you don't contact us, your everyday debit card transactions that overdraw your account will not be authorized after August 15, 2010 -- even in an emergency,' with 'even in an emergency' underlined for emphasis.'"


When questioned by the Times about the letter, a Chase spokesman gave a laughable response...(continue reading)

*BOLDED WORDS MY EMPHASIS

Little Black Spot

This would've been funnier if I posted this last Wednesday, but this is really great.  For your laugh of the day click HERE to listen to a Lenten song. 

Problem SOLVED!

Remember when I was complaining that I was having problems posting pictures on Blogger?  Well, I (with the aid of dh! - okay, mostly dh w/my ... input!  LOL) figured out what was going on.  Wanna know how much help BLOGGER was?  Zilch!  Nada!  Noodle! (movie/show/dvd?)

When was it that Blogger in Draft changed their image posting?  December maybe?  It was upsetting to me (!) - they had such a wonderful system for uploading photos.  Far superior to regular Blogger, as I put it.  Then... the change.  It was almost like I was back to using regular Blogger. 

Fast forward to last night...

I hunted down a helper in the Blogger Help forum (ha ha! - what help?) a few days ago.  I actually left a comment on her blog pleading with asking her to help me.  She was very prompt in gathering info from me. 

Nothing she asked me or offered really helped my situation, except the question if I was using New Editor or Old Editor. To be honest, I didn't know what that meant. 

At this same time (last night) I was reading her email,  Paul was on his computer ready to help me - tired of all my griping about my problems, I'm certain ;) - and came across an option of  "Updated Editor".  He changed the setting to this option seeing if this would help.  I tried posting in regular Blogger and was pleasantly surprised at the fact that the format looked a lot like Blogger in Draft!  I tried posting a picture, and was able to post it (WoW!!!).  Then I tried posting 4 photos... only one uploaded - Grrrrrr!  What is going on??

On one end of the spectrum I was so excited that the new editor was like my lovely Blogger in Draft with awesome image loading, the other end - I still couldn't post pictures!

Then Paul and I started investigating my Picasa account (which is linked to my blog - anyone using blogger and posts pictures has their images on Picasa).  To make a long story short, I went to STORAGE on my account and saw that I was at 100% (there are other issues with Picasa that I won't go into).  So the reason that I couldn't post pictures is because I didn't have any more free room. 

There are a couple different things you can do to rectify this problem.  With each blog you get 1GB free with Blogger/Picasa.  So, you can either create a new Blogger acct and transfer your current blog and keep enjoying free blogging.  Or you can do what I did and pay $5 for 20GB for a year.  Next time though, I think I'll just create a new blog address.

This isn't a problem I've ever heard of happening in the blogosphere.  So it really took me by surprise.  And created much un-needed stress for this melancholic. 

Hopefully this will be of help to someone who comes across a posting problem. 

Good day!

This Guy, Right Here!

...turned FIVE today!!

Happy Birthday!!!

WE LOVE YOU JOSEPH!!

More Snow and Valentines

Day 2 of snow. It was a beautiful sunny Saturday morning. Sophia was out of the house by 8:25am flat. Did I take any pictures? No. We were too busy sledding!!! We had so much fun! I really wanted to grab my camera, but... I couldn't get away from the fun. Plus getting sidetracked is my middle name. I would've come inside to grab the camera, and the computer would've called my name. I'm sure of it. It's... a sickness.

Dani stayed the night at a friend's house last night, but when she came home she made a sweet little snowman on the back deck (that is, after she lost a game of chess to her daddy!). We love this cheery little fellow.

After Dani made this cute little snowman, she and the boys gathered up some snow in a bowl so I could make some snow cream. It was pretty good, but you could only have a little bit. If the pictures could post you'd see a bowl of what looks like mashed potatoes.

I could post this picture in regular blogger (meaning, not in draft) but cannot manipulate it at all. So I'm not sure what is going on. But I'm bummed. And of course, there are no answers from Blogger.


We also made sugar cookies for St. Valentine's Day - cute little heart cookies with pink and red icing. They are very pretty :)

Happy St. Valentine Day!

problems?

so, are any of you having problems posting picures to blogger?  i've had trouble since early this afternoon. :::sigh:::

Atlanta Blizzard of Twenty Ten

Well, for once they were right! They predicted 2-4 inches of snow, and would you believe it - we did get at least 4 in.! What a beautiful sight! And the kids (young and old alike) played and played and played!

What you are about to see has not happened in Atlanta in years and years and years.  Seriously.

 It was so funny - when we pulled into the driveway from playing at the rec center, Therese was telling me she didn't know how to make a snowman.  She asked me to show her.  That struck me as funny because it seems as though that's just something kids instinctively know how to do.  But if you don't grow up in snow, I suppose that's not true.  So I hopped out of the truck and started rolling a snowball all over the front yard, leaving a path behind it - and boy, it was the best packing snow ever!  Everyone soon got the idea and pretty soon everyone was making a body part...

 ...hence the reason for the 4 piece snowman

 Charlie is plotting his destruction here

"Hmmm...I just don't think that's good."

Charlie's snowbaby

putting the snowman back together (Charlie kept knocking it down)

Well, we are in Atlanta!

Love, True Love

i have so many of these shots...

evening...

late morning...

I bought my double-sided tape at my local grocery store and used silver thread which I already had on hand.  You know how you curl ribbon? - with open scissors.  I found that using that tecnique with a wooden skewer worked for these.  It gave the body of the heart more fullness.  The curly insides I just wrapped the paper tighter around the skewer, or pencil.  We did add beads to some of ours - at the bottom.  And I did use some fancy cuttin' scissors on a few.  Our living room windows have one hanging in each of the four dirty filthy windows.

Therese and I had fun putting these together. Seeing them move just so when a draft comes 'round.  They're peaceful in a way.

heart craft found here

The Holy Twins

St. Valentine

Love is...

Cookies, too, will be baked, frosted painted and eaten!  I'm not sure if I mentioned in my Christmas cookie post about my new bucket-o-cookie cutters, but it includes many different hearts.  We're looking forward to that!  I'm also going to do the clothespin heart craft - I bought some twine and my plans are to string it up and clip the heart pins to it and we can clip our Valentines to it or whatever our hearts desire!

I'm loving the thought of spring

and likewise, I'm loving that we have HEAT

I'm loving (the thought of) a clean house

I'm loving our hanging hearts

I'm loving my catchy blog song

I'm loving the chirping and chatting of the guineas

I'm loving the fact that I'm thinking of Lent a week before

I'm loving that everyone liked and ate their dinner tonight

I'm loving that we've had so many long years with our doggie, who is recently showing her age

I'm loving seeing my friends' babies being born here, there, everywhere ~ IRL and out in the blogosphere

I'm loving seeing my soon-to-be 5yo boy wear his medals I got him at the shrine (the only boy who wears them faithfully. every. single. day. !)

I'm loving Netflix Instant Watch

I'm loving a glass of (soon-to-be-refilled) red wine

I'm loving... the quiet

Until tomorrow... :)  When I'll be loving my vocation in full swing!!

What are you loving?

Enrolled

Today the kids were enrolled in the Brown Scapular. A very holy priest - just ordained in June - offered Mass and afterwards did the enrollment. It was such a special ceremony that I even had him place my scapular on me. I've been enrolled, since second grade - First Holy Communion. The scapulars were given to us. But there was no ceremony or anything said to us about the scapular. So, just to be on the safe side - I was enrolled. Again.

Some moms had their littles and even babies enrolled - but I only did my 6.5yo on up. I think First Commuion is the time most begin to wear one - though this priest did leave it to the discretion of the mom.

Good thing I got the kids scapulars when I went to the shrine last month!

I Apologize for the Apologist

If you'd like a funny and quick article to read, here it is.  And thanks to Patrick "Cool Cat" Madrid - on many levels ;)

Cavies

Well, with no more hamsters around, Therese was sure she wanted another panda bear hamster to replace her Oreo. She also let us know that Sophia would need a hamster too - because it wouldn't be fair if she was on her third hamster while Sophia has only owned one. Anyway, the girls were all set on choosing new hamsters on Saturday - that is, until I brought up the possibility of getting Guinea pigs. With minimal research, we set out Saturday afternoon in search of guinea pigs (aka cavies).

It was at the third petstore where we found more than one guinea pig - we just had to get two. Of course one for each daughter, but also because they do better with a companion. We got two females (they only sell females at the store we were at - plus the little research I did do said that you really want females vs. males. Males smell worse (ha ha!) and they're more active).

The girls picked out two babies who just happen to be sisters!

Aren't they adorable?

This is Therese's "Carmelite" (aka Augustina - "Gus Gus") I don't know if she's really decided on a definite name yet!

And here is Sophia's "Agnes"

Having never had guineas before, we're finding them to be quite awesome! They just LOVE to cuddle (with people and each other) and make purring noises when they're content - it sounds sort of like pigeons cooing- it's SO CUTE!!! They also squeal a bit - mostly in the middle of the night - which is very loud. Not sure if this is due to their nature (I believe it's only Carmelite making the noises) or if it's because they're babies. At any rate, it wakes me up for now. And that's saying something, as I am quite the sound sleeper :)

Carmelite is very friendly. She has more of a bunny-looking nose. While Agnes would rather stay in her cage (which they share) and hide. Not very social.

This is only our third day with them - so if you have any experience with guinea pigs can you share your thoughts about them?

19 Years!?

Happy Birthday to you, Kayla!!

~You are such a blessing to us~

We Love You, Beautiful!

Happy Feast of St. Agnes

Take a look to see Pope Benedict blessing two lambs - on the feast of St. Agnes - for the pallium.

Funny

Over at Shoved to Them, she shares this story which totally made me smile!  Have you ever done something like that?  I'm sure I have; I'll be thinking of something....

Someone Failed Lunch

Have you seen this one concerning the win in Massachusetts?  It's pretty creative, funny and right-on!