I almost forgot that I got tagged last week by Dawn for this little book tag. Easy one to do and good for me since I’m not feeling very creative at the moment!
Here are the rules/requirements:
1. Grab the book closest to you.
2. Open to page 123, go down to the fourth sentence.
3. Post the text of the following 3 sentences on your blog.
4. Name of the author and book.
5. Tag three people of your own.
I’ll use the book I’m currently reading. I went to the appropriate spot on pg. 123 and here are the sentences:
“How often did he feel as if he didn’t have a care in the world; not often. He’d been equipped, after all, with a nature that could run to the melancholy if he didn’t watch it. “Serious-minded!” a neighbor had said of him as a child, putting on his glasses to get a better look at the tyke who stood before him with a large book under his skinny arm.”
That passage is from “Out to Canaan” by Jan Karon, the 4th book in the Mitford Series.
I hope a lot of you will do this one, but only like 5 people usually read this! Feel free to post it here in comments or on your blog and let me know you did it! If I need to tag someone specific, I’ll tag:
Dianne
Susanne
Eden
I think all of them read a good bit or have recently mentioned books on their blogs! No problems if you don’t do it!
Making little baby gifts has been one of my favorite things to sew since I’ve had my embroidery machine. I need to figure out some way to have a little side business with it! Kathryn is about the only person that’s wanted to “hire” me; she seems to have a lot of friends having babies at the moment so it’s a good way for her to have some fun or personalized gifts. I’ve done quite a few of these baby burps for girls I know that were having babies too. Getting started is always the hardest part for me when sewing but when it’s going, I could sit and play with the trims, designs and colors for hours! Sewing makes a HUGE mess, or is it only me? Anyone else have it strewn all over when sewing?
These are the latest burp cloths I’ve done; I talked to K this week and she wants a couple more of these for another friend, so I’ll need to pull my stuff out again. (I love the yellow & white polka dot trim, it was a new ribbon I had and we loved how it turned out! I’m going to have to look for some more fun trims like that)
I’m finding it hard to get back into a routine again after the holidays! I did make this recipe about a week or so ago and it was pretty good. Served it over pasta as the recipe called for; it seemed a little runny to me and I thought it might actually work better as a soup so I reused the leftovers and added some things to it to make it more of a soup the second time we had it. Be sure to visit Sandra for more recipes.
Broccoli & Beef Pasta
2 cups broccoli florets
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
1/2 tsp dried basil leaves
1/2 tsp dried oregano leaves
1/2 tsp dried thyme leaves
1- 14 1/2-oz Italian-style diced tomatoes, undrained
1 10-oz. can beef broth
1 lb extra lean ground beef or beef strips
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 Tbs tomato paste
2 cups cooked rotini pasta
3-oz. shredded Cheddar cheese or grated Parmesan cheese
Combine beef and garlic in large nonstick skillet cook over high heat 6 to 8 minutes or until meat is no longer pink. Strain in a colander to remove excess fat and drippings. Add beef mixture to slow cooker. Layer broccoli, onion, basil, oregano, thyme, tomatoes, tomato paste and beef broth in the stoneware. Cover cook on Low 6-8 hours.Serve over pasta and sprinkle cheese on top.
I believe I forgot to put the cheese on top so that might have helped! I think you could also use very lean ground white turkey instead of the beef if you like to do that kind of thing; sometimes I sub ground turkey for beef in dishes like this. This time I had extra lean ground meat that was like 98% fat free so I used that.
Can’t take my eyes off of you”
That is for Stacy, because she thinks I use Broadway lyrics so much, which actually I don’t think I ever have. That’s a little odd since I love musical theater so much, she doesn’t like it as much! This one isn’t too hard, used in the theater but an oldie too……so who knows it?
Back to the subject at hand. We finished our puzzle and Stacy wanted me to put a picture up. We are still looking at it, can’t take our eyes off it! I’ll need to take it apart soon though because E wanted to start a new puzzle today! The new one is only 500 pieces, whew. And we picked one that had lots of different colors in it.
Here’s the one that drove me crazy with so much blue that I’m not used to doing!
I think the box said this was some place in Switzerland. The one we pulled out to do today is the Cologne Cathedral in Cologne, Germany; their name for it is the Kölner Dom. I told Elizabeth that Don & I had been there before! She wanted me to pull pictures out to prove it to her which I haven’t done and that’s a story for another day!
Really it’s initials instead of the whole name, at least on the blankets it was. We have several couple friends that we wanted to give a little something for Christmas so I decided to monogram some throws for them. I liked the font and used just a single initial on the blanket. I also monogram fleece blankets for graduation gifts and fully intended to go back to the store after Christmas, buy those early and put them up until graduation time. But when I went back, they were gone already! 🙁
I’ll have to be on the lookout for them when I get to Jackson sometime soon. In the meantime, blankets that I did for Christmas gifts:
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One of my favorite gifts I gave this year was something I did for Ava Clair. I made her a pink “dress up” dress to play in! I had forgotten that little sleeves and little seams are a bit harder to do than big people things but I enjoyed doing it and liked how it turned out. I so wish I had a picture of her in it but for now I just have a shot of the dress alone. I hope her mom or dad will send me a picture of her in the dress! (hint hint, but they never read this so they’ll have to get the message another way!) Trent told me on the phone that she’s had it on playing in it.
Click below for the photo:
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over you……….the puzzle we started New Year’s Eve when we had some friends over to hang out. I love to work jigsaw puzzles but for some reason this one is giving me fits. Lots of blue water, blue sky, blue mountains and I think I’ve never been good doing all the blue in a puzzle. I seem to remember always doing the green parts when growing up! It’s spread out all over my kitchen table and that might be bothering me some too. This is what it looked like last night after working on it a bit with friends:
1000 pieces sounds like a lot right about now! Hopefully it will be finished in a day or so; maybe another picture then if it turns out ok.
I’ve felt rather glum today on this first day of the new year. We learned yesterday of two different young men in our area that both passed away in the last few days. This morning we went to the visitation of one, 27 years old and a classmate of one of my girls. I’m not sure how he died, whether it was an accident or not. Which doesn’t really matter because there is still a grieving mother and family who has lost their child. There are no words and I’m never really sure what to say to people that are grieving. “I’m sorry” feels so inadequate and yet maybe the only thing I can say. I’m so sad for them and can’t even begin to fathom what they must be going through, what they will go through. I usually think we aren’t supposed to lose our children but in our little neck of the woods, we have lost many, many teenagers and young adults over the last few years.
I know the other family is devastated as well to lose their 30 year old child and because it’s a holiday will have to wait a few more days for maybe an autopsy and some other things to take place. Two young adults who seemed to have so much life ahead of them but are gone. It could happen to any one of us I suppose…… “there but for the grace of God go I”
It seems such a sad way to start a new year…..I pray that God will comfort them and that they will somehow turn to Him in their time of sorrow.
Hope that everyone has a happy and healthy new year! We got together with a few friends and had a fun time visiting. We started a puzzle as well, but will have to see how that comes over the next few days. Maybe this upcoming week I can get back into some kind of normal routine.
Enjoy your Monday!
From my family to yours, another belated Merry Christmas…….and a great big ‘ol
HAPPY NEW YEAR! Hope everyone has a great year.
This is the card I sent out this year for Christmas; I was pretty pleased with it!
Oldest child Trent is on the left with his sweet family.
Don & I are next in line.
The youngest two, still in college, are Elizabeth & David….next to me.
Number 2 child, Kathryn, is on the right hand side of card with her hubby & baby.
They have all been here this week for Christmas, except for Trent & family. They live in Houston and we saw them at Thanksgiving. They are all fun to be with! I’ve loved having them here but it is work………I’ve forgotten how much they like to eat and stay up late! They will start leaving in stages Saturday I think.
More later.
Updated, to say: we took the photo at Thanksgiving…….we all (hubby’s whole extended family) went to Destin, Florida for MIL’s birthday. So I had my family together and snapped a picture. We don’t all get together too often because of kids moving away!
“………….Get up everybody and sing!”
I got tagged by Kelli a week or so ago for this meme. I did something that was sorta similar last month……and my other post is here.
Maybe I can come up with a couple of things that are different.
1. Most nights before I go to sleep I have to flip my pillow over to the other side.
2. I was sorta scared to get my ears pierced til I was way grown! Now I wish I hadn’t waited so long, earrings for pierced ears are SO much cuter!
3. Even if it’s hot, I like to be covered up with something when I sleep, a sheet is usually enough for me.
4. I can curl my toes way under toward the bottom of my foot…..hubby thinks it’s weird because he can’t do it!
5. I like things loaded in the dishwasher a certain way! But, I’m trying to be better and know that if I get help, that’s way better than it being done a certain way.
6. I have to have something on my lips at almost all times, either lipstick or soft lips. I like that stuff!
I won’t tag anyone specifically this time, but everyone feel free to jump in and play along! I hope I’m not the only weird person around.
Hope everyone has had a wonderful and blessed Christmas season! We certainly have……we are busy with lots of family and friends visiting, eating, hanging out, watching movies, etc. I hope to get back here regularly in a few more days. Enjoy your holiday season!
I finished reading my list of books for this challenge last week, Yay! My original post with my list can be found here. I did a few updates as I went along with my reading and I’ll put links at the bottom of this post to some of those. Katrina asked us some specific questions for this final post so here’s my go at those:
The best book you read this Fall I think I would have to say At Home in Mitford and 90 Minutes in Heaven. I’m really enjoying the Mitford series of books by Jan Karon, light and easy to read and pretty clean. 90 Minutes in Heaven is a true story written by a pastor of his experience and it was interesting what he went through and parts of his descriptions of Heaven brought tears to my eyes. I pretty much enjoy most of the fiction books I read!
The book you could have lived without Easy one, Hanna’s Daughters……I almost quit reading it several times but as is usual for me, I kept on with it hoping it would get better. It was just not a book that I really loved.
Whether or not you read more than you would have without the challenge Probably not because I read a lot right now at this point in my life. But I definitely read things that I wouldn’t have read without the challenge. I don’t usually read non-fiction but I included some on this list and some books I already had so it helped me with that. I also am not sure I would have finished my Daniel bible study by Beth Moore if I hadn’t included it in this, and I’m really glad that I finished it!
The best thing about joining in the challenge This would be reading other people’s lists/blogs. It’s fun to see what others are reading and what they think about certain books so I really enjoyed that part.
If you discovered (and enjoyed) a new book or author after reading someone else’s list I’ve found several books that others have read that I want to add to my list for the upcoming year and there are other authors that I want to check out……I think a lot of people have read things by Jodi Picoult and I’ve not read her yet so that is on my to try list.
Any other insights, enjoyments, thoughts, or impressions! I loved doing this and love to read! So this was particularly fun for me to find other people that love it as well and find out books that they enjoy. Thanks Katrina for hosting this, it was lots of fun! And thanks to everyone who participated because I enjoyed reading all of your lists.
I sort of did an update on my Daniel bible study (although I didn’t call it that) and it was something that was meaningful to me………it can be found here.
Don’t think I did an update when I read Things Pondered by Beth Moore but it is a book of poems and some things she’s written from personal experiences……I enjoyed it because my women’s group has done a lot of her studies. I also didn’t do an update to the Let Go of Clutter one either….it is sort of a self help book that had some good ideas in it. The author stated though that it wasn’t a “how to” book but more of trying to help you understand why you hang onto clutter. Not my favorite kind of thing to read but helpful sometimes!
My other updates were #4, #3, #2, and #1.
Last week my son was getting ready to come home from college for Christmas break. He ran an errand for me on Thursday and then did some shopping for himself also. He went back to the dorm to finish packing and loading his truck; most everyone else was already gone. Coming back out of the dorm to drive home he noticed that the driver’s side had been hit and dented in! Hit and run! He thinks he would have noticed it if it had happened earlier in the day because it is on the driver’s side of the vehicle but he didn’t see it then. But did notice it as soon as he came out of the dorm later in the day to drive home. He called to tell us and we told him to get a report from campus police for insurance purposes. He’s done all that and we’ve had adjusters and appraisers come and look and then talk to hubby about it all. It is so annoying right here at Christmas time to have your vehicle hit and then someone drive off and tell you no information. Hubby said it was probably because they were uninsured in the first place; someone else suggested that if it was a college student they might have been too afraid of what their parents would say. Here are a couple of pics:
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I need to be so organized this week but I’m afraid it’s not going to happen! I have some menus planned, which will help with the shopping and preparing……but right now I can’t decide which day to have which thing! So here is a general idea of what I’m doing, or hoping to do. Last week some things got changed/left off at the last minute and that could happen again but it helps to have a plan.
Taco Salad
Crockpot Deer Steak, veggies
Baked fish
Chicken & black bean enchiladas
Broccoli & Beef Pasta
Homemade pizza
Cheeseburger soup & sandwiches
Maybe later today I’ll be back and be more specific on the days but this is what I’ve got at the moment! Check out Laura’s site for more menus and plans for the week.
