Life with my sister

The kids enjoy dyeing Easter Eggs every year. Since I am far from being OCD or a type A personality, the kids get to dye the eggs anyway they want. They can use every color for one egg or just one color. It doesn't matter to me. Their creativity gets to shine! We were at Aunt Janet and Uncle Mike's house this Easter weekend and Aunt Janet was so sweet to let us use her kitchen to dye our 3 dozen eggs. And to let us use her refrigerator to store them in. her frig may never smell the same again! I spent Easter morning with Mom at Aunt Janet's. The kids and Stephen went to church and then joined us for lunch. I missed being at church (It makes 2 years in a row. Last year Daniel was sick.) but enjoyed being with Mom for the last time for a while. We had Whole Hog BBQ for lunch. It was Mom's choice, but it is our favorite BBQ restaurant. I made a cake and the kids had a couple of Easter egg hunts. We spent the rest of the day in front of the tv watching The Masters. I hav...

The Easter bunny came to our house and left Henry all sorts of fun things. He was a happy boy to wake up and see this bucket sitting in the den with his name on it! After a little play time we got dressed and headed to church to worship our risen Saviour. Henry loves going to his class. His teachers are Ms. Linda and Ms.Tracy. He talks about them all the time and asks, "I go Linda and Tracy's room?". This morning he was ready to go and see if they had Goldfish. He is a sucker for some food and learning about Jesus. Our attempt at a self-family portrait this morning before church. Randall and I both look squatty sitting on this couch in jackets. We laughed at how we looked, but Henry looks cute and really he is all that matters anymore. It is not Easter at our house without the rabbit cake. This year Henry was crazy about it. He is so aware now, it is funny. I had to hide it from him Saturday after I made it because he was on a mission to tear into that bunny! Our Easter m...

Our little bunny boy started Good Friday excited about going with mama and daddy to see the Easter Bunny at the mall. He was SO excited and proud to get dressed in his bunny sweater and go. Look at that grin on his sweet little face! And then he saw the bunny. It was terror and horror and huge loud screams. I made him sit there anyway and get his photo taken. I had other mothers in line giving me looks of shame as their kids started to scream and cry in unison with Henry. It was truly a mother moment I will not forget. Randall and I walked away laughing. I am sure the other mothers did not find us amusing. It was like a comic strip moment. Randall insisted we purchase the overpriced photo for a keepsake even though he captured it on his phone. It is so precious, really. Poor little bunny of mine. He got his red sucker and bunny ears and became proud. He told all those we passed in the mall "I saw the Easter Bunny!" with a big proud smile. I am sure they heard him and knew the...

I know Easter is all about Jesus and his sacrifice, yet we also celebrate the bunny at our house. We knew the real meaning of Easter when we were growing up while celebrating the bunny, so we carry on that tradition with our little Henry. This is our third Easter with our little fella. Learning the rules of egg hunting has been difficult for our little guy. He wants to throw them and run away. It is quite comical to watch. We took our little egg hunter to an egg hunt with some friends. He was unsure about the group hunt, but was willing to line up with the kiddos and take a stab at it. Wearing the bucket on his head. What a little clown. He is my child and I love it. And finally he realized the eggs had candy in them and he was off to the races! He now wants candy in the eggs we play with at home...but of course! Our cookie lady, Amy shipped us these cookies for Henry's school Easter party. Aren't they adorable?! She really does a great job and we can always count on her to co...

I have to show off my latest Cricut fun. These are Easter buckets for some of my favorite kiddos. Julie giving me a Cricut for my birthday was the best thing ever. Working for a sign shop and getting the leftover vinyl is the icing. Having a friend who loaned me her Easter cartridge is the cake...she rocks! I hope the kiddos love the buckets as much as I loved making them. Abby

I know Easter is over, but this week I have not done much in the kitchen. Here is a recap of our Easter meal. I love to set the table in an overly festive way. I come by it honest. It is in my genes. I also had other great influences in my life like Mama Swords house at the holidays. She was the mother to Daddy's best childhood friend. There are no words for that woman's decor at the holidays...no words! And there is my sweet "Sassy"( Mrs. Carolyn) who could be Mama Sword's sister when it comes to tablescapes . I love thinking of all the women who shaped me into the gawdy tablesetter that I am!! I know they would have loved to have come and sit at my table with me! What is Easter in a child's home without a bunny cake?! Mama always made a bunny cake for Jules and me. Yes, this is my second year to give up my beautiful coconut cake for a bunny. It is worth it to see Henry go bonkers over it. He kept walking up to it and chomping his gums in the air...it wa...

I'm not going to give you excuses as to why I don't have pictures in this post. All I'm going to say is my desktop computer doesn't have internet access at this time. I'm sure if I plugged something in to the proper place it would, but I don't even know where to begin to look for the something or the place. So, life goes on. We went to Branson on Thursday of last week to celebrate Daniel, David, and, Anna's birthdays. We (except for Stephen) love Branson . The kids love Silver Dollar City and I do too, the shopping is great there too. It was fun, but then it rained. And rained. Saturday on the way home Daniel began complaining about his stomach hurting. We gave him Pepto and it still hurt. Sunday morning he woke up with the same complaint and asked me to stay home with him instead of leaving him home while I went to church. So I, the preachers wife, missed Easter Sunday services. I also missed the Sunday before Christmas. I'm a preachers wife failure!...

Henry's 2nd Easter was such a fun time. We loved celebrating all week with him. Last year he was too little to even sit up or partake in any of the activities. What a joy it has been to watch this little guy grow over the past year! He is my little bunny. When Samuel was about this age he had an Easter outfit that almost mirrored Henry's. I should have scanned in the photo and compared them for you, but I am a slacker! Julie said she wished she could still put 13 year old Samuel in these little outfits, and I know I will feel the same when Henry is 13. They are so precious looking and short lived. I am soaking it up while I can! Th proverbial Easter morning family photo. This was a self portrait with bad lighting and a camera that is on the brink of death, I fear. Despite the lighting and ill camera, I thought we cleaned up pretty well for Easter Sunday! I love sharing Easter traditions with my sweet boy. Teaching him about Jesus this year with his little toddler Easter CD h...

Instead of thinking about food for the belly this week, let's focus on food for the soul as we embark on Easter this Sunday. This song is a great description of Good Friday and what Easter is all about. I used to sing it at our church in Mississippi and I cried every time ... and in turn made everyone else cry. Nothing like the power of Jesus! This song tells the story of Easter so well. Happy Good Friday to you and I hope you, dear blog reader, know that Jesus died for you on that cross. All your mistakes, shortcomings, goof ups, and rebellious ways. What a joy to know that no matter what we do or where we go, we can never be separated from the love of Jesus. I pray that if you do not know Jesus today that this post will stir something in you and that you can have a true reason to celebrate Easter this year! Abby

We started our Easter week with Daddy home because of all the rain. It is a catch 22 having him home...it is good, and bad. Oh the life of a wife of an agri man, I tell ya! Anyway, he likes to crawl in Henry's bed when he wakes up and surprise him. It about does me in , but it is cute, so I deal. Henry got to experience his first Easter egg hunt this past weekend. He was so cute! I made his hunt bucket and had his shirt made. He is rotten, you know?! It was a windy, windy afternoon but so much fun. Henry was a little unsure while all the other children were running at warp speed, but he soon took off and went after the "balls" and he managed to get 4 of them. We were proud, and even prouder when we found candy and quarters inside the eggs! We had the hunt with some of my friends and Henry loved seeing everyone and playing at the park! His little class had an Easter Sunrise Breakfast this week and I loved being able to go and sit with him. He loved showing me all his li...

This is an interesting/unique spin on Food Friday. Henry and I have had Strep this week so my kitchen has been closed and honestly the thought of swallowing any type of food has been on the bottom of my list, as you can imagine. So glad to be on the mend now and excited to share this fun egg post with you. Let me start this by saying that Easter is SO much more than eggs and bunnies, it is all about Jesus. Jesus is the reason for Easter. Eggs are so symbolic of the tomb though and I love that. I have been wanting to make some blown eggs but was so intimidated by it. I am part of a club of really neat girls in town and one of them is real artsy and she showed us how to blow out eggs at our club meeting last week. I loved how simple she made it look, so I dove right on in and tried it. My sweet little mama was at my house when I did this and she captured it in photos. I will share only this one because the facial expressions on the others she took are so embarrassing! It was quite the ...