A Picture of Us

Ok, so maybe it isn't really a picture of us personally, but, as anyone who knows our family would realize, it definitely represents the two of us. Besides, titling this post "Our Bed" would have been a little weird. ;o)

We were at Ikea last year and I really wanted a duvet cover. We don't have a duvet, but I figured a duvet cover is just like a giant pillowcase and it would work just as well with our comforter stuffed inside it as it would a duvet. I like our comforter, but it's so big I have to take it to the laundromat to use their big machines to wash it. When you have a dog that sleeps at the foot of the bed, you find the need to wash the bed covers increases dramatically. The duvet cover is small enough to fit in my washer which means less trips to the laundromat. :o) I really fell in love with this one, but thought it would be too girly for my handsome hubby. He assured me it would be fine and that he didn't mind getting it. He loves me like that. He knows my tastes and is willing to sacrifice for me.

Then, he got the cool Captain America pillow from a sweet friend for Christmas. It's made from felt and has arm loops in the back so when he and Michelle get their nerf guns out, he has his own personal shield. How cool is that? Anyway, he didn't know where he was going to store it and I said to put it on the bed. He mentioned that it didn't quite match the whole pink, frilly, victorian kind of look we had going in there, but I think it fits perfectly. It's so US!I think I may need to make Michelle a shield now.

What about you? Any interesting things in your house that really represent you and your personalities? How do you blend the masculine with the feminine stuff?

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

PS: I posted a tutorial over on the craft blog on this chore chart I made for Michelle this week.

rusty cookie sheet turned cute chore chart. ;o)

What's in a Name Part 2

I am so very sorry. I shouldn't have left y'all hanging like that. I know it's just been killing you the last day or so wanting to know "what does it mean?", "why does she call it an upside down house?". (I have no idea how to punctuate that sentence correctly.) Well, my dear readers, I have come to the rescue. Wonder no more. (OK, so maybe I'm getting a little dramatic. That happens when you spend the afternoon doing history read-alouds with your 9 year old.)

Our adventures in an upside down house. Maybe this photo will help solve the mystery.

Do you see that door? Yep, that one up there on the deck. That's our front door. It leads to the living room, dining room and kitchen along with the master bedroom and a bathroom. The downstairs has the kids bedrooms, laundry and what would normally be a family room, but we use it as our school/craft space. So you see, instead of the kitchen on the ground floor, like a normal house, it's up a flight of stairs. Not fun to bring groceries in, or in the case of my favorite hobby, to bring cakes down. Yep, our house is upside down, but we love it. Sitting in the living room looking out the big picture window, you feel like you're in a tree house. :o)

Someday we hope to move some earth next to the house and add on a basement below and a garage above, along with a mud room and a master bathroom. (Ooh, a master bathroom would be SO nice). That way, the kitchen and living room would actually be level with the ground and the downstairs would be considered a walk-out basement (although, that's what the realtor called it when we bought the place.) Someday. For now, I just keep telling myself that those stairs are a built in work out for me, especially on days when I'm working on a cake and I have to go up and down them a couple of times to get to the big fridge that's in the garage. :o)

On another note, I've decided to keep the craft blog. I realized that many of my friends and family who read this have no desire to read about the crafts that I do, and that some who are interested in craft tutorials (which I hope to start putting on there) have no interest in what we are up to as a family. So, I'll just give you a sneaky-peak here of any projects and direct you to the craft blog if you want more info.

Well, it sounds like the dryer is done, which means I get to go fold laundry now. :o)

Till next time...
God's love and blessings.

What's In A Name?

Well, lookie here, another evening with all my chores done (yay) and no hubby home (boo). Since he isn't home needing the internet to get school work done, I have a bit of time to chat with you.

You may have noticed in my last post that I decided to change the name of the blog and thought you might like to know why I chose Berried Treasure. You see, we moved into this house in the spring of '09. It was so beautiful out and we have 25 acres, so the kids and I spent many afternoons exploring the woods and taking lots of pictures. Most evenings we spent telling hubby about all the neat things we discovered and it got to a point where he was asking us what new "treasures" we'd found that day.

There were lots of flowers,

some trash,

a few odd things,

but the things that got me the most excited were the berries. As the summer went on we kept discovering new areas of berries growing. We found raspberries, black caps, blackberries, wild strawberries and even some wild grapes.

And so, Berried Treasure is in honor of all the fun things this property holds for us.

What about the part about living in an "upside down house"? I'll guess you'll have to wait till next time to hear about that. :o) 

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

Family update

Well now, hello there. How nice of you to visit my little blog. It would probably be nice if I visited it once in a while and kept it updated wouldn't it? Ah well, such is life. Sometimes it is better to live life rather than blog about it. And then, sometimes things happen in life that you just can't blog about and since those things seems to be the overwhelming stuff of life right then, there doesn't seem to be much else to write about.

Anyway, I am back (for now). My sweet hubby is at a meeting tonight, and since I have no cakes to work on and the house work is done, I thought I might drop in here and post a little update on life. My last post was back in October and after looking at my photos I realize a lot has happened in the past few months.

November:
We had quite a bit of transitioning going on here in the home. Our son, Nick moved back home after his time in the Air Force and our daughter, Angel finished her cosmetology school and moved out. Talk about mixed emotions going on.

The highlight of November was a visit from my sister's family for Thanksgiving. We had such a good time. I really do wish they lived closer. I think my sis and I spent the first 5 days of their visit in the kitchen though, so this photo sums up the week for us. I forgot to put the camera on auto focus when I handed it to Michelle. Oops. Oh well, it may be blurry, but it's one of my favorites.

We had a bit of a snowstorm come in the last night they were visiting so the kids had to get out and play in it a bit.

Here we are just before they left. We had to goof around a bit so I wouldn't cry. I always cry. :o(

December:
December, of course brought Christmas and all it's fun traditions. We added a new one this year. Michelle often looks over my shoulder while I'm browsing Pinterest and she was always intrigued by the Elf on a Shelf ideas posted there. I couldn't see paying $30 for a stuffed elf, so we made one. We don't do the Santa/elf thing here, but it was a bit of fun to make believe that Emma, our Christmas friend was getting into mischief at night. Michelle loved looking for her each morning and coming up with ideas for her. Maybe next year I will have time to post her adventures, but for this year I'll just post a couple of our favorites.

She's in the fridge eating MY chocolate!

"Making" gingersnaps.

January:
Technically this one would be December, and I don't have any photos, but Angel's long-time boyfriend proposed to her on New Year's Eve. So, now we are planning a wedding in September. I think this is going to be a VERY busy year.

I didn't take very many photos in January. In fact, except to take photos of cakes, I haven't had my camera out much at all. I think I need to remedy that. I love looking back and reminiscing, but that's hard to do when you don't have photos to reminisce over in the first place.

I did get a few of the birds outside my office window. I think they're called redpolls, but I'm not sure. They definitely like thistle though. Which reminds me, I better get the feeder filled up tomorrow.

Speaking of my office window. I will leave you with this photo of our Layla. She has learned to jump on the patio chair and tap on the window when she wants to come in. This is how she always looks when she comes in now, our little black snowball. :o) Too cute for words.

Well, till next time (which hopefully will be sooner than 4 months from now ;o)
God's love and blessings!

PS. Did you notice the new name and header? Keeping up with 3 blogs was just too much. I will keep my cake one separate, but I think I will use this one for family updates as well as craft and DIY projects and no longer post to the craft one. Especially since most of the projects are for around our home anyway. I'll post more on the name choice later. ttfn!

Corn Maze

After swim lessons on Saturday we went with our friends out to a corn maze. It was pretty intricate, with several mazes to choose from. The mommies took the little girls off to the easier maze while the daddies took the bigger kids to the larger one.

These three always make me laugh with their matching shirts and braids. They reminded me of the hare in the tortoise and hare story. They took off running, but we didn't get half way through before they were tired, hot and bored. The maze had a fun game similar to clue that you could play by finding all the check points and eliminating suspects, weapons and places. Unfortunately, because we didn't finish the maze, we never did find out who kidnapped the farmer. :o)

Once outside the maze though, the girls seemed to have found their energy again and had fun playing the various games available. They had a bean bag toss, potato sack races, tug-o-war, hay bales to jump off of, and this neat little puzzle. It looks like she's flying over the ropes here, but she was just in the middle of jumping over them. This was before they read the instructions and found out they were supposed to tie a rope on their waist, attach the rope's clip to one of these ropes and weave their way under and over to the other side. 

Angel tagged along with us for this trip, but I didn't get any shots of her in the maze since she went with daddy. She did, however enjoy playing with Amanda the calf at the petting zoo. I'm not sure who enjoyed it more, Angel or Amanda.

 

She looks like she's very happy with the scratching she's getting. :o)

As I type this I'm amazed at the difference a week can make. Last Saturday as we went through this, it was 77 outside and we were hot and thirsty. Right now, I look and we have snow in the forecast for next Saturday! Hopefully we'll get a few more warmer days, as I still have lots of outdoor things I hope to get done before the cold stuff really hits.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

A Picture for Your Fridge

This post has nothing to do with family activities (except that it's fall here and I've been taking lots of pictures), but this thought has really made me happy this last week, and I thought I'd share.

 Mind you, I'm not a scientist or anything, but if I remember correctly, there is a reason for the leaves to die and fall from the trees before winter sets in, especially up north here where we can get a bit of snow and the weight would break the branches.

However, I don't remember why they change into these gorgeous colors before they die and fall. I vaguely remember how (something to do with not needing their chlorophyl, the stuff that makes them green, to photosynthesize in the winter), but I don't think there's a scientific reason for the "why" of it.

I think I know the reason why. God did it for us. The bugs don't need to see the colors for pollination, most of the animals can't even see the colors. He did it just for us. He could have just made them turn from green to brown and fall off the tree, but He didn't. He made them gorgeous!

I think there's two reasons. The first one is for us to see and be in awe of His glory and His creation. In Isaiah 6:3 we read, "And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, [is] the LORD of hosts: the whole earth [is] full of his glory."

I mean, who couldn't be in wonder and awe of this beauty?

And the second reason--simply because He loves us. I think about when my kids draw pictures for me (or used to) to hang on the fridge. They pour their heart and soul out trying to make something beautiful for me, just because they love me.

I think this is God's love letter to us. He makes this gorgeous picture and He says, "Here, I made this for you to enjoy because I love you."

 

Doesn't that just make you smile too? I hope you get a chance this season to get out and see some of God's awesome creation, marvel in it, and marvel in the fact that He loves you and made you this awesome picture to hang on your fridge.  :o)

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

The rest of our September so far...

I'm sorry if I bored you with the minute by minute replay of Michelle's birthday party. It's just that this blog is kind of a family journal, and I enjoy going back and rereading the things we did in the past and maybe someday my kids will too. So, if I get a chance to blog when the activity is still fresh in my mind, I'm apt to put more details into it. ;o)

Anyway, here's a couple of pictures from some of the other activities we've been up to this month. Mike and I took Michelle miniature golfing one weekend. It was on our "To-Do" list for the summer, and thankfully it was really nice out that weekend.

Michelle got a hole-in-one and was just a little excited. ;o) I got one too, but Mike ended up beating us anyway.

This is the "hole-in-one" stance.

The course we went to is very well taken care of and quite pretty, so while we waited our turn for a hole, Michelle took a couple of pictures of Mike and I with the pretty waterfall in the background.

I thought these pictures were too funny not to share. Angel bought Michelle a soap making kit for her birthday. The soap is like clay and you can sculpt with it, but it also had a VERY strong smell. This is what I found when I came downstairs. She was working diligently on her little soap "cupcake" with one of her scarves wrapped around her nose to keep out the smell. No, she doesn't wear glasses. Those are a pair of reading glasses with the lenses popped out. She wears them ALL the time, apparently they help her focus more. 

Cute soapy cupcake. Love the cherry on top. :o)

A couple other things for this month. We started our home school year, and one afternoon, since we had some errands to run in town, we decided to take our history reading and lunch down to the lake. This little guy was on my windshield when we arrived. (Please take no notice of the extremely dirty windshield.) Not sure how he managed to stay on the whole way, but glad to drop him off in his new home by the lake.

 This is a much nicer view than the four walls of our office.

Michelle also started swim lessons on Saturday mornings, and although I'm not allowed to take photos during the lessons, I did snap this one of the three amigos enjoying lunch together after their first one. I really need to shoot more photos to ensure I get a good one.

And, last but not least, I have to put this one on here simply because I seldom ever get photos of Angel since she's rarely ever home. She was a model this day for one of the girls at school and she was all "dolled up". Only a couple more weeks and she will be graduated from cosmetology school. I'm sure she will be glad not to have to commute back and forth anymore.

 Well, I think that gets me all caught up for this month. Yay! As I mentioned before, it is fun to go back and look at the things we've done. I guess we were busier than I thought.

I'm going to do my best to get back into the Photo-a-Day journal and posting each day. Sometimes it seemed to help me be a little more focused on what we were actually doing each day. Often times I find that as I'm getting older, the time slips by faster. I wake up Sunday morning and wonder what happened to the week before. I wonder if I've made any memories that are worth remembering. God has only blessed me with a limited amount of time here on earth. I hope to make it time well spent. :o)

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!