Laundry Tip

I have an interesting tip for you to get your laundry smelling AMAZING!!! First step: Fill washer with laundry; make sure to sort by color.

Second step: Add desired amount of your favorite detergent.

Third step: Throw in a box of dryer sheets. You read that right. The whole box. Not the dryer sheets pulled out of the box, but the dryer sheets IN the box.

Fourth step: Start washer.

Fifth Step: When washer is finished, you will need to sort through the laundry and pull out the dryer sheets, all 50-100 of them. The box will have disintegrated into thousands of teeny weeny pieces.

Disclaimer: Your laundry will feel somewhat waxy after it has run through the dryer, and you will continue to find miniature pieces of cardboard littering your laundry. You may even have to re-wash some of your clothes to eliminate the countless bits of cardboard stuck to your clothes and towels.

But..... this tip will get your laundry smelling super nice. How do I know? I inadvertently tried it yesterday! (The pic of laundry above includes some of the dryer sheets that made it through the washer AND dryer - ha!)

You will know when my kids are coming. You will smell the "Fresh Awakenings scent" by Gain a mile away!

Big Fun in a Small Town

First came Tahlequah and now Thomas.

It was so funny.

In passing, while the kids were having lunch, I mentioned that oh... by the way....we'd be going to Thomas to visit the Wilsons in a couple of days.

YAHOO!!!!!! WHEN? HOW LONG ARE WE STAYING? YEEEEEEEEEEEEAHHHHH! WOO-HOO! CAN'T WAIT! LET'S GOOOO! I had to silence the masses. They were out of control with anticipation of our three hour drive to the town with not even a stoplight.

There may be no traffic control there, but what they do have can't be found in the city limits of where we live.

Open lands.Payton and Brennon.A different way of livin'.A backyard garden that resembles the size of a football field.
Sweet corn right off the stalk.Witnessing the earthy birth of strawberries, melons and a host of veggies.Larry.Enormous tractors regularly sharing the road with my now rather small-feeling SUV.The driver of the tractor offering my kids a ride in his country drawl: "Ya'll kids wanna ride on our fertlizer spreader?" (see Luke below along for the ride?)Friendship that digs down into my soul.

The smell of freedom.

Stars that seem to cut beams straight down to us.

The echoes of God in your heart.

That's why we go to Thomas.

And you better believe that we'll be going back!

A Penny Saved Makes Momma Happy

Kamryn Rae requested that she be allowed to open her own savings account... so on her 11th birthday, that's what we did!

That birthday money isn't gonna burn a hole in her pocket!

Testosterone X 6

A month after Luke's 6th birthday, we finally had his party!

You can see below why I called this post "Testosterone X 6."
Six 6-year old boys at Luke's 6th birthday party.

Luke wanted a Tech Deck birthday party. In case you don't know, Tech Decks are little fingerboard toys that kids can do tricks with.

The good thing about Tech Decks? No road rash!We set up a skatepark using his Tech Deck skateboard ramps. The boys had way more fun playing in the skatepark than I imagined they would. I thought it would be one of those things that lasts 5 minutes and then they start running like wild maniacs around the house. I guess beginning the party by giving each boy his own Tech Deck skateboard helped with that. (We blew up about 30 balloons and put Tech Decks in 6 of them. The boys had to bust open the balloons to find a Tech Deck skateboard. They loved this noise and chaos- Luke's idea!)

If you look carefully at the boy in the foreground, you can see his little Tech Deck skateboard flying through the air doing some cool trick. Luke found these grind rails on You Tube. I know, I can't believe that a then 5 year old could surf You Tube (with me watching over his shoulder!!!) and discover a tutorial on how to make a grind rail (what's a grind rail anyway???) using a wood block and a drawer pull from Home Depot.

But find it he did, so we made our trip to Home Depot and my ever so handy husband put drilled holes and put them together. We gave the boys sharpies and they spent about 15-20 minutes decorating their own grind rail to take home later.

It was amazing how totally cool they thought this was.

It's also amazing how cool they thought it was when the boy in the top right hand corner of the photo belched. See Luke laughing hysterically? Opening presents was great fun for Luke. After that, they did all begin running around like wild maniacs, but I didn't stop them.

After all, how often does my boy get to just revel in his testosterone?

Here is our sweaty and stinky boy getting his picture taken by his skateboarding birthday cake from Reasors after running around like a wild maniac.

After all that spitting, burping, running, crashing and burning, you can see on his sweet, little face that he still gets super excited about blowing out the candles on his birthday cake.

And that made this estrogen-laden momma very, very happy.

The Man Could Dance (Updated)

Kings of pop and Angels of television are not immune to death." - Rena

Quilting Lessons

I don't think it gets any more precious than this: My 97 going-on-98 year old Granny teaching Kami to sew a quilt.

And I mean REALLY teaching her (with a ton more patience than I would have!)

Granny was down in the nitty gritty, fixing the thread and resetting the bobbin. Sitting with her at the sewing machine for 2+ hours, guiding Kami's little hands and thoughts as Kami stitched her miniature quilt squares into bigger blocks.

(As an aside is it an amazing thing that my granny can still see well enough to put that thread through that tiny eye of the needle? That alone can be maddening at times!)

I was only at Granny's house for a few minutes... I dropped Kami off and called Granny about an hour later to see how the sewing was going.
Me: Hey Granny! How's it going?

Gran: Well, it's going OK. Kamryn is sewing and I'm ripping out.

Me: What?

Gran: Well, when she makes mistakes, and she's going to, I just rip it out for her. It's going to take her some time to get the hang of it. It's certainly not going to help her if I do it for her! She's got to do it herself to learn it.

Me: Thanks for taking the time to help her, Granny!

Gran: Honey, that's all I got anymore is time. Happy to do it!
hours: 2
quilt squares: 10
memories with Great Grandma: absolutely precious

I Heart Faces - Week 24 (BOYS!)

I really do heart this face, as ornery as it is.

Notice kool-aid mustache, sweaty hairline, and squinting left eye... focusing on intended target for his green water balloon.

What could be more boyish?

Check I Heart Faces website for more faces of ornery boys.

Text Messages to God

During my freshman year of high school, one Brad Camp, Younglife leader, told us that praying was like talking on the phone. You just pick up the receiver and talk to God. The difference is you never have to hang up. That really stuck with me.

Back then, 20+ years ago, cell phones were only on the Jetsons. Who could have imagined text messages to God then? Call me crazy. That is exactly what I've been doing.

Like many of you, I pray throughout my days, whispering up little prayers of praise and requests for guidance and protection.

But I found there is something oddly satisfying and possibly therapeutic about typing out a text message to God. After all, prayers seems to be whisked off into the vast universe much like my text messages are. Where do they go? How do they get there? It's kind of all on faith. One difference isthat I see text messages charged on my bill at the end of the month, but God doesn't accept cash, check or credit card. Kinda amazing how free prayer is, huh? I know God hears my prayers, whether I pick up my prayer "phone" or my cell phone.

But lately, with adrenaline coursing through my body on a 24/7 cycle (stress!), the text messages slow me down and I say exactly what I want to say, purposefully. Even if it is in text message slang. Dear God, U r so gr8, so powrfl, & awesm. U hve r future n ur hands.

He gets it.

Want to try it? Just make that God is in your network of friends. ;-)