2014

We are getting ready for the new year and thought we would post some of our favorite moments of 2014! Looking back through the year we are reminded of God's faithfulness and blessings through the year. It really has been a great year.

Remember the ice storm in Atlanta earlier this year? We were stranded in Atlanta during that time. It ended up being a great adventure together.  It actually turned out good for us to have a forced vacation and rest time and allowed us to get out and enjoy walks in the snow!

This past spring we went to Disney World with my family! We had such a wonderful time and made so many great memories! Looking forward to our next Disney trip!

This summer we traveled to Milwaukee for work. We had a wonderful time and spent a day with our BFFs in Chicago!

We also traveled to Mackinac Island this year. It was such a memorable trip between tandem bikes and our crazy travel (thank you, Delta for getting us at least to Michigan and within driving distance of our destination! You guys are awesome!) it is definitely a trip we will not forget!

We also enjoyed two hot air balloon festivals this year. One at Callaway gardens and one at Rock Ranch. They are always so beautiful!

We headed to the beach with family to take pictures. We had such a blast with our besties.

It has been such a wonderful Christmas season this year with friends and family! From the white elephant party to family game night to Festival of Lights at Callaway  it has definitely been one of the best Christmas seasons!



It's been a great year and we are looking forward to 2015! Here are some pictures from last years party.

Praying everyone has a blessed and happy new year!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

We love Christmas!!! We love Christmas songs, lights, hot cocoa, eggnog and cheesy Christmas movies. And we love making our home feel like Christmas!
I love having unique things to decorate with. The glass garland above the fireplace I found on amazon last year and I love them. I added the red berries to give some color.

The wood ornaments we made by transferring a photo on to the wood using this process. The bird ornament and the pillow were two of my favorite finds last year! The bird came from Hobby Lobby and the pillow was at Target. I got them at the end of the Christmas season so they were both half off.

We couldn't forget adding Christmas decorations to our music room and our kitchen.


We also put up some simple decorations upstairs in our guest rooms and sitting room with garland, small trees and paper snowflakes.

Just a few simple things can make it feel like Christmas. It truly is the most wonderful time of the year!

A Homemade Christmas 3

The last few years for Christmas we decided to make our presents. This past year we did some wood working projects.
First were these clocks.  We cut these wood squares and painted them. We painted them black first then white and used sandpaper on it to give it a distressed look. Next, we bought some clock kits from Hobby Lobby and drilled a hole in the middle of the wood. Before putting the clock kit together we transferred a photo onto the painted wood using these instructions. Just make sure to remember to print everything opposite of the way you want it because you will lay the photo face down to transfer.  The last step is to attach the clock kit and you have a custom wood clock!

Next, we made the trays. We cut the pieces of wood to the size of tray we wanted and attached them, then we stained it and added the letter.  Lastly, we added the hardware.  On the lantern, we painted it the same as we did the clocks to give it a distressed look. Once all the pieces are cut, the lantern is actually very easy to put together.

And who doesn't like food? We made some homemade barbecue sauce and kettle corn. We printed some labels and made a very easy and fun gift! The kettle corn we made using this Whirly Pop popcorn maker. We use it all the time! It makes great popcorn!

If you want to check out other ideas for homemade Christmas gifts you can also check out these posts:
A Homemade Christmas
A Homemade Christmas 2

Candy Carnival

This Halloween our church decided to do a Candy Carnival. We wanted to do something to involve the neighborhood around our church, so we set up carnival games in our front yard complete with a ring toss, pumpkin bowling and face painting! And of course, lots and lots of candy!

 

We had such an amazing turnout! It was such an honor getting to meet so many wonderful people in the neighborhood! Both kids and adults had fun playing all the games and I can't wait until our next carnival. Thank you again everyone who helped put this together! You are amazing!!!

Rock Ranch

This past Saturday we took a day trip to Rock Ranch. We discovered Rock Ranch in the fall of last year while looking for a corn maze.  We decided to check it out last year with my parents and fell in love with this place. It is turning into a fall tradition for us!

It is such a wonderful family atmosphere with lots to do! Lots of games, animals, fresh produce,  beautiful scenery and even a pumpkin cannon. And of course a corn maze!

They also have a zip line which Jon decided to do.

Each weekend during the fall they have a different theme. This weekend was the Hot Air Balloon Festival. They were going to have balloon rides all afternoon, but unfortunately it was too windy for the balloons to go up.  They did, at least blow them up and light them as the sun went down. It only lasted a few minutes.  They were having trouble keeping the balloons from blowing over and keeping the baskets on the ground because of the wind.  It was still fun to see all the balloons up even though it was short lived.

Fortunately, this happened to be our second balloon festival this year. A couple of months ago we went to the balloon festival at Callaway Gardens.  It was so much fun to watch them blow up the balloons! They lay them out on the ground and actually use a big fan to blow them up. Then they use the heat to get them off the ground.

P.S. I really want to go back to Rock Ranch and stay in one of these!  :)

Michigan

Well, it has been a VERY long time since my last post! Between moving into a new home (pics coming) and job changes, things have been a little busy around here to say the least. Now it's time to play catch-up!

We recently returned from a yearly fall trip we take with my cousin and her husband. It is something we look forward to all year! The last couple of years we have explored Michigan. This year we went to Mackinac Island. It was so beautiful and unique because there are no cars on the island. The only way of transportation is horses and bikes!

It was such a beautiful day (although warmer than we were expecting) that we decided to rent bikes and somehow we talked the guys into tandem bikes! That was a first for all of us and it was pretty hilarious trying to ride tandem for the first time! There was definitely lots of laughter! At one point my face was about two inches from the face of a horse. We had a few close calls, but we finally got the hang of it and enjoyed a beautiful ride around the island.

Since there are no cars on the island, the only way there is by ferry. Our ride back was during a beautiful sunset!

We stayed in a cabin overlooking Lake Huron. It was beautiful views and we built a fire a night and sat outside to look at the stars. It is extremely dark in that area so the view we had of the night sky was incredible! Here is the view from our cabin.

And here is my cousin's little girl. It doesn't get much cuter than this!

One of the reasons we like to travel in the fall is to see the colors since we don't really see many where we live. On our drive back to the airport we came across some beautiful colors! We just had to get out and walk around!

It was such a wonderful fall trip and we are already looking forward to next year!
And since we are playing catch-up, here are some pictures from our trip last year to Michigan's upper peninsula. We went to Pictured Rocks. The colors were beautiful!

You can also check out our other fall adventures in Seattle, Canada and New York!

A Homemade Christmas 2

This year we decided to make some of our Christmas gifts again. It's always fun to make gifts, but it can also be very stressful coming up with ideas and then trying them for the first time not knowing if they will work or not. Fortunately, we had some great successes this year. You can also check out last years Homemade Christmas.

I was inspired to do these by something I saw in Hobby Lobby (LOVE that place!!!). The picture I saw was a very large wall hanging, so I decided to do my own version scaled down a bit.  I took the glass out of the frames and used Mod Podge with scrapbook paper for the background.  I bought the wooden letters and small clothespins at Hobby Lobby and painted them with acrylic paint.  I added water to the paint to give the letters more of a stained look. I attached it to the twine and there you have it.  I did glue the letters and the clothespins down to make it more permanent especially with wrapping them.

I bought these small wooden boxes from Hobby Lobby and painted them black.  Then I printed out family photos and used Mod Podge for the top.  I got the tutorial for the necklaces here.   I bought the tile pendents and Diamond Glaze from etsy like it suggests in the tutorial.  I printed out pictures for the necklaces on an inkjet printer. The problem with this is the ink will start to run and make your picture look terrible when you put the Diamond Glaze on it. To keep this from happening, I took clear packing tape and put it on both sides of the picture before glueing it to protect it.  It worked perfectly.

I bought the bracelet kit here. I printed out old and new family photos in black and white. Again, used the packing, and glued it using Diamond Glaze.

I found the headband tutorial here. I love this headband. I can't wait to make some more that I get to keep!

For this gift, I had to sneak on my dad's computer and get some photos that he took this summer while he and my mom were in Europe. I bought 8x10 canvas and some gel medium. I printed out the pictures. You will probably want to flip the picture on the computer before you print them because they go on the canvas backwards.  When I was doing research for this project I noticed everyone said to use a laser printer.  I don't have a laser printer and decided they didn't know what they were talking about.  I have now learned that they were right. Inkjet printers do not work for this project. I repeat, inkjet printers DO NOT work for this project! So, I printed them off my inkjet and took them down to Office Depot to make laser copies.
Once you have your laser copy, cover the canvas with your gel medium. Place the photo face down on the gel medium. Smooth out all the wrinkles and let it dry overnight (or at least 6 hours).  Once it is dry, use a spray bottle and spray water on it. Use your fingers to start rubbing away the paper. This process will take AT LEAST 30 minutes. I think the first one I did took me 1 hour. It will seem impossible to get all the little paper pieces off, but keep rubbing and you will eventually get it all off. Just be careful not to rub so hard that the picture starts coming off. Finally, when all the paper is off, you are left with your picture on the canvas! Cover it with gel medium to seal it and you are done. I love how these turned out! I will definitely be making many more of these for my house!

I bought these mugs at the Dollar Store. I bought this marker and wrote their name on the mug along with an encouraging word or something we love about them. We filled the mugs with candy.  For some of the mugs we also put hot chocolate mix and marshmallows, and for the others we put some Starbucks Via packs and biscotti.

For the cookies, we took Oreos and dipped them in melted white chocolate chips and then in crushed candy canes.  They were so yummy!

So there it is, another Homemade Christmas.