It's Christmas Time!

Rob and Kristi were here for Thanksgiving weekend and we really enjoyed Makenzi! She has grown so much in the last two months! She has always been so hard to get a picture of! She is constantly on the move! We have very few pictures of her that aren't blurred! We took alot of video of her this year since still pictures weren't to be had!!


These next 3 pictures are out of order. So, I will just tell you about them in one fell swoop! Trisha Jewett gave me napkin that she wanted me to use as the inspiration piece of the the large bulletin board (4'x8') in the Family Center at church. They are the napkins that will be used for the reception following the "It's a Time for Joy!" cantata. So, this is what I came up with. I wnated to use one of those paper mache deer, but I think that would have been too much fo rmy budget so I used the trusty projector and enlarged the deer from the napkin and used spray glue and 3 shades of glitter. I sued my Cricut for the verse and it says, "O, the precious name of Jesus! How it fills our souls with joy!" I used a cheap cloth tablecloth for the background that I will cover over in January and then uncover for February's board.

For years I have done bulletin boards and I am just now getting into the habit of taking pictures of them. These are the two that are in my Sunday School classroom. I got the ideas for them from http://www.boardsgalore.com/. GREAT site for bulletin boards- children's SS, adult bulletin boards, school classrooms and special events.

The "wood" is contact paper that I used a permanent marker on to make the individual planks. I first tried to hot glue the straw onto poster board, but spray glue worked best. I didn't have time to freehand Mary and Baby Jesus so I used my projector and enlarged a picture of them from a gift bag and made a few adjustments.

This year's Christmas decor is very different for us. Last year the kids said they wanted to do the trees like the trees at church... clustered and no ornaments, just white lights. Now, I live with a bunch of Scrooges, so when they ask for something as far as Christmas decor that I think is do-able, you better believe I am doing it! I am very happy with the results!

I focused in the living room and didn't do every nook and cranny. The overall look is more winter than Christmas, and I prefer that.

This architectural piece has been floating around my house for a couple of years, but never in an actual decor spot. I think it found it's home..

I saw a fireplace mantle done similar to this on a website and decided I had to do it! I wish I could remember whose blog it was on so I could give proper credit. They used a frame they found at a thrift stroe. I tried. Really, I did. I went to 5-6 different Goodwill's and even on their 1/2 price day I would have only saved less than $7 than this frame that I bought at Flower Factory. The ones I would have got at GW I would have had to clean and paint. I hope to have family pictures taken this soon so I can use this frame for that later. This is different, but I love it!

These candlesticks were some I had in the dining room. I didn't get candles for these so I just put a band of ribbon around them. It is the same ribbon that is on the wreath and frame. I should have taken a close-up of it because it is so pretty. It is a sheer cranberry with a gold embroidery.

I did get a close-up of this material. I have been eyeing it FF for a while and wondering where I could use it. It is a tone on tone sheer. It is a brighter red and adds the right amount of pop for all of the darker reds.

Here's the overall look of the living room. The three trees are make our own little winter wonderland. With all sizes of trees (those 2 little ones by the big trees being the smallest)
we have 9 trees in the living room. Usually they are scattered around the house. The urns/pots that the smaller trees are in were already in the living room on the hearth.

The hutch in the dining room got most of the attention this year, with jsut touches around the room. I haven't even done a centerpiece yet because Natalie's wedding is this weekend and I still have a tiny bit of work to do on that. (I cannot wait until I can show you pictures from that!) On Thursday we will have our family Christmas so I will have a center piece for that and will probably take pictures then.

I love my Pfaltzgraf Winterberry dinnerware set. As you probably know, I love dishes and I love them even more when they aren't locked into one day. I use these well into February.

This is my Nativity set that my sister Debbi made for my Daddy and when he passed away I got it. My step-mother had it on straw... me... I have it on lace this year.

This is Makenzi's Christmas Corner. The little stove and sink is a set I "helped" a dear friend of our make for Rachel when she was about 4. As you can see I need to get new knobs and a new "sink." And the door to the oven is needing to be replaced. Someday.... In the cabinet is "food" and dishes with pot and pans!

These little friends are jsut waiting for Kenzi to come and play! My sister also painted the little sled on the step. Two little bunnies are putting up a banner that says Merry Christmas!

Debbi also painted this teddy bear plaque. She was amazing! She her work freehand. She passed away in 2000. We loved her work before but they are treasures to us now.

So, there's the 2009 Christmas decor for the Fye Household. I think I made my Scrooge's happy. Now, maybe, just maybe, they won't complain too much when the Christmas music is playing.

I'll leave with this thought as the cry of our hearts:

"Each year some new heart finally hears, finally sees, finally knows loves, and in heaven, there is great rejoicing! The Child is born anew, and one more knee is bowed!"

- Ann Weems

Fye Family Time

Quick Weekend with Family

Much of the time spent together with the Fye family is spent around the table. Now I would like to say that it is not because we are eating all of the time, but really even when we are playing games there is always something good to snack on close by! I will say that this year we did cut down on the sweets a bit! There were only 4 pies, 1 batch of fudge and 1 bundt pan of pumpkin bread. We all have have pretty healthy sweet tooth so this was a big deal!!

Not everyone was able to make it for the weekend. Randy and Steven were missing from Deb's family and Rob, Kristi and Makenzi were missing from our crew. And really it seemed Milton was missing, too, even though we stayed at his house! He had to work all weekend and so when he was there he was pretty zonked.

This is Trenton Dale, Jerry and Liz's boy. He's such a good little guy.

Of course, these are my babies... if you could see all of the pictures taken you could tell she was the one taking them since she is in most of them!!

We had Mother/Daughter outfits for this day... no, not really. We never did have matching outfits. And somehow I just don't think she'd go for that now!

Some families all look alike. You can see someone out and say, "Ah, there goes a Jones!" But Larry's family doesn't really look alike... except in this picture! You can tell they are related here... same tight-lipped smile!! My kids don't look alike either. Occasionally in a picture I might think Ryan is Robby if it is a distance away, but then I realize he is much bigger than Rob is!

Do you know how hard it is to get a picture of them without one of them talking??? Yeah, we have no problem with Jerry... the main problem children this time were Larry and Debbie!! Larry kept making his usual faces and Deb couldn't stop talking! On Ann's camera there is one of Deb with her mouth open wide, laughing! Wish I had it... funtimes!

So, Mom had to get in there and straighten them all out! Those of you that know Ann, know how funny that is! Yeah, there were lots of shots of this one, too. In this picture is Jerry, Ann, Donna, Debbie and then Larry in the chair.

Three of the five grand-daughters... Kara (Donna and Milton's), Rachel (ours)and Chloe (Jerry and Liz's).

Miss Anna (Donna and Milton's) with Ryan and Rachel. It had been a year (I know that is awful!!) since we had seen Donna and Milton and their family. I noticed the biggest change in Anna. She has grown so much and is becoming a lovely young lady!

Ryan and Miss Chloe. He is so good with babies and children. He will make a wonderful Daddy some day!

One of the many things we look forward to when we are with Grandma is her noodles. She makes wonderful noodles! Since we weren't getting together for "Thanksgiving" dinner we were a bit disappointed in thinking we wouldn't get some of her specialties! But we were happy to see that noodles made the weekend's menu!

It was such a qucik trip, we didn't really do anything, but some made their way to the cave that is on Donna and Milton's property. They got a little dirty! The little kitty cat even went with them! That's Crystal holding kitty, Liz and Curtis (Donna's oldest). Jerry and Trenton went to the cave, but didn't go in very far. Just far enough for Trenton to be satisfied that he went in.

Crystal, Debbie's oldest, here with Jerry. Debbie and Crystal drove 12.5 hours to be with the family for the weekend! It had been a few years since they have been able to come so we were happy to see them, just wish it could have been for longer!!

Curtis and Ryan playing Risk, it looks like. Family favorites are Stratego, Risk, Castle Risk and Stock Market. (Wow! I was writing the next paragragh and noticed Curtis' left elbow and thought it looked like it is scarred froma burn... then noticed Ry's arm and realized it is from the light hitting the plastic table covering that Grandma has on the table... just thougth I'd tell you in case you noticed it and wondered about it!)

Donna is working on her Master's Degree in Elementary Education, I believe... don't quote me on that... anyway she is taking classes and she needed to work on a project and it just so happened that I knew something about what she was doing so we were looking at her assignment and I realized I could use what she was having to do. She had to set up a Delicious account and have 50 bookmarks and 5 people on her network. Well, I just love Delicious! It is a site that organizes all your favorites and you can share them through this networking site. And you can mark some private for ones you don't want to share. Like your dashboard, your broker, your bank, etc. And it is easy to add to it. Just link the page to your site. I love things that keep me organized! Maybe there was a way to do it before and I just wasn't aware of it. But I do like this! You ought to check it out. It is fairly easy to understand... you know what they say, if I can do it, you can do it! Since then I have seen one other person that put her Delicious bookmarks available on her blog. I am sure it is something that is going to catch on quick or maybe I will just notice it now that I know what it is! Have you seen it before?

I'll leave with this thought... Families are like fudge. Sweet, but with a few nuts!

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures

Well, for some reason the pictures were put on here in reverse order!! But there are so many I have decided that it'll just have to do. If there is anything I am, it is flexible!! (family joke!)

This first picture is of the new me! Larry introduced me to someone we've known for years as his new girlfriend~ I had put up with a very bad perm for 18 months and kept trimming it thinking it would get better, but I realized I just needed to bit the bullet and get all the fried hair cut off!

This is a before picture... that is after for some reason. And this is what my hair looked like when it was at one of its better times... see, it really needed help! Now my hair on a bad day looks better than it did on a good day! This was over a month ago and it has grown out a bit already.

My Mom and brother, Steve came from Texas over the week before Labor Day weekend. We went on our annual Burress-Fye labor Day weekend get-away so didn't get to see a whole lot of them. Rob and Kristi were here for the weekend so they got to see them, also.

These are my cousins. Karen is Aunt Barbara's daughter and Brenda is Aunt Harriett's. We all look like our Daddy's!!

It was great to see Steve. I didn't get to see him when I was in Texas in June. I hadn't seen him since Mom's heart attack in January 2007. Steve is an amazing person. He is so talented in many areas and such an enjoyable person to talk with. Hopefully when he comes back next year we will be able to spend more time together!

I love this picture of Aunt Barbara and Mom. Mom will shoot me for putting this on here, but that's ok, she's shot me before!! Their time together was filled with "remember when's." A favorite was when my Mom tried to sneek in the back after getting home late from a date and Aunt Barbara wouldn't let her in because Grandma and Grandpa were downstairs waiting for her. I guess Mom had a problem obeying rules... if curfew was at 11pm she'd have her date drive around the block a couple of times because she refused to go in on time! Hmmm... guess that is where someone in my family got her reluctance to obey curfews!

This was our 11th annual steak dinner for the Burress-Fye "Camping" weekend... obviously we have moved on from camping. Rachel says it is now "cabining!" The larger the families grow the more money it costs! We were tossing around the idea of going back to tents next year, but we were going over the percentage of times it rained and now we are thinking of tossing it out! If we had choices of weekends to go that would be different, but when this weekend is the only option for a long weekend I don't know if we want to chance it.

The fire pit had to be cleaned out so that Larry could cook the steaks for dinner. Makenzi was such a good little helper!!

Isn't this too cute?? Uncle Ryan having tea with Kenzi. This was the cutest little playhouse. It has 3 sides that are hindged together so it can be folded to be put away. I took lots of pictures of how it was put together.. I may tackle that project someday!

Kenzi couldn't wait till dinner to have corn on the cob! We had them sitting out on the deck in their husks and she just grabbed one, started shucking and got it all cleaned off and started eating! Is she a doll?

Rachel and Ryan love the time with Makenzi. Bo and Lucky even made this picture. We hadn't seen Lucky for a while. They got along pretty good. Lucky is older and has calmed down which suits Bo just fine! My Mom always comments about how Rob always makes funny faces for pictures. It was such a quick trip for them to come for just the weekend, but I am so glad they did. I love having my family all together under one roof.

This was at the State Fair. We actually went twice this year. Once with our friends the Budensieks (if you know them, you know we had a good time!) and then we went back for more chicken and ice cream!! Actually, I love going through all of the 4-H exhibits and so we did that on our second trip, too.

This is out of order, but a good one to end on! She must have been eating cheese curls... see her orange fingers and lips? She is a good "mixture' of her Mommy and Daddy, but my, she does look like her Daddy in this picture! I think it must be that ornery gleam in her eye!! ('Tween you and me... she got a double dose of that!!)

July and Feeding the Fam!

In July we celebrated Ryan's 17th birthday.

(I will have to post more pictures later, because my computer isn't cooperating with adding pictures!!) And Kristi and Makenzi came for about a week and we have fun pictures I will share with you another time, but oh, we LOVED having them here! This was the first time Kristi came without Robby. We did miss Rob, but we were happy Kristi stayed here with us

(she could have stayed with her aunt).

This is Kenzi in her "Daddy Mode." If there is a video on that has their attention,

you might as well, forget getting it!!

After her trip to Chuck E. Cheese!!
Isn't she a doll?! Oh, I miss her!!


We went over to Jerry and Liz's to celebrate Jerry's 33rd birthday.

Jerry and Larry... They look about as much alike as my boys do!

Jerry, Liz, Trenton and Chloe

Some weeks I have such a hard time coming up with a menu! This week was one of them, but I do love to have my weekly menu all planned out! It makes life so much easier! So here it is:

Breakfast Options:

eggs, omelettes

blueberry muffins & fruit

pancakes

cereal

Lunch Options:

Spanish Rice

salad with grilled chicken

mini pizzas

chicken patties

homemade "corndogs"- (I make corn bread and place hot dogs down into the batter)

Monday: Penne-sagna (all the same ingredients as lasagna, but using penne)

Tuesday: My Birthday!! Pork roast, mashed potatoes, carrots, broccoli, deviled eggs and rolls and white cake with buttercream icing! This is one of my favorite meals!

Wednesday: Homemade"Hamburger Helper" Deer burger, mac & cheese, seasoned with seasoned salt... YUM! and tossed salad

Thursday: Lexington-Style chicken, baked chicken, green beans, blt salad

Friday: hamburgers and hot dogs, potato salad, veggies and dip

Saturday: Taco salad

Sunday: Sirloin steak, baked potatoes, tossed salad

I will try to get some more pictures on tomorrow and share a soup recipe...

fall is just around the corner, you know!!