Buying a House: The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

This is what buying a house is like.... It's sitting inside a really big alligator's mouth just waiting for it to crush you! That's the bad and the ugly, the good is we get a house and we are really learning to pray! It was a beautiful thing that I organized my office and filing cabinets right before we started this process since it was much easier to pull taxes and such from the folder labeled "taxes" than it was to dig through piles on the desk to find the pile with the sticky note that said "taxes". Yay me.
It has been a long while since I have posted so I will give ya a quick run through of the highlights, the other stuff can't be that interesting or else it would be part of the highlights.

• Fae wants to crawl so bad it makes her mad, but she can feed herself which makes her happy
• Had a lady "steal" a cake...still waiting for her to pay her remaining 300 something-odd dollars
• Packing is no fun, but it gives me chance to purge my house. I have made friends with the people at the resale store down the road...I'm gonna be donater of the month
• My husband, my dad, my father in law and my step dad (basically all the men in my life) all have birthdays within two weeks of each other and we have no money for presents, so I made them their fav desserts
• Fae and I get to go to Louisiana and hang with the fam one more time before school starts...yay
• Mom and Wesley are going to Ohio and I have decided I am angry with them because I can't go, so there.
• I was getting random things for Matt's mini-birthday celebration like Iron Man cups, Transformers plates, a Toy Story 3 table cloth, silly string, a pecan pie, a Hot Wheels car and stuff for chicken enchiladas at Wal-Mart the other day and the lady at the check out asked how old the birthday boy was and when I told her 24 she said her guess would have been 12. Um excuse me but I do believe the silly string cans said "Fun for all ages", although I have no excuse for the other things.

Well, there ya go. Is it sad that those are the interesting things?
AND in the midst of all the crazy house buying ridiculousness I have started a new blog... cleangreencreative.blogspot.com
Why have you started a new blog you ask? Couldn't tell ya....

Mom's Anniversary!

HAPPY DAY AFTER YOUR ANNIVERSARY MOM AND WESLEY! Yay for 5 years! I remember your wedding. You were so beautiful! You looked nice too Wesley....Hope you're having a great day after your anniversary! Love you :)

Cleaning out the Pantry

I look back on my pantry and think HOW WAS I LIVING THIS WAY! It wasn't so bad until I looked at the before and after pictures. Why did I take before and after pictures of my pantry you ask? Because I can! I took on this task because I found this blog called I'm an Organization Junkie and was inspired to take back my house. When we moved in I was pregnant and tired, so I didn't take time to organize anything. A year later....

After reading this blog what really inspired me was that I couldn't keep track of what I had in my pantry, so shopping was dramatic. I came home and had doubles of everything or I would think I had something and end up not. So, off to the dollar store I went. I ended up spending about $10 at the dollar store and $10 on a shelf. Now when I open my pantry it is pleasant instead of stuff falling out at me. Thus emerged the new pantry. I haven't got the labels on the baskets yet because I want to be able to change them if I change whats in the basket, but sooner or later.

A Prayer

In service this morning Pastor Steve was talking of the importance of getting God's word in your heart. Now everyone has heard this before, but this was different. It put a desire in me to use the word to learn to better know and listen to God, so I can be used by him. That is my sole desire in life is to know and be used by God for his glory. I want him to be so abundant in me that people can just see him through my actions and words. I read a scripture today that I really loved and wanted to share it.
"For we know, brothers loved by God (that's me!!), that he has CHOSEN YOU (that's me too!!) because our gospel came to you not simply with word, but with POWER!!! 1 Thess. 1:4
God is not a pushover. God is POWER! People say "Almighty God", but do they really believe he is almighty? He has come to us with power and to give us authority through Jesus. Didja hear that? AUTHORITY! I'm tired of christians being seen as some pushover religious group. It is time to walk in the power and authority that God has given us through his son.

After 3 Months the Burden is Lifted

This cake (and the grooms cake) have been invading my every thought since the cake was ordered something like 3 months ago. I am SOOO thankful to have them done, delivered and eaten. This was my first fancy wedding. I had done a wedding before, but it wasn't in upscale Dallas. Matt helped me cut the fondant since I don't have the patience and focus to do it perfectly. It went on a lot easier than expected and made the cake look very neat and sturdy. Mom helped me deliver it, which was an adventure in itself. We had to go all the way to Dallas, so I was worried about all the cake in the back...the groom's cake jiggled all the way there..it made me crazy! Then when we got there we couldn'r find the club we were delivering to, come to find out it was inside of another building and unmarked. Genius. Once we finally found it (on the 39th floor) we had to walk around this hioty toity place in jeans and sandals looking for a cart to bring the cakes up on. Then the groom's cake jiggled all the way up the elevator...geesh. Once we got the cakes up the entire wait staff was having a meeting right next to the table watching us set up, oh my. Then the real fun began. The groom's cake was drooping in the back (probably from all the jiggling!!!) so we built a chocolate strawberry support system, then the flowers kept falling out of the middle of the brides cake...drama drama drama. If you know my mom and I at all you know that we laugh...a lot. We would run into to each other or something else that lacked grace and laugh, but I don't think you were allowed to laugh in such a high class place... Once we finally got everything set up I thought they turned out pretty well. It was absolutely God through me, no way I could do something that beautiful by myself. People were taking pictures of them, so I am guessing that was a good sign. Someone came up to us and said it looked like you could wear the bride's cake. I'm not totally sure what that means, but I'm going to take it as a compliment. I wasn't as impressed with the groom's cake, but it wasn't a complete disaster.

*You don't have to be good as long as you're better than who you are with*

15 Weeks: Prodigy Already?

Since Faelyn was born my friend Sarah and I have been labeling her our "Prodigy child". You know, because every Mom knows their child is the smartest one! When she started in the infant class at the school I teach at I had to fill out an information sheet for Fae so the teachers could know more about her. One of the questions was "What do you want you child to learn this year?". Since Faelyn will only be like 6 months old at the end of the school year I thought it was a funny question and told Mrs. Paula (Fae's teacher) that I wanted Fae to be able to recite the alphabet backwards :) While she may not be there quite yet, look at her READING! Ha! I walk into her classroom expecting my little baby girl to be sleeping or doing other things normal of a 15 week old, but no...she is just chillin' reading a story about Noah.

Value: Where does it come from?

Pastor Steve has recently talked about the things or people we try to get our value from other than God and it really affected me. It brought to light how often I depend on others to give me my value other than God which is obviously a let down most of the time. So, since I started to grasp this concept of course I have to be tested in it! Last weekend I made a castle cake for a lady that I thought turned out pretty well, but she wasn't there when I set it up and later that day I got an e-mail describing all the things to felt was wrong with the cake. She said it would take her days to list everything that was bad and she wished she hadn't paid me. She said the bottom two tiers were the same size (which they weren't), that the pink was the wrong shade, that the cake was the wrong flavor (which it wasn't) and the list goes on. Obviously this wasn't the perfect ending to my week and it brought a lot of feelings of failure and doubts on continuing doing the cake thing. So, as I am sitting in the parking lot of Wal-Mart reading this e-mail from her and this feeling of defeat washed over me and I laid my head on my steering wheel and cried. Through the tears God spoke to me and amazingly enough the tears lasted no longer than a minute. God picked me up, dusted me off and sent me into the store to continue buying stuff for the next cake adventure. Even as I am checking out I am thinking, "What am I doing putting myself through this stress and making myself vulnerable to people's disapproval AGAIN?!" all the while praying for God to give me my value through people's critiquing. It's not as thought what the lady said didn't affect me, because it did and the thoughts still creep up on me from time to time, but the peace the surpasses all understanding is my covering and the cake-ing continues!
P.S. There were issues with the cake order for Wednesday too BUT I am still getting ready for this weekends cakes, I don't even understand this perseverance....

Working Nights: What Happened?!

I have always said that I didn't want to work nights, since Matt works all day and that is the time he is home, but since this cake thing began I work nights! Can I still complain about it since I am technically home? Matt and Faelyn are hanging in the living room enjoying a movie together and here I am in slaving away (ha) in the kitchen, which is cut off from the living room and my family. I I shouldn't really complain since I enjoy making the cakes and I am only a wall length away from them, but is it too much to ask to want to enjoy the movie to?! Poor Chelsea...

Cooking Dinner: Blessing or Burden

As Matt and I were grocery shopping the other day after having no groceries for like a month, thus making random things from the cabinet and getting fat on fast food, I was thinking about how my cooking has changed with the amount of things added to my schedule. While a shorter time spent cooking may seem like an obvious reaction to a heavier schedule, I hadn't really noticed it since it happened gradually. I used to spend time and make menus and create recipes that I knew Matt and I would really enjoy, but I think last week the most elaborate thing I made was spaghetti with sauce straight from the JAR! Doesn't that sound fancy? So, I stepped back and thought about whether or not I missed cooking for my family and I DO! I miss the house smelling like a good meal and Matt and I sharing something other than McDonalds french fries. While I'm sure some days will bring the desire to just order pizza, I want to make time to cook dinner for my man again. He deserves it and I deserve not to get fat on Burger King! Amen.

A Scripture: Tried and True

I had these random thoughts recently about needing a new scripture to live by, like the one I was using had an expiration date... I know...the way I think sometimes is so ridiculous when I write it down. But as I look at my daughter and all the things Matt and I have been through, prayed through and accomplished I realized these words from God are the same yesterday, today and forever. Nothing better than a tried and true scripture.

I CAN DO ALL THINGS THROUGH CHRIST WHO STRENGTHENS ME! PHIL 4:13