Sassy has a giveaway!!

So my girlfriend is having a giveaway on her blog. It's for Little Yaya's boutique. The giveaway is for an adorable blanket that are home made. Make sure to check it out on SassyFrazz's blog.

WE GOT STEPS!!!!!!

Brody has taken TWO steps. We aren't officially calling it walking. Would you?? We figured walking is more when he can walk from one thing to another without help. How old were your kids when they started walking? 

Frugal Friday

Sorry I missed last Friday but I will try to make it up to you. This week is all about cooking & grocery shopping. So here are a few things that we do. 

First of all I will plan a dinner menu about two weeks at a time. When you do this try to use what you have on hand. Look through the cupboards and see what you can make for dinner based on those items.

Once you have your menu for the two weeks then you should be able to determine what you need for groceries for the next two weeks. ( you can do this one week at a time as well. i just stretch it out to avoid grocery shopping.)

When you go shopping stick to your list, nothing extra. I don't know about you guys but in order to do this I must go, not the husband. Whenever my darling husband goes he comes back with pop, chips, or a candy bar. He is so naughty. 

So onto cooking. I will make breakfast for supper. Breakfast is cheaper. We have cut back on the amount of meat that we cook with and add more vegetables. Meat is expensive. Also you can eat vegetarian once a week... beans & rice is one of our favorites, grilled cheese and soup, or vegetable stir fry. There are a few options.  We also will have cheap burritos... refried beans, shredded cheese in a tortilla with sour cream. :) 

Eating out - DON'T!! Hahaha.. jk. It's hard to do if you are like us, we love to eat out. However, when you make a menu for your meals it makes it easy not to eat out because you already have a plan for supper. If you are going to eat out split a meal. Most of the time they give you more food then necessary. If you do fast food use the dollar menu. Don and I ate off the dollar menu a few weeks ago from BK and we ate for less then $5.00. Ok. I think we are officially cheap... ummm I mean frugal. :) Add anything else that you want to share and I hope you enjoy my little tidbits. :O

This is what I have been up to.....

So this is really only part but it's kept me busy. I took pictures of Amity and Darin last week and have been spending much of my free time editing. The week before that I had my contest going on and that was the week we found out about Anna. So I guess there has just been a lot going on. Not to mention that I don't know how to keep my contests at the top of my blog so I worried that people wouldn't find it if I posted!! :) Sorry it's been so boring. I have a BUNCH of new pics of Brody. We have been able to get outside and that has been wonderful so it's been fun to get some pictures of him outside. Anyway, that is just a brief update there will be more to come. 

And the winner is.....

BUNNY B! Thank you to everyone for participating. It was so fun to have so many entries for my first giveaway. I enjoyed reading what people wrote! Bunny B enjoy your stationary. Thanks again everyone. :)

A Beautiful Tribute

Yesterday and today was the wake and funeral for Anna Meg. There isn't much to say I guess about the wake. It was informal. We walked in and everyone was visiting. We saw many people we hadn't seen in years. 

Today (the funeral) was bittersweet. I have never seen two people who are truly a tower of strength. Certainly Anna's parents have their struggles but today was all about Christ and celebrating Anna's life. They started the service by singing to God. We sang "Blessed be the name of the Lord." In this song the words are "You give and take away, You give and take away, my heart will choose to say Blessed be your name." There isn't a doubt in my mind that Nate and Lisa believe this completely in their hearts, the Lord has taken Anna home and they will continue to Glorify God. I know that it's not about them but about God through them. That is what I saw today. The point of the sermon was that there are no answers to why these things happen, the only answer the pastor had was JESUS. :) It's so so true isn't it? The Lord has to be our Rock, he is our Redeemer, Savior, Healer, our all in all. Today the Lord was praised, Anna was honored. Anna's dad got up and spoke. It was rather gut wrenching, but it was truly amazing. I believe that the Lord held him up as he spoke. He shared who Anna was with us, talked about her life, her personality, the things that she loved. It was really great hearing him talk about his baby. He stated more then once that they were so proud of her, it was so evident and they were right to be proud. At 3 years old she endured more then some of us will ever experience in a life time. She was a courageous, faithful, intelligent, and compassionate baby girl. Anna Meg was loved deeply and will be missed dearly. 

Poll Results....

I thought I knew the answer to this when I created the poll... without a doubt the place I had wanted to always go was Fiji. :) BUT.. since I created the poll I thought long and hard about that answer. If I ever had a chance to go to one place I would actually choose Italy. Everything in me has always wanted to go there and I believe that you would get to see more then just being on an Island. However, I would be ecstatic if I ever got to go to Fiji as well. It was a tricky question really because every place I put I have longed to go but if I had to choose just one it would be ITALY!!!! OHHHHH..... I would love that. :)