How to Preserve a Husband

I found this on the back cover of the 1974 Ball Blue Book Easy Guide to Tasty, Thrifty Canning and Freezing. I will let it speak for itself.

How to Preserve

A Husband

Be careful in your selection. Do not choose too young. When selected, give your entire thoughts to preparation for domestic use. Some wives insist upon keeping them in a pickle, others are constantly getting them into hot water. this may make them sour, hard, and sometimes bitter; even poor varieties may be made sweet, tender and good, by garnishing them with patience, well sweetened with love, and seasoned with kisses. Wrap them in a mantle of charity. Keep warm with a steady fire of domestic devotion and serve with peaches and cream. Thus prepared, they will keep for years.

Projects Galore

So, today I decided to work on some projects from my "fix it" drawer.

First, Elaine, my daughter, had ripped the strap off her AWANA sparks bag. She ripped it over 2 years ago and our church no longer has a Sparks program, but hey her bag is fix!

Second, Elaine made a pillow in Sunday school a few weeks ago. It was a tube of fabric stuffed with fluff and tied the ends close with ribbon. The ribbon kept coming off, so Elaine unstuffed it turned it inside out and we stitched up the ends. Turned it again and restuffed it. Added some extra stuffing I had lying around to fill in the corners we created. Then closed the ends.

Now the one I am most excited about. About 3 or 4 years ago I had received a blue velvety dress in some hand me downs. The seam under the chest was coming loose. Elaine was obsessed with her belly button and would lift her dresses to get at it. She still does some days. She is six years old! Anyway, I had cut the dress at the seam and made the bottom into a skirt. Then put the top into the fix it drawer.

SEE

I  had kept the top of the dress just cause I have a hard time throwing a way a useful piece of fabric. Elaine wore the top around the house while I did the other projects. So, I decided to make the top into a shrug.

Thee best part of projects getting done? My daughter helping. :) She pushed the foot pedal for the sewing maching, unstuffed and stuffed the pillow, and removed pins. It was great!

Here is the end result.

OH wait that is my teenager going out to feed the calf. Why the helmet you ask? Cause he is a goof. He decided it would protect him from the calf bucking the bottle into his face! lol Inventive, huh?

Ok here is the real picture :)

And the modeled finished project. With the skirt that I had made out of the same dress over 3 years ago.

I found wordle have you?

I found a site from a link on another blog talking about this and making Father's day Cards or possibly a wall hanging with this site.... I LOVE IT!! Click on the sidways version of mine to get to their site or  click www.wordle.net. Enjoy!

Love is...

Letting me put my cold feet on you, but you better NEVER try to put your cold feet on me.

Cuddling with me to warm me up on our camping trip in September. Then going to your cold side of the camper because you know I can't sleep with someone near me. Every. Single. Night.

Seeing you cry when the cat died.

Moving us out to the country, so I could have my little farm.

You never ask me, "So, What did you do all day?" Exspecially when I haven't showered, the house is a wreck, and I haven't even thought about dinner. Never.

Trusting me, when I feel so undeserving of your trust.

Never having a shut off notice because you are a wonderful provider and hard worker.

Getting my cat from outside in the window well in the middle of a tornado warning.

Sitting in the van with 4 kids while I run in the store for "just a few things". We all know I come out with a cart full. And your hardly ever rattled because it took too long.

Missing you even when we are in the same room.

Scared to let myself love you so much that I would hurt, that I pick at your faults. And you time and time again forgive me and continue to love me so much it hurts.

Progress

My progress with The Four F's

1. Faith - I will memorize 4 new bible verses.

I have taken an index card and wrote down 2 bible verses on one side and the 27 books of the New Testament on the other side. I spent 2 days remembering to look at this. REALLY need to focus on this. I have the tools, need to use them.


2. Fitness - I will do cardio 20 minutes a day 3 times a week.

Jan. 11-15 25 minutes of Cardio every morning. In addition to my cardio in the a.m. on the 15th I had 2 1/2 hours of moving bales of hay. One hour of that was spent hauling 2 bales at a time up hill on my kids sled to my barn. The lack of plowing a path to the barn won the war of the van getting anywhere near the barn w/ a loaded trailer of hay...sigh.

Jan. 16th and 17th I spent mostly in bed sick. :-( but hey I lost 6 pounds on those two days alone! NOT the way I want to loose weight, but I am not in the market to gain it back either ;-)

Jan. 18th (today) I was up again this morning with my 25 minute cardio workout dvd.

So, this goal is going VERY well.


3. Food - I am going to eat only one serving size of one sugary processed dessert type item per day.

Epic fail. Except maybe the days I was sick...I think I bit off more than I could chew on this one. I have decided to abandon this goal and exchange it for drinking water. The recommended amount of water a person is to consume in one day is 1/2 their body weight in pounds turned into ounces of water. So, if you weigh 200 lbs you should consume 100 ounces of water. I don't mind saying I have a goal of consuming 100 ounces of water and that is not my recommended amount. That is my personal goal. I hope by drinking my water and keeping up with my fitness that 100 ounces will be my recommended amount. (hint: I should be drinking more water.)



4. Finance - Once a week I will spend money on something fun to do for/with my kids.

Jan. 8th The kids did their bowling league. Sometime that week we also rented a video game and movies. Corey went to Barakel for winter camp the weekend of the 14th.
We are borrowing a snowmobile from Lindsey's boss and had to buy gas for it. Lindsey has been taking the kids for rides on it.
Friday the 21st we are going to an indoor waterpark for the day!!!
So, as long as I can come up w/something for next week. I have MORE than met the goal in this area. Maybe, I over did it?


So, how about you? Are you doing some life evaluations and goal setting changes. It is the time of year for resolutions, after all. Why not make those resolutions into a reality by setting goals to make them happen. One step at a time.

If you have set some goals how they going?

Copy Cat Inspiration

My friend Ashley Pichea over at AP Freewriting 101 has begun a goal setting section on her blog titled 3 in 30.

I am going to follow along with her on this, though I will be working in fours. I am late so I guess I will be doing 4 in 28 or 27 depending on how you want to view it. I plan on starting TODAY so to me that is 28 days right? Not gonna do the math on it...so sorry if I am wrong.

I may not be doing this in a very public way, based on my track record of keeping up with my blog. I will atleast post my goals here.

I like the three areas she is covering, so I am going to copy cat that as well. Some of her goals sound pretty darn close to things I want to be achieving as well. I will try to be a little different though. The Four F's is what I will be deeming them.

1. Faith - I will memorize 4 new bible verses.

I know that sounds a bit vague. I feel like I should pick the verses out now. That would mean thinking. I have some idea of what ones, I just need to look at a make shift list I have started of verses I would like to have committed to my memory.

2. Fitness - I will do cardio 20 minutes a day 3 times a week.

I feel like cheating in this area already. I cleaned the barn for 4 hours on Saturday, with my wonderful husbands help.Which is "weight lifting",right? Wet dirty bedding is heavy! I am sore from that still. I really let the barn get away from me and build up. So, I choose cardio and set a time to do it each day and how many days each week. Instead of a goal of a certain number of minutes for the whole month for excercise in general. As my mind is already looking for ways to have already achieved the goal. Since I am starting these goals today, not back dating the start of my goals, I am also avoiding the ability to cheat and count things I have already done.

3. Food - I am going to eat only one serving size of one sugary processed dessert type item per day.

Anyone who knows me knows this is HUGE. I could sit down w/a bag of cookies by myself everyday and end up with just the empty bag left. Cut a pie into 8 slices. There are 5 in my family. Everyone gets one piece, except me. I make sure there are no fights over the last 3 pieces by eating them myself.
This means one item and one serving of that item according to the packages serving size recommendations.

4. Finance - Once a week I will spend money on something fun to do for/with my kids.

Yeah a section on finace that I start out with spending on fun things?
Things like going ice skating or a trip to Pirates Island water park in K-Zoo. Ok, so this is kind of a cheater goal since I have 2 fun things already planned this month. Ice skating and Pirates Island. But in my defense, we still have to follow through and actually do them! :-) Plus I have NO clue what I can budget for after picking a bigger one like a trip to a water park. I will cheat on this one as well and call their Saturday morning bowling league as part of this. Since we have been cutting back and not going every week for league, I feel I am entitled to say, "Yes, actually going bowling this month would count. Yet I would only count it as one thing. Even if we go more than one Saturday." That sounds like a good compromise with myself.

So, how about you? Are you doing some life evaluations and goal setting changes. It is the time of year for resolutions, after all. Why not make those resolutions into a reality by setting goals to make them happen. One step at a time.

If you need help with how to set reachable goals visit Ashley's blog for more help here.