Saturday, July 31, 2010

The Simple Life

I long for the days of sitting on the veranda with a good book, corresponding through snail mail with family and friends, and hitching up the buggy on Sunday to "go to meetin' " as they say. I crave a simpler time, a simpler place where life was about family and faith. I'm tired of the fast paced hustle and bustle of many trying to impress, fulfill themselves with things, and the need to buy the latest and greatest......


Starting in August, I will be writing a series on living simply. This topic has been on our hearts lately and in an effort to get our actions where the Lord is leading our family, I thought it would be fun to blog about some of the convictions God has laid on our hearts.

If you want to link up and share some of the ways God has led you in these areas, I would LOVE to hear about them! My goal is to encourage and gain insight from others and the convictions our family have may not be right for you and vise versa.

These are just some of the topics I will be talking about.

~Contentment
~What is a need
~Treasures
~Stuff
~Budgeting
~Sacrificing
~Being Busy
~Blessings

Friday, July 30, 2010

The Aquarium

During our vacation time with Daddy last month, we headed over to the aquarium in Jenks and had a blast! It was great to get out of the heat and spend some family time together! (See we do spend money, JK)
Since we are residents of Jenks right now, we got a super cheap deal to get in, so decided to jump on it!

My little deep sea divers! Everyone LOVED the sharks!
Is this a relative?

The turtles were a favorite as well!

They had some new exhibits opening soon, so if you haven't been in a while, you might want to head back! I saw that the first week of August is SHARK WEEK!! Should be exciting!

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Thrifty & Nifty Thursdays: Shopping



This week I scored some fabulous deals at the store!!

At CVS I got:
6 bottles of Palmolive
1 box of Kotex U tampons
2 bottles of Biotrue contact solution

TOTAL $25.61
After sales, coupons, and ECB = $1.07 spent
I also scored a $25 giftcard for when I fill my next prescription


At Target I got:
4-8pk of Juicy Juice
2 boxes of Bagel Bites
6 cans of Chef Boyardee (all free)
4 -9pk of Bic pens (all free)
1 box of Cars gummies -not on list :(
1-4 pack of Easy mac
2 boxes of Hamburger Helper
1lb of Strawberries
2 tubes of Aquafresh toothepaste
1 gl of milk
1 bottle of syrup

TOTAL $47.41
After sales and coupons = $22.29 spent

At Walgreens I got:
6 bottles of Ajax
1-pk of glue
9 pks of Dentine Gum

TOTAL $20.00
After sales and coupons = $6.42




Love Dare: Day 1


Can I go all day without saying something negative to Tom? Can I be patient and understanding? It's better to keep your mouth totally shut than say something that tears someone down!


Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building each other up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. Ephesians 4:29

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Completing Him: Letting Him Lead

This week's challenge was to talk to our husbands about the goals they have for our families. Where do they see us in 1 year, 5 years, and even 10 years down the road. Our goals as wives should be to support that vision any way we can, and most times that means stepping back and letting our husband's lead and being the behind the scenes helper.



In our family I try to always clear things through Tom first and with his busy schedule, sometimes that means waiting. This past week Tom has been super busy. Well, many things had transpired during that time, so I had a lot to run by him. My friend had offered us a dog house, I had some shops available, and I had seen some items on clearance we needed. I ran those all by Tom because he likes to know where the money in the envelopes is going. He worked on the budget and set the amounts up and we both feel that he is ultimately responsible for bringing in the money, making sure we are being good stewards of what the Lord has blessed us with, and seeing that wise decisions are being made. This doesn't of course mean that he is paying the monthly bills, stocking up on good sales, or buying our groceries. I do all of that but he has the lead in that department.

Now maybe this seems extreme to many of you, but personally, I don't want to have that kind of responsibility. This is one of many areas we feel the Lord wants the man to be in charge of, but I work with Tommy's vision for our family and try to carry it out to the best of my ability. You see, one of our vision is to be debt free in the next five years. That's where we know God wants us to be and we know that it is doable. Tom's goal is that we continue to save now and once he starts practice continue to live like we always have. Just because we might get a raise, doesn't mean our budget should. Once we are debt free we can continue to give, but on a much larger scale and bless those in need. Yes, once we have our student debt and home paid off, we would love to enjoy some extra blessings for our family but our life wont change that much. If we are happy and healthy with a resident's salary, then we don't need anything else.

Another part of our vision is to see that our children love the Lord and we feel one of the most important aspect of that goal, is to model behavior that is pleasing to God. It takes work to be purposeful in everything one does, but to us, that is why we are still on this earth. We will homeschool them, teach them about God's gifts to us, and how to pass those treasures onto others around them.

I personally love setting goals. I love seeing the dedication and hard work go in and the payoff at the end. Do you have a vision for your family?

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Fun at Anay-nay's

I'm a little behind with pictures but right after we got back to Oklahoma my sister Annie (Anay-nay to Grant) had us out to their farm in Mannford. We had a great time together, had some wonderful food and had fun splashing in the water.

The boys had never been on a slip-n-slide before and thought this was great! The men had shot guns earlier in the day beofre the womenfolk had arrived with the chillins. Shooting Tom broke his finger and then later he twisted his leg really bad on the water slide.....maybe country livin' ain't for my man!

Friday, July 23, 2010

Completing Him Challenge: Make Him a Priority


So this week, in an effort to make Tommy a priority, I have been making sure he has time to rest when he gets home. I'm bad at trying to immediately get him involved in whatever the boys and I are doing, but he needs time to unwind and clear his mind so he can spend quality time with us! He deserves a break too!

Tom is a food-aholic, so I've also been trying to cook food he loves, this isn't hard since he loves almost anything, but I've gotten some of his favorites out.


It's not hard to make someone a priority when you love them, it's just easy to forget! I love you Bunny!