Sips N Strokes

Last night Ben and I went with my mom and my sister to a thing called Sips n Strokes. The idea is that you paint and you bring your own beverage to sip while you work. They guide you along the way and we all paint the same thing. Last night we were all painting a cat.

This photo is of the studio before everyone started.


This is a painting that the owner of the studio painted. I thought it was pretty.

Ben and I getting ready to paint.

Ben decided he didn't want to paint a cat. He decided instead to paint an oceon scene.

The finished product.

This is my cat I painted.

Christmas in Alabama

This year, as always, we drove down to Alabama for Christmas. This year has been filled with change for everyone it seems as my mom and dad have a new house.

We had a gathering of our family on Christmas eve to open presents and a nice dinner. My niece and nephew were beside themselves to open presents (we had told them when it got dark we would open them) and so when we discovered that they had already arranged all the presents out on the floor we knew we'd better go ahead and open them.


This is my neice and nephew, Chloe and Clay. They were distributing presents with the help of their mom.

After we opened all our nice gifts I sat the kids down and explained that I had brought some Christmas crackers like the people in Britain open on Christmas. Usually in Britain everyone opens them at the dinner table with arms crossed, but I forgot about them at dinner. We enjoyed the little paper crowns and prizes in them. This is Chloe wearing her red lips that came in her Christmas cracker.

This was my prize... the moustache. I couldn't smile or the moustache would fall off.

We told my brother, Preston, that we needed a picture of the royal family. This is a very typical look you get from my brother.

This is my sister Stephanie and me with our crowns.

This is my parent's new house. It's beautiful.

Most of the houses look pretty similar, but my parent's house has one defining feature... this huge boulder thing in the front. It was left over by the builder and they said they'd come back for it and never did. My mom likes it and wants it to stay. Strange how things work like that.

Today I went to my sister's house to look through some baby items she has kept. Needless to say... I was a little overwhelmed with everything, but thankful we won't have to buy it ourselves.

"We Made It Through The Rain"- Barry Manilow

Actually, we made it through the snow. It's been a while since I've updated this blog due to some issues with getting hooked up with internet. Anyway... we have moved now and we are enjoying the whole reality of something being ours. Ben has been very enthusiastic and knocked down popcorn ceilings and we've both peeled wallpaper. If I never see another piece of wallpaper that will be ok with me. These house things seem so easy until you start them and then the conclusion comes to you that it is a nightmare. All that to say it's not as easy as it seems. Wait until we have a child right? ha!

These pictures are of Ben loading up the 26 foot truck we rented. I must have had a pregnancy moment or something because when I saw him drive up in that thing I started crying. It looked like he was driving a tracter trailer or something.... and to think you just need a regular driver's license for one of those! (think about those Miami drivers in one of these puppies) I finally relaxed and realized that it was going to be ok.

We are in Alabama now visiting my parents in their new "city" living. Actually it's just a larger town, but it's a major difference from Holly Pond. I'll have pictures soon. Tomorrow is Christmas eve and we have our big family shindig then. One thing of note... Ben and I drove down here and on our way down I was looking out the window and guess what I saw? Camels!!! Camels in Tennessee. I can't say you see that much in the south. Merry Christmas everyone! Remember Jesus is the reason we celebrate!

Our First Home

This past Thursday Ben and I closed on the purchase of our first home. Here it is! We are so excited. We haven't move in yet, but we are looking for refrigerators and talking about paint colors. We are very thankful to the Lord!












Here I am.

Let It Snow!

Today it snowed. It's hard to get a good picture of snow coming down, but just know that the size of the snowflakes were about the size of a ping pong ball. It is beautiful to watch from inside... not so fun to drive in.













Here is from our front porch. See the snow on Pam's car? It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

Christmas Blooms

Yesterday Ben brought home a blue poinsettia for me. I can honestly say I've never seen a blue poinsettia before. This is also a picture for my family that has asked for more shots of my hairdo.



















Here it us up close.


















I have been waiting for what seems like two years for my orchids that I brought from Miami to bloom again. I guess they didn't have much light in Miami in our little bathroom window. Here it is and you can see that two more blooms are on their way.