Nothing Says Love Like . . .

My very own box of brown sugar and cinnamon pop-tarts.  Sugar loaded goodness!!!!

Really, there aren't many things that I miss from the States.  I'm blessed to live in a country where the most essential things like chocolate, ice cream, and Doritos are readily available, and if I might add, a bit tastier than their cousins in America.  I am blessed

Yesterday I wasn't feeling well (OK, I was really sick) and to cheer me up a bit my husband brought home this box of pop-tarts as a special gift for me.  There is one shop in town that has pretty much any American pop, candy bar, cereal, and pop-tart flavour available, if you're willing to pay the price!  Now I know that pop-tarts probably aren't the best thing to eat when you're sick, but they sure tasted good!  No, I didn't eat all of them.

Thanks, Babe, for spending a small fortune to make me feel loved!  I love you!

Valentine's Happenings

We've sort of had three Valentine's Days around here.  The first one started early last week when a parcel arrived in the post (a package arrived in the mail).  It had my name on it, but really it was for this little one . . .

Grandma and Papa spoiled her with some new hair bows and a heart box just for her . . .

Fun foam hearts, body lotion (the best kind for her eczema) . . .

A new outfit, as well as window clings, and a few other little surprises.  Oh, and a Valentine's card that she has carried around the house almost daily. :)  Thank you Grandma and Papa for spoiling our little one (and for the few little goodies tucked in for us as well).

Our second Valentine's Day was last Saturday.  Each year we have a married couples meeting for the married couples in our church.  We usually have a nice banquet with decorations and a nice, sit-down meal.  This year my husband wanted to do something different.  So, we (hubby and I) prepared and packed picnic baskets for each of the couples that were coming along.  These included sparkling grape juice, pita sandwiches, potato salad, blueberry and white chocolate muffins, chocolates, and . . .

chocolate covered strawberries!  What would Valentine's Day be without these?

We met at the church and my husband gave everyone directions to head out to a park about 15 minutes out of town.  When everyone got to the park we gave them their picnic baskets and each couple headed off to have their own private picnic.  Included in the each basket was a notebook and an envelope with some games for each couple to do together.  There were also many little walks to do together around the park.

We all met back together for some Bible teaching on marriage and a group photo.

Thanks so much, honey, for all the work you put into making this evening special for each couple.

Our third Valentine's Day was actually on Valentine's Day!  Some friends of ours invited my husband and I over for a delicious meal.  Abby got to stay home with Nana and Daddy and Mummy had some grown-up time.  Thank you, Michael and Crystal for all your hard work to make the evening so special.  Crystal out-did herself with chocolate covered strawberries, strawberries and cream, and some other goodies to start off with.  She then made roast lamb, roast carrots, roast potatoes, roast pumpkin, and green bean casserole.  So YUMMY!!!!  I brought some bread rolls and salad to help out as well as dessert.  Tried a new recipe for dessert and it was SO GOOD.  Hopefully I'll post about that soon.

On a side note, it was 10 years ago on Valentine's Day that my husband and I met for the first time.  We both were serving at a Valentine's Banquet.  I love Valentine's Day!

What did you do for Valentine's Day?

Space Ship and Bubble Gum Ball Machine

Bulletin boards.  Anyone who went to the same college that I did and studied teaching remembers bulletin boards.  One semester we had an assignment to make drawings (or take photos) of 30 different bulletin boards.  We then had to put them on cards to make an idea folder out of.  How I wish I had saved those cards.  You see, my Sunday school room at church (which is also the junior church room) has not one, but two bulletin boards in it.  Guess who is in charge of them?  Yours truly!  They don't get changed as often as I would like, but I do try to keep them looking nice.  On Monday I finally had the chance to change them.  I wanted to take photos of the old ones to show you, but I didn't have the camera on Sunday night and there were three teen girls willing to take down the old decorations for me then.  Hmmm . . . do I let them take the old ones down and not get photos or do I wait till tomorrow and take photos and then have to take down the old decorations myself?  Sorry, I don't have any photos of the old bulletin boards. 

Here are the two newly decorated ones:

The stars have the names of the girls in my class on them.  There are only five stars now, but we are hoping to add more as more girls come.

If you look very close, the gum balls have different pleasant words on them.  You know, like, "Please," "Thank you," . . . etc.

And now, just because no post is complete (according to my mom) without a photo of Abby, here she is in all of her glory showing off her sunnies (sunglasses).

We're still working on how to put them on. :)  Have a sunny day!

Mummy's Little Helper

About five times a day a little voice says to me, "Mummy, help?"  Anywhere I am, whatever I am doing, this little one loves to be my helper.  Today she discovered she was just tall enough to help put the towels into the washing machine.

Thank you, Abby for being such a good helper!