Pretties and Tasties

Here are some pretty things that I have been making and cooking up lately!


This is a shortbread cake with vanilla frosting and, as you can see, strawberries and blueberries to make a flag. I made this cake for the fourth of July!


I made this dress for Baileigh! The first article of clothing I have made! That's one down on my New Year's resolutions!

There's the little model! Isn't she pretty?




This is a strawberry shortcake that I made. The whipped cream icing is homemade and I had so much fun making it! I have discovered that I truly love making whipped cream!




This is also a strawberry shortcake. My future great-niece, Hannah, decided after tasting the first strawberry shortcake that she wanted this cake for her birthday. So, Aunt Jessi made it for her, only bigger!

Summer Reading

So, anyone that knows me knows that I love to read! I also do not allow myself to read for pleasure during the school semesters because I will read instead of doing my school work. Therefore, I am happy to say that I am finished for the summer term and am now allowed to read. I have been collecting books over the last several months that I will read and I thought I would give you all a list of these books along with the order that I plan to read them in.
1. New Moon by Stephenie Meyer (I am actually already reading this; about a quarter of the way finished.

2. Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer (I decided that I needed to get through at least this book by the end of June, considering I am going to see the movie!)

3. The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova (This is another vampire book that Katie gave me to read; I'm very excited and interested in it!)
4. Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer (I have to finish the series!)

Disclaimer: The rest of the books on my list are all Christian romance novels. I love them!

5. A Promise To Believe In by Tracie Peterson (I have read this book before, but it's the first in a trilogy. I just got the other two books in the trilogy and its been a while since I read this one, so I wanted to refresh my memory.)

6. A Love To Last Forever by Tracie Peterson (I love this author!)

7. A Dream To Call My Own by Tracie Peterson (Book 3 in the Brides of Gallatin Trilogy)

8. Kiss by Ted Dekker and Erin Healy (This looks suspenseful. I have read books by Ted Dekker before and they were fairly action oriented.)

9. Blue Ridge Brides by Lauralee Bliss, Tamela Hancock Murray, & Lynn A. Coleman

10. Indivisible by Kristen Heitzmann (I read a few books last summer from this author and I really liked them.)

11. An Amish Gathering: Life in Lancaster County by Beth Wiseman, Kathleen Fuller, and Barbara Cameron

12. Courting Trouble By Deeanne Gist (I randomly read a book by this author a while back as well and really liked her!)

13. Freefall by Kristen Heitzmann

14. Never Say Never by Lisa Wingate

15. The Measure of a Lady by Deeanne Gist

16. Dawn's Prelude by Tracie Peterson

17. Morning's Refrain by Tracie Peterson (Book 2 of the Song of Alaska trilogy. I do not currently own this book or the next one but the goal is to get it by the time I get to it on the list!)

18. Twilight's Serenade by Tracie Peterson (Book 3 in the Song of Alaska series)


Well, that is my summer reading list. It is also highly probable that I will end up reading the Harry Potter series again, but we'll see! What are you reading? Happy reading!

terrible no - good blogger

I am awful. I said I was gonna do this blog and I haven't posted anything since February! What is wrong with me? I promise I will do better. I've been extremely busy but that is no excuse! I still need to learn a lot about this whole blogging thing! Maybe Katie will give me some lessons! I'm crafting for the first time in 6 months, so pictures coming soon of really cute dress for Baileigh and afghan for me!

The adventures of a not-atheletic-at-all girl

So, I've been bowling a good bit lately and it is absolutely hilarious! I think it's fabulous that a good score for me is like an 80 something. My highest score in my entire life is a 103. Last night, I learned about the annoyingness of fouls! I didn't really realize that if your foot went over the line it would give you a foul and you wouldn't get any points for that turn. This happened to me once when I had knocked 9 pins down! I think I missed that part in bowling class. It totally took me several times of getting fouls to even understand why I was getting a foul. Nobody told me and I was extremely confused! Then, I felt really stupid once I realized what it was! My, but I can be so naive sometimes! I did win one game with an 83 but I maintain that it was luck and other extenuating circumstances; it had nothing to do with expertise whatsoever!
So, I am adding another thing to my list of resolutions for this year, even though it is now almost March!
9. Improve my bowling skills. Beat my personal best of 103 and have fun!

Valentine's Day

So, I think it's so interesting what Valentine's Day does to people! My 6-year-old niece decided today that she was in love with our 10-year-old neighbor. Not only was she in love but she was talking about how handsome he was and that she was going to marry him! She actually told him tonight at church that she like him! She just blurted it out! That takes a lot of guts! I totally would not have had the guts to tell a boy that I liked him at 6 years old! That would have been the last thing that I would have done at that age! Shoot, even now at 23 years old, I have times where I don't have the guts to say things I would like to. The lesson in this = maybe I need to take a cue from my Baileigh and just dive right in! Who knows what the future may bring!
I will leave you with one of my new favorite songs, appropriate for Valentine's considering it is from the soundtrack for the movie, "Valentine's Day".

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Snow in Baxley, Georgia

It snowed here Friday night!!! It was so excited!!! I am posting some of the pictures from my yard!

Life

Why is life so frustrating sometimes? It feels like I'm constantly waiting for something. I guess that's the life of an impatient person. Why can't I just be patient and let things come as they are. Because I'm OCD, I think. It's nice to be organized and a planner but sometimes it drives me crazy! I want so badly to plan my life, but that's not really how it works! :) I need patience and lots of it! **Sigh**

The death of Razzie

I think cell phone companies are ridiculous!!! Also, I have learned that insurance is always important. The other night I was hanging out at my friend's house. I was handing her my phone to show her a picture and the phone, Razzie, slipped out of both of our hands and plunged into her glass of water. Talk about slow motion effects!! We immediately retrieved her out and tried to dry her off. At first, I thought everything was fine. I was able to call and send texts and all. Then she started acting like one of the keys was stuck. Then many of the keys refused to work. Then, I shut her off and she would not turn back off. So, I made my way to the Verizon store the next morning because one night without my phone was all that I could handle. Due to the fact that I had just upgraded my phone in October, I had to pay full price for a phone because I had no insurance. Three hundred dollars later, I have a new phone. Her name is Lola the Motorola and I really like her but I wish I hadn't had to pay that much for her. The moral of the story folks is: make sure you have insurance for such freak occurrences as this.
P.S. I totally have insurance now!!!

The bane of my existence = Retail stores

Why is it that when you have the time and money, you can never find what you want when shopping? And yet, when you don't have the money, you find tons of things that you presumably need or want. This past Saturday, I went to Savannah for some much needed shopping. First, we went to the Osh Kosh store and I found tons of cute stuff for Baileigh and spent too much! Then, it was time to shop for me and that's where I struck out. I started in Target, I was looking for a boombox called the MiniMove that you can plug your Ipod into. The only ones they had were pink, and though I am extremely girly, I'm not THAT girly! Sigh! Then, we went to CATO to try and find me some jeans. I tried on about 10 different things and absolutely nothing fit right. Mama found a pair of jeans, but not I. My brother had given me a Borders gift card for Christmas and I knew there was a WaldenBooks in the mall (they accept Borders gift cards) so I thought I'd see what I could find. Apparently, they had closed down since the last time I had been in the Savannah mall! So, no books for me! I did finally find a cute shirt at Walmart of all places! Overall, the trip was not very successful for me! It was also a yucky day. It was wet and cold and I like the dingbat that I am had flip flops on! I have found a new appreciation for ordering things online!

This year

I know people usually make resolutions for the year on New Year's but, apparently, I'm running behind. Anyways, this is a list of small and not so small things that I would like to accomplish within this year.
1. Get a job!
2. Be healthy: eat right & exercise.
3. Read my bible every single day, even if it is only one verse.
4. Learn how to grill
5. Crochet for myself an afghan and more scarves
6. Travel to Pennsylvania to see my family
7. Trade my car for a pick-up truck
8. Learn how to sew more things than just pillows

That's all I can really come up with right now but I reserve the right to add to it.
Good night!

Here I go...

So... I've decided to start a blog. I don't know if anyone will even look at it or like it. It may be boring. That doesn't matter to me. I'm excited about using this as a fun way to share my life. I'll be posting more soon!