Tuesday Ten

Happy Tuesday, Y'all!  Time for Tuesday Ten!

ONE

Oh.  My.  Stars.  We have had some serious behavioral issues round our neck of the woods this week.  All I'm sayin' is thank the Lord school starts soon...very soon.  And it hasn't been terrible stuff, just simply Harrison not listening and talking back to me.  We've resorted to spankins, restriction and taking things away from him, but nothing is working.  Finally (and kinda sad that it was my last thought), we just sat down and prayed about it.  So, this is a new week and we're all hoping for a much better outcome.  I told Harrison we weren't doing anything fun until he got his self together, which actually proves to be punishment for me because it means I'm stuck in the house too!  Okay, I'm done ranting, but I figured it'd help if I just got it all out there...  Check out his chore chart for the week and tell me this isn't just pitiful!  The check marks are days he did his chores - Every day.  But the sad faces are days his behavior warranted no pay for said chores.  One (ONE!) good day out of two weeks - Yikes.

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TWO

It's no secret I'm a fan of Ann Voskamp and her blog A Holy Experience.  As I read her blog (on that particular day where the above-mentioned behavior issues hit the fan) titled "When You're Finding it Hard to be Patient," boy oh boy, it was just what I needed to put the day into perspective.  Her writing has a way of igniting the conviction of the Holy Spirit in the most engaging way.  Ann says, "Patient people dare to gratefully accept people where they are.  Grateful for who they are now, appreciative of works of art not yet finished, but still deeply loved."  How very true for children, and heck, for me too...I'm one of those 'works of art not yet finished.'  Definitely a work in progress.

THREE

Pinterest!  If you haven't heard of Pinterest, you're missing out.  My dear friend Jen got me hooked on it and it is SO addicting.  Seriously.  Imagine loads and loads of crafty tutorials, decorating ideas, gardening ideas, recipes and party planning ideas all in one place??  (and really so many more categories than that)  That's Pinterest.  Once you set up an account, you can go in and add "pins" to your boards which are basically like a favorites list of sorts.  Mine are categorized for crafting, recipes, decorating, organizing, etc.  Besides posting my own pins, I can "repin" any of my friends ideas to my board.  It really sounds complicated and took me a bit to figure it out, but it's so cool.  Try it.  And then promptly let me follow your boards.  Some ridiculously cool things I've found on Pinterest...

Pilgram Hat Cookies

Made from cheap wood shims

Cute mustache pacifiers

FOUR

With the end of summer, brings kick-starting a new year of MOPS.  I love our MOPS group and am excited that the 2011-2012 year will be my first year as co-coordinator.  Next week, our core group of leaders will be trotting off to MOPS National Convention in Nashville.  I'm excited to go, but knowing how homesick I get, I'm a little nervous at the same time.  In the end, it's always worth it.  So, I spent a few days this week brainstorming and putting together pages of ideas for our new year.  It's going to be great!  If you're local and interested in MOPS, check out our Facebook page here.  If you're not local and are wondering what MOPS is all about, check out the MOPS website here.

FIVE

Just a few weeks ago, I misread the directions on the bread machine and had major pizza dough fail!  And would you believe I screwed up pizza dough again??!  Yes, I'm serious.  Needless to say, we went out for pizza that night...which then got me thinking maybe I should mess up supper more often. 

SIX

My Harrison can be sweet when he wants too -- key words there, when he wants to.  I made pancakes for Saturday morning breakfast for my little men.  As Harrison was clearing the table, he says to me, "Man, that was good good breakfast."  I said, "Well, thanks...maybe one day you'll get you a wife that'll cook you good good breakfast."  And his reply, "Yep...just like you."  Besides the fact that given his behavior towards me for the week, this comment was endearingly sweet.  I told Justin the story later and his synopsis was, "That boy's playin' you like a fiddle."  And that may be true as well, but for now I'll take what I can get!

SEVEN

I love a good thrift store and a few months back, Brig and I ventured into a new one on a lazy Saturday afternoon.  I managed to come out with two things, one being a plum-colored knit jersey dress that just happened to fit perfect and look perfect and is ridiculously comfortable.  I've been wearing that thing to pieces - total cost $2.50.  The other item was this black knit jersey handkerchief-hem skirt. 

Ick...I'm not a fan of the tattered handkerchief-style skirt, but for $0.50 (yes, that FIFTY CENTS), I figured it was the perfect excuse to remake it.  Here's the after...and I probably should mention that I pretty much love this skirt now!

EIGHT

Though I love to sew, I've been a big fan here lately of quick projects...like quick as in less than an hour.  I came across this tutorial on Pinterest the other day for a makeup brush roll and couldn't get the thing out of my head.  And it couldn't have come at a better time either, as I was desperately needing a new way of storing my makeup brushes.  The bigger ones are always easy to find, but I waste time every morning digging in the bottom of my bag for those smaller eye brushes.  No more!  This tutorial was ridiculously quick and easy.  I changed the dimensions a little from the original tutorial, as I wanted to include room for two more big brushes.  Easy peazy!

NINE

...It's another quick and easy project that I found at the perfect time.  We came home from church Sunday afternoon and Harrison showed me how he dropped his Veggie Tales Bible (yet again) and now the spine was torn from the pages.  Definitely an easy fix with a little Gorilla Glue (love this stuff!), but I figured now was a good time for a Bible cover tutorial that I recently came across.  I don't remember where I found this tutorial but I basically adapted it to the dimensions of Harrison's Bible and added easy-to-carry handles.  And of course it had to be camo and have his little name stitched across the front.  This project literaly took me less than an hour (including the monogram) and Harrison loved it!  Anything that makes him proud to carry his Bible makes me happy!

TEN

Dontcha know I had to put something food-related in a Tuesday Ten!  At the grocery store, I grabbed this Betty Crocker (she's the best) Decadence Supreme Chocolate Mousse cake mix.  The cake mix and the mousse frosting mix is all in the box - nice!  I whipped this up for Sunday supper and it was great!  We're still noshing on leftovers the next day.  You keep it in the fridge, which is partly I think why it's so good.  I'm a big fan of icebox cakes that are cold - Yum!  The only complaint (which really isn't a complaint) is that I didn't realize until I was making the mousse that there's only enough mouse to frost the top only of the cakes.  Meaning there's not enough to traditionally frost a round layered cake all the way around.  It was still great without the extra frosting, and my waistline will probably thank me for that later.

So you can see it's been a slow week, but anything but boring for sure.  Partly slow because we've spent a lot of time just staying home...due to the behavior issues noted above!  Hopefully, things are improving in that subject.  We'll be back to our usual shenanigans before long!

AND...as usually for Tuesday, we're featured today over on Sweet Shot Tuesday at My 3 Boybarians...#59!

Have a blessed week!