It's still winter!

For those of you who had started wondering if maybe SPRING was just around
the corner, I'm afraid it isn't quite yet. This morning I awoke to the sound of snow shovels scraping the pavement outside. My first reaction was "Oh, no!", but then I remembered that Angie's family needs some snow to use my give-a-way, so I quickly changed my opinion to "Yeah!" (Besides, I'm tired of looking at the gray background. At least it looks clean and fresh again.)

We have had some interesting snow storms during the last few years.

Who can forget the blizzard of 2003?
Liz looks completely dwarfed by the snowy tree!

Robbie (or is it Ken?) had to cut the tree branches off our neighbor's garage roof.

Everything was buried under a thick blanket of snow.

Tree branches covered the back lawn.


We had a long day with no power. Thank goodness our fireplace worked!
We cooked a delicious dinner in our Dutch oven and enjoyed the peace and quiet of a world without television and all the daily interruptions.
That can't be too bad, can it?
(Besides, I'm sure school must have been canceled, too!)

Enjoy the day!
♥
JoAnn

A scone or a scone?

(photos by Google.com)

It's late and I am tired.
Okay, you ask, why am I still up?

I am waiting for my "scone" dough to raise (rise? It's past my bedtime
and I can't think)!
Tomorrow night we are having Navajo Tacos.
Yum!

Our scone recipe is a family favorite.
We usually make it when we have a big soup party, but this time we are having the tacos.

Tomorrow night some of the "cousins" are getting together to go watch the Grizzlies play hockey and they are coming by here for dinner first.
Hockey games are much more fun on a full stomach. (And way less expensive.)

Did you know that I always visualized the big, fried bread kind of scone when I read my teenage English romantic novels? I always wondered why they would go to all that work
every day at tea time.

Here is one version of English Scones.

I 'm sure they are good, but our recipe is DELICIOUS!

My husband's very proper, petite, 90-something-at-the-time grandmother once ate five or six in one sitting!
(To her credit, they were NOT as big as the one at the top of the blog.)

Well, my discourse on scones is over. The dough is ready to be punched down, covered, and refrigerated. I'm off to bed to dream about the upcoming weekend.
If you have a chance to eat any scones soon, (Navajo or English) remember to curve your little pinky and sip your drink slowly!

If you are interested in the recipe, click on scones below.
(It's at the very bottom of the post. Sorry!)
♥
JoAnn

scones

This is what I gave to Angie last weekend:
(She won my give-a-way.)

1. Insulated metal thermos (to warm you up-as you are outside playing)
2. Stephens Gourmet Hot Coca (with marshmallows, of course)
3. Knit hat and neck scarf (snowman style)
4. Bag of coal pieces (can't have a best dressed snowman without the coal)
5. "Snowmen at Night" by Caralyn and Mark Buehner

(If they can't find a snowman to move-they can create their own!)

Now all they need is a SNOW STORM!

I hope she will make some fun memories with her family!

♥
JoAnn

Early Valentine's Day fun with the Aunties.....

These cute little girls had a fun day with Auntie Michelle and Auntie Kate.

Looking "Cool" in their shades......decorating heart shaped cupcakes....
getting some uninterrupted attention......

"Only an aunt can give hugs like a mother,
can keep secrets like a sister,
and share love like a friend."
-unknown

♥
JoAnn

Multiple personalities.......?

Sometimes my children have too much fun!
Liz and Robbie had quite an adventure on Friday night as they played around with the camera.
Now I need to harness all that manpower and put him (them) to work!

Thanks, Liz, for sharing this picture!
(Since I can't do the fancy things-I just borrow yours!)

♥
JoAnn

Count your blessings.....

We do have a lot to be grateful for today!

By the way, if you've ever felt like one of your kids was "double trouble" you should check out this blog!
♥
JoAnn

I am linking this to Mary's Mosaic Monday at Little Red House. If you like photo mosaics go see some of the fun ones there.

A bright spot in a dreary day.....

Today was a day off from work and I wanted it to be relaxing, satisfying,
interesting, and fun.
I did some more cleaning (satisfying, although not relaxing, interesting, or fun).
I ran a few errands (fulfilling none of the above wishes).
I even went on a little drive to see the Great Salt Lake (couldn't even see it-too much gunk in the air-therefore none of the above either).
I almost got a pedicure, but decided with my dry feet it not only wouldn't be relaxing, but might even hurt! (I'm a wimp.)

So....here I am playing on the computer.
I decided to enter Mary's Mosaic Monday on Little Red House at the last minute and this is what I created.

Irene- A Beautiful Bride

Hope you all had a nice weekend/holiday!
♥
JoAnn

I Have a Dream....

(Photo from Google.com)

Do you have a dream?

Martin Luther King Jr., considered by many as one of our great American heroes, is remembered for his famous speech about having a dream and then making it come true. As this time of year approaches, we always have our students do some writing
about what they would like to accomplish in their lives.
It is always fun to read what they come up with, including seeing their creative spelling and interesting thought patterns.

The writing below is done in sections, starting in the middle and then reading
the boxes in order from 1 to 4.
(It's called "4 Square Writing" and it gives them help
in organizing their thoughts into paragraphs.
This is the "sloppy copy" and it will be rewritten on regular paper later.)
This was one of my favorites.

Enlarge the picture and enjoy the wisdom of an 8 year old.

"I Have a Dream"
by Shaista


It makes me worry a little less about our future,
knowing that tomorrow's leaders have some pretty good "dreams" in their heads.
Besides, being "mannerful, helpful, and kindful" can't be all bad!

♥
JoAnn

Thanks to Shaista for writing this great paper and to her dad for letting me publish it!

P.S. Remember the blog I told you about? It has daily updates and is quite touching.
It's called The Livesay (Haiti) Webblog.

(click to enlarge)

Today I had the day off and I spent a little time doing some editing.
I'm not an expert, but I think I made quite an improvement.

What do you think?

♥
JoAnn

Prayers.....

Our hearts go out to all the people in Haiti who have suffered so much from the effects of a devastating earthquake.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (click to read more) has a wonderful humanitarian program. They have warehouses full of supplies to help with disasters and are often some of the first to arrive on the scene. They send food, water, sanitary supplies, and other things such as bedding and tents.

I wish we could do more to help,
but
Prayer is a powerful tool and we can all unite in praying for them!

(Photos from KSL.com)

I also stumbled across this blog about an American family living in Haiti. I only browsed, but saw some touching moments.

*****
On a lighter note....

A Prayer
"So far today, I've done all right.
I haven't gossiped,
haven't lost my temper,
haven't been greedy,
grumpy,
nasty,
selfish,
or over-indulgent.
I'm very thankful for that.

But in a few minutes,
I'm going to get out of bed.
And from then on,
I'm probably going to need a lot more help."
-author unknown




Have a nice day!
♥
JoAnn

(flower photo from Google.com)

Preserving the past.....

Don't you love digital cameras?
My daughter takes thousands of pictures of her two little girls. She can capture a fun moment, immediately download the pictures to her computer, shoot off an email, and Voila-I can share in the excitement. Her children will have well documented memory books, with plenty of pictures to choose from.

It hasn't always been so.
When I was really young, we had an old camera similar to this Brownie.

(Photo from Google.com)
Film was expensive to develop, the quality was quite inferior, and the pictures were in black and white! Our family wasn't rich and so at our house a roll of film might stay around in the camera from holiday to holiday. When you finally got your pictures developed, you might not even have any that you liked.

I don't have a lot of pictures to document my early years-but the ones I do have mean a lot to me. The picture at the top of this post is of my cousin, Kay, and myself at the family cemetery plot. In the background you can see an old car and some relatives standing around visiting (probably catching up on life's comings and goings). We are probably holding some iris or lilacs from our grandma's garden in little Mason jars filled with water.
Lots of history in that little picture.

But....
Notice the crumpled edges of the photo, the cracks, the glued on scrapbook paper, and the fading details?
I need to do some restoring to a lot of old pictures!

I also need to take care of all the thousands of photos that I have taken with my digital camera.
Kind of daunting to think about it, isn't it?

My blogging friend Marg has some great ideas on her post today about organizing family photos. You might want to check it out. After all, we all want to hold on to those great memories!

Have a great day tomorrow!

"Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."
-Author: Dr. Seuss

♥
JoAnn

Our home office.....a work in progress

This past year we have been working on our "junk room", turning it into a computer/office/den.
It had always been used as our office, but it looked more like a storage room-for junk!
(Think mismatched, ugly furniture and no hidden storage.)
If you want to see a before picture click here.
It has been a long, slow process, which still isn't quite finished, but we enjoy the room so much.
Thanks to my husband for his hard work!

I hope you all had a nice, relaxing weekend!
Back to work tomorrow.......

♥
JoAnn

P.S. The winner of my give-a-way was Angie M.
I'll post what she won later. (I don't want to ruin the big surprise for her. Haha!)

I linked up to Mary's Little Red House Mosaic Monday. Go check out some fun mosaics.

By the way, does anyone know how you "grab a button" from a blog?

And the winner is.......

(photos by Google.com)
And the winner is....
After my scientific (not), electronic (not), but very random and completely fair drawing, the winner of the snowman book and "other things" is.....

Angie M.

Congratulations!
Thanks to all of you who entered my contest. I only wish I could give you all a book!
I enjoyed reading all your comments and I appreciate your support of my blog. I am probably the most obsessive blogger alive- I check a million times a day to see if anyone has visited my site. I guess it is a good thing that I work and can only check it at home!
Anyway, THANKS!


Some other winners are.....
Andrew and Irene-
who found out they are having a little boy!

Yeah!
Life is good.

(Pretty great birthday present, Andrew!)
♥
JoAnn

Oops! I was just reminded by my husband that my contest was officially supposed to go until tonight at midnight. If anyone has any complaints....let me know, and we can have two winners! Sorry!
Angie, you are still a winner!

I'm feeling 20 years younger and a lot more peaceful.....

(Portrait by Katie-my daughter)
Thanks to everyone who offered advice for curing the winter blues...
and to everyone who entered my little give-a-way!
(It's still open until Friday night at midnight!)

I now feel armed with a list of ideas to help me get through the long, cold, winter:

Katie and Lacie (sisters, by the way) are going to participate in "Feel Great in 8", an eight week program of fitness, spirituality, and general well being.
Marg is busy knitting scarves for her daughters and is looking forward to the Olympics (She lives right there in Canada! I'm so Jealous.).
Holly is excited to have her house back (kids are in school again) and is doing some major cleaning and organizing.
Kristina believes in staying physically active during the winter and letting the exercise "high" keep her going.
Alyson likes this time to make goals and plans.
Pat will be taking this time to sort through clutter, recycle, take things to Goodwill.
And so many of you are just enjoying the beautiful season and time with your families.

So...
I have improved my ATTITUDE and will get busy with my own little projects.

I'm cleaning and organizing my cupboards (two down, fifty to go).
I have some "new baby" sewing to do. Yeah!
I'm looking at a laundry room make-over.
That diet is still waiting to get started.....
I have great plans to boost my emergency preparedness...
ETC.

Thanks, to all of you for coming to my blog and especially to those who leave a little comment. It's become quite a hobby for me and I really enjoy the interaction with all of you!
♥
JoAnn

"Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right."
-Oprah winfrey

Winter fun and a give-away......

(photo from Google.com)
The holidays are over.
(check out my give-away below)

All the decorations are packed up and put away.
(My sister Linda said putting away all the stuff is like giving birth-
good thing we have a year to forget how hard it is!)

Everyone has gone home.
It's time to go back to work.
The next fun holiday is over a month away.

Sometimes January gives me the winter doldrums.
I find myself looking for some "projects" to get excited about.
My friend Sandi gave me this idea and it sounds like a lot of fun.

Next time it snows (the really good, wet kind that sticks together) go looking for a yard with a snowman in it. Sneak back during the evening and carefully move the snowman to the front porch. Leave them a copy of a fun snowman book along side their snowman.
(You might want to do this to someone you know-just in case you get caught!)

I love books written by the Buehners (great stories and amazing illustrations) and they have a fun one called

"Snowmen at Night".

It is written by Caralyn Buehner, illustrated by her husband Mark, and costs $5.95 at Scholastic. (go here for details.)

It is a story of what a snowman might really do and it actually moves to the front door of the family's house. If you would like to win a copy of this book and some other surprise things that go with it, please leave a comment on by blog. I'll close the contest next Saturday (January 9th) at 12:00 midnight.

I'm sure there are other fun books to use, too.


What do you do to get excited this time of year?

♥
JoAnn

"Snowmen fall from heaven...unassembled."
-anonymous

Water, water, everywhere.....

The Salt Lake Valley has been covered by several snow storms this holiday, and since we live in a desert climate, that is always a good thing- plenty of water for our summer crops.
(Did you notice the inversion and the yucky air?)
Plus, Utah is quite famous for its skiing and snow (we love our mountains) and what makes better skiing than fresh, fluffy snow?

But what happens when winter snow and ice meet up with flooding water?

On New Year's Day a water pipe broke on our street, sending gallons and gallons or water out on the frozen street. The biggest problem was that it didn't have any place to go since the snow covered all the gutters, causing ice jams.

We forgot to take any pictures until most of it had been cleared up, but
this gives you a little idea of the mess. The cars in the street had water almost to their doors.

Everyone hurried out to help by shoveling snow, driving cars through the snow to create open channels for the water, or "supervising" everyone else working (my job).
It seems we never outgrow that urge to play in the water!

It's a good thing things got cleared out in time for a new storm during the night.
I think I prefer my moisture frozen this time of year!

Hope the new year is starting out well for all of you!
♥
JoAnn