Sinner's Pew

 

 

When our ward put in new church pews, we received one of the old ones that was in pretty good shape. We put it in our kitchen. A first, it was nice to have a storage area underneath the the pew along with extra seating we despartley needed in our kitchen. After three months of the pew being used for everything except seating and correct storage, I wanted it out of the kitchen. I'd rather have empty space than a junky pew. We moved it into the livingroom in the dead space by the piano. We draped my great-grandmother's quilt over the bench to give it character. Maybe if it looks nice, we won't feel so compelled to junk it up. This pew was designed for sinners, not junk. We want to keep it that way!

Christmas Colage

 

Christmas Goods

 

This is the first Christmas where both Frrest and Sadie knew who the real Santa is. It made Mrs. Claus a little sad...Forrest and Sadie both wanted an XBox 360 and Guitar Hero3. Along with the xbox, Sadie received a camera (I told her if she takes the picture, she has to scrapbook it!),a pink wireless remote controller, Forrest gave her new yarn along with a bucket to put it in when she crochetes, rocket dogs, Pirates no. 3, a pink throw blanket,and PJ's. Forrest received new camping gear (swiss sleeping bag and back pack) for his Scout winter hike this past weekend. He also received an LED flashlight, nikes, brown throw blanket, harry Potter movie, a football from Sadie which he loves, and PJ's. What a wonderful day we have had today, to reflect on our family and the blessings that the Lord has given to us and for the Christmas spirit we felt as we watched "Mr. Cruggars Christmas" and "Joy to the World." I love the ending of Joy to the World when he sings, "let earth receive her King". Gets me everytime. We hope that you and your family had a wonderful Christmas today. Let's let everyday be Christmas in our hearts as we begin a new year. With love from the Walkers, George, Trudy, Forrest and Sadie.

First Fire of Winter

 

 

The house was beginning to get cold and since George was out hometeaching, Forrest and Sadie said they would start the fire. We all went outside and gathered a couple of logs and twigs. Forrest removed the old ashes and put paper on the bottom and then wood on top of the paper. Sadie was able to help too by breaking up twigs and throwing them in the fire. I was so proud of them for knowing how to start the fire! The house was soon warm and toasty. Doesn't the smell and the heat of a fireplace make you feel so cozy? We love our fireplace!

Filled with Gratitude

We are so full of gratitude to our Heavenly Father for all of our many wonderful blessings that He gives to us through our obedience. We must be doing something right as we are recognizing all of His blessings and His hand in our daily lives. How fortunate we are to be members of His true church. To he His diciples here on earth. There was a point in our lives that we did take this for granted. We will forever be indebted to our Savior and for His Attonement he made for us and through true repentence we can return to live with our Father in Heaven. As we teach our children correct principles, they too will feel this gratitude and we can all return to live with him again as a forever family. This is our mission in life.

Check out my Slide Show!

1st Annual Cookies with Cay

Cay invited Sadie and Lacey with us moms to come over and bake goodies for the Holidays. The girls learned so much from Cay. (I believe she knows just about everyting there is to know in the cooking deptartment!) The girls made the chocolate pretzels and rolled them in sprinkles. Kagan was there to assist them in this task. They cut cherries, cracked eggs, and mixed till their arms feel off. After they worked for about an hour, it was time for a break. They took off looking for the boys! Kagan, Keaten and Carter didn't seem to mind. As the girls were playing, Roberta, Cay and I began to put the goodies into bags and tie ribbons on the ends. I was nervous about this activity. Not about coming, but about cooking. It isn't me cup of tea. Needless to say, I had a great time bonding with my daughter and strengthening my friendship with Cay and Roberta. We discovered that we had just started a tradition!

Can't Sleep so Let's Blog!

I can't sleep, so with Carhartt on my lap, the pleasant background noise of the dishwasher and Snouser, Forrest's hamster, running on his squeeky wheel, I will attempt to give you an update on what's happening at the Walker'ss pad. I am not understanding how the time is passing by so quickly and nothing has changed in our schedules. It is so scary at how the seconds, minutes and the hours are passing us by. Time is coming and going as "a thief in the night". I just got the chills!

Our Christmas tree went up this week. It usually goes up Thanksgiving night, but with us being in Knoxville, it didn't happen. Sadie got tired of waiting around on us and decided she would take the initiative. George is still working some overtime a couple days a week and trying to fit some wheeling and dealing in on the side. What a talent my wonderful husband has! Forrest has really come into the dry humor like his Dad. He is really cracking me up. It is a wonderful change from him being negative all the time. Sadie, on the other hand, is in the process of taking his place. Instead of dry humor, she is taking up the habit of dry sarcasism and we all know where that leads to... The Lord is so kind. He knew I couldn't handle two children going through the hormone change at the same time. The official switch has been made. It is Sadie's turn now! Forrest asked me today, "Am I acting better than Sadie?" I would rather continue with Forrest! LOL! For all the readers of this blog, please cherish the moments of your little ones and pray for me! I'll keep a journal on what works for me and what doesn't on raising a girl tween and a boy teenager and hopefully I can be an "instrument" in helping you in several years! Time to go. The Sandman is calling me....

Spring Cleaning in December

All I want for Christmas is a clean house! When and how did we collect all this junk? I have called it many names, but junk is the cleanest word I will use at this time. (Call me for additional nouns that I use instead of the word junk). Forrest and Sadie were very cooperative in deep cleaning their rooms. I informed them before school of the task at hand. If we waited till spring to clean, it might be too late. We collected so much trash out of Sadie's room that we will need to wait fo next weeks garbage pick up to get rid of it all. And the sad thing is that we aren't done yet with her room! She has more to go! Bless her heart, she is a little packrat. Forrest, being a boy, doesn't care much about keepsakes, so his room was a breeze. If we had 3000 square feet in our home, we would still pack it full of *&%@. My new motto is, "If you haven't used it or seen it in 6 months, CHUNK IT!"

New Coat of Paint

Since there was nothing on the calendar for this weekend, I decided Friday night to paint the livingroom and hallway. I got halfway done that night and finished up Saturday morning. I say "I" because it was my project. It needed to be done and what a better way to spend the weekend by being productive! The color is "swiss coffee". Not too light, not too dark. We absolutely love the color.

Fall Passing By

When did fall pass by? I really wanted to take pictures of our property with the beautiful fall leaves. Our yard is so picture perfect when the fall leaves are on the ground and cover our driveway. Forrest and Sadie love to rack the leaves into a pile and jump in them. I guess with the drought, there wasn't enough leaves to

make even a small pile. I am lucky that I was able to take this picture as fall was passing me by!

Golden Compass movie

I've gotten several emails concerning this movie from my friends and I want to pass it on to you. Our family will not be seeing this movie! I am very disappointed in Nicole Kidman for doing such a movie. My friend Pam Hohneke sent these links to me and ended her email by saying "Satan is a tricky dude".

Click here: Urban Legends Reference Pages: The Golden Compass

http://www.philip-pullman.com/about_the_writing.asp for this site check out the question about whether or not he believes in God.

http://www.randomhouse.com/features/pullman/author/qa.html read What stance do the books take? It just seems a little off to me.

Time to Make the Doughnuts

Do you remember in the 80's there was this commercial from Dunkin Doughnuts where an alarm clock went off at 4am and this grumpy man gets out of his bed and says, "Time to make the doughnuts". This to me is the everyday things we must do. Making the doughnuts for me is coming to school each mornning to teach 160 vibrant elementarty kids PE. What doughnuts do you make everyday?

Check out my Slide Show!

Giving Cousins

The kids are racking up! The Dollar Tree was very good to us!

Christmas on Thanksgiving Day

This year we began a new tradition for our gifts. Every present must come from the Dollar Tree. The girls bought for the girls and the boys bought for the boys. This way everyone got a couple of gifts each. You will be amazed at what we found for each other for a dollar! It was a great experience for the cousins to unselfishly pick out gifts for others.

Happy Thanksgiving!

What a wonderful Thanksgiving we have had this year! We all drove to Knoxville to Frankie's house. It is not normal for all of us to gather together twice in a year, and today made twice in four days! A traditional Thanksgiving dinner includes a turkey. Our dinner was everything minus the turkey. The upper element in the oven went out halfway through cooking the turkey. Not to fear, there were many side dishes to eat that we didn't miss the turkey. How boring it would be to have a pefect Thanksgiving dinner! We were done eating and everything cleaned up within an hour. It is time for Christmas!

30 more to Go!

I am determinded to do 50 pages by December 21. I went into Hobby Lobby this afternoon and everything was half off! All papers, stickers, rub-ons, stamps, etc. I had about $60. worth and then I started to feel guilty because the deal was to do the pages using what you already have. I was either feeling guily , weak or strong, either way, I left empty handed and called Rachel for group therapy! Next time we decide to make a challenge, I am going to add some contingencies or my own covenants to the deal! This is the page I did tonight. I love the Elsie products. They fit myteenagers to a tee! I can't believe I have a teenager!

Fia's Babtism

Sunday we packed into the car with Granny and headed to Lagrange, GA to see my sister Mary Kate's daughter Sophia be babtized. It was just yesterday that MK and Richard flew out to California to bring her home! What made this day so special was that her real birth parents flew in from California to see her. Fia had asked them to give the two talks at her babtism. What a special honor it was to meet the couple who gave Fia to our family!

Coming out of the Closet

It is time I confess. I am coming out of the closet to let everyone know that I scrapbook in a closet! It is so nice to open the door, pull up a chair and scrap and when I am done, shut the door! No mess to clean up! Forrest and I created the closet back in August. He calls it my "crapbook closet". It was such a hassle to pull out all my supplies just to stuff it back in a few hours later. Now I can scrapbook at my convience. Some ladies have a fourth or fifth bedroom to call their scrapbooking office. I have a closet. And oh how much I love my closet!

Come Fly With Us

Come and let us take you for a magic carpet ride! We are certified in the following areas: chauffeur, accounting, lawyer, doctor, pyshoclogist, teacher, maid, refferee, hostess, stylist, organizer, therapist, cook, cheerleader, coach, and planner.

Warning: Fly at your own risk. We firmly believe that these titles enable us to fly the majic carpet, but you be the judge! Hope you will fly with us soon!

Scrapbook Challenge

I went out with some girlfriends to Hobby Lobby two weeks ago. We had a blast! We were like kids in a candy store! After we checked out, we decided to commit to a challenge of doing 50 pages each by Dec. 21. The only rule of the challenge is that we cannot purchase any more scrapbooking supplies. This forces us to use the items we already have on hand for these 50 pages. I did 12 pages this weekend, with only 38 pages to go! I look forward to everyone meeting the challenge so that we can step foot back into Hobby Lobby ! Hobby Lobby BEWARE!

Sadie's candy

Check out the stash of candy Sadie collected! This is the first year she collected more than Forrest! She and Jared went to the church's trunk or treat and that is where the collection was made! Forrest and Cody were "to big to go" and they stayed and walked the neighborhood.

Halloween #13

This Halloween was our 13th year to g trick or treating wtih our best friends the Ropers. Our very first time to go was when Forrest and Cody were about 2 months old! This is about the only tradition we have in our family that has lasted this long! They will always be BFF

About the Walkers

We have a wonderful family, consisting of my husband George, his lovely wife Trudy (me!) and our beautiful children Forrest and Sadie. George works for a subcontractor for NASA and works on heavy equipment. He loves to wheel and deal on the side. I am in my 8th year teaching K-5 Physical Education. In my spare time, I love to scrapbook and am in the process of learning about photography. Forrest is 13 and in the 8th grade. He is our athelete. His football season jsut ended, but soccer season will begin in soon. He is involved in Scouts and loves to play Runescape. Our daughter Sadie is 10 years old and is in the 5th grade. She enjoys playing the piano and hanging with her friends. She is such a drama queen! They both live to terrorize each other on a daliy basis! What we enjoy the most are those special times we have together to enjoy our family without intereference from the outside world!