inspired by...

Today's post is inspired by... a post I just read over at

Day by Day...My Life as a Busy Bee.

Thanks Suz for the idea!

The well has been running dry lately and

I guess I've stooped to stealin' ideas now. oh well.
Anyhoo...

A few years ago we went to Colorado Springs for our vacation. We had a

wonderful time. One of the things I was most excited about was the

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. It's a gorgeous zoo and we had a blast.

One of Miss Boo's favorite things were the giraffes.

And feeding them.

With her bare hands.

Pretty cool, huh?!

I'll bet you're wondering what in the world this has to do with Suz. Well...

I'm getting to that part. She did a post or two about

taking Flat Caroline out and getting some pics with her.

I'd heard of Flat Stanley before and knew this chick

had to be related. We've never been given a

Flat Whoever assignment, so we decided to make up our own

not-so-flat photo op. Boo loved the giraffes at the zoo so she bought a

cute little stuffed giraffe at the zoo's gift shop and appropriately

named him Crackers, after the crackers she fed the giraffes

at the zoo.

First we tried it like this.

Here Crackers is sitting on top of the Will Rogers

Shrine of the Sun that's on the zoo's property.

It's gorgeous up there!

It had better be since I about lost a lung climbing the

gumpteen zillion steps to the top of that silly thing!

This pic turned out cute.

But still it wasn't a favorite.

Leave it to the hubs to come up with this one!

This silly photo makes me smile every time I see it. It's just

so stinkin' cute! Don'tcha think?!

I can't see...put another quarter in!

nothing to fear

I have nothing to fear but fear itself....

....and spiders!

Spring has sprung, y'all.

Ick!

and the winner is....

I decided to go low tech and just deal with this with paper...

it's not like a had a hundred names or anything. So here's the deal.

I wrote everbody's names down and folded them up. Ta-da! Seee???

And then closed my eyes!

Yep... I didn't peek! Not even once!

I would'a had Boo come and draw a name for me,

but she's working on a research paper today,

so I took care of the honors myself.

And....Jill is the winner!

Yay, Jill! Email me with your address and I'll mail your goodies to ya! : )

a birthday and a giveaway

Happy bloggy birthday... to me! Wow! I've been blogging a year. Well, my first post wasn't really much to brag about, but it was a start. (you know..testing testing, one two three kinda stuff) I don't know all the reasons why I blog, just that I love it.

Whether I'm happy, sad, grieving, silly, afraid, or just weighed down...you guys come and read what I have to say. It's just crazy when I think about it, ya know?! Some posts stand out to me for various reasons. But these are the ones that mean the most to me because they pertain to the Life that I've received in having a relationship with God. Part one, two, three, four and five. I could keep linking all day to different posts that are important to me for this reason or that one. Or funny...to me anyway... I don't think I'm all that funny, although I try sometimes. lol But I think we'd all get bored! : ) Anyhoo...

And then there are all of you. I might as well just write everything down in a spiral notebook and shove it under the bed, if it weren't for you all. Like I've said before, I don't know all the reasons why I blog. Or why you all read the stuff I write for that matter. But I know I've gained so much from all of you. Thank you! Thanks for being much better bloggers than I ever will and making me laugh and cry and think in ways I never thought possible. And accepting me into your kind little sorority and being the best commenters a girl could ever ask for!

So! Now that I've gushed all over the place.... I have a little packet of goodies to give away to a chosen (I hate to use the word 'lucky') commenter. I wanted to give a little something back to the ones who've given so much to me through their kind words along this quirky little journey called blogging. So, I have a couple of fun prizes to give away today!

I couldn't decide what I wanted to give away. Like most people, my house is full. And everybody's house looks different so something to sit and look at might look great at one house and weird at another. So, something like that was out. And of course, whatever I chose needed to mail easily. And of course, be useful!

Every time I post a recipe for something fast and simple, I get great comments about how wonderful it sounds to get the job done quickly. So how's this?! I have a wonderful cookbook by Dawn Hall. I have several of her cookbooks and she's an amazing lady with an incredible story of the work God has done in her life. And her recipes are yummy too! I have to tell ya, I was tempted to keep this cookbook for myself... so that's real luuuuv, y'all! : )

And because I'm not just about feeding the body but the soul as well, I have this wonderful book by Andrew Murray. It has 365 devotions in it... so it will take a year to use it up. That's pretty cool. I love Andrew Murray! Another title of his that I love is in my sidebar. His writings are so concise and rich!

So these are my giveaways! Just leave me a comment anytime today through Saturday and I'll draw a name or do the random.org thing or something and pick a winner and post it sometime on Sunday!

How does that sound? Don't forget to leave a comment so your name can be entered to win!

tomorrow is the big day

Well, I can't believe I've been blogging for almost a year.

But I have. And tomorrow is the big day!

My little bloggy's first birthday!

I know some people thing of it as an anniversary, but I don't feel married to my blog. But I did give birth to it.

And try to nurture it and take good care of it.

Ok...it's not a plant, but you get the idea.

Come back and visit tomorrow for a bit of a stroll down memory lane and a little giveaway too.

See ya!

you know it's bad when it's worse than that

I had 'fun' today. Let me set the stage. I'm at the doctors office.

Flat on my back. I'm not exactly relaxed.

Like I can relax when she's doing that!

But the fact that I couldn't relax wasn't helping and she was having trouble seeing what she needed to see.

And it's not what you're thinking either!

I was at the dentist!!! I like my dentist.

I like her a lot. But she's doing a new screening.

It sounded like a good idea so I went on ahead with it.

I was not a happy girl.

I found out I have a very strong tongue and it doesn't like to be pushed out of the way so a light can be shoved what feels like all the way down my throat.

Imagine that!

A defense mechanism to being choked gagged while flat on my back. Who knew!

I sat up after it was finally over and thought to myself....

this is worse than a trip to the gyn!

My girlie doctor will be so proud.

She's moving up!

busy week and a little something yummy

We had a busy week during spring break. That's why you didn't see much of me. We also celebrated a birthday (a couple of times). And had some cump-ny too. The IL's visited and we had a wonderful visit. I took them out to eat for lunches on Thursday and Friday. And we also enjoyed a little bit of local fun. We went to a fun factory that has tours. And on Friday, they took Boo to the mall to walk around. She enjoyed some one on one time with them. And I took the afternoon to do some important stuff like reading some blogs folding clothes.

I also made big dinners Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights. Well kinda anyway. Wednesday I made turkey burgers. It's not exactly a big meal, but it makes six patties and I didn't have to freeze the extras like I do when I make it for 'just us'. And Friday night I made roasted chicken and veggies with rice. It was all very good. Oh yes.. and birthday cake.

And Thursday night I just made a roast. Well...not just a roast. But the best roast ever! There's a story behind The. Best. Roast. Ever. One day early in my married life, I was visiting a friend. She and I would hang out all day sometimes in her kitchen while she did this or that.. or worked on a craft project or something. It was a fun time for us and sometimes I don't know if we realized it or not. Anyway... one day I was over there and after a while I mentioned I was beginning to get hungry. Now this girl has always been sort of the grandmotherly type, or maybe she's just a good southern girl, because she always had a little something on hand if the munchies set in. So she proceeded to tell me my 'options' from her freezer. And one of them was roast. I kinda just sat there. Roast??? Well. ok. I guess.

I had eaten my fair share of roast growing up and I was not too impressed with it, to tell you the truth. The gravy was always kinda watery and the meat wasn't always tender and it was a bit of a hassle to make. So when she said roast, it didn't conjure up the best images.

But my options were few that day. So I decided I would have to could handle the roast. Well, I was pleasantly surprised. I couldn't stop raving about this roast! And of course, asked her how to make it. Because if roast could taste like that, then I wanted a piece of that action for myself! To my delight, the recipe isn't hard at all. And *gasp*...I can make it in the crock pot. Love. It!

Now that you're probably slobbering all over the keyboard, I'll tell you how it's done! : )


These are the two key ingredients! Tony's Creole Seasoning and

two pouches of McCormick's brown gravy mix. That's it.

Well, except for the roast and potatoes, that is! You put the roast in the crock pot.

I trim the meat of the weird layer of fat on the bottom of the roast.

I didn't do that in my younger days. But I do now. And

if it's a big roast, it might be a good idea to cut it in half

because of cooking it in the crock pot and core temperatures

and the 'danger zone' and all that junk.

Anyhoo...

You put the roast in and sprinkle some Tony's on it. If you're more liberal

with it, the whole thing will have more zip, since this is a spicy seasoning.

But also keep in mind, it's mostly salt. So... use it accordingly.

I tend to do a light sprinkle and it just adds that little something

special without fire shooting off anybody's tongue or anything.

Then you cut up some potatoes and put them around the roast. After that you mix up the gravy mixes with water in a shaker container (or put it in a measuring cup and stir with a fork to get out most of the clumps etc) and pour it over the meat and potatoes. I then refill the container with water and pour over it all until the gravy just about covers most of the stuff in the crock pot. I know this runs against all the crock pot wisdom that's out there about not needing to add liquids bla bla bla. But hello..you're making dinner and gravy too! Put it on high for a little while to kick start the cooking and then turn it to low 'all day'... or 8 or so hours.

Here's what I do when it's time to eat. I take out the meat and potatoes and put them in a dish and cover them with foil to keep them warm and let the meat 'rest'. Then ladle some of the gravy into a sauce pan and start bringing it to a boil. While that's happening, I take some cornstarch and water and mix that together... probably about 1 1/2 tablespoons of each...I'm just guessing...and pour that into the gravy and stir with a whisk. It will thicken up pretty quickly.

I usually make dinner rolls to take advantage of the deee-lish gravy. And a salad or steamed broccoli is nice to go along side. Gather the fam. Your dinner is ready!

Can I come over?