Update at the Williams' House

 

A lot has happened here since I last blogged. The end of my school year was awesome!! I especially treasure my time with my family! I love this picture of me and girls at the Mother's Day Tea at their church. 

I also like this picture because it shows a pretty accurate picture of my teeth! That's right...my teeth. In May I noticed that my 2 small baby teeth were feeling loose (you heard that right...I still have baby teeth)!! My dentist recommended we do some ortho in preparation for my bridges in December. So...on the first Monday of summer I got braces!!

 

It has been quite the adjustment! I only have them on the top teeth but it is still tricky learning how to eat with braces. I am thankful they are for short term! 

The next big thing we have been up to is giving our house a facelift. We started by ordering shutters and windowboxes. 

They came white in color and so I had to decide what color to use as an accent. We had just repainted the foundation to a color called "Resort Tan" by Sherwin Williams. I decided to paint the shutters and flowerboxes the same color.

 

They took two coats of paint but I was very happy with how they turned out. But I thought they didn't match the front door very well. So we painted the front door a fun color!

We chose Drizzle by Sherwin Williams for our door color. I am very happy with how they turned out! 

I had a lot of fun filling my flower boxes with new flowers! The people at Earl May gave me great suggestions. They said to use a thriller (tall one), filler (bushy type one that will grow side to side), and a spiller (one that comes over the edge). I think they turned out great!

 

Summer also means it is time for car shows! This year we left super early at 4 AM to get a spot on Grand at the Good Guys car show in Des Moines. It was worth it but boy I was tired!!

Summertime also means more time to try new recipes. Tonight I made homemade Breakfast pizza. It was delicious!! Hopefully my next post won't be six months from now!

Spring has sprung...I think

Well a couple months have passed since I blogged and a lot has happened in the Williams' household! Here is a recap of the big happenings at our house!

1. Arizona

In January we headed to sunny Arizona to go to the Barrett Jackson Car Auction with Jeff's cousin Curt and his wife Kris. It was so nice to feel the sunshine and warmer temps!

One of the highlights of the trip for me was having another Holiday Starbucks! When we stopped one morning at Starbucks they still had all the holiday flavors. Maybe the warm temps make the holiday flavors less popular there! This morning I had an egg nog latte...so yummy!

Here we are at the car show. It was such a cool experience to be with Jeff at his 9th Barrett Jackson Car Auction. There were really cool cars there! I really enjoyed it! We also stayed one night with Jeff's aunt Mary Ann. We went out for Mexican and had a wonderful night!! It was great seeing her!

2. Losing Bailey

February brought one of the hardest months of our life. We realized that Bailey was struggling keeping food down and we thought maybe we needed to adjust her diet. After having her bloodwork done we realized her kidneys were shutting down. it was absolutely heartbreaking to face the fact that we were going to lose our dog. We decided to give Bailey an IV to help her kidneys work. This treatment gave us another 10 days with her and we think helped her to feel less toxic as her kidneys shut down. We slept at the farm on an air mattress for a week while we gave her the treatments. It was so emotional!

She was such an amazing patient and did everything we asked. It is so hard to believe she is gone. We miss her everyday. We loved her so much!! We got new license plates for Old Yeller to honor our pookie!

3. Florida Getaway

At the first part of March we took a quick weekend getaway to Florida. We went to Universal and Downtown Disney. Jeff's parents and sister's family were there too. It was so fun to hang out together!!

4. Entertaining

Now that we have a new dining room table I have been excited to have people over for parties! I have hosted 2 so far this year! My first party was a Valentine's brunch for some girlfriends!

I tried a new recipe which was Panera Spinach Artichoke Egg Souffles...they turned out great. With the souffle I made strawberry/donut hole kabobs. I also made a yummy strawberry smoothie for the drink! We sat and chatted for a couple of hours and it was awesome! I absolutely love having girlfriends over and I love brunch!! Win Win!!

My second party was a birthday party for Evie, Jeff and Mom. Evie and Jeff both turned 35 and Mom turned 67. Jeff smoked a prime rib that was to die for. I made twice baked potatoes and corn. Mom brought salad and Evie made rolls and dessert! It was a wonderful night. I love having my family in my home too!!

That gets us about caught up! Now come on Spring and get here!! 

Our Living Room Remodel

Before the remodel...

 Jeff bought our home in 2002. He remodeled most of the house and created a beautiful home.

Last year when we were married I moved in and added some of my girly touches...but just couldn't decide how I wanted to decorate. 

 

One day when we were talking Jeff and I discussed the idea of taking out the wall between our living room and the front porch which we never used. 

 

So we decided to move forward with our remodel.

Jeff did most of the demo to the front porch. We discovered there wasn't any insulation in the walls which was why it was always so cold out there. 

 

While Jeff and our contractor worked on the wiring, insulating, and dry-walling the new front room I was picking out paint colors. 

I ended up choosing the dark brown color in this picture for our new front door. The color is from Sherwin Williams called Windsor Greige.  I didn't end up using the navy, yellow, or turquoise but that officially became my color palette.

 

Bailey was such a trooper through the whole remodel. Since she is blind we were nervous about the change in the room but she has adjusted beautifully!

Once the wall was out and the new door was installed Jeff painted all the new trim white.

 

We kept our furniture in the same spots until the new room was complete hopefully making the transition easier for Bailey.

Jeff's mom came and painted the front room one day before we got home. It was a huge help! The front door is full strength Windsor Greige. The walls in the front room are 50% strength of that same color. In the current living space we painted the walls 25% strength of Windsor Greige. I think using the same color throughout really tied things together.

 

You can see that Bailey really got used to the furniture in new spots once we moved everything. This is the best picture I have of the new space. We have two larger ottomans that we use in front of the couch for Bailey to sleep on. When you come to visit those are usually put away.

 

We had two big furniture purchases. One is this new table and chairs from Pier 1. I really wanted a round table since we have a small space. It does extend to an oval which will be nice for bigger groups. 

My favorite purchase is probably our Turquoise Media Credenza. Jeff got a new tv (which I love) and I got this adorable TV stand. I love it because it holds all our components and baskets for blankets and books.

We feel so excited to share this new space with all our friends and family! Please come visit soon!!!

Do daily devotions really make a difference?

This summer I had an interesting conversation with my friend Chelsey about faith. We shared our concern about why it is difficult to take time each day to spend with the Lord. We also talked about how sometimes we just feel so far from God. We began to ask why and discuss if those two concerns are connected??

So on a long truck ride home from a car show with Jeff I started to talk with him about doing an experiment. What if I asked Christian women in my life to be part of a 60 day - 2 phase study that would try to answer these questions.

PHASE 1

Women in the survey would get a daily survey like this to answer. They would simply answer how they would describe their "cup of faith". It also allowed room to describe more about their day. 

After Phase 1 some women shared that this process of reflecting on their faith each day helped to keep God more in mind each day. But I was excited to start Phase 2.

PHASE 2

I was most excited to see how Phase 2 would change the women's daily cup of faith surveys. For the next 30 days I sent a daily devotion in the morning for the women to read. The devotion had 3 parts.

First was the Scripture of the Day:

Second was the actual devotion for the day. I used various devotionals online, personal experiences, and devotional books to write the daily devotion. 

Third was the Focus Point of the day.  It usually included a question and an action step.

I asked the women to try to read these devotions within 1 hour of waking up. I thought this might set the tone for the day.

At the end of the day I sent the daily survey. For this phase I also asked the women to share thoughts on the morning devotion.

RESULTS

So...what did we learn?

 

52% of the participants described their "cup of faith" as much more full after the 60 days

 

29% of women described their "cup of faith" as quite a bit more full after the 60 days.  

 

93% of women felt like a daily reflection on their faith affected their faith walk quite a bit or greatly

 

78% of women felt like the daily devotions affected their faith walk quite a bit or greatly

Planning our meals

Every Sunday night you will usually find me sitting on the couch creating our menu for the week. This system has worked well for me over the past 9 months or so.  Here is what I usually do...

First I look at the Fareway ad for the week. If anything catches my eye I try to use those items in my menu for the week.



Second, I start a word document with the days of the week at the top of the page and space for my grocery list below.



Third, I mark off any nights of the week I know we won't be home or we have plans that might lead me to choose a quick meal or a night it might be best to have a crockpot meal.

Fourth, I ask Jeff is there is anything he is craving. Usually I have a craving for a certain type of food like Mexican or Italian. I try to work those in first. I have found that choosing meals that sound good to us help us to not eat out as often. We actually look forward to what we have planned for the week!

Fifth, I start filling in some of our staple recipes that I can think of. I usually end up with two or three nights open.

Sixth, I head to Pinterest to find a new recipe to try. I usually search by the meat we have in the freezer or what is on sale at Fareway. These helps me narrow down the search that can be very overwhelming!

Once I have filled in the menu at the top of the word document I start my grocery list. I look at each recipe and quickly type the items I don't have in the fridge or pantry. Sometimes I type them down and put a question mark next to it if I am not sure. It is better to just get everything written down before I go check, otherwise I get distracted by other things!! :)

If my grocery list isn't too long I will add a "Sweet Treat" recipe to the list. I love to try new recipes for cookies, breads, etc. but I only add those items to the grocery list if I think I will actually have time to make the recipe or if I think I am not going to go over my budget for the week.

I also add those weekly items that are staples for our family like things we like to pack in our lunch (String cheese, pudding, pop, etc)

I try to type the items in groups on the word document by area of the grocery store. I am not always correct but being close helps.

Last I write my menu up on our chalkboard. This helps Jeff and I both to remember what's for dinner and usually one of us will remember to lay out the meat we might need that night for dinner. That really helps me when it comes time to cook!!

So...that's how I do it!! Here is a look at what we are going to have this week! I have linked the recipes that are online!

Monday – Little Cheddar Meatloaves and Baked Potatoes

Tuesday – Meatball Subs and Fries

Wednesday – Burgers on the Traeger Smoker

Thursday – Small Group (no meal)

Friday – Chicken Fried Rice

Saturday – Manwiches and Coleslaw or EAT OUT

Sunday – Chili and Cornbread

Monday – Eggs and Bacon

Either Jeff or I usually pick up groceries on Mondays so I usually plan one week out. I have the ingredients at home for the Monday night I get groceries so that I am ready to go the night I have to pick up groceries. The other factor I include is making sure I have enough for our lunches the next day. I try to make something good for lunches on Sunday night so we have food to take to work the next day or two. Friday and Saturday nights are better for things like steak which aren't quite as good as leftovers. 

Hope this was helpful or at least interesting! :)