Wine Tasting

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Yesterday my sister and I went wine tasting in Penn Valley, California!

It was so much fun! We had such a good time getting away together and getting to taste free wine.

I was so excited because this is something that California is known for, so it is something that I wanted to experience when I came to visit.

We had such a good time...we are already talking about taking a Napa Valley Tour next time I come to California (preferably in the summer time).

At the first place we went to, they treated us so nicely. They gave us a taste of a white wine in their tasting room then gave us a plate with a little bowl of soup and bread and sent us back to their storage room where they had it all set up for tasting.

It was so nice and ALL FREE!

Some of the vines there

Barrels of wine.

The wine tasting set up

Me enjoying my wine very much!

After tasting 8 glasses of wine (which they were very generous with), we also got to taste two dessert wines with a homemade dessert that was YUMMY!

After the first place we went to a second winery...with a little bit of a different set up but equally as good.

It was all such a good time! I definitely want to do it again and take my husband with me! Meguell would love it!

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Travel

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TODAY

1:30pm-leave work

2:00pm-pick up boys from school and head straight to Dallas

5:00pm-arrive at DFW airport

6:45pm-board the airplane

7:15pm-take off from DFW to San Francisco

9:00pm-arrive in California for the first time EVER!

I cannot wait to land in Cali....to get there and see Cass, Nate, & Noah waiting on me!

I hope Noah is awake and happy!

I can't wait to hold that little one!

It is hard to believe that I have only seen him three times ever in his lifetime!

I hate that!

But I love that my sister has made it so easy to feel so connected to him.

I just hate that I am not there to see him grow up.

For the most part I was and still am there watching my brother's three kids grow up, but I feel like I am missing a lot of Noah's life!

But I am so grateful for these times that I can go visit them!

And I still hold on to the dream and desire of my heart that I will one day live in the same city as my sister and get to be REAL face-to-face best friends with her!

Our plans for the week I am there:

Nov. 22nd-arrive in San Francisco, get food, go to hotel

Nov. 23rd-spend the day exploring San Francisco, specifically seeing

-The Golden Gate Bridge

-The "Full House" house (2 miles from our hotel)

-Going to Fisherman's Wharf...probably eating there

-Going to China Town

Nov. 24th-THANKSGIVING...I get to cook thanksgiving with my sister for the first time EVER! Nov. 25th-Nate & Meguell go skiing, We take the boys to a small town near by for a winter festival, shopping, and wine tasting

Nov. 26th-leave Noah with Unky Guell...me and Cass are going wine tasting at a vineyard/winery!

Nov. 27th-Church...work on Noah's room and other home projects

Nov. 28th-do whatever we want....work on home craft projects

Nov. 29th....well we won't talk about that! :-(

All in all this will be a wonderful trip! I hope fun and restful at the same time!

It will be restful just getting to spend time with my sister.

To stay up late and chat about life.

To learn fun cooking stuff from her so that I can be better at cooking for my family.

To share my craft ideas for her house and do those together.

To wake up with Noah & let him sleep with us!

I can't wait!

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Tribute to the Fall Season

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Although my house officially turned into wintery Christmas season this weekend, I wanted to post my last Fall Creations before we passed up Thanksgiving. (We went ahead and transformed our home this weekend because we will be spending Thanksgiving in California, so it seemed only right to come home to a winter wonderland :-)

So I feel like a real craft blogger now....because this post is about a craft party that I had...and I know those professional bloggers have those all the time with people!

So here is what we did. For my discipleship group last week we just hung out and did crafts together. These were fun for us but were also used for our Life Group Thanksgiving Dinner decorations. They turned out awesome and it was so much fun to see our crafts hung for everyone to enjoy!

We made Leaf Garland----out of real leaves!

First we all brought leaves that we picked that day off of some pretty Fall colored trees! Aren't the colors wonderful!

Then we bought a box of non-scented wax from Hobby Lobby. I'm sure you could use scented wax...I've even heard of this being done by using old candles that you can't light anymore. We melted our wax in a tin coffee can so we didn't have to mess up a pan.

After the wax melted we all took turns dipping the leaves in wax. You dip them twice to make sure they are covered well...then we laid them out to dry on wax paper. It was so cool to see the texture of the wax on the leaves.

Here is all of our wax dipped leaves...see the color stays great! They are so vibrant and pretty....now for stringing the leaves together.

This part was easy....we each took a needle and thread and began weaving it through the leaves. It was crazy to see how flexible the leaves were because of the wax. After stringing a ton of leaves on, to make it more fun when hanging them, we sewed pretty ribbon onto each end. This in my opinion made it easier to hang and more sturdy when hanging.

They turned out so pretty! We each made our own strand so we had four strands hanging at our party.

FYI....the colors began to fade a week later though, so it doesn't totally preserve them, but it did the job that we needed them to. Plus mine is now hung in my office, and although it is not as vibrant, it still has color and looks great! (And it was not as messy as it might seem--it was very easy)

Just wanted to add this fun photo! We had a worship night outside around fires last night....these awesome owl cupcakes were made by my friend Brittney Marshall! She is so great at remaking pinterest cupcakes :-) The inside of these were vibrant rainbow colors! And they tasted AWESOME!

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Traveling

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Meguell and I are so excited about next week.

On Tuesday we will be leaving Abilene and traveling from Dallas to San Francisco to spend the holiday with my sister, brother-n-law and sweet nephew!

I cannot wait! It is going to be such a sweet time to spend with my sister. And so much fun to cook Thanksgiving dinner with her.

Plus I just love the feeling I get when I am traveling.

It is so fun to clean your house, pack your bags, and head out for a nice little vaca!

Just the excitement of traveling is so fun to me.

Of getting to wake up to a day of adventure in a new place.

With no work or priorities...

you can sleep in if you want, or read a book while you enjoy morning coffee with no rush to do anything or be anywhere!

O and I just love flying!

It is just going to be an all around wonderful week!

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Thanksgiving Post

Well it's still considered Fall....and Thanksgiving is coming soon. So I wanted to share the few Thanksgiving-Fall crafts I have done in my home before I move right on in with all my wonderful Christmas decorations!

First, I made this wreath from this Pinterest post. (Once again this picture is taken with my phone and you can't see all the details well)

For this wreath, I just got a cheap wreath form from the Dollar tree and the small spools of tulle from Hobby Lobby and picked up a small branch of Fall colored berries. It was a little time consuming but I KNEW I really wanted to make this, so I kept at it. I sat down to do it probably 4 times before I finished it because you have to cut all the strands of tulle and tie each of them.

I also added some golden/glittery tulle strips throughout! (once again sorry you can't see it) and the leaves are hard covered in glitter leaves I had last year that I thought would go perfectly!

I also bought a SMALL strip of orange burlap when I was at Hobby Lobby once. There was barely any left so I grabbed the rest on the roll for only $0.99. And this is what I decided to do with it really quickly and easy!

It looked very cute by my little pumpkin.

And now this is my Thanksgiving mantel. I made the banner the other day with some scrap pieces of felt, and it ended up kind of cute. A little childish but I think I like it. I also made the leaf frame. You can't tell in this photo but it has a book page behind it so it's really neat.

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It's been a while....

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It's Been A While....is the name of a 2001 hit song by Staind...also a song that my brother liked.

TODAY....

It's been a while is the title of my blog, because

It's been a while since I have seen my BROTHER!

I cannot believe that in just a few more weeks it will have been 2 YEARS!!! since I have seen my big brother !

That completely blows my mind!

I hate that I have to MISS him!

I hate that he is gone!

I still remember the last hug I gave him and the last words I said to him.

I still remember his laugh, and his silly voices.

I hate that he will not be an uncle to my kids one day!

I hate that I will not get to celebrate Christmas with him, one of his favorite holidays....this year or any other year in my lifetime!

I hold on to the memories that I do have of him!

I know my brother was not a perfect person, but I looked up to my brother so much!

My brother was always there for me and my sister!

Even though he beat us up when we were little.....he would beat any person up now who messed with us!

I trusted him!

He took care of me!

He loved me and adored me as his little sister!

I remember one of the things I looked forward to most for my wedding day....LITERALLY....was what sweet words my brother would say to me!

He was so sweet to me!

He cared about me!

And.....I didn't get to hear what he would have said....but in my heart of hearts....I KNOW!

I miss him, and it's been WAY TOO LONG since I have seen MY Big Brother.

On December 3rd 2011....it will be two years since MY BROTHER lived on this earth....

It will be 2 YEARS since the DADDY of three sweet little kids lived on this earth.....

It will be 2 years since MY MOM got to see her SON....and it will also be two years since the last time she held HER SON!

It's been a while......

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