Hello again, we have been in the deep freeze here, and we are not used to it.  Usually only a few days a year that are this cold, but we have had a couple of weeks below freezing and below zero a few nights. I don't care for it.  Paul said in Philippians 4:11, "I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content"  I still have some work to do to get to this perspective.

The malinois is as crazy as ever.  He has been sleeping inside at night with the temperatures being so cold.  I am not sure it is necessary with his thick coat, but I hate to think of him being cold, so he sleeps in the living room and I sleep on the couch, because the Tasmanian devil cannot be left alone in the house at all, and in the bedroom he will not be calm, he is "on guard" all the time, meaning everything MUST be checked out, there is no laying down and being quiet. He is more familiar with the living room, so he can relax in there some.

He has also finally learned to use his dog house outside.  We had guessed that he would not use it because he could not see out of it and was afraid something would sneak up on him, but it got really windy one night and he decided he could use the dog house and has used it regularly since.  The first morning I came out and he was in there, he looked like he had let me down, he was so ashamed I had caught him sleeping and not watching; he is a very interesting animal to say the least.

Below is a birthday card I made for my DIL, I cut a large tag out of brown textured card stock and put a piece of paper I had ripped out of an encyclopedia about Rudyard Kipling, (she is an English/Literature teacher).  I cut a little smaller tag out of off white textured card stock and distressed the edges of it with Tim Holtz distress inks, not sure what color.  Used the sketch pen in a bronze color to write on that card.  I cut one even small out of the same brown card stock and used the silver sketch pen to write on it.  Decorated it all and pined it together with a butterfly paper clip and some various embellishments. I believe the tag shape came from here.

This was a candle holder that I purchased at Hobby Lobby on sale half off, it was originally made to hang vertically.  To make a wedding gift,  I took the hardware off the mirror back and turned it horizontal and etched the couple's last name on it, I then added the wedding date and a part of Scripture "Love never fails" to the front and cut the couple's first names out of vinyl in a fancier font and placed it on a diagonal over the etched last name.  The couple seemed happy to have a personalized gift.

This is the card I made for the wedding couple.  I did not upload pictures of each page, but I used the same paper throughout, and then I printed the text I wanted on vellum paper and attached that next to each letter in the free space.  On each page is a Scripture about marriage and my personal sentiment was on the last page, next to the "S". I used various embellishments throughout and cut the butterfly on the front from a file I got free here .  The original tutorial for the card idea is here.  I just added the letters of the last name, using the same principles found in the tutorial, and I added them all to the last page, the "S" page. I will try to come back and upload a couple pictures of the pages so it will be a little more clear. 

The holidays have passed.  Boy was it busy, but it was a great year. The Sunday between Christmas and New Years last year, 2012, we received a call from our older son.  He was very upset, his wife had just told him she thought she was pregnant.  They had talked about names and the prospect of having a baby, and he had gotten in the shower.  When he got out of the shower, she was showing signs of miscarriage.  He called and said that he hadn't wanted to tell us this way, but they thought they were expecting and now might be having a miscarriage.  We decided a trip to the urgent care was in order.  We needed to see what was going on.  Urgent care sent them to the ER, we met them there.  After hours of waiting and testing, the diagnosis was that not only was there a heartbeat, there were two heartbeats.  Our daughter-in-law was carrying twins.  We were all elated.

In August, two healthy bouncing baby boys arrived, she carried them 38 weeks, they weighed 7 pounds 9 ounces, and 7 pounds 12 ounces; and they are gorgeous:)  We cannot express how thankful we are to God to have them here and what a blessing they are to us.

So Christmas this year was very special, we had little blessings to enjoy.  Forty years and one week before Christmas 2013, my mom delivered twin boys, Eric and Derrick; one was still born and the other died a few minutes after delivery.  I was very young at the time, so I didn't understand, and I still don't know if there was any explanation as to what happened to them.  This year, for Christmas, my family had 5 month old twin boys in our home. It has been an emotional roller coaster for my mother.  The delivery was frightening for her, and the first time she held them, she felt like she had waited 40 years to hold those precious boys.
God does truly work in mysterious ways, but we must try to trust in His plan and His purpose.

I did do some projects for Christmas; different night lights for my great nieces and nephews, and a special Elvis one for my friend, who is an Elvis fan.  The ones with the clear lights are a lot easier to read in the photos than the red lights, but in real life they are equally easy to read.  The "frosted" ones, I made a template out of vinyl and placed the template on the glass block, then I ran the glass blocks through a bead blaster to get the heavy frosted look.  The trick is to not lose any vinyl letters in the blaster, which I did on one block, it is missing a letter. There are a few at the bottom that still have the vinyl on them, for those of you who, like me, are creatively challenged and need to see it to grasp it.

 Psalm 139:14 "I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made"

"Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; Save me and I shall be saved, for You are my praise."  Jeremiah 17:14.  This little girl struggles with brittle bone disease, she has had 16 broken bones in her three years of life, so this was a  very special verse just for her.

"Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9b

"I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength." Philippians 4:13

 "Whatever I will become will be what God has chosen for me"  This is a quote by Elvis at some time in his life.  I did a search for his signature, took the signature image into the Silhouette software and did a trace on it, then edited the points until it looked like the original image, and cut the signature out of Vinyl.  For this block I also added a re recordable, push button, sound chip that I purchased here and recorded a 90 second clip of "Kentucky Rain", my friend's favorite Elvis song.  That was really fun to add the sound clip to it, I attached the device to the side of the block and tied piece of black tulle around the outside of the block to cover the device.  Turned out pretty good, the picture is before the black tulle was added.

"God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." 2 Timothy 1:7  (This is the one missing a letter, an "o")

This is the block with the vinyl template attached, before it was put in the bead blaster.

These are the results after it has been blasted and the vinyl removed and the lights added.



"His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace"  Isaiah 9:6b






 Well that is about if or now, I have been making tag cards of late and will try to get a post up with pictures of those soon.