The good news for you is that I managed to get some pictures! Not of Livvy with the doggies, unfortunately, they were all moving too fast! But I tried to get a few portrait shots of the doggies, a tough venture indeed! What’s funny is while I was desperately trying to get Cricket’s attention for the camera to capture his face, Mozart suddenly started posing beautifully! Here is his typical greeting face:

Isn’t he CUTE?!? If you want to pet him, feel free!

Once again, while I was chasing down his rambunctious brother, Mozart simply sat and posed! It was hysterical! Look at this dog!

A sideshot. See the decorative blue bone on the back of his sweater?

Can’t you just see his little personality? (Pardon the diaper…)

Finally! Once Cricket saw Mozart posing for the camera, he decided to give it a try! (For a much shorter time, though) He made a cute pose for about 5 seconds, but the picture quality isn’t so hot. My apologies on behalf of the Morkie and Kodak.

Oooo, this is what I was looking for! Here’s Cricket Bug’s personality (notice the tongue):

Trying again; fail. Oh, how he LOVES to dance at the little gate. Oh well, at least you get a good view of his tongue. Wait, it seems he’s looking straight at my finger… what’s so tasty about my bony little finger?!?

Ever-hyper-active-has-no-idea-what-hes-doing-boy sniffing at the black box of goodies! (No doggie food in there, bud.)

There ya have it! You have to admit the sweaters made them SOOO much cuter! I do so love my Morkies. Though Livvy will tell you, “Whoa, dey stink!”

1. Open your Picture Folder. It can be on your computer, or some online venue. Choose the sixth folder, and open it.

2. Now, select your sixth picture. Post it on your blog and tell a story about the picture!

Here’s the picture:

Ya, that’s me. Goofing off in the corn crib at the Corn Maize in… oh my gosh I don’t remember!!! Maybe it was Oneida? So if you were there that day and you saw this band of weirdos in hoodies laughing, talking, jumping, making faces, and doing all the other normal stuff that weird people do– that was us! And we had a good time! As you can see.

At any rate, THE STORY. When we first came and walked the grounds before walking the maze, we saw this cartoon-looking barn-thingy that had a cute “Crazy Corn Crib!” sign in front. Of course, it was with the sandpile, Tonka trucks, and toddlers’ maze, so we figured it was another little kid thing. But after we had done the maze and everything else around the place and needed an excuse to stay a little longer (well, and Mom needed more pictures. Not sure why, I edited them all and there were like more than 100!).

So we did everything we could, and finally checked out the corn crib. “Oo! A big barn filled with corn kernels!” You walk through, sink in the corn kernels like you would in those cages filled with balls at McDonalds. The sign said “Take your shoes off!” so being the law-abiding citizens that we are, we did. Well, my sister and I. The boys didn’t want to; looked… pretty silly. But my sister and I are brave enough to look silly all by ourselves, so we jumped in and posed “corny” poses for Mom’s camera, and this is one of them. I think I was pretending I was in “corn heaven,” laying in corn and eating it. Actually, it did smell pretty good! Considering hundreds of little children and maybe crazy teenagers had walked around in it with their socks and sweaty feet… So I didn’t eat it. But there was also the cutest little girl in there and she loved my sister and she didn’t say anything, she just giggled!

So there’s the picture and there’s the story! Thanks, Mom, for meming me! Now EVERYBODY can know how crazy I am! And if they knew already, here’s to refresh their memory!

Well, I did, and I never uploaded or posted them. TOO much has been happening this year. Sorry, folks, but finally, here they are! Maybe this will help you remember what spring looked like.

Here is our garden, from a distant view. What I attempted to do hereafter was get closeups of the things that don’t immediately meet the eye.

Here are the blue violets that covered the grass.

The arbor from “below”

These cute little flowers also carpet the ground in some areas; they’re so lush!

A flower that we planted on purpose: golden daffodil. Isn’t it perfect?

Bleeding hearts; these are bright pink flowers that grow on a very hardy bushy plant

Grape hyacinth; according to my memory, these little things don’t have much of a fragrance, but they’re cute when they grow on the edge of the flower beds.

Periwinkle, also called Creeping Myrtle, which we planted as groundcover in the flowerbed, so that we don’t get overrun by weeds. Great stuff!

Mom loves these things! Great big radiant pink tulips!

This isn’t in the garden, but it was interesting. A stray Douglass fur tree was growing in a bed so we moved it. It struggled, but it survived after shedding it’s first year’s growth of needles, though the new needles remained! It looked like Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree.

Finally, what was actually a failed shot. I wanted to get this exact shot and perspective, but not to focus on the grass blades! I was trying to focus on the tall violet, but couldn’t see what I was shooting. So I got the grass. All the same, I think it’s a very interesting picture. I like the simple object in focus with the old-looking building in the background. (You’d probably never know it was our garage!)

So that’s it! Hope y’all had fun!

I guess my first subject is inevitable: our BEEEEEAUUtiful Siamese-point cat Livvy!!
Look at those eyes!

Never knew a cat could be so sweet, so personable, so curious, and so INNOCENT!!!!

Right now, this kind of thing is VERY VERY beautiful to me. I know it’s not what would usually come first on your list of things beautiful… but it’s a big part of my life right now.

Sheetrock. It’s almost done!!!

God puts such beauty in all of our lives; and in all these things He leads us to the most beautiful thing of all:

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)

But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)

Such a beautiful promise:

The LORD is gracious and full of compassion,
Slow to anger and great in mercy.
The LORD is good to all,
And His tender mercies are over all His works. (Psalm 145:8-9)

This sign is now on our refrigerator; I made it to remind me and all of us as well.

Thank You, Lord. Life is good now, not always tranquil, but where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. And You’ve blessed us so much even though we are clumsy and stupid. You make the rain to fall on the just and the unjust. You shower us with blessings, and for those who honor You, You give to them to the point of overflow!

Can’t wait for next week’s Something Beautiful! Hopefully by then we can show you our progress on our kitchen!!

Here’s what you will need:

Construction paper or some similar heavy-duty paper
Scissors
Ruler
Highlighter marker (if you’re smarter than me, you’ll use a light-colored one)
Glue stick
Scotch tape
Pencil
Colored pencils
Utility knife

1) Cut a 6 inch by 11 inch piece of construction paper. (TIP: Make a perfect rectangle by measuring and marking a 6 inch length at the top and bottom of your paper.)

2) Fold your construction paper, leaving about an inch of a lip at the top.

3) Measure and mark 1/2 inch off each side. (TIP: It is very important to be exact here, because this ultimately determines whether or not a CD will fit in your case!)

4) Cut ONLY along the marks, ONE layer of your paper, as shown below.

Here’s a better look:

5) At the lip, cut at outward angles to make a nice edge for your flaps.

6) Fold the side flaps over firmly and tightly.

7) With the gluestick, glue these flaps generously, especially at the edges. Fold immediately and press down tightly first with your finger and then with your ruler.

8 ) Allow to dry (fortunately, glue sticks dry quickly ) You may want to tape the bottom edges as extra support.

9) Fold the top lip over to make a flap.

10) With a pencil, trace a line in the center just below your top flap (when closed).

11) Draw a semi-circle over this line.

12) Cut ONLY the semi-circle pattern, down to a little bit below your straight pencil line. (TIP: I used a very sharp pocket-knife for this job, but I imagine a small-bladed utility knife might also work.)

13) Erase your pencil marks.

14) Decorate your case with colored pencils! (These I recommend because regular marker will bleed through, and crayon will get on your hands!)

So now you have just saved on buying CD cases, and you can decorate it as you so desire! (BTW, my amazing artist brother, The Brickster, decorated the cover you see above!)

CAUTION: These cases are not waterproof, so be careful not to get them wet.

Okay, I know it has been for some weeks, I just have not gotten around to uploading the pictures I took. Until now. Aren’t they cute?

I love this antique look. This is a 19th century cat’s eye view.

In color.

Violets. I love these cute little flowers!

And Livvy, in the evening, wanting to be out and about as spring is happening and everything is becoming alive! Classic shot, eh?

So there, I have done it. Spring in photos.

I won’t believe you!

But then I remembered that we were expecting about two feet of snow. Oh yeah. It was snowing pretty heavy outside; I don’t know if you can tell from the picture. At least all was quiet outside, except for the snow plows and the RUDE SNOW MOBILERS WHO DRIVE RIGHT PAST OUR HOUSE AT NIGHT. Maybe you can see their tracks here.

Sometimes I wake up and am shocked to see snow outside, then I remember, “Oh, yeah, it’s winter. Pooh.” Hee. Well, at least there is snow, not sleet or that HORRIBLE wet snow. Hee. Hee. Haha. WHOA! Alice is kinda LOOPY tonight. Like HARLEY. Have you ever visited this blog? It’s hilarious!

So if you have never seen snow, now you know what it looks like.

She is a blanky lover.

At night, she will come to our beds and meow at us to lift up the blankets so she can get underneath and get warm.

Since she was a little baby, she has LOVED the heating pad; the blanket that is always full of warmths!

At least she also keeps our laps warm.

Isn’t she adorable?!?

Anyway, I did get out and get some pictures of winter (a while ago); here’s one that describes how I feel right now:

Sunset; there goes our heat. Great reminder of our purpose, though, to walk in the light, to work now, while it is still day. There is really a lot we can learn from a sunset… but I’m getting philosophical…

And, I couldn’t close this post without sharing some great music. Y’all know how much I like Hillsong’s music. I just discovered the song “Devotion” from Hillsong United’s 2006 studio-recorded album, “All of the Above.” This song is a little different from most of their stuff; their songs focus a lot on adoration and declaration (in a word, worship), but this song is a meditation on Devotion; it is a prayer that comes from the depths of a believer’s heart. I loved it right away. And to my delight, I found it on tangle.com! Actually, this is “Devotion” and “Draw Me Close” from the same album.

I’ve been running, trying to be one who sees
I’ve been working salvation out on my knees.
There is nothing better than knowing that we are redeemed
I’m believing, trusting in creative hands
I am praying for our world to bow to Your plan
This one thought is unmistakable:
Take up my cross and follow You, Lord

When You stand, the tall trees and mountains bow
When You speak, the fiercest of oceans is still
And I see the sinner seek devotion
The lost become chosen
And I fall to my knees

I’m forgiven by a Savior who did not deserve death
He was blameless
And I was lost in shamefulness
I’m delivered but it doesn’t seem right
Unless I keep my eyes focused on the Savior who gave His life
In the middle of a world that denies it believes
it is breaking apart at the very seams
There is one thing to be alive for
And it’s to take up my cross and follow You, Lord

When You stand, the tall trees and mountains bow
When You speak, the fiercest of oceans is still
And I see the sinner seek devotion
The lost become chosen
And I fall to my knees

I will take up my cross and follow Lord where You lead me
I will take up my cross and follow wherever You go

I’ve found the place, caught in open arms
Where love’s embrace mends a broken heart
Here I will stay for all my days

Drawing closer, drawing closer

So that’s the stuff of a winter day; now I must go and prepare the dinner; chicken and rice… sounds good.