Trees

I just hung brown curtains in a green room.  I'll take a photo and show you sometime,  But that's just paint and fabric.  As far back as I can remember I have loved trees. I climbed them, fell out of them, sat in them and  under them.  I used to stand at the edge of the pine woods behind our house even in the elementary grades and look up at the trees.  I was fascinated and terrified as wind blew them into each other making huge cracking sounds.  I used to lay back in the leaves and listen the million "crinkles and crunches" as my body settled into the pile.  When I was in middle school I memorized "Trees" by Joyce Kilmer. When we were deciding where to go for a visit, my Gracie asked, "...but does it have trees?" Praise our Father who is so bountiful as to provide us with trees.

Love, Carra

Trees by Joyce Kilmer

I THINK that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,	5
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.	10
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

 

Scrabbo (uno & scrabble)

So my family (sister, cousins, dad) invented a new game on Christmas day. We had to leave early so I missed this creative experience. So here it is New Year's Day. My family came up to visit and right now we are playing "Scrabbo."

Highlight:
Horrible racks of all vowels.
Just when you strategize the next word, you have to pass the rack to the person on your left.
Just when you can do nothing at all, you receive a rack of worse letters!

This is a hilarious game. Wanna play? All you need is a Scrabble game and a set of Uno cards.

Begin Scrabble like normal (7 tiles each). After each turn, the individual picks up an uno card to tell how many tiles they get.
* red - 1 tile
* yellow - 2 tiles
* green - 3 tiles
* blue - 4 tiles

Yes, that means that after the first round, everyone has different numbers of tiles. But regardless of number of tile, if a person uses all of their letters on one round they get 50 extra points.

The coolest part are the crazy "other" cards.
Wild- get to place a word anywhere on the board on a subsequent turn.
Wild, draw 4 - pick 4 tiles and place a word anywhere.
Draw Two - give back 2 tiles
Reverse - hand over your entire rack one person clockwise.
When one person runs out of letters, the game is over & scores should be added up. Hilarious!!! You should try it!

Happy New Year!!
Love, Carra

I don't wanna know, wait - yeah I do..

So I was innocently reading a yummy sounding healthy hamburger cheese dip and read one tiny little line......

Oh dear, so many (most?) crock pots; have lead in the ceramic???  I'm in the process of checking into this and seeing what are the options.  Argh.  Right this very minute I have a yummy local chicken slow cooking in my crock pot on my counter.

Really?  Sometimes I wish I didn't pursue things.  But I want to do all I can to provide a safe home for me and my family.  So, what about my crock pot?  I'll let you know.

Love, Carra

I (heart) green juice 3.0

So on Wednesday, our little guy will turn ONE! I can hardly believe how fast the time has flown by. For his birthday week, two things are happening...

1. He will be receiving a more masculine/gender-neutral room color. We went ahead and put the girls back together to share a room, and Zade has moved into Faith's old room. The color of her room is called "queen anne's lace." Not a bright pink, a subtle, gentle pink, ...but pink. So Pete can no longer stand it, I'm finding it inhibiting for decorating, and we have a smidgen of space between the encounter winter conference (beginning tues) and the beginning of the spring semester. Colors? Green (leftover from the kitchen) and possibly one cream wall. All his furniture is black (see previous crazy furniture painting post).

2. He got introduced to "green juice." Dr. Ben Kim's Greens, mixed with vitamin C and diatomeceous earth (that's a whole other post). No juice, just gritty thick vitaminy water....and you can see... he loved it!!!

Hope you had a Merry Christmas!
Love, Carra