Celebrating the little reasons to be thankful

The little reasons to be thankful:

I came home tonight and ate the first meal cooked on the stove in our new home. My sweet husband cooked chicken breast and salad. It has taken a month to get to this point. The stove is still not completely up and running- we are waiting for additional parts- but one burner works, and my husband cooks, which are both good reasons to celebrate!


We also ordered the brick floor for our livingroom/kitchen today. It should be completely installed in two weeks. Which means, in two weeks, the furniture will come in from the garage and I can unpack.

... AND.....

The floor was less than what we had planned!

which means we can get something else for the house!! I have my eye on some blinds.

Every day there are more reasons to be thankful!

See who else is Thankful by clicking onto the picture above.

Live well Wednesday

At my weekly Weight Watchers meeting, I ran into someone I had known from the first go around. She knew I had made my goal weight, got pretty confident and left, gained 10 pounds and came back to again make my goal weight. Then again feeling pretty good about the whole thing, I left, only to return... can you see a pattern here? She saw one.

During this same time period, while I was leaving, going wild, running through the streets with Oreos in both hands, she had never left.

Why did it take me so long to learn that lesson?

I did however, lose another pound.

Read more from those choosing to live well by clicking onto the picture above.

Something to look forward to

The house we bought had been foreclosed upon, had sat empty for more than one year and was in bad shape. The more work we have done on the house, the more we have uncovered little things that makes me believe that at one time, someone loved this house.

For instance, someone planted some bulbs by the back patio.




and a couple more by the tree in the back yard.



Now, I have the pleasure of waiting until Spring to see exactly what they are.


And, there is a flower bed in the back yard that has long been forgotten.

I will be watching and wondering will anything come out of here this Spring?

Thankful Thursday

I am thankful for the women God has put into my life:

My mother in law let us move in with her for two weeks when we could not stay in our new house. She let us use the living room as our closet. She cooked a huge dinner each night, insisted on cleaning the kitchen by herself, washed all our clothes while I was at work each day and NEVER complained.

My cousin agreed to keep my cat, Sweetie, for one week while we moved. One month later, she is still keeping her, loving her, treating her very well, and has bonded with her so much that she re-named her Priscilla. She has even agreed to continue to keep Priscilla for a little while longer until our house is ready. This is just the latest in a very long list of loving and kind things that she has done for me.

My best friend since 5th grade is truly happy for every blessing that comes my way and is interested in all of the smallest details of my life. No matter what happens to either of us, we cant wait to call the other one and inform them-just like we did in Jr. high. I cant count the mornings we drive to work while talking on the phone- only to call each other again on the drive home. I did not realize how rare it is to have such a good friend, until her teenage daughter whined that she wished she had a best friend like we have.

My Weight Watcher leader that I take for granted. She is always friendly, always encouraging and always seems very happy to see me. She even remembered me when I came back after one year of being away, and was cheering the loudest after introducing me to the group.

Live well Wednesday

Another Wednesday.

Another meeting at Weight-Watchers.

Another .8 lost.

Another little victory to celebrate!

I credit the massive amount of painting I am doing. It must be the best kept secret in the world- painting burns a lot of calories. I will be in a pickle when I finally paint all the rooms in the house. I might have to start asking my friends to let me paint their rooms.

OR my birthday is coming...

maybe I'll finally get the "dancing with the stars" workout DVD.

On another food related note....

I had lunch today at Subway, as I often do, and just as I was about to order my usual- wheat bread- I saw the WHITE bread come fresh out of the oven.

It was so hot and steamy, the lady could hardly touch it to cut it in half. I immediately changed my order and that fresh hot bread was DELICIOUS.

Progress

Before




After




Its the little things that make me so happy..... Carpet on the front stairs!!

Mini Oreo Cheesecake (its Weight Watcher friendly)

I don't have a kitchen yet- I have to wait a few more days (weeks?) for everything to be up and running. But, if I did have an oven and cookware, I would have come home and made mini Oreo cheesecake. They are pretty easy to make and really tasty. Also, very weight watcher friendly.

My biggest tip is to buy a very small box of Oreo cookies- the kind they have at the Circle K/7-11/On the Run/ nicer gas station stores. They have 14 Oreos- just enough for this recipe and no more laying around the house tempting you.

Mini Oreo Cheesecakes

14 Oreo Cookies, reduced fat
16 ounces fat-free cream cheese
3/4 cup sugar or ½ cup Splenda
1 egg or 1/2 cup Egg Beaters® 99% egg substitute
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
12 foil cupcake liners

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place 12 foil cupcake liners into a regular size muffin tin. Place one Oreo into the bottom of each liner and set the remaining 2 Oreos aside. In a medium bowl, beat together the cream cheese, Splenda, egg substitute and vanilla until smooth. Divide the cheese mixture evenly on top of each Oreo. The mixture will be thick, so use your spoon and press down on the batter a little bit once it's on top of the Oreos so that some of the batter goes down around the cookies. Crush the remaining 2 cookies into fine crumbs and sprinkle evenly on top of each cheesecake. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the center is almost set. Cool completely, and then refrigerate for 2-3 hours or overnight.

Thnakful Thursday

I am thankful for:

1. hot bubble baths, sleeping in my own comfortable bed and hot oatmeal for breakfast on cold mornings

2. the chance to organize, decorate, plan and create my own home

3. a wonderful husband

4. helpful cousins

5. Godly Christian women in my life

Live well Wednesday

In the middle of moving, remodeling, living in a new house without a stove, oven or fridge, and battling a head cold/flu/sinus infection, I went back to Weight watchers, three weeks ago.

More than once I thought of quitting- already- because this is just not a good time for me. Its too hard to lose weight and watch what I am eating when I'm sick, moving, remodeling,stressed out.

But, I have somewhat stuck with it and went to the meeting today and, after three weeks, I have lost 1.6 pounds. Which is unbelievably encouraging since I have eaten some brownies this week, and M&Ms, and ice cream from McDonald's (it makes my sore throat feel better), and a shrimp po-boy and... you get the idea.... it wasn't the healthiest eating these last three weeks- but I did try to limit the treats to once every few days. It seems to have made a difference.


Anyone else who is Living Well also going to Weight Watchers?

My garden dreams

This is my flower garden now:






This is what I dream it will be:

Found treasure

While moving, I found a little beige Bible. It was probably a little white Bible at one time. The first page inscription says that it was given to me a few days after I was born from the Nursery Department at the Church that my grandmother attended, my mother attended and I grew up at, left and then returned.

The last page of the little Bible has a list of prayer requests obviously written in my 5 year old handwriting. The first on the prayer list is my cat. The second is Dawn's cat. Obviously, all the cats were prayed over in the neighborhood.

Further down the list was my preacher and his wife, which, after 30 years, are still my preacher and his wife. I told his wife last weekend what I found, but I cant wait to actually bring the little Bible to Church and show everyone.

I bet the same women who wrote out the inscription will be there, will recognize her handwriting and fondly recall all the events surrounding me getting that Bible. Hopefully, she will share it all with me.

I wonder how many other little beige Bibles that little Church has blanketed the community with?

What have I been doing lately?

Wondering why my dog is so happy.



Staring at my crown molding



Taking pictures while my husband takes the tile floor out of the kitchen.



Painting the kitchen "smoke blue".

There's a bee in my bonnet

Getting into this house has been a job.

The sale of my old house was relatively problem free, which is code for, it took three hours to close the house when it should have taken 45 minutes. There was a question at the last minute, but it was ultimately completed and an 82 year old man and his 78 year old wife- who have been married for 1 year - are now settling into their first home together.

The closing on my new house was not nearly as pain free. So many things went wrong that being sued for backing out of the signed contract to purchase the house was a very real possibility on more than one occasion. And apparently, the entire population of surveyors collectively decide to take a vacation during the Christmas/New Year's week and do not accept any work. No matter how hard you cry.

But now the stress of the closing is slowly melting away only to be replaced by the stress of cleaning/remodeling our new home.

But when I walked into the house yesterday for the first time since it is officially ours, I was taken by the beauty of the triple crown molding. I, of course, knew that we had crown molding.... but it was not something you could fully appreciate until its been cleaned and painted. I am not kidding when I say that I wandered around the house for a full 10 minutes staring at the beauty of the triple crown molding.

Until my husband snapped me out of my trance and put me to work cleaning kitchen cabinets.