DAY 31

 

WOW!  It is the final day of the decluttering challenge.  What an eye opening experience this has been for myself and my husband.  We got rid of items that have been taking up real estate for upwards of 30 years.  There is plenty more that could and will go.  My goal is to continue weeding out items.  Will I do it daily?  Probably not.  But I do feel I should pick a room  and completely take it apart and truly clean out all items no longer of need and then put the room back together.  Some rooms will be able to be done in a few days and others will take months.  It just needs to happen and it will happen!

Today's 'stuff' is from Josie's china hutch (again) and then my sock drawer (thanks Becki).  There are 2 Easter baskets, a table runner, 25 pairs of no show socks and 3 golf player sketches ( Tiger Woods, Chi Chi Rodriquez and Lee Trevino).  Those sketches have been with us since we lived in PA.  Yup, that would be over 30 years ago!

There were other things found that were not photo worthy.  Most of which went into the trash bin.  There were also many things found in Josie's room, that went back to Josie's house.  Those were things from her infancy that we had kept for memories sake.  I will let her parents decide if they want to keep them or not.  Those items did not get photographed either.

Overall, there was well over 500 items removed from the house.  I have shown you 496 items through photos.  I did not bother to count the items sent to Josie's house or most of the items thrown away.

I will leave you with something I found the other day.

Y'all know this is very true, right?

Until next time...............................................................(which will be tomorrow!)

DAY 30

 

Today is the next to last day of the declutter challenge.  Even though my header calls it a 30 day challenge, I decided to go ahead and do the entire month.  I am still working in Josie's room, cleaning out the china hutch.

Today, I found some great treasures.  Another deck of cards, a ceramic plate my mom made YEARS ago, 2 table runners, an entire box of votive candles, 9 taper candles, 2 crystal candle holders, a 2 inch pillar candle, 3 crystal candle drip protectors, 8 state spoons, and 2 pillar candle stands.  The table runners are going to my son's house.  His wife loves table runners and since these belonged to my mom she wanted them.  She already has the matching place mats for the bunny runner.

I will be making a GoodWill run tomorrow again to make sure I do not pull anything out 'just in case'.  The sooner it leaves the house, the better for my peace of mind.

My plans for today got drastically changed, late last night.  My plans were to do all my errands today while hubby cleaned.  Me being out of his way, seems to make things go smoother for him.  But then, Josie contacted me last night to ask if I could take her to the funeral of one of the students from her school.  The student passed away the beginning of week.  So, I will be picking her up from school, taking her to the funeral and then taking her home afterwards.  Not at all what I had in mind for my day.  This will be a tough one to attend since the person is so young (14).  

After the funeral, I should still be able to get a few of my errands run before I run out of steam.  There is a Sam's club run to do, water cooler bottles to fill and a quick grocery store stop to pick up 1 item for a meal this weekend.  With dropping Josie off at home, I will be able to deliver the items they wanted from the declutter.  That helps out a little.

Until next time......................................................................

DAY 29

 

The end of this challenge is nearing.  It has been a very eye opening experience for me.  I thought most of my home was pretty much decluttered from when I did it a couple of years ago.  It seems, I missed going through quite a bit of my 'storage' units that sit inside of my house.  Today, I am still in Josie's room and still working out of the china hutch.  More treasures were discovered and this time they brought back sweet memories for me.

I blew this photo up so you could really see the items.  When there are 29 items in one photograph, they kind of get lost.  Here I have 2 more decks of cards, a pair of mittens, a kitty cat candle holder and 25 sun catchers.  It is the sun catchers that brought back the sweet memories for me.   Most of the sun catchers are Tiffany glass.  My husband bought them for me when we lived in Pennsylvania.  Because of the dull gray winters there, he thought if I had these hanging in our windows, they would help to brighten my days.  Oh my, when the sun would shine and hit these, the rooms would burst into such glorious color and light.  Living in Arizona, I no longer have long periods of time without sunlight, not to mention I do not have as many windows in my current home as I did in my PA house.

This is a photo of our home in PA.  I loved this house and all the memories that went along with it.  The neighborhood, the schools, the rolling green hills, the friends we made......all of it brings back lovely memories for me.

Today, I am planning on making some snack bars for us.  I made some just before our little trip and we really enjoyed them.  They are all sugar free and the only sweetener in them is honey to help hold them together.  My recipe makes 9 bars and I cut those in half which means they are only 77 calories per serving.  They are the perfect afternoon snack for us when we want that little bit of sweet to tide us over until dinner.  

I was asked how my loaf of bread came out.

Here it is.  My sourdough starter has been fed with whole wheat flour.  Using that starter made my bread look like whole wheat and even has a slight wheat flavor.  I am a bit disappointed that there is not much of a sourdough flavor to the bread though.  Hubby and I both, like this bread better for sandwiches.  The next time I make it, I will do it without the sourdough starter in it and see if it will rise just a bit more than this one did.  

BTW, I am still looking for a name for my sourdough starter.  Does anyone have any suggestion?  I have already done Emilie and Trey.  This is the 5th time to have a starter and I just don't thing Cinco is a wonderful name for this starter.  I could name it Arthur since the starter came from King Arthur Flour.  What do y'all think?  I am open to suggestions.

Until next time.............................................................................

DAY 28

 

We are almost to the end of this challenge.  My worry of not being able to find enough items for the last few days was quickly abated when I decided to go through the china hutch in Josie's room.

First, let me explain why there is a china hutch in a bedroom.  When we lived in PA, I wanted a dining room set.  Like a formal dining room set.  We purchased a table (with 2 leaves), 8 chairs and a china hutch all made in North Carolina and all made in 100% cherry wood.  It was beautiful and I loved it.  I proudly displayed my Noritake China in the top of the hutch.  The bottom stored my serving pieces to my china along with my linens for the table.  When we moved to Arizona, the dining room set was one of the few pieces of furniture we moved with us.  Move forward 17 years and all of our children have moved out of the house.  I no longer need a 'formal' dining room set but I still love that hutch.  The table and chairs have been replaced a couple of times but the hutch still stays with my china being shown in it.  Along comes Josie and we decide to dedicate a room in our house for her.  (She is the only grand child living near us)  We get her a cherry wood futon bed (The mattress was special made with memory foam in it) along with an Ikea children's entertainment center (indestructible) but there is no where to store folding clothes for her.  Yup, you guessed it.  I put my china in a kitchen cabinet and moved the china hutch into her room.  The upper part houses porcelain dolls and the bottom stores all her burp cloths, blankets, towels etc.  Now that Josie is 15, I thought it might be time to go through the hutch to see what all we had stored in there.

How many decks of cards do you own?  Here are 20 decks of cards along with 8 drink sweaters.  The sweaters came in quite handy when we lived in PA and we had a glass of water or some other beverage.  The sweater absorbed all the sweat that came off the glass so you wouldn't have water rings on your tables.  Oh, and those decks of cards?  Ninety percent of them are from Las Vegas.  Back in the day, you could ask the pit boss for a deck of cards and they would just hand you a deck that had been taken from the tables.  They always had the corners cut off or had a hole drilled in the middle of them so you could not use them at the tables again.

Now, don't go thinking the hutch has not been gone through in the 15 years it has been in Josie's room.  She and I have gone through it many times as she grew up.  The burp rags are gone as are most of her baby blankets.  The only ones left are the handmade ones that people gave her as baby shower gifts.  I just can not part with them.............yet.

I woke up this morning to discover it was a bit chilly in our house.  I have had the A/C off for 2 days now.  Today makes day 3 of no A/C!  The temp in the house this morning was 69F.  I don't know if I will be able to keep the A/C off come this weekend though.  Here is a look at our forecast for the next few days.

About Saturday, I think the A/C may need to come back on for a few days.  I was so hoping to see the end of the 90's by now as well as the use of the A/C.  Come on, it is almost November!  

I hope all of you are having a beautiful fall day!

Until next time.......................................................................

DAY 27

 

Here I am again, with another day of decluttering.  This week is the hardest because of the amount of items needed for each day.  The first 10 items of the day are usually pretty easy to find.  But then I seem to slow down on finding the rest of the items.  Let's take a look at what I came up with for today.

I found these coffee cups in a box in Josie's closet.  These cups came from my hubby's office when he retired 15 years ago!!!!!  I do not even want to guess as to how they came to live in her closet.

Next up is the rest of the baby/doll clothes to be recycled to GoodWill.  There is also another shirt I found for a little girl in there.  Now that her closet is cleaned out, I can start on her entertainment center.  It is an Ikea piece of furniture that contains plastic bins for storage.  All of her toys and crafting supplies are in it.  It will be great fun to see what can be removed.

Today, I will be making my first pullman loaf of bread using my sourdough starter.  What is pullman bread?

It looks like the store bought sandwich bread.  It is a bit denser than the bread I make in the bread machine.  It has it's own special pan to bake in too.

You bake the bread with the lid on.  That is how it becomes square.  There is no sloping on the sides of the pan either.  It is 100% square.  My dear friend in Las Vegas introduced me to these pans.  There are 2 different sizes of pans.  The large is 13x4x4 and the small is 9x4x4.  I have the small as hubby and I like our bread fresh and most homemade breads are best if eaten in the first few days of baking and bread is eaten here maybe 3 times a week.  But, now that I am using sourdough to enhance the flavor of this bread, it may be eaten more often.  

Other than that, I do not have any major plans for today.  It is once again nice and cool out with a high of 68 today.  I did not make it to my porch to knit yesterday.  Instead, I pulled out the Havana blanket I was working on and did a few rows on that.  It was nice not to feel like I was in a furnace while working on it.  My plan is to continue on it until the temps head back up later this week.

Anything new going on in your neck of the woods?

Until next time.......................................................

DAY 26

 

Today is the day I take the stuff from last week to GoodWill.  But, before I left, I wanted to complete today's treasure hunt.  I am still working in Josie's room and have found some wonderful treasures.

There is a grow chart, 3 stuffies, 5 bathtub duckies, an Easter basket, Paint by number, Christmas angel and a plastic storage container.

This is the box that stores all my wrapping paper.  It is not the worlds greatest box, but kept the paper dust free. 

A pillow, a swim top, swim bottom (they do not match), a coffee cup, old briefcase, flip flops pillow, girls tank, baby dress and 2 baby hats.

That makes 351 items (not counting hangers with clothes on them) out my door!  And to think, I could do this for several months and never run out of items to declutter!

My to do list today is pretty long.  This is the reason I wanted to get my decluttering done early.  Our temperatures are in the 60's for the next 2 days, so I want to do all my errands during those days to enjoy the fall like days.  We will be back up to 90 by the weekend.  (sad face)  My menus are planned for the next 10 days, grocery list is made and will be fulfilled today, GoodWill is to be visited for donations, window and doors are opened with a nice breeze blowing through the house, and I have started another sourdough starter and it is flourishing quite well.

Look at that beauty!  I have not named this one............yet.  I did cheat a bit and bought a starter from King Arthur Flour company.  It was the best decision I have made. This photo is from yesterday and it had only been fed twice for this result.  I have a feeling I will be making some sourdough bread in the next day or so.  The crock it is in was a gift from a sweet friend who shares the love of baking breads just like I do.  In fact, she has taught me so much about bread making.  I just wished we lived closer than 5 hours away from each other. (big sigh)

Time to go and get ready to start my journey out of the house for today.  I am thinking of sitting on my front porch, this afternoon, and knitting while enjoying the fresh air and cool breeze.

Until next time..........................................................................

YOP WEEK 17 & DAY 25

 

I can not believe we are already up to week 17.  This year of YOP seems to be flying by.  I thought, with all the stay at home orders, time would drag.  Nope, it is speeding by.

I spent this week watching my Grand dog, Thor.  That meant I had time to do crafting and yet,  really did not do that much.  Here is what got worked on this week.

Hubby's second sock saw a little love.  Not a lot though.  The grand dog was most interested in the skein of yarn attached to this sock and kept trying to take it.  I had to keep a watchful eye on him during knitting time.  So, I thought, cross stitch might be a better idea.

I did manage to get all the pink flowers completed.  There is supposed to be back stitching on each one of the flowers but, I am not going to do it.  No, I am not lazy.  I tried putting the back stitching on the top pink flower and it muted the colors in the flower.  I ripped it out and decided I liked the 'petit point' look of this so, will not be doing any back stitching.  This is just now half done.  It was the easiest thing to work on with the dog around.  Although, I left the room for just a couple of minutes and when I returned, he was standing outside with this in his mouth.  He wanted me to chase him (his idea of a fun game) but I refused.  In just a couple of minutes he had dropped it and was back in the house seeing what I was up to.  No harm was done to the piece and I was super glad I had put the needle back in the needle case before I laid the piece down.

That is all for crafting.  I am still doing the 31 day declutter though.  Today is day 25 and I do have 25 items to get out of my house.

I am still working in the room we had designated for Josie when she was spending more time with us.  She is now old enough (15) she does not need to be here as often.  So, here is what I got from that room today.

I blew this photo up so you could get a good look at what came out of there.

There are, baby clothes, baby hangers, umbrella stroller, little hat, 2 stuffies, little collapsible hamper and a jug filled with baby socks, shoes, hats and undershirts. All the baby clothes are for two dolls I have.  They are the size of a 3 month old baby.  Josie loved to dress them up all the time.  There is a boy and a girl doll.  I will be keeping the dolls and just a few of the clothes I have.  I like to dress them up at Halloween, Christmas, Easter and a few other Holidays and display them.  You will be seeing quite a few more baby outfits leaving my house in the next few days.

Today, I am taking things easy.  After being gone almost 8-12 hours each day last week, I wanted to just enjoy being home.  There will be a couple of loads of laundry done today, but to me that is nothing too strenuous.  In fact, I kind of enjoy doing laundry.  I am going to make out menus for the week and do some research on recipes.  That to me is fun too.  Of course, there will be crafting involved today too.  I have a couple of meetings this coming week, but other than that, I am leaving my calendar open.

What are your plans for the coming week?

Until Next Time...........................Happy Crafting & Stay Well!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DAY 24

 

Time to show you my 24 items to leave the house today.

I finished cleaning out the laundry room cabinet and these are the last 6 towels that will be leaving.  With that cabinet cleaned out, I now have a place to put my accessories for my Kitchen Aid mixer.  That means, the top of my washer and dryer are now visible again.  Looks so much nicer in the laundry room.

Then I ventured into a room I have not decluttered in many years.  It is the room that was made up for Josie.  She spent a lot of time with us over the past 15 years.  We decided when she was about 2, to make a room dedicated to her so she would feel at home here.  Since she has grown up and spends less time here, it is now time for us to clean it out and make it more like a guest room.  The above two pictures I had always planned on putting on her wall in there.  They no longer appeal to me so they will be donated.

I also had stored all our wrapping paper in there and decided (thanks Becki) there was no reason to keep any of it.  I strictly use bags for gifts and if I need paper, I will pick up ONE roll at the dollar store for what ever occasion it is needed for.

Looks like I will probably be able to get the rest of the month completed from that room alone.  In fact, I think I will just keep doing this declutter until I am too exhausted to carry on anymore.  This house needs to be cleaned out!

So, today, I have already baked a loaf of bread, done a load of towels, done the declutter and am getting ready to start a sour dough starter (again).  Since I do not have any major activities for the next two week, I figure I can get a good start on the sour dough and probably even make a loaf or two.

Come back tomorrow to see what has happened in my crafting world as well as my 25 items that are leaving my house.

Until next time........................................................

DAY 23

 

Another day of getting items out of my house and donated, tossed or given away.  I needed to go and find a 'spare' dish towel to use for our water cooler and when looking for 'just the right one' I found a big mess in the 'rag' cupboard.  This get me started on cleaning it out.

Here is the beginning of that clean out.  Thirteen hand/dish towels that no longer have a purpose in my house.

Here are 10 pair of leggings I needed to say goodbye to.  See the ones that are inside out?  I did this last year at the beginning of leggings season.  That means, those leggings never got worn in over a year.  The ones that are right side out are ones I no longer wanted to keep.  I still have 18 pairs of leggings in my drawer and that is more than enough for me.

Today is my last day to dog/teen watch.  Hubby is with me today.  We will be picking up the teen around 1, taking her to swim practice and then he and I will go to a local place to have a bite of lunch.  We pick her back up at 3:30 and then will go back to her house.  We will all patiently wait for her mom to get home from work and then we are all going to go out to eat dinner at one of our favorite spots that has an outdoor dining area.  

We were notified, the people we sat next to in church, last week, one of them has tested positive for the virus.  We all had masks on and we did socially distance too.  Neither hubby or I are too concerned about it though.  When I say we sat next to them, I mean we were at least 6 feet if not more away from them.  My concern is for the person who has contracted it as he is in his 80's and his wife has multiple health issues that make her susceptible to it.  Here is the irony, he is a Doctor and she is a nurse so I KNOW they have taken so many precautions.  This disease does not discriminate.  He said he doesn't feel bad and only had a fever for a couple of days and just feels like he is dragging and has a mild cough.  I pray it does not get any worse than that.

I am looking forward to the weekend and next week.  I do not have any major plans other than doing things around the house to get 'caught' up on things.  What are your plans for the next few days?

Until next time.............................................................

DAY 22

 

It had to happen at some point during this decluttering challenge.  I knew I would, at some point, need to go into my closet and be brutally honest about what I should keep and what should find a new home.

The above photo is of shirts I do not wear or can not wear.  They are all Lularoe shirts.  Basically, those are the only shirts I own anymore.  Although, I no longer purchase Lularoe clothing, I have a lot of their clothes hanging in my closet.

On the left are more shirts (some Lularoe and some ordinary) I no longer wear along with two pair of Alegria sandal and 4 Lularoe maxi skirts.  I am not sure I have culled my closet all the way yet.  The 'winter' clothes have not been looked over so, there may be other items flying out of here before the end of the month.

I know this is supposed to be all about decluttering but I just can not help myself.  I just HAD to tell you other stuff.

Another day of dog/teen watching.  It will be a bit different today though.  The teen has a swim meet this afternoon in the next town over.  We spectators are not being allowed into the swimming pool area because of Covid.  However, we are more than welcomed to sit outside of the fence to watch our kids participate.  Since the teen's parents will not be able to make it, I will go today, take my camping chair, wear a big floppy hat, bring an umbrella to keep the sun off, wear a mask, bring along lots of water and sit in the sunny 90 degree weather and cheer my girl on.  This is their last meet before their state qualifying meet on the 31st.  The coach allowed her to choose the events she wants to swim in today.  She will be doing the 50 yard freestyle and the 100 yard freestyle and possibly a 400 yard freestyle relay.  Fingers crossed she can cut some more time off her speed on the first two events.

Tomorrow will be my last day of Grandma duties for a couple of weeks.  I have enjoyed this past week but feel bad that my house chores have been neglected.  Hubby has been a trooper and picked up my slack.  Here is an example of why he is my hero.

While watching the news a couple of nights ago, we heard about flour and yeast starting to fly off the shelves again because of the second wave of Covid hitting.  I went to the store the next day and there was no yeast on the shelves and flour was starting to get a bit thin.  I checked my supply of flour at home and found I had plenty of self rising, all purpose and wheat flour.  What I was low on was bread flour.  Husband went to Sam's club to purchase if for me and discovered they no longer had any bags of it.  So he scooted over to Costco and TA-DA......................

.

They are now carrying bread flour in 25 pound bags.   (I always buy 25 pounds at a time as it is all I use for my breads and dough).  I am set again for several months.  I went online to King Arthur and ordered a pound of SAF yeast so I should be all good for a while.  (I may have ordered more than just the yeast at King Arthur LOL)

I want to leave you with the photos I took yesterday:

Just a girl and her dog!

Until next time...................................................

DAY 21

 

Welcome back.  Today, I found 21 items that needed to vacate my premises.

Here I have four pair of shoes and a blouse I dearly love.  Why am I donating the blouse if I love it?  Because, everytime I wear it, someone asks me if I am feeling ok.  I finally took a look in a mirror and saw that it made me look quite pale and sickly.  The color was not my friend.

Next up are some magazines hubby had stuck in a bookcase.

And some more magazines I found in another bookcase. Just so you get an idea of my husbands passion for books, we have 5 bookcases in our house.  All but one of them is filled with books.  The last one is getting close to full.  In his defense, he has read 90% of the books and uses about 50% of them for research and reference when he teaches at our church.  He is also good about letting people borrow them.  When that happens, some come back and some don't.  

So far, there has been 231 items removed from my house.  Isn't it amazing how quickly things add up.

Today, I am off again to dog/teen watch.  The teen has a short day at school so we will be going to Chick-fil-a for lunch.  After lunch she has a virtual meeting with her school 'house' and then it is homework time.  The dog and I are going to do a little housework for my DIL and then we will watch some chic flics.  My DIL has an after work meeting/dinner to 'interview' a potential new Doctor to join their practice, so she won't be home until well into the evening.  This means, I get to have dinner with the teen again tonight.  My DIL was sweet enough to make a lovely Italian casserole for us so I don't even need to cook.  I brought some home last night so hubby could enjoy it tonight for dinner.

Did anyone see the meteor shower last night?  Hubby and I went out to watch but I think we have too many street lights near us, so it was a bust for us.

Until next time......................................................................

DAY 20

 

Why of why do we hold onto things we will never use again?  Case in point:

Old eye glasses with their cases.  None of these have the right RX in them for hubby or I.  So, why do we still have them?  They are heading to the Lion's Club today where they will be put to good use.  There are also little pouches that hubby had been keeping for no good reason as well as a cell phone holder that goes on a belt.  Whoosh...............out the door, never to be seen again.

Hey!  I just had to tell you, it was 63F when I woke up at 6:30 this morning.  This is such a good sign of fall for us.  Granted it will get into the 90's today, but only for a little while and then march back down into the 70's by bedtime.  Another week or two and my windows and doors will be opened to let in some lovely breezes.

Time for me to get cleaned up and head over to take care of a dog.  I also have after school duty with a teen (not that she really needs me, but loves to have me around).

Until next time.........................................................

DAY 19

 

Look what I found hanging around in our guest room/library.  More books that needed to find a new home.

I was surprised to find 19 books so quickly.  You know what that means?  There have got to be more than this that need to go.  That will be a job for another day.

Thank you to all who wished us a happy anniversary.  We had a nice day of doing almost nothing.  I did finish up the laundry, made menus, went to the grocery store, delivered those 17 stitch markers to a friend, made a loaf of bread, ordered bread making supplies from King Arthur, and topped it all of with hubby's favorite meal (tacos).  

Today I will be emptying the dishwasher, picking up a prescription, filling the car with gas, going to our son's house to spend lunch with the teen and play with their dog, knit on hubby's sock and then come home and make spaghetti for dinner.  After all of that, I have a cupboard that needs to be cleaned out.  I discovered it yesterday when looking for something.  This makes me excited because I think there will be treasures in there that will be finding their way out of my house!

Until next time...................................................................  

YOP WEEK 16 & DAY 18

 

Hello again.  Another week has passed and it was not my usual week.  Hubby and I took off on Monday for a little holiday in Las Vegas.  We spent time with his mom as well as some of his siblings and also some very special friends.  It was a lovely little get away and has lifted both of our spirits tremendously.  Since we were on the move so much, I did not have a lot of time to knit.  Yet, I do have a finish to show.

Sock #1 was completed during our little holiday.  It is just a plain vanilla sock with an eye of partridge heel.

After we returned home on Friday, I started the second sock.  The cuff is is almost completed.  This yarn is a bit splitty, so I do need to keep an eye on it to make sure I am grabbing all strands when working with it.  Otherwise, I really like this yarn.  It is super soft and very squishy.  The fiber content is: 80% Superwash Fine Highland Wool/ 20% Polymide.  Before you think the highland wool is from Scotland, I will let you know it is actually from Peru.  It is not an expensive yarn either.  Here is the link to look at it.  It is on Close out, so if interested in obtaining any, now is the time.

And now...............for the next segment of my post for today.

My declutter project is still going strong.  Today I have 18 items that have left the building.

I won't even tell you what years these magazines were from.  I will tell you, none of these are  from the last 5 years.  Amazing what you find when going through book shelves.

Books that have been read and will not be re-read are items that needed to leave.  I am normally pretty good about recycling my books but, somehow these few never made their way out of the house.  Although, the Debbie Macomber book is her newest released paperback (2020) and I just finished it about a month ago.  

This coming week is going to be crazy.  Our son is once again traveling for business.  I have dog and teen duty.  The teen is back in school 4 days a week now so, I will be doing lots of running for the next 5 days.  I sat down with our son and his wife last night and we worked out the schedule for the next week.  Let's just say........................I won't be doing much stuff around my house next week.  But...................there will be plenty of time for me to work on hubby's second sock!  That means, I need to spend some time today decluttering more stuff.  I also need to make out menus that will be easy for hubby as there will be 2 days I won't be home until well past dinner time.  Good thing I completed all the laundry yesterday. 

Today, hubby and I are celebrating 45 years of marriage.  We met on a date, set up by my ex-sister in law.  Four months later we were married.  It has been a wild and crazy ride.  We have moved households 15 times and lived in 4 different states.  We have been blessed with 4 children, 8 grand children and 1 great grand child.  It has not always been sunshine and roses, but those difficult times are what has brought us all closer together and made us a stronger family unit.  And yes, we are still in love.  Even more so now than the day we married.

Until Next Time...............................Happy Crafting & Stay Well!!!!!!!!