His smiles are this big ALL the time. The boy almost never stops smiling.

Wearing his favorite John Deere pajama pants

Reading a John Deere book he checked out from the library

He doesn’t know it, but he’s getting another new set (maybe more) for Christmas. I’m hoping to make him a matching shirt this time too.

I went and had my hair cut a couple weeks ago. It used to be waist length, and I loved it. The length was great, but it just didn’t look nice any more. The ends were getting really thin and bedraggled, so I decided to get it cut.

The stylist cut it into long layers. She took off 10 inches from the longest layer. I absolutely love it. It’s so much more flattering than the old hairstyle was. There are so many more options with this style. It’s great.

Another plus about this cut is that now that my hair is shorter, the natural wave comes out more. When it was long, there were some waves, but the length pulled out most of the curl. Now, I can put some mousse in it and the amount of curl that shows up surprises me.

My husband just took off running through the house chasing our four-year-old. There was a container of cornbread on the counter, and S grabbed it and took off running. Stephen took chase. This was after they had a mock argument over who was going to get to eat it.

My cornbread is good, but I didn’t realize it was that good. Good thing there were two pieces left!

I am so humbled by how God chooses to work in our lives. The ways He chooses to provide never cease to amaze me.

On Sunday, our thermostat quit working. Monday, we went to the store and bought a new one. Stephen installed it, and. . .nothing. We then discovered that we’d accidentally bought one that didn’t work with the system we have.

Stephen picked up a different one on his way home from work yesterday, and called a technician to come out here, just in case it wasn’t the thermostat that was broken.

Thankfully, it was just the thermostat. Now we have a brand new programmable thermostat, and the heat is working. I’m so thankful! We use our fireplace a lot in the winter, to offset our electric bill. We’ve had a way to keep warm, but it’s become pretty chilly in here at night when the fire has gone out. I’m thankful it hasn’t been colder outside.

I’ve heard over and over how a programmable thermostat can save you money, and we’ll see if it actually helps us. We didn’t buy it because it was programmable – we bought it because it was compatible with what we already have. It would be nice if it does help us save on our electricity!

Here’s what is a real blessing to me though. Yesterday I started a new piano student. The tuition money my student paid me came just in time for us to pay the technician to fix our heat.

God’s timing truly is perfect.

Mrs. U over at Making a House a Home is having a giveaway over at her blog. She discovered Adagio tea a few months ago, and has been blogging about how much she loves it. She’s mentioned it frequently enough that I just HAD to enter her giveaway, lol!

You can read her post at Making a House a Home.

The funeral is this afternoon. I really shouldn’t even be on the computer since we’re leaving in about an hour.

It has me really thinking. Stephen’s uncle died suddenly – he had cancer, and the chemo wiped out his immune system. It was a bacterial infection that became fatal. Our family is in shock – everything was very sudden.

I’ve watched family as they grieve the loss of father, brother, son, uncle, and friend. Wow, life can be so short. It is a powerful reminder to me to hold my own family close.

There’s a whole lot more that’s been going through my mind lately. I hope to blog more about it later. But for now, I need to go get ready.

Hold your family close. They are so precious.

This week is going to be busier than usual because we have a funeral on Thursday evening, the visitation on Wednesday (not sure how that’s going to work with church), as well as the church fall festival on Friday. So meals will be from the pantry and freezer.

12 Sunday – chicken, mashed potatoes, mixed veggies
13 Monday – chicken taco skillet dinner
14 Tuesday – cream cheese chx, spinach, brown rice
15 Wednesday – soup, rolls
16 Thursday – unsure of plans – sandwiches if we’re in a crazy hurry
17 Friday – fall festival at church
18 Saturday – venison cubed steak, green peppers

You can read more menu plans over at I’m an Organizing Junkie.

Early this morning, Stephen’s uncle went Home to be with the Lord. He’s been battling cancer, and has been having immune system issues due to the chemo he was taking. Last night, they called the family in. Stephen went to the hospital with his parents, and came home in the wee hours of the morning to tell me that his uncle had passed away. Today, we went up to the family farm to spend time with everyone. Stephen’s side of the family is very close, and it was comforting to be with them.

We got home not long ago. Stephen went in to put S in bed and prayed with him. Here’s what I heard from the other room:

“Please be with Grandma and PawPaw because they’re sad that Uncle William went to Heaven, and be with Daddy because he’s sad too. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

I know there’s much he doesn’t understand at his age. But for a four-year-old, he understands a lot more than I thought he would. He’s been so good today. I told him before we left this morning that he needed to be really good because people were sad. He said he could do that, and he did. It was a sad day, but it really was a blessing to me to see my little guy trying so hard to help people not be sad. I pray that my boy never loses that tender heart!

Today I did a coupon run to Lowe’s Foods. They’re tripling coupons this week, after not holding a triples promotion for about a year.

My total before coupons and scanning my card was $104 something. After all the coupons, here is what I bought:

2 kids’ toothbrushes
2 tubes Colgate whitening toothpaste
1 bottle bathroom cleaner
4 packages Gerber Graduates baby munchies
6 cans reduced sodium Progresso soup
8 boxes frozen Green Giant veggies
12 bags steamfresh veggies
1 3-roll package paper towel
6 boxes microwave popcorn
3 warm delight brownie bowls

While I did buy a few snacks (we LOVE popcorn), for the most part what I bought was healthy food. That goes to prove you CAN buy healthy foods with coupons. Yesterday I was able to buy 100% whole wheat bread, brown rice, and some link sausage and bratwurst (high in sodium but as little as we eat it, I don’t mind once in a while. And we love it).

I had clipped some $1 off 3 steamfresh veggies coupons, thinking they’d be a good deal if I found them on sale somewhere. While I was getting some of the other veggies today, I noticed that the steamfresh really were on sale. While the $1 coupons didn’t triple (or double), they still made each bag about $.60 if I remember correctly. Canned veggies are cheaper than that, but there’s more in a bag than in a can and the taste is SO much better. Then, as I put the veggies in my cart, a lady asked me if I wanted any more of the steamfresh coupons. She gave me two more coupons, and I ended up with 6 more packages of vegetables. It was great!

My total out of pocket today – $35.09. My freezer is pretty full of veggies. I’m happy. I’m going back tomorrow, but I need to go back through my coupons again because they were out of a few things today that I wanted. We’re starting to have to get creative with pantry storage space, but that’s just fine with me. It’s all food we actually eat. Well, we don’t eat the brownies on a regular basis, but they’re a nice treat every now and then. :O)