Our 4th of July Celebration!

To start off this blog post, I stayed up all night Sunday night because I was just completely overwhelmed with things to do. I had volunteered to help my friend work a family and friends July 4th party Sunday night for 4 hours, reaching home around 10. I had a little bit of homework due Sunday night by midnight. I had thought about it earlier before the party, so I did two of the assignments and left the easy one for after the party. After I arrived home, I did the last assignment! whew! Thank goodness that was over with. I always seem to stress about homework and things to do with school, and then when they're done I'm asking myself why I ever stressed over something so small!

I always love to color coordinate my outfits with my holidays, so when I realized I needed to wash some clothes that is what I did. This lead me to pulling an all-nighter! I washed four loads of clothes, cleaned the kitchen, living room, and dining area, baked a cake, and watched a movie. When the time came closer to five I began to get ready for our big day! I threw on some blue jean shorts, a red tank top, and a white shirt! RED, WHITE, AND BLUE! I just love it! I went outside and watered my lovely garden, ran to wal mart for a few things, went and fed mom's cat, and came home and baked a breakfast casserole all before everyone awoke! Man, I felt like I had accomplished something!

Hashbrown, sausage, cheese, egg, and crescent roll! YUMMM!

 I had never made breakfast casserole before, but I wanted to try something new and fast. I've never really been much of a breakfast person. If I do eat breakfast, it's normally something like pancakes or cereal; never a REAL breakfast!

Finally, we got on the road headed to Winona! I was plum tired, but made it safely because I didn't trust anyone else to drive my vehicle on 55N on a holiday! I had a feeling we would have for sure gotten a ticket! Boys tend to drive a little on the fast side! So we made it to Winona around 10 something and had a nice little conversation with Justin's Granny. Before you know it we were all starving again, but that was sure to go out the window after a dinner at grandmaw's.

Aidan and Granny before cooking lunch!

The many huge delicious steaks!

YES, you must have a baked potato with a steak! DUH!

I didn't get a picture of everything, but we ended up having salad, steaks, baked potatoes, broccoli and cheese, homemade Texas garlic toast, and banana pudding! Man were we stuffed. That's actually not even the word for it, more like hurttingggg we were so full!

Trevor. This was after eating. Doesn't he look so happy! NOT!

Aidan doing what he does best! This was also after eating!

As you notice, we were all lounging around in the living room! It was really time for a nap!

Granny has many sweet animals! She has three dogs inside, and two baby kittens that I could have squeezed to death they were so cute! I kept repeating the fact that Bella needed a friend since our old cat had passed a while back! Bella sure gets lonely sometimes! Poor kitty. Well, I couldn't help myself, pictures of the animals were a necessity!

This is Breeze!

This is old Winnie! She might have possibly been feeling like us!

I couldn't tell you the names of the horses. There are plenty of them. I didn't get anywhere near the pictures to cover all of the animals, but I just love them! Animals are a delight to have, especially in the country! It was such beautiful land and a beautiful day! We loved every minute of it and hope to have some land in the country ourselves one day! Hope you all had a wonderful fourth of July like we did!

xoxox
Lauren

MY SWEET SUMMER GARDEN!

I've always wanted a garden, but knew they were a little trouble to keep up with and I definitely don't have much space for it. I talked to Justin about it and he was willing to go to Lowe's and get things for me to start a garden. When this conversation was over, you can only imagine how excited I was. This was kind of a last minute thing, so it's moving much slower than most. I can't seem to have much patience with it because my grandma's garden has already produced most of her vegetables and mine only has two vegetables so far, that aren't ready to pick. I've caught myself getting aggravated, but have to remember I just planted it a little less than a month ago! Anyways, I've always thought about the future and all of the things that I will have with my family, and a garden was definitely one of them. I have been following another blog of this lady's that lives in an old log cabin, sews some of her children's clothes, has a farm, lives on much land, and cooks homemade things constantly! I just love it! I'm all about conserving. Some of you may think I am weird, but I enjoy the small things in life!

As I mentioned earlier, I have been getting quite frustrated with my garden because all I had seen for a while was a tiny jalapeno that was slowly growing! I walked out to my garden a few days ago to check it out while on the phone with my grandma, and I found a tiny green tomato! One itty bitty tomato! I would have a picture to show of that tiny tomato, but I accidentally deleted it from my phone! OOPSSSSS!

Two blooms on one of the tomato plants! 

Cucumber on the left, squash on the right!

Bell peppers on the right, tomatoes in the back, and habanero (sp?) on the left!

As you can see, my plants aren't too big yet. My tomatoes aren't even ready to steak yet. With this being my first garden, I will admit that I'm not too talented with the green thumb! HELP! I'm open to suggestions on gardening! I finally got the ho out after it today because the soil on top was just looking pitiful! After a good mixer upper, it looked dandy! I even accidentally cut off a small branch on my squash plant. WHOOPSIES! Got a little ho happy! :P

There she blows!

This is my project in the making! I have spent some time on it today. I'm learning slowly. I've learned not to water it until the sun goes down! It's a little rigged up with chicken wire, but chicken wire is much cheaper than regular fence! I'm a bargain shopper. If it works then it's fine with me! Hopefully here in another month or a little less, I will have a happy colorful garden! Full of yellow, green, and red vegetables. I will be a happy Lauren if it turns out!

xoxo
A new and improved gardening girl!

Cookinnn onnn a Mondayyy

I woke up this morning and was in the mood for a cooking day! My mom gave me a whole gallon bag of blueberries and i've been wondering what I was going to do with them. I'm not a big blueberry fan and surely won't eat them plain; they have to be in something. I was looking online for some recipes for something sweet with blueberries and lemon and blueberry caught my eye! Lemon and blueberry just sounds good together. I ended up making a lemon blueberry bundt cake!

By the way, this is only semi-homemade! :P

 There were numerous recipes online, but when I try to start from scratch on flavoring, there's never enough, so I decided to go with a cake mix. The lemon supreme cake mix is perfect! I did not use the directions on the back of the cake mix!

1 box Lemon supreme cake mix
3/4 cup of water
3/4 cup of oil
4 eggs
1 pack of lemon instant pudding
1 1/2 cup of fresh blueberries

I also threw together a glaze to put on top which calls for some powdered sugar and lemon juice! That's it!

Easy as can be! Mix it all up and turn your oven to 325 degrees! I baked for about 40-45 mins. I like mine very moist, so I try not to bake it as long as it asks for.

Ending product! Finger-licking good!

Next, Dinner! I have never tried making chicken and dumplings, so I wanted to throw it for a whirl! My mom never really made chicken and dumplings for us while growing up, so i'm not too hooked on it, but it actually turned out pretty good! quite easy to make besides squishing the whole chicken into the crock pot! :P Seems like I don't ever have big enough pots for things around here!

YUMMMM!!

I added green onions and green peas to mine! As soon as I get good at gardening I can pick these from my garden! :D That's so exciting to think about!



On another note, my sweet sweet bella girl is passed out and cute as ever!

My sweet bella girl is passed out! She was tired!

Well, today has been a wonderful day and well spent! I still have some homework to do, but it will get done tonight! My brother came over to visit and they ran to get a movie! Chicken and dumplings, Lemon blueberry cake, and ice cream with a movie! Great night! Thank you, Lord!

xoxo
Lauren

JIBBERIIISHH.

Hi! I know you've all been waiting for an update! My life has been so busy here lately. I started summer school on June 1st to get a few credit hours so I won't have to kill myself in the fall, but now i'm regretting it! I'm working full time, and tending to my garden! yes! I planted a garden!

Lots has been going on! If you haven't heard, my dad passed away on April 23rd to a massive heart attack. I cannot stress to my friends and family how important your health is! We have been struggling with recovering, but we are surely doing so! Of course, I miss my Dad tremendously, but I know that he is in a better place with perfect health!

Due to Dad's poor health, I have decided to grow a garden! It's always better to eat fresh! This is my first garden and I have jalapenos, squash, tomatoes, habaneros, and cucumber. I wanted to start out small in case things didn't turn out! I would hate to have spent a lot of time on numerous plants and it not turn out! I'm excited and can't wait for my things to be grown!

Also, I have started a diet in the meantime. After high school, unfortunately, I have gained some pounds! It's kind of frustrating, so i'm working hard at getting it off! I am on a 1,000 calorie a day diet.. along with exercising! Hopefully it all works out! Wish me luck!

No pictures for this post! Sorry! Next post I will be sure to have pictures. It's off to doing some homework for me now!

Love,
Lauren

When the Moon hits your EYE like a big-a PIZZA pie!

Sunday came so fast that I almost lost track of days! We have been planning all week to go out on our new boat that Justin and his brother have purchased within the last month! I was so excited, but knew I had much to do for school. The boat is not a fancy boat, it's a 1967, but we love it! It's a ski boat and it's well kept for the amount of years put on it.

I knew that going out on the boat consisted of me waking up at the crack of dawn! I told Justin Saturday night that I was going to sleep in a little. [My job is opening a new restaurant and we have been working 10-12 hour days.] So they went out for breakfast yesterday morning while I was snoozing away. I was okay with that. I'd miss breakfast for some sleep any day!

I finally woke up about 10 Sunday morning and knew that it was going to be a long day, but I was well prepared! I had my much needed sleep! I got up and jumped in the shower knowing I should have been ready long before! Grandparents left and off we headed to the reservoir! It was such a beautiful day, but so windy! The water is still too cold to get in, so we just enjoyed a ride and a little of fishing.

Justin and Trevor are new to the boating thing so it was quite an adventure trying to get the boat down the boat launch. Justin drives an old Ford truck, so just picture this big boat on this Ford truck. I just knew that thing was gonna go rolling backwards into the water! Morgan and I just had to close our eyes! We were laughing at something that was totally not funny, but It was so scary that it made it funny! I was munching on some hot cheetos meanwhile Justin is taking off the light on the boat trailer with the pier! Oh my GOSH! The right light was gone! Well, Justin stated that they had to get new lights anyways. Justin gets out of the truck to make sure the boat made it into the water and forgot to pull the e-break on his standard truck! He realized it was rolling and tried to one foot the break! One leg in the truck and one leg on the ground! Man, lets just say that was an adventure, but we learned some things!

Off we went, kind of driving and learning! Justin is the only one with his boating license!

Me taking a picture from the back seat! Such a beautiful day! 

 

 

 

After we passed the no wake/slow zone Justin took off! I think I may have gotten a slight case of whip-lash! NOT! haha! Anyways. Four hours later we made it back with a little bit of a sun-burned face. It was okay though. We had tons of fun! Maybe when the water warms up we will purchase some tubes, skis, etc.. Make some fun memories of our ancient boat!

When we arrived home I was so hungry! That sun surely drains you, especially when you have only eaten hot cheetos all day! So I got home and ran to Wal-mart to return some movies to the redbox machine and grab a few packs of pizza flour. I came home and made home-made pizza! Perfect for the night!

The beginning of my pepperoni pizza!

Chicken Alfredo Pizza!

annddd my favorite! Pepperoni, Jalapenos, Black Olives, and Mushrooms! Did I mention that i love vegetables!

I love to bake, but I will mention that I burnt the last pizza. I got in the living room and starting cutting out coupons and totally forgot about the pizza! We had all eaten by the time the last one was in the oven, so it was easy to forget about! I fed it to the dogs and they even had trouble biting it! Poor puppies!

At the end of the day we were all exhausted and well fed!

Even Bella! I think she may have got ahold of some of that pizza! She looks full herself!

She's a little chunk! She lost her tail to a mean pit bull, so she gained the weight of her tail in her stomach! We still love her! She is the sweetest girl in the world! :)

I hope that you all had a wonderful Sunday as I did.

Love,
Lauren

Beulah Land--Sweet Beulah Land

Yesterday [SATURDAY], I took a trip to my Great Grandmother's house in Moorehead, MS. I woke up early Saturday morning to make yummy lemon squares to bring along on the trip. Of course, you know we never miss a meal! Especially in the delta!

I met my grandparents, uncle, and cousin at the Cracker Barrel and we were on our way! It'd been a while since I had seen my uncle and cousin, Grace! I sure missed them; and the others that didn't attend the trip! We made silly pictures on the Nintendo DSI and ate peppermint sticks! We passed through Yazoo City and saw the damage that was still noticeable from the tornado that hit a year ago. It was a sad sight!

We finally turned onto Sheffield Dr./Rd. They put new rocks down since the last time I'd been. My uncle stated, "It's been years since I've driven down this road going 50mph." Picture my face in the back seat of the truck! Kinda scary!

There was Beulah's house that I sure miss! Inside were family, friends, good cooking, and beautiful antiques! Oh how I miss you, Beulah! (My great grandmother passed away towards the end of last year.) I had many memories as I spent the day going through some things and taking what I wanted. I miss her dearly, but I know that she is in a better place, up above!

 

 

 

My Cousin all dolled-up in Grandmother's jewelry and scarves!

Grace and I playing Beulah!

Grandmother's "goodies" Jewelry! 

 The last few years of her gracious little life she became to love Mardi Gras beads as her jewelry because it was something that she didn't have to fasten herself and could just slip over her head. I remember Mom gathered every color she could think of and bagged them up to give to sweet Beulah.

Aunt Libba, Aunt Sandy, Aunt Nelda, GIGI, and Kim.

These were all of the wonderful ladies that I spent the day with; minus Grace and I! We sure had a wonderful day!

We had a great lunch; although it wasn't Great Grandmother's cookin'.

The beautiful table with a lovely table cloth!

Grandmother's beautiful couch!

Saturday was very special to me. I am so glad that I had the opportunity to spend so many years with that beautiful lady! God sure blessed her with 99 years of life! Yes, I said 99! I hope that I will live that long and am as beautiful as she was! I enjoyed spending the day with some family and creating several more memories! I left with some jewelry of grandmother's and one of her sun hats to give to my mom!

I hope that you all had the chance to spend some years with your great grandparents! They are great!

Love,
Lauren

Bad SUNDAY accompanied by a wonderful MONDAY! Isn't that backwards?

Believe it or not, I had a horrible Sunday. I was completely exhausted from working almost 30 hours in 3 days and missed my Sunday morning worship. Monday came around and I was dreading that day for sure. When you think of Mondays, you think of this awful day that is so tiring and the start of such a long week ahead. Well, My Monday was anything but Normal. We all know what a normal Monday feels like. I had the GREATEST LUCK! I got to speech class this morning with my outline that was SUPPOSED to be on unlined paper.. well I explained that to my teacher and she took it with only taking 1 point off! Going onto my next class I knew I had homework due in my third class that I hadn't finished.

Walking to the back building at school I was nearly falling on the ground from the long walk and the extremely heavy book bag that was weighing my back down. I came to the door for my A & P II class and the door was shut and the light was off. You know when you've been walking outside or in a really bright place and then walk into a darker place, you can't really see well? Your eyes have to adjust to the new lighting. Well, so I thought my class was canceled. So, I walked to the classroom across the hall to ask the teacher if they knew where my teacher was because I hadn't gotten an email or anything informing me of my canceled class. He takes me across the hall and points at the tv that is clearly playing in my classroom. OH MY GOSH, was I embarrassed! After adjusting my eyes to the light, there I was totally embarrassed walking into yet another dark room with a video playing. I almost tripped over someone's book bag on the floor. Finally making it to my seat that was in the back of the room, I had made so much noise that the whole class had their eyes on ME!

Well, I knew I still had that homework to finish for my next (Marriage and Family) class. 30 minutes after I got into class the video was over and the teacher called roll and dismissed us! I was so excited! I had 45 minutes to sit in the hall and work on my homework for marriage and family. My phone was surprisingly ringing off the wall, but I knew I had to ignore it! I had work to do! I finished my work and moved onto class. After teaching the class about  SEXUAL BEHAVIOR AND SATISFACTION I was ready to go to work and then get home. Needless to say, I WAS STILL EXHAUSTED!

I went to work and finished 5 minutes early with my work. We, of course, had thunderstorms coming soon. I thought that I could make it to the clothing store to grab a few things I had been looking at and jumping back in the car before the rain hit! Well, with my luck as soon as I got into the store it started pouring! I didn't have the time to wait around on the rain to stop because I had signed up to take my Monday night class test at 7:45pm. I ran to the car, with heels on. On my way to the car you know I probably hit every water puddle there was in the parking lot. My feet were soaked by the time I got to the car, but that was the least of my worries. I finally got home and cooked dinner. I wanted to try something new. By the way I absolutely love to cook! So for dinner I made a new Chicken Ranch Pasta with garlic bread. It turned out pretty good, but as I was cooking I was dreading class that I had to be at in an hour for a hands on test with the dummy.

I hate those dummies at school that I have to perform first aid actions on! Well, I was just hoping and wishing that class was canceled because of the weather. Around 7:00pm I was checking my email before I got in the car to head to class. In the email I had one from my first aid teacher. What do ya know?! Class was canceled! WAAAHHHOOOO!

Beginning my day with a horrible mind, it ended up being one of the luckiest days I've had in a while. I needed that Monday. 

So, ending this blog post with a wonderful clip from a song!
"You know you're made for more, so don't be afraid to move. You're faith is all it takes and you can walk on the water, too." -Britt Nicole

Thank you, Lord.

Love,
Lauren