If you were to peek into my kitchen or hallway you’d see a new wreath and arrangement I made last week. About this time of the winter the blues can come – not just to your heart, but also to your home. Because the Christmas florals have been put away, things are kind of blah everywhere.

Now is a time to take a trip to a silk floral department to pick up a few sprigs of fresh looking flowers to brighten up your home! That’s what I did last week. I saw that Hobby Lobby had their florals half price, so I knew the time was right! I bought three bunches of flowers and spent $16. It was enough to make both a wreath and a centerpiece! Eight dollars for each silk arrangements is pretty good, I’d say!

Don’t just take the picks and stuff them into a wreath or vase. Get a pair of wire cutters and cut the sprigs apart. It may take some muscle, but it will look much prettier. Here are the results of my efforts:

I like a free form kind of look with the smaller flowers spilling down over the side of the vase.

This wreath hangs on the guest bath door. I heard a designer say it’s a good idea to hang a wreath on the door of the guest bath so you can say to your guests, “The bathroom is the room down the hall with the wreath on the door.” That way they know what to be looking for and don’t embarrass themselves by stepping into the wrong room – or a closet!

I chose not to hot glue the flowers onto my wreath. I made a little bouquet, holding the stems in my hand and arranged them, then I tied that bouquet onto the grapevine. It will be simple to redo this when I get the whim to do so!

The fabric heart was made from scraps I had leftover from my chair slipcovers.

I traced a heart-shaped cookie cutter onto the wrong side of the fabric, sewed it 3/4 the way around. Then I turned it right side out and stuffed it with cotton balls, and finished by stitching up the opening by hand.

Is there a place in your house that could use a little sprig of flowers to chase away the winter blues? Thanks for stopping for a peek from my porch!

With love,

There is a page in my prayer journal for each day of the week to pray for lost souls. Every Tuesday for about five years, I have prayed for the family of a man who was in our church. His name was Arley. He died of cancer and went to heaven, burdened for his daughter and son-in-law, with whom he was living. While he was still alive, Arley’s grandson attended VBS at our church and trusted Christ as his Savior, to the great joy of this dear man! However, because his mother and father were not believers, the young lad was forbidden to come back to church, hindering his spiritual growth and knowledge this new-found relationship.

My heart hurt for Arley. He loved his family and desired that they know and love His Savior, and have the assurance of a home in heaven. The Lord placed the burden to pray for his family on my own heart after he went home to be with the Lord. How the Lord would work, or how He would reach this family, I did not know, but I have prayed.

Last Wednesday I met with a couple of friends, so that we might spend time together in prayer. One of the ladies asked prayer for a lady she had recently met at a local business in our city.

“She needs the Lord! Oh! She said her father had attended our church before he died of cancer.”

After giving a little more detail and description, my eyes widened, and then welled up with tears as I realized that the Lord had put my friend in the path of Arley’s daughter! My friend faithfully gave her the Gospel, and is endeavoring to stay in contact with her. I was so in awe of this! God was answering my prayer, and He even let me get a little glimpse of how He is doing it. What a wonderful blessing!

To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting anything like this! It’s easy to just “go over the list” of names each day as I pray, without really considering that person in depth, and then watching with expectancy to see the answer! It’s too easy to just spit out names. It can become like doing roll-call at day camp, rather than asking the Lord to intervene in their lives today, or send someone to witness to them now.

I’m not sure who has been more affected by my friend’s encounter with Arley’s daughter; the daughter or me, but I pray it will lead her to Christ, and I pray that my prayer life will be all the stronger because of it. This was a wonderful reminder that my God hears! My God answers! My God is at work, and I need to be praying and then watching to see how He is working!

Don’t doubt that the one you are praying for isn’t being affected by your prayers! God is at work in their life! Keep calling out their name while you’re on your knees for them!

The other great reminder in this story, is that you and I might be the one God uses to be the answer to someone else’s prayer! Be ready today to share the Gospel with whomever God puts in your path!

With love,

With this being the week of Valentine’s Day, I thought I would make and share a couple desserts that would be great to either give as a gift, or to make for a special dinner at home.

The first is this Colossal Chocolate Chip Cookie…

Colossal Cookie

When you walk past those bakeries in the mall that have those giant chocolate chip cookies, the smell alone pulls you in to the store like an undercurrent in the Atlantic Ocean.  The chocolate, the gooey dough, the gigantic size!  Then you look at the PRICE and die of shock!

I made the cookie in the picture above last weekend for under $2!  If you’d like to surprise a Valentine in your life, this is a super easy treat to make!  You could add icing to it to decorate it; I chose to embellish mine with just the chocolate chips to keep it from being too sweet, but you could add M&M’s or any kind of candy or chocolate chips, if you’d like.

1 cup chocolate pieces – chips or M&M’s (I found Christmas Toll house chips on sale after the holidays and used those)
1 1/2 Cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Reserve 1/3 cup candies for decorating.  Set aside.  Combine flour, baking soda and salt; mix well.  In another bowl, beat butter and sugars until creamy.  Add egg and vanilla; beat well.  Add flour mixture; mix well.  Stir in 2/3 cup candies.  Place dough in center of a 13″ or 15″ round pan and spread out to sides.  Decorate with reserved candies.  Bake 16-18 minutes or until light golden brown.  Cool completely.  Cut into wedges to serve.
Yield:  10 servings

When you’re looking for a Valentine’s Day dessert, using an ingredient that is pink or red naturally is a plus!  It adds to the design of the day.  A strawberry dessert, then, is the perfect ticket to finish a special meal on this Lovey Holiday!

I’ve made Strawberry Frozen Squares for many years.  Want to know the first reason?  The recipe is marked, “Dale loves this!”  I love baking things he loves!  The second reason I’ve made it many times is because it’s a great, refreshing dessert!  It’s a nice ending to a big meal, because it’s not heavy like cheesecake would be.  It’s truly worthy of Valentine’s Day!  Here’s how you make it:

Frozen Strawberry Squares

Crust
1 cup flour
1/4 Cup brown sugar
1/2 cup softened margarine
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Topping
2 egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
2 Tbl. lemon juice
3 cups frozen sliced strawberries I also chop them into small pieces
1/2 small container Cool Whip

Stir crust ingredients together.  Remove 1/2 cup mixture to be used for topping.  Press remaining crust mixture into a 9×13 pan.  Bake 15-20 minutes at 350 until lightly browned.  Also bake the 1/2 cup of crumbs in a pie pan; stir occasionally.

Beat egg whites; gradually adding sugar and lemon juice.  When whites begin to stiffen, gradually add strawberries, beating mixture until stiff-about 15 minutes.  Fold in Whipped cream.  Pour on top of cooled crust.  Top with remaining crust crumbs.  Cover and freeze.  Set out about 10 minutes before serving. Cut into squares.

These desserts were made for company.  I have a little surprise planned for another treat.  I’ll share it later.  Hint:  It involves chocolate and pie crust, but it’s not anything ordinary!  =)

What sweet treats do you make for Valentine’s Day?

With love from my country kitchen,

I love all things home and family. I love creating yummy smells coming from the oven at all times of the day. However, it seems I have the hardest time accomplishing baked things for breakfast because, well, morning is so…so early! Ha! It’s for this reason, that I attempt to do advance prep so I can bake muffins for breakfast, and still be ready for the day before noon!

This yummy muffin recipe is a cinch to prep ahead. I got this from Southern Living years ago and it’s one of our family’s favorite. These are Pecan Pie Muffins!!!! They really do taste like a little pecan pie! Hellooooo! What’s not to love about pecan pie for breakfast?  

I made these this week and here’s what I did the night before:

Mix the dry ingredients:

When I was a little girl, I had an episode in a pool that instilled in me a bit of a fear of water. Learning to swim wasn’t something I was eager to do! I would get a death grip on the side of the pool, or on my little life preserver, rather than believe what my swimming mother was trying to teach me – that I could let go and learn to swim on my own.

It was on a family vacation, when I was about seven that I finally agreed to try to learn to swim. My mom was always close by, of course. I’d stand a mere three feet away and swim towards her, my arms outstretched, ready for her to grasp my hands. Over time, I learned to swim further distances. I got to the place where I learned to dive off the side of a swimming pool, hold my breath and swim to the bottom of the pool, or even race another swimmer across as I gained speed. It all happened because I learned from my instructor/mom to let go.

On Tuesday’s post, I encouraged the need for us to teach our children so they will be ready to venture out on their own with life skills under their belts. The spiritual application of that truth is even greater! We must give our children – as well as the people we are mentoring and/or discipling the tools needed for them to know how to grow on their own when we open our hands and they go out on their own.

Young disciples need to be taught independence. We need to teach them how to pray, where to find comfort in the Scriptures, how to run to the Throne and pour out their disappointments to the Lord, how to gain the most spiritual food in services, retreats and biblical radio broadcasts. They shouldn’t need us by their side forever. Our responsibility as a discipler is to equip – just as we do our children. The young disciple should know that the way they can honor their trainer is to go out and do what they’ve been taught! They need to swim!

I trust that you are indeed pouring your life into someone else – a child or a younger woman. Keep the goal of independence in mind as you train. There should come a time in the trainee’s life that they don’t need you for survival anymore! They need to know that they have learned to make it on their own. Oh, you can “stand on the side of the pool” and cheer them on, but it will be with the confidence that you won’t have to jump in and rescue them from drowning, because you’ve taught them the skills necessary to stay afloat!

As you train others, keep the goal of independence in mind! Who are you teaching? Are they becoming less and less dependent on you? That’s when you know you’ve been successful! Then, joy of joys, they’ll go out and find someone else to teach in God’s ways!

With love,