One Eyed, One Horned, Flying Purple People Eater...

Have you ever read Marley & Me by John Grogan? It's the story of our life, I swear, only our "Marley" is named Heidi. Her most recent escapade was to come home with purple polka dots. We suspect an irate neighbor with a paintball gun. She did have the decency to look ashamed. If she'd stay home, she'd stop having these problems...

Life here IS Messy- but it is never, never dull...

For those of you wondering, the washer is still broken, because true to form, the part was nationally backordered. OF COURSE it was. At least my favorite coffee shop is on the way to the laundromat. (or the Wash-O-Rama, as I heard a little old lady call it the other day... lol!)

I LOVE living here!

Changes for the Liturgical New Year...

I'm at it again... trying to re-invent my blogger self to better suit my needs. Surely there's a balance between telling you of every load of laundry, and never saying much of everything. I've recently discovered several blogs related to families "Living Liturgically" and I really like the direction they've taken. I've avoided discussing all things church related this last year, because it's too messy. But it's part of who we are, so I hope you'll humor me. I hope to make some changes, and list some great sites I've found to celebrate the New Year that starts Sunday. (The beginning of Advent is the beginning of a new liturgical year, so I think it's the perfect time for new beginnings.) What I think I'll do is continue to post about things like the washer exploding, or the day to dayness of our lives here on Life Gets Messy, (more pics to come as soon as I get camera batteries to co-operate) and then I want to begin using Home to Gilead again to blog about our growing faith, our homeschooling journey, and our local, simple living efforts. I hope you will continue to enjoy reading about our messy life here in Gilead.
God Bless.

We're back!

The girls and I had a great trip to MS to visit the cousins! I love to go, but it's always great to get home, too. Mr. Incredible has been bachin' it this week, and managed to get all that wood from last week chopped, some drywall patched, a doorknob reattached, and had the house clean & chicken in the crockpot when I got home. He even took his own clothes to the laundrymat so I wouldn't have to. Isn't he GREAT!!!

This weekend I want to...

BAKE -bread, granola bars, pumpkin bread and banana bread.
SEW- My sewing hero of a sister got me well on my way to having the girls' duvets done, so I want to keep working on them while I'm still motivated.
STITCH- I have 3 needlework projects going- my Sun picture, and 2 towel projects
CROCHET- I'm still working on dishcloths.
STAY HOME- we're not used to GOING anymore, so I plan to just enjoy being home for a while. Mr. I said it was great not leaving the hill for the week. He didn't even go get the mail.
PLANNING- Christmas is coming, so I'd better figure out what we're doing, and we haven't gotten anything for Thanksgiving yet, either, so we'd better HUP HUP!!

Not too much, right? But for now, I'm going to throw some more wood in the woodstove, and settle in with a good book. I feel very blessed tonight for what we have. Peace~

on the road again...

When life gets too messy... go to your sister's.
So.... to quote Sugarland...

"If anybody asks, not that they would, I'll be down in Mississippi, and up to no good..."

Have a good week...

How much wood could a woodchuck chuck...

Just when I was so proud of our cute little wood pile... Mr. Incredible had to go and haul THIS the rest if the way up the hill.

Here's the biggest round with a 2 ft level for scale. How insane is THAT!

Not quite as insane as he is, obviously.

Maybe I should call him Paul Bunyon instead.

Oh well. I guess I have more wood to stack.

At least it was FREE!!

Wash Day... Or why I married a mechanic...

Or... where my week went wrong...

Good news? My washer stopped squeaking, and making f-14 take off noises...

Bad News? Now it's not making any noise at all.

But, never fear! MR. INCREDIBLE is here!!

(no. really. have no fear. No live washers were harmed in the making of this blog post... it was already dead. RIP, Neptune...)

(evidently water + bearings = BAD)

THAT'S not the Maytag man!!!

Could this be the end??

Stay tuned, on the next episode of ...AS THE WASHER DRUM WON'T TURN...

What we did for Halloween...

Since we live in the woods this year, we had to come up with something different besides our usual trick-or-treating... so we had friends and family over for a spooky costume party. Our kids decided to be a S'More this year. Peanut was the Graham, Curly Sue was the Chocolate, and Little Bit was the Mallow. Perhaps the easiest costumes I've ever put together...

Say, "S'MORE!!!"

We "spooked" the place up a bit, from the gate on up...

The graveyard was so realistic the dogs kep stealing our "bones"

Then there was this "uninvited" guest who'd lost her cat when her broom got unplugged...

(my mom gets right into it, can you tell?) We had to let the girls know who it was, but she told a great story about her cat getting lost off the broom...

The big greenhouse was quite festive by the time we were done. It was a lot of fun, from the silly string fight, to bobbing for apples, and the kids "painting" pumpkins. We also had a great little fire going to roast weenies and mallows, and sipped on mulled cider all night. Sherrie made gift bags, and we ended up with a more reasonable amount of candy, and EVERYONE had a great time.