While exploring many of the 164 blogs in Karen Valentine's 5th Annual Blogger Party, I have been totally inspired with ideas to repurpose the space that I have available to keep my crafting items somewhat more neatly stored, organized and just inviting me to create!!

As it was previously, I really haven't had one centrally located space, ever, to keep all of my crafting supplies stored, organized and just inviting me to create.  I had a couple of places in the house, and then a couple of areas in the garage.  I would have to gather everything and take it to the area in which I was going to create.  Which I showed you all these places in my July 11th post.

As I said, many blogs I have visited have inspired me with ideas for being more organized.  However, one stands out "THE" most so far.  It was Tina at her "Beansie Babbles" blog that most inspired me!  You just have to check out her site http://beansiebabbles.blogspot.com/ and her July 12th post.  She has taken a 61" x 54" walk-in closet and used every square inch of space for her little crafting heaven on earth!!!

You ROCK Tina!!!  

The way she has used every square inch of space to not just store and organize her crafting items, this space totally invites no beckons us to, 

"Come on in the water's fine!"

So here we go with my space!  

Not quite up there yet with Tina, 

but it is 

almost
 my little crafting heaven on earth!!

I really can't believe I let you in to this space previously, 

seeing how organized many of you are in your crafting areas!  

Okay, so this is the before picture.  So sad.

I did spend a good 3 hours working on organizing all my colored scrap paper

and some other things last Sunday evening.  

It is amazing how much scrap paper a person can simply just not let go of.

I ended up with an entire 9 x 12 x 3.5 inch tote of scraps all organized by color.

Then yesterday I spent 5 hours doing this!

Welcome!!

To my newly stored, organized and inviting crafting space!!!

I am so excited!!

I not only have everything in one centrally located area,

I still have room for MORE stuff!!!

Just in time too, my nieces are coming over tomorrow to do some crafting with Aunt Laura!!!

What you do not see in this picture and why it took me 5 uninterrupted hours, I might add,

is there was a double bed in this room full of "stuff" needing organizing too!

That is even a way more sad picture that, thank goodness, I did not take.  

Anyway,

the other thing that came to me after I was all finished,

the bed can actually be used now by a guest!

Also,

this stand alone closet really can be used as well for that guest.

Before,

I would have to grab the pile of stuff and plop it somewhere.

Now, 

I can just grab a stack of totes and place them in another room!

So,

this area is way more repurposed than I had thought!

Again,

a great big THANK YOU to Karen and Tina 

for your inspiration behind my newly repurposed crafting space!!!

Okay, so if you don't get the title of my post today.  You obviously were deprived as a child, or your children were.  However, not to worry, your grandchildren do not have to be deprived, it's not too late!!

Remember the Frances books?!  They were written during the 60s and 70s by Russell Hoban and the very first book by Hoban was illustrated by Garth Williams (Little House on the Prairie series illustrator too!), the rest of the books in the series were illustrated by Hoban's wife Lillian.  The first book in the series was titled "Bedtime for Frances" but one of my favorites was "Bread and Jam for Frances."  These books are truly classics!  I love classics!

Okay, back on the farm, as my daughter would say when we get off on a bunny trail, or in this case a badger trail!  LOL!  Sorry for my humor this morning.  I may be the only one laughing.  I went to bed at a regular time last night, almost my going back to work time, then I got up at my going back to work time, and I have already had two cups of java, made a batch of zucchini bread and am working on some Pioneer Woman layered jello for a snack for Bible study tonight.  It's a visual for part of our lesson.  Don't worry, they get the zucchini bread too, and with cream cheese frosting to spread on each slice, if they choose!

My Dad's birthday was last week.  He loves to get, or at least he says he does, I am pretty sure he is telling the truth, anyway he loves to get my homemade cream or fruit pies for his birthday with a home made card.  Yes, he still likes these from me even though his daughter is over 45 and almost 50, home made cards! However, for this birthday I decided to try to make him some Blueberry Jam, another one of his favorites; since I had made him a blueberry pie for Father's Day.  

I found this great Blueberry Jam recipe online and just had to try it!  I am always looking for quick and easy recipes, but having the taste like you slaved over the stove for hours!  Anybody with me?!?!  There were only two ingredients used in making this recipe: fresh blueberries, and sugar.  I have seen other recipes in which people have used lemon juice or lemon peel and cinnamon, that is fine too.  Whatever your taste buds like, I say use those ingredients! However, on this particular day, I just used the two.   

First I washed the jars and then boiled the jars and lids for 5 minutes.

While that was all happening, I took the time to really wash and stem the blueberries.  

We didn't want those yucky stems in our beautiful completed jam, now did we!!

Once the blueberries were washed I did take the time to pat them dry 

with a paper towel.  Not ever having made this recipe before, 

I didn't want extra liquid to be a factor in how long

 it took for the berries to cook down into jam.

Next I put 4 pints of cleaned and patted dry blueberries into my pot on the stove.

I then added 3 cups of sugar, turned the stove up to medium heat, 

then used a potato masher and started releasing the juices from the blueberries.

*Side note here: I actually used this utensil I had in order to mash

and stir my mixture.  I used this so that the utensil I was using

would not scratch the surface of my pot.  This product worked 

great because it wasn't flexible.  It was stiff so that I could actually

mash the blueberries but then stir the mixture as well.  

Once the mixture was pretty mashed and it had come to a boil,

I continued to stir mixture for approximately 30 minutes,

allowing for it to be in a controlled boil the entire time.

Mixture is done thickening when you spoon out some jam onto a 

surface and it leaves a thick trail behind your spoon.

Do Not stop stirring the mixture or you will scorch your jam.

Believe it or not, I was able to get 3 1/2 pints cooked product

out of 4 fresh pints of blueberries.  

It is amazing how much cooks off!

If I don't say so myself,

the finished product was/is quite tasty!

There is no need to seal the jars with wax 

if you intend to eat the jam within 4 weeks.  

This recipe is good for up to 4 weeks stored in the refrigerator.    

  

Last Friday, July 5th was an amazingly great time with our church family!!  Each year our small town Fire Department and City Council put on a fabulous fireworks display.  This event doesn't always take place on the 4th, it usually takes place the Friday or Saturday following the 4th.  

In the past, we have met under the 4H Pavillion at our City Park.  

Not so much this year.  

Last year was so incredibly hot that we decided to rent the Community Building which is located just up the way a bit from the 4H Pavillion at the City Park.  

So glad we did!

This year we had the largest crowd ever!  There were approximately 160 of us!

In the past the most we have had is around 125.  

Normally we grill burgers and dogs.  We provide the meat, buns, condiments and tableware.

Then everyone else brings both a side, dessert and their own drink.

This year we did things a little/lot differently!

Along with not having it outside, and deciding to rent the building so we had AC,

the church came along side us and purchased fried chicken, 400 pieces of fried chicken!!

Then our family made several sides, while everyone in attendance

 brought a dessert and their own drink.

Main serving area with fired chicken, fruit salads, 

baked beans, pasta salad and cheesy casserole.

Dessert area, my favorite!

No party is complete without decorations!

These were fun.  I found the idea for the rockets on Pinterest.

The rest were items we purchased at either the Dollar Tree or Hobby Lobby.

We printed out the Declaration of Independence on paper,

then cut them out to fit around these LED candles.

The flag came from the church.
The lantern has an LED candle in it and came from our back patio.

This is what it looks like close up.

I just tied a little ribbon around the top

and then used this fun garland and wrapped it around the entire lantern.

This is the baked bean and finish making the salad crew!
My Dad in the dark blue and my step-mom to his left in the turquoise.

This is the run and get the ice, tea lights at the Dollar Tree,

clean-up, salad making and trash crew!

From left to right: my daughter, my niece, my daughter's boyfriend, his friend

and me.

Here is the rest of the clean-up crew!

My hubby in the dark shirt to the back with his hand under his chin,

 and his two buddies.

Of course the evening was not complete until we had watched the 

beautiful display that the Fire Department and City Council provided!

Thank you to everyone that came to this annual event!

We look forward to another great time next year!

Hello all!  I want to welcome you all to the party and thank Karen Valentine for taking time to put this party together.  What a great opportunity for all of us to share our ideas and get to know one another better.

This is my first year participating in the annual blog party.  However, I am not new to the blogging scene.  I have been blogging since June of 2008.

In 2008, when I first started blogging it was about our faith, family and the fun stuff we did.  It was also mainly used to keep our family connected that live in different parts of the United States and world.  

At that time, our daughter was getting ready for her junior year in high school and our son had just graduated from college.  

Here we were last summer, 2012 just four short years after I had started blogging and all of a sudden I came to a lull, so to speak, with postings.  Life got a little busier at work and the postings had quite a bit of distance from one post to the next.  I wasn't doing it for enjoyment any longer but more out of duty, or to check it off my "Done" list.  

I am very blessed to have a job in which I work 9 months out of the year and then get three off during the summer months.  In the past, I have filled my summers with lots of fun things but also things that would keep me so busy, and yes, I was often times doing things that I enjoyed but at a very hurried pace.  Then by the time my summer break was over, I didn't really feel like I got a break.     

As we came to this summer, I set some different goals.  I wanted to get back to cooking more and experimenting with creating my own recipes, as well as trying some new and old ones, and then modifying others after we had tried them; making them either healthier or more to the want of our taste buds.  It was my son that inspired me to change our family blog to more of a food and family blog!  

Since that summer of 2008, things have changed a lot around the home front.  Our son has since got married and we have a wonderful daughter-in-law!  Our daughter is still at home but in her fourth year of college, changing majors only for the 1st time, she is hardly at home between work, school and a serious boy-friend.  These changes have allowed us to do some remodeling and that has been exciting!

It actually all started with remodeling our kitchen three years ago!  It isn't anything huge but it works for our family.  In the foreground you can see a bar and pass-thru window, yes we knocked a hole in a load bearing wall!  That was fun stuff!!  We wanted our kitchen to open up into our dining and living area so when we were hosting family or friend gatherings (which we do quite often) we could feel like we were all together!  

So welcome to my "new" first space of creating, our kitchen!!

This was my "original" first place for creating.  This room was used to homeschool our daughter for six years when we moved into our home thirteen years ago.  We did lots of lessons and crafting in this room!  Our idea with putting this long 10 foot counter top in this room is so that one day it would transition from the schooling room to my crafting/sewing room.  

However......

Our daughter did go off to high school eight years ago but it wasn't until this spring when we tackled refinishing our wood floors that we transitioned this room from the school/crafting room to basically "The Office".  We cut down the 10 foot long counter top, and now we each have a place in the room with our computers to work on whatever project we might be working on using the internet.  Yes, my husband has this 4 foot section of the counter.  We just did this project a few weeks ago and have not completed his area, totally.  

This is our daughter's area of the room.  There were some ugly sliding doors on this closet and we took them off and put this curtain up using a tension rod.  

I like the look a lot better, makes the room seem a little homey!

  

This is my area!  A friend gave us, yes gave us this roll top desk!!  

This is were I find all my inspirations behind my cooking, crafting and home decorating ideas!!!

This has become my "new" crafting/sewing area!  It is now our extra room in the basement.  Eventually, the other 6 foot section of the counter top is going to be placed in this room!  

This room is still a work in progress!!

Although, I do find myself at this table more often putting together my crafty things, or pulling out my portable sewing machine to repair something.  

Then, if it is a nice day outside temperature wise, I often find myself out on our back patio creating.  

I have used this area for a couple of projects this summer!!

Thanks for taking a look at my spaces where I have fun creating my food and crafty items.

I hope you come back for more!!