What Have I Been UP To?--and Prayer Update For Ken's Family

What have I been

UP to?

I risked life and limb to take

that picture for you!

So WHAT have I been up to?

I have been UPto the UP.

Don't know what that is?

UP is short for the

UPPER PENINSULA 

of Michigan.

I am just popping in to tell you

I will be back Wednesday sometime

with a regular blog post.

Tomorrow morning  my son and I are
leaving at 4am driving

to Illinois to pay our

respects to Ken's family as everyone

says their final Earthly goodbyes to Ken.

.Thank you so much- all of you

for your prayers and support

here for Lisa and her children.

Here is what Lisa wrote
after reading the comments you left:
Lisa Mangold has left a new comment on your post 
"Prayers Of A Different Kind Desperately Needed": 

The past two days have been very difficult but God put many people in our lives today to help us through. I see now that God put it on the hearts of many to pray for us as well. As the day continued I felt more peace and now I know why. Thank you to all who left comments here. And thank you Diana for thinking of us today. It really made a difference!

Blessings,
Lisa 

I am going to try to pop around 
and catch up a bit tonight.
Have a wonderful evening

Our Friend, Ken, Has Gone To Heaven

I had another post up this morning

but took it down

to post this one instead.

Please pray for Ken's family today.

He is beyond the need of prayer

because I believe he is

fully and wholly healed
now that he is in Heaven.

This is going to be tough time

for his wife, children and

all of his family.

Any and all prayers 

are appreciated.

I will be gone for a few days

but back the first of the week.

Thank you all for your prayers

and support.

There is JOY In AUTUMN-My Favorite Season

 Just off the foyer we have a small

little "sitting room" with enough

room for a small love seat and 

the kids toys and books are

stored here.

As you walk into the room there is

an odd little "corner".

Give me a corner and I see 

storage and surfaces to decorate. 

Thus, the little built in. 

This is just at the end of our foyer

before you head into he main part

of the house.

Yeah- Yeah-

The one wonky cattail sticking out of the

FLORAL ARRANGEMENT 

has to go!

I just plunked it in there and now I

SEE it!

But -to the right is what I

want to show you today.

This is what is in that little niche.

The painting on top is one

MyHero bought in 1979 

when our youngest son was born.

It is by a WI artist, Robert Lardinois (Bob).

It has seen at least a dozen different homes

that we have lived in

and the frame has lots of nicks.

I could paint it but, like me,

it is showing its age-

and that's okay.

The slate on the bottom is one I painted

back in the early 80's..

That was during my "folk art" period.

But what I really want you to see is

JOY!

Isn't she just precious?

Can you see the name JOY printed on the base?

In front of her stands a 

German paper mache turkey.

He belonged to hubby's grandmother Clara.

This is another one of her turkeys.

He is VERY HEAVY clay.

He is PERFECTLY imperfect.

His legs won't support him anymore so he has

a paper base.  I suppose I should 

cover it with leaves.

Speaking of turkeys....

No - I am NOT posting a picture of 

MyHero dressed up as a gobbler-

although that WOULD BE funny!

Hmmm...Now there's a thought for a

Halloween costume for him!

No- SweetCheeks asks me every year

where HER turkey is.

He's right there on the window ledge that

separates the little sitting area from the

staircase.

Now THIS Ladies & Gennelmun

yes I know how to spell gentlemen

is THE most 

PERFECT TURKEY

I have EVER seen!

Now if you are easily offended

you might want to sign off right here.

Why?

Well....I am going to show you a butt!

And because we all KNOW that 

SweetCheeks loves saying BUTT

I am going to show you 

THIS!

And THAT, my friends

is the BUTT of the turkey featured above.

He moons me every time I go up the stairs.

I have SO MUCH MORE

Fall Decorating to show you.

I could do more pictures but

you know how I like to talk!

Yep- You'll just have to come back 

to see more!

Ummmm--dare I say it?

3 months till Christmas.

You're welcome!

Prayers Of A Different Kind Desperately Needed

It is with a heavy heart

that I am putting out this prayer request.

Usually, we want to pray for recovery

and a healing for the person that is ill.

I put out the first prayer request for 

them here.

Today,

I am asking that you pray for 

comfort and strength

for our friend, Ken,

and his family

as he prepares for his final journey home- 

barring a miracle.

Ken has fought a long, hard battle

seeking health.

He so wants to be healthy for his wife and family

and to be able to serve God as a pastor.

But in spite of his earnest desire for

a full recovery, 

his poor, Earthly body is just too tired.

He needs a second liver transplant

and he is not physically strong enough

to endure the surgery.

He has decided not to try 

any more experimental surgeries or procedures.

He has opted to live in comfort,

as best he can, for now.

Ken is out of the hospital and

at his home in Illinois.

He knows that his 

HEAVENLY BODY 

will be a divine one-

free of imperfections and illnesses.

He has accepted that Heaven will be his healing.

Please pray for him and his precious family

in the upcoming days and moments.

They need to be wrapped with all the

warmth and love we can give them.

A mere Thank you is not enough-

but know that I 

DO THANK YOU  

and truly appreciate each

and every one of you

that take a moment out of your day

to say a prayer and/or leave a message.

If you would like to leave them a comment here

Lisa will pop in to read them when she can.

Hope you have a blessed day~

The Rest Of The Story- Craft Room & A Lie I Told

Well, 

The CRAFT SEWING ROOM

is 

ALMOST DONE.

Done enough that I can show it anyway.

There will be things to 

"tighten up"as I go along

but it is to the point where I can

SEW & CRAFT.

Grab your coffee.

This is a LONG POST for me.

Here is a link to the first post I did 

about it.

This room is only 8-1/2' x 11-1/2'.

However, the ceiling is 14 FEET high!

The sink takes up most of one 8-1/2 foot wall.

I can't put anything next to it because the door

opens and almost touches it.

I mirrored the wall behind the sink.

AND I mirrored the wall behind the door.

These are both old mirrors and as

you can see the one has to hang over

the side of the sink because of electrical

outlets to the far right of the sink.

The tall one will be perfect for checking

out the fit of things AND I can see

anyone coming up the cul-de-sac behind me

when I am sitting sewing.

The tops of mirrors are just 

over 6' tall.

I did not buy one new thing for this room.

The light fixture above the sink is fluorescent

and has "daylight" bulbs in it.  

It is one I had and is turned sideways instead

of hanging from the ceiling.

It lights the place beautifully.

I have cable TV and a telephone here.

Coffee & water.

The only thing missing is a port-a-potty.

....hmmm...now THERE'S a thought....

The greenery in the corner is attached

to a metal "open weave" shutter.

It covers the mess of cords running to 

the TV and telephone.

Telephone is mounted to the right of the 

coffee cups on the wall.

The old piece you see is reflected 

from across the room.

It is so bright in here that it is hard to get pictures. 

The chair will be slipcovered this next week.

It is ugly but comfortable for sewing.

The material for the window treatments are 

from another house. 

I think I bought that material in 1996...lol..

I still like it and it is perfect for 

Fall & Winter.

I shirred some on a rod to cover up the

opening left where a door is missing.

The old cabinet below is actually two pieces.

The bottom one rolls out if I need a 

larger work surface.

It came out of an old warehouse that 

MyHero's granddad owned and was

probably used in the old lumber yard.

It is a rough tough old piece and I am 

loath to take a paintbrush to it.

The mullioned "windowed cabinet" above

are windows from an old rectory

that we junk picked.  

We just built a basic open backed "box" that is 8" deep

and put shelves in it.

There is matching one in the garage that holds

gardening supplies.

I also shirred the same material on to cover the

open shelving in the cabinet.

I attached a yardstick to the front so as I am

sitting sewing or crafting I can quickly measure lengths.

Like I said- the room is small so it is tough

to get full pictures of anything.

Some of my materials are folded and 

in the cabinet.

There are more materials stored underneath.

Speaking of storage-

This is the cabinet that I spray painted.

It sits just outside the door to my room

where it is handy.

It is full of things I don't need everyday.

Pulling back the curtain you can see what

is stored in the cabinet.

The sink has room for my serger when 

it is not in use.

There are a couple of changes I made

since I took my first pictures.

I hung my two favorite cups on the 

pegs above the coffee maker

AND

I hung my sweet crafting apron on 

the back of the door.

I would like to say that the blurry apron picture

is my attempt at "arty" photography-

but that would be a lie.

It is just a crappy picture.

Okay-

That brings me to the 

LIE I TOLD.

I didn't do it intentionally.

No indeedy!

I had taken a bunch of pictures from 

the back of our house and I posted this one

as being the view from my sewing/craft room.

Well, I lied.

That is from our master bedroom 

which backs up to the garage but

sticks out about 15' closer to the water.

Here is the REAL view from my craft room.

Still not bad.

As you can see it is so gray today that 

the water blends into the sky on

picture #1.

Do you see the little wooden boat on shore?

Picture #2 is take about 20 steps closer

so you can see the water behind that 

same boat.

So- sorry I lied.

Whaddaya gonna do?

Have me arrested?

image

Whoo Hooo-maybe I'll have 

Paris Hilton for a cellmate.

IF that happens

maybe I can ask her for a loan to 

EXPAND my craft room.

Just a thought.....

GO PACK GO

No time to post much!

BUT-

It IS 

PACKER SEASON

and

there IS a game today!

GO PACK GO

They playing some kind of little

old KITTY CAT team

from Detroit today...

just can't  seem to remember

WHO THEY ARE!

Sure doesn't look like much of a threat

to me....

GO PACK GO

WELCOME TO THE little CRAFT/SEWING ROOM

Okay-

The truth is that I am not quite done
with the craft/sewing room

but I AM far enough along to 

give you a good peek.

I am going to break this up into

a couple of posts because

I have grandkids here for the weekend

and you can imagine how time 
flies and there's not much time to blog.

This door is INSIDE our garage.

It is the old front door that was

on this house when we bought it.

Too pretty to not re-use somewhere.

There is a car IN THE GARAGE 

to the immediate right.

The "blue" you see to the left

is that sea-foam cabinet

and is full of patterns, etc.

I will show you that another time.

Come-on in!

When you open the door this is 

what you see.

That is my sewing table to the right.

It belonged to hubby's grandmother

and is a true Art-Deco piece.

There was a desk that matched

that we gave to a friend (darn it).

It is the perfect height and size

for this room

You can see the use and age on
the polished black top.  
The top is some kind of "resin".

Immediately inside the door
is a sink.

I picked this old tin & porcelain sink up curbside

when we lived in another town.

It was rusty and back then I 

painted it green when I was using

it for "potting".

Here it is all spray painted and cleaned up.

I spray painted inside and outside.
The bottoms of the shelves
were in pretty bad shape.
So- I covered them with 
self-adhesive tiles.

I do this under all the sinks in my house, too.
I just buy a cheap shiny self-stick tile
and cut to size. 
It makes it so easy to keep clean.

My next post I will show you the rest
of the room.
I should have it completely finished by then.
At least now the basics are all in place.

Okay-Here is your laugh for the day-
At MY expense, of course.

Before I started painting the sink 
I checked my paint supply.
I had 2-1/2 cans of Rustoleum Gloss White Enamel.

Good to go.
I figured I would need 2+ cans.
I start with the 1/2 full can and 
I spray the whole inside
of all the sink cabinets
before I run out of paint.

I open Can #2-
THIS is what the paint does.
Cleaning the nozzle does NOT help.

image
Not to worry.
I have a THIRD can and by now
I am pretty sure one more can will do 
the whole job.
Whooo Hoooo!

Um...Hello!

Let me just say-there is something
DOWN INSIDE the
spray hole and it will
NOT TAKE another nozzle.

Okay- I want to finish this so 
I realize that 
I HAVE to run to Home Depot 
at this point.
I am in an old nightgown to paint.
Yes- It's true.
No pictures of THAT!

I HAVE TO change clothes to go to
Home Depot.

I throw on some clothes-
hop in the car and run to 
Home Depot.
NO ONE in Home Depot
will look me in the face.
I think---
That's ODD!

However, I get TWO NEW CANS
of white spray paint.
I get in the car and look at myself
in the mirror.

My NOSE is full of 
WHITE SPRAY PAINT.
It looks like BOOGERS!

I can't do it- 
I just can't do it!
I CAN'T show you a picture
of a nose full of 
WHITE SPRAY PAINT.

Next time I will wear THIS!

image
NOT to Home Depot, Silly...
Just to paint!
I will wear something like THIS
to Home Depot next time.

image
HA!  We'll see who has the 
LAST LAUGH 
after all!

I have kids here for the weekend
so I most likely won't be around
until Monday.
Have a GREAT weekend!

View From The New Craft/Sewing Room AND Booby Trapped

I FINALLY GOT

the cord I needed to load pictures

from my camera to my computer.

Here is the view looking from the patio doors

towards the bay.

See the storm coming in

over the water?

Awesome, isn't it?

Well, THE ROOM is NOT QUITE

ready yet.

I had a sick kiddo here and then I 

got "the bug".

While I had "the bug"

I managed to keep the kitchen clean

and do laundry.

MyHero has the bug, too.

He has managed to 

KEEP THE BED WARM

and that's all I'm gonna say about that.

I will give you a peek at what I 

have been up to out there.

This was an addition in the back

corner of the garage.

We used the windows that we 

took out of the main house when we

rehabbed it.

They are good windows-just not

what we were using in the house.

They are brown here-but the 

sliding glass door was already white.

Here they are with one coat of 

white primer on them.

1 coat of primer and  

2 coats of paint and they look like this.

The room looks bigger and brighter now.

I should finish the room up this Friday

and then I will show you the whole thing.

Meanwhile...

Here are the girls at the beach.

Two of them are waterside.

The 11 year old, 

wanted me to bury her in sand.

and I obliged.

THEN----

her little sister decided to

ADD TO

 the fun.

The moral of the story is...

Your little sister can always

MAKE A BOOB OUT OF YOU!

Hmmm...Little sister is going to need some

SERIOUS TRAINING

if she is going to be a plastic surgeon!

SNIFFLES AND SNEEZES AND Oh- LOOK! It's SUPERMAN

We all had a busy weekend.

Family visiting.

A Packer Game.

A quick trip to Door County

and one little girl 

that spent the day on the couch.

AND because Mom has to work today

Nana gets to spend the day with her little

SWEET CHEEKS.

So, while SOMEONE is NAPPING

I hope to finish 

THE SEWING ROOM!

AND--IF I get that done I will

show you the pictures tomorrow.

IF I DON'T get it done I may have to 

show you some pictures of

SOMETHING SOMEONE ELSE.

Oh- Look!

It's my favorite Super Hero!

Nice Cape!!!!

Shhhh--- Don't tell him.

MyHero thinks he is 

SUPERMAN!

Somehow that cape just seems to be lacking

a certain something~

Ummmm..

Now THERE'S A CAPE FOR YOU!

image

Do you think if MyHero got a pair of 

BOOTS like that he would look

more like a 

REAL SUPER HERO?

Have a GREAT Monday!