Pray | Freebie Printable | Jeremiah 29:11

  One of my Life Verses is Jeremiah 29:11. It has come up time and again in my life to provide me with a calm for the control that God has in my life. I don't need to plan every detail. God's got this. This is a VERY hard concept for someone like me to grasp sometimes. I plan everything. I like to know what's happening next, what steps I need to take and how we're going to get there. You can imagine surprising me is not easy [lol, love you my Beloved Mister]...

  So I decided [after being asked by readers] to make a printable with this verse on it. Apparently [and gratefully] I am not alone. I made them in a six color combos. Hope one works for you!

  Today's Challenge is....
  to take a moment to STOP. Stop what you're doing. Stop planning, stop worrying, stop freaking [cause i have no idea what freaking looks like....[sarcasm]]. Take a look at all the good in your life and how far God has taken you. Worrying does nothing. Well, maybe grey hairs and stress lines. Hug your kids a little tighter, put work away and have a tickle fight on the floor! Take a walk and know that God has got this.

Prayer: Thank you Jesus that nothing is too big for you. What a loss I would be at if my problems were too big for you. Cover me with your calm spirit and wrap me in your loving grace and warmth. I deserve it not, but you give it in spades anyhow. Thank you for all that I have and for having absolute control in my life! Amen.


Ok, until I can make all my printables into PDFs, just click on these to make them larger and save. Oh yeah, and print them as 8x10 size!

Laugh | Conversations with Little Miss Diva | 2012

  I found these awesome printables [and of course pinned them]. I'm going to do them every year with each of our littles [there is a toddler and child version at that link above!].
  These are amazing conversation starters for sure! We had so much fun doing this activity together...just take a look at some of her answers [below]

  This wasn't just something to knock off of my pinterest list, and yeah it's fun to look back at it over the years, but this was so much more. It was a real conversation with my youngest daughter about things that matter to her. It spawned more conversations and she loved getting to talk to me. I learned that her hero is her sister. Awww! I am definitely going to make a much higher effort to spend more time in conversation with my children. I thought I was doing a good job...but there's room for improvement always!

  Today I'm going to share My Conversation with Aubrie [aka: Little Miss Diva]....fyi: this was SO much fun! she  really enjoyed it, too! It was fun to learn things about my daughter...I mean even though yesterday her favorite color was purple...and now it's obviously pink...I think when the kids graduate from high school, I will compile these into a memory book. Or perhaps our yearly family memory book, I will just include them in that....not sure [maybe both, so they have one and I have one..ooo...now I think I'm onto something]

Cook | Whole Wheat Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins

  There is a certain type of muffin that everyone in our nest enjoys so much. There's recipe that we love and I always follow, but today we decided to try to make them a tad healthier. We made Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins with whole wheat instead of white wheat. I didn't say anything to anyone, to see if they would still go over well....and....omigosh. BEST. BATCH. EVER.
  Here is a link to the recipe that we use [HERE] The only changes we made were that we used the whole wheat flour and since I only have one lemon left, I used 1.5 Tbsp of lemon juice in lieu of zested lemon. Next time I will zest the lemon. The lone lemon is for another recipe I am going to post next week. [you will swoon. seriously.]  These are so seriously good.

  Tips: Joanne [the author of the link where I got my recipe] gives a good tip that I want to emphasize: When you're mixing the batter, last step before you put into muffin cups to bake, DON'T OVER MIX. don't. Let it be lumpy. This goes against my natural instinct to whip everything smooth. Resist it, if you're like me!
  My Tip: When you're doing the crumb topping, be careful not to overdo it with the mixing again.I mistakenly let my Beloved Mister mix this the first time we made this last fall....runny mess that did not resemble anything like a crumb! Bless his heart. He tried. I asked him to help me. If you don't have one of those nifty pastry cutters [like moi], I cut the butter into small cubes and then used a fork [not my fingers] to make sure it turns into crumb like topping. Might take some trial and error.
    {FYI: if you do over mix the topping, use it anyways, it doesn't taste bad at all...it's YUM, it's just not a crumb topping, it's like a glaze...}


  What You Need: 
For The Muffins
1.5 cups of whole wheat flour 
3/4 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
zest of 2 meyer lemons or 1.5 Tbsp of lemon juice
1/3 cup oil
1 extra large egg 
1/3 cup milk
2 cups blueberries


For The Crumb Topping
1/2 cup sugar
2.5 oz flour (1/2 cup)
1/4 cup butter
1 tsp cinnamon

Getting Started

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Mix Dry Ingredients

Toss blueberries with a couple tablespoons of dry ingredient mixture

Mix and set to the side

Line your muffin tins!

Whisk wet ingredients

Add wet stuff to dry stuff

EASILY mix/turn/fold in blueberries

I forgot to photograph, putting batter into muffin tins...but i'm sure you can picture it! Chop up butter!

hmmm...should have taken a pic of the topping crumbs pre muffin topped...

Getting ready to bake!

20 minutes later!!!

OH MY they smell DIVINE!!!

yumalicious. oh yeah. i said it.

They were well received by the littles...