New Retreat Venue 2-8-2018

Almost a year ago Doyle tagged me in a post on Facebook about a new retreat venue in our county. My friend Teresa and I had said we really needed to check into it.

Although we like the retreat we attend in Canton we do not like the drive to get there and come home. About a month ago, the same Facebook page (Rock House Retreat) posted about having an open retreat February 8th-11th. I immediately sent a message to Teresa and asked if she wanted to go. She was game! We had 3 weeks before the retreat.

This venue was the brainchild of a quilter but she is open to scrapbookers too 😊. It's only about 30 minutes from my house!

Our bedroom. There is one more bed in this room on the wall were I am standing.

A very nice bathroom!

This is a picture I took from their Facebook page. I don't know how but I didn't manage to take any pictures of the main room! This view only shows half of the room. This is when you first walk through the door looking to the right. The dining area is in the front bottom of the photo. The kitchen is to the left of the photo not shown.

You can see quilts hanging on the wall.

They chairs are good for scrapbooking too!
Actually Teresa and I concluded that quilters and scrapbookers really have a lot in common.

This view of the kitchen is looking toward the front door. It is to the left of this photo. There is a hallway to the right of the kitchen were the rooms are located. This photo is also from their Facebook page.

Another plus about this place is there were NO issues with cell service or internet! Signal was strong!

Of course I had to walk around a bit and explore around sunset 😉

It was a great start to the weekend. More in another post!

Have a good one

Pretty But Destructive 2-22-2018

The ice continued to build on trees. As you can see these limbs are nearly touching the ground.

It is eerily beautiful.

There were many trees that lots limbs from the heavy ice. The ones most heavily damaged were pine and cedar trees.

Thankfully the roads didn't get slick.

Back at the horses, the icicles got longer. The temperature started slowing rising during the afternoon and ice began to melt....

...and the ice began to fall off.

I just love this little road that goes into the woods next to the horse pasture.


By Friday the 24th we were ice free!

Have a good one!

Ice Storm 2-21-2018

We were once again in moderate drought conditions. We had a very dry fall and most of winter. I along with others had been praying and declaring into the atmosphere and the rains came! You can click here for a short video of the downpour that happened before I went to feed horses on the morning of February 20th.

The weather forecasts were beginning to talk about a cold front that could possibly bring wintry conditions to our area. At first the thought was it would stay above freezing.



The front moved through our area on Tuesday 2-20. As you can see the temp Tuesday afternoon reached 70. When the front moved through the temps plummeted. By 7:30pm we were at 35.

Wednesday morning anything elevated was covered in ice. Thankfully the roads stayed wet.

It's pretty to see all the trees covered in ice.

At first glance it looks like water but it is ice.

I get horses fed and head on to work.









About 10:30 Wednesday morning we had a downpour of sleet.

Sleet accumulation on my truck.

Before I left the office the National Weather Service upgraded our Winter Weather Advisory to an "Ice Storm Warning"!


We lost electricity at 2:30pm. It was not restored until 5:00AM Thursday morning. We did not suffer though. Doyle hooked up the generator but MANY others didn't have that option. We offered the apartment to a couple of our neighbors but they opted to stick it out.

Keannon's parents did come stay as we learned they were without power and live outside the city limits. The rural areas seemed to take longer to get their power restored.

I'll share a few more pictures on another post.

Have a good one!

Valentine Cards

I made Valentine cards but I didn't give any away 😞. I would have sent one to Remi but they were in the process of moving to Colorado and I didn't have an address for where they were living currently.

I'm still not too sure that I like this one but oh, well! I didn't mean for the ink to smear on the white hearts. I tried something I saw where you ink your embossing folder then run it through the sizzix. It may have been the type of ink I used. I don't know. I decided that I would make it work. It does kind of have a "distressed" look to it. The love banner is a unity stamp from February 2017 KOTM. It was all one piece and I cut out the letters and attached it to a piece of twine to make a banner.






This Valentine Card I made for a Unity card challenge. Which was to make a Valentine Card using only black and white. I am entering this into Cards in Envy "Give it Some Heart" card challenge. You may recognize a technique I used on the last post. It is called "Triple Stamping". It is so fun and makes pretty cards.  I do like how this card turned out.  I think I may go back and color in the bigger hearts. I haven't decided yet. The Biggest heat came for the same KOTM as above. The heart with words came from April 2017 KOTM. The tiny hearts came from the stamp set "Never Ending Love".

This was my first attempt at this card. I wasn't satisfied so I made another. The paper was cut crooked. I didn't like the way I stamped the border. The heart border was created using the stamp set mentioned above "Never Ending Love". The raccoons are a Phyllis Harris design called "Sweets for My Sweet".










Valentine's Day Doyle took me out for lunch. It was on Wednesday so we had church that evening. It was still a nice day!

Thanks for looking! Have a good one!

Another Round of Cards

 I made this card for a young woman in our church. I used Lauren Girl which is from the AngieGirl Collection by Unity. I colored with Copic Markers.

This card was made using what is called "Triple Stamping". I learned this technique when I was making cards for Operation Write Home. Their website with tips and techniques are still up but the group is no longer operating. This is a great resource "how to's". I used two different medallion stamps from February 2017 KOTM.

 

 I love how this card turned out. It was one of those "happy accidents". I was trying to stamp flowers with different distress inks. It didn't turn out the way I had hoped so I added more ink and did lots of blending! I colored the girl with Copic Markers then cut her out and added foam tape for dimension. The stamp set I used for this is "She Never Says Never". The words on the background are also part of this stamp set.

I made this card for one of my friends from church.
This is a Phyllis Harris design called "All Things New". I colored with Copic Markers. To give the appearance of "wet" I used glossy accents on the raindrops and puddle.

This is another Phyllis Harris design. I just love her little girl stamps. This is called "Sunny Days".




Thanks for looking!

Have a good one!

Sunset February 3, 2018

These pictures do not really need any explanation.

Zoomed out.

I love this one!

Have a good one!

Night Out 2-2-2018

On Monday night January 29th a friend of mine from church messaged me that she had received a call from her dad's friend that he was found slumped over in a chair at a hardware store. He lives about an hour from here. He was taken to the hospital by ambulance.

After she and her husband had been in the hospital with her dad for a week, Doyle and I decided to go see them. We planned to take them out to dinner to get them away for a little while.

Doyle looked into some eating places and found a gem!

It's called "Fly By Night Cattle Company". It's off the beaten path but well worth going too!

We arrive just as the sun was setting. I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera. All I had was my phone. I still managed a few pictures and so did my friend Joelle who shared with me.

Joelle, is a new horse ridding buddy as well as church friend. She loves horses too. When we arrived she and I both made a beeline for the horses and to take pictures of the sunset!

Joelle

Nothing more "Texas" than a horse, sunset and Longhorn 😉

In warmer weather they have live music and a place for people to sit outside.

It was just so pretty!

I think this is a cool picture. Joelle took it.

We had a great time with them. It was just what they needed. We also spent some time visiting with her dad and praying for him. He had double pneumonia. He was a very sick man and was in the hospital for 2 weeks. He is now home still recovering.

Have a good one!