FREE Halloween Bucket List Printable

I am so excited to share this Halloween Bucket List printable with you. 

Click HERE to download for FREE

Love it and want to support me? Just click on the picture above to purchase. 

Just print,(laminate if you want) and check off each time you complete one of the items. 

Enjoy!

~Dedra

A Fun Experiment for your Spouse

I had a random idea yesterday. I went to a church meeting last night and I remembered a story I heard a few years ago about the man conducting the meeting. His wife has some sort of chronic illness and she can't do much at all for herself. He does a lot for her including her hair and her make-up EVERY DAY. He does a pretty good job at it to. :) When he talks about his wife you can tell how much he loves her! I so strongly believe that he loves her so much because he serves her.

I decided last night to serve my husband in some of the same ways this man serves his wife. I told my husband I was going to do something random the next day to show him I love him. I also told him to not expect the world because we have 3 kids AND  we are still catching up from having the stomach flu all week.

This morning I slapped some hand cuffs on my husband and told him he couldn't use his hands and I was going to get him ready for church (he went and I stayed home with the kids because we are probably still contagious and we absolutely don't want to share!).

For the next hour (it did take a while) I got him ready. I bathed him, dressed him, did his hair, brushed his teeth, shaved his face, put on his socks and shoes and brushed the lint off his suit.

It may seem like a weird or non-important thing to do but by the end his face was really beaming. We had to communicate about things we never have before as I asked him how to do his hair and if I was hurting him while shaving etc.

When he left for church he said he wanted to do that for me sometime and I can't wait.

If you want to do this, hint at it the night before. I think this really helped and had him wondering what on earth I would do to him the next day. Also, make sure you do it on a day when you have time as it did take a while. It also doesn't have to be getting him/her ready. You could feed them a meal or something else.

I hope you'll try this and that you have amazing results. Let me know how it goes! :)
~Dedra

DE-STRESS ALREADY!

Good morning, Mom!  It's Monday!!

Like most people's homes, things have been pretty crazy around here.  Even more so than usual.  To sum up:  car died-as in DEAD, dryer broke, vacuum broke, I have morning sickness the worst EVER 24/7, lost my wedding ring...pretty much a country song!  I keep telling myself to breathe and calm down.  I do deep breathing often to slow my heart.  BUT.  I have discovered a secret all purpose de-stresser!!  Talking one night, my husband and I came up with a plan that has changed our perspective.  Once a week, we sit down (in the evening when the kids are in bed and it's finally QUIET,) and have a talk.  We list on a piece of paper all the things that stress us out.  (One column for each of us.)  Underneath we write what we can do about each item.  The deal is to do all the things we CAN do, and then forget it...as much as possible.  HOLY COW, you guys, this has been amazing.  Some of the things that were bothering me I didn't want to bring up at first because I didn't want to stress my husband any more than a father of almost 7 should be already.  It created a really safe, non-confrontational venue to discuss hard topics.  Now we share burdens and work on them together.  Often times the only thing we can do is pray.  But it's enough to know we are truly doing all we CAN do.  I know we're not the first to try this, but I'm so excited about it, I had to share it.

Ice Cream Will Never Be The Same Again

Dedra here. Big things have been happening in my household lately. No, I'm not the one pregnant--Michelle is. :) Just making sure we are all clear on that one! :)

I've been exhausted with everything lately. My husband's work still hasn't improved. We aren't too far from the end of our rope. Still can't buy the house that we walked through 15 months ago but we are still trying!!! Half of our things have been packed up for almost 2 years and I have had enough. I have been unpacking, reorganizing, throwing even more things away and giving boxes of stuff to charities. I'm hoping to be done by the end of next week and hopefully I will be able to blog more and design more with a box-less and more organized home.

The oldest started preschool this week. Little sister got to tag along too. We are doing a "Joy School" type of thing where each mom takes a week. It's pretty low key which is what I was looking for. It is good but sad at the same time. The oldest also lost a tooth last week. Crazy! She got her first two teeth before 4 months so it is expected but still crazy to see her toothless.

NOW on to the reason you're here: 

Ice Cream Goodness

I made some yummy desserts to take to a dinner party. I was going to look at pinterest but the idea just came into my head and it sounded to yummy to ignore! I was soooo right.

Its like an individual ice cream pie with some twists. 

I started with a suped up graham cracker crust topped with chocolate chips. Bake.

Then comes ice cream.

  Top with whipped cream and candy bars. I used Reese's Fastbreak (my favorite), Kit Kat, Reese's and York (not my favorite combination but one of the kids was super excited for the York so it was definitely worth it!)

Here's the real instructions:

Graham Cracker Crust:
12 full graham crackers
1/2 c. sugar
3 shakes cinnamon (the secret weapon)
6 T butter (the real goodness!)
1 t. water

Put graham crackers, sugar and cinnamon in a food processor OR how I did it: place in ziploc bag and beat and roll with a rolling pin. It is actually super easy--maybe takes a minute. Add melted butter and water to the bag. Close. Scrunch with hands until it forms nice clumps.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray cupcake pan with some sort of oil/butter spray. Put decent amount of gloppy mixture in each section. If you want, sprinkle in some chocolate chips. (It makes the pies a little hard to dig your spoon into. It still tastes really good without.) Bake for 10 minutes at 350 degrees. Remove and smooth chocolate with a spoon. Put in freezer. Place candy bars in freezer. Pull out ice cream and frozen whipped topping to thaw (I usually only use real whipped cream but this is really good this way!).

Remove candy bars and cut up. Fill cups with ice cream. Put a dollop of whipped cream on top. Sprinkle on the gluttony candy bars. Put back in freezer. Pull out 10 minutes before serving.

Note: I've tried smaller muffin tins too (yeah, I've eaten more than I'm willing to admit this week) and the crust got really crunchy cooking at 10 minutes and I LOVE it too! I can't decide which I like better. I recommend making both about 3 times a week. Of course you'd probably have to excercise 16 hours to keep that many at bay but hey--it's worth it!

~Dedra
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