Remember

So Grateful Today

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Try it!

HI all!

Just wanted to let you know of an opportunity to win a gift from Clear Artistic Stamps! You will be totally BLESSED if you win...Belinda is so generous and wonderful and the projects and cards her Design Team comes up with will inspire you!

Head over to the Cottage studio blog and CAS's site as well...Two chances to win!! The odds are good and you will love the store and the blog! Trust me ;) Here's the links to the STORE and BLOG Be blessed and win!

Love ya!
Kim Marie

So busy, so crazy, so tired.....but so GRATEFUL!

Hi all my faithful friends!
I am here! Living life for sure, multiply blessed and trying to find a good time for stamping!!

You have all heard about my crazy days, so you know that I would be here every day if I could, devouring all your wonderful blogs and cards and such....I long for more time to just BE.

I am involved in so many wonderful things, but I am getting tired, so I have promised my family and God that I am going to scale back on my very sincere "Yes! Sure! What a great idea; I 'd love to!" and start saying, "Oh, wow, what a great idea! I just can't right now...." That way I will have time to just hang out and chat or actually create something with my favorite hobby! (Or spend time with my hubby! imagine THAT! LOL!) A friend to whom I was lamenting the difficulty of saying no to things I really love to do said this to me, "Kim, it is your daughter's senior year. You should have the time to spend it doing things that you will also love to do." She is right! Thanks, Mary Angela!

So, I am choosing not to teach a class next semester, I am not taking a student teacher, I won't be signing any songs (not a typo, I mean sign language) at church unless God directs me to and I'm not adding any new projects...oh, I don't mean crafts...I mean PROJECTS. I'll still coordinate our thanksgiving dinner deliveries...can't change all my traditions! But really, I know God wants me to stop being so busy busy, so I can find time to sit down and chat with Him more! A car cannot go without filling up on fuel, and I can't go without filling up on God. And in this crazy crazy world there is just so much to PRAY for! I want to give it my best effort...and I will be blessed!

Of course, you all are not on my "no more" list....in fact, this moves all of you up on my "gotta do it for my sanity" list!! Isn't that GOOD? And I may even open up some of those stamps I've had for awhile and actually ink them up. Isn't that GREAT??

I want encourage YOU to reassess your busyness, too....and to take more time out of the chaos to chat with God...He's waiting so patiently to share Himself with you!
I'm so grateful for you!

And the winner is!

These are cards from my Amazing and Creative SBS sisters...check out their blogs under the SBS9 banner over there----> Scroll down for the winner!!

Suzanne's card (with an E)

Lulu's card

Louise's card

Alex's card :)

Manna's Entry #2

Natty K's Entry

Manna's Entry #1

Debbie Y's Entry

Aren't they fabulous??

By random drawing, the winner is Manna! Congrats, girl!

And thanks for all the entries! Quite a variety of fun and color!

Whew. Now my challenge making days are done for awhile! Gotta go do the next bunch from our SBS group! Blessings!

Happy week!

Hi everyone! Happy week! We had a fabulous family weekend. Here's a snap of my girls that we took at Niagara Falls in their snazzy raincoats you wear on the Maid of the Mist boatride...aren't they so cute??

School started today and besides the headache I've had since 8 am, it was a good day! Scheduling therapy services are a BEAR, especially once you get out the high schooler's schedules! I work with ages 4-18! I think, with God's help, I almost got it down today...til tomorrow! LOL! Honestly, relying on God is the only way this thing comes together, and I pray a lot in these first days. Especially when I see which kids make it back for another year and which ones don't. One of "my kids" who is 16 didn't come back. I am so sad. He has a tough life and I can see why he might give up on school...I mean, should he really have to worry about homework when he barely has a home life?? I continue to pray for him.

Hey, do any of you read the comic strip, For Better or for Worse? I've been reading it for years and years...since just after I had my first baby, oh, 22 years ago. The strip is drawn by Lynn Johnston, a Canadian artist. One of the things I've always loved about the strip is that the characters grew up in real time...and the life of her characters were so real, I sometimes thought she must have hidden cameras in my house! So why am I telling you all this? Well, Lynn has decided to end the strip as far as the growth of her characters, so really the last chapter of the life of the Pattersons has just ended and the book is finished....I am so happy for her, but sad for me! She will continue to publish some of her original strips with a more modern look, and I will enjoy those, but I will miss checking out the new and exciting things....isn't it funny how wrapped up we can become in something so simple? If you have a chance, check out some of her strips...her site is really interactive and you can look at months of the strip at a time to follow a story line. My personal favorite story was when her teenaged character April befriended a girl with learning disabilities....see all that storyline here. The last strip on the first page is my absolute favorite of the story.

I also wanted to share the cards I am making to send to our Church sponsored missionaries this Christmas. We are putting cards made by a few of our stamping crew on a table in church so everyone can sign them during our mission emphasis month. Then we will send the cards to them with a gift for the families. Mine will go to Egypt, the Middle East (an undisclosed location) and locally to a missionary that helps international students. I chose to make all three of mine the same as I had only a little time, but check out these cards made by one of my stamping cult buddies, {as my DD likes to call my friends}.

Blessings!