I'm so ready for Tuesday to be over

I saw this on another blog and had to have it.

From Four to Forty....

in the blink of an eye.

Happy Birthday T.T.

Love ya,

Joy Joy

Searching for Pinky

I have been a mom for almost 13 years now. I have spent a large percentage of that time helping my two children search for their beloved stuffed animals that they claim they desperately need to fall asleep. My oldest daugther had Lambie Pie that she fell asleep with every night. She later added "Dog" to the mix. I have found these animals in obscure places. When she was little I would stumble across them while not looking for them. Like behind the blinds or in a foot stool that has a lid. Each time I would send a silent prayer of thanks to God for helping me locate these beloved items before a bedtime crisis ensued. Paige is outgrowing her Lambie Pie attachment. Now we search for cell phones, etc.

The latest search....

About four days ago my youngest daughter realized that Pinky was missing. Missing in action...Not there to hold and snuggle with her at night. We searched our house over. Underbeds, turned over toyboxes, rummaged thru clothes (clean and dirty)...nowhere was Pinky to be found.

As a mom the other thing I have done during all my free time is change the empty rolls on the toilet paper left for me. You ask what do these two have in common. Well I'll tell you. Last night I went into the bathroom in my master bedroom to sit and have a moment to myself and looked over and not even a square was left on the toiletpaper roll. So I opened up the cabinet directly in front of me that conveniently stores all the extra toiletpaper rolls and who did I SEE!

You guessed it. NONE OTHER THAN PINKY HERSELF.

Why wouldn't I have checked that cabinet before. What was I thinking???? That seems like a logical place to leave your favorite stuffed animal. Thank you God for once again revealing the hiding place of Pinky.

Amen.

Common Ground

The House that Dan Built:

Common Ground is the name of the conservation group at my church. We meet once a month and have different speakers. This month we had THE Dan Phillips. I want to introduce you to him if you haven't heard of him already. Dan has even been featured on HGTV's "What's With That House". He's been in People Magazine and on CNN and many other media outlets. Dan lives in Huntsville, Texas. He builds home out of salvaged materials that were destined for the landfill. He is most interested in helping single mothers, low-income families and artist. What most of us see as trash, Dan sees as ceiling or flooring material and many other imaginative ways of using items.

Another thing I admire about Dan is he uses unskilled laborers to build these homes. For instance, He teaches a person to lay tile or do carpentry and then after they develop a marketable skill he "kicks them out the nest" and sends them off to get a "paying job".

Here are samples of his work.

The picture at the top is Dan's vision of a storybook house. He built this house for a single woman who is an artist. This house is located in Houston. There is a project starting in Houston based on Dan's building philosophy called Discovery Green Project.

These are old frame samples from a framing store that were being thrown out when the store received updates samples. Dan created a beautiful ceiling for one of his houses:

The picture below shows a floor that was made from corks from wine bottles.

Go to Dan's website http://www.phoenixcommotion.com/ and check out his work and videos. You can see the passion he has for the environment and more importantly helping people.

Remember, your trash may be another man's treasure (or floor, or ceiling, or countertop). So think twice before you throw it away and always recycle what you can.

Stay Green,