Two Things Challenge

ACK! ALL MY PICTURES DISAPPEARED FROM THIS POST! The code for them still shows in "edit post", but no pictures. It's a mystery.

This week's challenge is Style and Substance. Here are my pictures:



My birthday is next week, and since I'm going to be working, I got my presents early. This Bee-yoo-ti-ful Autumn Bear was given to me by my dear husband, The Cowboy. I don't usually go for cutesy, but we were in the Build-a-Bear workshop letting The Zoo Keeper spend a gift card she had for the Bear she got for HER birthday, and I spotted this little fall fairy bear. I'm SUCH a sucker for fall colors, and it's SO soft. NO, he didn't kiss the heart and make a wish when they put it together, but he definitely gets points for STYLE. Especially since he did NOTHING for my birthday last year.



This vacuum cleaner is my present from my dear Mother-in-Law. She knew I was having to buy a new vacuum cleaner about every 8 months or so. Apparently my 3 kids and husband and various pets are too much for a $40.00 Dirt Devil from Big Lots. So she gave me this workhorse. This baby SUCKS, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. It gets ALL the dirt out, and it has this little light bar that demands you keep working until the floor is clean. I call it Simon, as in Simon Legree. "You will continue vacuuming until I say the floor is CLEAN" AND it doesn't even use belts for the beater bar, so no more burning rubber smell. This is a top of the line vacuum cleaner, no doubt. I should have it all my life. My MIL gets points for SUBSTANCE. Now I just need to USE the thing. Pay no attention to the paper air plane on the floor behind the vacuum cleaner. Nor The Zoo Keeper's Giant Dragon sitting there. Or the ironing board. Well, we DO live here. *blush*

I have to add this picture though:



This shows both Style and Substance in the beautiful way God promised Noah He would never again flood the entire earth. We all know the story Noah and the ark. We learn it at least 43 different times if we go to Sunday school as children. It's easy to see a rainbow and just not think too hard about it. Yeah, it's pretty, yada, yada, yada... But if you read Genesis 9:8-17, God repeats His promise three times. The rainbow and what it represents is important to Him, which makes it VERY important to us. I encourage you to spend a little time dwelling on what the Lord has to say to you about what it means.

The Minister's Cat

My Works for Me Wednesday tip is a word game that has entertained my children (an me!) in waiting rooms and restaurants for years. Nothing like keeping their little minds occupied when the food takes so long to arrive that they have colored the little children's menu, all the napkins, and are starting to "paint" their fingernails with cheap crayons that NEVER COME OFF. Not that MY babies do that anymore, since my littlest Audrey has just turned 10 and is MUCH too old to paint her nails with crayons when she could be making little magic growing worms with her straw paper.

The rules to "The Minister's Cat" are simple. Each player takes turns describing the minister's cat with the most obscure adjective they can think of for each letter of the alphabet. You start with "A". The first person might say, "The minister's cat is an antagonistic cat." The next person (if she is quite a bit younger) might say, "The minister's cat is an angry cat." If everyone playing has about the same level of vocabulary skills, you can decide who wins that round by general consensus of who came up with the most obscure adjective. We have also played by just taking turns with the alphabet, for instance, the first person gets "A", the next person does "B", the third does "C", etc., and no one really wins or loses.

It takes a while to get to "Z", and by then the food has come, the nurse has called the patient in, or Dad has finished drooling over the new chainsaws in Home Depot, and the sweet little old lady at the next table over has stopped by to compliment you on how well behaved your children are. You smile and say "thank-you" while discreetly trying to cover evidence of wet straw paper worms with your napkin.

Check out a plethora of interesting tips at Rocks in my Dryer.

Well, how strange!

I just tried to post a WFMW tip, and it's floating around somewhere in the blogosphere, looking for a place to land. I wonder who's blog it will actually end up on? I can just see my poor little lost waif of a post, alighting on "Terry's Tattoo Blog" and creating a stir with it's life changing WFMW tip. Maybe Terry will give up tattoos, and start playing "The Minister's Cat" with random strangers on the street.

I have to retype my Minister's Cat post now, and then hit that all important "Save Now" button BEFORE I impetuously click "Publish Post".

By the way, I'm back for a few days...Well, actually I have been back for over a week, but what with catching up on my house, getting the kids started in school, sewing a skirt for Aisa who informed me that she has NO dresses that fit her anymore, and watching "America's Got Talent", I haven't really done much online. I'll be leaving again sometime this weekend, so I just wanted to say "hi" to anyone who still checks on me once in a while.

HI! *smiles*