Making Your Hame A Haven: Fall Challenge

I love to learn new ways to make our house warm, inviting and calm. Over at Courtney's blog: Women Living Well (here) she is going to be doing a challenge that will be working on ways to make ourselves and our homes a little more calmer. This challenge is called Making Your Home a Haven. Making our home a place where our husbands and children can relax and feel refreshed. 

She will give us one practical tip and one spiritual tip that we can do to create a haven in our home each week. This will start October 4th and go till the end of the month. I am so really excited about this and look forward to learning more about what God has to say about how our homes should be!

Keeping the Home!

I am joining Janeen again this week for her Keeping the Home series. She was in her daughters' room and did an amazing job cleaning out and organizing! I was suppose to rearrange rooms, but haven't quite got to that part yet. We decided to wait and see how many kids they will say we can have in our Home Study on Tuesday. So we waited to decide which rooms would become what.

We did, however, baby proof the kitchen cabinets. Those little door lock things are aggravating. If you have ever put any in yourself, then I am sure you understand. We also added more Smoke Alarms, Carbon Monoxide Alarm and a Fire Extinguisher. (I hope we never need any of these but we have them just in case.) I didn't take pictures of any these because we all know what they look like. HA!

I also moved all of my cast iron pots that were around the wood heater. They are all now stored away in the baby proofed kitchen cabinets. That area was a dust bunnies heaven! It is all nice and clean now and I kind of like it without all the clutter!

Show Us Your Life-Master Bed Room

Kelly from over at Kelly's Korner is doing a Show Us Your Life Series and this week is the Master Bed Room. This is kind of fun, especially looking at other peoples rooms! I was really amazed at how many people viewed my link. WOW! Is all I can say, and they are still looking.

I love our Master Bed Room, but it is very little. If it was bigger I don't think I would add any other furniture to what we already have, just because I like everything open and roomy. My wonderful husband bought me the bedroom set 3 years ago, and I still really love it. I have been searching and searching for a quilt that I love for the bed, but haven't quite found one. (But it's out there, I know it is!)

As for the paneling in the entire house...It is going to vanish, eventually. I want painted walls with white trim and white doors. It is really hard to take pictures in any of the rooms, because of the paneling. Eventually it will all be gone though!

I read one time (I think on Fly Lady's Web Site) that our Master Bed Rooms should be the best room in the house. A place where we can go to relax and spend quality time with the one that we love the most. It should feel like we are stepping into a nice comfy bed & breakfast room every time the door is open. So I have tried to keep our room free of clutter, and it is the first room that gets straightened in the mornings, including making the bed!

Women In The Word Wednesday!

This morning we were to read Luke 15. In the first part of Luke 15, Jesus is being criticized because he eats with publicans and sinners. He then rebukes, by giving them the example of if one of them lost a sheep would they go in search of it.

If we loose something little we look for it. We will turn the house upside down looking and searching and when we don't find the item we are looking for, we clean the house spotless. Jesus also gives the example of the woman who lost a coin and lit her candle in order to sweep her floors to find it.

Our group of girls were suppose to "Let our Lights shine for God" this month. To me a relationship with Christ is so much more important than any worldly object. We should light our candles daily, sweep out the dirt of the world, and seek the presence of God. 

When a sinner repents and turns their life over to God, Heaven rejoices! We should give Heaven the chance to rejoice daily! We should strive to live like Christ daily!

"I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance." Luke 15:7



Keeping the Home!

So this week over at Christian Frugal Mama we are learning to be a better steward with what we have in an effort to be more content. Janeen is going to be working on her daughters' bedroom this week. So I think I am going to get started on making bedrooms for foster kids! It is really exciting to think that in a couple of months we might have some kids in our home. And not just teenagers, but young kids.

Last week I went though closets and cabinets getting rid of all the crazy stuff that we have "collected" over the whole 1 1/2 years that we have lived here. Lots of junk got tossed. We are planning on buying bunk beds and dressers for each of the rooms we have planned for the kids, so there isn't too much that I can do, except move the furniture that we already have. So here is the plan.

So we are going to turn this room into the office/sewing room again. It use to be that when we had one of Derreck's nieces living with us, but we changed everything around when she moved out. We will have to invest in a air conditioner/heater to, because when it's hot, it's HOT and when it's cold, it's COLD in there! Ignore the dogs, they were napping and were to lazy to get up. HA!

This is the Sewing Room now and will become a bedroom. It is a little bitty room!

This is the office and will become a nice size bedroom.



We will also be moving the love seat back in the living room which is a challenge in itself, because of the crazy layout of the living room/kitchen area. (Plus the piano takes up a LOT of room.)

Just Trying to be a Proverbs 31 Woman!!!

http://justtryingtobeaproverbs31woman.blogspot.cpm/2010/09/keeping-home.html

Keeping the Home!

So I found a blog wrote by Christian Frugal Mama about keeping our houses. This is what she wrote "As I posted about, I was convicted about being content with what I already have and learning to be a better steward with it." We all should be content with what we have and should be better stewards with all the God has blessed us with!

Has God blessed you with a marriage? Be content and a good steward with it!
Has God blessed you with a home? Be content and a good steward with it!
Has God blessed you with kids? Be content and a good steward with it!
Has God blessed you with a job? Be content and a good steward with it!

Everything God has blessed us with can be taken away in a heart beat. When we stand before God in judgement we are going to have to answer for every thing, including how we handled our everyday blessings! So if you haven't been a good steward with something, now is the time to change and make it better! I haven't always been the good steward with every aspect of my life, but I am trying now, and I know that it pleases the Lord!

So this week I have cleaned out a couple of closets, underneath our bathroom sink, and the cabinet above our washer and dryer. I will confess that everything I did was and is in preparation for our home study for foster parent certification! I want kids in our house and I want them bad! LOL!!! So if that means I have to clean every little nook and cranny I will gladly do it!

Blanket Closet

Before:

And AFTER!

Jacket/Vacuum Cleaner Closet

BEFORE:

And AFTER!

(There wasn't much to do in there, I added the ironing board and iron stuff to it!)

Sewing Closet

BEFORE:

And AFTER!

Cabinet Above Washer & Dryer

BEFORE:

And AFTER!

I forgot to take pictures from under neath our bathroom sink, but I didn't do much under there. Some of the changes were a big difference but some weren't. I like the big differences! Everything looks so organized now. (Derreck won't be able to find anything!)