What a beautiful birthday!

I had the best birthday this year, it was such a sweet precious time with great girlfriends...and their husbands!  I am so thankful that I have such sweet precious friends, but I'm even more thankful that all of them are in beautiful marriages and talk kindly of their husbands.  I am very encouraged to have friends that appreciate their husbands, what a blessing to be surrounded by such women on a day celebrating my life.  I turned 30 this year and felt like it was a year to celebrate.  My husband does a great job every year to not only make me feel special on my birthday, but he gives me a birthday week.  This year we joked about me throwing myself a surprise birthday party because I love to plan parties, but then I thought why not?  I do love to plan and who better to make my birthday exactly the way I want it, but ME!  Well, it was beautiful:)  My husband came home in plenty of time to make sure I didn't need any last minute help, several of my girlfriends were able to attend, we had a beautiful picnic down by the beach in gorgeous weather and no wind, the guys stayed down to play on the beach with the children while the girls went back up to our house to make soy-candles and then we wrapped it up with the guys and kids returning.  It was so beautiful to see the families that surround us as well as friends who have passed that stage in life and were there as beautiful "brides" setting an example with peace, patience and kindness all during the party when the silly girls were laughing immaturely!  I will never forget this day and how each of you showed me the "brides" I want to be...to my husband, to my future children, as a mother-in-law, as a mentor and as a life-long friend.  Thank you Dorothy, Sol, Tanya, Mary, Diane, Alyssa and Carolyn!  Galations 5:13

ToBeABride.com Walked for Hunger

We enjoyed a great day of fellowship with fellow Cal Poly Alumni at the Cayucos Walk for Hunger yesterday! One thing I'm eager to do is get involved while I'm living on the Central Coast, I don't want to take this life for granted. I am so thankful to be here! I helped raise support for the Walk (ToBeABride.com was a supporter too) and really wanted to walk it myself so I asked a few friends to come along (pictured above)! Isn't that a cute baby I'm holding, don't worry, it's not mine:)

Everybody came over to our new home for spaghetti and playing on the beach afterwards. What a great day to serve, it was so much fun! I love being around kids too, so I was blessed yesterday for sure! The guys are great mechanics too, so my husband was also excited to have both of them in the same garage with his Harley, great times for the boys! Looking forward to the next opportunity to serve Him as a joyous Bride of Christ! Romans 12:10-12

Being Creative while Saving Money in the long run!

One part of life that I enjoy and take to heart when living for Christ and my Home is creativity through art. It seems to grow even more broad every day as so much seems to be offered to us as we emerse ourselves into a world of technology. I used to write journals, having several different journals (one for each topic), now I can blog with each blog having it's own topic and insert beautiful pictures. It also doesn't take as long so I can do twice as much. I used to scrapbook, but now that I rarely print my digital photos there are programs to make digital scrapbooks which can be made into DVD's to share or shared online by email and social networking sites (below is a snapshot of one my pages). I love the color that I can bring to the page:

All this to say, if you haven't entered the world of technology, maybe now's the time to feel it out. Do your research on sites that can help you find prices from multiple stores all over the internet rather than going into multiple stores in person and having to remember what exactly was at the last store. I was just comparing computers with my sister to help her purchase a new computer over Christmas and you can almost always find the computer you want for less expensive if you just look a few more places before you purchase it! Sites will search multiple places for you right in front of your eyes and also let you give your specific price range to search only within that price range. This is very convenient now while shopping, but also down the road as you only have to purchase the computer and any design programs once then you can create unlimited projects. When I scrapbook, I'm always having to purchase supplies, have them in stock, take the time to go to the specific stores and search for what I want, then make sure everything is in perfect alignment when I finally do the actual project. Don't be afraid to take the plunge because computer programs are becoming more and more user friendly every day.  Below is a picture of my Christmad boutique table where I was selling coaster tiles using pictures I printed off the computer, my own pictures of family!

We are taught to store up treasures in Heaven and when I'm putting my money and time into something that will value my memories with family, it's worth it to me! Matthew 6:19-21