recipe // old fashioned scalloped potatoes

I have made this recipe quite a few times and it always turns out good!
Mama got me to make it for our family's Easter meal last week!  It tasted wonderful, and it was good left over too!

• 3 tablespoons butter


• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour


• 1 1/2 teaspoon salt


• 1/8 teaspoon pepper


• 3 cups milk


• cheddar cheese (amount to your liking)


• 6 medium potatoes, pared, thinly sliced (6 cups)


• 2 tablespoons chopped onion

Make white sauce of first six ingredients. Place half the potatoes in greased 2-quart casserole; cover with half the onion and half of the white sauce. Repeat layers. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for about one hour. Uncover and bake thirty minutes longer. Serves 4-6 people.

This recipe is easy, and it tastes really good!!!
Enjoy!

I wanted to let y'all know that I wont be able to post this upcoming Friday and Monday because Kristen and I are baby-sitting my nieces all of that week, and y'all can imagine how busy I'm going to be. ;) But I'll be back on the following Friday!

Are you going to give this recipe a try? How did they turn out for you?
What's your favorite way to eat potatoes?

book review || intervention

I had never heard of this author before Abigail let me borrow this book!

I didn't want to put it down! It grabbed me in the beginning and wouldn't let me go till the very end!



 

Intervention
By Terri Blackstock
317 Pages
5 Stars



Barbara Covington has one more chance to save her daughter from a devastating addiction, by staging an intervention. But when eighteen-year-old Emily disappears on the way to drug treatment—and her interventionist is found dead at the airport—Barbara enters her darkest nightmare of all. Barbara and her son set out to find Emily before Detective Kent Harlan arrests her for a crime he is sure she committed. Fearing for Emily’s life, Barbara maintains her daughter’s innocence. But does she really know her anymore? Meanwhile, Kent has questions of his own. His gut tells him that this is a case of an addict killing for drugs, but as he gets to know Barbara, he begins to hope he’s wrong about Emily. The panic level rises as the mysteries intensify: Did Emily’s obsession with drugs lead her to commit murder—or is she another victim of a cold-blooded killer?



I loved this book so much, I was sad when I thought it was a stand alone. But I looked into it and found out two other books follow it!!! You will never know how excited I was about that!!! :)
I don't know if there was any part in the book that I didn't like or I thought was boring! I think I loved everything about it! And the characters were fabulous!!
It had a pretty good representation of the gospel compared to most books I've read.

There are a few bloody scenes in the book, but it's nothing too gory, so I would recommend it for ages 14+. But that's just my recommended age.

This is a very clean read and I highly recommend it!

have you ever heard of this book before?
do you like suspense novels?

my testimony // how I got saved

I was saved at the age of five on November 13, 2005!
When I was five, my Mama was one of my church primary teachers. On the Sunday I was saved, I was the only student in the class. Mama taught about Jesus dying on the cross and being raised up from the dead the third day. I had heard that story quite a few times, but something finally clicked within me, and I realized that Jesus had died for me. Me.
I realized that I was a sinner. So I got down on my knees and prayed and asked God to forgive me of my sins. I asked Him to wash me clean from all my sin, make me a new creature and to save me.
After I finished praying, I felt so different! I was so happy! :) After the church service was over, I ran into the church, gave my Daddy a hug and told him what had happened. He, and the rest of my church family were very excited!

I would love to hear your testimony, so leave a comment below!



 

 

 

What is your testimony?

 

luke 24:6 - 7 + happy resurrection day

I hope y'all have a lovely Resurrection day on Sunday! :)

what its like owning chickens

Hello y'all!
So, as many of y'all know, my family owns six chickens. Two of them are Buff Orpington's, and the other four are Rhode Island Red's. Their names are Theodosia, Maude, Miranda Prissy, Polly, and Maxine.
Yes, we can all tell them apart. At first it was kind of hard, but we've had them about a year so now it's really easy! :)

Our chickens lay whopper eggs. They're HUGE. And I'm not exaggerating. One actually had a triple yolk. That was really cool. But one egg in particular was the biggest we had ever seen. We measured it, and we looked up the largest egg record and our egg was just a few centimeters smaller than the worlds largest egg (at least in height)! That was really neat!!! :)

It's a lot of fun having chickens.
There is something thrilling about opening the nesting boxes and finding a perfect brown egg nestled in the straw!
 OOOOOOOOOH!
No matter how many times I have gathered eggs, every time I see an egg, I'm always excited!
We get about three to five eggs a day. I think for a few weeks we didn't get any, but now they are laying again. I think all chickens go through a short amount of time where they don't lay though.
I love listening to the chickens clucking quietly, and watching them roam our yard, searching the earth beneath them for worms and bugs. They are just so peaceful to watch. And our chickens let us pick them up! All except Maude. You can read more about her here. 
I really don't mind taking care of the chickens. In fact, I rather enjoy it. Most of the time anyway :).
And I love being able to say that I own chickens. I've always wanted to live on a farm, and having chickens makes that dream come true just a little bit. Now I just have to convince my Daddy to get a cow...!!! :)


Our chickens definitely love people (all except Maude that is). If you go outside, they will be right beside you in a heartbeat. Maybe that's because we give them stale bread sometimes :)
But they will eat out of your hand and sometimes they will follow you around the yard! It's a lot of fun!

There is one downer about owning chickens though.
DUM DUM DUM DUMMMMMM * Sung to Beethoven's 5th Symphony *
Here it goes.
They use the bathroom all over the yard,

which means you may not be able to go barefoot in the Summer. :(
I still go barefoot though, and if I accidentally step on something (which I have done plenty of times), I just wash off my feet! :)

And that's that! :)

I hope y'all enjoyed this post! It was really fun to write it!

Do you like chickens?
Do you own them or like to own them?

life post // shopping trip + april fools

I haven't done a life post for quite a while. So I decided what better time than today!!! :)
(Sorry for the blurry photos. They were mostly taken on the phone)

If you read my last life post, then you might be wondering about our sweet cat, Thomas. Well, we had to put him down. He was such a sweet cat and I miss him a lot. We buried him under the shade of a tree where he liked to lay in the summertime.



The ladies in our church took a shopping trip about a week ago. It was a lot of fun!!!I got some good deals on some things. For instance, I got a jean skirt for $2.50 at goodwill!
I got a shirt at goodwill and another shirt on the clearance rack at the Loft, some lotion and hand sanitizer at bath&bodyworks, and a necklace at hobbylobby!!! I'm real happy!

We ate at Chick-Fil-A for lunch!!! I got a grilled chicken sandwich, fries, and a lemonade!! Chik-Fil-A has the best lemonade!!!

Jason took Ben and I out on a bridge to get some pictures of the stars last week. The sky was clear, but right when we got on the bridge and got set up, clouds started rolling in. So I didn't get any pictures of the stars! :(
I did get a neat picture of a car passing us though, using shutter speed. I snapped the pictures in Raw, and since our computer is so old, it wont read them. So I couldn't upload them on here to show y'all.

April first was such a fun day!! I had been planning pranks for a few weeks!!!
I made "brownies" for my parents and grandparents!! They were a little disappointed when they found out they were literally "brown e's!!!"

And then I put a paper cockroach in our living room lamp!!!

I got Ben really good with that one! :)

The weather has been beautiful here!!! I've really enjoyed going outside!! Ben and I started our garden. We planted our tomatoes, beets, sunflowers, and carrots. We'll finish planting in a few weeks, when it gets a little warmer. I'm planning on canning the tomatoes and pickling the cucumbers! Hopefully it all works out!!

Did you do any April fools pranks?
Are you doing a garden this year?

DIY mason jars

A good friend of ours from church gave Mama a bunch of old mason jars she didn't want anymore.
Kristen and I decided to paint them up. So we sat on our back deck, in the 80 degree sunshine, and painted them together. It was so much fun!!!

This is a really easy project, and the outcome is adorable!!!

What you will need:

• mason jars


• paint and paintbrushes (We used two different kinds of paint. But the chalk paint seemed to work the best)

Be sure the mason jars are all clean before you get started, then  paint away. Just make sure to paint in the same direction. :)

After ours dried, Kristen sanded them a bit to give them a distressed look, but that's not necessary.
(Photo credit to my little brother, Ben. He took a few of the pictures. Thanks bub!)




It felt so good to sit in the warm sunshine. I am so ready for Summertime!





I enjoyed a cold coke while painting, thanks to my Nana and Pop!



And here are the finished products.


... and my personal favorite (sorry for the blurry picture)


Painting these were so much fun. And I loved taking some of the pictures!

Let me know in the comments if you give this DIY  a try and make sure to tell me how it turns out! :)

Have you done any DIY's lately?