In the Wonderful world of Lillian :)

Candyland Father Daughter Dance

2012-04-25T13:46:00.000-07:00

The Dance is over and I can FINALLY post all the things I have been doing over the past few months. I came up with this great theme for our dance (really I stole it from another Girl Scout Service Unit that did the same theme but we made it better). The dance committee came together and each group chose a different part of the candyland dance theme. We had a Gingerbread house, Cupcake Commons, Lollipop woods, Ice Cream River, Peppermint Forrest, Gumdrop Mountain, Plummy (the plum tree), Chocolate Mountain, & the Candyland Castle. Each leader chose a different part of the decorations and went to work. These women all worked very had to fill the space for the dance and make it a success. Below you will find pictures of the decorations and the details on who made them and everything I know about what made these decorations AWESOME!

Here is where our dance begins. Cristi Hahn & Jenny Hagans took over the gingerbread house. Jenny provided us with a pop up tent (you know the kind you take to a tailgate party) which we converted into a Gingerbread house. Jenny spent time cutting out pieces for the roof while Cristi took care of all the little decorations that we used to decorate the gingerbread house inside & out. Diana Wolfe also made the little game pieces for the gingerbread house (the little red man). The decorations along the side were made using a variety of items. The round candy & the jolly ranchers (square candy) were cut out of cardboard and painted (by me). Dawn Kimberling made the candycane sticks out of paper towel rolls and red & white tissue paper.

Dawn Tidd took care of creating our START to the game board.

Jenny also invited a balloon specialist in who made us some flowers for outside our house and a person to hang out inside the house. The multicolored candy decorations were made using 2 different colored paper plates wrapped in cellophane.

The balloon candies were made using water balloons wrapped in cellophane tied on both sides with ribbon. We also made larger versions of these to hang from the ceiling. Also notice our blue game piece by Diana.

Cristi Hahn painted 2 pictures for the inside of the Gingerbread house. One window view painting and one Gingerbread family painting (for some reason I do not have a picture of this :/ )

The kids LOVED the gingerbread house they kept trying to hang out inside.

When the girls entered the gym they found the candyland path. The first stop on that path was cupcake commons created by Diana Wolfe. Diana made the large cupcakes using colorful buckets topped with foam insulation and decorated. I think she made about 30 of those (which I am sure took a long time).

The cupcakes on the call were mostly made by me I used an assortment of colored paper and my rotary cutter to cut out multiple cupcakes of the same size. I then used tissue paper to decorate the top to look like frosting. I used craft items around my home to decorate the cupcake wrapper including ribbon, pipe cleaners, foam stickers, & flower decorations. Diana also made a few of these paper cupcakes and she used cotton to decorate the frosting.

Diana did an AWESOME job making cupcake commons.

After Cupcake Commons the Candyland path lead the girls to Lollipop Woods. This section was created singlehandedly by Dawn Tidd. She seriously created 200 + lollipops all by herself and they looked AMAZING.

I LOVED her sign. It looked so AWESOME and creative.

The lollipops were made from paper plates or cardboard covered in fabric and the sticks were made from wrapping paper rolls, dowel rods, & PVC pipe. She used white duct tape to cover the different items and make them look more like lollipop sticks. Each lollipop was then wrapped in cellophane and tied with a ribbon. She also made mini lollipops using smaller plates and skewer sticks. The base for the lollipops were cut up pallets covered with green tissue paper (this part was done by her husband).

Her section looked amazing.

Once the girls made it through the lollipop woods the reached the Candyland Castle (which we placed on the stage behind the DJ). This castle was hand drawn by Jackie Hripto (one of my bff's who is an AMAZING artist) and painted by me and a small crew (including Melissa McClay, Doug McClay, and some of their neighbors who I do not actually know).

My loving husband Kurt Thompson is the one who risked his life standing on the very top of an 8 ft ladder to hang the castle up (otherwise it would have been laying on the stage because I do not do heights unless I have something to cling too).

We decorated the bottom of the stage with a string of assorted candy and hung some assorted candy around the castle. It looked really nice

Once the girls got past the Candyland Castle they had to cross the ice cream river created by Kim King. We borrowed a bridge from our local boy scout troop and they were even nice enough to drop it off and set it up. The Ice Cream display consist of 4 washer/dryer boxes retrieved from Home Depot which were painted and decorated to look like different flavors of Ice Cream. She also got some colorful fabric to use as the river.

Notice the chocolate, vanilla, & strawberry ice cream flowing out of the Neopolitan box.

The Boy Scout Bridge worked really nice and the girls LOVED walking across it. If you also notice the lights under the bridge they were Jenny's that she set up to give the river a little extra attraction.

Notice the massive ice cream cones, they are round laundry hampers stuffed with brown paper (to look like the cone) and topped with foam insulation. They looked AWESOME.

Kim did an excellent job decorating her section of the gym.

After crossing the bridge at the Ice Cream river we moved into the Peppermint Forrest which Dawn Kimberling took on as her project. This section was probably the hardest to decorate and the most detailed. I spent about a week on craigslist and freecycle (for anyone who does not know what freecycle is it is a wonderful website where you post the items you would like free and people in your area who have those items respond) getting fake Christmas trees donated to our cause and then spent a weekend driving all over PA to pick up the trees. We did end up paying about $40 total and had 22 trees for our forest. The Christmas trees in the peppermint forest really made the forest and without them it would not have been nearly as exciting.

Once we had the trees we proceeded to spray paint them red & white to look like peppermints. We also got a few strands of garland donated that we sprayed and wrapped around the trees for added color. The trees turned out amazing. We did learn very quickly that it was easier to spray paint them one color instead of trying to alternate between two different colors. We also used a ridiculous amount of spray paint.

Dawn Kimberling also used donated paper towel rolls, toilet paper rolls, and pringles cans to make peppermint sticks to line the path in the forest. We also had some larger mail carrier rolls (for posters and blue prints) donated that she used to make larger peppermint sticks. She used Girl Scout cookie boxes that she had left over to cut out candy canes and then wrapped them all in red & white tissue paper. She also used red & white plates to make the peppermints to hang on the wall and red & white pipe cleaners to make tiny candy canes to decorate the trees. She did an AWESOME job.

This red and white tree was one of my favorites. I spray painted it myself and it took 9 cans of spray paint and I can still see a couple of green spots :/ but it was the most popular tree of the night and I saw many girls taking their picture in front of it.

Dawn's sign also looked amazing. I am sure that it took a really long time to get the letters to look like little peppermints with the red stripes. As a final touch she bought some peppermint extract and poured it in cups which she placed under a lot of the trees to give off a peppermint smell (you can see one under the white tree above on the left).

Before & after the pathway was added to the dance floor.

Once you made your way through the Peppermint Forrest you came across Gumdrop Mountain which was one of my personal favorites. Tabitha Wallace did such an amazing job with the little bit of junk (and I really mean junk) she was given. To make the gum drops we started collecting empty plastic containers like butter, milk jugs, 2 liter soda bottles, and she even received a few yogurt cups. We also got about a dozen buckets donated. She then took colorful spray paint and painted them to look like gumdrops. To make it look more like a mountain we took a 4 ft table and sat it on top of two 8ft tables and then covered them with Green tablecloth to look like grass on the mountain.

In one of the many boxes of donations that we received there was actually a string of gumdrop garland that we strung across the front of the table after the mountain was stacked up.

Great Job Tabitha!!

The final destination on our candyland path was Plummy the Plum tree (and her two baby trees). Diana Wolfe also took care of plummy and the babies. She did a great job creating a life size tree and decorating it. The tree trunk was made using brown wrapping paper (the kind you use to send a package) and the leaves were made using green tissue paper. The plums were purple balloons (we ran out of purple and used pink for the baby trees).

We also decorated the ground underneath the trees using some gum drops and white Christmas lights and some more hand made candy decorations.

Great Job Diana!!

I am very sad to say that I do not have any pictures of the Chocolate Mountain that was set up out in the hallway by the Snack Tables. Robin McKenna did the chocolate mountain. She stacked many cookie boxes and stuffed a few pillows throughout (to give the mountain curves) and then covered it with brown tablecloth. The mountain even had a face and a cool sign. Robin did an amazing job making it look like an actual chocolate mountain.

I also do not have pictures of the snack table, the 16 candy guess games that we had for the girls to guess at while waiting to have their pictures taken or the lollipop tree where we gave each girl a lollipop and a prize on her way out the door. These games were something that we have never done before that the kids really enjoyed.

The only area left to show you is the ceiling. I do not think that the ceiling turned out exactly the way we wanted it too but the girls liked it and that is all that mattered. We used colorful plastic table cloths to run from one basketball net to another in an attempt to dim the lights in the gym. The problem that we encountered was that there were quite a few areas that we just could not get covered. Cristi Hahn & I also made 8 long strands of candy decorations that we hung from basketball net to basketball net as added decorations.

This is what the girls saw when they first walked into the gym.

The picture on the left shows a bunch of different colored tablecloths tied to the net and a couple strings of decorations. The picture on the right is of our pathway which looked amazing but got ripped to shreds within minutes of the girls arriving. Tabitha, Jackie, & I spent about 45 minutes taping these to the ground in a fun arrangement for the girls to follow.

This is what it looked like once the lovely couples arrived at the dance. Everyone enjoyed the theme and the decorations. We heard many times that it was the best theme EVER!! And I believe all the girls went home happy. Thanks again to all those wonderful women who took time out of their busy schedules to help make the decoration and set up for the dance. I most definitely could not have done it without you!! If you would like to do a similar dance and have any questions I would be willing to help you in any way that I can. :)

Happy Wednesday

2012-04-11T12:56:00.001-07:00

Happy Wednesday! I am back to work or my version of work these days and while the babies are napping I thought I would update my blog. I am going to try and make a valid effort to update it more often and include pictures.........like once a week. Anyway :)

Kurt & I had a very nice Easter Break though it did involve a lot of running around. I had the pleasure of having off Thursday thru Tuesday which was extremely nice. Kurt was not so lucky because he only had off work on Friday. The time off gave me plenty of time to clean my house, catch up on some school work, catch up on some girl scout events, and work on some decorations for an upcoming event. I also spent a lot of time on Friday & Saturday running all over town (oxford, exton, douglassville, & reading to name a few) collecting artificial Christmas trees for an upcoming Girl Scout event but that is a secret so more on the trees and decorations later :)

We spent Easter day celebrating our lords resurrection at church followed by dinner with Kurt's family. Easter dinner was at his grandmother's house and we enjoyed a nice lunch, family time, and I even got to hide the Easter eggs for the kids hunt (when your a big kid who is no longer allowed to hunt hiding the eggs is the next best thing). It was a great day! How was your Easter? Did you do anything special?

It seems that these next few months of spring are going to be filled with fun. We have the father/daughter dance coming up next weekend followed by a trip to Tennessee for my Granny's birthday (she is turning 80) then the next weekend is Camporee. After camporee I get a little break before my troop heads to D.C. to Rock the mall in celebration of 100 years of girl scouting. Not to mention the fact that Kurt thinks that we are going to find time in the next two months to go on our long awaited honeymoon (IRELAND) while I am secretly planning more towards June or even July. Hey maybe we could go in August and spend our 1 year anniversary in Ireland wouldn't that be cool!!!

Well I guess that is everything. What do you have planned for spring?

Update an a little bragging

2012-03-29T07:04:00.000-07:00

Well it has been a while since I had time to write a blog post. Christmas came and went along with Valentines day and now Easter is almost here.

Kurt and I spent our first Christmas together as a married couple the same way that we have spent the last 9 years as an unmarried couple. I asked for a sewing machine and Kurt was pretty skeptical but I still got the sewing machine :) I finally opened the box and started playing with it the first of March. I got Kurt a nice cover for his motorcycle because he just had it repainted in September. He loved it! We spent the morning with his parents watching the kids open gifts and then headed over to his grandmother's house for the afternoon. This year I think that we have decided to go to Tennessee for Christmas :)

Our first Valentines day as a married couple we went out to our favorite restaurant Longhorn and enjoyed a nice dinner. Kurt also bought me a dozen roses and spread them out all over the house in small vases and he cleaned the house.

During January & February my time was completely consumed by Girl Scout cookies. My troop really outdid themselves and sold 9636 boxes of cookies (almost 10000 boxes) and over 75 cookie booths (luckily I did not have to run most of them). This is the largest number of cookies sold in our service unit and as far as I know it is also the largest in the surrounding area. I was so proud of them!! We had 17 our of 24 girls in the troop earn a trophy for selling over 300 boxes and we had 2 girls sell over 1000 boxes of cookies. And the twins also sold 1000 boxes together!! Our troop also sold 730 boxes of cookies to send to the soldiers (our goal was 500). We sold so many boxes of cookies that our troop is able to afford a trip to Washington D. C. for the 100 year anniversary of Girl Scouting in June.

Some of the girls standing around the soldier cookies before loading them into my van for delivery to the Girl Scout Council.

Now that cookies are completed my schedule is filled with other events. I am on the decorating committee for the upcoming Father/Daughter Dance the theme is a surprise but it involves making lots of decorative candies like gumdrops and lollipops. More to come on this soon :). We also have a troop sleepover scheduled and I am planning the Girl Scout Camporee in the beginning of May another secretive theme this one based off of a reality T.V. show (hint a Girl Scout won on the show last year). Then I am co-leading VBS for my church this summer. These activities and at least two trips (one to visit my granny for her 80th b-day and one to Ireland) will keep my weeks full for the next few months.

School is still going good I am still making strait A's :) I just started a new class on Tuesday and it is a math class so we will see how the next 5 weeks of math goes for me.

I think that covers everything over the last few months.

Crock Pot Drive

2011-11-18T12:08:00.001-08:00

As one of our many community service projects this year my Girl Scout troop adopted Jar's of Hope a food pantry and thrift store in the Gap area. This food pantry is located in the Pequea Valley School District. I chose to go outside of our school district so that there would not be any awkward moments when a girl realized that she recognized someone in the food line from school. When we asked Jars of Hope how we could help they recommended a Crock Pot drive for the people in the area who did not have working ovens to cook larger meals. Our troop set out on a mission to collect as many crock pots as we could. we rummaged through thrift stores and good will to find cheap crock pots to purchase with our troop money and each girl also asked friends and family to donate. We ended up with about 50 crock pots. On Thursday November 17th we relocated our troop meeting to the food pantry to help distribute the crock pots and gently used hats, gloves, scarves, and jackets. The girls really enjoyed helping out. I am so proud of these girls for their hard work and good behavior while helping at the food pantry.

Kurt's Birthday Celebration in Atlantic City

2011-11-16T12:20:00.034-08:00

My husband is officially 29!!! Happy Birthday Kurt! For his birthday I planned a nice little getaway to Atlantic City one of his favorite destinations. We had lots of fun on our little trip. It is always nice to get away.

We have arrived :)

A beautiful day at the beach!!

My idea of a great day at the beach :)

Birthday dinner at our favorite restaurant Longhorn!

A day at the beach.

I even went barefoot.

Isn't he handsome

A special surprise Bally's version of The Price is Right

Host Todd Newton

We didn't make it on stage but I was surprised that they had such great prizes including multiple cars and trips even one to Disney.

We had such a great trip and it was a great way to celebrate 29.

F.A.L.L. Leaders weekend

2011-09-29T13:09:00.000-07:00

Last weekend 4 of my new Girl Scout co-leaders and I traveled to Camp Laughing Waters for some Girl Scout Trainings. They had to take a bunch of required courses while I got to enjoy some fun and some not so fun courses. Overall it was a great weekend and I believe that we all had a great time. We even have a few pictures :)

Group Photo :)

One of our classes was a Flash Mob class where we learned the Flash Mob dance that will be presented at Rock the Mall in Washington D.C. in June. This is our attempt at a flash mob during the flag ceremony on the last day. I am of course in the purple long sleeve shirt & Dawn is in the grey hoody to my right.

Clearly we needed more practice LOL

Twist Me Turn Me Show me the Elf :)

2011-09-23T22:10:00.001-07:00

Last night my Girl Scout troop officially moved into Brownies. We have our Sash's with all the basic patches, we have our pins, and we have our new brownie handbooks. We started our meeting with a rededication ceremony. The ceremony is one that Girl Scouts have used for years. It was simple to recreate.

We started with the The Brownie Story found in the girls new book. Then we went into our imaginary forest and took the path to the pond(which consisted of brown construction paper for stepping stones, my leftover fake flowers & greenery from the wedding, & the floorlength mirror that hangs in my bathroom). Each girl then chanted Twist Me, Turn Me, Show Me the Elf, I looked into the pond and saw myself (also found in the brownie book). Once she looked into the mirror they followed the assembly line of leaders they did the girl scout handshake, recited the promise from memory, & received their new brownie pin. We then sung the Brownie Smile Song. The girls had a great time. I just wish I would have remembered my camera :/ After our ceremony we sat down and discussed the differences in Daisies & Brownies and talked about all the fun things we wanted to do this year. I think we are going to have a great Brownie year.

We will hopefully be going apple picking this Sunday.

Our Mini-Moon

2011-08-30T09:10:00.001-07:00

Since we have such a big honeymoon planned in a few months we decided that we would not take a long vacation after the wedding. Instead we decided to explore an area of Virginia that we have been admiring from a distance for the last 9 years. Everytime we drive to and from Tennessee we pass through Natural Bridge Virginia on route 81. This area is one of the most beautiful areas along route 81 and also the halfway point between our house in Pennsylvania and my grandmothers house in Tennessee. It is such a nice area that we have often joked about moving to this area so that we would be halfway between both locations.

These first few photos are the view that we see along the road on route 81 everytime we travel to and from Tennessee. The pictures do not do it justice it is a beautiful area.

One of the first places we visited during our stay in Natural Bridge were the caverns near the natural bridge. The pictures below are just a few of the pictures we took while underground.

Kurt pretending to fish in the undergound pond in the cavern. :)

Some of these rocks were so cool looking.....

Others looked..........well what do you think this looks like??

And these?? Kurt had some fun with this one LOL

Overall we really enjoyed the caverns. Even with the bats.

Our next stop in our journey was an antique toy museum but we didn't take many picture.

Afterwards we went to visit their butterfly habitat. Lots of pictures from this one. Kurt really liked the butterflies.

Finally we made our way down to the Natural Bridge to explore this beautiful area that God Created. It was a long hike down and then once you walk under the bridge there is a long trail that you can follow one way leads to a beautiful waterfall and the other way leads to a display from the indian tribes that were local to that area.

The Natural Bridge area is a beautiful area that everyone should visit.

Finally we stopped at this great little mexican resturant on our way out of town I loved their decorations. Especially the tables!!

On Our way to the Wedding :)

2011-08-15T05:50:00.023-07:00

I am so excited that I cannot contain myself. Our van is packed and by this time tomorrow we will be on our way to Tennessee for the wedding. After months of DIY projects and making decisions about flowers, dresses, food, and more it is finally here. Amazingly I think Kurt is as excited as I am :) by this time next week we will be on our way home as a married couple. A special thank you goes out to all of those who have helped us put together a wedding in less than 5 months. Jackie (our unofficial and unpaid wedding planner) & Sasha (the best matron of honor a girl could ask for) who have both been important throughout the entire planning process. Dawn & Stefanie for their help with the wedding invites. Brittany for helping with the bridesmaids dresses. Amy for her constant motivation and moral support. Julie for her daily help with projects and ideas. In less than a week I will be married.!!!!!!!

Salsa :) Wedding Favors

2011-08-01T00:06:00.001-07:00

Where in the world did we get the idea to make Salsa as wedding favors?? Well we decided to plant a garden this year. So we went out and bought all kinds of plants: Strawberry, Lettuce, Potato, Tomato, Green Pepper, Jalapeno pepper, Cucumbers, Carrots, & Peas. Clearly we went overboard. We had a large garden (mostly full of tomatoes) then we had buckets along the side for potatoes, carrots, and a box of seeds in potting soil. Before we knew it we had loads of green tomatoes.

One night Kurt & I were sitting at home talking about a variety of topics and at one point we started talking about our wedding favors and came up with nothing good. We then moved on and later began talking about our garden and I asked the question.

"what in the world are we going to do with all of those tomatoes" without thinking about it Kurt said "lets make salsa!" And a wedding favor was born!

Salsa is actually really easy to make. First we washed all the tomatoes and removed and spots.

After the spots are removed you place the tomato's in to a pot of boiling water (roaring boil). Leave them for three minutes and then remove. The skins slide right off.

Once you remove the skin you try to remove as many of the tomato seeds as you can.....this part takes a long time!

Before we removed the seeds!

We did not do as good with this as we probably should. Once you have finished you should not be able to see large clumps of seeds.

Once all the seeds have been removed we placed the large chunks of tomato in my Pampered Chef Chopper and it worked like magic.

After all the tomatoes had been chopped we put them back in the pot to boil with the pepper, onions, and seasoning mix.

During this time you must also wash all the canning jars so that they are ready to go and then keep them warm so that you are putting warm salsa into a warm glass jar.

The Salsa process is a long one!! The longest portion being the water bath sealing. For some reason I did not take any pictures of that part of the process. It consist of filling a large pot with water and bringing it to a roaring boil. Then you place the sealed jars of salsa in the pot and let them boil for about 20 minutes until the seal sticks. Later we decorated them and put thank you notes on each one. We made enough for each couple to take one home. And a few extra for Kurt to eat because he really liked our salsa :) I hope you like it too.

Tissue Packets

2011-07-29T00:04:00.000-07:00

Another DIY project I found on http://www.weddingbee.com/ which is pretty much my favorite site these days! They are so simple to make!

I found a pack of pocket size tissues 60 tissues total for $2.00 that plus one roll of cellophane from the Dollar Tree. (.10 each)

Sasha & I cut out squares of cellophane and folded them like a present and taped them on the back. They looked so awesome!

A road trip & A July Wedding in the Bayou

2011-07-25T12:33:00.000-07:00

Weddings Weddings Weddings!!! It seems that everyone is getting married. My Cousin Teryn (who I have not seen in many many years) just got married last weekend in the bayou. My grandmother & I packed our bags and hit the road for Louisiana. Many people in our family told me over and over that she would not go with me to this wedding but we proved them all wrong. I personally think that she really wanted to see her grandchildren and great grandchildren. We decided to make it an overnight trip so we left Early Saturday morning (day of the wedding) and got to our hotel just in time after our 8 hr drive to freshen up and head for the ceremony. She got married at a place that was known for their crocodiles yikes. It was a beautiful wedding and I LOVED her dress. I didn't actually take too many pictures of the wedding because our seats were upfront but slightly blocked for pictures. I did however get a lot of pictures of the kids and my other cousins It was so nice to be in the same space with them after such a long time.

The happy couple :)

Granny holding Gavin (Kayle's youngest son)

she looks so happy to have one of her great grand babies in her arms. This is the first time she met Gavin but it seems that they hit it off :)

Granny feeding Jackson (Kristance's youngest son)

BTW did I mention it was really hot like 100 degrees that day. In case you can't tell by Jackson's hair.

He is not camera shy

Me holding Jackson he is such a cutie.

Granny with Eleanor

Attempting to get a picture with all 6 Great Grand kids.

I think that this one turned out the best <3

Nikia helping her nephew

Kayle with Gavin

It was a great trip!

I finally have my oh so perfect dress!!!!

2011-07-24T22:05:00.000-07:00

After a few shopping attempts and an online order disaster I finally have the perfect wedding dress!! It is more beautiful than I could ever imagine! I must admit it did cost more than I wanted to spend but it was worth it.

I have plans to have it altered to a knee length dress that I can wear again that way I didn't spend so much money on a one time dress.

Giftbags for the out of town guest!

2011-07-23T23:00:00.000-07:00

I got this idea from a DIY wedding website. Which I have been addicted too since getting engaged. The basic idea is to make welcome bags for all of your out of town guest and leave them at the hotel for the guest to get when they check in. I spoke with a friend who does extreme couponing and she got me all of the supplies for a cheap price. Sasha & I worked for about 4 hours to put them together.

The bags consisted of a silver paper bag from A.C.Moore, toothbrush, travel toothpaste, shampoo, bar of soap, razor, travel deodorant, panty liners, pack of gum, tic tac's , 2 bottles of water, 2 iced coffee drink, bags of chips, power bars, mini bag of chocolates, local area attractions, & Do not disturb sign. The do not disturb sign was customized saying "Do not disturb we are recovering from the Thompson wedding" I wish I had gotten a picture.

I found a template for these labels online and my wonderful friend Jennifer recreated them with our information on them.

Personal Care Items in a convenient bag (Sasha in the background).

Thank you Sasha & Sherri for all of your help with this project. I couldn't have done it without you!

The invitations OY

2011-06-30T22:17:00.000-07:00

After hours and hours of printing, cutting, glue sticks, and assembly I am finally done with those pesky invitations. They are awesome to look at but boy were they time consuming.

The inside!

The outside before the ribbon.

The ribbon process

Don't they look so beautiful & almost professional. Maybe I am bias but I LOVE the invites.

This was the special Saturday night of working while Kurt & his friends were having a cookout & a bonfire. At different points in the night I had each of the guys helping me make invites :)

A Visit with Granny & Nikia

2011-05-30T12:03:00.000-07:00

While we were in Tennessee this last trip we decided to take granny and Nikia to The Hermitage and show them where we were planning to get married. I think that they liked it :) It was a beautiful day and our trip even included a free tour of the grounds. We also met our DJ so that we could figure out exactly where they would set up and sign a contract.

This is the spot where we will be married.

Nice shade tree in the cocktail hour garden :)

Some fun pictures of the bride and groom around the property.

Nikia looking pretty :)

Inside the house on our tour.....shhhhhh don't tell them because we were not supposed to take pictures.

Way to hot to be wearing such a thick dress.

Butterflies just seem to like him :)

CCCHS Graduation

2011-05-28T08:03:00.001-07:00

Kurt and I took a special trip to Tennessee for memorial day weekend for multiple reason. We were going to sign the contract for our wedding location, spend memorial day cooking out with my granny, and see my youngest cousins graduate. It was a rushed weekend but it was fun. We left PA and barely made it to the graduation but we got there just in time. I saw so many people I knew and being back at Austin Peay really reminded me how old I am that I graduated 10 years ago at the same place. The boys looked great in their Maroon Cap & Gown and we were both so proud of them. Pictures Below:

2011 Graduating Class

Getting ready to walk across the stage and receive their diploma.

Here they go.......

Officially High School Graduates. Somehow we missed them after the ceremony with all the people and commotion. It was a great day!

Gettin Hitched

2011-04-30T06:45:00.000-07:00

While driving from one possible wedding location to another we stumbled across a wedding party setting up for a wedding. They had the best sign out by the road to show people where the wedding was located. I just had to have a picture :)

This sign is AWESOME!!

In case you cannot tell it was really bright out.

D.I.Y Ring Bearer Pillow

2011-04-28T15:17:00.002-07:00

One of my many DIY projects for the wedding was a handmade ring bearer pillow that matched my wedding colors. Since it required sewing I recruited my grandmother for help :) I picked up the fabric that I liked best and well she did the rest! Thank God my granny.

Doesn't she look cute helping me :)

She did a great job of course.

Easter, Granny's B-Day, & A little Wedding Planning :)

2011-04-28T12:02:00.000-07:00

Luckily for my gas tank and my sanity Easter fell the same week as my granny's birthday this year and I didn't have to make an extra trip to TN. This year our family decided to celebrate Easter at Shoney's (my idea I am soooo smart) so that no one had to cook and we could spend the day with Gracie since she had to work. We had a great time and I am pretty sure everyone enjoyed it. I always wondered why families went out to eat for holidays and now I understand.

Me, Kurt, and Caylei of course :)

Granny With Caylei they both look soooo cute!

Robert Lee

Nicole looking at her birthday gift we missed her birthday but we didn't forget.

Kurt holding Caylei. He looks so happy holding her but she isn't quite sure LOL

This family dinner also included a trip to the ladies room to try on bridesmaids dresses. They fit perfectly!!

Mary was so happy that hers fit.

My baby Nicole is growing up so fast she is a young woman now. She is also the age that I was (14) when she was born. Crazy right.

Granny's Birthday was on Tuesday and we took her out to Captain D's (our favorite restaurant) for lunch unfortunately I forgot to take pictures. As always we had a blast! Next year is the big 80 for Granny and we are going to throw another party :).

Lets start planning a Wedding :)

2011-04-02T14:10:00.000-07:00

I am back from Tennessee :)

I spent a very busy 7 days looking at wedding locations, wedding dresses, bridesmaid dresses, and color options. AHHHHHHHH I don’t think I have ever had so many people ask me questions that I did not know the answer too in my life.

What are your colors? What type of flowers? What type of food do you want to serve? How many guests are you expecting? And the list goes on & on.......

Luckily I had my best friend Sasha right there by my side to help me sort through all of the questions. She was also really good at asking the questions that I would forget when looking at the locations. I don't think that we found the perfect location yet but we were able to narrow it down quite a bit. There are just sooo many beautiful places to host an outdoor wedding in Tennessee. I am hoping that we can make an ultimate decision while visiting for Easter.

On a separate planning note we ordered "save the date" cards to send to our entire out of state guest. In an attempt to figure out how many of our out of state guest will be able to attend so that we get a large enough space. They just came in so expect them in the mail in the very near future.

We also started our wedding website and Honeymoon registry.

I am sooooo excited only 142 days til the wedding :)

Tender Baked Chicken & 1-2-3 Cheddar Broccoli Casserole

2011-02-02T22:10:00.000-08:00

Okay after looking through this cookbook I decided to start simple. One thing that I already like about this cookbook is that most of the stuff listed you can find around your house. I decided to make Tender Baked Chicken & 1-2-3 Cheddar Broccoli Casserole for dinner. Both recipes are extremely easy and took very little time to prepare.

Tender Baked Chicken Recipe:

Makes 4 Servings: About 300 Calories per serving

4 Chicken Breast

1/2 Cup Real or Light Mayonnaise (I used Fat Free Walmart Brand Mayo)

1 1/4 Cup Italian Seasoned Bread Crumbs

1.) Brush chicken on all sides with mayonnaise

2.) Place bread crumbs in large plastic Ziploc bag. Add chicken 1 piece at a time; shake to coat well. Arrange on rack in broiler pan.

3.) Bake in 425 degree oven about 30 minutes fresh, 40 minutes frozen or until golden brown.

It came out supper yummy and really moist and good. It was so easy. Perfect for a night when you have a lot to do and not much time to prepare dinner.

1-2-3 Cheddar Broccoli Casserole

Makes 6 Servings: Calories per serving:

1 Jar (16 ounces) Ragu Cheese Creations! Double Cheddar Sauce

1 (14 Ounces) frozen broccoli florets, thawed

1/4 cup plain or Italian seasoned dry bread crumbs

1 Tablespoon margarine or butter, melted

1.) Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In 8 x 8 casserole dish, combine Ragu Cheese Creations! Sauce and Broccoli

2.) Evenly top with bread crumbs combined with margarine.

3.) Bake uncovered 20 minutes or until bread crumbs are golden and broccoli is tender.

My broccoli was frozen but it still came out well in 20 minutes. When I cooked I started the thawed chicken at a preheated 425 degrees. When my timer got down to 20 minutes I reduced the heat to 375 and put my broccoli in with the chicken. It came out perfect after 20 minutes :)

Kurts plate looks tasty :)

Turned out to be a great dinner. YAY Cookbook

Just Me & Cookbooks

2011-02-01T23:20:00.000-08:00

Hi. I do not know exactly what made me decide I wanted to try out blogging. I really enjoy reading blogs and I think it would be fun to write one. Ultimately this will most likely become a mixture of my life: Girl Scouts, cooking, baking, school, and my family. I am very excited about this and can't wait to see where it takes me. :)

I think to get me started I will try a cookbook type blog. I started collecting cookbooks a few years ago, I get them from everywhere stores, yard sales, churches, sports teams, and even calendars.

I currently own 55 cookbooks. I do not actually use most of the cookbooks I own and I would like to change that.

I even have a few collections :)

<3 Lillian <3

My list of Cookbooks in Alphabetical Order:

Alderfer Inc. Cookbook

Amish Home Cooking With Elsa (this one only has cooking for large groups)

Amy Vanderbilt's Complete Cookbook

Better Home & Gardens: New Cookbook

Better Home & Gardens: So Good Meals Cookbook

Betty Crockers Hamburger Cookbook

Beyond the Bowl (recipes involving breakfast cereals should be interesting)

Big Valley Amish Cookbook

Biggest Book Of Casseroles

Bread Of Life (this cookbook holds my FAVORITE Meatloaf recipe ever)

Charlestown School Country Cookbook

Cookbook Album Of Lancaster County PA

Cookies For Kids (I use this one a lot)

Cooking With Friends Columbia Elks Lodge 1074

Crock Pot Cookbook

Farm Journals Country Cookbook

Favorite Brand Name Bake Sale Items (I love this one <3)

Fix & Forget Slow Cooker Recipes

Great American Recipes From Elks Lodge 2645

Hoover Blenders: The Gourmet's Delight

Kitchen Aid Recipe Collection

Meals For Two Cookbook

Octorara Girls Soccer Cookbook

Penningtonville Church Cookbook (my church's cook book :)

Quick & Delicious Canning, Pickling, & Preserving

Quick & Delicious Breads

Shortcut Cooking

The American Family Cookbook

The Best Country Cooking 2001

The Contemporary Yogurt Cookbook

The Cookie Book

The Cozy Home Cookbook

The Frugal Gourmet Cooks American

The Trinity Sampler

There Is Room At Our table

Weight Watchers Favorite Homestyle Recipes

Wok Cookbook ( I don't even own a Wok)

100 Best 4 Ingredient Recipes

150 Delectable Desserts

150 Delicious Refridgerator Desserts

200 Classic Cake Recipes

200 Ways To Serve Fish & Seafood

230 Tasty Sandwich Recipes

250 Healthful Dairy Dishes

250 Sauces, Gravies, & Dressing

250 Superb Pies & Pastries

250 Tasty Snacks: Ideas For Entertaining

250 Ways To Make Candy

250 Ways To Prepare Meat

250 Ways To Prepare Poultry & Game Birds

250 Ways To Serve Fresh Vegetables

300 Delicious Salads & Many One Dish Meals

365 Easy Chicken Recipes

2002 Recipes Calendar

2008 Fresh Cooking Calendar

One of my favorite books