Watchin' God Book One - Listed Alphabetically

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Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Computer desk and my 'list'


Some time soon, I will paint a small tacky pink knock-down computer desk. I found it on the side of the road the other day.   The desk will be periwinkleI started to paint the inside of my cloffice that color, but decided against it because we live in a rental, and the landlord probably wouldn't appreciate me painting the closet such a color.  He's funny that way.  My heart is set on painting something periwinkle.  



                                                  (The official periwinkle Valspar paint name is Merlin #492456)



(Once I painted the bedroom in my house periwinkle with bright white trim, with a brushed silver ceiling fan.  Then I moved.  The tenant painted the walls dark taupe...  breaks my heart, but since I didn't live there, it was okay...  That's one reason I want to move back - so I can paint the room periwinkle again!  Either that or take the ceiling fan down and bring it back up north with me...  It's my house, after all... Sadly, the fan wouldn't fit in any of the rooms in our Snowbird Palace.  I guess if I want periwinkle walls and a really cool brushed silver fan we will have to move down to GA, at least for the winter.)

(wow!  The color is horrible!  My hair was definitely NOT red.  Oh well.  The color of the wall on the left is pretty close to actual.  The worst part about this picture is I looked sooo young!  Not so much now... vanity, vanity.)


You should have seen me trying to get that desk in the car! It got stuck halfway in the door... I had to drive (with the door open and the desk hanging out) to a small parking lot across the street and try to get the top off so I could take the desk out of the car and hope it would go in the back seat sans top. For some reason, all the tools had been removed from the car!! Luckily there was a gas station/garage in the parking lot, so I went in to borrow flat and phillips screwdrivers.  "Are you guys laughing at me yet??" I asked with a smile as I walked in. One guy disavowed any such thing. The other guy laughed and said "I sure was!" He then kindly went to get the screwdrivers for me.

 

The desk top came off without incident, but the rest of the desk had been glued together so it was a bit challenging to get it in the back seat. At least the desk came out of the car.  And back in the car so I could bring it home.  Somehow, it just didn't seem right to consider dropping off the desk at the location I picked it up.  So, I was stuck with it...

And I remembered to return the screwdrivers!  Nice guys.  I must remember to make them some goodies.  (And not eat what they don't get...)

Oh, how I wish I would have taken pictures of that little fiasco!  You guys would have loved it!

As I was taking the desk out of the car, debating where to put it, it dawned on me that I had just a week ago wondered what I would use for a desk in my new craft/office/sun porch room.  You know what I'm gonna say next:

Thanks, Lord, for one more thing on my 'list'!  It's so much fun watchin' God! 

p.s.  Guess what I found in the pocket of the driver's side door afterwards?  In my defense, if tools are going to be in a door pocket, it's usually the passenger side, and I did look there... 

If there isn't a picture of the finished desk, please leave a comment to remind me!  
 
What have YOU found on the side of the road that just filled the bill for you?

Thursday, October 10, 2013

recycled plastic bag wreath



Nothing fancy here.  We shop for groceries at a store that uses plain brown plastic bags.  Sometimes I'm lazy and ask for those instead of paper.  (They're easier to carry the 100 feet or so from the car to the house.)  I've been donating them to thrift shops instead of throwing them away. (See?  I can be responsible every now and then!)  BUT...

Isn't this a much better use for them?!



This would work for Fall - add leaves, twigs, whatever floats your boat.

Or Winter - add twigs and pine cones with a little white paint to look like snow.  Maybe some red berries...

I'm on a roll!  Since there is that craft fair to do in a month, perhaps I'll save a few more bags and make another one.  They're easy, if  time-consuming.  Make one while you're watching The Sound of Music.  (or Downtown Abbey, or whatever...)


Here are a few instructions:



First find a metal coat hanger - the flimsier the better.  Then make it round.  A pair of flat-nosed pliers work well for getting the ends straight.  (Please excuse the fuzzy picture.  It's kinda hard to take a picture with one hand, and work with the other...)


 (New instructions:)  To allow the wreath to sit flat against the door or wall, place the circle against the side of a table at the beginning of the hook neck.  Bend it so the neck and circle are at right angles.  Then do the same just above the twisted part, making the hook parallel with the circle. 
Next, flatten out the bag and cut off the seam at the bottom and the handles.  Cut off the writing.  Save the handles that don't have writing on them.   (I don't know why some of these pictures are sideways.  Just cock your head to the left, or use your imagination...)


 






Fold in half  lengthwise and cut along the fold on both pieces. 

 Fold in half lengthwise again (this will be a different 'lengthwise' now.) 

I guess I could have said fold in quarters and cut all the folds.  That would work, too.  Just so you have pieces about this size.

(I made a second, smaller size by folding the long narrow pieces into 3 sections in this step.  Gives the wreath a bit of dimension.)

 Scrunch 2 pieces in the middle thusly.



Tie on the hanger and fluff out the ends.  (In the picture, only one end is fluffed.)  Tie all the pieces from the same direction to keep things neat.
If you chose to make different sized pieces, alternate them along with the handle pieces: long, short, long, handle, long, etc, etc, etc.

Your job is now to decide on decorations.  Have fun!  If you make one, please post a picture to share!

This is one made from fold-top sandwich baggies.  Cut the sides of the fold, so that both top pieces are flush, and not folded over.


UPDATE:  As I was surfing pictures of plastic bag wreaths, I came across this at Crafts n Coffee





Go ahead... make my day!  Tell me where you found the link for this post.  And are there any changes I should make to the directions to make it more clear?  Because I know what I'm doing, but you may not...  

Saturday, October 5, 2013

500 hits!!!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!  Whomever you are that just this very hour made the 500th hit on my blog!!  It's 9:32 am EST.

I checked the numbers earlier.  499...  One more Lord?  It would be so cool to have it go over 500...

After reading about Kari's flat tire on A Grace Full Life it seemed appropriate to write about the angel and the gas can.

Then in an effort to check something on the blog, I noticed the magic number!

So, whoever you are, THANK YOU!  I wish you would leave me a comment so I know who you are!

UPDATE:

On Oct 13, Beckie from RoadKillRescue featured my brown plastic bag wreath, and the numbers doubled in 2 days!  As of 9:27 EST today, this blog site is over 2000 hits!  Thanks Beckie!

Update 2:

Dec 18, 5 p.m.  3333 hits!  fun.  I love numbers!

May 2, 2014, 5000 hits!  But what's more amazing is that for some reason I checked my +1 account and there are 49,299 hits!  Truly amazing!  May God use my scattered and feeble efforts to show someone the way Home. . .

Angels and Gas Cans

After reading Kari's post on A Grace Full Life about a tire blowout and a 'courtesy officer' I had to post a 'Watchin' God' story of my own.  After all, that's what this blog is supposed to be about, right??

 Sorry, no pictures.

Jamie (my really nice son whom a friend said thinks I'm pretty cool - back 10 years ago, and after having grown up with me as his mother [see book on right], so that's pretty amazing!) and I were driving from somewhere south to Hardeeville SC on I-95.  No idea where we were that would have both of us in the car, and heading south.

Oh wait!  I have a picture of the house we lived in then.  That's another story.


To the chagrin of my husband, I had (okay, still have) a tendency to cut the gas pretty close because I knew exactly how many miles my Honda would travel on the interstate.  When it's all on the interstate.  Which, evidently it wasn't.

We were just north of home, by maybe 2 exits and a few miles, when suddenly the car started to sputter.  Not a good sign.

It ran out of gas just feet away from the entrance to an exit - at the bottom of which was a gas station.  Jamie was busy playing a vidiot game (did I mention I hate vidiot games?  When someone else is playing them??  But if he hadn't been, there wouldn't be a 'rest of the story'.)

With wallet in hand (come to think of it, Jamie couldn't have used my debit card to purchase the gas can, more than likely...  Okay, you're off the hook here, Jamie) I headed down to the gas station.

Inside the store, I was looking for a gas can.  A skinny, scraggly-looking old guy asked if I had run out of gas, and how far away.  I explained.  He bought the gas can AND the gas.  Even filled the can for me!  Then offered me a ride back to the car.  I was a bit skeptical, but figured maybe God was being nice to me, and certainly He could protect me.  There were enough people and a video to identify the man if anything happened.  (Besides, I'm by nature a trusting soul.)

There was a road that ran parallel to the Interstate, and we drove in his ragged red pickup to a location opposite the car.  (maybe that was God's way of reclaiming the honor of red pickups.  Another few stories there...) The nice gentleman handed me over the fence, asked me to hold the gas can so he could get over also.

When we got up the hill to the car, he put the gas in the tank for me.  The southern gentleman all the way.  I'm not sure where Jamie was - inside the car still playing games, or outside watching.  I was hoping he was paying attention to such gentlemanly behavior.  (Yup.  He's grown up into a nice gentleman himself.)

Then, when I turned around to thank the southern gentleman - he was gone!  The truck was gone.  There is no possible way for him to have gotten down the hill and over the fence and driven away in that time!  No possible way at all.

Thanks Lord!  I love it when you send angels to take care of your kids!  It's soo much fun Watchin' God!!