Have you guys ever heard of a cricut?

And no, I don’t mean the noisy little bugger that gets behind your dresser and refuses to let you sleep!

It’s this fabulous little machine:

Image from cricut.com

It doesn’t look like much, but it’s a mean crafting machine!!

My friend had one and she always talked about how much she loved it. “Those crazy crafters!” I would think to myself “Always looking for something to spend money on.”

Then I tried hers out and LOVED IT. We were using it to cut out shapes and decorations for a scrapbook I work on for MrC and myself sometimes… and it’s so easy! And so neat!

I decided that if I still wanted one when I got my tax refund, that I would buy myself one.

Then two days later (and I still haven’t filed my taxes, if that tells you anything) I got on ebay and bid on one and WON! (Insert excitement here!)

So here’s a quick how-they-work

You have the above machine (the one pictured is the Cricut Expression).

You buy a cartridge:

(Note- these are NOT CHEAP! If you buy them at Wal-Mart or online at cricut.com, you will pay up to $80!!! So far I’ve been stalking ebay and craft stores for good deals- I will never pay more than $25.00 for one!)

You plug the cartridge into your machine.

Then you take the keypad overlay (included with the cartridge) and put it on your cricut:

Then you place a sheet of cardstock (or other paper, thicker usually works better) on the ’sticky sheet’ that comes with your cricut. And you pick what you want to print from the keyboard and add any options that may be available (shadowing, italic, bold, etc). Here are some shape options that come with this particular cartridge:

Each cartridge (when bought new) also comes with an ‘ideas’ book where you can pick up hints and tips on what works well.

Also? You know the lettering that you see on people’s walls? With the sayings like “Home is where the heart is…” or “Good times happen around the kitchen table…” Well, you can also print those vinyl letters with your cricut! Really I’m just getting started, but there are so many possibilities!

Now the big question: What are you going to pay for this cutting wonder?

You can find them at Wal-Mart (with one or two cartridges included) for around $290.00. Which isn’t too bad of a deal. But I went on ebay and bought a brand new one (no cartridges included) for $200 and free shipping. I bought it from a user named craft-e-corner (click the name to go to their site) and it was shipped quickly (and free!) and it arrived in perfect condition. And really, I’ve seen them go (from that same seller) for under $175.00.

There’s also a new cricut out for cake decorating, which is pretty neat.

Do you guys have one? Have you heard of them?

Are you remodeling?

Were you impressed with my$6.00 project where I took a gold fan and made it silver?

Do you like redecorating every once in a while but are on a tight budget?

Well, I started a new blog. One devoted soley to bargains I’ve found and great (but cheap!) products to aid in your remodel or redecorating.

So check it out and let me know if you have any thing you’d like to recommend!

 JEN’s Home Bargain Blog

So, even though the roads JUST got cleared off two days ago, it is snowing again. And we’re supposed to get another 7 inches by tomorrow morning.

Ugh.

So while I soak in my snow-induced-depression, I’ll leave you with some pictures I’ve taken recently.

and finally:

MrC sent me roses at work on Friday. I was 100% surprised!!

Let’s talk chicken feet today, shall we?

First off is Fred’s feet.

His spurs are like nails. I mean there is no give to them when you squeeze them. Just complete and utter HARDNESS.

Fred is not a friendly rooster, but he and I have an understanding. MrC sometimes has to remind him of their mutual understanding in other methods involving a shoe and threats of a gun.

But overall Fred isn’t too bad of a rooster. And when we have visitors, he’s never bothered anyone. *knock on wood*

Now onto a less lethal pair of feet:

This is one of my Barred Rock hens. In fact, she was/is the dominant hen.

You can see the toe on her left leg is facing backwards. I have NO IDEA how this happened. Just one day last Spring, I noticed that she was limping and closer inspection showed that she had somehow ‘broken’ her toe so that it wasn’t correctly positioned anymore. I brought her inside to inspect it closer (much to the dogs delight) but there was no swelling and I couldn’t see any external damage.

Chickens are mean to the weaker chickens so I kept a close eye on how she was treated. She was eating normal and would hop from the chicken coop to outside with the other to eat bugs. But all that hopping would make her tired and she’d just lay in the grass for periods of time. She still slept on the roost by hopping slowly up the ramp, and none of the other chickens were picking on her.

Then her toe swelled up. To about 3 times it’s normal size. I knew that if she got an infection in her leg, it would eventually kill her so again I kept a close eye on her for any signs of change.

The swelling eventually went down and soon she became one fast hopper. I’d call to the chickens and they’d all come running and here she’d come, hopping like her life depended on it.  I wish I would’ve gotten a video of it b/c it was pretty comical to watch her come hopping so fast.

Now you can’t even tell there’s anything wrong with her.  She’s still the dominant hen and never hesitates to make sure the other chickens know that.

But I still wonder- how in the WORLD did she break her toe like that?

For whatever reason, I’ve become suddenly very interested in the birds that visit our bird feeders. I even asked for (and received!) a bird-watching book for the lakehouse. So now I’m even more annoying with my “Well, look-e-there! It’s a whatchamacallit!”

Right now I have 6 bird feeders at the lake. And the birds go through them very quickly. (With the help of a squirrel every once in a while… even though I have 2 squirrel feeders as well) But it’s neat to watch the birds that stop in. Here are a couple of my favorites:

This little guy is a Nuthatcher and is neat b/c he hops down the tree (like he is in the picture) but they can pick up their heads and look at you from that position. (A unique trait among birds, so says my Kentucky Bird Watching Book).

This guy is a woodpecker. And it surprises me how big he is. He looks funny hanging off the side of the bird feeders!

Here is one of the MANY cardinals that visit. He looks fat and sassy doesn’t he?

This past weekend, we (and by WE, I mean Mr.C and LakeHusband and LakeNeighbor) started tiling the shower in the master bathroom. You have no idea how happy I was that all my colors (the tile, accent tile, and wall color) came together. I think even MrC was surprised.

Nothing’s sexier than a man with a calculator! ;) 

 You can see the color on the wall. I think it’s called cold slate or something like that. It’s a gray-green color.

To compare, this is what the old shower looked like when we bought the house:

Complete with mold growing on the ceiling. There was also uncleanable black gunk all around the shower door.

Oh- and the rotting plywood right at the base of the shower:

Not to mention the STRIPES that were everywhere. Red and Green in fact. It actually took THREE coats of HIGH-HIDING primer to cover the stripes. Crazy.

I can’t wait to be done with it and have a fabulous master bathroom!!

MrC does business with a lot of contractors. A perk from that is that he gets to do lots of neat stuff (he got taken quail hunting, he got taken to The Oaks (the race before the Derby), etc). And sometimes I get a part of that perk. Like when he brought a ham home from Clifty Farms. The farm is located in Paris, Tennessee. We’ve never cooked a ham before, but we followed the instructions and wah-lah!

This particular ham goes for around $70.00.

 It was VERY salty, but I like salty ham so it suited me perfectly.

Have you guys ever cooked a completely raw ham? Are you doing one for Christmsas?

Merry Christmas!!!

I know I’m a little late (hello! Christmas is in 6 days!) but I wanted to post some pictures from my family’s Thanksgiving.

For one, MrC always deep-fries the turkey. One word: YUMM. This also helps mom out b/c it means that the oven is free for all the other things she cooks.

The one bad thing about deep-fried turkeys getting more popular is that the cost of oil is going UP. And when you need 4 gallons, it can set you back a good $40!!!

MrC found this AWESOME injection recipe from Crisco’s website. Click HERE to see it. I don’t remember if we used it on my family’s turkey or not b/c they are picky eaters, but we used it on his family’s fried turkey and it was A-MAZING. (We are some fried turkey FOOLS!)

Here is the finished product:

Yes, please.

After food was ate and lottery tickets were scratched (another Family tradition- everyone gets 2 lottery tickets at their place setting), we took some GIRLZ-ONLY shots.

Me with my 5 sisters and my mom. I’m not sure what Sister#2 is pointing at. 

Then my camera got ’stolen’ from my sister and lots of random shots were taken. I like this shot of my sister (#4) and her boyfriend:

I think it’s neat that my camera caught her camera too.

Have I mentioned lately that I LOVE MY CAMERA? I mean, yeah, you can buy a better one, but for $200 (they’re originally $230 but you can catch them every once in a while for $200) the Nikon L100 is a great camera!

So do you guys deep fry your turkey? Or go the more traditional route?

I love going to Gatlinburg.  I love scenic views of any kind, water, mountains, you name it, I love it. And Gatlinburg definitely has the mountains! Around here, Gatlinburg is a nice mini-vacation spot. It’s about a 5 hour drive and has lots of shopping, views, and shows.

This fat raccoon showed up on our first night. We were in awe about how round he was. Apparrently he gets fed quite a bit.

I think he heard us talking about how fat he was and he stuck his tongue out at us.

We also went to a show while we were there. It was called The BlackBear Jamboree. It was their Christmas show. We aren’t usually in to that type of stuff, but the friends we went with wanted to go so we went too. There was a glitch in one of their songs so we definitely knew they were lip syncing, but it was still neat to watch the dances.

This was the view from our bedroom. It was beautiful.

The cabin we rented was a 5-bedroom, 5-bathroom log cabin called The Grizzly’s Den (and it’s for sale for $1,250,000… ya know, if you have that layin around and all). MrC and I got there at 11:30 at night and we had a heckuva time trying to find it. Garmin didn’t recognize the address (or even the ROAD- it just showed us driving in mountain space) so it took us a good 30 minutes before some of our friends drove out to find us. It was a beautiful cabin, just very high up in the mountains.

It also had an 8 person hottub!

I loved the HUGE logs used to build this cabin.

Where do you guys take short vacation trips to?

At the lake, we try to keep a ‘fun’ atmosphere. So when it’s late and we’re all sitting around drinking discussing the classic novels we’ve read and the lecturers who have inspired us, we’re usually outside, surrounded by (what I like to call) TACKY LIGHTS. If you’re not familiar with these, they are similiar to Christmas lights, but have a plastic decoration that covers them, making them even MORE FUN than Christmas lights.

Behold, our Tacky Light Collection so far:

Flamingo Lights.

 Martini Glass Lights.

Fishing Bobber Lights.

Mill Lite Bottle Lights

Pumpkin Lights.

DragonFly Lights

Spider Lights.

This past weekend we took them all down and I cleaned them. You’d be suprised how many spiders were calling the Flamingo insides  their home. I’m sure we’ll add on to our lights as we find new creative ones. So which ones are your favorite?

I was recently in a wedding. My friend Keri (who is 5 years younger than I am), that I met when we both worked at Cracker Barrel, got married. She asked me to be in her wedding (the first one I’ve ever been in) and told me that ’she needed me because I would be the honest one.’ hee hee. I guess if you’re gonna be known for something, Honesty isn’t too bad!

Here’s a picture of the flower girl. I used Picasa3 to edit it.

I was trying to do this in Photoshop, but couldn’t figure it out. Picasa3 did a fairly good job though!

Her color was persimmon, which was an orangey-red color. It was beautiful and perfect for fall.

And finally, one of Mr.C and I.