Dinner for Two

[caption id="attachment_1351" align="alignleft" width="300"] Brown onions on high in 4 tablespoons of butter[/caption]

Ahhhh! I have never posted a recipe, but this was worth the post! I don't lay awake at night thinking about cooking, but I do love to cook things and have my family ooh and ahhh over it. Anyway, tonight is my last weekend night with my man by myself and I really wanted it to be special. This night called for fabulous food, christmas lights and a table set for two! The christmas

[caption id="attachment_1352" align="alignleft" width="300"] Add heavy cream and crumbled blue cheese[/caption]

lights were sparkling, the table was set but the food part was up in the air. I turned to the Pioneer woman. I do love her recipes! I can actually cook them and they turn out! I found a recipe for grilled ribeyes on an onion blue cheese sauce. It looked so good! The Pioneer Woman takes you through the recipe step by step. Honestly there is no way to mess this one up.  I

[caption id="attachment_1353" align="alignleft" width="300"] Put sauce on the plate and lay your steak right on top![/caption]

also remembered seeing that a friend of mine had made it and posted it on her blog ,thespoonfulblog. She gave it a thumbs up so I decided it must be a winner. It was amazing! I have so enjoyed being with my man these past couple of weeks. I have kind of had a peek into the empty nest thing. I must admit my heart experienced a roller coaster of emotions. I absolutely adored having my husband all to myself! It was like having a two week date! Then there were moments I was sad because I missed our children and all the action around the house. Then I experienced guilt for enjoying the quiet slow paced day. Then there were times of feeling lonely and other times I enjoyed being alone. Some days I was horrible inefficient with my time and other days I was the over achiever. Whew, is that exhausting or what? Weird. I truly went from 5 children to no children and it turned my world upside down. A good upside down. I learned a lot about myself...another blog for  another day. But for now, I'm enjoying dinner for two! Try the recipe! Fire up the grill, add sparkling lights, and set your table for two!

Thank you for stopping by! love love love Ruthie

The Father's Arms

I am so glad you stopped by! I want to tell you a great story about a daddy and his daughter, so I thought this would also be a great time to show my gift I made for my daddy. I collaged and painted book covers and bound them with utility rings. Some of you may be thinking what in the world do you do with that? Well, daddy and I write notes to each other a lot and they sit in a box. I thought I would pull them out and put them in this book to make it easier to look at them any time I want. Obviously you could do this with anything, recipes, letters, valentines, the list is endless! Try it!

If you read my last post on Twelve Days, you know I went to the beach for a couple of days with my husband. While we were there we got to enjoy the Seaside 4th of July parade. It was fabulous! The floats are so fun and creative and they always throw candy and beads and sometimes shoot you with water guns. It is a fabulous event. The parade begins at 8:00, but people begin lining the streets about 7:30am. Eddie and I had a great spot right between sweet families with lots of children dressed in red white and blue from head to toe. There was a precious little girl beside us about 6 yrs. old who was eagerly awaiting the parade. She was dancing and waving her bucket(to hold candy) and every now and then would bravely step into the street to see if the parade was on it's way. The longer we waited the bolder she grew moving further and further away from her family.Then out of nowhere this huge bumble bee began to buzz around her relentlessly. She ducked right and left and waved her arms and her bucket, and I'm telling you that bee would not leave her alone. She tried twirling and swinging the bucket and I could see by the size of her eyes that panic was about to set in her sweet little heart. She gave it a few more swings with her bucket and when the bee darted to upwards to dodge the bucket, she took advantage of the situation and ran straight for her daddy. She nestled right up under him like a hand in a glove. She fit perfectly, bucket and all. As I watched her , I thought it was so interesting that once she was snuggled up to her daddy the bee was no longer an issue at all! She did not ask her daddy to save her or tell him to look out for the bee, she did not even look around for the bee herself. She was in her daddy's arms and she was completely safe. She trusted her daddy without question or concern. It was fascinating. One minute she was experiencing complete chaos and the next minute she was resting peacefully in her daddy's arms.

I could not help but compare that scene to my Heavenly Father. It is a perfect illustration  of how our Heavenly Father longs to hold us and protect us. He is our refuge our place of rest. And yet if you're anything like me I fight that bee until I'm absolutely exhausted and then fall into His arms to find rest and peace every time. Why do I wait so long? Why do I fight the bee in my own strength? In Psalm 91 verses 14-16, God promises to deliver me, set me securely on high, when I call He will answer, He will be with me, He will rescue me, and He will satisfy me. That is some kind of promise. So what are we waiting for? Quit fighting that bee and RUN to Him. It's safe there. It's good there!

"He only is my rock and my salvation. My stronghold; I shall not be shaken. Psalm 62:6

Love love love Ruthie

Twelve Days

[caption id="attachment_1331" align="alignleft" width="300"] SOLD[/caption]

Hi! I am so glad you stopped by! It's been a while since I posted and it's great to be back! Last week my husband and I found ourselves with no children at home. We actually had about twelve days to ourselves. Before you read any further, if you found yourself in that exact situation, what would you do? How would you spend your twelve days? Seriously, think about it!

Honestly, I probably contemplated every single idea that you just dreamed about. However, considering we'd already taken vacation with our family, we had a very limited budget, my husband still had to go to work, my grand plans were shrinking by the second! At the last minute my sister graciously gave us her beach house. Perfect! We packed a bag, hooked up the boat, and headed for the coast for a couple of days! It did not matter that the forecast called for rain every day or that we were experiencing record breaking temperatures, I had my man all to myself! We had the most amazing time! We ate fun food, we walked, we talked, we caught big fish, and my personal favorite we watched the sun go down over the ocean every night! Fabulous!

Do you remember when you fell in love? It was so fun! You had this awesome dating relationship where you did fun spontaneous things like sneak out on the golf course at midnight and eat ice cream or picnic under a waterfall. Then you have this amazing wedding and then life happens. You actually have to go to work or drive carpool and the  spontaneous is now scheduled in a day timer. "Life" is a good thing, it's just loud and fast and takes a lot of time and energy. But it's how you do life every day that makes the "twelve days" fabulous! Life is fun and busy and fast paced and it's filled with lots of people, I get that! But if we don't make a conscious effort to nourish relationships at home with our children and particularly our spouses, then when we get "twelve days" we won't enjoy the time. That's a fact. Take ten minutes every day and be intentional towards your spouse. Seriously! Try it! For ten minutes look him or her in the eyes and listen, ask questions, laugh out loud and enjoy. Get up a little earlier just one morning and share a cup of coffee. Instead of lunch with friends pursue your spouse for lunch. Who doesn't want to be pursued? We make time for those things that are important. Where are you spending your time? Be intentional! Make a date this week!

Leave a comment on how you were intentional towards your spouse this week! I would love to hear!                                                                            love love love Ruthie