30 Day Journal Challenge

Since I've had some free time on my hands I have started to follow a lot of blogs. Let me tell you, there are some talented and inspirational ladies out there! I came across a blogger who is challenging her readers to a 30 day journal challenge. You can click the link to the right to check her out. She posts a topic each day and that's what you journal or draw or do whatever comes to you. I'm not much of an artist so you will probably see a lot of words and pictures in my journal. I LOVE this idea. I was a big into journaling when I was in high school and then some how it always gets away from me. I've tried to pick it up a few times since then and the notebook always ends up hiding in a random drawer some where. So I've accepted the challenge and I will post my pages on my blog. I was a couple days late on starting, so here are day's 1 and 2.

Day 1 was to create a full page design to introduce yourself. I chose words to describe myself, things I like to do and people and dates that are important to me.

Day 2 was What is the best part of your day.

I will be working on today's journal topic a little later today. I will try to post it sometime today. I'm working on a cookie order for some fathers day cookies and I need to get them finished up by tomorrow. I will post pics of the final product!

Customer Service

I have worked in customer service since I was in high school. Unfortunately good customer service seems hard to find these days. I am often surprised when I go into a retail store and feel like I am inconveniencing the staff by shopping in their store. Heaven forbid I want to give them some of my money.

Anyways, I'm not here to talk about my poor customer service experience. I recently had a very GOOD experience in the most unexpected place... while getting my oil changed.

I don't normally handle the oil changes in our family but since I'm not working I had the time to take the car and we were getting ready to head out of town and it needed to be done. I've gotten my oil changed before, many years ago and I always felt awkward about it. Would they try and rip me off with all these pricey "add-ons"? or talk to me like I'm stupid because I'm a woman? Both of these have happened to me before.

As soon as I pulled in one of the guys came and opened my door for me and lead me to the waiting area. While I was waiting, the manager came in to tell me what they were doing and to see what kind of oil I wanted. Every time he addressed me it was "Mrs. Timmons" and he explained thoroughly what would be best for my type of vehicle. He thanked me several times during my visit for doing business with them. He enrolled me in a discount program that would save me money on future visits. When the car was done another man escorted me out to my car, thanked me again and shut my door for me.

Overall it was a very positive experience and unfortunately one I do not see enough of these days. Anyone who works in customer service or owns their own business SHOULD be thanking their customers and going above and beyond to make the experience memorable...even if it is just getting an oil change. After all it's our customers money that is putting the roof over our heads, and feeding our children.

Snail Mail

Remember the days before e-mail and facebook? Pretty soon the younger generations won't have any memory of snail mail, with everything being available online. Now days you can pay your bills on-line, shop on-line and heck you can even order a pizza with out ever having to speak to anyone!

Well I stumbled across a blogger today who's taking us back to the days of snail mail! I signed up so I'll let you know if/when I get anything in the mail.

I LOVE this idea. I used to have pen pals when I was younger. I think we had to for a class but then my cousin and I were pen pals over the years. I think it's so great to stay connected to people this way. It's much more personal than e-mail, and I think it makes us take time to stop and think about what you really want to say to that person.

So I'm going to give this a try as well. If you would like some snail mail from ME, just a little something to brighten your day, shoot me an email at jltimmons@gmail.com with your mailing address and "Snail Mail" as the subject, and then check your mailbox the following week. I won't give your personal information to anyone and since I think only family and friends read this you know I'm not a crazy person who will stalk you :)

I'm Back

I realize that I have been MIA for a few months. I am attempting to get back on the blogging bandwagon. Seeing as how I don't have a job I should have all sorts of time to blog right? right....

There has been a lot of things going on in our lives over the past few months some good and more bad. I will try to recap what's been going on over the past few months in my up coming posts. In the meantime I realize I left you hanging with my last post of the wonderful fabric that I would be turning into a quilt. I completed it and here it the picture to prove it!

Teaser alert!

Here are a few teasers for my upcoming weekend. This weekend the women in my family are getting together for our annual "Bunny Weekend" in honor of my Great-Grandma Bunny Clapper.

The cookies are just for fun to share with all the girls. I really just needed an excuse to practice my decorating skills!

As I have mentioned before I am trying my hand at quilting this year and these are the cute fabrics I picked out. I just hope it all turns out as good as it looks in my mind :)

I will share more next week with the finished product!

Happy 3rd Birthday Carter!

This precious little boy has been bringing joy to our lives for 3 years. The time really does go by so fast. He had a shaky start in the world when he got RSV and was hospitalized for 14 days. Now he's a rough and tumble little man who makes us laugh and smile every day. I'm so excited to see what God has in store for our little guy. Happy birthday buddy! We love you!

What's For Dinner?

In an effort to try to eat healthier I've been on the look out for new recipes to try. There have been a few road bumps along the way... we are picky eaters, I wouldn't call myself a very good cook and I hate to buy a bunch of groceries for 1 meal that you can't use to cook anything else. I found a recipe that looked good so I tried it out and we had it for dinner tonight. I found it in the February issue of Oxygen Magazine. Here it is!

Chicken Tenders with Balsamic Vinegar Glaze

The Cast of Characters:

Olive Oil to coat the pan

12 oz Chicken Tenders

Ground black pepper to taste

1 tsp minced Garlic

3 tbsp Balsamic vinegar

1 tbsp honey

1/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth

Fresh Parsley (optional) I opt'd out :)

Step 1:

Heat oil over medium-high heat. Add the chicken tenders and season with pepper. Cook, turning pieces halfway through, until cooked. Approx 7 minutes. remove chicken from the pan and set aside.

Step 2:

Reduce the heat to low-medium, add garlic and saute. Then add vinegar, honey and chicken broth. Simmer, scraping the bottom of the pan for 1 minute.

Step 3:

Return chicken to pan. Mix all ingredients together and heat through. Garnish and serve.

This makes 4 servings and it's 250 calories per serving. Not bad at all!

Our side dish was another recipe I found in the same magazine issue

Green Beans with Lemon and Garlic

Ingredients

1lb frozen fresh cut green beans

2 tsp extra virgin olive oil

1 clove garlic minced

Juice of half a lemon

Sea salt to taste

Step 1: Steam beans until tender- set aside

Step 2: Heat oil in pan and saute garlic for 5 minutes. remove from heat

Step 3: Add lemon juice to pan and stir. pour garlic-lemon sauce over green beans and serve

This makes 6 servings and is 40 calories per serving!

Here's the final product. It doesn't look quite like the magazine picture and it would probably look nicer if it wasn't on a tupperware plate. Oh well, just keepin' it real. It was all very easy and didn't take me longer than 30 minutes. That's my kind of meal! Let me know if you try it out and what you think!