A Pair of Bartletts

Tea with the Father, and some very special ladies--AN UPDATE

First, I would like to thank EVERYONE who was so faithful to pray for our special tea party this past Thursday.  Monica....thank you for putting out the word on The Homespun Heart.  Another huge thanks to Alicia Williamson Garcia for ministering to us through music but also through delivering that very timely word from the Lord.  You challenged not only our very special guests, but me as well--I'm sure that the other hostesses would agree.  WOW--where do I start?  I guess I'll start with the actual tea itself.  Here is a picture of my table after being decorated and then with the "tea goodies" decorating the table. 

This is the table that I hostessed, right before I filled the serving plates with the "dainties" for our tea. 

 

Here you can see the delicious cranberry scones to the right, with the sweets in the backgroud.  Our sweets tray contained beautiful little lemon squares, homemade creamy fudge, Danish wedding cookies and big, read and juicy strawberries.  Along with the hot black tea that was served, we also offered an iced strawberri kiwi tea that was SO delicious and refreshing, because down here in the deep south, it gets    "WA-WUM", as any good southern belle would say (that's "warm" for all of the  Naw-thuhn-uhs reading this post).





And what proper tea is complete without finger sandwiches?  Of course there were cucumber sandwiches, chicken salad and some yummy little open faced homemade pimiento sandwiches. 

God was there with us on Thursday.  He was glorified in every word and every action that took place.  The women at my table were precious, to say the very least.  I will treasure the handwritten prayer requests that they gave to me at the tea.  I had the very high privilege of praying individually with each one over each of these humble requests.  These women may be in some extremely dire circumstances as of late, including drug addiction, alcoholism, abuses of every sort and other issues to many to name.  But on Thursday, they dined with us.  They were ladies with us.  They sipped hot tea, enjoyed scones with lemon curd, double Devonshire clotted cream and fresh strawberry jam.  Some took their tea with cream and sugar, and some took their tea without.  They laughed, they smiled, they heard a wonderful word from the Lord, and just for a minute, they were able to go to another place in time.  It was a safe place, without ridicule and without judgement.  It was a place that they were allowed to be the true ladies that they are, underneath what seems to others to be "tough exteriors".  They wore the best clothes that they had...and they were our HIGHLY HONORED GUESTS for the afternoon.  I can think of no place that I would have rather been at two o'clock in the afternoon on Thursday.  Thank you again for your prayers.  The Lord heard them, each one.  And glory be to the Lord, at the close of Thursday, there were three more added to the Lamb's book of life (as reported to me from the sweet, precious owner of the facility). 

Labels: Ladies Night Out, NoMo Women's Ministry

Moxie, On Cooking

Recently I brought home a new cookbook that I have been wanting. It's a fabulous collection of a book that literally tells yo uhow to cook everythin, such as it's title suggests. Check out this great book by Mark Bittman....let me know how you like it! The hummus recipe alone makes the book worth while! As you can see from the film below....I barely got it out of the bag before Moxie decided it was time to wallow all over this fabulous new find. Now it has his official stamp of approval!!!!!!!!! Let me know what you think of the book--i fully believe that it is an "end-all, be-all" type book with it's encyclopedia-ish style of writing. I'll look forward to hearing from all of you in blog-land!

Finally, the Update from Ladies Night Out!

Well, slowly but surely, I'm getting caught back up on my blogging. Recently, I posted about Ladies Night Out at my church, where I hostessed a table of eight ladies. WOW, what a night! We had the greatest time of worship, fellowship and sharing a meal together while getting to meet a precious sister in the Lord, Kasey Lowery Ewing. If you would like to see more of Kasey's incredible journey, you can visit her blog, High Heels in High Places. I would tell you her incredible story, but she tells it much better than I ever could. Kasey and her sweet husband (who was a former intern at our church) had the most horrendous experience of losing a child in a very tragic way. But, God, in His infinite wisdom, has used their story to touch the lives of many. If you have a minute, visit Kasey's blog. I can promise that you will be blessed.

In the meantime, here are a couple of snapshots of the set and of my table. I LOVED our set! How girlie is that I ask you? It was a beautiful spring back drop for a very "springy" event! My Mom is in the picture below on the left and her neighbor and our friend, Robin, is on the right. Even though they attend different churches, they have become "regulars" at our Ladies Night Out functions. Our church is so very blessed to have such an incredible ladies ministry. I sincerely hope that others reading this post will either begin participating in your church's women's ministry or that you will help begin one if there is not already one in existence. Ours is such phenomenal. I think that for a long time I took it for granted, until I began to actively participating in the hostessing end of the ministry. I hope that you will get involved...if you do, please let me know your experiences. I would love to hear of other activities in other churches! Keep me posted!

Labels: Ladies Night Out, NoMo Women's Ministry

Wonky Blog!

For whatever reason, by blog seems to be having some technical difficulties. I'm not sure what they are or to what extent, but hopefully I will have this resolved by tomorrow....please stay tuned!!!

Fort Morgan Trifle

I love to come up with creative ways to make things around the kitchen stretch...kind of like the "Semi-homemade" style. I don't go this route for everything, since I do love to make things totally from scratch. But, when we're at the beach, I like to try and do some new things that use up the items we have bought, so that we don't have to bring home too much. So, out of this came "Fort Morgan Trifle".

We always stop at Burris Farm Market on the way to the beach to stock up on fresh fruits and veggies to take with us. One of my purchases happened to be some BIG, BEAUTIFUL, RUBY RED Baldwin County strawberries. I also picked up some things at Sam's Wholesale before we left town. One of my purchases there was a really good looking lemon bundt cake.....it was SO yummy and moist. After having a friend of ours over to the condo, along with some of our family that came for the day on Saturday, there was a chunk of the cake left. When I was making a list to get a couple of things at the grocery store on Sunday evening, Rob specifically asked for some vanilla pudding for after Sunday night supper. Well, since I love to cook, it's really hard for me to make "just pudding". So, while on the way to the store, my mind started spinning on what I could do with vanilla pudding that would give it a little more zip. There you have it folks.....Fort Morgan Trifle. Since I knew that there wasn't a trifle bowl at the condo, I had to come up with something that would be pretty and that would hold these thick ingredients. Here are the ingredients that I used, but I didn't really include measurements, since it would depend on how many that you need to make. They were really easy and you could come up with any variations that would make it your own. I happen to love the flavor combination of the lemon, vanilla and the strawberry. I hope that you will try these out! If you do, send me a picture of yours so that I can see your unique variations!

FORT MORGAN TRIFLE
Lemon poundcake or bundt cake, cut in 1" cubes
Vanilla pudding, prepared by directions for thick, pie style filling
fresh strawberries, sliced (or your own seasonal favorite fruit
Cool Whip topping, or fresh whipped cream

Cut cake into 1" cubes. Make layers beginning with cake on the bottom, pudding next, slid sliced fruit around sides of the glass, follow with whipped topping. Repeat for another layer and end with whipped topping. Add a pretty berry slice to the top for a garnish. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before serving to allow everything to "get married" and soak together. Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know that it's been quite around here lately. I have been super swamped at work the last few weeks, but will be catching up on the blog over the next few days, so STAY TUNED!!! In the meantime, here are a few vacation photos for your viewing pleasure. Rob and I just went down to a condo at Fort Morgan for a few days and got back today (bummer!). At any rate...I'm back, refreshed, and ready to get caught up on some blogging! See you very soon!