Call me crazy!

Well, go ahead...

Call me crazy!

I did it. I finally did what I've always wanted to do. What might you ask would that be??? Well,
I was with some precious dear friends over the weekend and we decided it was time to do it!

I got a tattoo!

OH YES I DID!!!

And, for the record....there was only clear minded thinking involved. This wasn't a 2am run to the tattoo joint and a decision that I regretted the next morning.

Nope. I love this tattoo more and more each day.

Now, before you go and make judgements about this decision and all.....just know that this very cool tattoo is a symbol of my love for someone else. Yes, you read that right. Every time I see this tattoo I'm reminded of a deep, real love. Then I'm reminded of my love for someone else....my husband, Chip.

It's not backwards or mixed up.

This tattoo is right under my wedding ring. I think you'll understand my priorities once you take a peak at the picture below.

I'm beyond thrilled.

Have a great day!! Praying that Christ is first in all that you do doing your day!

Hugs and blessings~

I'm calling it "thank God for your friends day"

I'm entering a new season of life right now and over the last couple of weeks some precious people have been there for me and I'd like to personally thank them right here in pictures!

Sound fun?

Sure. So, let's gooooooooooo!!!!

This is me and Teri. Oh, how I love this girl. She's one of my northern friends! What a gift she and Becky Jo are to me. One day I'll get a picture of me and Becky Jo.

Holla!!! This is another BFF. Love you Robyn. I wish we lived next door to each other.

Nikki....you are the real fabulous deal! The girl is one heckuva encourager!!

Sweet, sweet Kim. What a gift and blessing you are to me. Simply thank God for you!

Oh Mary!!!! I cannot wait to spend time with you. Your wisdom and heart are simply contagious!


Jenny and I are sisters separated at birth. Love her and her family.

This picture makes me wanna cry. Nancy, who is in the middle, is having her 2nd son as I write this! And, Carolyn, well you know how I feel about you.

I love ya Lesley. You are always here for me. ((hugs))

These girls just hold a dear, dear place in my heart. Always grateful for them...no matter what the season is. Love you Patty, Steph, and G.

Abby, Abby, Abby....how I wished I lived in Nashville with you. Me, you and Nikki would be definite BFF's. Now, we have to do the distance thing and I'm ok with that. You both are worth it. ;)

There are so many others that I want to shout out to but I can't find a picture on my computer of them.....

Angie, Connie, Dedra, Tonya, Susan, Teresa, Jan, Jerri Sue, Carol....who am I forgetting??

You know how you have been there for me the last few weeks and I thank God for you today.

Take time to let your friends know how much you love 'em! Life is fragile and short.

Hugs and blessings!!

Headin' to the Ham

I am heading to Birmingham for some fun and some friends!!!!!! YES!

We are heading South to catch some SEC baseball action. We are fanatics. And, for me...my bonus is some friend time with Robyn and Mary. My favorite pic of Robyn was taken last January when we were in Atlanta for Travis Cottrell's live CD and DVD recording. Some cool chick named Beth Moore crashed our lunch!!!



Do you think we are a bit much?? Too much black and white?? Nah. LOVE THIS PICTURE!!


This was the moment our friendship became real life and no longer imaginary!!! We love us some Nikki too!!!!

I'll see you back on Monday with a fun recap and hopefully lots and lots of pix of our weekend!

Love each and every one of you.

"Thank you Jesus for all sorts of friendships."

Blessings~

Stupid friends

Y'all, one of my most favorite times in the past month was my trip to hear Travis record a new worship CD/DVD at FBC Woodstock just outside Atlanta. I picked up Patty and Georgia and we hit the highway toward Stephanie's....for several hours. Well, what typically happens when you hit the highway with great friends and have some distance ahead of you??? Oh, let me tell you what happens....

You get VERY silly, laugh until you cry, eat some junk, and comment on every thing you see or pass along the way (remember the truck, Patty?). I wish I could tell y'all what was written on this particular 18 wheeler, but it is just not appropriate blog worthy material. ;) Ok, so somewhere along the way, we kept using the word "stupid." And, you know how we do.....we started intentionally using the word in every possible sentence and in every form we could. And, that is exactly what we did. Let me give you an example of how it started....And, please use LOTS of sarcasm as you read aloud. Thanks...because we really are sweet, precious people. Remember, the silliness is getting into full gear now.

Fran: "This stupid truck is not getting out of the left lane. I need to drive faster than 55. Its the stupid left hand lane people. Stupid driver. I'm gonna take you out, stupid driver."

Patty: "This is some serious stupid traffic in Atlanta. Could you imagine doing this stupid stuff every day? Stupid traffic isn't moving."

Georgia: "Do I need to get out and tell these stupid people how to drive in rush hour? Stupid man next to us is texting and driving."


Ok, so you get the gist of what we were doing. It became sooooooo very funny with each minute that went by....with each scenario that went by....with each comment said. I know I couldn't breathe at one point I was LAUGHING SO VERY HARD!!!

So, what happens next? Stupid has taken on a life of its own and became the word of the weekend among us. It is still alive and active out there in cyber world through emails, facebook comments, and even my birthday gift from these girls.

These are the beautiful flowers my adorable husband sent me....

These are the flowers my precious friends sent me for my birthday.....

And, this is the stupid card they sent......

Do you know how hard I laughed over this???? Don't you just love funny, inside stuff between friends?? Don't you love it that you have people who you can just be completely ridiculous with?

Don't you just love the silliness of gooooood friends?? Don't you just love it that these are friends I met on the internet through blogging??? Don't you love it that these girls mean the absolute world to me??

Friendship is a pretty cool thing and I absolutely thank God for it!!!

Proverbs 18:24 "there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother."

I love each and every one of you and am thrilled to call you friend.

Hugs and blessings and much laughter.....

Sweet, sweet friends

Hi Monday! How are you? Me? Tired and wishing we could rearrange the week and make the weekends a little longer. Don't take it personally. I'm just not a big fan of you.

Had such a fabulous weekend! With friends. And, with friends I've known since ELEMENTARY SCHOOL!!! Can you even imagine after all these years you even still know each other and will hang out together as if time has just stood still?!

These girls, Shawn is on the left, I'm in the middle, and Laura is on the right, are so dear to me.

We get like that the older we are, huh? They are just precious to me.

Here we are Friday night eating at a fabulous Sushi/Thai restaurant. I don't think the waiter was too keen on us. I'm not sure why. Look how cute we are. ;)

We stayed up way late and talked and laughed and talked and laughed. Don't you just love that?

The great thing about our friendship is that we have not always been near one another or would even talk or see each other for years. So....through many life events, we have somehow managed to stay in touch and see one another every year or two. It takes effort doesn't it?

Here we are being goofy (ok, I was being goofy) with the camera and we were taking pictures when you weren't ready. Because we are grown up like that.

Saturday we shopped and shopped and shopped and shopped. We had so much fun. I got so many gifts knocked out. You know the ones, teacher gifts, birthday gifts that fall between now and Christmas. And, we found this place that comes to Memphis once a year for a few weeks that sells BEAUTIFUL pottery dishes for DIRT CHEAP. DIRT CHEAP I tell ya. I got a piece for $6 that would normally sell for $25-30. Ch-ching.

So, here is Shawn coming out with her goods.....

Since I've been home, I've been thinking about friendships....all kinds....and I want you to think about letting your friends know just how much you love them. Let them know just how special your friendship is with them. Let them know. Don't wait to tell them.

Regardless of how long you've known someone, tell them just how grateful you are for their friendship. And, the value of good friendships is something we can all teach our children about.

"I miss you Shawn and Laura. Thanks for being some dear, dear friends. My life is better for knowing you. I can't wait to see ya again!!"

I love you all. Have a great day and I'm so glad to call each of you "friend."

"A friend loves at all times." Proverbs 17:17

Hugs and blessings~

Its a convicting Friday

Hey everyone!! Happy Friday and Happy weekend to us all. :)

I must say my Godstop Friday...thank you so much Patty for spurring us on...was a little convicting. Ok, A LOT convicting.

How we can quickly fall back into an old pattern or an old "me" for even just a short period of time and know it all along and yet stay right there.

I was having dinner the other night with a dear, precious, Christian friend and everything was just hunky dory.

Let me just keep it simple and say that some "drama" unfolded among some friends that I knew that were also there eating. Well, I had to fill my friend in on who everyone was and what was going on with them and the whole nine yards.

Lets just say there was too much talking. ON MY END.

Well, I felt so bad about it the next morning and decided I should hit the neighborhood and start my walk. I walked at the feet of Jesus for the entire walk...begging forgiveness, pouring out my heart, almost in tears, giving it all over to Him. It was a sweet time, but one of those most convicting times when you just feel sick to your stomach.

I'm feeling better about it today. But, I know that I should not have gone on and on and on and "gossiped" all about it to someone else.

I'm learning this old lesson again. I have matured desperately in this area over the last 10 years.

But, isn't it funny that just a week ago someone said to me "Fran, you've grown so much because you handled those conversations so well and didn't get all in the middle of it."

Hmmmm....how quickly we can go from one end to the next in just a matter of days.

Praying for us all. I need me some self control of thy tongue.
Blessings and love,
Fran

Some Garden fun!!

Isn't this fun y'all for a Friday in the middle of June?? Hope you enjoy your little trip into my home and through the backyard. Its been so much fun having you. We could sit out back with some good ole sweet tea when you're finished and just hang out. My favorite thing to do!

Thank you Lisa for hosting this most fun event. :)

Into the front doors we go...

Quick cut through the living room...



Out the patio door to my favorite place of all..



Enjoy my friends!



The greenest fern I've ever had...



Hangin out chairs...



No..I didn't make this pot, but it sure is cute isn't it?



I love this big brown pot.



This is like mama plant and baby plant...



Covered and cool is important when its 101 outside...



Can you see the pond in the distance?? The biggest bullfrogs you've ever heard come out promptly at 9:00 every night to begin their concert!

Have a great weekend y'all! Come back anytime you can.

Blessings~

A little Tuesday afternoon heaven...

Look where I got to go Tuesday!!! It was simply beautiful, peaceful, and so much fun in such a short period of time!!



That was a view from my sweet friend Lesley's cabin at the River somewhere in TN.
I'm not 100% sure where I was, but it sure didn't matter!!

Ok...here we are heading out in the water in our kayaks! Yes. Kayaks!!!




Y'all it was so much fun!! My kayak was right on top of the water. We saw a snake.
Lesley jumped...not out of the kayak, but she took that paddle and seriously took that baby backward quickly!!

I got stuck trying to turn around and ended up just going side to side, bank to bank, and couldn't get that puppy around. After a good hard laugh, I pulled it together and got "her" facing the right way.

Here I am sticking my tongue out after that fiasco!



There were so many fish swimming in that water too. Lesley has some serious eyes or special fish vision because she could spot 'em a mile away....and I'd be over there going..."where??? Where are they??? I don't see them??? Where'd they go??" That probably didn't get on her nerves! :)

We also saw a duck blind that had a momma goose on top.....and we do believe she was dead....and her babies were still underneath her wing....and they were yellow too. Anybody know why baby geese are a different color?? The daddy goose was swimming in the water on the other side of the blind. He was clearly protecting his youngins. He didn't seem to be upset by us. He must have sensed the mothering skills in us were alright.



Ok, we only had a short time to have all this fun because we had to get back to pick up the kids from school. I learned so much from my wonderful outdoorsy friend. I did ask 401 questions about everything under the sun.

I could write pages on how sweet my friend, Lesley is, but she would probably kill me. I hope you have someone in your life that is just the real deal...nothing hidden, honest, loyal, loves God with all her heart, sincere, family is everything, dedicated, blah blah blah.... You get how wonderful she is.

I love ya Lesley! Proverbs 13:20 says this..."He who walks with the wise grow wise."

She makes me wise and I happen to have a blast with her too! :)

God Stop Friday!

The day is almost up, but I will not forget to leave y'all with some sweet God Stop moments from this past week! As always, thank you Patty for hosting this sweet event! ; )

Ok...I so wish my friend Teresa, who comments on my blog and others, was a blogger but she's not. She and I live 30 minutes apart and found each other through my blog. Well, a couple of months ago, we met for the first time, and I feel as if I've known Teresa for 100 years. That long lost best friend that you had placed in your lap directly by God Himself!

She and I had lunch today and talked 100 mph and she just blessed the socks off me!! Here is a picture that was taken at our 1st "meeting" and a sign we made for another bloggy friend, Leigh, that Teresa actually knows in real life and I actually know in the non real life of blogville!! So, here we are for the 1st time...and no, I didn't take a picture of us today at lunch. I forgot! :(

So, I'm so thankful to God for giving me this new friend. I believe that we will be friends for a long time. She's the real deal and I'm thrilled to have her in my life. She listened today. She encouraged. She laughed. She shared. She blessed me in every way a friend can. She's honest. We've prayed together. She is simply delightful. She loves her family. But, most of all....Jesus is all over this precious woman!! He is so in you Teresa....He shines gloriously in you and through you!! You are precious to me!!

And....secondly....my family is life to me. My hubs and my boys are EVERYTHING to me! You know how you just sit and look at them and have the Holy Spirit just speak love and joy over your momma's heart for these people He has blessed you with???!! I had that today. And, my heart melted right then and there as I hugged and loved on them!! It was like God whispered in my ear....."Aren't they just the neatest and coolest?!"

"Thank you so much for these men in my life, Jesus! They are truly everything to me."

Have a wonderful weekend wherever you are and whoever you are with! May you reflect the love of Christ to everyone and have some fun and laughter!!!

Hugs, prayers, and blessings over you all~
Fran

Well, its Friday and it will be a two-day post-er I believe. I'm going to do "God Stop" Friday first and then this afternoon i'll throw in some "Know and Tell" that I have wanted to do for weeks. I'm wild that way!! Hee hee

Ok, let's back up and say "THANK YOU" for your sweet, kind, heartfelt words about our new house. You don't know how much that blessed me. This was a local move for us so we didn't have to go into the depths of change with schools, churches, or finding new friends, etc. But, I thought of that kind of move many times during our own move, and simply said, "thank you Lord for this simple move!" Simple? Yes. it. was. It was a move lead by God and therefore it was good. Ok, thank you!

Now....this is a fun, fun, crazy, small world kind of God Stop for y'all on this Friday. Well, loooooooonnnnnngggggg story short. Last Friday, I "met" a girl through my own personal blog. She had found me through Leigh's blog and left a comment about last Friday's "God Stop Friday"

post. Well, the crazy thing was, she thought that she knew the girl I was talking about in my hallelujah moment with Jesus. Ok.......hmmmmmm.......this is completely nuts!

So, she and I began emailing and low and behold she used to live in the same town I currently live in and we know several of the same people. And, YES! We were praying for the same girl!!!Ok......hmmmmmmmm......this is nuts!

Well, her old church, here in town, does a monthly womens night and I was planning on going bc I love the speaker that they were bringing in. I mentioned the womens night to "anonymous," AKA Teresa, and she told me how bad she wanted to go, but couldn't bc of her daughter's basketball game. Did I say she is only 40 minutes from where i live?! Ok.....hmmmmmmm....this is nuts!

Well, Thursday morning, she emailed me to tell me that "I'm coming Thursday night!" Ok......

this is officially nuts! She's coming people and we are going to be in the same room! She and I were going to officially meet!! Try explaining this to people who don't know what a blog is!

And, wouldn't you know. Me and "anonymous," AKA Teresa, met last night at the womens event and talked like we had known each other for YEARS! She is a Godly woman who I could easily be friends with. You know....more than imaginary friends! :) You are the real deal Teresa and I'm thrilled that we know each other! She is so passionate about Jesus. I really wanted to get in the car with her drive back to her town and keep talking! (grin)

So, you never know who you'll stumble upon and meet in this world of blog friendships and she might just be right down the road.......or highway.

God is so precious to just drop this girl right in my lap. She is praying for me next weekend as I speak for the 1st time at my church's womens retreat, and I'm honored to pray for her as she speaks next week too. Nothing like the body of Christ.

"Thank you Jesus for allowing this world of blog to bring us closer to You and encourage us through new friendships in the Name of Jesus." Amen! He's totally cool isn't He?!

WOW! I'm still amazed that "anonymous" and I have met. Email me the picture that was taken last night, Teresa, and I'll add it. Hugs to my no longer imaginary friend! Your the best Teresa!

Blessings~