September Sponsor Call

So here we are at the beginning of September!

Fall officially arrives in about

22 days.

Days are getting shorter 

and the nights are 

nice and cool.

Great sleeping weather as my

parents would say. 

 

I wanted to let

you know that I have 

signed on with

PassionFruit Ads!

I want to help promote you,

your Etsy shop, your Ebay business,

whatever you need to promote,

 and it is now a kazillion times

easier for you to 

advertise with

Kathe With An E!

I currently have 6 spots available

 on my sidebar. 

You'll not only get tons of exposure,

I will also shout out praises of your

Etsy shop, EBay store or blog

via Twitter and Facebook

several times during the month!

 

Don't hesitate to email me with

any questions!

I cannot wait to help

you and your business grow! 

Want some stats and info?

Click here for details

  

And to show my appreciation,

here's a cute picture

of my grandson Joshua who is now

3 weeks old!!

(somebody slow down time!)  

Giveaway Winners!

I want to thank everyone

that helped me to celebrate

my first year

Blog Anniversary!

You are all why

I love blogging!

Now it's time to announce the four winners!

(if any of the winners fail to claim 

their prize a new winner will be chosen but 

will not be announced)

 

Prize pack #1 

consisting of

 A Beautiful Turquoise Clutch From Mercy's Purses 

And 125x125 2 Month Ad Space From Four Marrs & One Venus

goes to:

Rachael Eliker

Prize pack #2 

consisting of

 Beauty Items From Under The Suburban Sun 

And A New Header And Matching Buttons From Get Outta My Head Please

goes to:

Nicole

Prize pack #3 

consisting of

 A Hand Beaded Wrap Bracelet From Happy Hour Projects 

And A Handmade Necklace From Chicken Scratch 

goes to:

Michelle Hilton

And finally, prize pack #4 

consisting of

 A $50.00 Visa Gift Card,  A Free Autumn On The Porch eBook, 

And A 125x125 Ad Space For 3 Months From Kathe With An E

(that's Me!)

goes to:

Vickie Jean

Congratulations ladies!

Keep an eye on your email

on how to claim your prizes!

Tea With My Mother

I really can't have tea with my mother.

This week marks 

32 years since she passed away.

Very young and very suddenly.

Saturday, September 1

would have also been her 

78th birthday.

Not a day goes by that I don't think of her.

(my older and younger brother and me with mom)

She had such a great sense of humor!

My girlfriends always wanted to come

to our house because she made them laugh.

 

Mom was a traditional mom.

She never worked outside the home. 

And she never learned to drive.

She was tiny, 4 foot 11 and a half.

She always stressed the half LOL.

She loved TV!

 Especially soap operas.

To her, the actors were her friends.

She'd refer to them by their first name.

I remember her dressing up for 

Luke & Laura's wedding and telling her

friends that she would be unavailable as

she had a wedding to go to LOL!

Merv Griffin, Mike Douglas, Dinah Shore,

she loved them all and never missed

watching them.

I wish she had shared with me her

fried chicken recipe.

32 years have passed and I can still taste it.

32 years I have been trying, and failing,

to duplicate it.

She did, however, teach me how to 

 shuffle dance to "Tea For Two".

 She had not been sick at all

and, in fact had babysat

my six month old son,

the only grandchild she knew,

the day she passed.

She & my dad were on their way from
Denver to her birthplace, Iowa, for her birthday.

They stopped at a rest stop to,

well rest, along the way.

She went to sleep and never woke up.

To celebrate her birthday,

I set up a little table

so that she & I can have 

a birthday tea party together. 

Just us girls.

♥Tea For Two♥

I brought in a small round table

from the sunroom.

I covered it with a plain white tablecloth

and then layered on a scarf from my thrift shopping.

The tea cups and saucers are from Ross.

The teapot and matching

sugar and creamer

were purchased at Home Goods

with a birthday gift card

from my dear mother-in-law.

The rose pitcher was a gift long ago,

filled with flowers, from Mr. B.

The pink roses are from Michael's.

I like to think mom

saw me putting this little table together

and thought it special enough

to get dressed up and tell her

friends that she was unavailable.

She had a tea party at her daughter's to attend.

 Happy Birthday Mom!

I love you and I miss you♥

I always share my tablescapes with 

Kathleen at Let's Dish at Cuisine Kathleen 

Susan at Between Naps On The Porch Tablescape Thursday

and 

Marty at A Stroll Thru Life Table Top Tuesday

Click here to see where else I may be partying this week.
AND
Don't forget to come by on Tuesday's

for my link party.

You're Gonna Love It - Week 19

Don't forget!

My One Year Blog Anniversary 

GIVEAWAY

is still going on 

HERE

Wow!  
What a great party

last week!!  

So many great linkups!

And, I notice some new faces too!

Welcome!

If you follow my Facebook page 

you noticed I have started 

spotlighting some of my favorites.

If I had the time I'd link them ALL up

because I truly love every one

of you creative friends!

And speaking of creative,

Deep In The Heart of Arkansas 

had the most views last week

with their thrifty

Bathroom Art

 Go ahead an grab a button

please!

 

Now let's get week 19 

rolling!

Feel free to link up anything you have created.

Recipes, decor, crafts, written or photographed.

Anything you are so proud of

you just gotta share it with others.

 

As always, I don't require you to follow

Kathe With An E

in order to link up.

I do want you to follow me because YOU 

want to.

You may also want to follow

on Facebook (Kathe With An E)

or  Twitter (@kathewithane123)

I will be featuring some of my favorite

link ups on Facebook during the week.

I'd love it if you made sure

you do have word verification disabled.

Some of us (raises hand) have a hard a hard

time cracking the weird code required

to leave a comment, so we don't.

I have maybe gotten one spammy comment in 

the year I have blogging.

Disable it and you will see your comment stats soar!

I promise!

While you are at it, check to make sure

you are not a "no-reply comment" blogger.

You leave me a lovely comment and I can't 

easily reply to it :-(

If you've recently started with Google+

this very well was set without you even knowing it.

I would love it too if you would link back

to the party in some way

so that others come and party with us.

Either grab my party button

or add my blog link to your post

or on your blog party page.

Again, it's not required.

I only have one rule:

I ask that you please 

DO NOT link up

giveaways, Etsy shops or anything for sale.

Save those for the first Tuesday of each month

when, Anything Goes!

Link up to your specific post URL, not your main blog URL.

And, don't forget to come back 

and visit all of the creative co-partyers!

Let them know you met them at

You're  Gonna Love It Tuesday!

No Let's Par-Tay!!

 

My Garden, My Heaven

You may remember my post from back in June when we moved the garden shed.  At the time I said I wanted to make a sign for the door of the shed.

Well, here it is almost September and I finally got one made.

We have been fixing some sections of our fence the past few years and I, very smartly, if I do say so myself, saved some of the worn fence panels.

I had Mr. B cut me a piece to the size I wanted.  Even though I have asked for my own Skil saw (and a sander!) for Christmas he's afraid I'll come in holding a finger when I use it. 

I gathered my craft paints etc. and then marked it off for my stencil.

 

And thus began my flurry of activity. I am a very impatient crafter. 

 To help speed things up, I used my trusted blow dryer.

 It helped to keep things moving along quickly.

(Oh look,that old lady's hands again!)

First line done.

On to the second line.

 And the second line completed.

I then added fee handed flowers in each corner.

I love this Polycrylic by MinWax!  

It's water based so I can clean out my brush 

and it dries super fast and crystal clear!

I  put two coats on the front and one coat on the back.

I let it dry overnight then had Mr. B attached it to the door of the shed.

I love it!  It is the perfect finishing touch 

I had wanted for my little garden shed!  

It makes me smile even more now when I go out to 

grab a shovel or the hedge trimmer.

I have more pieces of the fencing left 

and I am planning to make some more signs 

to use in the flower gardens!

Click here to see where I may be partying this week.

Sharing at Remodelaholic too

And don't forget to come by on Tuesday's
for the link party.

 
Follow my blog with Bloglovin 

Challenging Myself/ Express Yourself with Revlon

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Revlon for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Being a woman of a certain age,

I'm not one to wear much make up,

I'm pretty conservative on the colors of makeup I use,

but I’m joining the

Revlon Expression Experiment

because, well no matter your age,

playing with makeup and trying new things is fun!

Here is a run down of the Revlon products I tried.

These eye shadows are really out of

the normal realm for me but I was game to try them out.

I first used the the eye primer which is good for brightness 

and making the eye lids smooth so the eye shadow lasts longer without creasing.

I started with the charcoal as liner,

then the aqua blue

(which looks green on me)

and then the white under my brow.

I've gotta say,

I kinda the dramatic effect they gave my eyes!

Mr. B thought we were going out on the town!

I love to paint my toenails during the summer.

Revlon nail polish promises, and delivers,

a gel-like shine (when used with the Revlon base and top coat).

I usually go with a more summery pink but

I lovelovelove the blue!

I've had the enamel on for about 3 weeks

now and not one chip!

And I'm a barefooted kind of gal!

I'm more of a neutral or touch of color lipstick wearer and

I have been looking for a perfect red lipstick for my skin tone. 

The Revlon Super Lustrous red lipstick goes on smoothly,

has long lasting color and it made my lips feel softer and smoother.

I'm going to try and wear the lipgloss

everyday because I like the shine!

I'm going to continue to experiment and use these fabulous products.

In the meantime, why don't you join me in the

Revlon Expression Experiment?

All these products are available in your neighborhood drug store!

One Year Blog Anniversary Giveaway

 Holy smokes! Where has the time gone??? 

I just can’t believe it! 

One year ago today, 

I hit publish on my very first blog post. 

So, it’s official. 

I’ve been blogging for a year now! Yay! 

I had no idea at the time where all this would take me. 

Thank you everyone for making this possible. 

I couldn’t imagine my life without this blog, 

or the friends I’ve met because of it. 

Some, I've had the immense pleasure to meet 

in real life and, 

others have become such very dear friends

via email and Facebook (you know who you are!!).

When I started this journey a year ago, I didn't fully

understand the power of your friendship.

When I was going through my daddy's final

illness I asked for prayers

and they were so freely given it brought

tears to my eyes.

I cannot begin to tell you how much your prayers 

helped me during that difficult time.

Thank you.

When we recently welcomed 

my grandson into the world

you shared in my joy so completly

that it was though we were hugging in person!

With happy tears in my eyes right now I tell all of you,

I love you friends and I value your support

with all of my heart!

Of course I can't forget to thank my family!

Mr. B, yes, he is just as sweet in real life as I make

him out to be in my posts.

He truly is my biggest cheerleader.

He pushed and prodded me to

share my tables, garden, recipes, thrift finds, all of it.

He just knew I would be a success.

He also sees me as far more talented

and funnier than I do myself.

My sons, gosh, the praise they give to me

and this little blog

is amazing!

I hope that I have made them as proud of me

as they have me!

Things weren't easy, raising them on my own,

but my love and theirs has never wavered!
We made a pretty good team.

To show my appreciation I wanted to have a giveaway.

Some of my very favorite bloggers 

have contributed some amazing prizes!

To make it fun, cuz you know I am a big fan of fun,

I am breaking them out into 4 different giveaways!

Enter one, two or all of them!

Unfortunately most items cannot be shipped out of the

United States so the giveaways are 

only available to those in America. 
All giveaways will end at 10:00 PM Mountain time
on Wednesday August 29, 2012.

The first prize pack includes a prize from

one of friends in real life and, now in the blogging world.

Mercy has just started blogging so 

please go visit her!

 Mercy and I used to work together

but have stayed in contact.

Mercy has an amazing talent for

finding the most amazing fabric

and making them into clutches and purses.

She now sells them on her Etsy shop

Merc's Purses

 Mercy has generously donated this

beautiful Turquoise Clutch.

 Also included in this prize pack,

one of my funkiest and funnest bloggy buddies,

Jen from 

Four Marrs And One Venus

has donated 2 months of a 

125x125 ad space on her blog!

 If you have never visited Jen's blog

here's a glimpse of what a DIY coconut she is!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The next prize pack is from someone special to me.

Laura from

Under The Suburban Sun  .

I met Laura when she would guest post on her daughter

Krista's blog, Army Wife Style.

We have since become great friends.  

It seems not a day goes by that 

we aren't emailing back and forth.

I share cooking tips with her and 

she gives me, much needed, nail and hair care advice.

I am convinced we are long lost sisters!

Mr. B just knows her as well as

"My Friend Laura".

Laura has donated a

a big tube of 

Elizabeth Gray Body Balm

and a pair of lovely earrings from

Forever 21.

If the body balm works as well as the 

hair conditioner she sent me does,

the winner of this is going to look 10 years younger!

And the earrings?  How fun and flirty are they?

I'm really excited to include Brook from

Get Outta My Head Please 

in this prize pack!

Brooke is who I went to to redesign my blog!

She endured countless late night

emails from me.

She asked me about things I had

not even thought of.

You all know that I do love my new look

and I owe it all 

to Brooke!
Brooke is also celebrating her
1st year Blogiversary so be
sure to stop by and enter her giveaways!

Brooke is offering

a new header and matching buttons for your blog!

Brook is your go to gal when you decide

to update the look of your blog!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The next giveaway package features two new

friends.

First up is Adrianne from 

 Happy Hour Projects

I met Adrianne from joining her fun 

link party she hosts every Friday!

She has also been so helpful to me

in answering my many blogging questions.

Adrianne has donated a beautiful

hand beaded wrap bracelet.

 I love the purple beads.

Actually, it would go really well with the

dress I am wearing to my son's wedding 

in November!  Hmm...

I love my new friend Alecia from

 Chicken Scratch

Not only is she getting married soon,

but she loves Halloween and so do I!

In spite of all the planning

for her upcoming wedding,

Halloween decorating, and blogging,

Alecia has donated a 

wonderful handmade necklace.

 I love what it says.

Let It Go has kinda been my motto this year.

There is so much we can't control so,

Let It Go!

  

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The final giveaway package is from

ME, Kathe With An E.
I appreciate everyone that follows

my blog, and Likes me on Facebook  

so much.

I will be giving away a 

$50.00 Visa Gift Card!

In addition to the gift card, I will be giving one lucky winner

a copy of the just released e-Book 

Autumn On The Porch!

This e-Book features Fall decor ideas and recipes

from 40 bloggers, including yours truly!

Finally, I will be offering a 125x125 ad space 

on the side bar of my blog for 3 months!

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

  I sincerely wish I could have prizes for you all!

I am virtually raising a tall champagne glass to you all!

Here's to many more years of fun and crafty deeds done dirt cheap!

  

Don't forget to come by on Tuesday's
for the link party.

 

You're Gonna Love It - Week 18

FINALLY!
The heatwave here has finally

broken!

We have been able to go to bed the

past few nights with the windows open!

It may not last as, rumor has it

the 90's will be back later in the week.

I'll take the good sleeping weather for as long as I can!

In even bigger, and more interesting

than the weather,

news,
on August 22, 2011 I 

published my very first blog post!

As promised, tomorrow,
Wednesday August 22, 2012,

I will be hosting a BIG

Giveaway!

There are wonderful prizes donated by 

some of my favorite people!

So be sure to come back tomorrow and

enter one, two, three, FOUR 

Giveaways!!

I am in the celebrating mood

so, let's get this party started!!

Last weeks most viewed post

was Diann from

The Thrifty Groove

I have loved Dian's blog since before I started blogging.

She never ceases to teach me new things.

Last week she shared her Slop Basin 

and what a slop basin is used for.
I had no idea!

Go, go now and learn from Diann!

Grab an I've been featured button Diann!

 

Now let's all grab a glass of 

champagne and get to partying!

Feel free to link up anything you created, baked, mashed,

 decorated, wrote, photographed, discovered etc.!
Anything you are just so proud of
you must share it with others! As always, I don't require that you
be a follower
in order to link up.
 I want you to follow
Kathe With An E
because you want to.
Not because it is required.

Ohh and you can now follow me

on Facebook (Kathe With An E) 

and Twitter (@kathewithane123)!
I have been featuring some of my
favorite posts on Facebook too!

(Of course if you do decide to follow,
either with GFC or the Linky Followers,
you will be able to see on your dashboard

  exactly when the party starts each week
and, let's be honest,
you will make me smile and
I love to smile!)

As always,  I will ask that you think
about disabling your word verification too.
It makes it difficult to leave a

comment and some

bloggers, when they see 

you have it, won't bother to leave a comment.

Don't know if your blog requires word verification 

or how to remove  it?

 My blog buddy Shannon over at

Fox Hollow Cottage

wrote this great post on

how to remove word verification from your blog

 

One more request!

I get so many

lovely comments from you all

that I can't reply to because

you are a no-reply comment blogger!

That makes me sad because, no matter

how busy life gets, I ALWAYS reply

to every single comment you leave. 
You may not even know you have it turned on!
When Blogger updated their format
earlier this year it could have been turned on
without you even being aware of it!

Amanda at City Girl Gone Coastal

explains how to turn off your

No-Reply Comment

here

I would also love it if you would link back
in some way
so that others come and party with us. 

 Either grab the party button
or add my blog link
to your post or on your

 blog party page.
But again, it's not required. 

 There is only one real rule:

  I do ask that you
please DO NOT link up

  Giveaways, anything for sale,or Etsy shops.
Save those for the party on the first Tuesday each month. 

Link to your specific post URL, not your main blog URL.
And don't forget to come back and mingle

with the other linkers!
Let them know you met them at
the party here.
That's it!

 

Let the celebrating begin!