To my sweet cousin - I love you, rest in peace

Last week and weekend were very difficult for me. We lost one of my favorite cousins.
My first cousin, Dorothy Beth Hageon Davis passed away.
Upon hearing the news, I was deeply saddened. Dot was such a wonderful, beautiful person inside and out. She was intelligent, always had a smile on her face and most importantly she was a Christian.
Dot did a lot of work in the church and the community and even ran for school board last year. She was a part of the Women United Choir and was Choir President at St. John Baptist Church in Silsbee.

To this day, I still feel like I am in an awful dream and just can not wake up. Her death was sudden. She had just found out that she had a cancerous stomach tumor and started chemo. I never thought we would lose her so soon.

All last week, I cried so much....On the way to work, on the way home, before bed, in the middle of the night.....asking God for understanding. Primarily, the pain hurt so badly because I had just spoken with her on Wednesday at lunch and she said that she was fine. She asked where was Jerry. She loved our relationship and our love for each other.

A week before her passing, I had an awful dream that someone passed away in my family. It wasnt her, someone else, but I woke up crying. In my dream, I kept saying "but I just talked to her, how am I gonna talk to her now". After hearing of Dot's passing, I thought, "but I just talked to her" I instantly thought about the dream I had just the week before.

In a way, I am little angry with myself because I wish I was able to do something...I don't know what - move her to MD andersen in houston, help her get a better doctor (she didn't have insurance) or just be there to question the emergency room doctors she had. But, I have told myself that God is a God all by himself and there was nothing I could do. He needed her more.

This whole incident made me think of my dad passing away with lung cancer when I was 11 years old. He was doing fine and was being moved to a nursing home the next day, but passed in the night....we had just saw him.

I remember a sermon from way back when...the pastor stated that it is no longer here today, go tomorrow, it is now..here today, gone today. So, you really have to tell your love ones you love them.

On our drive to Silsbee for the funeral, Jerry and I admired the tons of beautiful pink flowers. I guess they were azalaes but we saw them everywhere. It was ironic that Dot's funeral was a pink theme sort of...pink casket, pink programs, she was dressed in pink, and had pink flowers. I take this as sign that she was right there with us on the drive there, back, etc. At the funeral, she looked at peace and to me had a smile on her face. I never been to a funeral where the person looked like they were smiling...at total peace.

To Dot-- you were such a wonderful person, rest in peace and enjoy your mansion and the streets made of gold. I love you, but God loved you more.

You will be greatly missed!
Your cousin,

Tonya

Dot (always smiling)

Dot, Aunt Mable (her mom), and Ann (her only sister)

Taken at my mom's house Christmas Eve 2010

Ice Cream Sandwich Casserole

Just when you thought ice cream couldn’t get any better, there’s a recipe to show us all different. Last year sometime another blog that I follow, posted this recipe on her blog. Of course, I immediately copied it and tucked it away so that I could make it later. Well, we were having a party at our house one time last year. So, I grabbed a copy of recipe and ran to the store.  HOLY GREATNESS!!! This is one dessert you don’t wanna miss!!!! It’s TO-DIE-FOR DELICIOUS!!!

ICE CREAM SANDWICH CASSEROLE



24 ice cream sandwiches

toffee chips {I used Heath, but any toffee chips would be yummy}
1 tub whipped cream

hot fudge topping, {melted, I used Smucker’s}

caramel topping {melted, I used Smucker’s}

Heath/Skor/Symphony bars {to crumble on top}


Get ready to work fast because you don’t want the ice cream sandwiches to melt!! Unwrap 12 ice cream sandwiches and layer on the bottom of a 9x13 baking dish. You’ll have to cut a few to make ‘em fit…get creative!

Melt your hot fudge and spread a layer on top of the ice cream sandwiches. The caramel will spread pretty evenly without being heated, so mix that in too :)

 

 

Top with a layer of whipped cream…

and add the toffee chips.

Now repeat the process…ice cream sandwiches, syrups, whipped cream and toffee chips. The other recipes said to take a toffee bar {like Heath/Skor/Symphony} and crumble them on top. That would’ve been AMAZING, but I forgot ‘em at the store and I had to split my bag of toffee chips between the middle layer and the top. It was still AMAZING!!!!! So, everytime I make it I just use toffee chips only

This is the PERFECT treat! SO YUMMMMMM… Sadly, this dish never stays in the freezer for long because we couldn’t stop eating it!! HA!! Seriously though, you can keep it in the freezer {covered} for about a week…if it lasts that long ;) The majority of time I give half of it my friend, Kim, so she can give it to her kids....as not to tempt myself to eat the whole thing LOL.
 
This is one of those desserts that has you sayin’, “why didn’t I think of that before?!?!”. YUM!


I just took this dish to an 80's party and everyone LOVED IT!

We love our neighbors

Being a first time home owner we were always wondering what our neighbors would be like. I, admittedly, thought since our community was a fairly new community that our neighbors would be friendly and eventually would become friends of ours. I also thought that once we closed on our home and moved in, that a neighbor would come over with a nice baked pie or other good. That did NOT happen. LOL I guess we aren't living on "wisteria lane" like on desperate housewives. A few months later at Christmas our neighbors did bring us cookies. And this past Christmas other gifts (shown below).

We did meet our neighbors in our culdesac and they are all great. Our next door neighbor moved out of state a few months ago. That was hard to take because we loved them so much. They were our age and had a young, very cute baby boy, Sebastian. The person the bought home after the previous neighbor moved is awesome. A little older (and they are from Alaska) but they definitely have the same mentality that I have (party planning, etc). We are suppose to get together and plan a block party (especially now that the weather is super nice). I can't wait!

There is one couple in a our culdesac we are really close to. They are a couple years younger than us, but we have good times with them (Natasha and Aaron). Last week, they invited us to Friday happy hour at Babloo in Katy. Little did they know that it was our favorite spot. We love the food and the homemade sangria (side note: did you know that to make a pitcher of sangria,all you need to do is fill up 1/4 the pitcher with orange soda (any generic brand) a little of vodka (not necessary needed) then pour in a bottle of red wine (Merlot or Cabernet sauvignon). DELISH. If you have some fruit to cut up in it....even better! I learned this by watching the waiter do it at our table at Babloo.

So, our neighbors and I went to Babaloos (Friday is their Latin/salsa dancing night and there are usually a lot of people on the dancing floor). Mr. Spouse and I didn't dance this night (surprisingly). We enjoyed the sangria, the people watching ( I love people watching) and  the tapas food (the southwestern egg rolls are the BOMB).

Below are pics of us and our neighbors at Babaloo.

Jerry and Aaron

She's expecting the first baby, thus the water. But umm Sangria please for me :-)

Also, here's a pic of the cute gifts from Christmas that a couple of neighbors left by our door. Awww......

Tulips from next door. I love tulips!

I love the iron top on this candle

Love thou neighbor! :-)