Reading Update: Done with the Queen of the Air and on to the Queen of the Empire

I finally finished reading East to the Dawn: The Life of Amelia Earhart.  I must say that Amelia was an amazing woman.  After reading the biography, I can see why she successfully accomplished so much in the world of flying.  She possessed the courage to take risks while having the intelligence to not take foolish risks.  One great example comes from the time she learned to fly.  She did not agree to do her first solo until she had the opportunity to work with experienced pilots who could teach her what to do in any emergency.

It's a shame that she disappeared and we do not know what happened to her and her navigator.  Obviously this mystery adds to the public's admiration of her work, but she earned that admiration even before her attempted and nearly successful flight around the world.

About a month ago, I watched the movie The Young Victoria on a day when the little one had a fever and wanted to be rocked a lot.  In addition to providing new insight into her life, it created in me a desire to read her biography Queen Victoria: A Personal History.  This, too, happens to be a book we already owned. 

I just finished reading about her childhood, and so far her story shows how when God has a plan for someone's life, it will succeed not matter the circumstances that surround that person.  Victoria did not have the most supportive and encouraging mother and her father died at a young age.

Her life is one that I do not think I would have any desire to live and makes me grateful for the simple life I had as a child.

Yard Update: I Can't Handle the Heat

We did begin our project to place lava rock around our shed, but you will notice that I said "begin" and not that we finished.  It took a little longer to remove the grass from the area we wanted to place the rock, so we did not complete the project on Saturday.

Matt removed all the grass, and we began digging a trench for the edging, but that is all the progress we made before we had to retreat into the house because of the heat.  I had hoped to go out yesterday to work on the trench some more because the little one was at her grandma's house again, but too many other projects needed my attention. 

Today they forecasted temperatures in the triple digits and along with the high heat, the humidity has decided to stick around.  Since this is supposed to continue through the end of the week, I do not know when I will get back out to work on the yard.  The little one takes her nap during the afternoon, which of course is when the day is hottest.

Fortunately, once we do get back out to work on the project, it should not take us too long to complete, especially once we figure out how to plant the edging in place.  The rock is ready to go.

Our Weekly Menu

I always have a difficult time selecting what to plan for our meals, so I decided to try a new technique.  I began my planning by assigning a specific style of food for each day; for example, we mainly like to eat American, Mexican, and Italian food.  To add a little more variety, I added grilled foods and BBQ foods to my list.  I then went through the week and assigned a style of food for each day and then went through my lists to find the foods that fit each style (this is just for our dinner meals).

It seemed to help with the planning this week, and I hope that it will continue to help in the future.  I plan to save different templates of these types of food assignments so that I can then go back and use the templates I created in the future to make the process go even faster.

Our Menu

Breakfast
Smoothies
Muffins and yogurt
Eggs and Pancakes
French Toast
Toast with Peanut butter and yogurt
Eggs and muffin
Smoothies and toast

Lunch
Macaroni and cheese
Leftovers
Spinach Salad
Chicken Tenders
Hot dogs
Leftovers
Bean and Bacon soup

Supper
American - sloppy joes
Italian - chicken parmesan
Grilled - (still deciding)
Mexican - enchiladas
Eat out
Italian - pizza bake
American - honey Dijon chicken

Budget Update: The Month Is Almost Over

Wow, June is nearly over.  I have been teaching an 8-week on-line this summer and at the end of this week we will be half way done.  Of course, the end of the month also means that I need even more diligence to make sure I do not go over our budget. 

Looking at the numbers on YNAB (You Need a Budget), I am still in the clear for our groceries.  In fact, I still have about a fifth of the grocery budget left to spend.  I plan to do some grocery shopping tomorrow, so I need to be very careful to not go over the magic number.  I really hope to stay within the budget for this month.

I hope that sticking to the grocery budget next month will be even a little easier since I plan to continue to wean the little one off of the jarred baby food and just have her eat the same food we eat.  Since she does not eat very much, I usually just give her some of my meal so I do not even have to do much extra work yet preparing her meals.

Unfortunately, there are other categories where we have already gone over budget.  While we do not eat out much, we have gone over our budget in that area.  Some of that stems from me not always having the necessary food to prepare my husband a lunch to take to work.  That is one area I need to work on next month.

We also have already gone over budget on clothes.  Since I stay at home, I try not to buy myself many new clothes, but my husband does need nice attire for work.  Also, we needed to attend a funeral this month and he did not have a dark jacket to wear, so off to the store we went.  We did, at least, manage to get the jacket and two pairs of nice dress pants for far less than their original price.  It's possible that our clothing budget is not realistic.  We will need to discuss that at the end of the month.

We've done pretty well in other areas like cleaning supplies, grooming supplies and haircuts, household tools and supplies, and furniture and equipment.  We have also been fortunate not to have any unexpected expenses arise this month.

Hopefully, some success this month will lead to even greater success next month.

Feeding the Little One

Perhaps the biggest struggle I currently have with our little one is knowing what to feed her.  I continually hear about younger children who only eat table food, and then I see us still feeding her some jarred baby food. 

Around her first birthday, she finally began at least putting the table food into her mouth.  Before that, she would only eat Cheerios, toast, and cheese.  While she would put some of it in her mouth, she still would not eat much of it, so I continued to give her some jarred baby food to make sure she received enough to eat.

Some of my struggle with this issue lies in not knowing at what age a child really should no longer eat jarred baby food.  All the resources that I look at just say what foods kids should and should not eat at certain ages, but they do not really address how to go about making the transition from jarred food to table food. 

I decided this week to try giving her more table food.  On Wednesday, I gave her a meatball (cut-up of course) and some vegetables.  At lunch she did not do a very good job of really eating much of the food.  She would put it in her mouth and then spit it back out again, so I decided that we would try again at supper, and I did not give her any jarred food.

That night at supper, she did a much better job of actually eating the meat and the vegetables.  On Thursday, we went out of town for the day, so I gave her some jarred food for lunch, but at supper we ate a pancake and some more vegetables. 

This small bit of success has given me hope that we are close to finally making the transition to only eating table foods

Yard Update: Plans for Saturday

Since we have been blessed with the occasional rainstorm, I have not been able to get out and work on the dirt pile quite as often as I would like.  Next week the temperature is supposed to return to the high nineties, so I do not know just how much work I will get done then either.

This Saturday, we hope to go out and create a rock bed around our shed.  This project should solve a few problems.  One, it will improve the look of the shed and the surrounding area since weeds currently grow up around it.  Two, it will give us a place to keep the rocks that we have separated from the dirt, and three, it will empty the two large Rubbermaid containers I have been using to hold the rocks so that I can fill them back up again. 

Tackle it Tuesday: Salvaging Lotion

I just hate it when the pump on the lotion bottle no longer dispenses lotion when I can tell that a significant amount of lotion lives at the bottom of the bottle. 

I usually save the not quite empty bottles with the intent of removing the remaining lotion and adding it to an existing bottle.  The tediousness of this chore leads me to avoid it as long as I possibly can, usually until too many bottles clutter my cabinet and I have to deal with the problem.

Today I decided to try a new technique.  In the past, I would just remove the pumps and shake the remaining lotion into my hand before placing it in the remaining bottle.  Not long ago, I saw that my cousin would cut the tops off of the Bath and Body Works lotion so that she could access the remaining lotion. 

I decided to try this with the bottles of lotion sitting in my cabinet today.  I used a utility knife (very carefully) to cut off the tops and then I used a spoon to scoop out the lotion and place it in the waiting bottle. 

This created far less mess than shaking the lotion into my hands, and I think that I salvaged even more of the lotion.  I need to find a thinner instrument to use to transfer the lotion to the bottle, but overall, the outcome of the experiment left me satisfied.  Maybe I will not wait so long to empty the bottles next time.

Budget Update: Useful Software

This year we began using the budget software You Need a Budget.  For many years, we used Quicken, but at the end of last year, it suddenly froze and we could not access our records.  My husband had the same problem occur at work, and apparently a problem existed in the current software.  We decided to look for a new program instead of trying to continue with Quicken and the possibility that it would freeze on us again.

You Need a Budget works in a similar fashion to Quicken, but we have found some elements work a little better.  Since the purpose of this software centers on keeping a budget, we discovered that running budget reports is easier than in Quicken. 

The layout of the program also allows users to easily and quickly see all their accounts at one glance.  We use the software to keep track of our cash spending, checking account spending, and credit card spending.  My husband also uses the software to keep track of all our investments so we can easily see the location of our resources.

Another element we recently began using is the iPod app for You Need a Budget.  I am now able to carry around our account and budget balances so that I know for sure how much money we have left in the different budget categories.   This is the first month that I have used the app, but it has helped me stay on track so far this month.  I can even enter new transactions while I am out and then just sync it with the main program at home so our accounts are always up-to-date.

Internet Down

So, I woke up this morning a saw a red light shining on our router.  I did not really think much about it since it said power next to it and I did not remember that the light is not usually red.  I found out later that the red light means our router is dead, so we currently do not have Internet access at our house.

Under normal circumstances, this would not be a problem, but I am teaching an online class this summer so not having an Internet connection makes it difficult to grade my students' work.  Thankfully my parents live nearby, so the little one and I are spending the afternoon at their house so I can stay caught up on my class work.

We will hopefully be up and running by the middle of this week and I can return to more regular posts.

Useful Ipod App: Errands

I wanted an Ipod touch to help keep me organized and stay on top of the various tasks that I need to complete around the house.  To do this, I decided to use the Errands app to help manage my daily, weekly, and monthly to-do list.

If I remember correctly, the full app cost $2.99, but the free version works well too.  I went ahead and bought the full version so I could get the updates sooner, but I have not noticed much difference between the full and free version

The app gives user the option to see their to-do list in a calendar format or in a list in the individual folders.  Users also have the option of seeing four tasks per screen or eight as well as the order in which they want the items to sort: due date/priority, priority/due date, alphabetical, or none (manual ordering). 

The app comes preloaded with some folders, but users can add their own.  To enter a task, users can do it from the specific folder they want the task to file under, or they can begin entering it under a different folder and change the folder assignment as they add the details of the task. 

I like to enter my tasks as a checklist so I can enjoy the satisfaction of marking each task as complete.  Users can also select the day they need to complete the task, the time by which to complete the task, an alert to remind them of the task, and a repeat cycle if the task is one they need to do again. 

I usually keep my Errands' list set on the All Tasks folder so I can see all the tasks in each folder that I need to complete.  I also have my app set to show a week's worth of tasks at a time so I can see what I need to do in the future. 

The app helps me keep stay on top of routine household tasks like sweeping the floor, cleaning the kitchen sink, and dusting the various rooms.  I like that I can set each task to repeat so that it will remind me when I need to complete the task again. 

I also use the app to remind me when to change out my disposable contacts and to know what days I can try and tackle some of the one-time projects around the house.

It comes in handy when I am trying to figure out what to do when I have a little extra time on my hand.  I have been amazed to learn how many tasks only take about fifteen minutes to complete.

I know that I could use a piece of paper, but then I would have to rewrite the various tasks I want to repeat, and if it is a task I only want to repeat every three or six months, I might forget about it all together.  Plus, this helps eliminate the clutter of having various to-do lists littering the house.

Tackle It Tuesday on Thursday

Now that my daughter is over a year old and with another little one on the way, I decided to finally tackle putting away all her former clothes.  I had already put some of the clothes in boxes, but I wanted to go back through all of them to make sure they were at least separated into the correct sizes, and I'm happy I did.  I found some boxes with multiple sizes mixed together.

Here is the mess after I took all the clothes and boxes out of her closet.  The little one had a ball dragging the clothes all over the living room.

After the little one went to sleep for the afternoon, I first separated all the clothes into the different sizes.  I then went to work separating each size into onesies, dresses, outfits, etc.

I was able to place the NB and 0-3 months clothes in one box as well as the 3 month and 3-6 month clothes.  After that, each size received its own box (my daughter is the first grandchild on both sides of the family, so a want for clothes she has never known).

The boxes are now neatly stacked in the spare room waiting to be taken up to the attic.  The clear box on top contains clothes that would also work for a boy, which is a good start because we just found out today that we need to collect a whole new wardrobe for the next little one.

Yesterday's Baking Day

Since the weather was supposed to be a little cooler yesterday, I decided to do a little baking.  I like to try to avoid adding too much heat to the house when the thermometer reaches the century mark as is the forecast for the next few days.

I succeeded in making some wheat sweet dinner rolls and a loaf of wheat cinnamon raisin bread.

The original recipe just calls for white flour, but to make them a little healthier, I like to substitute 1 3/4 cups of wheat flour for the white flour.  These rolls have just the right amount of sweetness to them, and they come out very soft and chewy.  I have made them into cinnamon rolls as well with much success. 

This was my first time to make this bread.  I used the cinnamon raisin bread recipe from the cookbook that came with the bread machine, but I substituted whole wheat flour for the white bread flour.  It tastes pretty good, but I think that I am going to try a different recipe next time just to make sure a better recipe does not exist.

Yard Work Update: Yeah for Rain

We received some much needed rain last week (along with some wicked storms and a near tornado).  According to our rain gauge, we receive 1 1/2 inches on Thursday evening and another 1/2 inch on Sunday morning. 

Of course, that meant the ground was too muddy to go in the back yard and separate dirt and rocks, so instead I spent some time early this week pulling weeds out of the front flower beds.  Why is it that my plants struggle to survive in the heat and the weeds seem to flourish? 

Today the ground was just right for digging in the rock pile, so I spent thirty minutes making a very small dent in the pile, but at least it is a dent.  I hope to get out there on a more consistent basis to work on the pile so maybe it will disappear faster.

The Little One Is Growing Up

Our little girl turned 13-months-old last Friday, but today is the first time I have been away from her for an extended amount of time (by extended, I mean more than 4 hours). 

Since our next little one is due to arrive in the middle of November, I know that there will be a need for little one number one to stay overnight at the grandparents' house.  To ease into this idea, I decided that she should begin spending an entire day at her grandparents' once or twice a month.  I had a dentist appointment this afternoon scheduled during the her naptime, so I decided that today would be a good day to have her stay at the in-law's house.

I met them at 10:00 so they could take her back to her house.  The plan is to meet them again at 7:30 to bring her back home.  Nearly ten hours without my little girl.  I have to admit that I cried after I dropped her off and I am eager to see her again tonight. 

We are extremely fortunate to have both sets of grandparents live so close.   With her current status as the only grandchild on both sides of the family, both sets of grandparents anxiously wait for their time to spend with her. 

I have gotten quite a bit done, but it is entirely too quiet around this house.

Our Weekly Menu

Here is our menu for the week.  Right now, I still mainly just plan the main course and leave the sides up to chance.  We are not adventurous eaters, so our sides mainly consist of a rotation of vegetables like corn, green beans, peas, and potatoes.

Lunch
Grilled cheese
Leftovers
Refried beans and tortillas
Chicken tenders
Dine out
Leftovers
Bean and Bacon soup

Dinner
Cheesy chicken
Cheeseburger pasta
Grilled chicken
Papa Murphy's pizza
Sloppy Joes
Chicken Tenders
Chili

Budget Week Two

So far so good with sticking to my plan to stick to our grocery budget.  I did my grocery shopping last Tuesday, and I kept the total just under my goal for the week.  I have also done a good job this last week of only buying what we truly need and not buying any extras.

One issue I came across last week as I tried to prepare the meals I had planned for the week was not having the items in my pantry I thought that I had, so I had to change a couple of meals for the week, but I made a point of using the items I had and I did not go to the store to get what I needed. 

We also have avoided making a big purchases this month, and we are almost half way through the month.  Since we are in process of preparing our house for the arrival of a second little one, we have a wishlist of items that we feel would improve our storage situation (we do not have a basement) as we move our office out of the third bedroom to make room for a nursery.  Even though we have patiently looked at Craig's List waiting for the right items to become available at a lower cost, we do not absolutely need any of these items.  I am hoping that we will be able to hold off on these purchases for a few months and save up some more money in the budget.

Useful Ipod App: Mealboard

I realized that as I wrote about how much I liked my iPod touch, I did not give very many specific details about the apps that I like and why I like them.  As I would tell my students, I need to provide more specific information, so I thought that I would devote Fridays to highlighting apps that I like to use.

For people who like to plan their meals out in advance, Mealboard is a useful app to have.  This app gives users the opportunity to plan meals a week at a time for as many weeks into the future as they want, and it lets users add their personal meals to the different categories.  The app also gives users the option to change the categories to whatever categories they wish.

The app comes loaded with a few recipes and some basic categories like meat, poultry, veggie, salad, pasta, and dessert.  To help with planning different meals each day, I added a lunch and a breakfast category, so instead of having to search for meals under the traditional categories, I can quickly look at my lunch list and decide what we will have for lunch each day. 

Users can adjust what day of the week the meal plan begins on, which I find helpful for planning shopping trips.  Since I usually do my grocery shopping on a Tuesday, I have my meal plan set to begin on Wednesdays.  That way I can look at the upcoming week and know what items I need to buy.

One feature that I do not use is the shopping list feature.  When users enter a meal, they have the option to add the list of ingredients needed and the directions for the recipe.  Users do not have to enter this information, but if they do, they can run a report for the meal week that will tell them all the ingredients that they need for the week.

My planning usually just consists of the main dish for the meal but not the sides because I am doing good just to plan out the main dishes for the week, but users who like to plan every last detail can enter it all into the program.

One last feature that I also have not used is the template feature, which allows users to save a specific week's meal plan as a template to use again later.  I probably should use this feature as it would say quite a bit of planning time if I just had a handful of templates to choose from each week instead of creating new plans each week.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give this app an 8 because it is easy to use and it serves it purpose well.

Selling Books: Not Sure It Was Worth the Effort

With a second little one on the way, we need to transform our current office/storage room into an actual bedroom.  That means we need to go through our five bookcases filled with books and thin out our collection so we can then move the remaining books to new locations around the house.

Until today, we had set aside about three diaper boxes of books (diaper boxes are great all purpose items to have around the house).  I decided to take the books to a local used bookstore to see if they would buy any of them.  I did not figure we would get much out of the books, but I figured a little bit of money would be better than no money at all.

The lady who helped us must not have been having a very good day.  Even though my books and my sisters where the only books she had to go through, we had to wait over thirty minutes for the process to be completed (the store was not that busy either).  I had the little one with me, and she was not to happy to be stuck in her stroller for so long in one place. 

In the end, we received $10 for a few of our books.  The store has a book donation box outside of the store, so we just put the rest of the books in there.  Now I have to decide if I want to take future books to the store to sell or just save my time and donate the books to begin with. 

Yard Disaster

Here are some pictures of our yard, some of the work we have done, and examples of much of the work that we still need to do.  This 100 degree heat has not really helped our situation any.  I don't want to go outside to sort rocks in the heat and all our plants are drying up.

As you will see in the other pictures of our backyard, there are four different types of fences.  This awful looking fence in the front of the house is standing up by prayers alone.  We have had to put in metal posts to help support the fence for the time being.  We hope to replace the fence soon with a much more attractive and traditional one.

 

Here are some pictures of our back yard.  As you can see, the rock pile is still there waiting for me to come out and begin digging and sorting again.  Unfortunately, with all of this heat, the dirt is going to be especially hard and difficult to separate from the rock.  I hope we get some rain soon to soften the dirt.

 

In these two pictures you can see our poor attempt at growing grass.  Part of our problem is that we are horrible about watering the grass seed once it is planted.  We are looking into having a sand well installed so that we can water the lawn without worrying about the cost.  If  you have any thoughts on that issue, we would be happy to hear them.

In the first shot below, you will see some crazy snap dragons that came back volunteer this year even though they are supposed to just be an annual.  The remaining shots are of the various planting beds we have in the front of the house.  The two main beds did not have the paths of rocks until we created the paths a couple of years ago.  I like the paths because they help break up the beds and make it a little easier to manage.  I have just about all the plants I plan to plant in the back bed of the south planting area.  I just hope that they will survive the heat. 

Strange Habit

I often hear people joke about their OCD tendencies, and I think that everyone probably has their quirks.  One of my strange habits that I recently realized is that I have a specific way that I like to remove eggs from the carton.

When I use an egg, I begin on the outside of the carton and work my way towards the middle.  Not only that, if I need to use two eggs, I have to take them from the two different ends and they have to be diagonal from one another.  It is a bit of a bother if I have to use three eggs as it unbalances the carton, but at times it cannot be helped.

I have no idea how I started this habit, or why, but it throws me off if someone else takes eggs from the carton incorrectly.  Fortunately, it is uncommon for anyone else to remove the eggs from the carton here at our house.

What strange or quirky habits do you have?

Sticking to the Budget

Ugh, the B word.  Why is it so difficult to stick to a budget?  We have not been doing so well these last few months, so we are determined to stick tightly to our budget this month. 

It's funny, I figured that I would do better with our grocery budget as soon as Lucy no longer needed to drink formula, but last month I spent more on our grocery budget than I had before when I was buying her formula. 

One plan I have for sticking to the grocery budget is to only do major grocery shopping every other week and to try and use up the items in my pantry.  I struggle with wanting to keep my pantry stocked, so I tend to forget about or just not use the items that I already have.  Since we do not have a large house or a large pantry, I know that I need to use up the items I have before I buy more.

I have continued to plan our meals at least a week in advance using the MealBoard app on my Ipod touch, but I still buy items that we do not necessarily need for my planned meals.  This is another area I plan to work on to help us stick to our budget better.

So, here's to sticking to our budgets and being good stewards with the abundant blessings that God has given us!

Useful Tool: iPod Touch

This last Christmas I asked for and received an iPod touch.  I did not want an iPhone because I do not use my cellphone enough to justify the monthly cost, but I did want a device I could carry around me that could hold my to-do list, grocery list, and give me the ability to go online when Wi-Fi is available.

I have loved having my iPod touch.  Since one can download most of the apps available for the iPhone, there are many applications to choose from.  I found a simple to-do list app that lets me categorize my to-do items and lets me set the routine events on a schedule.  This has helped me stay on top of housework since I can assign different tasks for each day instead of waiting until the end of the week and doing all the chores at once.  I think my house has consistently remained cleaner than it did while I was working and not at home.

I like the grocery shopping app that I have, but I would like to find one that will let me enter the prices for the various stores so I can have the information available to me as I shop. 

I don't have many games on my iPod as I would be too tempted to sit around all day and just play the games instead of doing work around the house. 

Finding Bargains

I know that going to garage sales is a great way to find inexpensive children's clothes, toys, and other items, but I have never been much in the habit of going to sales.  I usually get tired of stopping and getting out of the car only to find few items I might be interested in buying.

Now that the little one has outgrown most of the clothes we received at baby showers, it is time to beginning doing some more garage sale shopping, so I made a trip out to Andover this morning to check out the city-wide sales. 

The first sale we stopped at had many items sitting out on the driveway and looked promising, but the people had a little too much pride in their possessions.  They had marked many of the children's clothes at $2 or more.  We did not stay there long and made our way through the neighborhood, hoping to find some better bargains.

We found a group of five or six houses close together having sales, so we were able to walk more and drive less.  They had their children's clothes more reasonably priced, so I picked up a couple of dresses and a toy.  The last sale we stopped at I found what I feel was the best deal of the day.  I picked up a pair a Nike athletic shoes for $1.  They are currently too big for the little one, but she will probably fit into them within a year or so. 

In all, I am happy that we went out and it was worth the time and the drive, but it is still going to take me some time to make this a regular habit.

Yogurt Shop Review

I still have not gone out to take pictures of our yard, and we have not really done much work out there anyways because of the rain, so I thought I would write a review of one of the many new yogurt shops in town. 

I went to Orange Leaf at 21st and Tyler today with my two sisters and the little one.  After a trip to the zoo and lunch at Chipotle's, a frozen treat sounded good.  When we walked into the store, a wall of different flavors of frozen yogurt greeted us; today the store featured flavors like chocolate and peanut butter; green tea and raspberry lemonade; butter pecan and coffee; and banana and raspberry, blueberry, and strawberry (these are the flavors that I can remember).  They group the flavors by complimentary pairs in case someone wants to combine the two flavors. 

I like simple flavors, so I chose the raspberry, blueberry, strawberry combination.  Showing restraint, I did not fill the huge bowl to the top with the yogurt; I think I only filled it about a third full.  Once we selected our yogurt, we found a huge selection of toppings waiting for us.  The selection included many types of fruits, chocolates, candies, and cereals.  I added a few sliced strawberries and some dark chocolate chips. 

The price of the treat depends on the weight of the creation.  Fortunately, mine weighed in at 7 ounces and the cost came in at just over $2.50 with tax.  I felt the price was pretty reasonable and I found the yogurt to be fresh and delicious.  The little one accepted a few bites of the frozen treat, but she was more interested in trying to walk around the store.

Perhaps the only complaint I have about the store is that they do not have any high chairs.  Otherwise, they kept the store clean and neat and a friendly staff works behind the counter.  The music selection surprised me most.  When I heard a Toby Mac song, I figured it was just one song that made it onto a secular play list, but the rest of the music was distinctly Christian as well.

I would definitely recommend stopping by Orange Leaf whenever you have a craving for a sweet frozen treat.