Thanksgiving

It's kind-fun to find pictures on your camera that you didn't take . . .

The wonderful months of fall . . . . .

and with fall, brings my most favorite holiday of all  . . . . .

with it's food . . . .

more food . . . and especially family. . . . .

though I and the rest of us felt the absence of some of our loved ones.
It would be nice if we could all be together again.

This is Ceci skyping with Baxter.

I've resisted skyping, but had an enjoyable time talking with Baxter.

Maybe it's time to go buy a camera . . . .

We made our (what is becoming) traditional "gingerbread" houses.

Mom actually made gingerbread this year!

I'm amazed at how much even the boys love to make the houses.

Trude got quite involved in the making of her house!

Mom and Dad . . . with dad working "outside" the box as normal!!!!

He made a combination gingerbread/cardboard house.

(and joined me in the use of a glue gun to bond the house together)

(which is cheating according to my nephews)

Here's my gorgeous man.

McKay's finished project . . . .

and mine . . . . . (Ceci's in the background)

and Lincoln's.

We can't end the day without Christmas carols!

McKay went and sequestered grandpa's guitar.

which must have fueled Grandpa's desire to save our ears (from McKay's playing)

and join in in the accompaniment.

It's been a few years since he's actually played along.

I loved hearing him play again!

Stevie was just itching to get involved in the piano playing!!! 

She did a good job I think.  She'll be taking my place in a few years! 

and . . .  as many times as I tell myself, "you can't flip videos"

I still make the mistake of taking them wrong . . . .

So you will need to "flip" your head to watch!

Trudy played for us too (I have a video) but I think she'd skin me alive if I posted it!!!

Happy Thanksgiving ALL!

The numbness is setting in

I did something kinda exciting last week , , , , ,

It all started out as "McKay taking guitar lessons" and is still that . . . .

BUT, swim season has started and McKay is very busy.

Too busy to take his guitar lessons.

Enter starving musician (the guitar teacher)

I can tell this kid (the age of my oldest son) needs the money.

and I hated to tell him McKay was going to quit for a while.

Enter wanna-be guitarist (me!)

Forget that I am 40 something very fastly approaching  50 something . . . .

I asked the starving musician if he'd mind teaching me while McKay does his "swim thing."

What's he to say?  NO? 

He asked me what "style" I'd like to learn . . . jazz maybe?

We decided on folk. 

 Poor guitar teacher!!

hey, he thought the song I brought to learn

"I am a child of God"

was pretty cool, at least he was being nice about it!

I have a goal.

The goal is to play said guitar at girl's camp coming up in June.

(you can feel sorry for the girls!)

I have visions of camp songs around a campfire.

(as long as they all those songs are in my repertoire which is currently ZERO)

I'm glad I have this goal, because . . .

the first lesson was really fun.

B.U.T, the first practice session wasn't very fun. . . .

my first words to my husband were

"I don't think I can do this"

I've practiced every day since.

My fingers hurt like the dickens and are becoming kind-a numb feeling.

Each day, I'm able to play a new chord.

AND

I'm praying calluses develop soon.

PLEASE!

 Yes, I am CrAzY!!!

Fun to do . . . . to do . . . to do . . . to do

My dad had this saying he loved to quote to us kids:

"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy"

This is very good advice for those who work hard.

(which my father did do)

I didn't find out until I just googled it that the proverb has another sentence.

"All play and no work makes Jack a mere toy"

I know some people who fall under this category!

(including us sometimes!)

Our family had chosen to have a weekend full of play this weekend . . . .

It may have happened except for this . . . .  

Our trees decided to let go of their leaves last week.

This is what greeted me one morning when I drove up from seminary:

A carpet of leaves

 . . . . if I hadn't known there was a driveway in our yard

I wouldn't have known!!!!

So instead of taking our weekend away.

We decided to stay home and not be a mere toy.

The work didn't seem as hard this fall.

Thanks to hurricane Irene that took about a 1/3 of our work away.

or at least 1/3 of the work was done at a different time!

Working outside made me thankful for many things . . .

The beauty of fall . . . . .

I was thankful . . . .

that I could experience plants that

For me . . .

had only existed in books before we moved here . . . 

plants with names that were so romantic and now just roll off my tongue

like I've lived around them a lifetime . . . . . .

Dogwood, magnolia, holly (badly pictured below) hosta, camellia, rhododendron and azalea's.

I don't know that a weekend of play could have been

more exhilarating

than our day of work was.

Pretty interesting egh???

Caving In

Four or five years ago, we updated our kitchen appliances.

Almost immediately our new refrigerator's ice machine stopped working.

I should say . . . . right after the warranty expired the ice machine stopped working.

For a few weeks we bought ice and poured it in our ice machine.

RIDICULOUSNESS.

to say the least.

We called the repairman and he installed a new ice maker.

Now I joke that we have the world's most expensive ice,

it was so pricey to make the repair!

Recently I caved into peer pressure (from my card club ladies)

and bought one of these . . . .
 

WHY did I buy one of these?

I have debated with myself several times about it,

and I had decided I wasn't going to do it.

WELL . . . .

I've been making homemade Christmas cards the last few years.

I really wanted to make something simple this year.

I THOUGHT I had designed a simpler card

but realized once I got into the process . . .

that I'd be cutting out

several hundred letters by cranking die cuts through my Cuttlebug.

Oh, WHAT A CHORE!

(for smaller projects, I love my Cuttlebug!)

Thus the purchase . . . . a Cricut . . . die cutting machine.

I was showing my sister my new purchase and explaining this all to her.

"You mean, you bought this just so you could cut out the word "JOY"?"

She asked with unbelief in her voice . . . .

Yep!!!

. . . . . the world's most expensive Christmas Cards will be coming

to some of you shortly.

Boy has life changed for us the last few years for me to even consider

making this silly but fun purchase!

P.S. If you want to be on my Christmas card list . . . .

even though my card isn't that great . . . . .

and promise to send me one back . . . .

e-mail me at tcys@comcast.net

or if you feel comfortable . . . .

leave your address in the comment box.

FA LA LA LA LAAAaaaaaa, LA, LA, La, Laaaaaaa.

Going Ape

This weekend we went to a rather unique celebration of our friend Kiersten's 40th birthday.  There is a place in Rockville, Maryland called Go Ape.  We'd never heard of it before and were game to give it a try.  We spent at least two hours in the tree tops going through different rope obstacles.  It made us feel like kids again!

Here's Lincoln . . . .

And me with my visiting teaching companion and her husband . . . . I know this doesn't look like we are up in the trees, but we were!!!

The caribiner safety clip-ins gave me courage!

This was the worst for me . . . . .climbing the ladders . . . . .

Lincoln on the "Tarzan Swing" which was most definitely the hardest one to make yourself do . . .

The birthday girl . . . . Thanks Kiersten for letting us share your day with you!  We all wore a little purple her honor . . . .



McKay would LOVE this!

Miss Industrious

A couple of weeks ago my sister invited me to her "Tastefully Simple" party.  I went just to be supportive of her.  I didn't know what I was getting myself into.

I've been to these parties before, but this lady had something put together something that has intrigued me for quite some time.  She had menus that were put together (of course, using her products!) that you could prepare and then freeze and have on hand for a simple "warm up" meal later.  10 menu items that I could see would translate into 20 meals for my small family.

Needless to say . . . . I bit . . . and ordered the meal plan . . . . she had shopping lists put together, complete with labels to place on your freezer baggies once you had the meals done.

I don't think I've ever purchased so much meat at one time before.  I substituted ground turkey for the ground beef . . . . . . I thought it'd be fun to take a picture of all the ingredients for the meals but didn't put all the meat I bought out for the picture!

I also bought these ziploc vacuum bags thinking that the frozen food should last longer with less air in the bags.

The menus include roasts, sloppy joes, chili, chicken noodle soup, stew, crunchy chicken, and more.  I didn't get all the meals done . . . . but now have 16 meals in the freezer (minus the ones we've already eaten).  It feels nice to know they are there.  The crunchy chicken menu actually made enough for us to have 3 meals!

They aren't quite the same as my own homemade cooking . . . . . but has given me ideas of how to use my own recipes and do the same thing with them.  It'd be fun to do this with someone else . . . . I was in the kitchen for 5 hours and was pretty dang tired when I was done . . . . and I still had two menu items to go. 

Do any of you do meals ahead like this? and how and what???