I feel so Martha!

As if I am not already super busy, I have to go make more work for myself. A few weeks ago I bought a pillow for James. Well he tried the pillow on and off for a few days and decided it wasn’t working. Well, I had long since thrown away the packaging, labels, and receipt, oops. What do you do with a new pillow that no one wants and you can’t return? I turned it into a lounging pillow for our family room. I bought a yard of fabric and made a pillow case for it. Then I got a bit carried away with accent pillows and a new curtain. So what do you think? The pillows obviously won’t be on the floor, they go on my tan couch, and this was just for the picture.

Midnight Sun

I feel like such a nerd! When I first heard about the Twilight Saga, I thought, “I am so glad that I am not a slave to those silly books.” Well James, I blame you for all of this. James got the MP3 of Twilight and we listened to it on the way to Utah and Las Vegas. That was all it took. Now, not only did I devour the books but now I am hanging off of ever bit of drivel that Stephenie Meyer throws at me. I come to find out that she is writing Midnight Sun, a companion book to Twilight from Edward Cullen’s voice. I just spent the last hour reading the first 20 pages online. I am not sure if the book will be good enough to stand on its own, but I bet I will be out with the masses buying the book. GROAN!!! The funniest part of all of this is that I am hosting book group on Friday and the book is…The Twilight Series. To see Midnight Sun: http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html

School starts today!!!!

I am just going to warn everyone now, I am going to be a bit busy this week. I will try to keep up on my postings but school starts today. So I will be keeping my nose in lots of books. I am hoping that I can soon figure how to balance my schedule.

Harvest time, already?

We had quite a harvest today! This last month we would get a squash or two every so often and we would get tomatoes, if we could get them before the critters. But that was about the extent of our produce. We decided that we were tired of waiting for our carrots and what a surprise we found. We got about six carrots. I don’t know if it is the uranium mine that we live near or just our inexperience, but I have NEVER seen carrots quite like this. What do you think? We also harvested our first pumpkin, yippee! If you know of any good pumpkin recipes, let me know. I think I am going to try dinner in a pumpkin (anyone ever make that before?). I will try to post a picture of what I finally do with our mutant carrots. And just a side note, our peanut plant is doing surprisingly well. Does anyone know anything about peanut plants? We are just a little too new at this. Next year will be better but this gardening thing is still pretty fun!

Talk about a good job!

Well, I tried it again. For church this Sunday I did a lattice hairstyle. I feel very proud of myself. What do you think?

Steak Kabobs

My friend,Ashlee Hyer made this recipe for my family when I was in the hospital and James has been begging me to get the recipe from her. I got it and made it last night and it is so yummy we didn’t have any leftovers:( The best part of it was I had almost all of the ingredients already. So now I feel like I have to share it with everyone. Please try them out, they are out of this world. Enjoy!



Steak Kabobs
Marinate beef chunks for about an hour in:
¼ c. A1 sauce
1TB. Vegetable oil or sesame oil
2 cloves of garlic crushed
2 tsp ground ginger (or 1 tsp fresh)
¼ tsp crushed red pepper
1 tsp sesame seeds
Pan fry the meat in the marinade until cooked then put meat on skewers with: green pepper, red pepper, onion, pineapple, mushrooms, and or mango. Place in oven at 350 for 30 to 40 minutes or until the vegetables are cooked. Serve with rice and sauce.
Sauce:
¾ c. orange juice
¼ c. honey
the juice of one lime
1 Tb. Soy sauce
1 tsp garlic
½ tsp black pepper
Cook in a sauce pan until reduced. If you are impatient you can thicken it with a tablespoon of cornstarch.

Is it wrong to pat yourself on the back?

When I found out I was have a baby girl two and a half years ago I was very excited. But there was something in the back of my mind that really bothered me. I am all thumbs when it comes to braiding, curling and making hair look cute. My sisters always did that type of thing when we were young, so I never learned. Now Lucy’s hair is long and thick enough to do something with it. I always said that she refused to sit still long enough for me to do anything cute. That was just an excuse. I received an email today from my friend, Millie, her daughter always has adorable hair. She showed me where she got her inspirations and I decided to take a leap of faith. Be gentle on me this is my first attempt and I can’t wait until tomorrow so I can try a new style. Thank you Millie for the encouragement. Let me know what you think.

Children Strongly Oppose Healthcare

Study: Most Children Strongly Opposed To Children's Healthcare

I knew we were paying too much for our healthcare. I am with the kids, let's cut all healthcare. What do you think?

Las Vegas

So we are back from our vacation and I promised to post some of our pictures. So here they are: I just love this picture of Lucy at the Shark Reef

This is us in front of Mt. Rushmore at the Bellagio. How odd that we go to Vegas and will never escape Mt. Rushmore.
Again we are at the Bellagio, in front of the fountians.

This is when we were on the strip at night. We saw the pirate show at Treasure Island.

We had so much Fun in Veags and were were so glad that Ashley could show us around.

Air Conditioning? Yes, Please!

We had quite a fun time this weekend. My sister and her family and my parents came up from Colorado and we all went camping. We have discovered how much we like Chadron State Park, and how much the kids like camping. Thomas and Lucy were real troopers and took to camping like they were born in a tent. We all came away from camping with a new appreciation of air conditioning and everyone but Thomas came away with a hefty sunburn. I hope you enjoy the pictures of our cute kids and their little cousins.

Wall-e.

Well James talked me into going to Wall-e. What really sold me is just going on a date with my husband. But, Wall-e is nothing like I expected. It is charming, funny and entertaining. It was worth the money getting a babysitter and walking to go to the theater. We can’t wait until it comes out to DVD. I recommend Wall-e for all ages; we are now trying to find a time to take Thomas. There are definite political undertones and the movie mirrors our society, but it has a good message, so it is worth it. The previews don’t do the movie justice; if you don’t think you will like it (like me) you will be pleasantly surprised. Don’t forget to stay for the credits, they are entertaining, too. Have you seen it? Did you like it? Are you going to? Let me know.

Believe it or Not!!

So we were in our garden yesterday doing the never-ending job of weeding, and we found the strangest weed. A peanut plant!! Can you believe it, when James pulled it out we were in shock. We are thinking it was a forgotten peanut from a hoarding squirrel (we have some fat squirrels in this town). Well, we transplanted it into a good spot by the soaker hose and we will see what happens.

Anything is possible with a little water and time.

When we bought our house two years ago we also bought the empty lot next to it. We were beside ourselves on what to do with that much property. So we decided to do what every other person does when they are crazy enough to think they have some spare time, we put in a garden. So in February we bought our seeds and put shelves in our basement windows and started our garden. We have finally gotten all of our seedlings into the ground, but we did lose a few in the process. This was no easy feat and we are still not done. Now we are working on keeping the weeds at bay and we are giving it weekly fertilizer treatments. We have also connected a soaker hose to our sprinkler system so that it gets watered automatically every night. We did that about two days ago and since then the garden has really been happy. We even had the foresight to install at thick layer of green ground covering (weeds) to walk on between the rows. Really I am taking more credit than is due. Almost every night James weeds, transplants and gives tender loving care to our new addition. Thomas and Lucy play on the playground and I help about as much as a 5 year-old would (except I don’t get into trouble). I am so excited about this new adventure and I hope that all of you who live close can also reap the benefits. By the end of this we hope to harvest tomatoes, butternut squash, eggplant, green peppers, sunflowers, pumpkins, zucchini, yellow squash, carrots, sugar snap peas, basil, cherry tomatoes, Indian corn, and crab apples. Also, I forgot to mention that James started about 15 grapevines last year. Only two survived, but those two are doing fabulous and we should see grapes next summer, yummy!

I think I am a Paul Giamatti Fan.

I just finished watching a fantastic mini-series. It was Paul Giamatti as John Adams, based on the book with the same title by David McCullough. It was nice to watch a movie that makes you proud to be a part of this country. I highly recomend this for everyone, and the best part is that you can get it from Netflix. I hope you enjoy!