Monday, October 31, 2011

Bro, Sis and Popcorn


Post-Wedding Conversation

We arrived  home safe and sound last night from the TX wedding!  It was a bit of a whirlwind trip... Tuesday to Sunday.  My brother, Randy, married his beautiful bride, Raechel, in a lovely ceremony on Saturday.  I'm blessed to have such a dear new sister!

Stephen, Clara and Hil were all in the wedding.  I wish I could share some pics from the big day... but as I mentioned before we're having downloading problems.

I wanted to share some quick snippets of coversation with Clara from earlier today.



Clara:  "Can we go back to the wedding area?"

Me:  "What do you mean?"

Clara:  "Can we go back to the wedding area?"

I again question what she's referring to.

Clara:  "Where Uncle Caleb is and Uncle Randy married Aunt Raechel."

Ahhhhh!  Heart wrenching to Mommy who would LOVE to be back with all of them too!  I explain that we can't go back there because it's far away and Uncle Caleb and Uncle Randy and everyone aren't even there any more either.

.... more conversation....

Clara: "They go to moonlight first?  They have to go to moonlight first?"

Took me a second or two... but I think moonlight may be a take off on "honeymoon".   I love it!   I think I like "moonlight" better!



Well, the trip was such a treat... and as you can see Clara had a grand time too!  She and Hil greatly enjoyed the love, care and fun times with Uncles, Aunts, Grandparents and new friends! Hopefully, I will manage to work around the picture downloading problem and still share some pics of the  wonderful day!

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Two Trips and a Journey

I know... long time no post!  Well, I'm finally sitting down to type a bit about our lives of late... provided we still have an audience out there after such a long "absence".

Ok, we'll start with trip number one (referring to the post title:-) ).   A couple weeks ago, I headed off on a business trip... but it wasn't my business trip.  :-)  Stephen's company sent him to beautiful Lake Placid for two days of work related training and he got to take his little family along!  What a treat for me.  We weren't sure up to the very last minute whether or not the kids and I would be going, due to the fact that both C and H were dealing with sickness.  But in the end we decided to go ahead and go for it... and it turned out to be a nice little get away.   The first evening we did a cookout fire, cooking "silver dollars" in the coals and roasting biscuits on unrolled coat hangers.  During the two days Stephen had training, the kids and I visited a couple Olympic venues, including the site of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice".  We also got to ride on a ski lift and then ride an elevator up 26 stories to see what it's like to be on a ski jumping tower! I don't know what kind of person you have to be to strap on skies and actually choose, of your own free will, to swish down that steep slope and take off into the air going, ideally, 60 miles an hour,... but I can tell you one thing, I'm NOT that kind of person!!!  I got some GREAT pictures during those few days, but unfortunately either our camera or the computer is having issues and we  haven't been able to download any from the camera for quite some time now!  I have a few things on my phone... so might share some of that later!

The second trip is an upcoming one!  This week we have the much anticipated excursion to my "little" brother's wedding!  I'm so looking forward to getting to see my dear family!  Lord willing, all my siblings will be there, except for David and him wife, Amity, who are expecting their little Blessing from the Lord about two weeks after the wedding.  They will be missed!   Clara is looking forward to getting to be flower girl and Hil will be make his debut as ring bearer.  And my Stephen is to be handsome groomsman.

The afore mentioned "journey" is of a completely different nature.  Stephen is suspicious that he may have a gluten sensitivity of some sort and is wanting to try going off of gluten for awhile to see what happens.  At first, the idea of starting to cook and bake without gluten was NOT too exciting or appealing to me.  However, I've started warming up to the idea and after thinking more about it, talking to a friend who is also starting to experiment with GF, and watching some videos online, I'm actually getting excited!  I think it will be fun!  I love trying new things in the cooking and baking arenas (mostly because I'm a fan of food :-)... so this should be actually quite enjoyable!   So, we begin a journey of learning about such things as Teff, Xantham Gum, and Amaranth... and how to bake with them!  It may be a short term journey or it may last for a life time... either way it should contain lots of learning, experimenting, failures and, hopefully, lots of success and yummy and nutritious food!  I'm looking forward to really getting started on the adventure once we get back from the wedding.  Expect more posts on this as we head off on our GF experiment!

So there you have it... two trips and a journey.

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Together

Clara is no longer the only little one who likes to dance around here  Enjoy the sweet performance!


Wednesday, October 5, 2011

"Look Mom! No Hands!"

Look closely and you will witness the reason for me suddenly "losing control" of the video!

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Monday's Moments To Remember

It was cold and grey at the park.  However, some rays of sunshine still made their way to my heart.  The first was arriving and finding that hundreds and hundreds of Canadian geese had decided that the small pond and it's surrounding grass would be a good place to gather.  An impressive sight.

Some more rays of warmth cut through the chilly day as I pushed my little Hil on the swing.  I decided to sing him a song with accompanying hand motions.  After I sang one or two he rewarded me with his sweet grin and encouraging round of applause then signed for "more"!  So of course, I sang some more.  More smiling, clapping and signing for "more".  How can a Mommy say no?  On I sang.  And on he clapped and requested encores!

Thank You, Lord, for using my little son to bring sunshine to a grey, cold day!