Beach, May 2014

Beach, May 2014

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Happy Holidays

So I've been away from this space for quite some time.  I guess all the Holiday crafting got the better of me.  But now things have slowed down so let's catch up!
Ryan, Shanda and the dogs came to visit us the first week of December... We took the dogs to the dog park and then they helped decorate the Christmas tree.
Natalie fell in LOVE with Uncle Ryan and had to be with him all the time.  It was SO cute.
We tormented the Dogs with Antlers...
And the kids had a great time decorating the tree... Natalie has mostly stayed away from the ornaments, she has pulled the feet off the frog and decapitated a flamingo... but Loren was able to fix them with super glue
Natalie just LOVES her animals, especially Sam
Here she is with her beloved Uncle Ryan
I asked her to stand in front of the tree... she set this up herself
Loving each other.  They are playing so much better together these days.
With both of us laid off we have been going on almost daily walks... here Loren is riding Aiden's bike... cute huh?
Our tree... We went out to get our tree at a local tree farm and when we got there they showed us their price sheet (I had already set my sights on a "big girl tree" after years of 3-4 foot trees at the old house) and they wanted (gasp) 80-100(!!!) bucks for a 8-10 foot noble... Seriously???  That's highway robbery, and we told the guy that, lucky for us there was a 'bargin coral' of trees that we assume people cut down then refused to pay 80 bucks for.  So we got this tree for 15 dollars.  It was the quickest tree trip in history.
I even made Natalie her stocking finally (furthest on the left).  Last year she just used mine and I am working on sewing Aiden's stars on with embroidery thread.  When mom and I made them for Aiden's first Christmas we just glued then on as the pattern suggested.  But every year one or two fall off and need to be re-glued so I figured I'd just sew them.  Now he has informed me he needs many little stars to go with the big stars.  We'll see.
It has been so much fun to have room to decorate the house.  Mom and I even got outside lights and put them up the day after Thanksgiving.  Yep, we're that kind of people.
and GIANT snow flakes... these were just to annoy Loren with :)
Festive greenery and our cute little nativity scene.  We also have a cute bear one that we got last year but Natalie has been moving them around and throwing them so they had to be put up out of harms way
At Fern Ridge Damn on a walk
The boys
When did this little boy of mine get so big?  He's growing out of things left and right!
We even got some snow before Thanksgiving... not much but enough to make the house look pretty.
and for the kids to go outside and play in.  Natalie was busy trying to wipe it off of everything.
Aiden LOVED it, as did the dog.
here he is making snow angles... his way..
I asked him to smile for me.... this is what I got
Thanksgiving my mom came down and we did the whole spread.. it was nice to have her help and company...
Loren even helped with... I had to take a picture of it!
MMM... I love thanksgiving, any holiday that is just about food and family is good with me!
Natalie hamming it up in one of my old dresses. I have more pictures to post of gingerbread houses, and men, bird decorations, crafting fun and what not but this is a good start.  We hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season!

Friday, November 5, 2010

this moment

{this moment}  inspired by Amanda Soule- A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.
With both of us off work we have been away from the computer enjoying our family time.  I can't say I've missed it...please forgive my sporadic posts...I have kids to play with and peppers to can!!

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Grammie!! (and pumpkins)

 Grammie came to visit for our annual Pumpkin Patch trip.  We went to Thistledown as usual.  
 Natalie was a little clingy and made it difficult to get good pictures of her out there, but we had a great visit, apart from them being out of apple cider... the NERVE! 
 Natalie picking cosmos!
 Look at how much fun they were having!!  Remember how sweet and cute they looked last year??
 Daddy showing Natalie the buggies
 Natalie and Grammie in the corn maze
 Off the boys go... pumpkins in tow
Grammie's Mouse House... Isn't it cute?? we went and collected the sticks and use our mice from last year... I love it!
 Aiden collecting sticks (truth be told he was complaining about it but shhh... )
Natalie in the grass looking very disheveled... messy hair and all...

Roxanne also brought downs some hosta starts and we pulled up the ugly looking plants that were in the shade garden and started something else... you have to imagine how it will look when the hostas come in full and beautiful in the spring... and I'll put in 2 or 3 more toad Lilly's and some flowering shade plants that I saw but can't remember the name of... stay tuned for the splendor in the spring!!

We were sad to see Grammie leave but look forward to her coming back again real soon! 

Friday, October 15, 2010

This moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.


one last picture of the gang (Natalie is off screen crying...)

This week we had to say good bye to our dear friend Maren and her two wonderful little boys Elias and Soren.  They are moving back home to Wisconsin (we did try to get them to stay).  Our little group that started so long ago as a group of lonely stay at home mamas in Springfield and our first babies that in many cases weren't even crawling will never be the same without them.  We have been through second pregnancies (most of us) together, house hunting, moves, sibling rivalry, knitting, felting, cooking....Often this is the only group of people that really understands and always has the time to listen.  Maren, super mom who had bread baking before the rest of us got up, had already ridden her bike to Eugene with the kids in the trailer to weed her garden by 10, then canned a  batch of ... something, made cheese followed by spinning some wool into yarn before ending the day knitting a sweater with her hand spun wool!! 
We'll stay connected through glory of the Internet until their visit next year "when it stops raining".  I guess I better get my butt in gear and start being better about my blog! Happy Travels my friend, we'll miss you! 

Monday, October 4, 2010

ok... who skipped ahead in my life?? I can't be 30... can I?

yep.  30.  Not sure when it happened but it's been a wild ride I've learned so much, met an amazing man, started a family, bought a house and made and lost countless friends. 
 Here's to the next 30 years, and whatever it may bring.

Friday, September 10, 2010

This moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Let's talk food

In my description it says this blog is about food somewhere... but I rarely talk about it. I do love food (this may be the reason I am still 25 pounds heavier then I was when I got pregnant with Aiden.. hum... ) SO I chose this beautiful almost 90 degree day to make one of my favorite pasta sauces.... roasted. My absolute favorite is our family recipe and you will never find me posting about that. So anyway Roasted Sauce. First get a bunch of veggies.

I use lots of stuff, not just tomatoes.  It's a good use of veggies that have been in the fridge a little to long, or little bits of this or that.  I have used greens and I had some frozen tomatoes I added in to this batch too.
Cut them all up into chunks.  Hard stuff should be smaller (like carrots) since they take longer to cook.  While you are cutting pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees.
Oh and if you were wondering about the 2 heads of garlic? yep, use them all.  just smash them with your big knife and pull the skins off.  It might seems like a lot but it's roasting and roasted garlic is much different then raw.  Then drizzle it all with a lot of olive oil.  When you think that must be enough, add a little more. Season with salt and pepper and some red pepper flakes.  Mix it all up and put them in the oven.  At this point you should have your oven door pop back up and hit your arm causing you to dump the contents of one pan on the oven door and on the floor of the oven...No?  oh that was me!  So pardon me if there are some middle pictures missing.  I had to have Aiden take Natalie into our room, shut the door and I had to extract all the spilled stuff from the bottom of the oven and clean then pre-heat again (did I throw them away? no.  That was a lot of food. I'm poor, and I know that Loren doesn't read the blog so what the hell.  It will get roasted to kill germs and my oven is clean).  So mix it all around every 15 minutes or so and if you have two sheets like me rotate those bad boys.  As  you get about 30-45 minutes in to it they will start to soften up so I smash/break them up as I go and I start stirring more often.  Eventually they shrank down enough to put them into one sheet.
I don't know why blogger turned this but oh well, this is how it looks when you take it out.  My mom stops here (she taught me this) with yummy chunks, but Aiden picks things out that he 'doesn't yike'
so I pulse it in the food processor to a uniform color so you can't tell what is what.  Let it cool first a bit.
now mix it all up and enjoy.  I had a heavy hand with the red peppers, and I lost some of my olive oil in the 'accident' (bad Italian with no extra oil) so it ended up thick and spicy. It'd be great bruchetta or since I needed to cool it off I added some v8 I had in the fridge, tomato sauce would work too but the v8 was open.  So yeah, yum.  See the spoon in the container.. I might or might not have been just eating it.

this moment

{this moment} Inspired by Amanda Soule- A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.