Our Anniversary

Thanks for the Happy Anniversary greetings! We had a great day together! Some of our favorite time was a two-hour window without the kids in the middle of the day! Our intern, Kathy, and one of our students came over to be at the house with the kids so we could get some coffee.

We ended up getting some coffee, talking, talking, talking, buying a Magnolia tree for the house, then buying some food to make a special dinner after the kids were in bed.

We grilled trout! It was amazing and so, so easy!

Here's a pic of US...and our fish! ...not the kids! Sorry! : )

Happy Anniversary Joel and Amy

Hope you have a great day together!

Black Beans and Rice

Amy asked for this black beans and rice recipie that I found so I thought I'd just put it up here for you all to see. I can always just email it to you so I don't have to write it all down. I liked it a lot and although it takes some time, it makes a LOT and I froze some for later. Cheap to make too I think.

Black Beans and Rice
Ingredients:
1 ½ cups black beans
3 cups rice
2 ½ cups onions
2 ½ cups peppers
¼ cup olive oil
4 cloves garlic
½ cup sofrito*
½ teaspoon tomato paste
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 Tablespoon cumin
1 bay leaf
4 cups chicken stock

*Sofrito:
5 cherry tomatoes
½ a pepper
½ an onion
2 cloves of garlic
½ bay leaf
touch of cumin
touch of oregano
about ¼ cup sherry or to taste
salt to taste (optional)

Directions: blend the tomatoes, pepper and onion, then sauté everything (but sherry) in oil till all veggies are "limp". Add sherry and let simmer.

DIRECTIONS:

• Cover beans with water and boil/simmer till tender. About 1 hr
• Sauté onion & pepper, add garlic & sofrito, then add tomato paste, beans & herbs and cook for 5 minutes stirring gently.
• Add chicken stock and rice. Season with plenty of salt. Boil/simmer till rice is done. About 20-30 minutes.
• Makes a lot…enough for about 8
• We liked it plain or in tortillas
• Enjoy!
  Notes:
  I don’t like cooked peppers or onions much so I only put in about ½ of a pepper and onion. I also don’t really like spicy things so I put cumin in to taste. I had to keep adding water to the beans because they used it up as they cooked and I didn’t need any salt because the chicken stock had enough in it. I thought about making more sofrito and putting it in the freezer to use later.

New things

Well, this morning there is a cool breeze blowing and rain falling. There is actually a thunderstorm! We don't get those often. It's a nice change from triple digets and a hot house. I like it because they say warm temps (80s) are coming again. Fall hasn't arrived yet and although Jon is ready for it...I'm not.

We took some pictures of our garden at the Stager's house. We've been enjoying lots of produce from it. We FINALLY have a watermellon. I don't expect that we'll actually get to eat it. It's pretty small for August!

I made applesauce for the first time this past week. It's actually pretty good and easy to make if you're going to freeze it. I have some I want to can but I need to get a bigger pot first. We had so many free apples I had to do something!

Noah discovered trampolines and blackberries this weekend. I wanted to share those pictures. They make us smile!

New season

Tomorrow begins a new season. Another school year begins and with it comes the relentless pace of life. I think we've had a good summer with a balanced mix of pleasure and work. Our trips to Portand, Hilton Head, and Aiken were highlights, seeing 5 of our grandkids and their parents. It would have been even better if we could have added a visit to see the other 2 grands and their parents but another time!

I finished reading this morning a great book - Crazy Love, Overwhelmed by a Relentless God by Francis Chan. (http://www.crazylovebook.com/) It may have just been the right time for me to read it, but I have to say it re-centered my thinking as to the importance of how I live my life and why. It's so easy to get caught up in the daily routine and forget about the reason I'm here and how very much God loves me and desires a personal, intimate relationship with me. I take so much forgranted forgetting that I'm really not promised tomorrow and that what I do today matters. I rarely reread a book, but I think I might this one. There are some interesting videos on the web site too.

I'm facing some challenges this first week of school and would appreicate some extra prayer - that I would have wisdom, a special calmness, and clear thinking. I know that Marie would appreicate being remembered too as she starts a new year tomorrow, at a new level. Dad has to go to the VA Thursday to have some blood work and then next Tuesday to his primary doctor. I'm still debating whether I need to take off work to drive him downtown.

I know that summer isn't over for many of you, so enjoy the remaining days or weeks!

Love you!

Abigail's Card

Amy- Did Abigail get the B-day card we sent? Mom told me the address but I'm hoping I didn't write something down wrong. I haven't sent anything to you all in the mail before. :)
Just wondering- Marie

north carolina

Tomorrow, we are headed home. We had a great time up here and loved the cooler, non-hair frizzing drier air! It's nice to spend less time on getting ready:) However, we are ready to leave...Very small towns are not very user-friendly. We explored lots of waterfalls and bombarded the mountain terrain in our church's 15 passenger van. Ben and the boys got official appalacian mountain haircuts. I usually do it for them, but they were all in need and I didn't bring the clippers. Ryan is almost bald. He likes it though. We didn't like that the barber shop did not take our debit card, and we really didn't like that the gas station and pharmacy next door would only give 10$ cash back (and only if we bought 10$ of junk...) We had some cash between us - luckily! We usually use card only. Today, we 'hiked' triple falls. I'm sure it was nothing like Jon and Erin's 'hike.' It was all on foot and very little climbing involved - and we carried the kids a lot of the way:) We actually climbed up the side of the water fall on the rocks. I didn't think we could actually be successful, especially with the kids. It was very satisfying to get to the top unscathed:) We had the top of the 3rd falls all to ourselves. (until some freaky guy popped out the woods out of nowhere...but he did rescue ben's shoe before it went over the edge) The boys had an awesome time playing in the water and jumping from rock to rock. One time Matthew slipped and fell in and Ben went after him and ending up falling too. They both were okay, but really wet in really cold water. We can't believe the weather here. So cool in the evenings - refreshing! We thought we were hiking in air conditioning - we didn't even sweat:) Besides the unfriendly mountain folk, I'd almost like to live here - well, maybe north GA. I can handle Ga mountain people. (especially since I kinda am one:) Better get packed and in bed - early start tomorrow!

An Adventure

My parents are headed to Hawaii for 2 weeks so they volunteered to watch Noah last night so Jon and I could go on a date. We decided to head to Lewis & Clark state park in Troutdale and take a hike that we'd taken 7 years ago when Jon was in OR for Joel & Amy's wedding. We did it in the dark last time (and I had shin splints too) and it was pretty scary but we thought this time it would be better because it was light out. We packed a picnic dinner and headed up. Oh, my...it was still scary in the light. It was a steep climb and I'm not to great with heights. I had to keep focusing on what was right in front of me or I'd look down...not a good idea. We FINALLY made it to the top and had a great view and some good food. We decided not to eat too much and to leave while there was a lot of light left. Good thing too because we went the wrong way down for about 10 minutes (straight down hanging onto roots for dear life) before we climbed back up to try a different route. Whew, we decided not to do that again. We wanted to share some of our pictures since there won't be any more! Jon's pointing to where we were, there are some of the view and one looking down at the parkinglot.

The other night we had a lot of fun with Noah. We turned all the furniture in the living room into a gigantic tent and we all had a blast crawling around...even Bree. Noah had so much fun he was up until 11pm. I just couldn't get him to sleep. We hope tonight is better because we are all in need of some good sleep.

please pray

My friend at work, Wanda Bland's husband died tonight of we think a stroke/heart attack. He had one 2 wks ago and has been in and out of the hospital ever since. Wanda had to do cpr on him while the ambulance came, but he never made it. Last september I asked you to pray for Wanda since she drowned/had a heart attack and was in the hospital for a while. She's had a really rough year! She is also a member of our church. Our pastor, thankfully was able to make it to the hospital in time to be there when the docs gave her the news. Please pray God would give her the strength to handle all of this. Her health isn't 100% either. I'm really worried about her.

Thank you