Merry Christmas!!!

Since I have this thing called a job that requires my time on holidays such as Christmas Day, we celebrated a day early! We went to church and Santa came then. The kids enjoyed it very much and I'm so grateful we got to enjoy it in the new house this year! May God bless you and your family forever and always.




















Merry Christmas!

November/ December

Not a lot has changed since last time I posted and dumped a ton of photos on you. I just wanted to share a few more pictures with you.



This guy, he was truly my best friend. He would listen to any of your problems and give advise very unjudgemental. He always wanted the best for me. Making sure that I would always be safe and happy. One of the things I will forever be grateful is the time he spent teaching me and leading more to the Lord. I have always believed but Howard strengthened my relationship with Him so much. October 27th he went to live with our savior. I think of him every single day and miss him terribly. With the move we see EVERYTHING we own. It's funny how many things that I had forgotten that he had given me that I find again. It's little things, from books about the bible, or bodybuilding to utility knives and hats. Anything that he thought I would enjoy he gave me. It honestly isn't about the things but the fact that he wanted so much for me to be happy and safe and he took the time to do the things he did for me means the world and I will never forget... Howard was a gift that God put in my life so that I had could learn more about God and then teach others.



Just because that's cute...

November 3rd, late at night Lillian decided to look into a super glue bottle.... and then she squeezed it. This was the outcome:



This was actually much better then it was all that night before. This picture was the next morning at the doctor's office. We were very lucky in the fact that the eye doctor was in Seneca that day so he squeezed her in and they had to knock her out to pull them apart. They pulled 3 of her eyelashes out as they were rubbing her eye and then they dyed her eye to make sure there was no damage and there wasn't.







They gave her some goofy juice before the 'surgery' and she was goofy!!!! These were all her faces, I just coping her!



Just because, he'll hate this ;) Missed the kiddoes so I took a pic and sent it to the babysitter (Mom) to tell them goodnight for us.

After Thanksgiving we were going to see Santa but after waiting for 45 minutes and seeing it was going to be another hour we decided to leave. But this was while we were waiting...



Then we had a birthday boy!!!



He's so excited....



Finally, we got to see Santa!!! Will had to take the John Deere ad to him to show him what he wanted for Christmas. Lillian was quite shy and didn't know about him but she did good and there were no tears this year!!!!

October/ November photo dump

Starting back when it was still warm, I finally got my camera back out. I hadn't taken many pictures on it since I got my new smart phone. Tenley had come over several times as my kids are her Dads are helping each other out a lot.







Lillian was there, I just didn't have any good pictures of her. They were all blurry.

And then there was Halloween!



My pretty princess! And Cousin Elsie the Fairy!



Our Knight and Shinning Armer (s)



Being quite uncooperative... Like every sugar loaded Halloween. Refuses to take pictures with Grandparents. I did miss a few Grandparents but with a sugar high, and a rush to see everyone in one day, I did my best.







Oh how fast life goes by! I am getting my camera out more and so I'll be updating more often.

LIFT!

I'm going to tell you a story. This story is about a woman who took care of herself, ate right and exercised on occasion. She was still healthy but decided to do a little more and hired a personal trainer. (me) If you think you are busy, you haven't met this woman! Making it a priority to take care of herself, we meet several times a week. She works hard. Really hard, every session. For the last 10 weeks, the scales have slightly crept up. It's really hard to see this even if you KNOW that  the scale is just a number. I know! I have dealt with this myself. Even though, I am quite fit, I have a hard time seeing that number in the mornings. So I get this struggle. I kept telling her not to give up and she agreed. Finally, she took 'after' pictures to track her progress. AMAZING, in 10 weeks the scales have gone up about seven pounds. 7! That is a lot when your goal is to lose weight right? Well, look at these for yourself. You tell me, does that look like a 7 pound weight gain?!

 

Yes, the second picture is her 'after' picture. This is why lifting, and taking pictures are SOOO important! I'm proud of you for not giving up and working as hard as you do even when you don't wnat to!!

2 months!!!

All pictures from this 2 month hiatus is in reverse order... And from my phone so not the greatest pictures but hey it works!


Our kitchen is very close to being done, we need a back splash, and the tile celling and finish drawers and we will be done.

I went to my first It Works! event! We had a lot of fun and a lot of contacts!! I'm telling you this is a great biz!!

We now have baby calves. They are more for Uncle Kyle but I dont' know what they have planned, for all Will knows, they are his... He and Lillian really enjoy helping Dad feed them.

It had been FOREVER since I had baked and I missed it so much! I found the new best sugar cookie recipe! Once the kitchen is done then get ready... I'll be baking much more! :)





We went to the Renaissance Festival in KC with Tara and the kids and Grandma. They enjoyed it but it was a long day. It wore them out!





Proof!





School pictures were the cutest EVER!!!! Just look at that face!





Will's first day month of school. We are finally able to drop him off with no tears. So I don't have that precious first day of school picture... It was a disaster!





This was moments before!!





Lillian was quite sick for the month of August. She had gotten two parasites and couldn't get rid of them or so it seemed. Turns out, she became lactose intolerant because of one of the parasites or the meds that she was on to cure it. Either way, she didn't argue with switching to Almond milk for a while. It was the lack of cheese that she had a problem with. After a month of no dairy, we re-introduced it back and she hasn't had a problem since. It was a rough three weeks before though... She came with me to a training session I had. I couldn't find daycare and she did pretty good until I had to change her diaper... :/







So there's our last two months! Short, fast and I'm ready for snow! Who would have guessed that? Carpet is being laid today in the new house! Fair warning, it may be until we are in the new house before I have a chance to update again. I don't want quit this, I am quite proud that I have been doing this blog for over 5 years!!! I'm excited to see it when the kids are in high school.

The Fruits of Our Labors.

To say that I have gotten addicted to canning is an understatement. It has been so much fun and it is was even more fun getting all of it on these shelves and seeing what we have actually done! The shelf on the right starting at the top...
Only 2 jams left over from last year, pineapple habenaro jam, margarita jam.
Second self, canned blackberries, canned blueberries, blackberry pie filling, cherry limeade jam, peach pie filling.
Third shelf: Apple cinnamon rings, cinnamon pickles, pickle relish (2 from last year), lime pickles (3 from last year), apple pie filling
forth shelf: Watermelon jelly, pink Merlot jelly, lemon poppy seed jelly, Carmel apple jam, Mango lime jam, peach amaretto jam, pina coloda jam, Spaghetti sauce (all from last year), beets from Mom,
Left shelving: BEANS! As many as we had go bad, it's still good to see we have that many left still.
Second shelf: Habenaro gold sauce and salsa (3 from last year).



And for supper last night, we had meatballs (I made a ton and froze quite a few of them for future easy meals). Cole slaw that I also canned. Plums that Mom had canned, the Pineapple habenaro jelly that I made, on cream cheese and crackers. Now I'd say that's a meal home made!

I can't thank my Mom enough to help me going on this. Although, I think the more I'm getting into it, so is she. But, I'm going to get over my fear of pressure canning and she is going to teach me. I can't wait to try soups and next year make spaghetti sauce with meet already in it. Maybe we'd have mashed potatoes if they were already a little cooked in the cans. How easy would that be?! Carrots are .59 a pound right now and if I knew how to pressure can, we could have carrots easy at our hand ready to warm up, and enjoy for inexpensive and no crap added food!! So, shout out to Mom for helping me, you have really created a monster in the best way possible!! Love you!

What we've been up to...

Lillian and baby helping me snap beans. I quit before the bean plants quit producing... I feel like it's a waste but my hands were hurting from snapping so much and we had 53 quarts of beans and 7 gallon sized bags frozen. (I swear I bathe my children!)





22 lemons juiced and one beer drank...



This isn't even all of them!!!
From left to right
Lemon Poppy seed
Peach Amaretto
Cherry Limeade
Pina Colada
Watermelon
Margarita
Pink Merlot

Not pictured is Carmel Apple Jam (may make another batch because it's soooooo good!) and I will make some habenro jam yet once those are ready...

And yes, I am selling them!! Ask me about them if you want some!!! GREAT gifts!!!



Grandma's Lime Pickles (sweet sandwich pickles) 2 gallons worth so- 8 quarts-ish



Grandma's Cinnamon pickles (I skipped the coloring them red process as how much red food die do we really need in our diets anyway. So they may not be as pretty but they will still taste yummy!)- 2 gallons



10 quarts of apple pie filling, Peach pie filling is in the back and I'm not sure how many of those are in there, I think 6-ish but the peaches on trees are not quite ripe yet so may add a few more :)



And here's my pantry (hopefully soon, this will be moved to the new house!!!)



So, unfortunate but we (Mom and I) lost about 25 quarts of green beans due to something called flat sour. Canning is a learning process I think for everyone, new or advanced at the hobby... Apparently it happens if when you let the beans sit too long before processing. Well, I'm terrified of pressure canning. Maybe someday I will get the nerve to start trying it but until then, I snap them and get them ready for my Mom and then she pressure cans them for me. It took a few days to get to her and while time to eat them fresh would have been okay apparently, they started getting this bacteria and caused quite a bit of heartache in terms of canners everywhere. 25 of about the 90 quarts that were canned became either unsealed or were just cloudy and smelled awful when we dumped them. So, education for all others, make sure you get them processed ASAP! After the loss, we have kept around 40 quarts of green beans that are still good.

Tomatoes aren't even ripe yet. I really think that I'm just going to can them for soups or chili or even salsa in the middle of winter... You get to a point of almost burning out in the kitchen and I'm getting close to that. After the pickles I have yet and habenro jelly, and a few jars of tomatoes I think I'll be done in the kitchen.

I have also accepted that we will not be moving into the new house until after chopping (since that starts... today) I am taking the time to clear out each room and boxing up the stuff that we don't need for the next 3 months, throwing away all the stuff we don't need and just hoping when the time comes to move it will be a speedy processes. I didn't get a good picture of the kitchen on my camera before now so here's a picture I put on Facebook with the kindle...



There are doors on all the upper cabinets now and most of the bottom cabinets. The island is almost done (probably done now just needs stained and varnished.) So, next blog post I'll get that picture for you!!!

Finally, the kids enjoying half a jar of watermelon jelly!