Archive for the ‘Home’ Category

These are the Days

Monday, August 9th, 2010

THESE ARE THE DAYS I’LL REMEMBER

These are days you’ll remember

Never before and never since, I promise

will the whole world be warm as this

Guini’s birthday celebration was delayed by the Heaven Fest craziness. So how could I refuse when she asked for a really big cake, purple and yellow, chocolate with buttercream icing and lots and lots of color and flowers…plus sparklers on the top. Presents first, dinner and swimming, then cake and ice cream. A lovely way to spend a summer Sunday evening.

And as you feel it, you’ll know it’s true

that you are blessed and lucky

It’s true, that you are touched by Something

that will grow and bloom in you

Left: Amelie Belle is 4 and a half months now and she is good buddies her Aunt Stephanie. Center: Guini the birthday girl loves her baby cousin. Right: Aunt Tara is always popular with nieces Averi and Gemma May.

My amazing and insightful sister-in-law, Dawn recently commented that these family times together, the little cousins playing tug-of-war over some toy or the other and whatever mischieviousness they can all find to get into will be memories they will cherish as they grow up. I hope they’ll know that they ARE “blessed and lucky” and that the love of these days will grow and bloom in their lives, too.

These are days you’ll remember

when May is rushing over you with desire

to be part of the miracles you see in every hour

Here we are, Dave and I and our 6, very longsuffering grandbebes. They pose for us, they smile and coo and endure photo ops. They act silly and one day, when they are old enough, they will really wonder about us! Perhaps they already do.

You’ll know it’s true, that you are blessed and lucky

It’s true, that you are touched by Something

that will grow and bloom in you

It was Guinivere’s birthday celebration. She just turned 5. Hunter is 5 and a half. Gavin who is holding baby Amelie Belle, is 7 and baby girl is 4 1/2 months now. Best friends and cousins Gemma May and Averi are 3 and 2 1/2 respectively. These are the grandbebes on a summer’s evening in August.

These are the days

that you might fill with laughter

until you break

Left: Jovan is such a good mommy to her girls. My son married well. Middle: These are the men of the family – Dave and Tristan, 2 sons-in-law who could not be more wonderful if they tried, my husband and lover of 29 years (and a very flirtacious friend for almost 3 years before that), Dave and Rocker-Bo, the kid probably most like me in the world…only waaaaay better. Right: And my beautiful firstborn, Tara with her beautiful firstborn, The Little Prince.

These days you might feel a shaft of light

make its way across your face

Dave’s hair looks really gray in these pictures, but not in real, up-close-and-personal life (except for the salt and pepper facial hair and a little in the temples). Hmmm…wonder what is up with that? I KNEW that camera was trying to make me look old against my will. This is proof! The little girlie-grandbebes rely on Poppa to keep them safe from the splashing boys in the water.

And when you do

you’ll know how it was meant to be

Left: Averi following the grandbebe swimming ritual, which is, you get out and dry off so you can go right back in again. Middle: Steph loves her cake. Right, Gemma and Averi are always in deep discussion and generally some disagreement about some topic or another. But they are besties.

See the signs and know their meaning, it’s true

You’ll know how it was meant to be

The grandbebe painted, wooden stools…crazy-looking-maybe-I-should-have-planned-before-baking-but-the-brithday-girl-loves-it-anyway cakes…a zinnia that both Amelie Belle and I took a fancy to last night on our way around the yard (where new bikes for Stormie and Rocky, no less, were being assembled, a game of catch was going on, kiddies were splashing in a pool and sweet conversation floated on the summer air). These are the signs…

Hear the signs and

know they’re speaking to you, to you*

NOTE TO SELF: To get over myself {for the love!} and get over my ridiculous heartbreaks…See the signs, hear the signs…it’s true. These are the days…

* LYRICS: “These are the Days” by Natalie Merchant

Posted in Birthdays/Anniversaries, Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, Marriage, Memories/Melancholy, Mi familia, My most unforgettable people, Photos of the Fam, Songs I am singing, Stuff I actually think | 6 Comments »

Twelve reasons to teach your kids to garden

Wednesday, July 7th, 2010

There are just things you can learn about God and life and love from the simple act of gardening. So it’s a good thing to do with kids, whether in small form like letting them draw their face on a paper cup and then growing some grass seed for hair (a homemade Chia) or maybe letting them choose and take care of a potted plant, to actually building them a little square wooden box and letting them grow veggies (the ones they know they like and the ones they will like after they have grown them!).

Here is a list of the reasons I want my grandbebes to garden with me. And why all kids would benefit!!

1.

Dirt is fun. And dirt is creativity! God actually made man from the soil in a garden. I want the kiddos to know they can plant a seed and nurture life, too, just like their Creator! And making mud just for mud’s sake is alright, too! PLUS? Bugs!

2.

Patience. The seed goes into the ground and we wait to see it sprout. The plant is plopped into a hole and we wait for the fruit. In between the beginning and the end, there is watching the tempertaure, the watering, the sunshine, getting rid of competing weeds. It is a good thing to learn to wait with hopeful expectancy!

3.

Poop makes stuff grow – fast! The hard things in life that get dumped on us? They cause us to become better and stronger. I once accidentally dropped some watermelon seeds near a nice, aging pile of manure I was going to spread. The vines erupted like they were from the land of the giants. The plants were enormous and the fruit was amazingly sweet. Manure is good for the soul.

4.

Sometimes I have to tie vines against a support stake. Sure they’d rather just meander off in every direction, but the tying is necessary. While to the vine being tied it could look like it is being controlled and bound, but the truth is, the plant will actually thrive and produce more because the leaves are arranged to receive sunlight and the soil below can now get the moisture and feeding it needs. Support is a good thing when you know you need it and especially when you don’t.

5.

You’re pruned if you do and pruned if you don’t. Pruning-It is a cut. There is no way around it. Sprawling huge shrubbery that are leafing and flowering are difficult to approach with the pruners. But if you don’t? It will become long and leggy, overgrown and weak. And when allowed to go on in that state, it will lose its beauty and much of its fruitfulness. Jesus said He’d prune every branch that wasn’t fruiting and He’d prune every branch that was pruning so it would produce more. He knew His gardening! So see? You ARE pruned if you do and pruned if you don’t, so we may as well let Him do in us what we must do to our plants. And everywhere you cut, life explodes in every direction, making the plant stronger and thicker and healthier and more wonderful!

6.

God will bless you to be a blessing. He gives seed to the sower. When I started gardening and didn’t have a clue – just mentioning that very fact brought out the giver in all the gardeners I knew. They hooked me up with starts and seeds and plants and tips. I, in turn, had a wildly successful first garden year and blessed every single person I knew with so many tomatoes and zucchini and onions and radishes and peppers…they all started running from me.

7.

Bees are our friends. According to The Bee Movie with Jerry Seinfeld, bees are becoming extinct. I am not sure if that is so, but I know we haul our Colorado bees to California wine country during the winter and then back again for farming season here. There are less bees now and that is true. And bees are the great pollinators. They are wonderful and NOT aggressive. You can work side by side in the garden with the bees just a few inches away on your prettiest flowers and to them? You are just a landmark. I want the kiddies to know that there is a purpose for the bee and they shouldn’t be afraid…

8.

Deadheading is a necessary part of having fabulous flowers. When the bloom has passed, remove it so the bright lovelies can shine.

9.

You have to prepare the soil to have your plants grow. You cannot just plop something in this hard, rocky, clay-ey Colorado dirt and have it grow. In fact the only things that will grow in this native soil are weeds. If you want a good garden, you’ve gotta amend. You have got to add decomposing matter and time-released fertilizer and manure and compost and hummus and vermiculite. You have got to make sure what is in the pot or the garden plot is ready to receive and surround and care for the seed or young plant. Thought and preparation are so important for any wonderful project in life!

10.

Gardening? It’s messy, hard work. But anything worth having is! Oui?

11.

The great joy of the fruit of your labors will finally and most certainly happen! One day the flowers will blossom and the veggies will become edible. One day the tree will provide shade and the grass will be so green. And rejoicing! Zany-crazy-happy dancing! Cartwheels and hallelujahs! You actuallty get to REAP what you have sown! Glory be! No joy quite like it!

12.

Everything between God and man started in a garden. I want the grandbebes to know that God will meet them there, that they’ll hear His voice whispering in the wind and see His majesty at the first fully ripe beefsteak tomato. I want them to know He will talk to them and give them understanding in the garden just like He did with Adam and Eve. And that sometimes He’ll ask them, like He did with Adam: “Where are you?” Not because He doesn’t know, but because He’ll want to know if they understand where they are in life right at that moment, if they comprehend how the lives they are living and the choices they are making are affecting their futures.

Yes. I want my grandbebes to know that I have found Him in the garden and they can, too.

It isn’t too late to do some fun gardening with the little tykes this summer!…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Go check in on the grandbebe gardens and assist as needed.

Pictured: The yard. The garden. This morning.

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, Stuff I actually think | 2 Comments »

A good kind of tired

Friday, June 11th, 2010

7 Things that wear you out, but for good reason

Weeding in the garden, fertilizing the soil. Hard labor in God’s creation.
Throwing big, joyful family birthday celebrations with homemade gifts and silly songs and specialty cakes and desserts and decorations to reflect the recipient’s interest – just going a little bit over-the-top to say I LOVE YOU!
Helping a friend who needs you even when it isn’t on your schedule, especially when it isn’t on your schedule.
Growing really, really good tomatoes.
Laughing your head off at ridiculous things: like finding out you are just as forgetful as your mother – right after you have made fun of her.
Two+ hours singing old songs at the top of your lungs with your mom and dad from the sheet music case in dad’s office: the songs he loved when he first found Jesus in the 50s (Ira Stanphill, Mosie Lister) and the ones he and mom and I sang together in the 70s (Lanny Wolfe, Dottie Rambo).
Laughing so hard you can’t breathe with people who love you enough to resuscitate you if you fall over cold from it

4 Things that drain the ever-loving life out of you and probably won’t be worth it

Working hard to be number one in your chosen field; being the first one to work and the last one to leave.
Being the best at everything.
A perfectly clean house, one where every single thing is in its’ place and where there are never ever kid fingerprints on the patio doors and no dog hair in the vacuum cannister and the laundry is always finished the day it is started. You know-a house that reveals nothing of the people living there…
The burden of always being right.

Pictured: early morning from the patio. Left, “Snow on the Mountain” near the pond trickles toward the house. Middle, an unplanned pot gets whatever flowers I haven’t used elsewhere and will declare its’ own identity eventually. Today the white ruffly petunias are asserting themselves. Right, white petunia to snow-on-the-mountain, “Hello. How is it going down there?”

The conclusion of the matter~

All has been heard, all has been said and done; the end of the matter {the conclusion} is: Fear God [revere and worship Him, knowing that He is] and keep His commandments, for this is the whole of man [the full, original purpose of his creation, the object of God's providence, the root of character, the foundation of all happiness, the adjustment to all inharmonious circumstances and conditions under the sun] and the whole [duty] for every man.

Ecclesiastes 12.13 The Amplified + other words I think fit

The Russian Sage, left, thinks it is ok to naturalize and extend its’ borders. We will have to have a talk. Balloon background, right, from Wrex’s birthday.

SENT TO ME IN AN EMAIL FORWARD, and o-so-true….There are five things that you cannot recover in life:

(1) A stone…………..after it’s thrown,
(2) The word……….after it’s said,
(3) The Occasion….after it’s missed
(4) The Time……….after it’s gone.
(5) A person…………when they’re gone

When all has been said and done, most of what we worry our pretty little heads over (people’s opinions of us, status, getting ahead) won’t matter 5 minutes from now, let alone 10 years down the road. I really want to figure out how to be tired for the “right” reasons. The good kind of tired….

Posted in Birthdays/Anniversaries, Garden/Food/Seasons, Home, LIST! I love lists!, Stuff I actually think | No Comments »

Garden Debris as Decor

Tuesday, June 8th, 2010

Onion.

As thoroughly infatuated as I was watching the red onions carve out their architectural space in the garden (I wrote about it HERE), they were not invited to that spot. No, not all all. In fact, that particular space in that specific 4 x 4 (see Square Foot Gardening) had been called for by another crop and we signed the lease some time ago. However, I was happy tp let them homestead until time to plant the new crop.

I pulled them out today. I was ever-so-slightly reluctant, as the flower heads would have popped into their glorious splendor later this week for certain (at which time they’d have sent their seed frolicking and invading the rest of the backyard and garden). But my pre-soaked green bean seeds could wait no longer.

No pre-thought-out arrangement. I just stuffed them into my biggest container, where they were free to shoot in whichever direction they so desired..

Gathering the uprooted reds to carry to the house, I decided I’d dry and use the bigger onions, but throw the rest in a vase for my own enjoyment. I have them on the coffee table where they are emitting the very slight, subtle and truly sweet perfume that an onion possesses.

Yes, they had put down roots where they didn’t belong and had tried to claim the middle square as their own, but I couldn’t just leave them out on the street, could I? We are enjoying our mutually satisfying arrangement. I have quenched their thirst in a cool house and they are looking very green and happy and structural for me. It is a win-win.

Other garden debris you can enjoy

I also like using pruned shubbery twigs in vases, painted tree linbs on walls or in containers with uplights on them, zinnias from the pots, and rocks. Garden castaways can have a second life if you can take the time to find the beauty.

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Home, Stuff I actually think | 1 Comment »

Summertime…and the livin’ is easy

Sunday, June 6th, 2010

Fish Tacos, Sort-of-Ensenada-Style Mexican Slaw and all the fixin’s

Summertime and the living is easy

Fish are jumping and the cotton is high

Your daddy’s rich and your mama’s good-looking

Hush, little baby don’t you cry

don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry

no no no no don’t cry, don’t cry

Uncle Joe has a cabin by a lake near Aberdeen. Rocky fished there and brought home 12 of the best-ever walleye and we had a family fish fry the night after we all got home. Delish! {soft fried corn shells, guac and sour cream, cheese, the slaw with jalepenos, fresh tomato and cilantro salsa…omygosh…yummmmmm!}

No, these aren’t ours. These are google-images. We ate ours too fast to photograph them…but these? Bring back goooood memories!

Gavin and Guini spent the night and started asking for lunch 20 minutes after breakfast was over. You know what they wanted? That leftover fried walleye! They know a good thing when they taste it.

Gavin did a self-portrait photo shoot while here.

Good food with people you love intensifies the enjoyment all the way around. You may quote me on that!

So, thanks for the fish, Rocker-Bo. Gotta get you that boat so we can enjoy more-more-more!

Food + above-average company = Lots

and lots of LOVE!

P.S. And look: http://asoftplace.net/2010/06/hello-summer/ I found THESE after I posted about creating a SUMMER SANDBUCKET LIST the other day. Creative mommy/design blogs out there! I LOVE it!! Now I must make my own display like this! Good times in the summer!

NOTE TO SELF: Add {Mexico!!} to Summer Sandbucket List!

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, Mi familia, Songs I am singing, Stuff I actually think | 2 Comments »

Are You Ready for the Summer?

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

WASN’T SUMMER VACATION THE B E S T WHEN WE WERE KIDS??

Are you ready for the summer?

Are you ready for the sunshine?

Are you ready for the birds and bees,

the apple trees,

and a whole lot of fooling around

Three months of…nothing. Three months of everything! Summer was so great. I loved those last days of school: cleaning out my desk and hauling my No. 2 pencils home where they would be used for meaningless pursuits and drawing whatever I felt like. Time off from school!

I liked school. But I lived in anticipation of summer.

Pictured: Left, The dog just hangs out; Right, I snapped this quick shot of a sedum in my backyard. Then I saw grandbebe playthings in the background and realized THAT is really the beauty of summer…

Summer as a kid…

…Where I would spend inordinate amounts of time reading, playing with friends, acting out plays with siblings, watching baseball, playing jacks, organizing neighborhood projects, making homemade macaroni and cheese or pork and bean sandwiches (which were delicious-take my word for it) and listening to music. I loved basking in the sun and speeding around on a bike at twilight. I loved driving around with the windows down and small dipped cones at the Dairy Queen. Collecting fireflies in jars was fun, hopscotch on the sidewalk was normal and a brand new jumprope begged to be used. I skipped-a-rope and hula-hooped on long summer days.

Summer was never boring because if I’d said I was bored, my chores list would have been increased. So I kept busy and it was fun. And wow, I miss it. Don’t you?

Are you ready for the summer?

Are you ready for the hot nights?

Are you ready for the fireflies,

the moonlit skies,

and a whole lot of fooling around

Shouldn’t we all get a three month vacation when the sun is shining and the birds are singing and the pool is glistening? Shouldn’t we all get so much time off that when the fall comes around again and the lined paper goes on sale next to the argyle sweaters, we are thrilled to throw ourselves back in to it?

No more pencils, no more books

No more teachers dirty looks

No more math and history,

Summer time has set us free

Don’t read too much into this, but I find my red onions, especially against the puffy-clouded, Colorado-blue sky, very sexy. They are simply statuesque, very sculptural.

MY ADVICE:

During my workaholic-super-achiever days, I’d get to the end of summer and realize that, as an adult, I’d “missed” summer. Because even though we don’t get them “off” from all responsibilities more like when we were kids, I still had definite ideas on what “summer” should be, simple things…Like homegrown tomatoes, dinners of grilled steak and corn on the cob, big bowls of potato salad and ice cream in the backyard. I’d think of summer as being how many glasses of iced tea I’d enjoyed on the patio after a long, hard day in the yard or garden. I’d wish to have read a book, a really good book that had taught me something new and to have stayed outside until that last shred of light was gone on countless summer evenings. And yes, there should have been at least one miserable sunburn.

And for too many years, come Labor Day, I would look back and realize I hadn’t done any of those things. Or way too few.

See the bee in the middle picture?

So my advice to you? My advice to me? Plan now. Make your list and check it twice. What will you have to have enjoyed by Labor Day to know, that even though we are all grown up and have jobs and lives and responsibilities, you also had your “summer vacation”? What are those things for you? It will be like a Bucket List for Summer. Let’s call it, hmmm….a Sandbucket List. I will get mine started….(o, there will be more)…

My Sandbucket Summer List (the beginnings) ~

Lemonade on the swing, as many times as possible, in the evenings, on the patio (real lemons, yes, please)
A little getting-dirty-in-the-garden everyday – at least try to make it everyday
Fresh-brewed iced tea every time Tara comes over (because we are the tea lovers)
Sidewalk chalk art days with the grandbebes
Reading stories to the grandbebes on the patio swing
Roast marshmallows in the chiminea
An outdoor movie night
Slow walks around the neighborhood after dark
Fast walks really early in the morning
Fast drives over country roads (with the top down on the Mustang, of course!)
Some outdoor worship nights
Floating in the pool, listening to 70s music
Hanging out with the neighbors a little
Gotta wade around in a cold mountain stream
Maybe head over to a festival, perhaps Heaven Fest??!?
Sing my lungs out next to a rushing mountain river so only me and God can hear
Read a novel…hmmm… Altar by my husband?

“Summer breeze makes me feel fine, blowin’ through the jasmine in my mind….” Song: Summer Breeze by Seals and Croft

So there you have it. My Sandbucket List for right now. I will keep adding. Get your pen and paper out and start making yours. Tell me what you’ll be up to!

Are you ready for the summer?

Are you ready for the good times?…*

I am now!…Jeanie

*LYRICS: “Are You Ready for the Summer” from the movie classic, Meatballs (1979) starring Bill Murray.

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, LIST! I love lists!, Memories/Melancholy, Songs I am singing, Stuff I actually think, TV, Movies, Books, and Entertainment | 5 Comments »

In the Spring of Fields

Saturday, May 29th, 2010

SW Missouri.

Visiting the mamala and the papala with two of my sweets, Tara and Tredessa. Avoiding Branson on Memorial Day weekend, though I do want to do Sight and Sound’s Noah’s Ark show soon, and maybe tour the “Titanic.” Just not THIS time.

I plan to drive my new car home. $795. Oh, yeah, baby. {just dreaming}

I will strap Tara’s new tub on the top of my car.

Tara is THRIVING on the humidity and believes she was born for it. Ay-yi-yi!

It took us awhile to get this right.

Mom and dad (grandma and grandpa) took us to their favorite Chinese/Mongolian restaurant. It IS good.

Need a tub or shoeshine chair? I know where to find them.

Just mom on her average grocery-shopping day.

Pretty junk. Good prices.

Tredessa hit the jackpot: Her Knight in Shining Armor AND a perfect Director-of-Operations for Heaven Fest vehicle. Vrooooom….watch out!

Beautiful morning in Springfield, MO. Birds chirping, breeze blowing. Swing swaying, sweet moments. Home.

Even though I have never lived here, home is, at least partly, where mom and dad are. Always.

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Home, Mi familia, My most unforgettable people, Photos of the Fam, Stuff I actually think | No Comments »

Head Over Heels

Tuesday, May 25th, 2010

TEN REASONS TO GROW YOUR VEGGIES UPSIDE DOWN

google images

The main drawback for me, frankly, is how sort of odd-looking they are. I hate the vinyl ones you see in TV ads and most of the online examples leave something to be desired, but I am on the look-out for how to make them more beautiful because until I get my farm and I am stuck with my small, suburban yard, I have to use available space!

I grew one tomato plant upsidedown last year (a 5-gallon bucket wrapped in a bamboo shade for aesthetics. It grew at a very fast pace, which was fun. Then it got hammered by a terrible hail storm in late June and one half of the mass and length were shredded. But it still produced a good amount of tasty fruit. I will be growing more upside-down stuff this year. I’ll keep you posted!

NOTE: This was in yahoo-news yesterday: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/garden/20tomato.html?no_interstitial

There are tons of sites about how-to have an upside-down veggie garden. Google them! They have lots of images for ideas, too!

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Health, Home, LIST! I love lists!, Stuff I actually think | 5 Comments »

springstuff, the list

Monday, April 19th, 2010

“Imperfection is beauty,

madness is genius

and it’s better to be absolutely ridiculous

than absolutely boring.” ~ whosaidthis?

And isn’t April ridiculously mad and delicious?

Elise-the-Niece, the very personification of spring, is here for a visit on her way from almost a year on the YWAM base in Hawaii back to Aberdeen, SD and her family.

Things of spring: MY LIST~

Hunter, Gavin and Guini; Guini and Averi ~ artwork on the patio

Sidewalk chalk and seed packets.

Salad greens and spring showers.

Blue skies and garden bunnies.

Family birthdays and family food daze.

Birdsong and backyard play.

Sugar snap peas and Cherry Belle radishes.

Grandbebe chatter and catching up with neighbors over the fence.

Home Depot then home work.

Sidewalk sweeping and wagon pulling.

Clean windows and fresh air.

The boys building forts and digging holes for buried treasure.

Perennials popping up around the pond.

Sprouts in the garden and sproutonline.com

Petunias and pansies.

Lilies and lilacs.

The lawnmower’s roar and squeak of the swing.

Azure-blue dusk and snow-capped mountain horizons.

The smell of hot soil and the intoxicating scent of wet cedar mulch.

Fertilizer and polished furniture.

The whoosh of kids swinging and the wind’s soft whisper.

The grill fired up and sweet girls dressed up.

Terra cotta pots and tomato seedlings.

Bright lights and short nights.

The Kelley kids at church one evening last week; Elise-the-niece with Amelie Belle, the newest of the grandbebes.

April hath put a spirit of youth in everything. ~William Shakespeare

Stormie and Amelie; GemGem and her Aunt Tara; Stormie and Guinivere. At Stormie’s family birthday dinner.

Celebrating with mi familia! Happy Birthday, again, Stormie Dae Rhoades, spring baby and lovely girl! The grandbebes eating.

In springtime, love is carried on the breeze. Watch out for flying passion or kisses whizzing by your head. ~Terri Guillemets

Wrex and Stef with the birthday girl. The cookbook holder Wrex made for Stormie with his own two, bare hands! Same as the high-ticket model at Anthropologie. But better! Wrex practicing eating while holding a baby. He vows a tiny human being will not interefere in this department!

If you’ve never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a flower in spring bloom, maybe your soul has never been in bloom. ~Terri Guillemets

The coconut cake for Stef and Elise, icing/filling kinda to die for. Tara singing a song Stormie wrote for part of her birthday gift. Fruit Pizza is ever-so-much-more-scrumptious the next morning. Approximately 3872 calories. And I HOPE I am only kidding!

Outside after dark: the boys building their fort. Averi and GemGem, best cousins…just before the tragic accident. Gemma “ran right into” Hunter’s construction site and got quite the owie on her face. But a band-aid and a kiss makes everything better. That and getting some attention.

“Spring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems.” ~ Rainer Marie Rilke

{sigh}

I love spring. And I LOVE lists!

Posted in Birthdays/Anniversaries, Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, LIST! I love lists!, Mi familia, My most unforgettable people, Photos of the Fam, Stuff I actually think | 7 Comments »

The Green, Green Grass of Home

Friday, March 19th, 2010

We whipped up some “official supporter” t-shirts as thank-you gifts for the people attending our vision dinners this month. We thought we’d do a nice, spring-full-of-hope-and-brightness version, rather than the ever popular black t-shirt (and because people have been requesting it). We decided on a bright white with Heaven Fest green (aka Jeanie-green) print.

Here is the green we had in mind.

www.heavenfest.com

See the groovy-70s green above? That slightly yellow-er green that matches my computer??? Uh-huh. That was the green I was expecting.

Here is what we got.

It was such a unique green color I thought the t-shirt guy (who is w o n d e r f u l to us, btw) had invented it! I think I’ll call it: Longmont Green.

But leave it to Stef and Wrex to turn it into a beautiful St. Patrick’s Day fashion statement. They really did look bright and beautiful at our family dinner for Wrex’s wRunzas night! You can hardly tell Stef is pregnant (due 8/9/10…how cute is that??), but Wrex is showing a little more.

How did Stef manage to match that Longmont green? She is good!

We ate Runzas, aka Nebraskan Mystery-Meat Sandwiches, now known as Wrex’s wRunza’s and plopped on the couch for a family photo (everyone is there, but sadly you can only see Tredessa’s legs on the right, Rocky’s knee and Jovan’s pregnant belly on the left…guess we should have checked that…?), and ate lots of delicious desserts (Stef made 2 rolled ice cream cakes: a Reese’s PB and a mint-chocolate and Stormie did Andes-Mint-style Brownies)!

Most everyone wore green (although I have never seen so many clashing shades of it in my life), so we pinched each other just because anyway.

I call this portrait: Two bald guys in the kitchen.

Our planned entertainment of timing Jovan’s contractions was not to be. But the grandbebes kept us laughing and the ‘wRunzas’ turned out, so it was a good night.

It’s not THAT KIND of snow!!!

Yes, it is snowing today – the day before spring. But simmer down, people. It has been warm. It is not here to stay. Do you know why it is here???

To make everything GREEN!

Oh! May the God of green hope fill you up with joy, fill you up with peace, so that your believing lives, filled with the life-giving energy of the Holy Spirit, will brim over with hope!

Romans 15.7 The Message

I can live with that!

God spoke: “Earth, green up! Grow all varieties of seed-bearing plants, Every sort of fruit-bearing tree.” And there it was. Earth produced green seed-bearing plants, all varieties, And fruit-bearing trees of all sorts. God saw that it was good. It was evening, it was morning— Day Three.

Genesis 1.11 The Message

Posted in Garden/Food/Seasons, Grandkids, Home, Mi familia, My most unforgettable people, Photos of the Fam, Prayers for a God-full life, Songs I am singing | 7 Comments »