My how time flies

Like the old saying goes..."how time flies when you're having fun!"

48 years ago today, a baby girl was born to Floyd and Harriet. This baby girl was somewhat of a surprise pregnancy as this baby's siblings were 9 & 12 years older than her. Harriet begged the dr. to let them take their new little daughter (maybe not so little at 10 lbs) home a day earlier than was customary as there was a nasty March snow storm predicted for the next day. The dr. agreed and all were settled in their home by the time Northern Illinois was blanketed in a whole lot of the white stuff.

The little girl had a wonderful time growing up on the farm where she swung on the tire swing, played dolls on the front porch, got her boots stuck in the garden mud and screamed and screamed until her Mommy came to the rescue, bottle fed calves, watched the pigs play and loved riding her pony, Midnight whenever she could convince her big sister to saddle him for her.

The little girl was raised on the farm until she was seven when her family moved to a nice, little, home on the edge of town. It was there she spent her "wonder years" until marrying and moving to a town far, far away (10 miles) where she lived until ten years ago when she moved back to a location where she can see the farm she started out on across the field.

During that time this girl (now a woman, old lady, chick, etc) raised three sons (with the help of her husband, of course). Those three sons have all now flown the coop, leaving an empty nest but blessing her with two beautiful grandbabies and allowing time for just her and her husband to be a couple again.
It's been a great ride for her so far and this "old woman" can't wait to see what God still has in store for her. In the meantime, she's just swimming in His flow!

It's all about perspective

The snow we mostly see as a pain in the backside, our New Orleans friends see as a great adventure.

Pastor Teresa learning the ins and outs of tractor driving from Dan(above) and Pastor Larry(below).

Suzanne on a Suzue (pronounced Suzy) tractor. How appropriate is that?

Pastor Teresa making her long awaited snow angel.

Isn't most everything in life about perspective? We can choose to see anything that come our way as a pain or an adventure, as a blessing or a curse, as the glass half-full or half-empty.

What do you typically choose to do?

What does an angel look like?

An angel looks like this and her name is Tami!

The Pastors from His Hands 2 Go, the organization we work with on our short-term mission trips in New Orleans are coming to visit this week and will be staying with us.

This dear friend, Tami, knowing that, showed up at my door last night with cleaning supplies in hand. She told me she was going to clean my upstairs for me to get it ready for our guests. She blew me away.

This woman, my friends, was Jesus with skin on to me last night!

Love is.....

Love means so many different things to different people.

When I think of love, I think of


My husband and best friend of almost 29 years who makes me breakfast most every morning, is a wonderful man and servant of God, puts up with alot of garbage from me especially during these wonderful mid-life mood swings. He is amazing!



Our sons and their wives(Luke & Laurie-top left, Jon & Heidi-top right) and fiance. Yes, we have another marriage coming up. Joe & Kristin(bottom right) were engaged on Christmas. We are blessed to have three wonderful, thoughtful, respectful sons and daughter-in-laws.

And our two beautiful grandbabies. Owen who is almost 10 months and Ava who is 2-1/2. They are truly a delight. I never understood the saying "if I knew how much fun grandchildren were, I would have had them first" but I sure do now. We thoroughly enjoy every minute we get to spend with these little gifts from God.


Happy Valentines Day everyone!

Fun Stuff

I saw this idea on a blog the other day and decided to give it a try.

I like the fact that you could make it as primitive or modern as you want depending on how you paint the frame and what paper you put in it. I chose paper that reminded me of old wallpaper and didn't paint the frame. I left it in all it's glory with gouges, chips and all.

This is such an easy project. I found the window at a salvage house, then used glue dots to place the scrapbook paper on the backside of the glass. Wallah, a new piece of artwork for under $10! I could even change out the paper during the holidays if I want.

Now, tell me, how fun is that?




Sorry the picture is a little washed out. I couldn't get it without a reflection off the glass but you get the idea.

Scrapblog

I read in a blog the other day about a website called Scrapblog. Sorry I can't remember whose blog it was to give you credit.
Anyway, it's the coolest thing!

It's a free site and you can create fun stuff like this...

There are tons of backgrounds, themes, stickers, etc to play with.

It's user friendly and FREE! It just don't get no better than that!

Our little bread raiser

I mentioned in a previous post about how I enjoy making bread in the winter as I can let the dough raise on the corn burner. It can be quite the topic of conversation for those who have never seen or heard of one before. I thought I'd show what it's all about starting with the cleaning process. We clean it everyday. I'm using the term "we" in a very general way as I really don't do much with it other than enjoy the warmth.

We=hubby Dan

DIRTY

CLEAN

We start it with wood pellets soaked in lighter fluid first. Sometimes it gives us trouble not wanting to stay lit.
Dan has to preach it a sermon on those occasions about the virtues of staying lit.


The corn feeds in with an auger out of a bin in the back. We go through about 1-1/2 to 2 bushel of corn a day. It does a nice job in heating our home with the exception of the subzero weather we've had. It doesn't keep up as well then but I doubt any furnace does at that point.

Almost there

Ahhh, yes, time to grab a book and curl up in the corner. We'll chat later, I'm off to do some reading.

Have a warm, cozy night. I will!

Good ol' comfort food

To me ,the poster child of comfort food is fresh, warm sweet rolls straight from the oven.
I don't make these often but every once or twice a winter, I'll get a whim and make batch or two or three. A batch equals 2 - 9x13 pans and I've made 3 batches since Saturday. Hey, when I get on a roll, I get on a roll. (No pun intended) :) And no, we have not eaten 6 pans of sweet rolls ourselves, but hubby-man has almost polished off one.
I sent one home with our son and daughter-in-law, a pan went to work with me this morning for "my guys" there and a pan with Dan for a group of men who were moving furniture for church this morning. The last two pans are raising right now and are going to a shop who let Dan borrow a much needed tractor manual a while back.

I always use my Mom's recipe. As a child growing up it was something she would make when she was hosting a morning Stanley or Tupperware party. Do you remember those? You can stir them up the night before, refrigerate overnight and form into rolls in the morning. Cinnamon rolls might seem difficult but they really are pretty quick and easy.

So without further delay, let's get started.

Mama's sweet rolls
In a large bowl, mix and stir until the shortening is melted;
1 cup hot water
1/2 cup sugar
2 T. shortening
1 teaspoon salt


In another bowl, stir until yeast is dissolved;
1 cup lukewarm water
1 T sugar
2 packages of rapid rise yeast

Beat 2 eggs and add to yeast mixture first, then to first mixture.

Stir in 5-1/2 to 5-3/4 cups flour. Mix well and refrigerate overnight.

In the morning, punch down and roll out into a large rectangle.



Brush generously with 1/4 cup of melted butter. It has to be butter, margarine just won't due for cinnamon rolls.



Then sprinkle well with cinnamon and smush it around on top of the dough with your fingers so the top is entirely brown. Sprinkle liberal amounts of brown sugar on top of that.



Starting with one of your long sides, roll up tightly, sealing edges by pinching together.



Cut into rolls. I usually can get 24 - 30 out of a batch.


Let rise until doubled in size.

I always let mine rise on our corn burning stove as the top is nice and warm. If you use the Rapid Rise yeast and sit the pans in a nice warm spot, they only take 1-1/2 hours to raise.
Once doubled, bake at 350 for 15 - 20 minutes.



Frost while still warm with cream cheese frosting. No light cream cheese here either (it goes along the same line as only butter).

ENJOY!

Cream of Mushroom Soup

I just made the best soup. I found the recipe on Chronicles of a Country Girl's blog and went from there. I'm not a big cream of mushroom soup fan unless it's in a casserole but I've changed my mind now.


Go check out her recipe. The only thing I did different was used a package of Knorr vegetable soup mix as I couldn't find the cubes.
And I think next time I'll try and cut back on the butter.

This only took a few minutes to make but tasted like you took all the time in the world.
Give it a try!

Winter is good for one thing..

Sunsets! There isn't much that beats a winter sunset. There is just something about the contrast between the white ground and the colors of a sunset, isn't there?




I'm baaaaccckkkk!

It feels like I have been away from blogging for an eternity. Between the holidays, a two week mission trip to New Orleans(check out the trip blog) and the startup of our campus Spring semester time has been at an incredible premium in the last month. I'm hoping it's now settling down to a dull roar. Time to hole up in the house in front of the corn burner and relax a little.

While at the doctor today (for a sinus infection I seem to have brought home from New Orleans), I mentioned to him a concern I have of the forgetfulness and inability to focus I've experienced lately.

After discussion about what has been going on in my life recently. His very eloquent $80 answer was "stop trying to juggle so many balls at once." How does one start dropping those balls out of the sequence? I've tried before somewhat sucessfully but then it seems I go back and pick them up again. Kind of like giving my concerns and worries to God...I lay them at His feet and then go grab them back again!
Does anyone else have trouble with this? What's your solution? What have you to backed away from recently?

Here's to the rest of the winter and dropping some of those balls! I'm really going to do it this time, really I am. Well, at least for a while.