Getting back into the swing of things

It's been a while since my last post... My computer crashed twice and in the one week in between the crashes we lost our camera. Thankfully my computer is repaired and we found our camera.

This was back in December. I thought it was too funny not to post. Not only are we all reading or writing something, we're playing a game of "hearts"...

...while Micaiah and Kathy slaved away making the most fabulous caramelized onion rolls ever! 

On the way to our friends house we saw an old roadside attraction. Pa found another historical sign

The other part of the roadside attraction. Not sure why the others wanted a picture in front of it, but here it is.

Marscel tackled this back hallway and now it looks like a totally different place. I'll try and get an after picture for the next post.

It's so nice to be done with mudding and painting and fun to "decorate" the house with our pictures and such.

In our "garden". 

I was trying to get a picture of my curls. I did a type of pin roll and loved how they turned out. Perhaps a bit vain, but there you have it :-)

Chilling and playing rummy. Such a fun game! Marscel didn't agree so much that night. Poor kid I creamed him every round except one. He's such a good sport and kept humoring me by playing another round. There are days it's reversed, just not this one :-)

They say the water here is really bad and as our water filter only fits on the bathroom sink we wash all our vegetable there. You may wonder why we are washing so much kale... we love kale chips! The perfect snack in the afternoon... one of my favorites! They remind me of a cheese cracker, but there is no cheese and it's raw which means all the nutrients are still there! Yeah, things like this excite me (only when they taste good :-) Here you are folks try it for yourself:

1 bunch Kale, washed and broken into desired size

In blender, blend:

1 cup raw cashew, soaked for 2 hours

1 red pepper

juice of lemon

2 teaspoons Fruit Sweet

1 Tablespoon nutritional yeast

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon onion powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

pinch of cayenne

Mix with kale. Layer on trays and dehydrate on 105° until crisp (you can put it at 140° for the first hour to bring it up to heat and then turn it down to 105° to speed up the process) *Note when things are "cooked" below 105° it still is considered raw and having all the nutrients of not being cooked*

One of our dishwashers. Instead of having one dishwasher we have four rotating ones. 

Though it's not my favorite job it's not so bad since it reminds me of fun nights with the Flynns talking and washing dishes after dinner.

I've been having fun experimenting with new recipes. I was a bit skeptical of this one as it's pretty much only three ingredients (minus the toppings). So fabulously easy and just as delicious: http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/broccoli-leek-soup.html

Salad with Cesar Dressing and Butternut Squash Ravioli with butter and (real) maple syrup

This is the first time I've ever made ravioli and I must admit after the first batch I thought it might be my last. It was to time consuming and hard to work with... till I made a batch of the egg pasta with spelt flour instead of wheat. Much easier to work with! By the end of it I figured out how to do it faster and will probably make them again

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/egg-pasta.html

I love Williams Sonoma recipes! They even had helpful tips on making it. I love the fact that you can freeze them! And what could make it better then talking to one of my awesome brothers while I make it? ... ok, talking to any family member would be just as good... I love them all!

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/tip/making-ravioli.html

And the finished deal before cooking. With only four of us at home one 4lb squash made enough for more then four meals (to have with a salad, like above) I ended up making over 80 of them.

http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/pumpkin-ravioli-with-sage-butter.html

For those of you who aren't interested in my online picture cooking show I will now move on...

Monday reminded me of one of the reasons I like living here. Elizabeth and Katherine Hutchins were able to stop over on their trip. After a fun night of talking we realized we didn't take any pictures and had to remedy it, even if it was rather posed

A group shot before heading out. I hope we'll be able to do it again soon!

And guess what? It actually snowed here enough to make a snowman and go sledding... even if it didn't last a full day! Hopefully I'll get more pictures up soon of the "after" pictures of our place. Until then, 

Au Revoir!

Totaled

Last week we were reminded of God's love and protection over us in a big way. Pa, Mom, Matthew, and Micaiah were on their way to our friends house (Marscel stayed home with me because I was sick). As they were turning on their road they were hit by a car traveling 65mph. The other driver, an older lady, came over the hill and not thinking she could slow down in time she she had two options 1 swerve to miss them into oncoming traffic or 2 swerve off to the shoulder of the road. She did the second and lost control of the car hitting right near the passenger door of our van.

They were pushed 60 feet after the hit. That's our van on the left. We are so thankful it wasn't pushed into the road.

A close up of our van... the second to be totaled in our family. Mom was sitting in the passenger seat.

The other car. Her airbag went off and she was fine.

Pa and Mom off to the hospital in their first ambulance ride. Pa hit his face and has a huge blood blister on his lip and Mom bit through her lip. She had to get it glued and it's healing nicely and Pa's x-rays came back good! We were told most people that are in an accident on that road aren't so fortunate and don't make it out alive. Mom said the verse that kept coming to mind was Isaiah 26:3 "You will keep him in perfect peace,
       Whose mind is stayed on You,
      Because he trusts in You."

Back at the Cochrans. 

Thank you so much for taking care of them so well!

A group shot of the kids before heading back. Thank you for the pictures Savannah!

We are reminded of how fleeting our life is and rejoicing that though sore and bruised, the Lord protected them from any further harm!

Henry James Thomas

Henry James Thomas is here! 

He arrived at 6:06pm yesterday December 1st and was 9lbs. 4oz. 

Though unable to be there in person with modern technology I was able to take a picture of the Thomas family of four :-) Congratulations Michael and Rebekah... and Jack too!

We were so glad Mom was able to be there!

Jack was glad she could be there too!

I was hoping to get a post up before Thanksgiving, but was too busy with preperations and travel to Jordan and Melissa's, but here it is at last. It's been a while since the last post, but that certainly isn't because we haven't had anything interesting going on worthy of taking pictures. As I mentioned in our last post we were going to be moving to an apartment that needed some renovating. We are now officially out of the place in Edmond, but still working on our last room while living out of boxes as you shall see... but first I begin with before the move:

 It's so handy having a beautiful model when you are going through a photography class.

I hope to be like her someday!

art

Who says playgrounds are for kids?

Boxes in storage = moving has begun

Enjoying some fellowship with Hannah and Lily after a days packing. 

Thank you so much for your help, ladies!

First day of renovating. Step one: mud all holes in wall

Cleaning the only finished room... the bathroom. Glad we didn't have to fix anything in there!

Now for a tour of the "before" pictures...

The boys room aka Marscel's room.

My room... as well as the library and sewing spot. It opens into the boys room (the green in the lower picture) and through the double doors to the....

Living room

Top view is taken from the kitchen door and the bottom from my room

The kitchen... with cockroaches. Thankfully they have almost all been annihilated

The pantry (and closets for the master bedroom)

The master bedroom

The kitchen and pantry both had five layers of wallpaper and paint that had to be scraped off

The five layers in the pantry

Learning how to mud and tape from Mr. Bender

So many friends came to help on the weekend

AND a lot came the next weekend too! We are so blessed! Thank you all so much for your help

At first we thought the master bedroom was just paint... then we noticed parts of it peeling away. Seems they painted over wallpaper

After all the cracks and holes have been filled (all the little white patches) the texturing can begin

Knocking it down

"I think he is ready to go pro!"

After the texturing comes the priming and then ceiling paint

Next the paint. If you're tired of my tutorial like comments feel free to skip them. I won't be offended.

One room down five to go

Boys room after... the only room we were able to take after pictures in before the boxes arrived.

Starting my room. At first I wasn't sure of the color. It seemed like I was painting tomato soup on my wall. I love how it looks when it's dried though, so warm and colonial-ish.

We all kind of fell into a routine of "our" job. Mom does a great job on the trim!

The right side is before I cleaned the excess paint off the window. The left side is after.

Forever etched on the walls... for the "ever" that the walls are there anyway. Whether written on the walls or not the true love will remain

Speaking of love... Our photo assignment for the week was to take a framed picture.

*smile*

Moving day has arrived! This is the first move I was not there for the major moving day. I had the opportunity to go to the Gospel Centered Marriage Conference with Matthew and Micaiah. Unfortunately, since we only have one camera I don't have any pictures of our time there (You can order the set and hear what we heard at the NCFIC store). Back in Oklahoma I was told the camera battery died after this was taken. Just picture a bunch of busy people loading the truck, driving, and unloading.

When I arrived back I had to capture the memories of what it was like.

Just enough room for a mat. I can't wait to see the "after" pictures of the rooms :-)

Not sure where all this stuff will end up

Yeah, things are a bit packed

We just finished painting the pantry today, so it looks nothing like this... well the walls look nothing like this... everything else looks similar

Having to work around all the boxes was an added challenge...

It made for some interesting, fun situations. I was only balancing on a pole from the staging that wasn't set up and  was only balanced against the wall. This was my happy solution. I ended up having to move things to set a ladder up in the end since I can't cut the paint in behind my back... not yet anyway.

Pa working on one of the most warped, patch needing places. Looks great now.

Mom painting, sprinkling more love here and there

At first glance I thought all the hard work was aging Marscel rapidly. 

He sure cleans up well though

Practicing with reflectors and indoor lights with our neighbor Brad.

In case you think we always look good... here you see we don't wake up looking all with it. Nevertheless we wish Mom a very happy birthday. We usually go sing to the person when we first get up. Sometimes we like to light a candle and stick it in an apple or orange, but having neither we thought cookies were a happy alternative and having the candles packed the lighter worked.

The Cochrans remembered it was her birthday and put up decorations when we visited them.

Happy Birthday, Mom! You don't look more then 24! No wonder people think we're sisters! I love it and I love you!

One more reason I love our small town 

*Note: Children do not try this at home without your parents permission

Our first visitors in Guthrie! The Rudds braved our box filled house to be able to visit.

Taking time to smell the roses... or in this case pet some puppies

We're so glad you were able to come! 

What would a tour of Guthrie be without a visit to the drugstore museum?

One more shot together... I always loved these type of shots.

The advantage to playing the same song over and over again is you still remember it years later and can play it when you visit the First Publishing Museum

Fancy what we'd see on the back of the piano!

They did end up using one of the pictures we took back in April

The more the merrier? You bet! I love the saying "There's always room for one more". Overlapping with the Rudds, Stephen also got to stay with us. Since he was working at the horse show during the day we would catch up in the evenings.

Thanks for all your help, Stephen! If you ever need big appliances moved (ie fridges and freezers), or a bunch of cans and jars stacked, Stephen is the man.

Good friends, good conversations, good times

We thought we should get a picture of how he spent most of his time... since most of his time was spent sleeping. I wonder if he always sleeps smiling :-)

Me and two of my "little" brothers.
As Mom is with Michael and Rebekah (stay tuned for whether I'll have another nephew or niece!) We didn't have a camera for the rest of the week and thus, were unable to take any pictures of the American World Quarter Horse Show. Thanks for taking us Stephen!

Hopefully I'll get a thanksgiving post up soon... sooner then later anyway.