Sweetheart Supper

The Sweetheart Supper went off wonderfully this year. I thought it would be fun to give you a run down of the the activity involved:

Saturday while Michelle and I grocery shopped, Kara began baking desserts and Jessica watched Kara's son and my kids. Saturday night Diane and JB joined me at the church to wash the stem ware and the china while Ryan was at home marinating pork loins and making raspberry vinaigrette.

Sunday after church we dropped our kids off at my parents for a movie and popcorn party and began the rush to get things done. Tracy and Ali peeled 15 pounds of potatoes before I got back to the church. We then were joined by Diane, JB and Jessica for set up. Between the six of us, we got the tables set up, covered, and set for each guest. M&M's were an added touch which seemed to be a great snack for those of us settting up.

Meanwhile Ryan peeled the rest of the potatoes and moved outside to cook potatoes and pork loin. By this point I'd made multiple trips to the store: grab lunch, back to get batteries for the grill starter and something else. Kristen showed up and some time in there they began candying the pecans for the salad and did LOTS of stirring. It all kind of blurs together but I think JB and I were setting up the lighting while Michelle was doing dishes. The church was out of dish soap and I made trip #3 to the store while Jessica ran home to get her slicer. Ryan came in with the finished potatoes and I heard him say he didn't think he had enough. Seriously, it was 20 pounds of potatoes. Apparently cooking them in the turkey fryer (it was clean people) got nice and warm and they disintegrated into the water. His potatoes looked like potato soup and were reduced to about 5 pounds of potatoes. To the store again and this time I drove. More potatoes were peeled, Ryan was grilling, Michelle was doing dishes and we were right on track.

I went to the bathroom to change out of my grubby clothes but had forgotten a camisole to go underneath. Great. Asking Ryan if the shirt was too low cut, all of us ladies got a realistic lesson in how guys think. Kendra ran home and got me a camisole and I headed back to the bathroom to get ready. Back in the kitchen Spenser and Kendra were there to get the salad ready. It looked super yummy and I realized much later when I sat down to eat that I forgot to have them put the crumbled goat cheese on! Oops.

Shortly after that, our drivers (Kendra, Pastor Lee and Spenser) headed out to get a few of the ladies. I headed outside to greet the ladies as they arrived at the church.

We had 25 women join us for supper. They were thrilled to be there. Down the steps they were again greeted by some friends who took their coats. As they removed their coats, in front of them was a table full of roses donated in secret - one for each lady that came.

They sat at the tables and began chatting away with their neighbors, friends, and those who were there to serve them. I welcome the ladies and prayed before we served them. Salad was served first. Organic greens from the local food co-op topped with crumbled bacon, purple onion, candied pecans (they will stick to wax paper if you bake them - we found out), and home-made raspberry vinaigrette.

While they were enjoying the wonderful flavors of the salad, we were preparing the main dish. While some cleared the salad plates, others refilled drinks and served the main dish. We enjoyed Pork Loin grilled by Ryan, green beans prepared with bacon, garlic and spices by my folks, and mashed potatoes prepared by Ryan.

While ladies were enjoying their food, and servers were clearing plates and chatting, Shane and John were providing background music. Considering my lack of communication with Shane, this was perfect. Shane and John were amazing as they played guitar, mandolin and even the harmonica. It was lovely.

After supper dishes were cleared, the guys took a break to eat and the ladies each had a chance to share their favorite thing of the year. This sounds really corny to me and I wish I could come up with something better. But honestly, I think they love sharing so it works out well.

By time we were done with sharing, dessert began coming out of the kitchen. Kara is wonderful at baking. She prepared two kinds of truffles, "X", "O", and heart sugar cookies that were amazing. Nothing simple from Kara. By time dessert was served, I think us volunteers had the extra desserts polished off!

After dessert, we did some more visiting before the ladies picked their rose and got ready to go home.

It was a lovely evening. I'm so incredibly thankful that I could serve in such a small way in my community. I'm blessed beyond measure for my friends who helped out. Many hands make light work! For those who helped out financially, those who shopped, watched kids, set up, cooked, baked, served, photographed, cleaned-up and whatever else people did. I can't wait for next year!!!

Isaac

Kalahari Resort

Well, I intended to share some pictures of our time at the Kalahari Resort. Thinking my hubby loaded all of them to my ipod, I started this post. Only to find out that he loaded the first half (that I had downloaded onto his laptop) onto my ipod and the rest are still on the camera... so here's what I'll share for now:
My meal Wedneday night. We started with coconut shrimp for an appetizer. They were awesome. My meal was a stir-fry that I didn't appreciate and thanks to Fort Dodge Animal Health, I was encouraged to order something else. I then ordered the coconut shrimp dinner and it was lovely. I couldn't believe it came out looking like this:

On our way back from supper, we stopped on a little rock for a family picture. Scott was less than thrilled to be taking the picture but Ryan smiled nicely and Bethany looks all grown up.
While at the African themed resort, God kept gently reminding that I wanted to love a child in need in His Name. I couldn't believe that the entire resort was full of reminders (both fun and historical) of Africa. I wanted to take their decorations home with me.

It was good to get away for a few days. An early morning coupled with no nap and a little boy who wouldn't poop made for a difficult day. But we did enjoy time with Ryan at lunch, a short visit to the waterpark, and eventually nap time. Thursday went much better when they slept in and we went to the waterpark first thing. I won't admit that my soon pooped (just a little) in his swim trunks at the waterpark some time before we got to the toilet. What fun to clean up! I will tell you that my son who is not adventurous (doesn't like the slide, doesn't ride a bike) loved the big waterslides where he had to ride a boat! What fun. Maybe more of those pictures in the coming days.

Life Happens

A quick photo update:

Scott rubbing aloe vera lotion on his sun burned face. He came downstairs with it all over. It was too cute!
Bethany loves to go out in the shop with her grammy. She can be found sitting next to Grammy on a stool playing with "toys" while Grammy quilts. This and meal time are the only times you can find this child sitting still.

Daddy reads to Bethany just before she goes to bed.

Aunt Janie finally taking a picture of the tree with beautiful fall colors after talking about the tree for 5 days.

Great Gram, Aunt Janie and Scott go for a walk to the park.

I hate waking up to a dark sky and have a hard time dragging my butt out of bed when its dark. But the gorgeous sunrises I see as I head to work make it all a little better.

Wii weren't the only ones having fun with our new toy. Ryan's parents and grandparents could be found playing the Wii last Sunday at our house

Right after a nap is not a good time for Great Grandpa to hold Bethany... but a cookie might make all the difference.

fun with the kiddos

Last night we went to the park for a bit. Some friends were gathering for volleyball but I decided not to play. Instead I pulled the weeds in the one flower garden they have and it looks much happier now. When I was done with that and friends were all showing up, I took kid duty. We had fun. Z and B were having a "guy party" since their mom and sister were out of town. Their dad brought them toys to play in the sand and even thought to bring toys for Scott. It was such a sweet gesture. After they were done in the sand (mostly because Scott kept throwing sand at Z and B, naughty boy), we played on the swings. I wish I had a picture of it. I had 4 kids in swings and was running back and forth pushing them as high as I could, telling them to hold on tight, pushing their little butts back into the swing, pushing some more, listening to them giggle and getting quite the work out.

Not sure if my arms are sore this morning from the swingset work out or from loading fire wood on Saturday!

Seine

Seine (noun) - 1. a fishing net that hangs vertically in the water, having floats at the upper edge and sinkers at the lower.

Some days, I do really interesting things and today was one of those days. A quick stop between appointments at the local trout hatchery and I caught a glimpse of an interesting project. When we had all the flooding, the hatchery flooded. Fish were out of their raceways and downstream. Fishing near a hatchery recently has proved to be quite a catch. Today, the guys were using a seine to gather some of the fish from the overflow pond and put them back into the raceways. The trout are raised at the hatchery and then put into nearby cold water streams. In previous seining events, they've gathered over 25,000 trout. Today was another venture to save some fish to be returned to the cold water streams. It was really cool to watch it all happen. Check out these pictures:

First you start with the seine which is weighted on the bottom and has the floaty things at the top. You line one edge of the pond with it.

The boys swam the end of the seine across the pond to create a huge net

Then you begin to pull your net in, hoping its full of fish

Once you have the fish in a confined area, you can begin to fish them out. In this case, they were removed with a net, put into the trucks that usually deliver them to the stream, taken to the raceways and put back into their homes.

Wedding Shower and Bachellorette Party

I had a weekend with the girls and it was lots of fun. Thanks to hubby for making arrangements for his parents to keep the kids. And thanks to his parents for coming down so I could go out and have some fun with the girls!

Friday night was the wedding shower. The invite said "lace and frills welcome". The previous shower I went to, the bride got a million pairs of thongs. So, I decided on something a little different. I took an artichoke jar out of our recycle bin. Cleaned it up and made a new label. It looked just like the old one only it was specific to the bride and groom. It had an ingredients label and nutrition label and the whole bit. The jar was filled with lots of "frills". We had a good time. One thing I'd change is that I'd find out ahead of time if the bride's @postalic mother would be there. And in the event she'd be in attendance, I'd save my gift for another time. Needless to say, the mother didn't appreciate the "lace and frills" and it was obvoius!

Saturday we spent the day on the Mississippi River. Thirteen friends, the bride and the "slave" had a fun day together. A big thanks to RJ for driving the pontoon boat for us. It was fun celebrating and enjoying a little sunshine. I had a blast on the wave runners and laying on the beach. They talked me into wearing a cute bikini and I got a little tan. Woo hoo, its the 1st of July and I'm finally getting some color to my skin!

It was quite the adventurous day. A few things to remember... I forgot to stop in M town at the Quick Trip with the other Suburban. In fact, we were having so much fun talking, I don't even remember driving through the M town! How many people can say that it hailed on them while they were on a sand bar on the Mississippi? Yes, we can. It hailed for about 3 minutes and poured for another 10. It was crazy. Don't wear your contacts if you'll be splashing around on a wave runner. [side note: I didn't know about the wave runner and wore my contacts thinking I'd be spending the day basking in the sun with friends]. And one last thing to note, after losing the safety key to the wave runner, don't volunteer to hold the button out with your fingers the whole time back to the docks. Even if you can see the bridge from there, its a long drive and your hands will get really, really tired. I had forgotten what river water smells like. Its not so pleasant but I loved every moment of it. The river here was tons warmer than the San Joaquin River I grew up playing in!