Food, are you hungry?

Many of you who know us know that we are passionate about FOOD....
well we have to consume it several times a day to sustain life and it is at the root of many of our joys (can anyone say chocolate????), and pains (hello, tooth aches, diabetes, those 10 lbs we would just love to lose)
I really do spend my spare 5-10 minutes here and there digging up all I can on the subject.
If you have 40 mins to watch, or watch a little, and come back later. Enjoy the following:
It is time to take control of our own food, just as our Prophets have always encouraged us to do.....

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2008/12/27/the-food-industry-challenges-that-obama-needs-to-address.aspx

Let it Snow!!

So, we're working on our FOURTH snow storm in a week - yes folks, we woke up this morning with more snow falling (it has since turned to rain).  Our last snow storm, Sunday night, left us with a hefty 12 inches of the light powdery stuff and I had a very interesting experience that I wanted to share.

I went outside after breakfast to face our driveway, which is just big enough to park 4 cars (2 x 2).  Now, I realize that it's not a big driveway by any means.  We have a snow scoop, which makes the job pretty easy.  The difficulty lies with our almost 4 year old.  She loves to help and her method of helping is to wait until I have filled the scoop with snow, then she climbs on.  In the process of climbing into the snow scoop, she knocks half of the snow out.  She then rides to the top of the mound of snow that I am making, then falls out so I can empty the snow, then rides the scoop down.  It makes for a very long process.  In addition to that, every once in awhile she has to get the sled out and take a few runs down the mound of snow - her little "hill" (pronounced "hee-uhl" that would make any southern mother proud).

As we were thus in the process of cleaning out the driveway - we were about an hour into the project and hadn't even cleared enough to park a car, I looked up and saw a guy park his truck out in front of the neighbor's house across the street.  In the back of his truck was a snowblower.  I assumed that he was there to snowblow the neighbor's driveway, so I continued to fill another scoop with Liliana.  The guy unloaded his snowblower and parked it next to our driveway.  He jumps through the 2 feet of snow at the beginning of the driveway and hands me a card.  He told me his name was Michael and that he was from the Kindness Center and was there to clear my driveway for free.  I looked at him and told him that would be appreciated.  Thirty minutes later, the driveway was clean.  He wished me a Merry Christmas and said that he was happy to do my driveway for me so that I could spend more time with my daughter.   

Why he picked me to help, or why he was driving down our road, I don't know.  I do know that it was one of God's Tender Mercies, giving me some help that I needed at the time.  I later looked at his website: www.thekindnesscenter.com .  He goes around to different middle schools in southern Maine and gets the kids to do different activities to promote kindness.  His story is on it, explaining why he does what he does.  I have thought about this whole experience a lot and has helped me to think about how I can help others more.  

christmastime

I love Christmastime. I always have. Jacob, liliana, and my mom our at our Ward Christmas devotional tonight. I stayed home inorder to put mattie to bed. She is still getting over sickness. As for me, I can't wait to get over my '6 week illness'. 4 more weeks to go till Im out of the first trimester!!!!!WAHOOO....It is these weeks (and labor, cant forget that) that make me say the very common, " I am NEVER going to do this again".
Well having number 3 means that I cant be taken for my word when it comes to this..Its not that I forgot how hard it all is nor how painful, its just I am realizing the endless capacity to love and for some strange reason (cant blame it on drugs, didn't have any) I was already thinking about baby #3 in the hospital with Mattie. Please, someone should lock me up, or just put me out in the woods. jacob knows I would never find my way out!
liliana is so very excited for a new sibling. I am so grateful that I have not had to deal with a jealous older sibling. She just loves her little sissie so much and looks out for her very well. My love for them grows as I watch their love blossom together. It never occurred to me that my kids might actually love one another (hmmm...maybe I came from a dysfunctional home....???) She has already informed us what she would like to call the baby, let us know what you think:
Boy-weenie
girl-sybil
(by the way, both of these names are names of animals in some of her recent book finds-she must have been inspired)

We are enjoying jacob being home for vacation. What a difference two full time parents makes! He is still busy working on securing a job (residency) for next year. It is quite the process and we really wont know the final answer of where we go till Feb 9th and yes, we will post the results. In the end it matters little where we would like to go, it all depends on who wants him there, so a few more weeks of knots in our stomachs..seriously, we have to PAY to go through this mess.....

Craziness Abounding

So, with the holidays upon us, we have decided to make our lives as crazy as possible!  Many of you know that Heather's mom is staying with us for a little bit.  Not only do we have that, and all that comes with having an extra person in a 2 bedroom house with an open study area, but my car decided to loose it's engine on the way home from Skowhegan Wednesday afternoon during a snow storm.  On top of that, Heather and Mattie came down with the flu.  If that wasn't enough, Heather's pregnant (if you couldn't tell from the ticker on the left side of the page), and is fairly run down from that.  

Life is great!  Thank goodness for loving friends and family that help us out!

camping

Well, we had a family camping trip this past weekend....
We wouldnt have normally planned one for the winter but, thankfully we were prepared
Due to an Ice storm, our electricity was out for a few days. We brought our Coleman camp stove inside, placed it ontop of our normal stove. We cooked yummy food that we ate by the light of candles and flashlights. We also were very fortunate to have , what used to be considered just a decoration, a wood stove that runs on propane (the kind with the fake wood in it). We turned that sucker on to stay warm and invited many over from the ward so they too could stay warm.
Jacob and I have been feeling for a few months now that we needed to prepare a good 72-hr kit. We have yet to collect everything, but we had collected many things that totally helped us this past weekend. Many in our ward and surrounding towns still do not have power and it appears it will be anther week or so for loads of people. I told jacob that living in the ghetto part of town finally paid off (we live close enough to downtown we are on the top of the list for power restoration)
I still feel like there will be many more upcoming times when we will need to rely on our 72-hr kit and long-term food storage.
There were a few key items we would have been hurting not to have. water goes first at the store (although the beer isle seems just as empty!!!). thankfully we always had running water, because we would not have had enough for 72 hrs worth for cooking, cleaning, and drinking. We also were burning through candles at a faster clip than I realized I would. And note to self...each child wants their OWN flashlight...even if it is a visiting child, over for the sake of getting warm....
also, some children, no longer know what to do if there is nothing 'on' to entertain them....We did not have that problem with liliana, she loves board games and will play as many as you can stand but it would be worthwhile to have 'practice' runs where the family does not have access to electricity, so that all get used to what it is really going to be like.
I am so thankful that this emergency is over for us. I am exhausted from the camping trip.

Obituary

We will miss you!!!!!!!!!

You came so far, from Germany to flavor our homes. When you arrived, you were so tiny, only the same size as 4 pieces of rice. When you left us today, you measured at 1 cup. How you grew! You were so shy when you arrived, but soon found comfort in our yummy raw milk. You thrived and we thrived right along with you. We never knew it would end this way, how could anyone know???
There are so many 'what if' questions that have no answers. Like, what if you had had a different adopted mother, maybe then you wouldn't have died during a fire in the oven. I am sure a different caretaker would never have knowingly put you in the oven and turned it on broil, while draping a dish towel on top of you.
I tried to save you. It was too late.....just too late...the dish towel that protected you blew up into flames,and your special plastic top (made lovingly, by your adopted father) melted just like a camp fire marshmallow right into your bubbling container.
I can hardly stand to look at your charred self.
You can never be replaced (although a new shipment is arriving next week), you will always be our first kefir grains. We learned so much from you....

an army

This is crazy....a batallion has been deployed in our own country...

http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/18737/