Saturday, October 25, 2008
house for rent
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
More cooking pictures
And here are the menus I promised but never posted:
BROILED FISH STEAKS1
CHICKEN POT PIE
MEAT LOAF
CHICKEN & RICE
HASH BROWN CASSEROLE
CHICKEN GOULASH
BROCCOLI SALAD
TUNA NOODLE CASSEROLE
EAT OUT
SLOPPY JOES
ORIENTAL CHICKEN SALAD
LASAGNA
HONEY WORCESTERSHIRE CHICKEN
OVEN FRIED FISH
SMUCKER’S CHICKEN SALAD
ENCHILIDAS
SPAGHETTI
ROASTED CHICKEN & NEW POTATOES
BEEF RICE-A-RONI WITH VEGGIES
OMELETS
CHILI DOGS
ORANGE-ALMOND TROUT
BEEF STROGANOFF
SOUTHWESTERN BEANS AND VEGGIES
CHICKEN SATAY
DELI SANDWICHES
CHICKEN & DUMPLINGS CASSEROLE
BROCCOLI QUICHE
GRILLED FISH
TWICE BAKED POTATOES
FRITO SALAD
Tonight we're having omelets - yummy
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Menus
Valentine's Day
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Profound words
That “Time of the Year”
“Are you getting the Christmas spirit?” It’s funny, as many times as we’ve heard that, we may not be able to define it, but we know what it means. The stores thrive on it because something puts us in the mood to shop. Sure, it’s crowded and rushed, but there’s a whole cluster of warm associations and memories: family coming home, good food, music, bright lights, brightly-colored ads, and stores and clothing. It’s just so … so … festive! Before recorded history, people probably celebrated the time when the days stopped getting shorter and started getting longer as signifying hope that life would return to the land. Much later, the Christian church incorporated it into its tradition. The years have combined many ancient and cultural symbols, from Christmas CDs to Christmas specials, from Santa to gift-giving, to become the holiday we enjoy today. Recently, we shake our heads at the odd tug-of-war between “Merry Christmas” and “Season’s Greetings” – between school programs where “Silent Night” has been silenced and we ”rock” around the Christmas tree.
The “True Meaning”
The historical event at the core of this holiday has almost completely vanished from public consciousness. But isn’t Christmas just a tradition? After all, there’s nothing about a Christmas holiday in the Bible. And since it became part of the religious calendar so long after Christ lived and the New Testament was written, we’ve gotten both the year and the time of year wrong (the birth was probably 5-7 B.C., and the time of year was almost surely not winter.) So where does that leave us? Does this charming little story have anything to say in a cynical, modern world?
Perhaps just like God took his window of opportunity to send a very personal message to earth, we have a window of opportunity to bring a very hopeful message to a restless world. Incredibly, God broke into human history with a “whisper”, a threadbare, young couple; a newborn in a feed trough? Come on. … A cosmic shift was set in motion, and hardly anybody noticed. Don’t you see, God acts on His own terms, and those terms have little to do with earthbound power, worldly wealth, and human wisdom. All of those have a limited run on life’s stage and finally leave us hollow and still yearning for more. Remember that seasonal “spirit” I mentioned? Well, there is a Spirit – He’s God’s Spirit, and He calls to our spirits, “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the water without cost; the water that truly satisfies.” Jesus said, “anyone that drinks of me will have springs of living water welling up from His soul.” Jesus wasn’t saying, “I’m this very profound teacher, bro, and if everybody just gets along, we’ll all be cool.” Is that our impression of Him? Not even close! He was God’s Son, sent from God Himself, sent to shake up the world, sent to welcome seeking hearts. He came to dies, He came to save us from our own self-centeredness, hurtfulness and pride, He came to draw us back to God’s own heart, to rise from death to life, to live among any who would give themselves to Him, to show us how to treat each other. And perhaps finding beyond our desperation the joy that comes as we reach out to touch the cheek of a certain sleeping Child.
Feel free to share this as much as you like...just give glory to God and credit Ken Hougey as writer. Thanks!
Monday, June 18, 2007
Pretty things
Here's what our old one was like:
Here are my knickknacks, safely behind glass, so they need little dusting:
Lastly, just so you know it's still me, here's some things that aren't so great:
My knitting...I bought all sorts of needles and yarn, etc a few years back, and now hardly use them, but I hate to throw or give them away, because I still like knitting.
This coffee table was one of the first nice pieces of furniture that we owned...you can maybe see the chip in the glass (lower right corner of the glass, and taped to cover sharp edges - we had already paid to replace the glass once.
Hope you've enjoyed my little tour...I have even more pictures, but that's enough for now.Friday, March 16, 2007
HAIR
When I went to college, my hair was short, mostly blunt cut, and halfway through college, I got a really nice tapered cut (don't really know what'd you'd call it) at a salon. Most of my adult life it has been short like that, although when I had my first child it was to my shoulderrs. With each baby (there were 4), the hair got a little shorter - no time for anything fancy after all. Surprisingly, my very talented husband learned to cut hair, and he would trim or style mine when I asked. (He even gave me a few perms, with varied results.) And once I started dying mine, he even liked doing that for me. (We still have a few boxes of hair coloring, but since the grandkids came along, I think I'm entitled to go gray. I am the grayest of all my sisters, and I think even grayer than my brothers, even though I am the middle child, not the oldest.)
A few years ago, I decided to grow my hair long. I grew it for 3 years, and enjoyed it very much. Then one warm spring day I realized that I was wearing it up most of the time, so what was the point of the long hair. By the way, my aforementioned husband preferred it short, but was agreeable to my wearing it long if that's what I wanted.
Anyway, a year ago I had it cut, and as the stylist was working on it, she cut it off straight first. Although I had originally planned to go back to my earlier style, I decided to go with the straight cut. I got a good response, and I liked the look. The problem was, everytime I went to the salon, I got a new hairdresser, and each time it came out slightly different, but okay.
This week, as we began to head into warmer weather, I decided to get it trimmed again. I asked Ken to do it for me, and he agreed. First, I need to explain that in all the times that he cut my hair, it was a good cut and flattering. I told him - just trim it, about an inch or two shorter all over. Shortly after he started cutting, he said, "I have no idea what I'm doing." Which should've been a clue. After another 5 or ten minutes cutting, he said, "I think I'm going to have to layer it." I didn't want it layered, because that's always hard to grow out. So he let me take a break to go look at it in the mirror. It was ghastly - a blunt cut practically just below my ears - not a good look for me at all. We both agreed that layering was the only way to salvage the cut, and so he did that. (I guess because he can't picture things in his head, he couldn't remember what my hair looked like once he started cutting.)
I still don't like the cut - today is day 2, and after sleeping on it, my hair looks like someone randomly cut here or there, but with no rhyme or reason. At least it will grow back, eventually. I am not going to post a picture because it is really a bad look for me. Maybe later, if I can find a way to manage it. If you really can't wait, you can go to KKDV.com, click on the coffee break link, and look at the picture for 3/15 (yesterday) - I won a coffee break for my co-workers and me, and they took a publicity shot for their website. I'm on the right in the front row.
I could tell soo many hair-raising stories about haircuts (mine and those given by me) but you probably don't want to know all of them.