29th Anniversary

It was 29 years ago today Kevin and I married.  Can't believe this much time has gone by so quickly and so many memories to reflect on in those years.

Our wedding picture - we look like babies : )

He was in the Navy just starting out with his sub schools in San Diego.  He completed one set of classes on Friday, we married on Saturday and by Monday he had to be back in class starting his next set.  So, there was no time for a honeymoon get away.  That would have to wait until almost 5 years later when the submarine he was on while away on a Westpac (6 months at sea) would pull into Guam around Christmas.  We had arranged for him to take time while in port and I flew out to enjoy a week on what for us was a tropical paradise.  It was wonderful at that point in time to break up the 6 months of seperation the deployment created and finally get a belated honeymoon.

Last year at our anniversary get away at the Mission Inn

It would be just after our 10th Anniversary that our life with kids would begin and infertility struggles ended when Cameron came into our life through the blessing of an open adoption.  A whole new world would open to us as we began the joy and trials of parenthood.

Today we will celebrate by going to a restaurant we both have wanted to try for quite some time.  The restaurant is the Napa Rose.  It's an award winning one that is located within the complex of the Disney Grand California Hotel.  We've stayed at the hotel on a couple different occassions as a family, but haven't yet tried this particular restaurant.  Am VERY excited about our plans!!  Cameron will be holding down the homefront for us as we get away.  Will post pictures of our time out tomorrow, but have some stock pictures of the Napa Rose to share today.

Napa Rose Dining Area
 

Open Kitchen

Grand California Hotel, Disneyland

 

Barn Project/Challenge

If you've been around a little while you know we've maintained a busy agenda of cleaning up and clearing out and completing LOTS of projects here.  Several months ago I began painting the house the new Smoky Olive color, then had to stop as the weather got really hot and stayed hot!  Now that the house is painted I'm on to a BIG challenge - painting the barn.

We have a gambrel style barn/garage.  The front and back are the part of this that is the "challenging" bit I mentioned.  It's really tall and getting all the way to the top means getting creative with scaffolding and ladders.  The side closest to the house is done, and I moved on to the back by the pool.  My arms and neck are already feeling this : )

Painted side near the back of the house

This is the progress I've made on the back with just ladders and extension poles

Another view of the back of barn

The positives of this are it really needs new paint as the weather over the years has taken quite a toll on the old paint.  I'm liking the look of the new color, so while this cooler weather holds it's time to really get a move on and to get this done!!  


Will post updates as I make progress.

Oh, and just an extra - Kevin got the first coat of white on the finished stucco, YAY.

Corn Chowder for Lunch

Found another recipe that's a definate keeper.  In an effort to just use what I have on hand and not go to the store, with the possible exception of fresh fruit or vegetables if I run out, I have been searching for recipes that introduce new dishes to my regular repetoire of the tried and true ones.  I came across this one for corn chowder (click on for link). It is really good!!!  My only change was to add fresh tarragon and lemon thyme from the garden instead of just the fresh thyme the recipe calls for.

Made this for lunch and served with the last of the bread I did in the bread machine with spreadable butter our family is now hooked on. 

Frugal tip:  Spreadable Butter (click on for link)  this is something I've been using for a few months now and has worked so well for us.  As my old post states, we love butter and always had a stick of butter in a container for use on the counter as it gets too hard in the refrigerator.  With our use in cooking and for bread, bagels, etc,  we were going through a lot of butter.  Then with the heat this past summer, despite the air conditioning the butter was melting.   So when I first tried this it was just to have something I could put in the frig and still be able to use on bread without the gloppy mess it makes when it's too hard.  This recipe did the trick.  What I hadn't anticpated as a side benefit, was that by making a pound of this at a time, extended because of the oil and water and  it being so easy to spread we significantly cut down on the total amount of butter we'd been going through.  This reduction has taken us from using 8 sticks or 2lbs. a month to 1lb. and sometimes even less because this spread seems to go SO much further.  If you've priced butter lately you know that adds up quickly.

So, if like us you don't like or won't use margarine, this is a helpful and frugal way of extending your butter without the loss of flavor and making it easily spreadable.  It's a win-win situation : )

Computer Moving Towards Normal

Computer still has issues.  Kevin has been great in making so many strides against this nasty malware.  He's still having to pull hidden files as he rids my computer and I try not to click on anything that might reintroduce this nasty thing.

We've made backups now of my homeschool records and all the many pictures I have on here.  Though I have lots of other documents, teaching resources, music, etc...  It was the pictures and school records that bothered me most when I thought they might be gone.  Also found my Facebook account had unsuccessfully been attempted to be accessed by someones computer in Kiev, Ukraine.  That doesn't really sit well, kind of creepy even though I really have little info on myself in my "personal" info. Glad for the blocks that were there and thwarted that.

My "Favorites" lists and folders had been temporarily lost so I found myself doing searches to try to find some blogs I really enjoy following, but can't always remember the blog addresses that can differ from the blogs name.  So in the process of searching I found myself following rabbit trails and finding a few others that are fun and interesting : )   Also came across a recipe I used for dinner with great success last night. It was for baked potato soup (click on soup to access recipe).  Everyone absolutely LOVED this.  Will definately be making it again.  I served it with bread I'd just made in my bread machine.   So something positive came from this mess : )

I'm a bit gun shy about making searches to complete the resources I'd hoped to find for the unit study I still want to do next month for the girls.  Will use the resources I have on hand about the Pilgrims.  Tried and true sites I've used before, and may make a trip to the Library for my other needs. 

 

Life moves forward for us, hope all is well for you who pop over to check in on us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Computer Issues

While researching materials for next months unit study on the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving I  came across a site that offered multiple helpful resources including some cute videos.  It seems though that one of the videos introduced a virus that made it appear my hard drive experienced a complete system failure.

I watched helplessly as my screen shutdown then began showing one system failure alert after another.  My icons all began to systematically disappear as more system failure folders showed up on the screen.  I was able to access and start a virus scan, but wasn't sure if that's what this was or my computer hard drive was actually shot.  I decided to wait for my IT dept. head, aka Kevin, to get home and take a look.

He ultimately found it's a malware virus that trys to sell you their product to "restore" your system and thus hijacks your computer.  Kevin is still working to clean out the thing and bring back my files and tools that are in here, just hidden from my current use.

Now I am not a computer junky, but I seriously did not realize how much I've come to rely on this thing until I had no access to it yesterday.  I lamented the pictures and homeschool files I had not backed up and might  have lost.   How many times I use this to now check info for school resources, or to give me news or information updates.   I  have all sorts of teaching resources and music I've downloaded that I like to listen to as I do things around the house.

Even when ready to get dinner together I went to grab a recipe and realized I couldn't get it from my computer.  SO, moral of the story be careful in what sites you open up even if they seem perfectly legit.  Backup what you don't want to lose regularly, to a source other than your computer !!!  Realize life worked prior to computer and survival without is possible ?  :  (

Hopefully by my next post I'll have access to my pictures and tools back to be able to return to a format I use regularly.  In the meantime I am really grateful to Kevin for his hard work that gives me this much of an access back to my computer and for salvaging and backing up to CD my pictures and school files !!!!!!    The idea of losing those memories and all that work was truly upsetting. 

Predator Alert

We've recently had some harsh reminders of natures reality.  A few months ago we had seperated the two roosters that were less dominate in our flock.  They were relegated to the "bachelor pad".
It was a pen within our chicken yard that kept them near the flock, but in their own space.  Within the course of two nights we lost them both.  We weren't exactly sure what got them.  Domestic cat, wild cat, owl?

I wrote last month about having to seperate the last and largest rooster because he was defeathering our girls and they needed a break from his overly amourous attention.  We put him in the seperate pen but this time had a chicken wire top to prevent anything from getting in.   He'd remained there for a few months just fine until the other morning Cameron found a lot of feathers and a missing rooster.  The top of the pen in one corner had the chicken wire pulled away from the fence.  We found what was left of him partially covered by bamboo leaves in the upper part of the pool area.  This was definately an owl.  All evidence pointed to their mode of hunting, their strength because he was a BIG rooster, and the way they will store their kill for later eating. 

Unfortunately on the evening of Amber's birthday we left during sunlight, but got home after dark and closed up the hens in their house.  It was the next morning we realized we were one short.

So we have been extremely diligent to get the "girls" in their protected house before dark to prevent any more free meals for this owl.  As irritating as it is for us, it is a reality in nature.  We provided a nice buffet for a mighty hunter to access.  Now we just need to prevent it from having anymore success.

I could appreciate this mighty hunter more if it hadn't cost our flock so.  Hard lesson to learn about being truly diligent with the abilities of these predators.

Projects Resume

With the final arrival of MUCH cooler Fall temps it's time to get busy!!!  We had a wonderful day of rain that fell consistently and gently on Thursday.   LOVE THIS!!!  It was enjoyable to actually have a fire in the fireplace, watch the rain falling outside and the smell of rain has always been something that triggers fond memories for me.

 So now with these helpful climate adjustments it's time to get back to the projects we'd placed on hold because it was too miserable to be outside.  Kevin and Cameron have been busy the last couple of days getting the stucco done on the back room.  They had finished the one end wall a couple months ago prior to our new AC unit being installed.  We still had the area around both back windows and the french door entrance that needed to be done.  The scratch coat is up and today they will be adding the finish layers.  Once dry I'll paint it white to match the other areas of stucco we have done on the house.

 

 

Love being able to check off items on our "to do" list.