Swimming!!

Yesterday Dad convinced me to say that if the pool was 66° I would go swimming. It was 66°!! I jumped in a couple times and numbed up to it!! It was actually quite refreshing!!

Flowers

The flower bed right in front of the house is flowering (see Lorissa's blog), so I decided to take some pictures. I was wondering around taking random pictures with the flowers and went into the den saw the flashlight and boom!! a light bulb went on in my head.

These particular pictures I took and Lorissa edited and cropped(thank you, Lori!!).

At first, I just had the flashlight shining straight at them, but I found that it made the flower extremly white and out of focus. So I put a sock(yes, a sock, it was clean:) in front of it and found that it gave a much softer light. Then I taped the flower to the sock and snapped a picture!

You may have noticed that there is a little logo at the bottem of my posts. This is the Picasa logo, and, if you have Picasa, you know it has a little button that says 'Blog This' . I decided to try it and found that it goes a lot faster than regular posting!

Fantastic Books

Right now I'm reading this wonderful series, The Lord of the Rings. I'm almost to the end of The Fellowship of the Ring, and can't wait to start on the third.

We have watched the movies before, now some scenes in the book really stand out and are very vivid. So now I want you to tell me whether you have read the book, watched the movie, neither, or both, using the sidebar survey gadget!

Of Worms and...Eyes

So Lorissa and I were outside today and we decided to look under a round cement thing. We found this four inch long worm. It was moving somewhere fast (for a worm).

It was there with its friend Wiggles. So we had Squiggles and Wiggles. (not named by me)

So then we had a helicopter land in the field behind us to spray. And, because after six years of living out here, we are still not used to such sights as a helicopter spraying, we had the binoculars out. and so then Nate and I decided to try this:

This is the best one; the others were even more blurry and not as close up.

Baking!

Once again we have succumbed and made Dad's Favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies! After this I made some biscuits. And today I making rolls for with our turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce. Thanksgiving all over again!! Here are some pictures of our adventure!!

The first ingredients.

Gooey goodness!

Watching them bake!!

The finished product!

The First Day of School.

Today is the first day of a whole semester of studying. :) By 10 o'clock Mom had already given us our assignments, we just have homework.

Speaking of Mom, today is her birthday!! Happy Birthday Mom!!

Christmas Break

I received a canvas for Christmas. It already had the circle around the r and the r itself. The other wobbly circles were freehand. The blue should have been a shade or two lighter and the brown more even.

On warm(er) days, my siblings and I go out to play four-square. this generally becomes very competitive and all of us tired and worn out.

We have taken down our Christmas decor. Does that mean that we were de-decorating, or just corating?

Have a very Merry Christmas!! Janine is here safely and we are all enjoying having her around. We are also excited because it is Christmas break!! Have a great week.

Janine!!!!!!!!!!!

I am so excited because today is the day!! She will come home in 11 hours and is (hopefully) in a shuttle bus on her way to Atlanta!! We will pick her up this evening!!!! I can't wait!!

P.S. We did not (to the disappointment of all) get any snow. :(

SNOW!!

No, it hasn't arrived yet. But we are expecting it tomorrow! If we do get any, it will be at night:( This is from the last time it snowed in '99. I was 4 years old and I still remember it!!

It has been raining some, right now it is clear.

We are anxiously awaiting Janine's arrival this Friday evening!!!!!!!!!!!! Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas!!

We have them up!! Each year we do something a little different and for the first time, we have a large Christmas tree!! It is fake, but that doesn't really matter, it just means we can enjoy it longer! We do not have the outside Christmas lights up; hopefully we will soon. We also have our little Christmas tree on top of the entertainment center and a little scene on the hutch (that Janine has to see before I post it).

Thanksgiving was at Uncle John and Tante Rita's; other blogs have pictures so I won't post them here. On Friday we got up and had breakfast together and Mom and Dad left to go shopping.(What?! they didn't get up early? *gasp*) we had to

1. finish dishes
2. get down decor boxes
3. take down thanksgiving decor (which includes taking squash out to feed the cow)
4. put up both trees (big and little)
5. decorate trees
6. set up all other stuff (like in the entryway)
7. put empty(ish) boxes away

we had 2 hours 4 min. 12 sec. (actually made up this time- somewhere around that time) when they came home, everything was done!

Have a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 Have a great Thanksgiving!

New blogs on my blog

As you may have noticed, I have divided my blogs into family and other. I would like to say a little bit about them:

• The Rebelution blog: This blog was started by the Harris twins. Their official definition of rebelution is "a teenage rebellion against the low expectations of an ungodly culture." They have really good, thought-provoking posts.
• Cooking in Cast Iron and Zanks Iron Skillet: We got our mom a cast iron skillet for Mothers Day '07 and find these two blogs interesting.
• Challies Dot Com: We found this blog on The Rebelution and really enjoyed it. It is also on Marie's blog.

Enjoy!!

New Planty!

This little plant has grown from peace flower (Spathiphyllum species). Other common names are White flag, white sails, and Spath flower. When the plant bloomed this summer we took the seeds and put them in this planter, not thinking that they would really grow! The plant beside it is what we call a prayer plant(Calathea amabilis/ Stromanthe amabilis).

This is the plant in the bathroom.

Thanks to PlantOasis.com for their scientific plant names.

In other news, it's supposed to get up to high of 65 degrees! It rained over the weekend; that's a lot different from the weather we are used to!

I also cannot wait for Janine to come home in 39 days! She will fly in on the 19th of December, and fly out on the 12th of January!!

Comments

It's so exciting to open your email in the morning and find that you have three new comments on your blog!! To answer your questions:
Here are the cookies!! The recipe was originally called Neiman Marcus cookies. Dad found it off the Internet and loved it! Later in the recipe book Janine made for our family, she named it Dad's favorite cookies!

Dad’s Favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies
2 sticks butter, softened
2 cups brown sugar
6 Tbsp. sugar
2 eggs
4 tsp. vanilla
3 ½ cups flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
3 cups chocolate chips
3 tsp. instant espresso coffee powder (if your instant coffee is crumbs, crush in a bowl with the back of a spoon to powderize)

Preheat the oven to 300°. Place the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar in your mixer’s bowl fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed for 30 seconds, until fluffy. Beat in the egg and vanilla for 30 seconds more, until well combined.
In a mixing bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add to the mixture, while beating on slow speed. Beat for about 15 seconds, stir in the chocolate chips and espresso powder, and mix for 15 seconds longer.
Grease a cookie sheet. Place 2 tablespoon dollops of cookie dough 3 inches apart on the sheet. Gently press them down with a spoon into 2 inch circles. Bake for 20 minutes or until the cookies are nicely browned. Could make up to 4 dozen cookies!

Here are some of our decor; we don't really have that much. There will be more for Christmas!
The turkey above our hallway.
We have a cornucopia that we usually to put these flowers in, but we like to put everything in a different spot every year so now the are in a vase!