Carter and Sammy are great friends. Carter often visits Sammy, who lives in the nursery.
That is why I was shocked today to find this:
and this:
I don’t know what Sammy did, but Carter showed him who was boss.
Blog
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Top Cat
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Chewy Apple Oatmeal Cookies
Here is another one of our favorite apple recipes. I also like to count this one as healthy because it has apples and oatmeal, just ignore all that butter and sugar.
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 cups old-fashioned oats
1/2 cup chopped dried applesIn a large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugars. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Combine flour, cinnamon and baking soda; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well. Fold in oats and apples. Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls 2 in. apart onto ungreased banking sheets. Bake at 350° for 10-12 minutes. Let stand for 1 minute before removing to wire racks. Yield: about 4 dozen (funny I only got 3 dozen).
These are super easy and yummy. I did try to substitute 1/2 cup of the all purpose flour once with whole wheat to try to make them slightly healthier. I do NOT recommend this, they were not good.
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saturday photography
Today after we got home from running errands, i went to the car show to take some cool pictures.
Here are just a few of the awesome ones.
The Car Show photos on flickrSome of my favorites
(click for larger view)
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Friday Update – 10/17/08
Adoption Update: No referrals this week, but several families received their court dates. We also decided this week to expand the ages we were requesting. We are now waiting for two siblings 0-42 months with one being under 18 months.
Life: Matt’s Grandpa found out this week he has cancer. Please keep him in your prayers.
Running and Push-ups: Yep still doing those, being consistent, but not progressing super fast.
Gardening: I finally transplanted my little seedlings and they are going through some major transplant shock. Maybe it is because they want from a nice humid little house to the dry desert air. I hope they perk back up soon.
Random: I finally have decided what I want for Christmas. Solar Panels! Our local utility is finally offering a rebate for the purchase of them (up to $15,000). A system for our house would run around $33,000. With the Federal and State credits we only need about $15,000 more. Now if my money tree would start producing I would be set!
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Fighting Poverty through Education
Today, Oct. 15, is Blog Action Day, the day that thousands of bloggers, regardless of their genre, unite to discuss a single issue. This year’s issue is Poverty.Many experts believe that education is a sustainable solution to poverty, specifically education of girls. Why girls? (ummm because we rock!)
Recent studies corroborate what Camfed has observed and fostered on the ground: girls who complete primary and secondary education tend to marry later, have smaller families and earn significantly higher wages. Girls’ education has been posited as a “vaccine” against HIV/AIDS, with comparative analysis of data from Zambia, for example, of non-educated and educated women showing a substantial difference in infection rates. Educating a girl changes her destiny, as well as those of her future children, and ensures that she can contribute to the economic life of her community. (UN Chronicle)
A child born to a literate mother is 50 percent more likely to survive to age five. And, providing girls with one extra year of schooling beyond the average can boost their wages by up to 20 percent. (CEDPA)
Mortenson’s belief, one shared by many scholars and human-rights organizations, is that educating women is the best investment for community sustainability. Studies have shown that a fifth-grade education level for girls results in decreased birth rates and infant mortality, and increases the strength of the social structure. (IKAT)
What can you do? Support organizations that focus on girls education, make sure the girls in your life value their education, or considering working with children in your area that have less education opportunities.
Here are some programs helping with education in developing countries:
Central Asia Institute (I highly recommend the founder’s book Three Cups of Tea)
Send a Child to School for a Year in India
Teach Literacy to Women in the Congo
More on this topic:
United Nations Population Fund
If you know of any wonderful organizations building schools for girls, please feel free to share in the comments section.
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Apples
In case you haven’t noticed it is apple season. There are gigantic displays of apples at the grocery store (no trees here 🙁 ), and it got me thinking that I should share some of my favorite apple recipes. I will share them over the next couple of weeks. I have some I really want to try, like this one and this one. (As long as there is apples in the recipe it is healthy, no?) Today’s recipe actually is a healthy one, I won’t start you off on cake. 😉
Apple-Cheddar Salad with Walnuts (from Good Housekeeping, October 2007)
1/4 c. apple cider or apple juice
2 Tbsp. cider vinegar
1 tsp. honey
1/4 tsp. Salt
1/8 tsp. Pepper
1 head Boston or Butter lettuce, torn into pieces
1 lb. Pink Lady, Honey Crisp, or Empire apples (2 to 3 medium), cored and thinly sliced
1/4 c. walnuts, toasted
3 oz. shaved extra-sharp Cheddar Cheese
In large serving bowl, whisk together cider, vinegar, honey, salt, and pepper. Add lettuce and apple slices and toss to coat. Arrange salad on 6 plates; top with walnuts and cheddar cheese.
I actually like to eat this for lunch, so I whisk the dressing ingredients together in a container and then just put some lettuce, half an apple, some walnuts, and cheese on a plate and drizzle the dressing on then toss with my fork.
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Friday Update 10/10/08
Adoption Update: Three referrals this week, two infant girls and one infant boys. Congratulations to the happy families! Please pray for the sibling line to get some movement. I heard that the couple at the top of the line has been waiting since mid-November last year, they must be going nuts. I hope they get their referral soon. The wait is hard not only because you are waiting for the joy of getting to bring your children home, but also because as an adoptive parent you know there is two sides of this child’s story and on one side there is heartbreak. Missy did a great post on this subject this week, please take time to check it out.
Running Update: I ran again this week! Hurray for some consistency.
Push-ups: I am definitely being more consistent with these. I am going to be buff by the time we get to travel.
I actually did not have a very exciting week so not much else to get you caught up on. It was cool, then hot, now it is supposed to cool down again. At any rate the mornings have been absolutely fabulous. Almost beginning to feel like fall! I was able to ride my bike around town again to run errands and it was so nice. I missed it this summer.
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Happy Birthday Little Bro!
My little brother turns 28 today!
Hope you have a wonderful day!
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It was a Tom and Jerry weekend
On Friday night we went over to my parents’ house to make a scrapbook for Tom and Jerry of their family, pets, and home, so that when Matt and I travel to Ethiopia we have this to show them so they can get familiar with the people, animals, and places in their lives. (My mom thought of this great idea.) I know we could just have taken some snapshots, but this was also a fun family activity that got everyone involved and hopefully made them feel a part of the process. (Side note: before we travel we are allowed to send a soft photo album filled with pictures of just Matt and me so Tom and Jerry get to know our faces)
Matt and I holding up the cats’ page
My mom clearly trying to explain something to us (She was the only one who had scrap-booked before)
Jason and Michelle working away on their pages (which were awesome, we also did some pages for Baby A, I am pretty sure she will make her appearance before T&J)
My dad even got in on the action, he was our official circle cutter
We still have to do the pages for the nursery (that needs finished first), Matt’s sister, and me and Matt’s (yeah we forgot to take pics of ourselves).
On Saturday morning we got up bright and early to go garage sale shopping, there was a community garage sale, so we had high hopes. There were several garage sales, but most were extremely small and not much to choose from, we still managed to score some fun stuff.
A soft touch fire truck
Tiger xylophone
12 Pooh books for $1
Jackson getting concerned with why we keep coming home with toys
Matt playing with his hot wheels (yes we know that T&J could both be girls, but this boy wanted some hot wheels and I played with them as a child) Jackson was totally cool with the hot wheels until someone almost nailed him in the head with a flying car.
We also scored a gender neutral, tiny kid’s bike and I already caught Matt working on it
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Friday Update – 10/03/08
Adoption Update: Five referrals this week, four infant girls and one infant boys. Congratulations to the lucky families!
Running Update: I ran one day this week! I was also going to run today, but woke up with a headache and I am not dedicated enough to run with a headache. I did walk every day this week.
Push-ups: I completed the last column of week 2 this week and will be finally moving on to week 3. The sets are getting harder and harder for me, and instead of advancing a week at a time I have decided to advance a column at a time. I don’t really care about getting it done in six weeks (obviously, it has already been more than that) so I will take it slowly. I am sure I will get to 100 before Tom and Jerry get here.
Gardening: My seedlings are doing great, I will probably be able to plant most of them in the garden this weekend. It is still fairly warm, but I think they will survive.
Jackson noticed the water droplets in the seedling starter boxes and attacked, it was pretty funny until he tried to bite through the plastic
Random Stuff: There are two more tractor tires in the field behind my house along with several smaller ones, I plan on rescuing some of the smaller ones in the future to make a potato container in the spring. If anyone is interested in rescuing tires just let me know.
A solution to the obesity epidemic in America.
I also learned about the Phoenix Permaculture Guild this week. They have some interesting classes and a good tree buying program.
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Cookie Monster loves me
Last night I decided to make some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. (They are seriously yummy!) I decided to double the batch to make sure we would have enough for our small group on Thursday night. Doubling the batch was a bad idea! I couldn’t even use my mixer to stir it because there was so much, luckily my buff husband stirred the batter for me. It ended up taking me about 2.5 hours from start to finish (I didn’t even do the dishes yet because it was past my bedtime) and I estimate I made somewhere between 8 and 10 dozen cookies. I wish I had more room in my freezer to store some of these. To all the lucky people that live near me you will be getting some cookies.
Here is the recipe for those who are interested, I got it from my mom:
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
Mix together:
1 can pumpkin – 15 oz
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup cooking oil
Add:
5.5 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
Mix together then add to batter:
2 tablespoons milk
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons vanilla
Stir in 1 package mini chocolate chips. Batter will be thick. Drop heaping teaspoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350° for 12-15 minutes.
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Waking up to good news
The Ethiopian courts reopened early. They were supposed to open October 9, but we got word this morning that they opened yesterday. Hopefully this gets things moving again.
Thanks so much for the positive comments yesterday, they were very nice to wake up to.
On a random Ethiopian note, here is a link to an article on Lucy.
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Keep Hoping
Matt and I are still slowly preparing. It is not so easy for us to keep preparing when we don’t know when Tom and Jerry will be here. Sometimes it feels like it will never happen and you just shouldn’t bother reading a book on attachment, or prepare the nursery, or even think about child proofing.
Christine recently shared this post with me and the last paragraph really spoke to me at a time when I really needed to hear it.
Do not give up. Lay your all on the table. Everything is worth it. They are already yours, you have just not found each other yet. Keep hoping, keep praying, keep investing…they are coming. Be ready.
I had recently come to the realization that I had lost my hope that this would happen. I had stopped day dreaming about what it would be like to take Tom and Jerry to the park or the zoo or to watch them play with their dad. I started to pour all my focus to anything but being a mother or adoption. I just stopped. I didn’t want to prepare anymore, I didn’t want to dream anymore.
After a nice long talk with Matt last night and reading that post this morning I am feeling a renewed spirit. I will allow myself to day dream again, read some books, prepare the nursery, and maybe even childproof the house. I have hope again.
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Friday Update – 9/26/08
Adoption: There were no referrals this week. The courts reopen October 9 and hopefully things pick up then!
Running: I walked a lot again this week, hopefully next week I feel up to running.
Push-ups: I so wanted to keep up with the push-ups this week, but I had a clicking pain in my right shoulder (probably from all the lifting I did on Monday and Tuesday) so I took a couple of nights off from the push-ups, but Matt kept up on his. He is getting pretty buff!
Gardening: The tire gardens are full of dirt and ready to plant! I just want to get a little fence up to keep the dogs away from the gardens, then the real fun begins. I did plant a few other things this week. (Well Matt did the hard work of digging the hole for me.)
Pomegranate Tree
Artichoke Plant
Gerber Daisies, because a girl has to have some flowers
My seedlings
Carter keeping the seedlings company
