Truth

My friend Sarah Skees posted encouraging news from the mission field. Don't go there expecting something cute or funny - this news is the gospel kind of truth. Sarah's brother Chad and his family are missionaries in Papua New Guinea. New believers always have a fire about the Truth but the man described in Sarah's posting absolutely held the truth up to his world and proclaimed it. Worth your time. We like to hear the amazing results of the Word of God - here in Buhlaland and across the world.

Thanksgiving food and memories

Don't panic, of course we spent time praying in gratitude for the OVER abundance of our blessings - we had a great walk early,just as the sun was coming up. DH and I are delighted with the beauty of where we are living.

That being said -

I hate to shock people, but for those in the south or raised by southerners - Thanksgiving is about the food, well the food and the football. Unfortunately for my "adoring public" - not much of the food turned out great. I tried several "low fat, no cholesterol, super healthy" recipes due to our current need for cholesterol lowering, fat reducing getting fittedness (not bothering to use spell checker today!). Mashed potatoes were excellent, cranberry sauce was good, gravy was OK, green beans were simply a vegetable. BEST part was the turkey breast. For 3 of us - a whole bird would have been too much. Earlier in the week, a tv chef did a herb and olive oil mixture under the turkey breast skin before cooking it and I decided to try her method. WOW - very moist, lots of flavor and the best we've done. I semi brined the breast ( for the last 2 hours of thawing it was in a huge bowl of lukewarm water salty water and seasonings). After drying off the turkey, loosened the skin to make a pocket in which to put the herbal essences (that sounds like I used hair products doesn't it?) In a Cuisinart,finely chopped onion,olive oil, fresh rosemary, fresh sage, flat leafed parsley, sea salt and a mixture of freshly ground peppercorns (white, pink , green and black - available at WalMart ). Put prepared turkey in a small roaster - in oven around 350 degrees for an hour, put the roaster cover over it for another hour. After the second hour timer went off - I began testing with digital thermometer until it reached about 175 internally. Just delish and will do this again for sure - you could use any kind of seasonings and make it totally different.

My Mom was a great cook - she made everything from scratch and our holidays were amazing meals, we'd wake up to the smell of sage, onions and celery on Thanksgiving. She usually baked the dressing separate from the turkey. Drier dressing makes a great receptor for gravy!

Dressing in my household is artery clogging level of fattening because it is made with a couple of sticks of butter,6 or 8 whole large eggs and lots of rich cornbread. To go low fat , used healthier recipe for cornbread and whole wheat bagels - added usual sauteed in broth chopped celery, onions, parlsey, pimento and mushrooms, generous measure of poultry seasoning - then eggbeaters instead of real eggs with low fat chicken broth to moisten. Turned out to have a lot of texture (euphemism for a little grainy) and plenty of taste.

Thanks Mom for teaching me to try new things (even some that definitely went in the trash )- if you don't try you don't find great new foods or for that matter new people, adventures or ways to remove facial hair.

The smells and work of a holiday definitely create nostalgia for being at home with my parents and brother - watching the Macy's parade on TV, nibbling on whatever goodies were already on the dessert table and being together as a family with inside jokes and eye rolling lame stories- all the stuff you don't know you'll ache for and miss until much later in life.

Here in Buhlaland, we ate well, too much and talked a lot about memories. It is good.

Rainy Day

Since Friday - an amazing 4 inches of rain by 7 this morning. It is late in the afternoon now - and the sun has broken through the clouds in a big way. But this morning - the hostas looked like swimming pools for frogs (sorry didn't catch any in the act). While all this rain will result in beautiful flowers soon - the downpours have beaten down some plants and torn up the blossoms on others. Our driveway became a mud track with streams of water cutting into the sides and running across in front of our house.

Always surprised at how much damage heavy rainstorms can do - but we didn't have hail or high winds so the damage is all going to be repaired by regrowth or tractor! Just outside our breakfast nook windows - we have a tiny pond which is home to a rapidly overgrowing lily - in the lower center of the picture you can see the ripples from drops of rain still falling this morning. Normally we have several of the big pink blooms at one time.

So much for the rain updates! Today was also the Sunday to honor graduates at our church - normally kind of a "yawn" for people who don't have kids in that age group. What a pleasant surprise to have a good message and praise music! The J Walkers praise band did a good job - it was wonderful to have young men singing sincerely "blessed be the name of the Lord" and using their musical talents. The high school youth pastor did a "tag team"sermon with one of the graduating seniors. Their topic was the apostle Peter's frequent very public failures yet he was the rock upon which the church was built. They brought up the concept of raising children not to keep them totally risk free and aimed for worldly success. At some point parents have to release their children. Seemed remarkably timely message (besides the tie in to graduation) since several national news outlets did stories this week about parents in the "helicopter generation" - hovering over the lives of their children. Raise a child up in the way he should go - the path might not be smooth or level but with a solid foundation a person has roots and wings.