boys

And the President is...

What? Reagan?


(Sorry, I haven't figured out all the nuances of my camera yet...hence, the REALLY grainy pictures)


The little guys can't have ALL the fun on Halloween.

My soldiers

This year, the boys decided they were all going to be soldiers for Halloween. Oma C. kindly supported their decision and helped them select different BDUs (Battle Dress Uniform, don't worry, I didn't know what it stood for either, I had to GOOGLE it) and gear.

They each had different styles of camo on.

L1 picked vintage desert


L2 selected desert


L3 wore digital


L4 chose woodland


FIERCE!

Yes, that IS face paint. (L2 gave himself bloody smears)


Check out their awesome backpacks and canteens.

They each also carried an Ammo bag to put all their candy in. (I think the orange pumpkin would have kind of ruined the "look")


LOVE those boots!


GRENADE!


Yep, that's my baby...

It's TIME to be appreciated...

I was privileged to cater Bill's Client Appreciation Event today. He likes to have these events to show his clients that he cares. This event was held at "Stoudtsburg Village" in Adamstown, PA. It's a really cute village that is designed to look and feel like a European village with shops and many bright buildings. Many of the shop owners live above their stores.

I got the job to make finger foods for about 50 people. Here's what I came up with.

Summer sausages.

Assorted italian cheeses and crackers, fresh olives

Caprese on a stick

There's nothing like fresh mozzarella.

I still had some fresh basil from my garden that I rescued before the frost.

Another tray of cheeses and sopressetta with fresh olives, garlic crostini and crackers.

Sopressetta is an Italian salami. SO good. I had to keep the boys away.

I also made vegetable skewers served with a ranch dip.

"Pop in your mouth" sized wraps are perfect for a finger food party. Mama Nelda helped me with these. We spread a thin layer of cream cheese, sprinkled it with garlic powder and dill, and layered it with roast beef, turkey ham, or turkey. Then roll tightly. I refrigerated the rolls uncut, overnight and just cut them up before I plated them.


Okay, I can't take credit for these babies. They were made by the tea room people in the village. They were WAY too good.

The SPREAD.

I also had shrimp cocktail and some roasted peanuts.

The food went fast. Guess that's a good thing.

Kind of makes you wanna be my hubby's client huh?

My new camera....

It's a FUJIFILM, and has so many bells and whistles that it took me almost an hour to read the entire manual.

I had time on my hands, we were taking a 2 hour trip to New Jersey.

I'm sure I'll have to reread it 20 more times to understand the thing.

These few shots were taken before I read the "hows and whys" and many intricacies of my camera. My old cam could never have done this.


Saturday night's dinner. Pasta and shrimp. Yes mom! I like shrimp now and so do 3 of my 4 boys. Amazing!!


I love the super macro shot of the water drop on a gi-normous head of local cauliflower.


The knot of a paper napkin holder.


My husband's newest passion. He's been playing for a whopping 3 months or so and has written 5 or 6 really great songs. Amazing, truly.

Thank you hubby honey, again, for helping my new passion for photography. I love you! Tkkk. Tkkkk. Anybody there? Do you even read my blog honey?

My guys....

Here's my hottie and his buddy

The boyz on my birthday.

L1 L4 Dad L3 L2

Trying out my new camera.

It is......

A totally awesome NEW camera!! Yipeeeee!

and....my hubby surprised me with a nice get together of my very good friends, some whom I haven't seen for a few months. What a nice evening. Everyone brought some food and we had some nice wine.

The funny part is, we did have shrimp and pasta! I didn't have to make it. My dear friend brought some great Italian food over.

Thanks hubby honey! I love you...

Tomorrow I'll post some really good pics!!

I'm 35 today....

And what a day it is.

My dear husband's grandfather passed away to be with Jesus this morning.

My father-in-law just got out of the hospital last night, and my hubby is taking a 2 hour drive back and forth to help him out. (Isn't he awesome?)

My sister is (over)due with #8 any minute, seriously. And she lives all the way out in Montana! (I'm in PA)



My children made me breakfast! (No, not the papaya, it's just a pretty picture of fruit...)

We are having ice cream sundaes in the middle of the day.


I just bought myself a Senseo coffee maker and enough coffee pods to last me a year, a hair dryer and hot rollers with my birthday money.

I just love Amazon.com. Free shipping and lots of cool rebates, gift packs, and $10 off deals. I got a lot for very little!! Thanks family!
(I'm just drooling for that coffee...)


We are having a shrimp pasta dinner. In the words of Rachel Ray "YUMMO"
and watching a good family flick. That's our favorite family chill out time lately, dinner and a movie.

And I'm so excited to open the "mysterious package" hubby got in the mail for me.

I'll let you know what it is soon!



I'm so thankful to make it to another birthday. It's been a long 8 months since I've been sick. God is GOOD and His mercies are EVERLASTING, great is HIS faithfulness!

The healthier shortening

I want to share with you a healthier alternative to the regular old shortening everyone uses. My hubby can't have butter (lactose intolerant) and so I use shortening for pie crusts and some cookies so he can continue to enjoy these treats.



Shortening is normally made with hydrogenated oils. Spectrum makes one without.


"Partial hydrogenation is an industrial process used to make a perfectly good oil, such as soybean oil, into a perfectly bad oil. The process is used to make an oil more solid; provide longer shelf-life in baked products; provide longer fry-life for cooking oils, and provide a certain kind of texture or "mouthfeel." The big problem is that partially hydrogenated oil is laden with lethal trans fat.

One of the reasons that partially hydrogenated oils are used is to increase the product's shelf life, but they decrease your shelf life.

Trans fats cause significant and serious lowering of HDL (good) cholesterol and a significant and serious increase in LDL (bad) cholesterol; make the arteries more rigid; cause major clogging of arteries; cause insulin resistance; cause or contribute to type 2 diabetes; and cause or contribute to other serious health problems."

To sum it up...READ LABELS ON YOUR FOOD!



It's being put into just about everything...Bread, crackers, cookies, cakes.

Fast food is loaded with it.


Take control of your health by educating yourself and reading what goes into your food.

(info and quotes from www.bantransfats.com)