Wedding

Yesterday we went to the wedding of one of our church members daughter. It was beautiful. The day was perfect and the happiness infectious!


Presenting the bride and groom as husband and wife for the first time . . .


Dancing with the father of the bride . . .


Dancing with the grandfather of the bride . . .

Not to be out done, the twins cutting a rug : )

I know a few people who couldn't be there, this is so all may share the joy!
Blessings, Beth Ann

Christmas Prep

I have wanted light up deer for my front yard for the past ten years. Hubby wouldn't let me get any when we lived in northern MI. He said he didn't see the point since they would be under 10 inches of snow by Christmas! LOL Soon after we moved to middle TN and the weather is much more mild to say the least. Every year we acquire one more item for our outdoor Christmas display, but never any deer. I guess we were waiting for a screaming deal. This year as soon as they went 25% off hubby bought them. Not a great deal, but better than a poke in the eye.

Here is oldest son putting my prize together, some assembly required!

They're finished!

Awaiting their final resting place . . .

I put oldest son in charge of a center piece for the Christmas table. Did I mention that he enjoys flamage? In case you can't make it out, that is one large candle surrounded by a dozen smaller ones. I also don't know if you can see, but there are small star holes in the side of the candle holder. Half way through dinner there was a red sea of wax slowly encroaching upon us, it was a tad unsettling.



Here is my much tamer center piece for the kitchen buffet : )

Good times, good times.

Blessings, Beth Ann

Christmas 2009

Every year I have a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit. I think it is the weather and lack of snow. I had 33 years of white Christmas before we moved down here and it's hard to get out of that mentality. Might be easier on a beach, but here it was wet,rainy, windy and blah. But on Christmas eve I found my groove. I ran out to do errands bright and early, so did the rest of the town - LOL I don't think anyone drove into the 'city'. I took oldest son with me for some one on one time, but he got hijacked at his work when we stopped there to do a gift exchange. So he stayed to work and I finished the shopping. Went home where 3 eager helpers awaited me. The four of us donned aprons and proceeded to mix, stir, bake and decorate the rest of the day into the afternoon. The Christmas music filled the house as the vision of my children filled my heart and catapulted me into the meaning of the holiday. We quickly cleaned up and went to church for a candle light service followed by a family dinner. Hubby had to work but made it home for dinner and we opened Christmas cards from our oldest dd and the kids Nana and papa. I went to bed exhausted but with a smile on my face : )



Took this picture of my middle dd helping with dishes, what a blessing!


Here is a Christmas tray a dear friend gave me this year . . .

Filled the tray with lots of goodies : )


Middle dd and her best friend


We were blessed to have best friend and her mother join our family for Christmas dinner!

All these pictures represent what made the holiday special for us, friends, family and good memories.

Blessings, Beth Ann

Kids and Christmas 2009

Hope everyone had a blessed holiday yesterday. I received a small digital camera, so will make blogging a bit easier and faster : ) I am proud to show off our Christmas pictures this soon. Would have posted yesterday, but had to do the dinner and company thing. You understand right? LOL I find my computer can only support about five pictures at a time, that is why there will be a couple different holiday posts. Here are a few of the highlights from yesterday:

Oldest son trying to figure out the directions to his new MP3 player . . .



Twin daughter sharing tunes from her princess mp3 player with her dad . . .

Here is E showing off her new princess cloths for her doll's . . .

Here is E showing his new Pokemon ball/battle gym . . .

Here E is showing her talking Snow White from G. D and G. S - she loves it!

Hard to believe that with all the rushing and preparation that the holiday is over, but it was a wonderful one made brighter with the time spent and shared with family and friends.

Blessings, Beth Ann

It came upon a midnight clear . . .

. . . or at least a Sunday clear : ) Last week was the third Sunday of Advent, candle of Joy, and the twins were asked to portray the holy family in a brief story example. It was enough to make them beam ear to ear and for us to be proud for them. One of the elders took these pictures of the twins.


Here are E & E doing their solemn best in church, their big day!

Shhhhh . . . He is sleeping . . .

Tomorrow is the 4Th and final Sunday of advent, the candle of Love, as Christmas is only 5 days away! Tomorrow my oldest son will be flying solo in the sound booth for the first time. He is still a little shell shocked at getting this responsibility thrust upon him, but I have the utmost confidence in him. It is good for him to be busy, idle hands are the devils work place and all that. Between work, church and home school his plate is pretty full. Toss in a BF with a new car and he is pretty much booked. I guess it's God's way of starting to prepare me for his departure and the spreading of his wings. Sigh . . .

Blessings, Beth Ann

Recipes again . . .

Pineapple Corn Muffins

20 oz. can crushed pineapple

3 pkg. Jiffy corn muffin mix

Pre-heat oven to 350. Grease a 12 ct. muffin pan. Mix all ingredients together thoroughly. Fill each muffin cup 2/3 full and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Makes 18 muffins ~ YUMMY



Crock pot Greek Pot Roast

3lb. boneless chuck roast

12oz. jar pepperoncini

1 small onion, chopped

Place roast into crock pot and cover with onions. Pour pepperoncini and all it's juice over the roast. It makes a lovely marinade for the meat as it cooks in crock. Cook on low for 8 hours. Remove roast from crock and place on platter. Remove peppers with slotted spoon and serve beside roast on platter.

Makes 6 servings

(This received two thumbs up from my 13 year old daughter and DH was to busy moaning in pleasure to put his fork down and offer an opinion)

Blessings, Beth Ann

Ten day until . . .

CHRISTMAS! Where does the time go? Remember when we were kids and winter break at school seemed to last forever? Now . . . I am still trying to recover from our Memorial Day/twins b-day : low country boil party! LOL

Last week was the third Advent Sunday of the season, the candle of JOY. The twins were asked to portray the holy family. They were pretty excited right up until it was time to walk up on the daises. Mary had a wardrobe malfunction and Joseph had to be given a good shove, but they did it and we were all proud :)

Not much else new and exciting here, praise the LORD! Oldest son is working extra the next 10 days leading up to Christmas. The vet he works with also houses his niece who is an award winning pet groomer. Apparently everyone wants a pretty pooch for for the holidays : ) Usually he just does pick-up work for her for some extra cash. I guess big dogs need extra hands : ) Anyway, he is pretty happy with the thought of extra bucks before his b-day (1/14). He is trying to save for a new pay per-go phone. Anyone who knows Z knows why, and why he can't be trusted with a reg. cell phone. Another life lesson learned on the teenage road to maturity : )

I made my world famous Pineapple Corn muffins yesterday and also a 'Greek pot roast'. I also made a new recipe 'Reuben Casserole'. The main ingredient here is corn beef if you couldn't guess. This usually a bit pricey for us, but I was gifted some corn beef. I will post the recipes tomorrow.

Blessings, Beth Ann

Just checking in . . .

Hey there! Just checking in. I realized I haven't been blogging much as I spend more time posting on Face book, but there are still some of you guys who aren't connected and count on the blog.

Wish I had some fabulous news to bring, but mostly same old, same old around her and sometimes that ain't all bad : )

Been a pretty good day here despite cold temps in the 40's. Hubby had the day off and we took the twins to the flea market. Now the twins are thawing out with some hot cocoa. The poor things were born down here so they aren't as hardy as the rest of us. : ) The older two kids went to friends houses for the week-end, so eerily quiet around here. Also finished my Christmas shopping today, except for hubby. He wants a new steering wheel for his Camero, such a man - LOL

Speaking of hubby . . . He has offered to start giving free guitar lessons at our church to anyone interested. It's an out reach program for all ages. I'm pretty excited about it, we need some growth in our church. I will tag along to either help watch children or do knitting/crochet or any stitching with moms who drop off kids or just want some fellowship of their own. DH has done this before at the home school co-op we use to attend. He is sooo patient and kind hearted. I know, what's he doing with me right? LOL I am truly blessed. There is also talk of a car ministry. Once a month we have a day where single moms and such could bring their car to have it looked at or the oil changed for free. Knute said he could do that, but I hope he gets some help! LOL I feel there are good things ahead in the new year.

Blessings, Beth Ann

Three weeks in . . .

Just checking in to let everyone know we are still alive and mostly over the snotitise. It only lasted about 3 1/2 weeks! LOL I also wanted to mention that as of yesterday it has been 3 weeks that hubby and I started following the book 'Mastering Leptin' , which is a hormone. Basically you cure any hormone imbalances by diet, a predominately lo-carb one. I want to stress though that carbs are allowed though! Just that your protein has to be higher than your carb intake, which is not the norm for a sad diet (standard American diet). So if your meat for dinner - say chicken is 32g protein, keep your dinner carb at around half of that or less. There is a link at the right in my Amazon favorites, check it out. I have lost 21 pounds in the past 3 weeks and hubby is right around 20 lost as well. My energy is increasing every day and I am not dreading my doc appt. next week, like I usually do. I have long known that diet was key to most health issues and had previous success with lo-carb, but money is a factor. My good friend had been reading this book and saw another of our friends drop 70 pounds in 5 months. She staged a health intervention and gave me this book. After much emotional baggage was unloaded she offered support and took me shopping to get me started. It is still a struggle financially, but we are truly motivated and I know that in my friends I'm not alone and have my own support system.

I am anticipating that by Christmas I will have lost at least 10% of my body weight and come the new year I will be ready to start an exercise regimen. Blessedly I live only two blocks from a city park with a very . . . energetic walking track : )

Blessings, Beth Ann

Hello's and Goodbye's

I have been putting off writing this post for about four days and now that I am feeling a little better it's time to share. This past Tuesday we had to put our big dog, Hershey, down. We had been having issues with him for the past nine months or so. I can only describe them as anxiety attacks that were turning aggressive and were totally random. On Tuesday he nipped at our twin son and got his nose. Later in the evening, totally unprovoked, he once again attacked same son and got his eye. E is OK but will probably have a small scare and if the bite had been a millimeter more to the right, he would have lost his eye. For almost two days E's eye was swollen closed and he has a shiner. It broke our hearts but what else was there to do? We had already tried medication and he had seem to improve for about a month, but then he seemed to be steadily getting worse and even went after the smaller dogs. He even got hubby once, breaking the skin. That is what lead to the medican. Enough, guess I am just trying to make myself feel better by justifying it. In the end it was the hardest thing husband has ever had to do, but he have to lead an example to our children, even as pet owners.

This week also saw us welcoming a new, or maybe not so much so, edition. Her name is Izzy and she was another rescue from the vet. She is a beagle, doxin mix and is the most beautiful, sweetest dog I have ever met. Oh and she is a bed hog too - LOL Two different people from church tried her, but she wasn't a match. We had babysat her a few times, so she was familiar with us and our crew already. When the last set of foster parents called and said they couldn't do it for health reasons and didn't want her to go back to the 'pound', we took her. I know your thinking 'sucker', but actually she is good for the other two handicapped dogs. Having one in full use of all it's faculties is good for keeping them exercised and showing them how it 'should' be done! : ) I will try to post some pictures soon.

Hershey Dog 2002 - 2009 Good bye old friend

Blessings, Beth Ann

Mexican Shrimp

I made a recipe tonight that was soooo good, I just had to share!

Mojo Shrimp Scampi

2lb. shrimp, cleaned and cooked

3/4 cup real butter

1 Tbs. olive oil

6 cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes

1 Tbs. lime juice

1 tsp. seasoning salt (Lawery's)

1 cup baby bella mushrooms, sliced

Melt butter in large skillet or wok. Add oil and garlic, let cook a couple minutes. Add lime juice, pepper flakes and seasoning salt and stir together. Toss in shrimp and mushrooms and coat liberly. Cook until heated through, but watch out that shrimp doesn't get rubbery!

This is sooooo good you will lick your plate clean!

Serves 4 if your feeling generous - LOL

I served this with Asparagus in butter sauce.

This recipe ended up not breaking us, as shrimp was on sale at Thanksgiving time and will continue to be through the rest of the holidays. Also, I got the asparagus on a screaming deal at Kroger. Our store always marks down their perishables to half price. I picked up the asparagus in steamer bags in the produce dept. and it had a coupon attached to boot! So the bag, which had butter sauce already in it, cost only $1.45! I picked up four of those : )

This looked so elegant on the plate, definitely company worthy!

Blessings, Beth Ann

Wonderful Day . . .

Today has been a pretty good day and I just wanted to share it. My husband doesn't get many Sundays off (goes to work right after church) but today was one of them. Church in it's self was nice. Today is the first Sunday of Advent and our family was asked to read the scripture and light the candle, the candle of HOPE.

After church our two oldest kids went with a friend up to her house to give a hand and hubby took me and the twins out to lunch, so sweet : ) Then we all went over to the flea market, don't think I've been there in like six months. I tell you what though, the best time to make a deal at the flea market is late in the afternoon on a Sunday! LOL No huge finds or deals, but did enjoy the 'treasure hunt' as we told the twins. I did pick up a box of vintage blue Christmas tree ornaments for $1, 11 still in the box and none broke. They will look great on my sons tree, he received a white one last year as a gift. Feel so blessed for days like these, and the weather wasn't half bad either, almost 70 today.

Well I think we will put the tree up tonight and get at least the lights on it, the new LED lights that Clark Griswold, I mean my son, is coveting - LOL When he saw them he said our lights are 'pimping'. I am assuming that's a good thing? Anyway, yes we are now calling Z, Clark = as in 'National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation'. He has been very manic this year with putting up outdoor lights, just like Clark. Only thing standing in his way is money, or should I say our money and our lack of it. He did confess that he could easily spend an entire pay check on nothing but outdoor lights, and would that be bad? To be honest I too struggled with that answer. After all isn't it more fun to buy light up reindeer and inflatable toy soldiers than pay the sewer bill?

Blessings, Beth Ann

Day After . . .

Hope everyone had an awesome Thanksgiving! Ours was quiet, but one of our best. It was the first time ever we didn't have company, unless you count Izzy. We dog sat for our Pastor : )

I made a pumpkin cheesecake - YUMMY
I had a request for the recipe and I'm always happy to share:

PUMPKIN CHEESECAKE

butter
1/2 cup pecans, coarsely chopped
2 pkgs. cream cheese (8 oz. each), softened
3/4 cup sugar/splenda
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups pumpkin puree
1/2 cup sour cream
4 eggs
1 TBS. pumpkin pie spice
pinch of salt

1) Preheat oven to 300
2) Butter the bottom and sides of a 9 1/2 cheesecake pan. Sprinkle pecans evenly over bottom of pan.
3) In a large mixing bowl, use an eclectic mixer to beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla until fluffy.
4) Add the pumpkin and sour cream, mixing thoroughly. Add eggs and mix thoroughly. Mix in pumpkin pie spice and salt.
5) Pour the batter over the nuts in the pan. Bake for 55-60 minutes or until knife comes out clean. Cool for 20 minutes. Chill at least 2 hours before serving.

Yield: 12 servings

*I don't have a cheesecake pan, so I used a 9 inch pie dish and it worked great, except there was enough leftover batter for a second smaller pie. So really this recipe could make 2 pie sized cheesecakes : )

Blessings, Beth Ann

It's all about family

Only two more short days until Thanksgiving but I want to share what I'm thankful for now ~ FAMILY! I don't have much but my family is the most important thing to me and I am ever so grateful for them every night when I go to bed. When I look at my wonderful children or my amazing husband I could (and have) cry. Here are a couple recent pictures of my crew . . .


All of us on Edisto Island

Here they are getting ready for Halloween, L to R : Inspector Gadget, can of soup, little Red Riding Hood and down front we have a princess and a clown!

Here is our new addition, although he is three times this size now. This is Levi, a boxer/American bull dog mix. He is another of our handicapped rescues. He was thrown down a flight of stairs when he was six weeks old and ruptured his back. He has no feeling in his hind end. Four months latter though, he can do a walk/stagger like our mini doxin who has a similar problem.

I would love to hear what your thankful for this season.

Blessings, Beth Ann

More Vacation

Well we're in the home stretch for Thanksgiving this week and things seem to s-l-o-w-l-y be getting back to normal here. After my trip to the ER, I started to feel better but developed a chest wracking cough and the kids are still dripping. Looking forward to a more healthy Christmas season : )

Here are a few more vacation pic's from our trip to South Carolina this year -enjoy!

This is a view of the salt marsh we camp in front of. Can you see the Monarch butterfly? This campground is on their migratory path and they stop about the second week of October every year.

Here is middle dd with a blue crab she caught.

Here are the twins following a set of golf cart tracks on the beach.

Oldest son walking our anxity ridden dog along the ocean shore. He looks pretty happy here huh?

Middle dd walking to the "point" for some serious shell hunting!

Thanks for sharing our ups and downs with us and have a blessed day, Beth Ann

Good news and bad news . . .

The good news is I'm going to be a grandma again! : ) Yea! LOL The bad news is that everyone here is sick - yuck! They either have sinus,runny nose, cough, soar throat, well you get the picture. I have been sick since Monday and by 5:30 this morning couldn't take it anymore, or should I say hubby couldn't. He got up for work and found out that for the third night in a row I hadn't slept and was vomiting. He took me to the ER and got me fixed up. No, it wasn't the swine flu, although that had crossed my mind. Just sever sinusitis, high b/p, and dehydration. I got a shot in the buttocks and some good drugs. Twelve hours later I am well enough to blog about it, go figure!

Blessings, Beth Ann

Holy smokes!

Here is another chapter in our vacation story. . . While camping we try to cook outside the motor home as much as possible. Main reason is space, but some foods just aren't compatible, such as bacon. Husband had been banned from cooking bacon inside on a previous trip, so now fires up his portable Coleman on the picnic table when we have BLT'S (oldest sons most favorite food). I never gave it a second thought on this trip when he prepared to do the same again, imagine my surprise when I heard shouts outside as I was busy inside chopping the L and T! Apparently some of the grease caught fire and set our canopy a flame!

Here is a shot of the canopy, after the flames and all the shouting.

This picture is looking straight up through our new sun roof.

It doesn't look to bad from this angle and it was handy for catching rain in a glass to see the inches with the kids - LOL

Yet another shot, this one taken from the motor home steps.

And there is the offending culprit, small little guy isn't he?

Good times, Good times. These memories are what family vacations are all about!

Blessings, Beth Ann

Here they are . . .

OK, I know many of you have been waiting, patiently,for some vacation photo's. I picked them up yesterday, did they raise the price? Anyway, here they are . . . My family on Edisto Island, South Carolina.

My three youngest darlings, hanging out : )



Picture postcard perfect, flip flops on the beach. If you look closely you will see a mismatched pair of crocks, yea that's our twins sons', what a rebel - LOL

I call this pic 'scruffy hubby and drugged dogie'. They both look happy though.

Here is oldest son up a tree, what a monkey.

Here is a Loggerhead sea turtle nest. The island is a nesting site from May to the end of October.

Well that's the first instalment. I will post some more pic's in a day or so.

Blessings,Beth Ann

Autumn is in the air and the supermarkets ~

Well I guess autumn is officially here. I finished my first knitted scarf, a teal eyelash. I finished my first crocheted scarf, multicolored for twin son. I was even going to put tassels on it! But oldest son said it would be . . . 'too much'. He's our fashion maven, so I conceded. Let me put it to you this way, remember the old ZZtop song, 'Sharp dressed man'? They could have wrote that about oldest ds - LOL Hopefully I'll get some photos taken of the knitting/crocheting soon.

And if you were unsure before, the arrival of 'the NUTS' is the definitive sign of the pre-holiday season! Everyone has a holiday nut bowl and we're no different here. Even though it was a cold, rainy (Thanks IDA) day here, I splurged and brought home some nuts when I stepped out to Fred's for some OTC cold medicine. As I poured the little beauties into Grandma Lawaine's nut bowl, I could defiantly hear the strains of "It's beginning to look alot like Christmas . . . " in my head : )

Lets hear about your nuts!

Blessings, Beth Ann