Home for the Holidays!

We had such a wonderful Thanksgiving! Matthew and Amanda came home to Texas for an extended leave of 45 days. Colin has grown so much and is so sweet and cute! He learned to walk really well during his stay and loves to explore all over the place...especially outside.

Matthew got to our house in time for his birthday and to help celebrate all of our kids' birthdays (four in the month of October.) He and Amanda also went to the Renaissance festival which is held nearby and I got to babysit Colin the whole day. We had a really fun and special time with him.


They spent quite a bit of time at Amanda's parents' home in Sugar land and also at her grandparents' home in Huntsville. But they did come to our house for Thanksgiving. We also had Elisabeth Weber/Seago, Andrew's fiance and my mom, sister, Heather, and her husband. It was quite a bigger crowd at our house than usual!! It seems so strange to have so many adult children at the table and a baby and spouses and siblings and a mom and all of my younger children as tall as me or taller... I have to say I felt a little old! or at least I should have...in fact it just seemed surreal. I don't feel older! Ha!

Big news!! Amanda is due to have another baby boy around January 15th. She is doing pretty well but a little tired. Of course living out of suitcases for that long with a baby in tow would make anybody tired, even if they weren't pregnant! They have named their new baby-to-be Brennon Malachi. They have moved to California now, while Matthew attends language school. He signed up for a second term but this time as a Russian translator. We are so proud of him and his progress in the military.

Mom, Heather(my sister), and George (her husband) also came for Thanksgiving and we had a great visit with them as well. Talk about a full house for Thanksgiving! It was really REALLY special!


Since Heather works at the Renaissance festival which is just west of Willis, we get to see both her and mom a lot more often. When Heather gets tired of camping out at the festival..or hungry...or just too cold..she knows she is always welcome at our house. This Thanksgiving turned out to be quite a family reunion! God is so good. :o)

Andrew and Elisabeth are engaged!

Andrew and Elisabeth are engaged to be married on April 20th. They have been in a courtship process with the Seagos and our family for the last year or so. Elisabeth is from Germany and has been living with the Seago family for the last 2 years. Her birth family, the Webers, will be coming from Germany to attend the wedding next spring.

Andrew and Elisabeth are both attending Montgomery County Junior College. Andrew is majoring in business management and Elisabeth is majoring in nutrition and health. Andrew is working almost full time as a bank teller and part time in sales. He should be full time at the bank soon. Bank of America reimburses him for all of his tuition and books and he is also getting Pell grants which is very helpful. He is attending mostly online classes right now. Elisabeth works part time for the college at their library. She is on a student visa and has to attend full time school in order to retain it.

Elisabeth is a very sweet and intelligent girl and one who loves the Lord very much. We have gotten to be very good friends over the last two years. She is also hardworking and thrifty too. She has even convinced Andrew to hit the thrift stores for bargains! She loves to buy party dresses and make them over for cute and very 'art-sy' church dresses or even for every day. She is very creative and artistic. Rebekah and I really enjoyed helping her make her own engagement announcements.

We don't know her family well, but we do know her father is a doctor and her brothers and father are very good musicians. In fact they will be playing at the wedding. Her father will be staying with us while he is here and we hope to get to know him better during that time. She has sisters too...in fact I can't remember how many siblings she has but she loves her family and is very close to them.

She also has been unofficially 'adopted' by her American family, the Seagos. Ted Seago is our pastor and Johnnie and he have been like second parents to Elisabeth. They are all very close and have been helping Elisabeth with a lot of her wedding plans. I get to help too though and am really enjoying all of the preparations.

We hope that everyone can make it to the wedding so you can meet our new daughter-in-law to be!

A Happy Meal That Didn't Come From McDonalds

You will find, as your children get older, that each one has a special dream. Jacob's is to hunt. He has finished his hunting safety course, and has his own gun now, and he's studying very hard, but the real question was...could he really do it..or would he be afraid to take the life of an animal to put food on the table? He doesn't want to get 'the big buck' with lots of points, but he really does want to hunt.

So how does a mom help make a dream like this come true? Well, she says YES when he asks her to 'please buy one meat chick". And she helps him scald, pluck, clean and fry it when it's time to do so. I wasn't sure we would have the courage to dispatch a live chicken we had raised, but unfortunately, meat chickies (rock Cornish hens) are bred to grow fast and will die of a heart attack if you don't process them by a certain age. Last week, after much searching on the internet for how to do this humanely and correctly, Tim, Jacob, and I took the plunge and dispatched "Mrs. Happy". She was not happy at the time as the weather was getting hot and she was miserable due to her huge size. I have to say God prepared me for this, because my daddy was an urban homesteader.I had already helped dispatch and pluck many , many a chicken. I don't like it.--but I can do it.

When everything was ready, we entered the 'pioneer' era of Little House on the Prairie...and processed our first meat chicken. Tim and I were very proud of how Jacob handled the situation with fortitude and no squeamishness. It wasn't easy, but he took a little step into manhood in bearing up and doing what needed to be done. Mrs. Happy is in heaven now (if chickens go to heaven), but we all enjoyed the gift she gave us. (All eExcept Andrew who is our 'nurturer' and to whom every animal is a pet.--He had mashed potatoes and gravy for dinner.) 

Next time we will buy five white chickens and nobody is going to name them!! Tim feels confident that Jacob will be able to help him take care of processing other animals once he begins to hunt. He will only be allowed to hunt for the purpose of bringing in food...but we know he will be able to handle the work required. We will certainly have to 'cull' some of our flock later on as we can't feed 35 chickens who aren't laying eggs, and I know I will be able to count on our little man to take care of it for me. What a guy! (I should think raising girls would be so much simpler! Sigh...)

PS. Yes, the chicken tasted delicious!

My Son's Graduation Cake

 

I finally finished Elisabeth, Andrew's friend,  and  my son, Andrew's graduation cake for their party on Saturday. I can't believe I have another 'baby' finished with homeschooling!!!

I taught Elisabeth how to ice and decorate a cake with the Wilton method and she picked it up really fast. She did the stars and the squiggles on the top cake (her idea) and the side and back border.  I made the squiggles with a cake comb. This is the first time in years that I have used this tool. This is a two layer 11 x 15 cake with a two layer 9 x 13 cake on top. It's the first time I ever used dowels rods and a second cake board.

Rebekah made the graduation cap and braided gold embroidery thread to put on cap. I baked a base for the grad cap of chocolate cake in a large custard cup. We had a really fun time deciding how to put this together.