Travelin'

Saturday, we saw the sun rise in California on the way to the airport.  This time it's a one-way trip.  The emotions are all over the place.  We've lived in California for the last five years.  We've had a lot of life in those five years.  Good life, good memories.  As I was packing up, I came across this photo from our very first day at Woodleaf.

Abby was five and Joe was three.

We've had two more babies and grown lots of hair since then.

Woodleaf is different, too.

This is a picture Abby drew of all the Woodleaf kids in 2007.

Betsy, Max, Abby, Tamara, Hannah, Augie (O), Canaan (K), Sam and Joe.

Now she's almost big enough to babysit the Woodleaf kids.

 

I am so overwhelmed right now with love and gratitude.

We have been so blessed with friendships in California.  Our friends rallied around us and helped get us get packed with such short notice.  They came together and celebrated with us the things that have made these last five years so wonderful--our friendships.  It hurts to put distance between those relationships but we are so so grateful to have had all those people who love us and have shared life with us in Cali.

Now the sun has set on our first day in Alabama.

 The first day of a new adventure, a new season.

We were welcomed to this side of the country with such abundant love.

Our families have opened their homes and made sure that we had rooms ready complete with special touches for each one's individual tastes.  They had barbecue waiting for dinner (and chow chow even!).  A friend loaned an entire toy box (with toys in it) for the little boys until the rest of our stuff arrives.  My heart just swelled with gratitude.

 

With all this love coming at us from both sides of the country, it's no wonder we have emotions leaking out all over the place!

 

 

 

It's that time again!

 

I know you've all been waiting with baited breath.

It's our annual park picture!

So without further ado I present...

2012 

I can hardly stand how fast they are growing.

You can take a look at our past years' pics here.

Of course, it is always a challenge to get a good picture of all four at the same time.

Here are some of the other faces that didn't make the final and a couple photo bombs.  

This is when I asked them for their best smiles.

As hard as it was to convince them to get into those pics, they were all excited to try some crazy perspective pics.

Watch out for hungry, hungry Abby.

Joe, the incredible.

And would ya look at that.  Just look at it.

 It's super mom!

 

Bear Hole

Chico is only about an hour away from us (like most everything).  One afternoon before school got started we were able to take the big kids over there to explore Upper Bidwell Park.  Earlier this summer we had a fun family day in Lower Bidwell.  This day was hot so we went looking for water.  We quickly settled on the Yahi Trail which follows the creek for several miles.

It was so nice to take a hike without the little boys.  I mean, we love going out as a family but when everyone has generally the same stride you don't have to worry about telling this one to slow down and this one to hurry up.  It was really peaceful.

So, we walked.

Took in the scenery.

Jumped in the creek if we got hot.  Walked some more.

 We made our way to Bear Hole, one of several swimming holes along the trail.

Those black rocks were hot enough to fry eggs but the water felt amazing!

 

And it felt good to make some special memories with Abs and Joe.

We topped the afternoon off with take out from Tong Fong Low-the best Chinese food around!

 

If you are local,

what's your favorite afternoon getaway?

Blackberries for the pickin'

 

As many blackberries as we eat while we pick them, 

we are still lining up as soon as the blackberry cobbler comes out of the oven!

 

 

 

At our end of the summer staff party, we had a blackberry bake-off/taste-off.

Sarah's tried and true blackberry bars were present. 

This is what my kids asked for after our first berry picking.

So good.  I could eat half the batch all by myself.

Blackberry banana bread (just add blackberries to your favorite banana bread recipe)

and lemon ricotta blackberry muffins were my contributions.

Both were good

but

the champion of

blackberry AWESOMEness

had to be

Bekah's blackberry filled donut holes!

She used a Krispy Kreme dough recipe and squooshed it around the blackberry filling.

Deep fried and glazed.

What what!

 

What is your favorite blackberry dish?

 

 

Color in the garden

Red tomatoes.  And yellow ones too.

Finally!  Might be my favorite thing to come out of the garden because it means sweet snackin' cherry tomatoes and tomato sandwiches and tomato + basil pastas and fresh salsa and (a new discovery-thanks, gina!) tomato jam!  



Black beans (almost)

This is proof for my neighbor who scoffed at my black bean plants.  They happen to look just like green bean plants.  She just wasn't believin' what I was growin'.  See and believe, sistah!

Yellow squash

as big as my head when one hides from me long enough.

Orange pumpkins

several kinds...my renegade jack-o-lanterns

We have maybe a dozen of these sugar pumpkins that I can't wait to eat up in soups and pies and curry.  But not all at the same time.

More renegades.  I don't know what kind they are but they are so cute and tiny.  And yellow!  Anybody else know what they might be?

We'll have enough to start preserving soon!

++++++++++++++++++++++
I was able to talk to Gina and get the recipe we used for the Tomato Jam.  It is sooo good!  Try it on cream cheese with crackers, spread it on a sandwich or wrap, add it to the top of your dinner roll or cornbread.

Tomato Jam
5 lbs. tomatoes chopped
2 small onions diced
1/2  cup dark brown sugar
1 cup white sugar (*the original recipe called for 2 cups but we thought that made it too sweet)
juice of 2 lemons
2 1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp cayenne pepper
2 tsp smoked paprika (*original recipe calls for 1 tsp)
1 1/2 tsp cumin (*original recipe calls for 3/4 tsp)
1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
chopped jalapenos to taste (*our addition-makes it more like a pepper jelly)

Throw it all in a pot and allow it to simmer until it becomes syrup-y (approximately 3 hours but it depends on the juice level of your tomatoes).

You can see we took the liberty to experiment with the recipe a bit.  That's what makes cooking fun for me, just being creative.  So, throw in what you like and let me know how it comes out.  You may just discover the next best thing!

First day of Fifth Grade

Whoa.

I think this day was harder on me than first of kindergarten.

I mean, fifth grade, people!

That's the last grade in elementary school.  And then there are only three years of middle school and only four more of high school.  She's practically out of the house already!  I could barely contain myself.

We took these pictures at home because she said I would embarrass her if I tried to take them at school or ask any of her friends to get in a picture with her.

So, Abs is into all things London right now.  Not because the Olympics just happened there (although that was a fun thing too) but because her favorite authors are from London.  You know, JK Rowling and Jenny Nimmo.  I'm sure there are more but those are top of the list.

I couldn't leave her at school without embarrassing her at least a little...

She's refusing to look at me.

Just waves me away.

Leave, mom, please!

 

We had a little girl talk recently and I told her she can't leave me at home with all these boys by myself.  Dylan will graduate high school in about 15 years so she'll only have to live at home until she's 25.  Ab thought that was totally reasonable.

yeah, right. 

sigh.

 

Wild West

 

A few of the Woodleaf families got together and went wild for the last western night of the summer.

There were shoot outs and chase scenes galore.  That probably had to do with the fact that we had mostly cowBOYS and only a couple cowgirls (one being a just a babe).  But the old mining towns were that way too, I believe.

There were also tests of strength.

When your own child is able to look you eye to eye it's time to make sure she knows that my guns are bigger! 

In reality, this is totally unneccesary.

Abs is a sweetheart and I thank God on a daily basis that he gave me a girl like her.