Another Day at the Office

This photo was in the base paper in Guam. Nathan is in the front, in uniform, talking to some people.


Nate at work

Photo by Staff Sgt. Patrick Mitchell/36th CS) (This is the caption from the paper)
Members of Congress and staff chat with a B-1 bomber aircrew during a tour of Andersen Friday. The tour was part of a refueling stop, ending a tour of India, Thailand, Vietnam and Singapore.

Team Blog Info for Mom

Team Blogs are blogs where more than one person contributes articles. One person starts the blog then invites others to be a team member. The original blogger can be an administrator and edit all the posts, or not. Sounds kind of fun.. Coming soon:
The McBabes - Girls Only Blog.
or McBerryPatch Blog
or Faye's Family Blog
Nathan's family has a full family website where you can post pictures, exchange recipes and post on the family message board. But blogger is free.

Laundry

Each Monday Mrs. McNosh washes all the clothes and hangs everything up on the clothes line. She starts to get a little carried away and:

She hangs up the dog
and his dish and his bone.
She gets a wrong number
and hangs up the phone....

After a long weekend I feel like Mrs. McNosh. Every thing needs to be washed (including the dogs.) So far today we have washed, folded, and put away 4 loads of laundry. Emily and John have been folding and delivering for me. John is good at remembering whose is whose (sometimes rather tricky with 3 big sisters.) Right now our fancy new washing machine (thank you Nathan) is washing our sheets. Today is a beautiful breezy day, so I will hang them out to dry on the line.

An empty laundry basket seems like such a great accomplishment.

Sunday Dinner Revisited

We decided that inviting someone over for Sunday dinner would help us do a better job at fixing a real Sunday dinner, and keep us from feeling too gloomy. So last week we invited a young girl from church to follow us home this week. Her husband just left for basic training and so she fit most of our requirements: girl(check), lonely(check), kids Hannah's age(nope), not afraid of dog hair(check - has a dog).

We put the roast in the crock pot and turned it on! We made rasberry jello with frozen rasberries, we boiled eggs, and we made bread and set it in fridge to raise.

When we got home at 4:45pm we could smell the yummy roast from the garage. We put the rolls in to bake and devilled the eggs. Mixed up some juice and we were set.

Dinner was a success! Our new friend is really cute and seemed to enjoy the constant chatter from Hannah and Sydney. I was exhausted from a looooong day at church (ward counsel before the usual 3hrs) and a wild Primary with a missing music leader and secretary. The good food made me very sleepy, and as soon as she left we all went to bed! A lovely day. I wonder who we should invite next week.

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I remember a dinner that we sometimes ate as children - shredded meat in gravy over toast. I remember loving it, and I keep thinking this is something I want to do with our leftover roast, but have not tried it yet. Am I just imagining, or is this a real food? I am going to try to fix something like that for dinner tonight.

What's for dinner at your house?

Nathan's roomate, "Neo", has a blog. He has some pictures of the deployment and their home on the island. Mike (Neo) is a great guy and keeps us posted on what the guys are up to. It's kind of fun to spy on Nathan!


Mike (on the left) and little bro launching rockets in Abilene

Nachos

I have a serious Taco Bell addiction. How I love a bean burrito with no onions. Can you believe tomorrow is Friday and I have not gone there once this week? Uh, actually, you shouldn't believe that, now that I think about it I ran through the drive thru for Monday's lunch. Well, just one time this week is mighty good for me.

At Downey High School, after track practice, when Heather drove the Audi, we would dig around in the coin tray and check under the seats for change for a couple bean burritos for the ride home. What a cool big sister!

The problem is, I can get my favorito burrito for under a dollar. And Taco Bell is really close. And there is always about a dollar in change rattling around in the ash tray. And Emily hates Taco Bell, so I can be completely selfish and buy just one item and make her a PB&J (actually peanut butter and honey) sandwich at home.

The Nacho Bell Grande at Taco Bell is muy b-wayno. But it costs about $2.50, and there is too much on the tray for one person to eat alone. Nathan does not agree and feels if I really wanted some I should have ordered my own.

Nachos at home is as good, if not better than the Nacho Bell Grande. And it takes about the same time to whip up your own as it does to get coats and hats on the kids, let the dogs out, get the kids secured in car seats, lock the door, drive around the block to make sure you shut the garage door, then head to Taco Bell. I make this 2 different ways - fancy shredded beef nachos or regular old ground beef nachos.

The shredded beef nachos are soooooo tasty, but Nathan's gone and the kids hate that stuff, so I am going to just talk about the hamburger style nachos today. This week I browned up a pound of hamburger and froze most of it for later (for spagetti or nachos.) To give the rest of the ground beef a little nacho flavor, I poured in some salsa after the meat was all browned and rinsed. Then I warmed a can of Fat Free Rosa Rita Refried Beans, opened a bag of tortilla chips, chopped some lettuce, grated some cheese, opened the sour cream, and (since I was really feelin' fine) made a little guacamole.

To assemble the nachos you start with a layer of chips on your plate. Then you scoop on some beans, then meat, then add some lettuce, cheese, tomato, sour cream, salsa, guacamole, olives, peppers, and whatever else might be hiding in the cupboard. You can use your chips as silverware and just scoop and chow down, or you can use a fork and arrange each bite carefully.

Delish. And the leftovers make a tasty lunch.

The kids like to put some cheese on some chips and warm them in the microwave. They also like to eat every last bit of the sour cream - with or without chips.

10 days since my last post - Yikes!

My sister sent this and I thought it would be fun to have here.

1. What is your occupation? Marmee
2. What color are your underwear? White
3. What are you listening to right now? Scary music from Lost
4. What was the last thing you ate? nachos - mmmmmm
5. Do you wish on stars? With Sydney
6. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? green, broken, with the paper scratched off - my favorite kind
7. How is the weather right now? 41, windy, maybe some snow tonight
8. Last person you spoke to on the phone? Janene, about swapping babysitting this week for volunteering at school
9. Do you like the person who sent this to you? I love her guts!
10. How old are you today? 29
11. Favorite drink? Rasberry Lemonade, with chocolate milk a close second
12. Favorite sport to watch? I don't really watch sports, but I do wear a sports watch!
13. Have you ever dyed your hair? Yes
14. Do you wear contacts or glasses? Yes
15. Pets? Yes - one golden retriever, and one borrowed mutt
16. Favorite month? July
17. Favorite food? Chocolate Chip Cookies
18. What was the last movie you watched? The Grinch
19. Favorite day of the year? July 4th
20. What do you do to vent anger? Get a shakey voice
21. Fall or spring? Fall
22. Hugs or kisses? Kisses
23. Cherry or Blueberry? Blue berry
24. Do you want your friends to email you back? Sorry, NA
25. Who is most likely to respond? Hannah
26. Who is least likely to respond? nathan
27. Who do you live with? Nathan, Hannah, Sydney, Emily, and John
28. When was the last time you cried? 2 weeks ago - the week Nathan deployed
29. What is on the floor of your closet? Shoes and clothes
30. What friend have you had the longest? That I still keep in contact with? My sisters - I am terrible at keeping in touch with old friends.
31. What did you do last night? I went to Enrichment meeting, then watched American Idol with Hannah
33. What inspires you? Good Books
34. What are you afraid of? The dark
35. Plain, cheese or spicy hamburgers? Cheese
36. Favorite car? My new car!
37. Favorite dog breed? Golden Retriever
38. Number of keys on your key ring? 1 and the car opener thing
39. How many years at your current job? 11.5
40. Favorite day of the week? Thursday
41. How many states have you lived in? 5
42. How many cities have you lived in/name them? 5
Modesto, CA
Hood River, OR
Pensacola, FL
Abilene, TX
Rapid City, SD

Fast Sunday Dinner Disaster

Today was fast Sunday. We go to the 1pm service, so we really do have to fast for two whole meals, as we don't get home from church until 4:30ish. I knew that it would be dark by the time we got home, and I would be hungry. So I had Emily and Sydney come help me peal potatoes for soup before we left for church. I chopped the potatoes and put them in the crock pot. I added carrots and celery and onion and chicken broth. Then I had to change a diaper, and we headed out the door.

During the Sacrament I thought of the soup and I couldn't remember putting the crock back into the pot! I was hoping that I did it and just didn't pay any attention. But when we got home there were no yummy smells coming from the kitchen. The crock was sitting on the counter near the sink, full of brown potatoes.

I don't know if potatoes go bad when you leave them out, but they didn't look good, so we pealed some more and put them on the stove top. The soup was boiling nicely, so I grabbed a handful of Pringles and decided to come check my email. I wrote a note to my sisters, read a note to Hannah, and completely forgot about the soup - AGAIN!

I had a bad feeling as I ran upstairs and could smell the unmistakable odor of burning potatoes. Blech. Now, I am used to having to be careful to not scrape the bottom of the pan, but really, this was beyond lightly scorched. Burned. To a crisp.

We had ice cream and good french bread for dinner.

Will try again tomorrow.

Happy Anniversary!

Hiking to Half Dome - 1992

If I were a poet
I would write a sonnet
It would say "I love you"
Your name would be upon it
If I were a farmer
I'd give you a bunny
If I had a beehive
You would get free honey


If I were a baker
You could have a cruller
If I were a painter
Choose your favorite color
If I had some diamonds
I'd give you a few
Anything to show you
How much I love you


Did you guess my secret?
I am not a poet
Couldn't write a sonnet
And I think you know it
I am not a farmer
Can't give you a bunny
I don't have a beehive
Sorry 'bout the honey


I am not a baker
Don't know bread from batter
And I am not a painter
And it doesn't matter
I don't need a present
All I have to do
Is look at you to show you
How much I love you

- Kermit the Frog

Happy New Year

I need to get to bed, but I can't sleep. A week of late night movies has set my little inner clock to stay-up-late/sleep-in mode. So I guess I'll spend a little time here and list my goals for this year. I'll still have to get up early. Maybe I will get a nap tomorrow.

My dad always liked to teach a Family Home Evening lesson about goal setting at the beginning of each year. He would give each of us a paper and we would write goals for the year. I thought of Dad as I was gathering paper and pens for our FHE tonight.

This month in The Friend Magazine, I found this Goal Planning page. I printed off a copy for each of us and we wrote down some goals for the year. It's hard to read here, but the sections are: Home and Family, Interests and Hobbies, Spiritual, Physical, Friends, and School.


Goal Planning Page

The girls were really thoughtful as they wrote down some ideas. Sydney wrote in the Friends section that she would let her friends choose the game that they want to play. Hannah says she wants to learn to figure skate...and to say her prayers morning and night. Emily says she will Love Mom!

For myself - I want to continue reading the Book of Mormon daily. (did I mention that our family finished reading the whole book on Dec. 23rd? Well we did, and now we are going to start over. But we are just reading one chapter a day.)

- Be a more-fun-mom. (spend less time planning activities for others, and more time planning everyday fun with our family.)

- knit a pair of socks. I have yarn. I can do it. I should have been knitting while watching movie after movie last week!

- play the violin in church. (I had this great idea in the fall to get a quartet together to play for our ward for Christmas. There are 2 viola-ists and 1 cellist in our ward. I talked to everyone. I found music. But then our Primary Program took over and I didn't follow through. I think this could be a really neat thing for me and for those other aging highschool musicians. So maybe I can find an Easter piece, or some pioneer songs and really get the show on the road this time.)

- eat less move more, blah blah blah.

Happy New Year!