Bon Voyage!

Like so many Northerners, I headed south to Florida for my summer vacation.  Unlike most tourists, when I go to Florida, I stay with my sister out in the Florida countryside...well away from the beach.  I love her new house and the great big yard out back!

 Hanna loves playing in her new yard!

 Even though it was raining and cloudy for the first 5 days I was there, I had a great time babysitting my niece and just hanging out.  We found other fun things to do with our time like blowing bubbles, riding a bike and building a doll house to play with!

 An excellent rainy day project...Hanna even helped with things like gluing and smoothing on the contact paper.





One cloudy and drizzly day, we went to the zoo and took pictures of the animals...I used my camera, and Hanna used her Leap Pad and tried my camera!  We saw lots of neat animals, but Hanna's favorite was the peacock.

I loved the monkeys!

On the first nice day, we went swimming at the PGA National Resort and Spa!  It was finally a great day for swimming!

Later that day, I got to see Hanna perform in her dance recital.  Her adorable antics made the whole crowd chuckle.  The Lion King dance routine with her 2-4 year old age group was precious.

On Sunday we went to visit with our family in Geneva, Florida which is further North.  We enjoyed spending time with my 93 year old grandpap, my aunt and uncle and cousins.

Finally with two days left of my trip, the sun really came out and we hit the beach.  We drove to the coast and met my sisters' sister-in-law and her kids at Juno beach for the day.  Hanna and I both love swimming in the ocean.

 

Finally on my last day, we got some carrots and set off on a bike ride to the end of Hanna's new street.  Her neighbor owns an assortment of goats and sheep that Hanna couldn't wait to go feed.  She was a little hesitant at first but soon called the petit animals her friends.

I can't wait until Hanna and her mommy and daddy come to visit us in Pennsylvania in July so we can have lots more fun together!






 
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My Southern Style Sweet Potato Casserole

Southern Style Sweet Potato Casserole

My version of a southern favorite…sweet potato casserole

Serves 6 to 8  (One  large pie)

 My secret ingredient (passed down from my mom) is a little pure maple syrup in the whipped yams (orange sweet potatoes).  The crunchy pecan topping creates a textured treat for your taste buds. 

If you really want to do it like they do down South y’all…top a warm slice of pie off with some vanilla ice-cream, warm caramel sauce and a generous sprinkle of cinnamon!

Ingredients:

         Whipped Sweet Potatoes:

• 3 cups mashed yams
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• ¾ cup of milk
• ¼ cup of pure maple syrup
• ¼ cup melted butter
  
  Topping:

• 1 ¼ cup brown sugar
• ¾ cup flour
• ¾  cup melted butter
• 2 ½ cup chopped pecans

Preparation:

1. Lightly brush yams with extra virgin olive oil.  Bake at 400°F for 45 minutes to an hour an 15 minutes (depending on their size).
2. After yams have baked and cooled slightly, peel the outer skin away.
3. Combine first 7 ingredients. Pour into a buttered 1 1/2 to 2-quart casserole dish.
4.  Mix remaining ingredients together and sprinkle over top.
5. Bake at 350° for 30 to 40 minutes, until hot and browned.
6. Allow to cool before serving.  
   
   
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Family Garden

In our family, the garden has traditionally been a project for us all to work on and enjoy...TOGETHER.  We work together and harvest plenty for all.

Here's a few shots of two generations of our family in the garden last summer:

Over the years, I have learned all kinds of scientific things about gardening...double digging, companion planting, square foot gardening, organic soil enrichment, encouraging beneficial insects, organic weed control, and so on.  But my roots run much deeper than that...and this is where it all started...my mom and dad's back yard.  Dragging baskets full veggies up through our yard from the family garden is one of my most treasured childhood memories.  Snapping fresh beans and plucking fresh strawberries from the vines will forever be one of my favorite things to do with my mom.


Growing up we always had a huge garden in my parents' back yard.  Back then, dad plowed the soil with his Gravely.  At some point (probably during our teenage years), we outgrew our interest in gardening temporarily.  Then a few years ago, my brother and I started double digging a little plot for our mom for mother's day...and every year since then, the garden has doubled in size.

This year our garden will be full of fruits and veggies for the whole family.  My brother and I spent hours double digging to expand the square footage and putting up new fence.  We both have great tans to show for it, too!  My mom and I redid all the retaining walls and weeded and worked the soil.  Next, I incorporated manure and compost into the existing soil and put down the weed cloth.  Last week at the farm store where my mom works, she and I picked out our plants and seeds.  We made sure to include the ingredients for favorite family recipes like zucchini bread, haluski and chicken soup.

 Here's the layout of what we've planted so far:

 

All in all we have planted:  corn, pumpkins, watermelons, raspberries, strawberries, onions, chives, carrots, broccoli, tomatoes, bell peppers, zucchini, cukes, cabbage, beans, sugar snap peas and sunflowers!

 Today, my mom and I planted most of the veggies in this area...you can see the strawberry patch is well established already.  If you look closely in the pictures from last year, you can see how this little patch of yummy berries has evolved.  In the photo above, you can also see how we built the garden on two levels to improve drainage..since it's at the foot of a small embankment there is lots of run-off to keep the thirsty plants happy.

Zucchini

 

Lots of room for the pea and bean seeds to grow... (above)

(Below) In the top, right corner I planted corn, pumpkin and watermelon seeds today.

 

 We have two sets of raspberry plants in the back, left corner.  We planted them about two weeks ago.  The four in the back are doing awesome and were dug up and given to us by the neighbor.  The two sickly looking raspberry plants in the front were ten bucks each at Lowes!

  Clockwise from the top right are the chives, carrot seed patch, cukes, cabbage, peppers, tomatoes, broccoli and 2 rows of onions (along the back).

We gave everything a good watering today, and it's supposed to rain tomorrow...so everything should get nice and settled.  Stay tuned to see how our garden grows...

 How does your garden grow?

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Lightning and Downpours in Mars

Yesterday we had a huge invitation in Mars (Pennsylvania, not the planet hahaha)!  It was really chilly and soggy, and we had two thunder storm delays...putting the lengthy meet behind by about 2 hours.  I left a little early to get a head of the buses and got home around 9:30 p.m....it started at 1:00 p.m..  Today we are off to the Hempfield HS Track (my alma mater) for an away meet.

For this invitational meet, I was only allowed to run two hurdlers in the boys and girls races.  One boy hurldler was hurt and didn't run...the other took a nose dive over the last hurdle and is covered in brush burns now and unfortunately didn't finish!  The brush burns gave me flash back to the time I ate some of Jeannette's cinder track and sprained my ankle...luckily he walked away with just brush burns and bruises.  I still have cinders in the scars on my knees and elbows!

For the girls 100m hurdle race, the girl who is usually my lead hurdler ran some other sprinting events to try to help us get some team points.  Each athlete was permitted to run in only three events...AND she placed second in the 100m dash and also earned medals in the 400m relay and 1600m relay.

So my 2nd and 3rd place hurdlers ran.  The 2nd place girl ran her best time ever in both the trials and the finals...17.5 seconds.  With that performance the student beat the teacher...since the best time I think I had was 17.6.  Unfortunately she hit a lot of hurdles in the finals and ended up in 7th place and missed a medal by one...or as Mr. Colland used to say "x+1".

Overall the team did pretty good winning lots of medals...especially in the relays. Happy Friday!

Quick Update

Yesterday we competed in our first big dual track meet against a formidable rival team.  I'm very happy and proud to announce that my girl hurdlers swept the race winning 1st, 2nd and 3rd places!  My boy hurdlers also won 2nd and 3rd places in their race. The rival boy who won the race amazed us all and smoked my boys...an eye-opener for all of us.  But, five out of six ain't bad for my second meet!  Some of my hurdlers showed incredible improvement, and several of their performances really surprised me. Overall the girls dominated in the meet winning by over 40 points.  Our boys put up a good fight, but lost by 5 points in the end.  Our next meet is not for a little over a week so now we have some much needed practice time.  Stay tuned...

One of my blogging friends suggested this prompt, so I thought I'd give it a try...

I Believe...

I believe in God...a god of love, compassion, forgiveness and mercy...a god that does not discriminate and does not favor one child over another.  I believe in a god that is ever-present in every molecule in the universe and dwells in each of us.  I believe in a god that is the light and the force that drives every moment and action in the universe.  I believe this God does not belong to one religion but to all of us.  I believe we are all brothers and sisters in one human family.  I believe the content of one's character is more important than one's skin color, age, gender, ethnicity sexual orientation or religious association.  I believe people like Jesus, the Gospel writers (Matthew is my favorite), the Buddha and the Dalai Lama should be our spiritual guides and teachers...spiritual wisdom comes from many sources.  I believe we should try to model our lives after teachers like Jesus, the Buddha, Gandhi, Mother Theresa, and so on.

I believe everything happens for a reason and that which does not destroy us only makes us stronger.  I believe nothing is given to us in life that we can't handle and every challenge is a lesson, every enemy a teacher.  I believe that faith can get us through anything.  I believe in Karma.  I believe Gandhi was right..."an eye for an eye will make the whole world blind."  I believe in turning the other cheek and forgiving others.

I believe in giving without expectation of anything in return.  I believe in paying it forward and giving back.  I believe in compassion.   I believe in being truly grateful for the many blessings--big and small--in my life.  I believe that there are much more valuable things to be given and received than material items...time, charity, kindness, compassion, love, forgiveness, empathy, and open-mindedness to name a few.

I believe in the power of love.  Love can heal and save us all.  I believe a family should  be a source of unconditional love. I believe that we all should love one another.  I believe: "blessed are the peacemakers."  I believe that we are not here to judge each other but to learn from and help each other.

I believe learning is a life long process...and that we become wiser with age.  I believe in reading books...the tangible kind that I can stack on my shelf.  I believe in learning and embracing new ideas and lessons everyday.  I believe our children should be taught how to thing...not what to think.  I believe knowledge, learning, and understanding empower us all.

I believe in being kind to animals.  I believe pets improve your quality of life.  They can always make you laugh at unexpected times and ease the stresses of daily life.

I believe lots of fresh air and sunshine are necessary for our souls...being outdoors is healing and sustaining for our bodies, minds and souls.  I believe that growing plants is as good for us as it is for the environment.  I believe that home grown food is irreplaceable.

I believe in the power of a good home cooked meal.  Homemade chicken soup really does heal!

What do you believe in?



"The blog... sends out blog prompts so that we as bloggers can get a sense of what one another is like, this is in response to their recent prompt, "What do you believe in?"  If you are a blogger that follows here, please feel free to write a post about what you believe in, so that I can get to know you better as well."