Welcome 2026!

 

2025 -  What a year!  God has been very good to us.  We spent more time in Tennessee last year than we have in almost 35 years of marriage, but it's the right decision.  We have been here since before Thanksgiving and my family cup is overflowing.  We have seen both of Les' siblings, their spouses and all six adult children and one son-in-law.  We've eaten and laughed and eaten and laughed some more.  All of this surrounded Les' dad with so much love.

 

As any long time readers know, I'm not big on New Years resolutions.  I finished reading my Bible through yesterday and started a new plan today.  While I was looking for a plan to follow (here's the one I'm doing this year https://www.bible.com/reading-plans/19038-bible-in-a-year-365-day-reading-plan)  I found a short one that also looked interesting - "8 Resolutions Jesus Would Be Happy With."  Part of the description says this, "In this 8-day journey through the Beatitudes, you’ll discover how humility, mercy, and peacemaking (and more) reshape your priorities around God’s kingdom. Forget the pressure of keeping perfect resolutions — this study helps you start the year grounded in grace."  This was maybe a five minute read, but it was really good.  Doing what makes Jesus happy will make for the best year ever!

 

Happy New Year!  Do you have any resolutions or big plans?  We will be celebrating our 35th wedding anniversary in May and are still deciding where we want to be when we celebrate. 

Family Time

I have a reason for not posting about our trip yet - there's a new baby in our family!  My niece, Lauren, had a baby girl last month.  I was finally able to make a trip to Fresno to meet her and I'm so in love!  Olive Jae is just a darling little bundle.

 

 

We had a mini reunion on Tuesday night.  My brother, Rick, is a fabulous great uncle!

 

 

My sister, "Mimi" Kim.  If you look closely you will see braces on both her arms.  Kim took a tumble a few weeks ago and broke her right wrist, broke her right elbow, and sprained her left wrist!  I drove her to her followup appointment on Wednesday.  X-rays show that she is healing, it's just going to take time. 

 

 

The other star of the show, of course, is Olive's big brother Bo.  He will be in four in February and he kept us entertained all evening.

 

 

I brought several gifts, my favorite is this book - "A is for Adobo."  With his blonde hair and blue eyes you wouldn't guess that Bo is one fourth Filipino, but he is.  This is an alphabet book with Filipino words and it is adorable!

 

 

He loves Olive and is so sweet with her!

 

 

"Moose on the Loose" shirt that we bought in Canada.

 

 I found this darling handmade duck at a produce stand in Cookeville.

 

Bo had one request at the end of the evening - a little dance party, with head gear required!

 

 

After Kim's appointment on Wednesday, we got a little more time with Lauren and Olive while Bo was at preschool.  I think I just held her and stared in awe for about an hour!!

 

 

 

Bo came home just before I left.  He and Mimi had a drawing party.  It was so fun to see how creative he is!

 

I'm so thankful for my family!!

Pigs on the Porch and Other Tennessee Sites

 

I miss blogging!  Our year has been so busy, but I still miss sitting down and writing about our latest adventures.  We've spent a lot of time in Tennessee this year and we know it's where we need to be.  So far I've run in heat and high humidity, along with frigid temperatures (twice last month it was in the low 30s.)

 

A little frost on the grass

We were there for three weeks last month and the leaves changed before our eyes!

 

 

In spite of the weather, I have been getting out and running.  The hills are endless, but I'm pushing through.  I've seen quite a few cows, but the highlight was two pigs on a porch!  This is not a one time occurrence, I've seen them there quite regularly. 

 

We went on a little vacation in September - my good friend, Lori Long, retired this year so we took a cruise (with our husbands, of course) to celebrate!  I'll try to blog about that soon.

This is 93!

 

We celebrated my father-in-law's 93rd birthday yesterday.  Anyone who lives this long deserves all the cake, ice cream and presents!

 

 

Six Week Check In

 

It's really a good thing I don't get paid for my blogging.  I'd be broke right now!  My last post was about the fires here in California.  We were not personally affected and I'm very thankful for that.  January ended with a trip to Hawaii so Les could do in-person performance reviews.  It's always good to be back!

 

We were home less than 24 hours when Les was headed back to the airport.  He had a work meeting in Miami.  Three days later he flew from Miami to Tennessee and I flew from Burbank to Tennessee to join him.  This will be a more common theme for us.  As Les' dad ages we want to spend more time with him.  He is doing really well, but at 92 we know that time is precious.

 

We spent 12 days there and it was SO cold!  I under-packed and had to resort to lots of layers!  I did manage to get out and run one morning, but more days than not it was raining.

 

We got a light dusting of snow one of the Sunday mornings. 

 

It is good to be back home where I am able to thaw out.  Unfortunately, I brought a cold home with me.  I'm finally feeling better and now we're looking at the first of March in just a few days!

Friday Foodie ~ Christmas Breakfast

 

We had a wonderful Christmas at home this year, just the two of us.  Don't feel sorry for us - we love having the day to ourselves!  It's mellow and always begins with an amazing breakfast.  This year, I reached way back to my childhood and decided I wanted to make Chocolate Rolls.  This was Mom's take on cinnamon rolls, but since it was Mom, chocolate had to be involved!  I'm pretty sure she used Bisquick, because it was a quick and easy way to make something special for our family of six.

There is a recipe for cinnamon rolls on the back of the Bisquick box, but I wanted to make yeast based rolls.  I looked at dozens of recipes and decided on Easy Cinnamon Rolls from Scratch from Sally's Baking Addiction.  She has a "do not republish" policy on her blog, so I won't put the recipe here.  But go to her site because the recipe is simple and SO good!

 

I followed the recipe until it was time to make the filling, then I used cocoa powder instead of cinnamon.  That's the only thing I changed!  I did the first four steps on Christmas Eve, then put the rolls in the refrigerator.  When I got up on Christmas morning, I pulled them out and let them rise for about an hour.  At that time, I decided to move them to a larger baking pan and I'm so glad I did.

 

I didn't make the frosting in the original recipe.  I had a little bit of Pillsbury cream cheese frosting and just added some chocolate syrup to it.

I sent pictures to my siblings and nieces and they all wanted some!  My brother said it brought back a lot of childhood memories of one of his favorite sweet treats.  Mom set a high bar, but I think I might have reached it with these!

Thanksgiving Success!

I'll get to my food in a bit, but our Thanksgiving was just wonderful!  It really started Tuesday evening at our annual Thanksgiving service.  I love hearing what everyone is thankful for each year.  We followed this up with our annual youth bake auction.  There were so many great treats and our auctioneers did a great job pushing the prices up.  Our youth department raised over $3,300!  Les and I bought Oreo Truffles:

  

and Espresso Chocolate Chip Cookies.

 

We got home and stayed up waiting for Leksi to arrive.  While we waited, I made two types of muffins.  I spent much of Wednesday prepping as much food as possible.  I sent Kim a tempting picture of my dressing:

Les made his double layer pumpkin pie:

 

 

I was up early on Thursday morning and got my turkey going in the crock-pot.  This is the same kind of turkey I bought a couple of years ago, Jennie-O Oven Ready Turkey Breast.  As I mentioned, there wouldn't be room in my oven so I followed the directions for slow cooker.  Just add one cup of water, put the completely frozen turkey in, and cook on high for 4 hours.  I also added some chicken broth for a little extra flavor.

I also baked my peach cobbler.  It was the only thing that needed to bake at a higher temperature, but it didn't need to be ready at the same time.  It was still warm hours later when we were ready for dessert.

 

I started putting everything else in around 10:45.  Everything was going along great for about the next hour or so when my oven started smoking.  Unfortunately my macaroni and cheese boiled over and made a mess!  It was on the bottom rack, which was good because it didn't boil over in to anything else, but I suspect that is exactly why it boiled over!  We opened some windows and let everything finish baking.  Here is the spread:

Everything was SO good!  Yes, it was a lot of work, but I loved doing it.  This is the first time I've gotten to do this and hopefully won't be the last.  Leksi had told me she doesn't like dressing and I told her she didn't need to eat everything.  But she tried it and said, "This is the best dressing I've ever had."  Kim said it was one of the nicest Thanksgivings she's ever had.  My heart was as full as my belly!

Leksi turned 20 on Saturday.  Last time she was here, she told me that her skillet is kind of a mess and Wednesday morning she mentioned it again.  It was a simple gift, but we were happy to get it for her!

Rodney served in the Air Force, so it was fun to watch him and Leksi bond over their shared experiences.  It really was a Thanksgiving success - on both the food and family scene!

P.S.  As far as my oven goes - it's clean now.  My oven has two cleaning settings - Steam Cleaning and Self Cleaning.  For Steam Cleaning, I just poured a cup of water in the bottom of the oven and turned it on.  The steam helps everything soften up.  It wasn't enough, so I then used Self Cleaning.  I went for the full 5 hours and it worked like a charm!  The oven heats to a very high temperature and I ended up with ashes at the bottom of the oven.  Once it unlocked, I pulled the racks out and let it cool.  Then all I needed was a wet rag and everything wiped up!  No chemicals and Brillo pads required.