Hair salon

One of the hardest parts about moving is finding someone new your trust with your hair. For the first 3-ish years we were married I managed to get back to Ohio (from Delaware and Oklahoma) to have my hair cut and highlighted. For real. Then we hit California and it's just a bit too far for a hair cut...

So here I got to an Aveda salon in Vacaville. It's 95% naturally derived products and it's good for the environment, very hippy California, but I love it! So I decided to see if there might (fingers crossed) be an Aveda salon in Grand Forks and guess what! There is! They even have two different locations for crying out loud! It's the little things...

Two things keep recurring. This hymn, which I can't remember ever hearing on my Pandora station seems to play several times a day now. And my daily reading in both my one year Bible plan, my devotional and even several books I've read this week keep talking about Proverbs 16. Coincidence, I think not. Gods speaks comforting words to us when we need them.

"He leadeth me:  O blessed thought! 
O words with heavenly comfort fraught! 
Whate'er I do, where'er I be,
still 'tis God's hand that leadeth me. 

He leadeth me, he leadeth me,
by his own hand he leadeth me;
his faithful follower I would be,
for by his hand he leadeth me.

 Sometimes mid scenes of deepest gloom,
sometimes where Eden's bowers bloom,
by waters still, o'er troubled sea,
still 'tis his hand that leadeth me. 

 Lord, I would place my hand in thine,
nor ever murmur nor repine;
content, whatever lot I see,
since 'tis my God that leadeth me. 

 And when my task on earth is done,
when by thy grace the victory's won,
e'en death's cold wave I will not flee,
since God through Jordan leadeth me."

~~~

Proverbs 16:

1 We can make our own plans,
but the Lord gives the right answer.  

9 We can make our plans,
but the Lord determines our steps.

25 There is a path before each person that seems right,
but it ends in death.

33 We may throw the dice,
    but the Lord determines how they fall.

 

Kale Chips

I know, the picture isn't very appetising. I bought kale at the farmers market a few weeks ago for the express purpose of making these chips. I used Melissa d'Arabian's recipe which was super fast and super easy. I read the reviews and made sure to follow the tip of not putting to many "chips" on one pan, so I ended up with three pans! The chips cook down and shrink a lot though, so it all got eaten. Which also means they were good! Surprisingly very good. I shared with some neighbors who also liked them. I'm now inspired to try some squash chips...

Baking Day

I woke up and went for a four mile, one hour walk with my neighbor friend. We've been doing this pretty consistently for the past few weeks. We started at two miles and have built up. I'm sad for many reasons that she's leaving shortly for two months (her husband is deploying) but missing the morning walk is one of them. It was a beautiful day, and for the first time in weeks not too hot at 8 o'clock in the morning. After my walk was a busy day at home...

It included washing the sheets I had stripped off on cleaning day and hanging them out to try in the backyard sunshine.

And making a chocolate orange loaf cake for dessert that evening. I used my good double dutch coca from King Arthur Flour and I could tell a difference from previous cakes. This one came out darker and richer.

Then I made a batch of honey wheat bread. One loaf was for our dinner and the second (one batch makes two loaves) went to our next door neighbors with a jar of homemade strawberry jam. They just recently had their first baby. Which reminds me... I don't think I did a post about this years batch of strawberry jam. I ran out of the batch I canned with my dad last year, so I made a new batch all by myself with farmers market strawberries. YUM!

 And dinner got prepped. A shepherd's pie (I tweak Alton's recipe since we're not lamb fans and make a few healthier substitutions) with a thick layer of creamy mashed potatoes on top, yes please! The best part is that I can make the whole thing early in the day and keep it in the refrigerator until I'm ready to bake it off just before eating in a 400 degree oven. That also means all the messy clean up is done early in the day!

We had friends from church over for dinner and they stayed and chatted until nine o'clock. It was a nice, quiet, homey evening full off good food. The best part was J actually being home! He's been gone so much since April and thanks for another school and finishing his AC upgrade he'll be gone again shortly pretty much into mid-July. Sigh. But it makes having him home very sweet and so I will savor my moments with him.

Always more books

 Whitehorn Woods is one of Binchy's short story type reads. each chapter is a different person's story, but they all ed up being connected to one another by the end of the book. It's also a book that recalls character's from other books and links them to new people. That being said it wasn't my favorite book of hers. It wasn't bad, but at times it was down right bizarre!

 Murder at the Vicarage is the debut novel for Christie's character Miss Jane Marple. So of course I had to read it. Although as a rule I like the Miss Marple mysteries a bit less than the Hercule Poirot mysteries. I'd give this 4 out of 5 stars. It was good, a light and easy read (which is why I read of LOT of Christie's books during the summer) and the ending totally got me. It's set in a small village and the nosey neighbors are the key to solving the murder! I'd recommend it.

 Murder in Mesoptamia is another great Poirot mystery! As usual I was totally blind sided at the end. (Does this mean I'm just really slow, or is Agatha Christie just that good...) This story refers to the Murder on the Orient Express at the end, one of my 5 star favorites of hers! Fast read.

 Miriam's Kitchen is maybe my top book of the year so far. Definitely up there in the top 3! Here's a bit about it:

"Food memoirs often delve into the meaning of life. This hardly surprises--memories are as essential to daily life as the food that sustains us. Miriam's Kitchen blends recipes and food reminiscences with family narratives and observations about the author's personal evolution as a Jew. Ehrlich weaves the stories from four generations of family life, punctuated with powerful and often tragic memories. While her mother-in-law, Miriam, is teaching her to make chicken livers with noodles, Ehrlich unexpectedly learns how Miriam, her mother, and husband survived a Nazi labor camp in Poland during the Holocaust. Using vivid and bare yet discreet words, she graphically tells what they suffered and the nightmares that still haunt them.

Ehrlich's own story covers her transformation from a child whose family lit Sabbath candles but went boating on Yom Kippur, to an adult who chooses an Orthodox life marked by ambivalence about the rigors of being kosher and pride in what she is passing on to her children. Recipes for Honey Cake, Noodle Pudding, and many others are buried treasures hidden among Ehrlich's intense words. Sadly omitted is a recipe for potato kugel. Her grandmother uses this tempting pudding to good-naturedly test, taunt, and ultimately as the means for accepting her daughter Selina's non-Jewish fiancé into the family. Happily for us, 24 other tempting kosher recipes make up for this one missed dish. Miriam's Kitchen is a gripping and gratifying memoir of food, life, tragedy, and family survival."

I just loved it from page one. I loved how one thing, a food a story a moment would trigger a memory and off we'd go into another part of her book. It was like talking to a dear friend. Of course I also loved the recipes! When I got to the end I just wanted to open it and start again from the beginning. One of the best books I've ever read, hands down. This one is being added to my "to buy" list!!

 Wicked was an interesting book. I've seen the Broadway show, which is similar (obviously) but not nearly as dark. The book while good, contains several parts that I didn't like. There is a lot of dark and sinister sexuality explored and I just didn't think it needed that! That subject aside I really liked the book. It reminded me of a Narnia in the fact that you get to enter a totally new fantasy world and learn about new creatures and places. Very fanciful. I loved the vivid pictures the author draws, and all the details about society. It's not a hard read, I tore through the over 400 pages quickly. It's one of those books that needs re-read. I was reading quickly because I wanted to know what was going to happen next, but there is a lot to this book. It's one you will pick up new things with each read. I'm interested to see if I'll like his other books... it did make me want to read the original Wizard of Oz. I've only seen the movie!

 

One, Two, Buckle my Shoe was another Hercule Poirot mystery. Not my favorite, but as always a fun and entertaining read. The beginning where everyone is going to see the dentist was my favorite part. It's pretty funny and rings oh so true about real life dentist visits! The ending was quite a twist, not just the fact that I can never figure out "who done it".

Assignment

There are still a lot of unknowns that go along with this new assignment of ours. The biggest unknown is when. We don't know when J will be going to school to train or when we will be moving to our new home. Right now it looks like 6 months to a year before anything concrete happens because there is so much school for J. But we do in fact have an assignment. Next stop:

Grand Forks AFB in North Dakota! J will be flying a new plane too:

He's going to be remotely piloting the Global Hawk (click for more info on the new plane!), one of the new UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles).

So of course J is really bummed not to be continuing on in the C17 and to be doing a UAV assignment instead. The available assignments for us included only one C17 to Altus AFB for an instructor. Everyone else got UAVs or an MC12 or even non-flying assignments such as a recruiter.

Our squadron commander asked that we both meet with him to find out our assignment because he knew we'd be pretty disappointed. He had nothing but praise for J and said that although the location maybe isn't ideal, he chose this assignment specifically for J because he feels like it will be a good fit. J will have the chance to be a real leader and shine at this location. He told J that he saw him as a commander someday and he thinks this will be a good step in his career to help him get there. the hard, cold facts are that the UAV is the future of the Air Force. The future leaders of the Air Force are going to need some experience in the field.

And while J isn't thrilled about it, he's come around over the past week. He's back to planning out his next career moves and excited to be going to the only UAV that people have ever come back from to another flying tour. So yes, honestly, at first it was pretty devastating. But looking at what was available it's not that bad of an assignment and we are adjusting. I just hate change! (I know, this is the wrong job for that...)

So while we still have a lot of things we don't know, we've been researching the Grand Forks area! It gets cold... like -45 degrees cold. But, the upside is snow and white Christmases. (I've been scouring the Lands End website for off season deals already!) The town itself is a decent size with amenities like a Super Target, mall, Best Buy, a historic downtown by the river and the University of North Dakota. The base housing is all new (2005-ish) and huge! We are praying for an easy time getting a house there. It'll be nice to be back in a place with seasons and nice mid-America folks again.

So well, yeah. that's what's been happening here. I'm sure it still hasn't really sunk in yet. When we have to leave our beautiful house, the California weather and our dear friends and church it's going to be very hard. But, God has a grand plan for us that's better than anything we could orchestrate! I'm confident there are new dear friends and a great church and a cozy house all waiting for us in North Dakota. For now, we're trying hard to live day to day and concentrate on the blessings we have right now.





it's June...?!

I'm usually so good about blogging, but lately I've either been too busy or in a funk. my apologies.

Let's recap the past few weeks...

May 21-22 - J completed AC school at Altus with flying colors and flew back home to California!! Goodbye Altus AFB and Oklahoma =D

May 27 - Napa trip! We went and stocked up on whites and roses for the summer months. Now we just need to figure out the wine fridge situation (ours bit the dust!)

May 28 - J left on his first trip to finish his AC certification. It was good because he needs the rides, but I was sad he left on Memorial Day and hadn't even been home for a week yet.

June 1 & 2 - Birthdays!! J and his brother celebrated on the first and my sister and step-nephew were on the 2nd.

June 3 - I took a trip to the beach with friends!
June 5 - We met with our squadron commander and found out where we are headed for our next assignment. Not when, but where. It was a shock, a disappointment and it's been a rough week here so far. But more on that later.

How about some pictures?

Stinson beach

 My roses finally bloomed!!

 Happy belated birthday J!

I'm still here

This month is just flying by! Maybe it was my two weeks in Oklahoma, but I just don't know where the time has gone lately.

Last week after cleaning the house from top to bottom to rid it of two weeks worth of cat hair I took the offending cat to the vet for excessive water drinking and found out he is diabetic. Poor old man. He is on a new, special, and obscenely priced food but other than that there isn't much to be done for him.

A good friend of ours was in need of a fill-in nanny last week for their 6 month old, so that's who I spent the rest of the week. Prepping bottles, changing diapers, pushing a stroller and wondering how you ever manage to get anything done once you have children. I will say that it made my week fly by! Always a good thing when J is away.

Friday night I went to a squadron BBQ solo and then followed that up with an impromptu garage party with some neighbors.

Saturday I got to the local farmers market for the first time this year! Beets, green beans, strawberries, plums, nectarines and flowers were all purchased and brought home. the plan is to acquire canning goods today at the commissary and make strawberry jam. I'm on my last jar form last spring.

J is supposed to be flying his check ride, the final flight, out at Altus today. I say supposed because last I heard from him the weather was not cooperating at all... I've been praying all morning that he will get to fly so he can come home tomorrow! I miss him.

I've got a key spouse meeting today and I am watching the baby again two days this week. otherwise I've got no plans. Just anxiously awaiting J's return.

Book Reviews

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott  This is a funny book, if a bit crude. At the same time it's incredibly deep and touches on a lot of uncomfortable and "icky" subjects such as cancer, death, loneliness, addiction, failure, child abuse, etc. It's a book I feel like I'd need to read several times to catch everything she has to say. But a book that made me burst out laughing at silly things as well. You've just got to try it and see for yourself. Very good read. Made me contemplate really writing....


  Girl Meets God by Lauren Winner  This book was wonderful. I think I could create an entire years, maybe many years worth, of new books to read from things she mentions reading. It's always wonderful to read about a person you identify with; in this case a fellow book lover and Jesus lover. But she's also very different in other ways, reading volumes of feminist literature and poetry. But in all facets I found her a fascinating read. It was comforting to know I'm not the only one who has doubts, and struggles with their faith. I particularly enjoyed reading about her giving up reading for lent. Not sure I could do that. And near the end, her quotes about believing being the same as declaring our love for God and then asking God to help us with our unbelief really resonated with me. Will be buying this book.

Altus Update

I now remember why I didn't come with J to his 4 month long initial C-17 training here. This place stinks! Although in all fairness I think anyplace that you're cooped up into a tiny dorm room without any great way to cook and only the TV for entertainment would stink. I miss my lovely home, my comfy bed, being able to keep things clean (my kinda clean), my kitchen and it's pantry, my tea kettle, my scented candles, my slippers, my kitty, my large and cushy couch, my coffee table, my HD TV (don't tell J), my own personal washer and dryer, the dishwasher.... OK I'll stop. But yes, I'm ready to be home.

I really have no idea how my husband does this all the time. Living out of a suitcase, making do with whatever is in the small, uncomfortable, unfamiliar hotel rooms he ends up in all over the world. Most of the time I act like I'm the one with the tough end of the deal; being left at home alone in boring CA. while he sees the world and eats great food and plays with his friends. After these 2+ weeks I have a renewed and new found respect for my hard working, self-sacrificing husband and all that he does at his job to give me such a safe and comfortable home to enjoy.

But it has been nice spending time with him here. The week he was gone before I came out I was miserable missing him! I always hate, hate, hate it when he leaves. So despite being homesick I am really glad to be here. We should only have another week apart once I'm back home. That's so much more manageable than a month apart. So very blessed and thankful I am able to be here and see him during all his down time.

This all begs a big shout of to my fantastic neighbors who have been watching my house, taking care of my cat, watering my lawn and flowers, getting my mail, etc. Couldn't have spent this quality time with my hubby without their fantastic help!!

The other shout out is to friends here in Altus who have had us for dinner, taken us out to local spots for lunch and generally made the time here much more fun, enjoyable and speedy. Our good friends from back in the Dover AFB days have been just awesome!! And it's been to fun to catch up, chat and hang out with them and their kiddo. A big part of the good times here these past days have been because of them.

J has night flights the next 3 nights. Bad part is he's gone basically all night. The nice part is we get the day time, when he's not asleep, together. And best part! We've got an over night trip to good old Oklahoma City this weekend. We're going to stay in a nice hotel room. I'm already having visions of a giant feather bed... and we're going out to a baseball game in Bricktown. Should be a fun way to end our time together.

Then here is to a really fast last week apart. The only bad part is I know he'll be back out on the road a LOT once he's back home from this school. He has 4 rides to complete before his upgrade is totally finished. Sigh. But lets focus on the positive. We really are so very blessed!