Cousins, Christmas, and cows.

Disclaimer: I really don't have much to say about cows, but I really like alliterations , and there are cows in my yard.
And so our adventures continue.  We spent two weeks in Oregon and it was absolutely wonderful.  I am so incredibly thankful that we were able to see everyone and spend more time than we had originally planned. 
One wonderful thing about staying longer was the chance to see my dad's cousin Angela and her family.  Jesse and my mom and I met them at crossroads, and then daddy met us there, Cristin and Austin came, and then her husband Dan showed up after work, and it ended up being a family reunion where we shocked Angela by dropping all the latest news on her at once.  No, nobody is having babies.  Not that much news.  Just marriages and moves and stuff like that.  We don't see them enough, and everytime we do, we start the debate about how we are all related, and which of us are second cousins, and how many times removed we are...we finally decided that daddy and Angela are first cousins, Angela and I are first cousins once removed, Sophie (Angela's daughter) and I are second cousins, and when we have children, my kids and Sophie will be second cousins once removed, and our children will be third cousins.  Now it's on the internet as a reference for all future confusing conversations!  There has got to be an easier way to figure that stuff out.  But I digress...
On the 20th we went down to Mapleton and spent the day at Jesse's grandma Karen and grandpa Ed's house, with a side of the family that I have spent little to no time with.  That made it a little bit of a long day...hanging out with people you don't know during their Christmas is always awkward, even if you are technically family.  But we drove down the road to see the waterfall and it was beautiful.  I felt like my father, so excited to see moss, and mist, and climb around on rocks, and take pictures of trees.  I did slip and almost die once, but that's all in a day's work.
Frank and Vee were spending the night, so we got to cram in the back of Austin (Jesse's cousin)'s mustang that is having problems keeping the headlights on and sometimes over heats.  Nothing new.  I slept most of the way home, and woke up in a parking lot in Woodburn where we had stopped because apparently the throttle was sticking, and then in attempts to fix it, it was flooded.  So we ended up sitting there for an hour and getting home around 1 am, to the best of my memory.  That made two nights in a row that I was out past midnight, and this old lady doesn't handle that very well.
But next morning up we got and to church did trot, because the Chris Cline family was expected sometime after lunch.  After lunch turned into four or five, which became six or six thirty, and it ended up being sometime around 7:30 before they finally arrived.  But absence makes the heart grow fonder, and anticipation leads to restlessness, and restlessness leads to decisions to bake cheesy garlic onion bread, and that leads to another little piece of heaven, with all 23 of us gorging ourselves on spaghetti and bread and thoroughly enjoying everything about our family.  Especially our ability to make awesome food.
We also got to meet our youngest cousin, Micaiah.  He is about a month and a half old and looks exactly like every other Chris Cline baby.  Cousins are like no one else.  I miss being close to my cousins, and wish that I could be sure that my children will have close relationships with their cousins.  They are the only people that truly understand your craziness, without having to go through the trials of siblingship.  They are the only people that can stand in your living room, and follow a conversation on thunderwear (underwear with holsters in them), moving from one's views on heaven, to plans to act in commercials, to visions of shooting competitions...all in matching Cline Family Thunderwear and orange hats.
It brings me so much happiness, many times over, to see us all growing up, moving away, starting our own lives, being driven by the army, dreams of the coast guard, and little towns in Texas, and to all come together and still be just as close as we were when we were all under three feet tall.
Our trip back to Oregon, as my dear friend Rae pointed out to me, will not make being away from family any easier, but it was amazing, and it was something for me to look back on and know that 2000 miles will never be enough to separate us from the people that mean the most.

A Little Piece of Heaven

Greetings from the pacific NW! We flew back Dec. 12, intending to stay a week for a wedding, and decided to stay until Christmas Eve. Since we had planned on leaving on the 18th, we had plans to celebrate Christmas with the Clines on Friday and the Smiths on Monday.
Friday night we had the entire family there, all 14 of us. Crazy that the family has grown by three sons in one year! My parents' little house was definitely not meant for large parties, but close quarters is just a part of our life. Well, maybe not so much in Texas.
I can't even describe that scene to you. There is nothing comparable to the joy of children when they are excited to see you. Friday night, full of pizza and presents and excited children, 14 people sitting on two couches, stories being told, people getting smacked for not being nerdy, tea being spilled, minions and firefighter shirts and fuzzles and remote control cars, kids growing up before your very eyes and creating great works of art, laughter and joy. That is what heaven is going to look like. (Yes, I am paraphrasing what my father said from the pulpit the next morning.) Heaven will be all of us, together forever. The difference is that it won't give us headaches, I hope, and it will be even bigger and louder and more amazing that we can really imagine, but we got a glimpse of it.
One of the hardest things about moving to Texas is the real possibility that my children will not know their cousins and their grandparents. I want my children to experience a booming, boisterous family, descending upon people en masse. I want to be able to look around at my family and see heaven. It will be interesting to see what people God chooses to put in our lives to fill those spots, because I don't believe that He ever desires people to not be surrounded by other people.
If that is God's desire for our lives, we carried it out quite well Sunday night when both families converged up at the Smiths' house, along with Jesse's aunt and uncles and cousins, and an appearance from a couple of my old friends. And James. He's not family, he just shows up when he's hungry. Not really...he came to pick up a bumper sticker thing that Jesse had made for him (Jesse has really gotten into the whole vinyl cutting thing. He's been making stickers for days) and decided to stay a while.
So far it has been a good trip, and I am looking forward to being able to share more of our Oregonian adventures!

Thanksgiving.

"Everyone has to close their eyes and say thank you for three things. Ok, you're up!
-Kian
Our first Thanksgiving away from family.  Let me just take a moment to say how much I appreciate our fellow Oregonian orphans.  Without Jody pushing everyone, without Mel to cook the turkey, without Dave to fund the operation and host the event, it would have been a very lonesome holiday.  I cannot tell you how grateful I am to have such wonderful people.
About a month ago Jody and I started talking about thanksgiving, and came to the conclusion that he and Mel and I are the only ones that know how to cook.  Last week I stopped by his office and asked him what the plan was.  "Mel is going to do the turkey, since neither of us have done one before, I will do the ham, and you can do everything else.  But I will help you, of course." 
So by 11:00 Thursday morning we had successfully taken over Dave's house.  Annie had been there all morning cleaning and getting everything ready for us.  I do not understand how people manage to serve a hot thanksgiving meal.  I think we need to invest in alot of crock pots and turkey roasters before next year, because I think the only hot dishes were the ham and asparagus.  Although, in hindsight, I probably didn't need to make the mashed potatoes two hours before the turkey was done.  But as our first full blown meal, I would have to consider it a success.  Matt and Nicole and Chris showed up around 2 or 3, and everyone hung out in the kitchen and on the back deck, talking, laughing at Kian's antics, or getting attacked by the fart blaster while watching Planes.  Good, clean fun, as my husband would say.  When dinner was finally ready, and everyone gathered around the table, two questions were raised.  Who will bless the turkey, and who will carve it?  Well Dave was unanimously elected to carve the turkey (despite his protests that he has never carved a turkey before), but flatly refused to pray.  Honestly, we were a little surprised that everyone seemed to feel so strongly that someone ought to pray before eating thanksgiving dinner.  It's strange, to me, how some people observe religious acts on holidays, and feel just as strongly that they ought to be done at those times as they do that religion is not necessary at other times.  For any of my fellow OregonianTexans, I absolutely mean no offense.  You must understand that for me, it is a way of life, and while your way of thinking about religion and holidays is different than mine, I appreciate it so much, because thanksgiving without a prayer would be to me even more foreign.  I am glad that we had the opportunity to pray together, even if it means something different to you than it does me.
I had talked to Annie earlier about the question of who would pray, and had told her of my irrational fear of praying in front of people.  I hate it.  It scares me, it's awkward, I start shaking and often times break out, so I avoid it whenever possible.  At the table, everyone was laughing and joking about it, saying "Jesse should do it!" "Why won't you do it?" "It's your house!" but Dave kept asking who was going to do it, and the subject wasn't dropped, so finally I just went for it.
I still hate praying in front of people.  It still terrifies me, and I'm not super excited that I had to do it, but I'm glad I did, because it needed to be done, and it was getting awkward.
The next morning Jesse and Jody went out hunting and Jesse got his first pig!  All I've been hearing for two days now is "I shot it on the run!"  He is very proud of it, especially since it's the first pig to be shot by an oregonexan.  He also is not one to kill something and not eat it, and consequently my kitchen was turned into a processing plant for a day.  It smelled bad, but it is good to have meat in the freezer.  It takes alot for me to complain about free food.

Out on the town.

Weekends are always...odd here.  I am not used to having two or three entire days of nothing important going on.  During football season we at least ended up out in Strawn on Friday nights, and at least once a month we make a Saturday trip to Abilene to do the big grocery shopping.  But this weekend there were no football games, and it's not quite time for the shopping trip, so we were once again having the weekend dilemma.

"What should we do with ourselves today?"
"Whatever you want to do, my dear.  Today is your day."
"You only say that because you have no ideas. What do you want to do?
"I asked first ."

And so on.
It usually ends up with Jesse playing video games and me reading until I fall asleep and efficiently wasting the day away.  But this time, Jesse asked if I had been to any of the shops here in Breckenridge, and as I hadn't, we bundles ourselves up and headed out on the town.
Well, after spending half an hour de-icing the Tahoe, that is.  The hood was a veritable skating rink.  Poor little bobble zombie
shivered the whole way! But he always does.
There are a few cute little gift shops and antique stores all right in a row on the highway, and it was nice to stroll down the frozen sidewalk and poke into them.  I enjoy winter.  Well, I enjoy all the seasons, and but always ready for them as they come, and as winter's been a long time coming, I have definitely been enjoying it now that it's here.  The only thing that could have made it better would have been ending the jaunt in a cozy little coffee shop, the likes of which we don't have in these parts.  Instead, we stopped at Ray's to get eggs, and the guys who were out processing deer thanked Jesse for opening the car door for me.  No coffee shops, but yes, the local grocery store doubles as a deer processing plant.

As the last stop we went to WalMart to return a movie, pick up a new one, get Jesse some long underwear, and look for knitting needles and yarn.  He has these mittens that he wears hunting, but they're really beat up and full of holes.  My husband is so assured of my domestic capabilities (domestic bad ass-ery, if you will excuse the term), that he was convinced that, notwithstanding the fact that I have never attempted anything of the sort, I am fully capable of fixing the holes in his mittens.
Well.  I sent pictures to my mother (because she is much more domestically BA than I am), and she said that it would be easier to unravel it and knit them over again.
Jesse said no.  He also said it didn't have to be pretty, just "tie some knots in there to hold it together!"
My mother texted me a long explanation of how to do it, which I proceeded to skim over and then ignore.  You know me; I never follow instructions.  Long story short, it's a good thing he didn't insist on beauty, because I am far from an experienced knitter, I ended up sewing one part together rather than knitting, and my yarn was way too big.  WalMart doesn't have the greatest selection.  But I figured it out, the gloves seem to be holding together, and each patch got progressively better, until the last one almost even looks decent! 
I still feel like he would be better off with some new ones...but it reminded me how much I enjoy knitting.  Plus, it gave me something to do while he played video games that actually felt productive!  So after the glove patching product, I started on my prototype for a headband.

After a few hours on Sunday while he was out hunting, I am proud to say that I successfully created a cabled earwarmer for Jesse, without even using a pattern.  Totally homeschooler moment, but I'm ok with it, and he wore it and it kept his ears warm (he had some design input as well) so he can't make too much fun of me for it.
Now I have to come up with one for myself...it should be easier, because I won't have to make a skinny part to fit over a baseball cap.
And that concludes this episode of Our Great Texas Adventure.  Hope it didn't bore you too much.  I get excited about nerdy things.  And crafts.
P.S. the flower is not attached to Jesse's earwarmer...Just another project that happened to be in the picture.

Winter.

Today was the first really wintery day we have had. It started out around 32 and has dropped a little since then, but felt like it was about 15 what with the wind and the hail.  Thankfully we didn't have any golf ball sized hail stones like we have heard horror stories about, but these tiny little ones sure sting your face when they're being pelted at you. Unthankfully, I realized that I left all my coats in Oregon, and had to buy one at WalMart for $40 plus tax. Dumb.
There isn't much else to tell about today, except that I made some fantastic hot chocolate with allspice and cinnamon and ginger and nutmeg.  My marshmallows are getting very stale, though, which is sad.
 I only subbed one day this week, in second grade, and had one of the kids whose mom works at party planet.  His name is Cole, and all the kids were shocked that I knew his name.  Actually, I learned all their names pretty quickly, I was proud of myself.  Second grade is definitely different than third.  In third grade the 45 minutes of each subject is painfully long, and most of the class finishes their work in about half the time.  But in second grade, on the other hand, it's hardly enough time for even the quicker students, and most of them had work left over to do at the end of the day.  Well, as the teacher that was out at recess with me said, it's always better to have too much work than not enough.
In other news, I allowed us to run out of ice cream this week, and I thought Jesse was going to have me excommunicated.  I intended to wait until we go into "towntown" and buy ice cream then, because it's so much cheaper, but it was not to be.  Luckily for all of us, the ice cream was on sale.  Still not cheap, but not as expensive as normal.  And when you take gas into account, it's probably worth it.
I was informed yesterday that we are proceeding with the orphan thanksgiving as previously discussed, meaning that it will be hosted at Dave's house, Jody will do the shopping, at Dave will pay for it.  Also, Mel will do the turkey, since neither Jody nor I have as yet attempted such a feat, Jody will do the ham, and I will do everything else.  First thanksgiving as a wife and I get to do it all.  Yay me!  Not really.  I am quite thankful not to have the meat resting in my hands. Cristin and I were just talking today about how we are nor meat cookers.  But Jody asked me if I knew how to make mashed potatoes...uhh, even Jesse knows that one.  But he's an islander, so I can't give him too much crap.  After all, he's bringing his rice cooker, because you can't possibly have a meal without rice!
It will be good to start building new traditions, like rice at thanksgiving.  I am looking forward to getting everyone together again.  I know they all see each other every day at work, but now that we have two cars I rarely see anyone, and I haven't seen Mel and baby Eli since he was a couple days old!  I guess that's partially my fault, though.  I could always go see them.
Anyway.  I hope everyones thanksgiving preparations are going well.  Know that we are missing you, and can't wait to come home.  In the meantime, try some spiced up hot chocolate and think of me!

Zombies, fruit snacks, and sadomasochism.

Last weekend was Kyler's birthday party.  We were invited to go on a tour of the Cowboy's stadium with the Strawinians that Saturday, and since everyone planned on leaving early, we left as soon I got off work on Friday.  Friday evening was spent playing football at Trista's house (Jason's sister) and watching Emily display her skills in Tae Kwan Do and her ability to put her entire fist in her mouth.  That one I must admit was my fault...I told her about Sarah and her pride in that ability, even though we all told her it isn't something to be proud of.  So of course Emily had to try it.

When it got too dark to see the football, even with the porch light on, we went inside and watched more football, until everyone got hungry.  They eat dinner much later than we do, by the by.  Then we drove out to New York Hill for dinner, where Trista and her dad (Frank) proceeded to quote the Gettysburg Address.  Trista also demonstrated that she has memorized all the states in alphabetical order.
From the kids' table, I heard Keaton say "Do you know the states in alphabetical order? My mom does."  It's good to hear that Nerddom is still valued!

On a side note, I was subbing a third grade class, and got a note from a mother, saying that she did not make her daughter write a sentence using her spelling word "its" because she (the mom) didn't think it was a word, and it should be "it's".  They were doing homophones.  Its and it's were both on the list, as were hole and whole, their and there, etc.  It made me die inside a little bit.

So we stayed that night at the Strawn compound.  Jason, Mandy, their daughters, her parents, and her sister are all living there, plus us.  It was quite the party.  Mandy's parents are the most wonderful, welcoming people.  We are truly blessed to have been brought into such a lovely family.  The next morning everyone woke up and watched sponge bob while eating their biscuits and bacon, and we loaded up in the Tahoe and made it out of the house only a few minutes behind schedule.
A couple hours later, we rolled up at the Cowboys stadium.  Now I'm not really into football, but it was an impressive building.  The ceiling opens up and the side walls are giant sliding doors, that if opened one at a time would create such a great change in pressure that all the windows in the place would shatter.  Of all the things we saw, that was the one I remembered...sometimes I wonder about my memory.  Anyway, after the tour, we went to Dave and Busters and played enough arcade games for Jesse to buy a little Zombie whose brains pop out when you squeeze him and who is now the Tahoe mascot.  After that we drove another 30 miles or so to go to Main Event, where everyone bowled a game, played Laser Tag (our team lost.  We definitely had inexperience on our side) and more arcade games.  The last stop was at a store alot like Cabela's but the name of which has escaped my memory.  They have a giant fish tank that you can walk around behind and see the fish like you're underground...you know, like at the zoo.  It was pretty sweet.  I didn't do much sight seeing there, because I was wandering around the gift shop on the phone with Courtney, which honestly was more interesting to me.  After a quick (ish) stop at Jack in the Box, we finally turned homeward sometime after 10, and decided to stay another night in Strawn, because Jesse was exhausted.  I slept most of the way home, but I was happy to go to bed as well.
Anyway, we ended up going to Strawn for a birthday party and staying for three days.  It was long, and it's always stressful for me to not be home and following my own routine, but it was a very good weekend, and it was good to spend time with the family.  I'm starting to feel more at home there, and that makes me happy.
The next week passed without anything remarkable happening.  We made a trip to Abilene on Saturday and finally got my name changed at the bank, and then on Sunday we went turtle shooting.  There's a guy here at

church who has the biggest tanks in town, and he stocks them with catfish that he loves.  Unfortunately, when the other tanks dry up, all the turtles go to his, and they eat the baby catfish, so he shoots the turtles to keep them away from his fish.  He says they're predators.  Ever since he told Jesse about it, they've been planning to make time for us to go out there and shoot turtles.  It's been hard because his wife had a stroke at the beginning of the summer, and can't get around too well, so they've moved into town and don't go out to the ranch often.  But he told us while we were at the potluck after church that they were planning on going out after lunch.  The nurse from North was sitting next to us, and said "shooting turtles! That leads to child abuse, you know!"  And everyone started laughing.  Apparently years ago she was chaperoning a youth group trip, and ended up giving a 30 minute speech on the dangers of basically everything, and predicting that they would all grow up to be mass murderers and sadomasochists.  She's never lived it down, but it doesn't seem that she's trying very hard to do so.
John has a beautiful ranch about 20 miles out of town.  It has trees!  I've missed trees.  They do exist around here, but there aren't many here, close to town.  It was beautiful.  I'm not much of a turtle shot, but it was good fun anyway.  He drove us around the property, and told us that if we ever want to come back to just text or call him so he knows, but he doesn't need to be there.  He's planning on putting a lock on the gate, but he said he'll give us the combination.  People have all been so nice.  He told us that they just want us to feel at home, and to feel that we have people that we can go to if we need anything.  They seem like a very sweet old couple, and I'm glad that we're getting to know them a little, although I'm pretty sure everyone is going to be heartbroken when we move to Strawn, which is the plan for the near-ish future.  A year or so, hopefully.  But that's just the nature of moving across the country, I guess.  You land wherever you land, and then it takes time to figure out where you actually want to be.
I have no smooth transition here, so thankfully I'm not getting graded on this.  My transitions were always the harshest criticized parts of my academic writing.

I attempted to make my own fruit snacks today.  They were super easy, but turned out a little spongey.  From what I've read, that's what happens when you add the gelatin without letting the fruit cool down enough, but they still taste good, and have to be better for you than the ones that I've been buying (only four ingredients, they use honey, so there's no sugar) so I'll have to get some more gelatin and try it again.  Although this time I do believe I'll buy the organic kind from amazon.  Apparently the Knox

brand doesn't have all the wonderful nutritional benefits that organic gelatin has.  Of course, I'm not totally worried about being healthy (I was eating starbursts and BBQ chips for my lunch as I made the fruit snacks), but it's cheaper to buy it in bulk anyway, and I've read that if you add it to your shampoo, it makes your hair super thick and wonderful.  I've been reading alot.  Nerding out.  You know how it goes.

And that's about it.  I'm off to go make some chicken nuggets for dinner.  Two new recipes in one day!  So exciting!

Holidays

One holiday down, albeit one I am not accustomed to celebrating, and many more to go, Lord willing! We spent the Saturday before Halloween in Strawn (shocker) with the Strawnians, aka Strawn family, which confuses me because Jason's last name is Figuroa or something like that, and I always think of the Douglas County Strawns. Anyway. I should probably put off writing this till the movie is done...it's distracting me.
to be continued....
So we went to Strawn for the Halloween carnival that happens the weekend before Halloween every year. Apparently they figure that if they do all the festivities on a weekend, the kids will be able to stay up later. To us, it was just a chance to tag along with other people's children and eat their candy. The carnival was basically a bouncy house and a couple games, but everyone enjoyed it, and then we went over to Jason's house where Jesse was introduced to Diablo. Jason is very good at introducing Jesse to video games. I followed them around for a little whole and was very happy to hand the controller off to Ashley very quickly.
Anyway, eventually it got darkish, and the kids put on their costumes and we met the rest of the family at Mandy's parents' house.

The day before Emily told Jesse to guess what she was going to be for Halloween. "I'll give you a hint; it has 'bat' in it.". "bat man?" "what would bat man be if he was a little girl?" "bat boy?" "noo!! Bat GIRL!"

Just Jason's family (extended in many branches, mind you, but still family...everyone except us, of course) filled two pickups, and we joined the train of pickups with beds full of children making their way through the town. Unfortunately, it was short lived. It started pouring rain and lightninging so everyone in the bed decided it was time to go home and watch football. We hung out there, watching football, eating some sort of casserole, and playing basketball in the hallway until 11:00 when I rounded up my child and made him drive me home. I always feel bad that I have tone the party pooper, but he would play with those children (and Jason) all night, and it's not exactly a hop skip and a jump to get back home.
Besides, we couldn't skip church the next morning because we had plans to have lunch with Jimmy Moreno, the associate pastor, and his family, and he was very persistent. The first time I saw him, I had a feeling that he and ny father would get along nicely. Jesse and I wondered from across the sanctuary whether the kids in both the front two rows were his, or just the first one. He plays the guitar, quoted Yoda from the pulpet, and has just the beginnings of a deeply spiritual haircut. Turns out only the front pew was his, but he had another in the nursery, which brought them up to 5. Hannah, Rebecca, Josiah, Sarah, and Lydia. He said there would be a test. There never was, but I studied anyway. Yes, four girls and one boy. They are homeschooled, never watch football (don't have tv, so they can't) his wife was a music major, she has a midwife, she always buys him Pixar movies for christmas, as a family they dressed up as Narnians last Halloween, and his text alert is "bee do bee do bee do!". I do believe we have found the closest thing to Texans who will understand me.
The strangest thing was this concept of talking to your pastor. I have never really had a pastor. I had pastor Tim, but even then, our "group" was pretty unconventional, and I have never felt like anyone in my life held that role. Pastors that I know are always friends of my dad, dads of my friends, or husbands of my friends. They always hold another role besides pastor, and interact with me accordingly. I've never had a pastor and his wife sit me down and ask what my story is, when I came to know the Lord, or if I am right with God. I guess those are questions that pastors ask. Jesse wasn't surprised by it a bit, but the pastors in my life have always known those things, and I was never one of their new little sheep that they wanted to learn more about and hold onto. In that way, Jimmy and Anna were the furthest thing from pushy, and seemed laughingly embarrassed when I described the week before as "set the hook Sunday". They didn't act like we were a statistic, or a "prospect", which was nice.
 Honestly, it's probably good for me to have someone in that role. Don't get me wrong, I love being in ny father's church. I always know that I agree with him, I usually know the end of the illustration before he has finished the opening line, and I know my place. I guess that's what it is that makes people comfortable anywhere they go. We all want to know what our place is, and what role we are expected to play, even if it is just innocent bystander. But I digress. I have said many times that it would be good for me to go someplace else and be challenged a little and actually think in church (it's amazing the different things you think about when you hear a sermon come from someone you aren't used to talking with every day), but as often as I have tried, it was going to take me a very long time to get away from Colton Community Church. It's home, like it or not. Thankfully, God made that decision for us. 2000 miles is a heck of a commute, even if it's just once a week. I would have to get up waaaay too early for that!
Well. This has drifted a long way from Halloween and Strawn. Suffice it to say, we also went trick or treating here in Breckenridge with the Figuroas and the Leon Guereros (Jody and Kian) last night as well, and they got a good deal more candy because it didn't rain.
Also, I was walking through WalMart and saw all the Christmas stuff and smelled all the candles, and now I wish I had some way to decorate for Christmas, but A. it feels dumb to decorate a house when I am the only one who will appreciate it, B. I would have to buy all new decorations, and that's just lame, and C. it's really hard to decorate around skulls and crap like that. Tin walls are not very aesthetically pleasing, and would just seem out of place with anything but cowboy paraphernalia adorning it. I could do some candles though...(see picture below)
This is getting too long. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a goodnight!

Love.

Is it possible to love someone that you don't know?  Well, some would probably disagree, but I have to say yes, absolutely.
Thursday night I got a text from Jody, saying that Mel was having contractions.  Nothing serious, but since we had arranged that I would watch Kian when the time came, he was giving me a heads up, just in case.  Well, at 4:30 Friday morning I got a call from Jody.  "It's baby time!"  Long story short, I drove over, they drove to Peaster.  Kian woke up, was incredibly angry to find me in his house instead of his parents, cried for about 45 minutes and went back to bed until 11:30.
Eli was born somewhere around 10, and when Kian woke up, I called his dad so he could ask if it was a boy or a girl.  On hearing that it was a boy, he immediately decided his name should be Rusty Rust.  Jesse came over after work and battled Kian's ogre with Kian's dragon until Jody, Mel, and baby Eli got home around 4:30. 
One of the most amazing things is seeing a child become a big sibling.  Kian is one of the most loud, constantly going, rambunctious little boys I have ever met, but the moment he set eyes on baby, he was a big brother.  Little kids' "aawwwe!"s are so adorable, and seeing the four of them there was beautiful.  Kian kept trying to touch Eli's head, and hold him, and Jody was trying to keep Kian from accidentally kicking him in the head, or knocking him over.  It didn't matter how many times you explained to him that babies' heads are fragile, and Kian is not very gentle, he just wanted to love on his little brother, and he wouldn't back off.
That, my friends, is a prime example of loving someone without knowing them.  Eli is a part of their family, and has been for quite some time.  They all love him, even Kian, who is only 5, and loved him before they even met him. 
Another type of love attacked us at church on Sunday.  I guess we've been around long enough everyone decided at the same time it was time to rope us in. Maybe they discussed it at the last business meeting and wrote up a plan of attack. They are Baptists, after all... older man always greets us at the door, and this week he stopped us, told us that he loves us, and that he hopes we will join the church.  He said that he felt like he needed to talk to us about it, because we're good prospects, and it's a good church.  Being a PK, I understand when people see you as a "prospect", and I appreciated him taking the time to talk to us, even if it was a little awkward.  I'm not sure if Jesse saw as quite such a normal conversation to have, but that's ok.  I don't even know how many people came up to us that day to talk to us, introduce themselves or other people, invite us over for dinner, and just tell us that they're happy to have us around.  It was nice.  It was a bit overwhelming, but it is good to feel loved, even when it is coming from people you hardly know.  I'm sure there are plenty of not so great things that you can say about Texans, but they sure seem to know how to love on people, and that makes up for alot.

Stuff and Nonsense

It has been too long since I have written anything.  It's probably because things really are settling down and becoming more like home.  The everyday occurrences are less novel now than they were.  But I am trying to keep everyone up to date, so I will try to amuse you with a few short stories.
As you know, I have started substitute teaching at the elementary schools, and it has been great!  People say bad things about the schools here, but they seem to be ok from a sub's perspective.  The kids all seem good, the teachers act like they care, everyone is nice, the principals do lunch duty...it's not bad.  I subbed for the dual language Kindergarten classroom last week, and that one was a bit of an adventure.  The morning went fine, I had a helper, she's hispanic, soft spoken, and has a pretty thick accent, so I can hardly understand her, but the kids know what she's saying, so that's good.  Thankfully, it was an English week, so they had to speak english, but I did get to sit through her Spanish Language Arts lesson.  One girl asked me "What are you doing here?"  And I was just like, "I don't even know.  I'm just along for the ride right now."  After lunch I picked them up from recess, and my helper had disappeared into thin air.  The recess teachers told me that "the one that doesn't speak much english in the red shirt" was complaining that he didn't feel well, but they all whine all the time because they want to go see the nurse, so I didn't think much of it, and we went inside to start our math test.  Partway through the math test he started crying and causing a ruckus, so I sent him off to the nurse with one of the other kids, because nobody was getting any math done.  Well the nurse wasn't in her office, so I had him sit on the carpet, where he proceeded to cry and kick his feet and pound on the floor and ask for him mama.  Great.  He was creating a lovely atmosphere for the others to focus on math, of course.  Well that went on until he suddenly stood up and started vomiting bright blue.  It was like somebody dumped a blue slurpee all over the floor.  Everybody started yelling, I took him into the bathroom, but the toilet was clogged and it stank, which I didn't figure was going to help him, so I took him back out (the whole time he was following me around and leaving a blue trail behind us) and went into the hall.  Mrs. Cyprian's classroom was right across the hall and her door was open, so I left him in the hallway and tried to explain what was going on without totally upsetting her class as well.  "Um, Mrs. Cyprian?  I have a child out here that's....vomiting blue stuff everywhere."  I don't think I accomplished my purpose.  She was so nice, she called the office for me, which reminded me that all classrooms have an intercom that goes to the office.  That would have been handy.
Anyway, long story short, he finished puking, I put paper towels over all the puddles, because there were absolutely no cleaning supplies in the entire classroom, finished up the math test, and was just getting them lined up and ready to go to the bathroom before the field trip when the janitor came in.  I don't think he was very happy with me.  He told me next time that I should give him a trashcan.  That would have been smart.  I did not use my noggin.  Anyway, we were all using the bathroom, and I was planning on dropping the little sicko off at the office on our way out, when my helper came back.  She rattled off some things in spanish, felt his forehead, and said he was fine and put him on the bus with us.  I'm really not certain what I should have done there.  I'm pretty sure that when a kid starts puking, you're supposed to send them home.  Especially because another teacher came in at the end of the day, somehow got wind of it, and looked at me and said "and why is he still here?"  Great.  That was totally not my fault.  So I tried to explain, and the kids all started yelling "You said we weren't going to talk about it!"  And my helper lady said "he didn't have a fever" and I said "I think it was just the ice cream..."  And eventually the lady shrugged and left.  So I don't think I got into any trouble...But I still feel bad.  He did fine the rest of the day, but I was exhausted.
Later that night, we went back to Mary's with Jason and his family before the football game (we seem to be establishing a Friday night routine) and I encountered the 8lb cheeseburger.  I don't really know how big it was, but it was about an inch and a half thick.  It was seriously massive, and it took me half an hour to eat it.  I finished it, though!  Everyone was amazed, and accused Jesse of helping, but he didn't even finish his chicken strips, and I ate some of his fries and toast while waiting an hour for my food.  That place is fantastic, but it takes a long time to get anything.  Oh, I also had a slurpee drinking contest with Jason on the drive over.  I think I won, but he was in his own car, so I really don't know.  It was a big food day.
Apparently Jason asked Jesse why I never talk...I was tired and grumpy the last time we went out with them, and I will admit that I was kind of a poop face.  So I tried my best to be social and nice...but I'm just bad at it.  I don't make friends well.  I can do customer service like a champ, but that involves social encounters that only last for a minute or two, in which you have a pretty set script, rather than an entire evening at a football game where I have absolutely no idea how to carry on a conversation.  I guess I'm going to have to get used to it.  Jesse and Jason went to "stretch their legs" which was apparently a plot to leave me with all the womenfolk and force me to talk.  Rude.  But it worked, I guess.  We talked a little.  Oh, that reminds me...Jason's wife had a job interview this week.  I ought to ask him how it went.  Or have Jesse do it.  That's easier.
Anyway.  Things have been going well here.  I've started getting a few more kids in my dance classes, we're going in this afternoon to get our drivers licenses, and the weather has definitely cooled down.  We even lit the heaters today.  They're super old school, propane, light them with a lighter kind of deal.  They've heated about half the house, which is better than nothing.  Let's see....anything else?  I got a new phone yesterday and it's so giant it hardly fits in my hand...I got my debit card that is hooked to Jesse's bank accounts...and that's about it.

Company Soup

I never thought that football would make me miss home.  We went to another game with Jason on Friday, and this time Jody and Kian came with us.  The cheerleaders throw candy and Tshirts every time they get a touchdown, and Kian ended up with tons of tootsie rolls.  Needless to say, he got pretty excited about the whole thing, jumping up and down, cheering, yelling, running around with Jason's kids, nephews, and any other stray children he could find.  But it really did make me miss Oregon.  It wasn't really like Oregon, it was warm, there were only 12 kids on the field, they prayed before the game and announced that they were raffling off a rifle, but there's something about it...I guess it's mostly missing Dance Team.  It was homecoming week at OC, and I know that the Jets were dancing with the band, and Mac Attack was being crowned homecoming queen.  It's silly, because even if I was in Oregon, I wouldn't have been there, but it makes me miss them, all the same.
We hit an armadillo on the way home.  It was the first one I had seen.  Jody was surprised that Jesse would hit it on purpose, and Kian was very concerned, until he remembered that Armadillos have armor and therefore cannot die.  We also saw a sweet lightning storm that was happening to the West (maybe? I'm bad with directions) of us.  Kian called it a rainbow lightning storm, and it was pretty cool to watch.
Saturday morning Jesse went out to dig a hole for his pig bait.  He's had corn and yeast and koolaid and I don't even know what all else in a bucket fermenting for a couple days now, so we drove it out to one of the tanks (they call ponds "tanks" here) and dug a hole, but so far nothing has shown up.  We drove out again last night to check.
Jason and his brother in law were supposed to come out yesterday and shoot, but it was only about 60 degrees yesterday, and the wind was blowing pretty hard, plus it rained for a while, so the Texans opted out.  It is difficult to shoot with a strong wind, I guess.  So we ate pizza and played GTA, and they decided to come out today instead.
In their honor, we commited a cardinal sin and skipped church.  At about 9:30 Jason texted Jesse and said that he was on the way with 16 people.  Jesse asked if we could feed 16 people, because I had made a pot of sopa de maiz and had told Jason that we would feed them.  Well, my response was that you can always stretch soup, so I added another can of corn, some more milk and boullion, and called it good.  Shortly after, Jason said "Oh, did I say 16?  I meant 4."  He's going to have to learn not to joke about cooking for an army, because I will do it.  But that's ok.  We will have plenty of soup in the freezer for days when I don't feel like cooking.
Jody and Kian also decided to join us today, and Kian got to shoot an AR for the first time.  He was all over it.  Jason's daughter Ashley is 9, and is also pretty excited about shooting.  Jesse put a can of Tannerite under an orange cube and she shot it out from under in 1 shot, and it flew straight up into the air.  Nobody told her what Tannerite would do, and she was all confused about where it went; she wanted to shoot it again.
At the end of the day, everybody got to shoot stuff, stuff got blown up, Kian cried because he didn't want to leave, and Jesse and I sat down to a giant pot of company soup by ourselves.  We'll be eating it for a while.

Teaching

On Monday I got the last of my paperwork done and watched the super old training videos (on VHS) so I could be cleared to sub.  When I was done with all that, I went around to the schools to introduce myself, and everyone seemed pretty happy to see me.  In fact, they asked me if I could work the next morning, so on Tuesday I got to substitute for the PE assistant at East Elementary, which is K-1st grade.  That was probably the best way to start out, honestly.  I got to meet all the kiddos, I didn't get stuck with one group all day, and I wasn't even the teacher, I was just assisting, so I didn't have to do anything for real.  It was pretty sweet.  We only had one child completely melt down and cry so much that he left a puddle on the floor, so I would consider it a success.
I did discover one very amusing thing.  Tiny Texans' accents are so much funnier than adult Texans!  They're all these little babies running around with the thickest drawls I have ever heard.  One said "I was fixin' to tell her that!" and it cracked me up.  I don't think I've heard a 7 year old say they were "fixin" to do anything.  They all sound like Honey Boo Boo.  It's pretty great.  But the gym floor is concrete, and my feet were killing me by the end of the day.  I think I pulled a muscle in my left foot, or something, because it has been sore for two weeks, now, and after I got off work and picked up Jesse, we went to WalMart, and it popped and it hurt so bad I thought I had just ripped my foot in half.  But then it was fine and wasn't sore or anything, until I went running this morning and now it's back.  I don't understand it.  It's not even like I got new shoes, or anything...The shoes I run in are either my trainers that I got last year, or my old running shoes that I've been running in for 5 years and never had a problem with.  Maybe that's the problem...They are getting pretty old.  My toes almost fall out of them.
But anyway.  I thought I had a toddler class this morning at 11:45, and then a FunJam class at 4:30, but it turns out that my toddler class was at 1:15 and then FunJam is at 4, which was confusing, but that's a long story.  It's Homecoming week and everyone is confused, especially cheer people who are planning the parade and all that jazz.  So I went to Party Planet at 1:00, was shown where all the smoothie stuff is and how to sign people up and stuff, if need be, and then nobody showed up.  That wasn't very surprising, though, because there was only one signed up and she's in 2nd grade, so she couldn't have been there for the morning class anyway.  They must have checked the wrong box and meant the later one.  So hopefully I will have at least two tonight, but you never know, because it's homecoming.  I guess I will just have to wait and see.
I left my lights on this morning again (I know...it's bad.  I even thought about it as I was parking and still somehow managed to not shut them off), so my car was dead, so I had to jump it before I went into town, but I guess the drive in wasn't enough to charge it.  When I tried to leave, my car was dead again, so Jesse had to come over in the company car and jump it.  But while I was waiting for him I danced around in the gym, and oh my goosey hoover, it is so much fun to dance on those springy floors!  I love it!  It was all big, and bouncy and stuff....super awesome.  I should have just told Jesse not to worry about it and stayed and danced by myself for two and a half hours.  But it's probably better.  I probably would have gotten some wild idea to teach myself how to back handspring again, and then broken my neck and nobody would have had any idea until 4:00.  And my foot was hurting, because I am a baby.
So hopefully I will have some kids tonight, but if not, maybe I will get to learn how to tumble for real....but probably not, because Stan Carstons has a Tahoe that we need to look at.

White Lightning

Friday night we met the next De'Anthony Thomas.  I honestly had never heard of him before, but Jesse says he's pretty awesome.  So the next De'Anthony Thomas' name is Kyler, he gets very frustrated if you call him Tyler, he's 8 years old, pretty darn smart, and one of Jason's two nephews.
I went in to town around 4:00 on Friday, like I always do, and also because we had plans to go to Strawn that night with Jason, have dinner at Mary's, and go to the Strawn vs. Gordon football game.  I came in the side door, which takes me right past Jason's office as I go into Jesse's.  As I was walking past, Jason called me into his office and was cracking up laughing.  Apparently Ryan had been trying incredibly hard to invite himself along with us to go to the football game, and Jesse wasn't hearing it.  "So....you guys are going to a football game tonight?  Will there be girls there?  So...where's this football game at?  Do you think I could just ride with y'all?"  (He probably didn't say "y'all", but that was Jason's version of the conversation)  "Jesse didn't even let him finish the sentence!  'No!'  He just turned around, 'No!'"  Jason was highly amused by the fact that Jesse was refusing to let Ryan tag along, and he wanted to see it continue to play out.  So he told me that when Jesse got off work, I had to tell him that I had seen Ryan in the hallway, or the parking lot, or whatever, and casually mention that he asked to ride with us to Strawn and that I had said it was ok.
Well I have the most fantastic poker face, of course....not.  So I had my doubts as to whether I could pull it off, but I'm not one to kill a joke (when I understand it), so I agreed to do my best.  Thankfully, when Jesse got off, he went into Jason's office, so he was just around the corner and couldn't see my face.  Jason helped things along...
"Oh hey, Rianna and I were just talking...Did you tell him who you ran into?"
"Oh...yeah, I was talking to Ryan."
"What did he want?"
"He asked if he could come with us to the football game."
".....what did you tell him?"
"Oh I kinda figured it would be fine."
And for that I got a pair of safety glasses thrown at me as he stomped off, probably to yell at Ryan, so I told him that I was just kidding, and Jason said that I gave it away too soon.  "Yeah, but I didn't want him to hit me!"  Probably not the best thing to say to people that don't know me, or understand the relationship that I have with my husband...We did all agree that it's totally something that Ryan would have done, though, and everyone got a laugh out of it.
Anyway, we followed Jason out to Strawn, and met his family, including his daughter's husky named Neo, who is obsessed with eating a little white stray cat that has recently showed up at his in-laws' house.  Jason and his family are staying there right now because he is currently in the process of remodeling their house, and apparently half of the other houses in the neighborhood.  Their house is going to be pretty cool when it's done, complete with a haunted chicken coop and a backyard for football and baseball.
We showed up at Mary's a little before 6, and it was packed, but Jason said that since the line wasn't going out the door, it was slow.  Apparently Mary's is the place to be.  If you can fit in the door and if you can hear to talk to the person across from you, it's practically dead.  The kids (Jason's two daughters, their cousin whose brother was playing at the game, and Jason's nephews Keaton and Kyler) were sitting at the table over from us (Jesse and myself, Jason, his wife, and his sister) and provided us with much entertainment as they rattled the ice in their empty cups at the waiter, guzzling down can after can of root beer and coke.  I think the final tally was 13, but it may have been more.
Mary's famous for their giant chicken fried steak, so Jesse and I were told that we had to split a large, and that we would be lucky if we could finish it together.  "You haven't seen the way my wife eats!"  Why is that always what people say about me?  I do try to eat like a normal person and not like a vacuum....Oh well.  We finished it, but it was definitely filling.
Strawn and Gordon are about 8 miles apart, and major rivals.  Apparently a while ago the kids from Gordon broke in and burned a huge "G" on Strawn's football field.  They play 6-man football because there only 200 kids in the entire district.  They all say it's more interesting than "real football", but I still don't understand it.  I spent most of the time watching the cheerleaders or talking with Keaton and Kyler.  But I'm pretty sure most of us spent most of our time talking with them.  Those kids are hilarious.  Keaton is only 6, and his favorite thing seems to be repeating everything that Kyler says, but with his own twist.  We were telling jokes, and Jesse asked "What do you call a flying skunk?"  The answer is "a smell-icopter" and Keaton thought it was great, so he asked Jesse to tell him what the joke was, turned to the guy in front of him (Jason's counsin's fiancee, I believe), and said "What do you call a flying squirrel?"  We all tried to tell him it was supposed to be a skunk, but he wanted it to be different, so he stuck to the squirrel.  Kyler is in 3rd grade and plays football with 6th and 7th graders.  Jesse asked him if he had a nickname and he said it was White Lightning, because he's so white.  when asked if people will still call him that in highschool he said matter-of-factly "Oh yeah.  Unless I spray tan."
He says that everything he says he learned from Jason, and that Jason taught him to play football with video games.  He was a kick in the pants.  After the game they all had to race (Jesse and Ryan included), and when racing with his brother or cousins he was kind (or cocky) enough to run backwards.  They threw the football around for almost an hour and we didn't make it home till after 11, but it was a good time.  It was nice to meet Jason's family, and they all seem pretty cool; I'm glad we went.  Plus, Strawn HS's colors are red, black and white, which are the same as Oregon City AND David Douglas, so I think it's fate that we end up moving there someday and I work for the district.  I mean, it's obviously a sign.

Agameece before bed, no matter what.

Even if you have to eat it in the shower, apparently...

I made the great mistake of not giving Jesse ice cream last night, on top of not getting home till 7:30 and consequently not having dinner ready till after 8. So many epic wife fails!
But I should back up. Where did I leave off? Tuesday.

On Tuesday Jody and Matt and Ryan and Nicole and Kent and Tracy all came out to practice pistol. Not much more to say about Tuesday, except that I made a batch of lemon bars and the ants swarmed them while they were shooting, but Jody blew them off at ate them anyway. I brushed them off and trimmed a couple of them and sent them to work with Jesse the next day for Jason. A little extra protein never hurt anybody, right? Especially if you're having twins. Apparently that's the rumor circulating the office. Thank you, husband!
When I came in to work to drop off the car for Jesse and meet Jody so I could go with them to the baby appointment, Ryan and Jason started asking me about the twins, and Jody is all over it, too. When we got to the appointment, he told one of the midwives that I'm having twins. That, kids, is how rumors start.
"A tiny little story is all I need, you better watch out, I'm the rumor weed!"

This is not a peach cobbler.
It's my domestic attempt from the day before...

Anyway...that was a nice blast from the past. I'm getting ahead of myself again. Yesterday I attempted once again to one up my dear sister in our attempts to be domestically BA, and I made a peach cobbler, but it got a little over done, which made me very sad. And then, just before I left to go meet Jody and Mel, two white trucks pulled up, and a bunch of Texans got out and dropped a super mangy cat in a live trap on my front porch! I don't know why it took 5 people to drop off a cat, but it did. (How many Texans does it take...?) Apparently Kent's mom (who they referred to as Regina, but I had only met as "G", which was quite confusing) caught it the other day and
Kent told her to leave it at the ranch. He told Jesse that a cat was going to show up, but everyone failed to mention it to me, so I was rather surprised. Just as they pulled out, and I was about to leave again, the UPS guy showed up with my box from bed bath and beyond! I got a marble rolling pin and a muffin pan. No more rolling out pie crust with a coffee cup for me! I am super excited. It's all heavy and pretty, and has the little wooden tray to put it in, and it makes me happy. But I haven't had a chance to use it, because right after that I left to go into town.

Funny Kian quote of the day:
Kian-"What's your mom's name?"
Me-"Wende."
Kian-"What's her kid's name?"
Me-"Cristin, Rianna, Sarah, Ben, Connie, Noelle, Laney, Joy and Justin."
Kian-"Woah! That's a really long name."
Jody-dying laughing.
Another funny Kian moment was when they pointed out this giant boat-shaped play ground thing that Kian really wants. Jody told me that Jesse and I need it for our twins, and Kian said that he would rather have a boat than a twin, and kept going on about how he should have it, and not the twin. I think he was jealous of the imaginary twin and its playground. They also pointed out a "lamdronat". Literally, that's what the sign says. It's a hot topic of debate whether that's on purpose or not.
But anyway, the tidbits aren't running together well, and I'm starting to lose the thread of my story. So back to it. The birthing center is in Peaster, and it's about an hour and a half away from Breckenridge. It's run by a woman and her two daughters, and they all seem really nice. They basically have an entire house set up capable of accommodating two women in labor, if need be. They even have a fully stocked kitchen that you can use. Mel said that they have been really hands off through the whole thing, not pressuring her to do anything, and she really likes it. She said she hasn't gotten any tests or screens or even an ultrasound. Nothing but some blood work. Right before we left the younger sister, Sarah, said "I like her! I want someone like her to assist at births. We need someone like her." And then we had to laugh about the fact that that's the third time since I've been in Texas that someone has offered me a job the day they met me. Of course they weren't really offering a job, but it was still amusing.
Then this morning I had to go into Abilene to get my fingerprinting done. It was so much easier this time than when I had it done for OC! I don't know why it took forever last time, but today I was in and out in ten minutes. So I spent the rest of the morning at the mall buying teacher looking clothes. I even shopped in the women's section. I feel old, like last Sunday when someone asked me if I "work outside the home". I really wanted to shop at motherhood maternity, because they have seriously the most comfortable shirts I have ever worn, but I figured I should perpetuate any rumors. I already visited a birthing center...that might be too much baby for one week. But I feel like I can now, since I have a wedding ring, without being looking at me like I'm a harlot.
When I was on my way home, I passed Abilene Christian University, so I decided to stop by and see if I could get a catalogue, and sew if i could learn anything about online classes. Well I
ended up meeting the president of marketing and talking to the transfer admissions guy for almost half an hour, just to learn that they only have online classes during the summer except for masters programs. So it doesn't look like ACU would work out too well for me. Oh well.

I came home to dishes all over my life, because the sink broke yesterday and we didn't get the parts to fix till this afternoon. But my husband is wonderful, and he got it fixed right after work today, so I still had time to use my new rolling pin to make biscuits and gravy for dinner, and a batch of chocolate chip cookies for Jason. He said that in return for cookies he's going to take us to dinner in Strawn
tomorrow, and then we're going to a football game. It should be a good Friday night. Jason seems cool. He's a local, and his office is right across the hall from Jesse and Ryan's (they found an empty office and declared it theirs) so I sometimes talk to him when I'm sitting in Ryan's chair waiting for Jesse.
And that, I think, brings you up to date with all of our Texas Adventures. Till next time...! =]

PS. Jesse found a stick bug this morning!  It was cool.

Also, my biscuit picture was cool...gotta add that too!

I'm certain there's a monster in my bathtub.

I keep hearing strange clanking noises coming from the tub drain.  But that's neither here nor there.  We're in to week three, and soon I'll have to stop counting the days.
We went to First Christian Church with Ryan this Sunday.  It was interesting.  Definitely more high church than we are used to, complete with small children as candle lighters, a choir with robes, and a minister in a red, white, and blue tie drinking sweet tea from McDonald's in the pulpit.  The church has a big pipe organ, that is pretty cool, but on the whole, I don't think it's one that we'll go back to.  Everyone was still very nice, though, and as we were leaving, one lady came running out the door to say hi to me, because apparently I met her a few days earlier.  "We met you the other day!  It's so good to see you!  Do you remember?  I'm Virgil the 3rd's wife!"  I do remember meeting her, now, at the ribbon cutting for Party Planet, but I'm afraid I have absolutely no recollection of Virgil the 3rd.  I'm sure I will remember him next time, though.
After church we went to lunch with Ryan and discovered our new favorite restaurant.  Legends.  It's nothing special, I guess, but in Jesse's words "This place is way better than Ernie's...and we haven't even gotten our food yet!"  Ernie's is a Mexican place in town that everyone goes to, but nobody really likes, except for the steak.  I'm not sure about all the food, since we all had cheeseburgers, but the cheeseburgers were pretty great.  I have a feeling we might spend quite a few Sunday afternoons there.
I spent a good amount of Monday trying to catch a biker on Grand Theft Auto.  I eventually got incredibly frustrated and felt like it was stealing my soul.  After giving up on being a gamer, I went to the Administration office again and dropped off all the paperwork for the sub application.  I have an appointment to get fingerprinted for my criminal background check on Thursday.  I have to drive to Abilene to get it done, but it will be nice to have an excuse to get out of town.  It's hard to justify driving 60 miles just because you're bored, especially when you're alone.  But when you have a reason...you can go and kill an entire day!  I've started making a list of things I can't get in Breckenridge, like bleach pens, slacks, bullion and a pizza cutter.
Tomorrow we're going with Jody and Mel to their baby appointment, which should be fun.  Jesse commented the other day that everyone at work is having babies, and he feels left out.  Then he said that he's praying for twins.  But don't worry...we're still not planning on popping any out anytime soon.  We just really aren't ready for that yet, so don't get any funny ideas.  Ben told me something that you can eat that's supposed to increase your chance of having twins, but I forgot what it was.  Anyway, I'm not too keen on the idea of twins.  Jesse's not the one whose back would have to cart all that around for 9 months, after all.
Well that's about all I've got for ya.  I'm debating making cheesecake...I have some stale snickerdoodles that would make a good crust.

Some pictures.

These pictures really belong in other posts, but I wasn't able to put them up at the time.

This was from our first trip;
We caught a couple of geckos and tried to make them fight.

This one is us looking beautiful in the UHaul.

Me looking even MORE beautiful in the Uhaul...it was a long drive

We stopped in Clines Corners, New Mexico, even though, as my father pointed out, neither of us are Clines

This is the first scorpion we found in Dave's bedroom

And this is me in Dave's freezer.  I spent a couple hours scrubbing it.  It was quite the project.

The first of four scorpions we have found in our house so far.  Jesse actually stepped on one of them.

And that's all I've got.

Today was boring, so after sleeping most of the day while Jesse killed aliens, we drove to Eastland to have dinner and get an Allan wrench.  Well, we got sidetracked at WalMart (they have a real one in Eastland) and ended up buying almost $300 worth of groceries.  And a cooler.  And grand theft auto 5.  Just the essentials, of course.  With a cooler full of groceries in the car, we weren't really able to go to dinner, but that's ok, because groceries are worth it.  Especially since we found Tillamook cheese!  Jesse sent a picture of it to Ryan and he had us pick up a couple loaves of cheese for him.
I've had back luck with food lately.  I burned my second pizza this week tonight, and this morning we ended up with a million chewy waffles and cold bacon because I kept having problems figuring out the waffles.  But we have this fancy new waffle maker that flips over and has a timer on the side, so I had to use it.

But a few days ago I cooked steak for the first time, and that actually worked! I even got Jesse to eat salad. It was truly a miracle.

But that's enough about food.  I spent most of yesterday talking to Courtney about mermaids.  Apparently they are real, and there are documentaries about them that are quite convincing.  I must admit, I'm not a believer, but I didn't watch the full two hour discovery channel documentary thing.  However, Courtney and I did decide that she should move to Texas and dedicate her life to searching for mermaids in the Gulf of Mexico. 



Like I said, I may be losing my marbles. I mean, this is how I entertain myself lately:

Other than playing with safety glasses and going shopping, the most exciting moment of my week was when in rained yesterday!  It rained like Oregon for two days.  I went running in my bright yellow Seaside sweatshirt, and then did ballet in the front yard in the rain until my phone got wet and stopped letting me change the song.

So then I took a hot shower (usually it's 95 degrees in the bathroom upstairs, so I never take hot showers), made myself a not-super-awesome-but-better-than-nothing white mocha, and sat on the porch with Anna Karenina and listened to the rain. It was lovely.

I certainly am looking forward to starting teaching, but I am leery of toddler classes. I just don't know what they're going to be like, and I like to have things planned out. Oh well...gotta do what you gotta do, I guess. It's good to get 'em young, I just wish I didn't have to be the one to get them.

Math and Menus

I just had a sudden urge to do math.  There is something seriously wrong with me.  I was reading Blue Like Jazz yesterday (for the millionth time) and he was talking about being stuck in space by himself and having his hair and beard grow into his face and going crazy out there all by himself, not being able to even see or get his hair out of his eyes.  That didn't really happen, he was just talking about it...It's a good book.  But anyway, the point is that people kinda grow crazy when they're all alone for extended periods of time.  His point was that community is healthy, which I absolutely agree with!  I was talking to my father about how living on a commune in Texas wouldn't be that bad, especially if the other members of the commune build guns for a living.  Communes are cool.  A little bit reminiscent of cults, which aren't so cool, but I think I could make it work.  But I digress.  Back to the math.
I'm in the process of writing a menu, like a real adult.  I have been looking up recipes and writing them down in  notebook so I can add them to my recipe binder, and the notebook I happen to be using is my old Math 111 notebook.  Well I was flipping through, looking for a blank page, and I saw all these math problems, and I suddenly felt like I would enjoy the mental stimulation of doing math.  And that's when I realized that I really am spending too much time alone.  But maybe it's good for me.  I mean, math would probably be a good thing for me to do.  Jesse tells me all the time that I need to use my noggin...
Of course, thinking about doing math is fine, but I probably won't, because it's math, and who likes math?  But today is going by very slowly...

Beginning of week two:

Let me just say that we have now been living on the ranch for one week, in texas for ten days, and out of Oregon for twelve days.  It feels like ages.
We went to our first Texas church this morning, Bethany Baptist church.  We actually went twice.  As I believe I have mentioned, Texas (or at least Breckenridge) is a little behind when it comes to the internet, so only three of the 5 million churches in town have websites, and only one has easy to find service times.  We picked Bethany Baptist because it seemed to have a 9am service, and a bunch of people were planning to do 3 gun practice this morning at 10am.  Well neither of us set an alarm, and I woke up at 8:25, which is enough time to get me up and dressed and have breakfast made and eaten and out the door before 8:45, but I guess it wasn't quite enough time for Jesse.  However, we were only 2 minutes late to what I thought was a 9am service, but was actually bible study.  Long story short, we ended up going home for 20 minutes, and driving back at 10.  Thankfully everyone pushed practice back to 11, so we didn't miss out on anything. 
I'm glad we made it.  I've never been good at church hunting.  We tried once when we first moved to Portland, but we ended up staying at the first church we went to, because none of us wanted to prolong the search.  I have gone to two other churches since we moved to Colton, but those were chosen strictly because of the people I knew who were already going, and my attendance didn't last long.  So having to go to a new church, one that my father is not the pastor of, one where we don't have any friends, was a relatively new experience.  At the beginning of the service, the man doing announcements (who I believe is the associate pastor, but I'm not certain) mentioned something about giving to some specific program, and Jesse leaned over to me and said "oh crap, they pass the plate here, don't they?" and I was taken back to the first memory that I have of being in church.  Actually, I have three other early memories involving churches...one is getting a tambourine stuck on my head, one is climbing on the "rock wall" outside the old Elkton church, and the other is sticking olives on my fingers with Larry Hendrickson in the basement of the Lowell church, but those just happened at church, not during church.  My first memory of a church service is at the church in Reedsport (I'm fairly certain we were sitting on the left side, which is odd for my family, but I can't be certain), and when they passed the offering plate, I tried to take the money out.  I was about 4 years old and didn't know any better, but I was still confused and mortified down to my very core.
Thankfully our experience today was much less embarrassing.  Everything that happened was long winded, but it was cut short at an hour, there were two little kids sitting next to us that kept waving to me, everyone seemed very nice, and the pastor was good at preaching from the bible, rather than going off on tangents and leaving everyone thinking "so...because Jesus said 'blessed are the poor in spirit', that means we should be vegetarians??"  Of course, no pastor in Texas would tell you to be a vegetarian, but you get the picture.  He was decently concise, had good illustrations, and only a little bit of the preacher voice.  Apparently he and his wife were missionaries in Washington for a while, and did some work in hood river, so they could sympathize some with our culture shock.  We also met the school nurse from north elementary school, and she told me that if you have any college at all you can be a substitute teacher, and they're in desperate need of subs right now.  I guess they lost a bunch of teachers and had to hire all their subs. So I will probably try to figure out how to go about signing up to be a substitute elementary school teacher!  She said it pays $50/day, which isn't astronomical, but it's not awful.  That would definitely be an adventure...I have never experienced an elementary school classroom, especially not in Texas, but I should be able to handle faking it for a day at a time, right?  I helped all the kiddos with their homework at Candy Lane all the time, and only once had to tell a 5th grader that I didn't know what to do.  It'd be easy peasy!
Well anyway...we got home from church and people started showing up pretty quick, all in their matching colt jerseys that they wear to matches.  It was cool to watch.  I feel like I could do 3 gun, but not smoothly.  I'm not super comfortable with shotguns, and the transitions would confuse me.  So I stuck to score keeping and feeding people cookies.  Apparently my cookies are good enough that Jesse threatened to start selling them, and Ryan said he would go broke.  Honestly, I though they were a little, teeeeensy bit overdone, but I like super soft cookies.  Jesse didn't do bad, coming in sixth out of ten, which is pretty good for having never done it before.  They left most of the course up, so I'll have to try it sometime before I start teaching and don't have free evenings anymore.
Afrer that we went out on the boat and Jesse got to swallow a few gallons of Hubbard creek lake before figuring out how to wakeboard.  It was a bit too choppy for my taste, so I decided to wait, but he and Ryan and Annie and Dave all gave it a go.  Of course, with Dave wakeboarding, that just left Annie to drive, and she just learned yesterday.  She did a pretty good job (I guess, I don't know much about it) except for when she turned around and straight into our own wake.  I'm told it was a wall of water, four or five feet high that we plowed right through.  I somehow managed to miss seeing it.  I turned around just in time to get a face full of water, but it must have been a dusey, because it left a puddle of water on the canopy, and about six inches of standing water in the bow, where Annie had put Dave's chicken wings to keep them dry.  That worked well.  We had to take everything out of the boat when we got back to the shop and spread it all around so it can dry out.  Thank goodness for the heat! It would probably take days in Oregon.  The whole thing is carpeted.  Who thought to put carpet in a boat?  It snaps out, but still...it's like putting carpet in a bathroom.  Just weird.
Anyway.  That was our great Texas adventure for the day.  Over and out.