Life

Wes and I will agree that we have both began to appreciate life in new ways this past week. Yes there are the obvious ways, for example appreciating a ceiling in our living room and the fact that we both have computers but one other thing that has brought joy to our lives is the little sunflowers that are beginning to grow out front. I know this sounds totally cheesy but it's the truth. :) A couple of weeks ago when we planted our herbs into their pots (those are starting to grow too!) we also decided to plant a couple of sunflowers here and there just to see if it would work. To our surprise it actually did. Neither one of us have had much experience gardening so you can understand how exciting it is to watch something that you planted grow its roots and peak out of the ground. The amazing thing about sunflowers is your ordinary looking sunflower seed sticks right up out of the ground around the baby stem and eventually the little leaves throw the shell off. That is the stage they are at right now. I know I am probably sounding a little ridiculous getting so excited about baby sunflowers but as you grow up you begin to appreciate these little things that you've known your whole life and never took the time to think about... you know? So, some other things...

We finally found a bread recipe that we really like and can make as our regular sandwich bread. [if you don't have a bread maker we would encourage you to get one because you have so much more control over what kind of bread you want, its as fresh as you can get it, its inexpensive, it makes your house smell yummy, and its fun.] Here it is:

Bran and Yogurt Bread:
To make a large loaf in your bread maker:

1 1/2 cups water
1 cup plain yogurt
2 tbsp canola oil
2 tbsp molasses (or you can use corn syrup, thats what we used)
3 1/4 cups unbleached white bread flour
2 1/4 cups whole-wheat bread flour
2/3 cup wheat bran
2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp rapid-rise active dry yeast

*When making bread in your bread maker always do wet ingredients first and then dry ingredients and then last put in the yeast to prevent yeast from getting wet.

It's amazingly yummy I guarantee you will love it.

Aside from making bread we also made banana bread (to use up our dying bananas). Saturday we had our painting class together and absolutely loved it. I managed to take a couple pictures during our "lunch break" so you could see what it's like. We were asked to bring in 3 small panels to paint on. The teacher had us paint 3 different items one on each panel. The first one we were asked to paint this cylinder that was placed in the middle of the room. We learned how to paint lighting and shadows and then we had to do this with a box and a circle as well. We also learned how to apply a tinted glaze to our paintings... It was a lot of fun. We loved it! Also, Last night I went to a girls movie night with the girls from my home group. There were only 6 girls there total and I am so glad I went. I had a really great time getting to know them better and I feel like I can eventually become good friends with them. SO... that's all for now... OH wait, I almost forgot!

Our ceiling is fixed and painters are coming tomorrow. yaay!

AND Wes and I are going to start the 2nd Harry Potter book tonight! I know- so exciting isn't it????

love,

Katie