following the LEADER

I am writing this post as part of the Mom’s 30 Minute Blog Challenge by steady mom.  What a great idea.  Tuesday, I will link this post to her site, and voila.  I really enjoyed reading all the mommy posts last Tuesday.  If you’re a mom, you should try it!

We had so much fun yesterday with our pumpkins.  Last night after dinner, I roasted the parts that I cut out to make our doggy and kitty faces (I’ve tried to avoid the word Jack-O-Latern with my kids… I think they’re too young for the scary side of Halloween… we haven’t gone there).  So, before bed, I took the skin off the roasted pieces and threw it all in the fridge with a specific project in mind for this morning.

Pumpkin Bread!

I’ve never made it, myself, but I love it every time some one else does.  And I knew just the recipe I wanted to use.  In 2008 when we stayed with my Mom during the time surrounding Nathaniel’s birth, I was introduced to this cook book. I loved it so much that my mom gave me her copy when we returned to Africa.  What a sweet gift!  I would so much rather have her copy with the tape flags on the pages she likes and little comments in the margin in her very own handwriting.  I will treasure this cook book forever, and I’ve used it several times in the last 2.5 years.

Mark’s recipe calls for corn meal and whole wheat flour in addition to all-purpose white flour.  Between that, the last of the pecans Krystal gave me when she left, and the real pumpkin, I feel like it’s down right healthy.  I made a double batch, with help from Sam.  And, although it’s not the super sweet desert variety that I’ve had before, I have to say I’m pretty impressed.

Just add it to the list of foods I’ve made for the first time here in Niger.

And the list didn’t end there today.  Dave came home from the village yesterday with a ton of okra.  I made fried okra for the first time today too.  Just call me Betty C.  It’s been another good day!  Hope yours was good as well.

I’ve been feeling blue about the fact that we haven’t seen any fall leaves around here or tried on our first jackets of the season or seen mums and pumpkins on door steps (you get the picture).  And that still small voice inside of me has been consistently reminding me to be patient and enjoy this moment with gratitude for the things we do have.  So I decided today would be a special day.  And it has been!

Some things that made today special…

pancakes. building train tracks (an every day thing). playing in the bath tub. construction paper pumpkins. YouTube school bus watching. swimming in the little pool.  playing the piano and dancing. a morning nap for Nata.  It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (on YouTube.) watching Mama clean out the pumpkins (Sam declined my invite to help.) taking photos of a few favorite toys.  chicken and dumplings for lunch.  a snoopy band aid where it hurts (appropriate after Charlie Brown).  reading Curious George.  eating our first ever roasted pumpkin seeds.  an afternoon nap for Sam.  playing outside with a sweet brother.  watching mom make dog and kitty faces on the pumpkins.  pizza for dinner with some good friends.  seeing Esther walk. more pumpkin flavored treats to come. more pics posted when our internet speeds up.

more pics of the day are here!

Whose got it better than us?  We don’t know.

I’m from Houston.  Born at St. Luke’s hospital down town.  Graduated from Klein High School on the Northwest side of town.  Grew up at a church in the Heights.  This means nothing to you if we became friends after 1999.  If we became friends after 1999, you’re probably not a Texan.  You might be from Virginia or Massachusetts or a missionary in West Africa.  BUT… if we’re old friends…. friends like Joanna, my old pal from Youth Group, who came to visit last month, then you’re probably from Houston too.  Names like Shipley’s Donuts, Memorial Park, Allen Parkway and the Wortham Center all mean something to you.

It was Joanna that got me thinking about Ham and Cheese Kolaches. The word Kolache is very Houston.  Let me explain. 

[taken from recipezar.com]

“This will give you a really good idea of what we bring home from a donut shop in and around Houston. These breakfast treats come from the Czech immigrants who settled the Texas Hill Country (between Houston and Austin and around Austin), and frequently come in a fruit type (dimpled and filled, like a danish) that is also available up North, and meat (which apparently doesn’t exist anywhere else but around here in Texas). Ham and cheese has always been one of my favorites. The amount of flour you use will greatly depend on whether you are making this in or around Houston right before or after a rainstorm, as I always seem to; or if you are making it someplace with a normal, low level of humidity.”  As a Houstonian born and bread, that humidity comment just cracks me up!

Things have been bustling on around here at their normal crazy pace.  Last night 6 visitors from Atlanta left.  Our house was fumigated last week (we’re at war with a rather large population of ticks).  The boys and I have also been fighting illness and are now on antibiotics.  All of that to say that today I felt the need to make something familiar.  And my mind drifted back to Joanna and our conversation about eating Kolaches.  Some how in both of our memories this happened most at the Salazar’s house.  The Salazars were the coolest of all the youth group families.  They lived (still do) in this great old house in the heights.  I guess there must be a great Kolache place somewhere near by.  Karen Salazar walking into their kitchen with a white box packed with Kolaches is a comforting and nostalgic thought for me.

So, I found a recipe online and decided to give it a try.  The Kolaches did not turn out exactly the way I remember them.  This recipe is a little more like a roll or biscuit with ham and cheese.  In my memory, Kolaches are a little more layery.  And I don’t remember the egg white brushed on top.  BUT, they came close and they were very yummy. 

So yummy and fun to make, in fact, that I’ve got plans to whip up another batch for dinner.    I guess with ham and cheese and warm yeasty bread, you really can’t go wrong.  If you need me, I’ll be in the kitchen!

Today as we watched TV for what felt like the millionth hour, I felt a little pang of conviction.  The heat, you see, has been my excuse.  With temps well over a hundred every day, I’ve sequestered us into the office and filled the room with AC for more days than I can count.  And I’ve ignored that little voice inside my head that has said, “No matter how many times you play the documentary about animal migration in the Serengeti, they’re still watching TV.”  So, I asked Sam if he’d like to paint when Nemo was over, and he said yes.

Nata wanted to paint too.  “A 17 month old painted?” you ask.  Oh yes he did.  And he managed not to eat it all.  I’m hoping these paints aren’t toxic.  It didn’t say on the bottle.

It was fun.  It was messy.  And it was VERY creative.  Both boys had a blast.

The fun was less about the finished product, and more about the experience of touching and mixing and creating.  Just the way it should be!

Every time we do a project, like this, that we haven’t done in a while, I stop and marvel at how quickly these boys are learning and growing.  And I’m reminded to enjoy these moments and live in them fully, every day.

I hope all of you had a happy first Thursday in October.  Think of us as you watch the leaves change and the weather get cool.  I plan on taking these boys for many long walks in the woods, come November!  Oh how I can’t wait to see end end of fall in New England!