garden soil improvement?

yes I need some!!  Our soil here has too much clay.

  Last fall we did alot of sand but not enough apparently. 

Fred was plowing it up for the first time this spring

and look at all of the clay! 

Any ideas od what we should ad besides more sand?

on another note I noticed my bleeding heart is blooming! 

I just love these unique flowers!

 

I am loving this weather we are having!

Here it is, April 2,2012 and it is 82 outside! 

Lovely!  I am wondering though what are "real " summer will be like?

I have two plants that are blooming right now

a goldfish plant that I revived after my neighbor at the shop throwed it out!

 

the other is my Peace Lily plant that randomly blooms

 

this last picture I thought was just a good one showing life in the country!

 

 

 

Can you believe this little gal

my Cecilia Marie

has turned 13??? Today?

Here she is this morning eating her birthday Chocolate chip waffles.

she has turned into quite the little baker! 

 She makes cookies and bars on a regular basis.

 A few weeks ago she decided to try her hand at baking a pie. 

She has made several peanut butter pies since then.

  This morning she decided to bake an apple pie.

   She made this one while I was at work.  I was impressed!

Her brothers and her Dad are only too pleased

 to help her by eating what she bakes! 

 ......alright I confess I like to eat them too! 

Cecilia is a real help to me around the house. 

She is such a joy to have around

 and is always giving us something to laught about.

 She enjoys life and is often the life of the party where ever she goes. 

She got that from her father for sure.

  She is very shy until she gets to know you

and then look out she never stops talking

.....can't imagine where she got that trait from!!!

 

 

Well time just keeps flying by.
Chancy left for Elnora Bible School, in Elnora IN on Feb 20th. 

He is enjoying his 6 week term there. I am missing him.

  He has always been easy for me to talk to.
Life just keeps zipping by. I am busy at The Print Shop again

 after a short welcome lull in early Feb. 

Now it's just rush rush to get it all done. 

This past Monday Cecilia and I wanted to do some shopping in Quincy IL. 

We invited Mom & Aunt Jean to go along.

  It was a fun day just shopping. We did not buy very much of anything. 

We are down to our last week before our annual Ladies Day Luncheon......We need to decide what to call it. Ladies Meeting, Ladies Conference, Ladies Luncheon, Hmmm none of these seem to totally fit. This year is our 3rd meeting. We as of this morning I think we have 91 ladies with reservations. We have only one speaker this year. We have asked Evelyn Miller from Hutchinson Kansas and

Lilies of The Field It is exciting to see how God works out all of the details for these meetings!
So besides getting ready for that next weekend, March 17th, My mother-in-law Ann, My sister-in-law Heidi and her daughter Sophia are coming to visit us. They are also bringing along Cody's special friend Susan!!! I am looking forward to getting to know her better! She will be spending a day or two with me. So I have exciting times ahead. I also need to whip my house back into shape. My neglect is showing! To top it all off, I got a letter in the mail that says I am up for Jury duty this next Wednesday. UGH bummer!!! I am hoping they settle out of court. My week is too full already!

 Cody went to Florida last week to see a special someone.  He  wanted someone to go along.  His grandpa volunteered so that he could visit with Paul Wessselhoeft.  Paul & Marilu have the Ocheesee Dairy and Cody's special friend works for them. 

Last night Cody & Dad came home and brought with them Strawberries!

 

Yum Strawberries in February

 

 

look how big they are!!! And they taste yummy...

I am thinking strawberry shortcake for supper!!

They also visited Cody's southern grandma,

my mother-in-law Ann Brown on the way home.

She sent us Pecans!

 

Wow I fared really well!  I got my very happy son back,

 my Dad refreshed from a vacation and strawberries and pecans!!

In case any of you are interested in seeing Cody's special friend ....

 

here they are Cody & Susan   ( kinda cute together)

    We had planned to have the part on Feb. 13th.......

however it snowed all morning and so we ended up postponing it to Feb. 15th.

I had said I would share pics so here they are!

 

 

Here is the table ready and waiting for the girls

 

here is what each place setting looked like

 

We had made little "cake Pop" Teddy Bears. 

 The girls had great fun dismantling them and giggling!

 

These are the onle Cake Pops we made that were actually on a stick.

 

we tried our hand at making some candy lollipops

 

Candy coated pretzel sticks

 

and lots of truffles, there were.....

Oreo truffles, mint chocolate truffles,

brownie truffles and strawberry truffles.

 

a lady from church heard about the tea party

and made each of the girls a crotched pocket heart! 

She filled it with candy. 

Cecilia added a pencil and a nail file!

 

When they first sat at the table,

 there was much gazing at everything

and giggling and talking!

 

Cecilia was an etertaining hostess!

and the food was served and sampled.

I have quite a few old vintage hats,

I had the girls each put one on for a picture!

This brought much giggling to the table!

 

 

 

 

Starting at the top left to right

Faith, Katrina, Kaitlin, Morgan,

 Maison, Tori, Abigail & Cecilia

After they were all full and ready for something else,

we moved to the living room and they made Valentine cards.

 

And that was it! 

Fun, Fun,

Cecilia thought we should do it every year!

Hmm  Mom will have to think about that!!!!

Cecilia has been wanting to have a tea party for months.  So we are having 7 other little girls over for a Valentine Tea on Feb. 13th......Yesterday we set the table minus the food for a trial run at what it would look like.  I will post more pics after the party of food ect.  But I just wanted to give you a sneek peak!  So very exciting!

 

The other evening on the way home heading west.....I could not help but see the handiwork of the Lord!!! What a beautiful creation!

 

In January Mom & Dad, and Fred & I, hosted a seafood dinner for 10 people at Mom & Dad's place.  We had donated it at a Benefit auction.  I had mentioned this earlier and said I would post pics.  In the rush of things I did not get many pictures of food during the event.  But here is what I did get!

We used a snowflake theme for the table

here is an individual place setting

Fred and Dad peeled some of the shrimp so that I could lightly bread them

I made a crab dip for an appetizer that we served to them as they arrived and waited of the rest of the party to arrive 

We made a broccoli casserole and baked corn for their choice of vegetable and baked and served them in individual dishes 

Here is what the fried shrimp looked like

I also made a crab cake for each person.  I had never made these before and when I whipped up the ingredients it seemed as though there was not enough "batter" to hold everything together but it did  work and their were delicious if I have to say so myself!

We also boiled a bunch of shrimp, Dad's specialty! 

not the greatest pic but for dessert we gave them a choice of 5 cup salad ( Marshmallows, pineapple, mandarin oranges, sour cream and coconut) or they coul have.....

 

Super dessert which has also been called 4 layer dessert. A nutty crust with cream cheese layer then a chocolate pudding layer and then cool whip.  Always a hit anywhere!

And that was it!  They wee all stuffed and we had leftovers of everything!  Poor us had to eat the leftovers the next day for Sunday dinner!! LOL

Back in November Mom & Dad, and Fred & I,

donated a shrimp dinner for 10 people

 at a local Benefit Auction. 

We have agreed with the purchaser to serve the meal this Saturday evening! 

 So I have been busy shopping

 for last minute food puchases

 and making sure we have everything

we need to set a fine table!   

The people who bought the dinner payed close to $400 for the meal!! 

 LOL I guess we owe them a fine spread!!!

I will try real hard to be good

 and post pics of the food and table!!!