Toco

Saturday, we joined the Singh family for an all day outing. We left early and enjoyed a beautiful 3 hour drive to the North East tip of the island. It was so beautiful driving through the mountains and then along the coast! At Toco, at the tip of the island, there is a lighthouse(which I failed to get a picture of) and a beautiful outlook area. Here are some pictures of our lovely day...

A very cool broken down bench! Wouldn't it look good with some lovely vines and flowers around it?

The little path we walked down to get to the point.

Out on the point! So very beautiful!

The rocks on the point were so neat. Most had these red/pink stripes running through them.

This is the view from where we had our picnic lunch! Lunch always tastes better with a view like that!

After lunch all the kids went exploring down the side of the cliff. It was so fun to climb down to the edge of the water. We found some very beautiful rocks and a couple of pieces of driftwood!

These are Almonds. There are two kinds that grow here. This tree also had red/orange bark! It was so pretty and unique.

We all came home sunburnt and tired but it was a very wonderful day enjoying God's beautiful creation!

Homemade Noodles

I have always liked to make noodles. I played around a tiny bit with it when we lived in Arkansas, but not very much. So I did some research on the handy thing called the internet and found a new recipe and some new techniques. Then on Monday and Tuesday of this week I gave it a try! I had so much fun making these! And they tasted good too!

Here is what I did and the recipe that I used:

2 1/2 cups flour

a good pinch of salt

1/2 cup milk

2 eggs, well beaten

1 TBS butter

Mix together flour and salt. Make well in flour and add milk, egg and butter. Mix until you can knead it. Turn it out onto cabinet (or where you will be kneading it).

Dough will be very crumbly but keep kneading it and it will get smooth.

It will take about 5 min to form into a nice ball. You may have to add a bit of water/more milk...tiny bits at a time.

Now, it's waiting time! Put dough in a clean bowl and cover with a cloth for at least 30 min. I let mine go an hour and it worked great!

Then (now that waiting time is over), divide dough into four parts and leave 3 in the bowl covered with the towel.

Coat one slightly flattened piece in flour.

Then start rolling. It will take a good bit of work (mostly patience) to get it very thin. I got mine as thin as I could.

Hold the piece up to the light every so often to check for thicker parts. (They will be darker). You will not have to add much flour as you roll if your dough is the right consistency. Use your best judgement on this.

After that piece is rolled to your satisfaction, place it on a towel and let it dry a bit as you roll out another one.

Once the second one is rolled out, trade it out for the first one. Dust the first one with flour and roll up into a log.

Now. with a very sharp knife, cut it in slices of desired width.

Carefully unroll the slices....

and hang to dry. I used a clean plastic hanger. You can use a professional pasta rack (if you have one) or a broom stick (clean of course!) propped on two chairs...or anything else you deem worthy of drying your pasta.

Once you have hung all that, roll into a log and cut the second one. Then, start all over with the two pieces that are left. Warning: this part can take a good hour or so. (But it's worth the yummy results!)

Once it is all rolled, cut, and hung, let dry until it is hard...about 4 hours.

Then place in bag and freeze until ready to use. You can also use it fresh without letting it dry completely. One batch makes about 1lb of dry pasta.

I hope you have as much fun making this as I did! I will be making more, as we all liked it very well! My next try-out will be flavored pasta!

Questions? Comments? Let me know!

Have fun!

Happy New Year!!!!

Happy 2011!

I'm not much of a "New Year's Resolution" type person.

But I have been thinking that there is one resolution that a Christian should make EVERY day...not just the goal of a new year. The resolution should be this...to live every day for God and to make sure that your life reflects it in all you do.

Live by these words of our Saviour and you will have a wonderful year in 2011!

Luke 9:23 "And he said to them all, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me"

Gardening in December

Yes, in December! It’s really weird to be planting things one week and have our Christmas the next but I’m getting used to things not being like they used to! My little garden started out like this… We had to first chop, (yes with a machete) the weeds out. Then a few weeks later when the weeds are grown back I got my plants! Dad, Nathan and I walked down one Sunday morning to the market before services and got our first little plants. They sell them in groups of 4, 6, or 8 for a dollar TT ($1USD=$6TT). So I got 4 tomatoes, 8 lettuce (which died a week later), 4 cucumbers, 4 peppers, and 6 bok choi. When buying plants the seller puts them in a bag and then you take them home! Totally different than getting them in nice little flats like in the USA! So I paid my $6TT and brought them home. That afternoon I planted them in pots….and waited till they were a bit bigger to put in the ground. Then on Friday we headed out and found a couple of nurserys that had plants and got 4 more tomatoes, 4 cabbages and some seeds…squash, beets and Bodi Beans. Bodi Beans are like green beans only about 18 inches long and have a bit of a different taste and we really like them. Then next week I planted all the plants and the squash and the beets. All the little plants loved their home…the seeds didn’t! They have not come up yet and I don’t think they will. I am going to try them again this week. I planted the beans a few days ago and after a nice rain they were up! I am so happy! Now I just need a fence for them to climb on. So that is my garden so far. I’m sure that I will be taking more pictures as they get bigger. I am so thankful that I am able to go out and garden here. It’s one of my ways of relaxing and enjoying God’s beautiful creation! I so enjoy going out in the warm sunshine and pulling weeds to my heart’s desire. I am so thankful that I can. Working is such a wonderful blessing. I am very thankful that I have a garden in December to take care of!

Blooms on our Lime tree! YAY for more limes!

Our Mandarin orange tree!

Last...is our Julie Mango tree. We are hoping that we will have some fruit off these two trees before our time here is up.

Home, that humble abode of which we live.

For the last 19 years of my life I had lived in the same house in the same town. I grew up romping about the 19 acres we had. Then I pack up and leave. Now home is in Trinidad and Tobago, West Indies. This is a BIG change. It’s hot here all year long, it’s a different culture and a different way of life. But, one thing has stayed the same. We are still together as a family. And you know, if you are with the people that you love no matter where the house you live in is located, it is home. The old saying “home is where the heart is” is not far off. I miss my old home, my dear church family at Cave Springs. But as much as I miss the old, I’m so thankful that I have this new chapter of life to write.

Here are some pictures of our house and yard. It’s so much different than the 19 acres in the US but it’s home. And I do like it.

The front of the house. The open windows are the living room windows.

Our living room. Complete with musical instruments! It's nice and roomy and we have such a nice breeze that comes through the windows. Cheyenne also likes to poke her head through the bars when we are all doing something as a family! It is quite cute!

This is the dining room. It is between the living room and kitchen. It also (as you can see) doubles as the school room.

Here is our kitchen. It has lots of cabinet space for storage and cooking. We have quite a fun time in here! =)

The girls room, complete with mosquito netting for each bed. There is also a bank of very nice drawers and closet area. (The fans are sitting in front of it).

The boy's room. They have the same set up as the girls with netting and closets.

The Office! We keep our school things and computer stuff in this room. It also is our spare room for guests.
Our back porch. The laundry "room" is on the far end and we have a nice sitting area and some pretty plants on this end. It's quite lovely to sit out there in the morning! It's facing west so we have enjoyed some beautiful sunsets too!

This is the view from the front of the house. It was very rainy that day!

The view from the side of the house, taken from the back porch.

This is the wider side of the "yard" about our house and some of our potted plants.

The other side of the house and two of our extra water tanks.

Our lime tree! It is in one end of the garden. (Pictures of the garden to come when we do some planting).

Meet Cheyenne. She is our guard dog. She is a good dog and is learning to obey us well.

This is "the Flame" outside our house. It can be seen from the kitchen window and we watch it as we cook and do dishes. It is a burn-off fire from the local oil refinery.

So that is home! It's slowly becoming "our" home as we continue to decorate it and live in it. We are so blessed and thankful that we have such a very nice house to call home!

Sunday Reflections

Today was our second Sunday here in Trinidad. As I was traveling with my family to services I got to thinking about some of the different things here versus in the U. S. In America most families (including us) have more than one vehicle. But not here. This is how today went. We all got ready to go to services and instead of going down stairs and getting in a van, we went out of our gate and started walking. We walked for oh, maybe a quarter of a mile (maybe more) to the round-a-bout. There we hardly waited any and flagged down a Maxi Taxi. We all piled in and rode to the building, paid our fare and had a wonderful worship time with the brethren.

That has become normal for us every time we want to go anywhere that we can’t walk. We are planning on getting a vehicle that will transport us, but I am thankful for this time of non-independent transportation. It really makes one count the blessing of having your own transportation. I know that there are some people here that have to travel everywhere they go just the same way as we did this morning. Knowing this makes me appreciate having a car (or more than one) of my own in a different way. We are all so blessed. Yet sometimes we don’t even know it.

So, as you ride around in your car, be thankful you are among the blessed of this world that has one.

On a totally different note, we are all settled in now and school has started for the younger ones. We are getting into the swing of going to the open market and getting our weekly veggies and some of our meat. We still have to go to High-Lo to get milk, butter and other various items. We have had the pleasure already to have some guests in our home. We hope that will continue even more so in the months to come. I have personally enjoyed the time of reuniting with old friends that I have not seen in many months or even years.

In the next week or so I hope to start my garden and do some planting of plants in our many pots, inside and out. We have been enjoying limes from our tree and I’m hoping that we will plant a Paw Paw (Papaya)) tree as well. I hope to post some pictures of our house and yard this week.

Have a great day! =)

Out with the old, in with the new.

(This was written last Wednesday the 10th of Nov. Posting is a bit late due to some internet problems.)

I have not blogged in a long time. My reason? Well I could say that I was too busy (and it would be true) but I use that for far too many excuses. So the real reason is that we have moved. Yep. We did. And it was not across town, or within the state, or even within the U.S. It was across the ocean to a small Island named Trinidad. The nation is actually called The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. There are two islands one is Trinidad (the larger one) and Tobago (the smaller one). We are located at the bottom of the chain of the Caribbean Islands. We are actually really close to Venezuela, South America. It warm here all year long as we are only about ◦10 off the equator.

We arrived yesterday after 3 flights that went really well. I’m now sitting in my new living room typing this and listening to all the new sounds that I have to learn what are.

Our house is really nice. We have plenty of room for all our stuff (or we hope so) and today we plan on unpacking some things. There is a nice kitchen, a dining room and living room area, 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and a sink area outside the hall bath, a computer/school/study room and a back porch. There is also a down stairs area that is where the cars are stored and also a bathroom (that needs a lot of work). We have a small garden area, a lime tree and some other small trees that we’ll have to figure out what are. The house came with two dogs, Cheyenne and Buster. Cheyenne is part Doberman and part German Shepherd and Buster is…is Buster. He is a random mix of something. (I’ll have pictures soon so come back and check again.)

I hope to Blog often about this new chapter in my life. This is such an exciting time! I have always wanted to live in Trinidad and also be in the mission field. I’m looking forward to this time and hope that I can help one person get to heaven.

Stay tuned!