Happy birthday Adam

Adam is 14!!!

About five days old.








Dedication day




With Bethany case worker on adoption day

December Recipes

In December we went back to some of our favorites from the year.


Tyler made a hobo dinner.


















Hobo Dinner
1 ½ -2 lb lean ground beef
½-1 cup ketchup or tomato sauce
1 egg beaten
½-3/4 cup uncooked oatmeal
2 yellow squash sliced
2 -3 lg. potatoes peeled and thinly sliced
4 carrots sliced
2 lg. onion thinly sliced
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix ground beef, ketchup, egg and oatmeal. Form into six patties. Place each on a square of aluminum foil. Place vegetables on top of each patty. Add salt and pepper. Wrap foil tightly around each patty. Place on baking sheet. Bake at 375F for 1 hr to 1 hr 15 min.




















Crock Pot Roast
3-6 lbs beef roast
2 cans cream of celery soup (we actually use cream of chicken)
2 packs Lipton Beefy Onion Soup Mix
2 c water
1-3 c each carrots, celery, potatoes cut into 3” pieces

Mix celery soup and beefy onion mix and water in crock pot. Add meat. Cook on low 6- 8 hours. Add the vegetables. Turn to high and cook 2-3 hours more. You can speed it up by turning it to high earlier.






Adam made lasagna. I don't have a real recipe for it. We combine one egg and ricota cheese. Cook the noodles then layer noodles, ricotta mix, moz. cheese and sauce. Keep going until you're out of noodles. Add parmesan to the top. Adam didn't put enough sauce and cheese on his top layer but it was good anyway.




Jasmine made Spaghetti!

One last project and BIrthday

The girls decided to do one last Christmas project which they got at Walmart for 75% off.

It was a bit more complicated than they planned. You were suppose to roll some of the gumdrops flat to make a bigger flat piece of candy.

Birthday

Happy birthday to me!

About 6-7 mo old.


Don't I look thrilled to be there? And probably equally thrilled to have my hair curled!!

Happy Three Kings Day!

Okay, so we aren't hispanic but we borrowed their holiday. Here is what the web says about it:

What is Three Kings Day?

This is a Christian holiday that celebrates the Biblical story of the three kings who followed a bright star of Bethlehem to bring gifts to the Christ child.

In the story of the Bible the three kings, named Melchior, Caspar and Balthazar, brought gifts to the new baby. They brought gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

Three Kings Day is also known as The Epiphany. In Spanish and in South America it is referred to as- El Día de los Reyes.

The night before:

On the night before three kings day, traditionally, there are prayers, blessed dried herbs would be burnt, and the aroma would fill the house with wonderful smells. Doorways are sprinkled with holy water and in some homes the head of the house would write with chalk above the doors C+M+B (the three kings names) and the year.
Children would put their shoes out and wake up early the next morning in hopes of finding gifts in their shoes. The aspect of shoes is similar to the American tradition of leaving cookies for Santa.


Here are the shoes (but the kids only get half price after Christmas candy!)

Jessica reading about the Magi from Matthew 2.









For us, this is also the day between my mom's bd and my birthday, so easy to remember.

I hope to work in some Haitian holiday customs in the coming year. Any ideas???

Jasmine singing

Yet More Pictures

Wild Adventures. Adam doesn't seem too sure about the snake.




Girls dancing. Everyone just did whatever they wanted New Year's Eve so I don't have lots of pictures because they were in and out.
Playing Scene It.
Ty & Jasmine.
Girls at midnight.
Midnight-start of the New Year
Jessica working on our adventure book.
Jasmine outside.
Ty outside.
Ty's favorite activity!

More pictures to come.