back to normal ♥ july recap

What. A. Summer.

I cannot believe August is here! My mind is blown and it's saying "Naw, it's not August!" But it is, and we're closer to 2014 than the beginning of 2013. Gracious.

On to the recap. :)

July 4 - Independence Day! Rain, rain, rain. For hours, it rained! But that was ok, because my mom can hold an umbrella and grill at the same time, and she can put the ice cream maker in the sink. She's amazing. :) We had no fireworks, but two nights later (in the slight drizzle, I'm telling you, it was a wet week!) we watched our neighbors hugely impressive fireworks show. While standing on our front porch, we could see our other neighbors beside/behind us standing on their porch watching, too. We're cool like that. :)

The best part of rainy days - reading!! :)

July 7-12 was Music School, and probably our best one yet. We had over 200 people every night, and Friday night there were 355 there. I've already posted a couple of videos, but here are some pictures.

 

 

 

July 20 we spent the evening at the campground with Jacob and his family, which only made me want to go for a weekend ourselves.

Tickle!

July 28 was my friend Faith's 22nd birthday. (Please check out her blog!) She's in Papua New Guinea until December, so her little sister made her a slideshow and it ended with a bunch of us holding signs that said "Happy Birthday, Faith!" and this song: Across the Miles

And other than that it's been a very uneventful month. The weather has really cooled off - a LOT, and the humidity level has dropped like crazy. It's been gorgeous!

Amie is leaving Sunday afternoon for a three week music school at the college she's enrolled in up in Indiana. She's going to be doing correspondence classes this fall, but she really wanted to attend this school, so she's going to be gone for three weeks. :(

I hope everyone had a fantastic July, and I'm excited to see what August holds for us!

Raspberry Pretzel Salad

Yum, yum, yum, YUM! I LOVE this dessert! I've had strawberry pretzel salad several times, but when I saw this recipe for a raspberry version I knew I had to try it. I love raspberries and this was seriously so good.

Gather Ingredients:
bottom:
2 cups crushed pretzels
1 stick of butter, melted
1/4 cup sugar (I forgot to add this, and it still tastes amazing. Less sugar, right?! ;))


middle:
1 (8oz) package cream cheese – softened
1 (8oz) package Cool Whip – thawed
1 cup sugar

top:
6 oz package raspberry Jell-O
2 cups boiling water
1 bag frozen raspberries – thawed in refrigerator (I just used fresh raspberries. It was more expensive, but I couldn't find any frozen ones.)



Commence Cooking:
While my water boiled, I crushed the pretzels, added them to the melted butter, then spread them on the bottom of my dish.

 I added the Jell-O to the boiling water and set it aside to cool.

I then beat together the cream cheese and 1 cup of sugar.

Then I stirred in the cool whip until in was semi-well combined. (It was supposed to be well combined, but I got bored and decided it was good enough.)

Then I globbed it on the cooled pretzel crust. (I learned the word "globbed" from my grandma. :)) After that I spread it evenly on top of the pretzels. Make sure to glob it on there first, otherwise you get into a mess with your pretzels mixing with the cream cheese mixture.

THEN, I added the fresh raspberries. The recipe says to use whole berries, but our family isn't a big fan of fruit chunks in our desserts, so I smashed them up a little with my knife before I got smart and used the chopper. (Don't chop them too much, just enough to make them less chunky.)

Using the same technique as before, I globbed,  then spread those on top of the cream cheese mixture. (I used my finger - for my family members reading this, my fanger.)

At this point I'm thinking, "Oh, this is gonna be good."

By this time the Jello-O was cool, so I poured it on top of the whole shebang.

I put it in the refrigerator and cleaned up my mess.

Enjoy:
It took about 3.5 hours in the fridge for the Jell-O to set. Mama was shocked, because it takes her strawberry pretzel salad about two weeks to set. ;) I don't know if it was the type of Jell-O, or if I just let it cool longer. Either way, about 3 hours later and I got to cut into it and eat it.

I've converted. Though both are delicious and I'll never turn either one down, I now like raspberry pretzel salad more than strawberry.

Please let me know if you try it and what you think!! :)

Summer Saturday: me being lazy

We had our big Saturday morning brunch this morning (around 9:30am every Saturday we have biscuits and gravy, chocolate gravy, eggs, bacon, and several different homemade jellies). After that, the morning was a haze until around 1:00. I've heard of a few people around here having strep, someone had tonsillitis, and a ton of people have colds. Guess who else has some weird yucky sickness? This girl! :) Not sure exactly what it is, but I know it's some kind of infection so until the medicine kicked in I just kind of laid around in my room.

But then I ventured outside with my book and enjoyed the hothothot weather with the humidhumidhumid air, and it made me enjoy my late lunch of grilled chicken salad even more! :)

Tonight we went to the campground and ate supper with Jacob's family. Yummmmmm. Nothing beats outdoor cooking, eating hamburgers outside, after a hot summer day in the "cool" of the evening. Or maybe nothing beats spending a couple of hours with those little boys (they make me smile!). Either way, it was a lot of fun!

 

This wasn't a very interesting post, but not all of my Saturdays are going to include crafting or cooking or completing something on my bucket list. I'm just going to be enjoying a lazy summer Saturday! I hope everyone had a great weekend and will have a wonderful Lord's day. :)

Hallelujah!

At Music School last week we learned the Hallelujah Chorus in advanced music reading class. It was amazing. We learned it in 3 days!! We sang it on Thursday night and Friday night for everyone and some of us were so excited we were shaking. It's one of those songs that gives you chill bumps! 

It took George Fredrick Handel only 16 days to write the entire Messiah, and it's a three hour long piece. (The Hallelujah Chorus is only part of it, a piece took 3 days to write.) It was written in 1741 (over 300 years old!) 

His servant said he went to take Handel some water while he was writing, and he had tears running down his face as he wrote. He sent him away, and said he had to keep on writing. 

They sang it for the king, and when they got to the Hallelujah Chorus, the king stood up. Since then, whenever you go to a concert or hear the Hallelujah Chorus, everyone stands up. We stood on the platform and sang to a congregation of standing people. I've never experienced anything like it before. 

The Messiah was a God-inspired piece, and we've discussed how surely, a musical piece this complex, this beautiful, this God-inspired, and taken straight from the KJV (every bit of it!) must be sung in heaven. 

Friday night there were 355 people in our church. Hannah videoed it, and I wanted to share it on here. She was sitting near the back, so don't worry if it's a little hard to watch, it's the music that matters. I hope you enjoy it!

One Day All The Soldiers Will Go Home

Music School was this week! From 8:00am to 8:30pm we were at the church with 185 other people, learning music and singing songs. I got home last night around 11:30! It was a wonderful week. The advanced music reading class I was in learned the Hallelujah Chorus, and I'll have another post just for that another day. I believe it was our best school yet. On the last night (which was last night) we had 355 people in our church. Most of them were singing, but there were so many there to just listen. It was amazing! 

The Cleghorn family has been to this school for four years now, and they've been at our church lot during these years. They're missionaries to Indonesia, and they'll be leaving sometime this fall. It's hard to think about them leaving because they've become so special to my family and our church, but I know they'll do a wonderful work in Borneo. Please pray for them as they move to another country to serve the Lord!

They sang this song Wednesday night, and it was requested by several people that they sing it again on Friday night. I got chill bumps both times they sang it. Please listen to the words, this is a beautiful song and I think you'll enjoy it just as much as we all did.

Summer Saturday: Homemade Doughnuts

How do you spell that anyway? Donut? Doughnut? Donut / Doughnut 

Confession is good for the soul: These were a little hard to make, and weren't as yummy as I thought they would be. They were good, just not "Oh, wow! These are going on the make-once-a-month-list!" good. I got the recipe from Pinterest.

EASY: 
Making the dough. It required very few ingredients, not too much of anything.
HARD:
Peeling and dicing the apples. It took me twelve years to do two apples!

I'm not actually this tall, Amie snapped that picture at just the right moment - right as I opened the cabinet doors and went up on my toes. I think it makes me look kind of queenly.

BORING:
Letting it rise. Covered, 2 hours in a room temperature place (which was our microwave with the door ajar so the light stayed on and kept it warm.) THEN, transfer to the refrigerator for 4 hours. Come again? That's 5 hours for doughnuts!

MADDENING (meaning that whilst doing this I got mad):
Making the dough into doughnut shapes. Grrrrrrrrr. Ok, so I'm one of those people that follows a (new) recipe exactly to the tee. Lightly packed brown sugar? Softly tap fingers on measuring cup of brown sugar. Pipe dough into three inch circles? Why of course. NOT! This did not work, let me tell you. So in a panic, I begged my mom for help and she told me to flour it and roll them out. We had no idea what else to do, it was really difficult! Therefore instead of 18 doughnuts, I had 15 weirdly shaped balls of dough. (I'm so not a chef.)

Christine said, "I just make them round and cut out the middle." *blink* That would have worked great. Next time I'll do that! (Probably not going to be a next time... ;))

Oh boy, those are beautiful!! haha

MESSY:
Dipping them in the powdered sugar/milk glaze. I just made the glaze, dunked the tops of the doughnuts,  put them back on the cooling rack and watched it all drip down on the counter.

COOL:
Making the caramel glaze. I'll do this part again!! It's just sugar and water, then it boils for awhile and you watch it change colors. Then you add heavy cream and butter and it's like a volcano effect! So cool! Plus it made the doughnuts extra pretty.

FUN:
Now, what do you think the fun part was? ;)

Next time I want doughnuts I'll just tear up some canned biscuits and toss them in some oil, fry them and dip them in the glaze. But now I can say I've made doughnuts from scratch, and they weren't half bad! :) (Plus I also learned how to make caramel glaze from scratch: +1 for me!)

Overall it probably took me about 7 hours working on and off. (That's including rising time and clean up.) Mama just made some ice cream downstairs for us to eat tomorrow. It probably took her about 5 minutes, I'm not even going to ask. ;)

One of these days! :)

Summer Bucket List: finish five books by only reading them outside; make homemade donuts; eat fruit every day; start running (again-ish); catch a jar full of lightening bugs with Jace and Jackson; have friends over for a cookout and games; buy a bike; go camping; buy colorful tennis shoes; journal every night; blog once a week; complete a DIY; play whiffle ball and win; take the boys to the park; go on a picnic at Defeated; go to the zoo;  either go to the Hermitage again (ride a carriage this time), or go to Belmont Mansion or Bel Meade Plantation; decorate my corner of the office; get some hydrangeas; help clean up the pool area; make a dress with my mom

Happy 4th of July!

I do hope everyone had a beautiful Independence Day! :) It hasn't stopped raining here since this morning, but hey, it's just weather! 

We had an indoor picnic thanks to a wonderfully creative mom. She grilled hamburgers and hotdogs while wearing a poncho, put a table cloth on our island, and we ate off of red, white, and blue paper plates. We drank pineapple kool-aid and sweet tea out of mason jars, had corn on the cob, chips, a taco dip, and hummus.

 
We also made Butterfingers ice cream!

While Tanner took a nap we sat out on the porch (it's covered) while it poured rain. The boys made 4th of July t-shirts.

We've had a nice, relaxing holiday, and I hope yours was too! :) Maybe we'll see some fireworks later this weekend....

busy and hot ♥ june recap

I can't believe it's July already!! My mind cannot keep up with the passage of time. Shouldn't it still be March?!

The first week of June was spent getting ready for the second week of June...youth camp! The only thing I can remember from the first week was getting our 2013 camp tee shirts in the mail and distributing and getting money for those who wanted to buy one. I designed them this year! :)

Yes, it's a backwards mirror picture and I look like I'm missing a hand. This has already been pointed out to me. ;)

The cursive writing beneath "C-Stone" says, "...be thou an example of the believers...", and the back just said "Cornerstone Baptist Church Youth Camp 2013". I loved the color. :)

June 10-15 was our annual Youth Camp, ages 13-19, with a 20 year old thrown in the mix (me), my mom, Grandma, and PawPaw cooking, a few counselors, and a lot of preachers! Seven or eight churches besides us were represented by their youth. A lot of work and preparation goes into this week, but it's always worth it. We say this almost every year, but my heart tells me this may have been the best one yet. If you've ever been to a Youth Camp, then you may have experienced the emotions, crying, testifying, and commitment making that goes on. That's all very wonderful, but that's not what happened this year. While there was all that in moderation, it was a more somber year, and I'm praying that commitments were made in hearts that will last for a long time. A lot of kids came just looking for the Lord to speak with them - speaking personally from our church, there weren't many nasty sins to be taken care of, just hearts to be renewed. Everyone has said it was a different year, and it was definitely special.

 

 And then there was a free week. We needed it, because the fourth week of June was a combination of VBS and Jr. Camp!

June 24-28 - VBS and Jr. Camp. The way we do VBS is this: This year the "theme" was Missionaries of the Past. We had five rooms. Each teacher had one missionary they taught about, they decorated their room according to the missionary, his field, occupation, however they wanted to. One teacher even made her room look like the inside of an airplane and the kids got to "fly" to Burma to learn about Adonirom Judson!  The teachers and their helpers also dress up as either the missionary, the nationals, or just to so along with their room. The children are split into 5 different age groups, and each day they go to a different class. This allows the teachers to go all out on their rooms, learn lots of details about their missionary, and adjust their lessons for the different age groups. It's a fantastic way of doing it for us (we have a TON of children), and it goes over splendidly. Our missionaries were Dr. David Livingstone, Adonirom Judson, John Paton, William Carey, and C.T. Studd. I "traveled" with the 2 and 3 years olds, taking them to their classes - lesson, activities, crafts, lunch. I got to sit in on each different lesson, and it was so much fun! Here are some pictures from the different places we visited.

 

Our church has always emphasized and made heroes out of missionaries, so this was a very special week. I think the adults got as much out of it as the kids did, though perhaps on a deeper level. Jr. Camp started Tuesday night and ended Thursday night. I wasn't involved in this, but Amie was and said it was wonderful. It was for ages 8-12, and they went to VBS the first half of the day, then had Jr. Camp the last half, with services and staying the night at the church.

June 30 - The Sunday before Independence Day. We honored our Vetrans by having them stand on the platform while one held the flag and we sang our national anthem. Christine, Amie and I sang "Who Will Go to America" for special music.

(I was in the process of putting my other arm up in this picture, and then the camera ran out of memory space.)

I refuse to believe 2013 is over half way over. Happy July, dear readers! :)