Autumn Leaf Hydrangea

I was walking by my hydrangea today and the smell was outstanding.  I wish there was a way to send it  to you through the air ways.  The blooms are so delicate and beautiful.  This is an outstanding flowering bush for your flower bed and the blooms can be dried and used in flower arrangements. Then in the fall the leaves turn red and are beautiful too.  Double blessing with this bush.

A Small Vignette

 

I love green glass and over the years I have collected pieces of it.  This is some of my green glass in a small vignette in front of a huge window where it picks up the natural light and looks beautiful.

 

 

 

Grilled Mexican Chicken

This is a recipe from the Pioneer Woman.  The marinade for this chicken is wonderful and would also be great for faitias also.  If you don't want to go to the trouble of roasting the poblano peppers, you could just grill the chicken and make a mango salsa to go over the chicken which would be wonderful. This was a hit with my family.

Marinade
1/2 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 canned chipotle  peppers with adobo sauce, or more to taste (I used 4, they were small)
2 cloves of garlic, I used 4 cloves
6 skinless chicken breast
6 poblano peppers
8 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, cut into slices, you will need about 2 slices per chicken breast
Combine first 7 ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.  Pour marinade into a zip lock bad and add chicken breast.  Secure zip lock and move chicken around in bag to cover chicken with the marinade.  Marinate at least 4 hours in frig.

Roast poblano peppers in the oven or over a gas stove top.  After the peppers have blackened put them in a zip lock bag to sit for 20 minutes.  Remove them and scrape off the skin and cut them in half to remove the seeds.  You will use 1/2 of a pepper or more if desired on top of each breast.

Grill the chicken and about 4 minutes before it is done put a slice of pepper on top of chicken and top with a couple of slices of Monterey Jack cheese and let the cheese melt and then served.

This would be great with a Mexican rice and salad.

Mango Salsa

2-3 mangos, peeled and dices
1 purple onion, diced
2-3 jalapeno peppers, diced (you can remove seeds if you like)
juice of 1 lime
1/3 cup of chopped cilantro
Mix ingredients together and let set covered in the frig for at least one hour before serving.
This salsa is delicious and would be wonderful over the chicken if you don't want to do the peppers and cheese.

~Beautiful Saying~

This is a beautiful saying by Thich Nhat Hanh and was written on the inside of my Mother's Day card by one of my children.  I thought it was beautiful!

Each time my feet touched the earth I knew my mother was there with me.
I knew this body was not mine alone, but a living continuation of my mother and all my ancestors.
These feet that I saw as "my" feet were actually "our" feet.
Together, my mother and I were leaving footprints in the damp soil.
                                                                 ~Thich Nhat Hanh

It's May It's May

It's May it's May, the lusty month of May.  Remember the song from Camelot.  To bad I wasn't a singer, laughing.  Dutch gets the honor of hearing my singing voice but not many others.  I love music and singing, I'm just not that good.  Darn it!

I was mowing and our pasture is beautiful with wild flowers and when I saw the flowers the song from Camelot popped into my mind.  May is a beautiful month, every thing is green and the flowers are beautiful the heat of the sun hasn't been to hot on everything yet.  And there is just the right amount of heat to be the perfect temperature to really enjoy the outdoors. Good time to have lunch and dinner outside.  (We have to deal with the wind at our place.)  :(

Have fun!
xo

Mother's Day

I had a wonderful Mother's Day and enjoyed sharing the occasion with my daughter this year.  It was her first Mother's Day.  She made me this adorable hand print from Star Dutch for my flower garden and also the cutest flower pot with his foot prints as a butterfly, his hand print as a flower and individual finger prints as lady bugs.  They both are such adorable keepsakes!

It has been a precious year for me having my first grandchild and also watching my daughter become a mother.  I was fortunate and didn't work when I had our children but I have watched my daughter juggle working and motherhood.  Trying to do both and do it well can be pretty stressful at times.  There are many mothers who have to work and I will say I have great admiration for them.  I also want to say if a mother has to work there is no way that they can get everything done and spend time with their children.  I've told my daughter, "let the house go it will be here long after Dutch has moved on and the time with him now can never be replaced." There are so many things that pull on all of our lives, that we feel some obligation to, that are not important.  The things that are important just seem to pass us by.  I've watched her reevaluate the things in her life and let go of the things that really don't matter.  There is nothing that thrills me more than to see her relate to her son and love him and seeing him respond back to her.  It's been such a joy to see Dutch's aunt and two uncles respond to him.  A baby causes us to let go of our inhibitions and we all have become pretty funny and crazy at times to coax a smile or giggle from Dutch.

 Children are demanding and you never really get to sleep again, or finish a book or maybe finish a project, the house is never really clean for any length of time or that's the way it was for me.  I think for most of us that's what happens when you become a mother.  But to the young mothers I say, don't grow weary in giving of yourself to your children.  Your children will thank you someday for it.
Love your children unconditionally, be patient and play with them a lot.  Like I've said before learn what it means to love unconditionally. 

Nurse Appreciation Day

I think nurse appreciation day was Friday.  I meant to post this then and forgot.  I'm several posts behind! :(

Our oldest daughter is a nurse and has worked in ICU for 13 years.  She also works in the Emergency Room on occasion.  These two places are probably the two highest stress related areas in the hospital.  But she loves it!  We have tried to get her to move into a position where the stress level is a lot lower but she says it would be boring. 

I would just like to say that I am very proud of her and the work that she does.  She takes it very seriously and treats her patients the way she would want to be treated.  I've heard her co-workers comment on what an excellent nurse she is.  We should all be so fortunate to get a nurse with her skills and knowledge if we should ever find ourselves in the hospital.

She is my daughter and I want to honor her and show my appreciation for all that she does in giving patients excellent care.  Taking care of patients who are critically ill and then dealing with their families is not an easy job but she does it very gracefully. 

She is caring, loving and compassionate and that is the formula for a top notch nurse!

A Special Day

Today is our youngest son's birthday.  As the sun was coming up this morning, it reminded me of the day he was born.  That day, as the sun was coming up, the nurses were wheeling me out of the operating room.  I had been there since about 4 in the morning because the baby's heart beat kept dropping and they thought they were going to do an emergency C-section.  But his heart stabilized and as the sun was coming up they were wheeling into a delivery room.  He was born a little after noon.  After he was delivered, the doctor said "ah, this is the problem.  I was asking is something wrong?  He answered, no, he is fine but you are a lucky mother.  Your son has a knot in his umbilical cord and most babies die in the womb with this."  The knot tightens and there is no nutrition making it into the baby. 

Jon was the answer to the last part of a prayer prayed in 1981.  I prayed for two sons, one was born in 1983 and Jon came in 1988.  I asked that they be born on my dad's birthday and Jon was.  So this is a day that two special men were born.

He has requested Mexican food and a special dessert.  I need to get started there are a lot of things to get done before the family arrives tonight.

I'm always thankful for the morning and a time of remembering how special life has been for me and for my dear family~