Texas State Flower

3.29.12

Orange Blossoms!

It is such fun to live in Texas!  We have an orange tree in our backyard that is just blooming away!  It smells so good.  The bees are having a hay day in it too!

This tree looked really pathetic when we moved in.  It was more like a bush that hadn't been pruned since it had been planted.  Jeff has done a really great job of helping it grow into an actual tree!  It's been fertilized  every year and this year he cut off quite a bit of it to try and shape it more into a tree.

Orange tree with blossoms.

 The first year we lived here it had a couple oranges on it but they fell off when they got to be the size of a quarter.  Last year it had tons of fruit and they looked so great but they were inedible.  I don't know if it was because of the drought but the insides were white and dry.

This year we've decided to pick all the little oranges off but 12 and let it put its effort into those and to growing more as a tree.  I'm anxious to see what happens! I guess by the time they are supposed to be ripe, we will have had our little baby!!!!

Hundreds of tiny oranges cover the tree.

Beautiful orange blossom!

Largest orange I've seen so far.  I'm trying not to pick it off with the others!

It sure was a gorgeous evening here yesterday.  Jeff was so wonderful and weedeated and mowed the whole entire yard!  It looks so pretty!  Thanks Jeff for all that you did!!!

I hope YOU were able to enjoy your day too!  :-)

Mango Salsa

We are sort of into mango salsa these days.  Sort of means I've made it a total of three times.  The first time used avocado and tomato, and then I found a recipe that uses red pepper and is then zero PointsPlus!  And Jeff prefers the second recipe so I'm in luck! 
This is how I made it.
Dice one mango
Dice about 1/4 cup red bell pepper
Dice one small jalapeno, seeds and all.  (We like it hot.)
Add cilantro.  This can be fresh or 2 cubes powdered.*
Add dash onion powder.
1 fresh lime squeezed.
Mix.  Refrigerate at least 30 minutes before using so the flavors can mingle.  We've eaten it the next day and it's still good.  It adds zip to your Mexican food!
 * Mom gave me some Knorr's cilantro cubes and they come in so handy because I don't have to worry about wasting fresh cilantro.  I use two cubes.

Very tasty Mango Salsa

Whooping Cranes!

We were so lucky to have a great fishing day yesterday.  Sometimes Jeff can use overtime as days off so he took one on Friday and off we went!

We didn't see too many redfish, but I did catch three small legals.  We also got to see five whooping cranes!  I tried to get our camera out to take their picture, but I was too late.

The two little white specs in the middle of the photo are the whooping cranes!  haha!

First, we saw two together, and later three flying together.  Jeff says they normal travel in twos or threes.  It was pretty cool!

Other scenery pictures since I had the camera out...

The water was really murky and muddy yesterday.

Getting ready to head down a creek in the bay.

7 spots and a crooked hat!

Almost 27 weeks!

To Die For Dinner Rolls!

Oh wow, these light whole wheat dinner rolls are simply the best EVER!  I was searching online for a recipe that had low pointsplus value and came across this one here from Betty Crocker.  It makes 15 rolls and let me tell you, they are g-o-o-d! And only 3 PointsPlus!  I used a bread machine to mix the dough but I don't know why you couldn't do it by hand.  Maybe just let them rise twice.  If you try it, let me know how they turn out!  I also converted the bread yeast into active dry yeast...4 1/2 teaspoons.
I hope you try them and enjoy!  They are delicious!  We had to have one while they were still warm!

They were supposed to all be the same size!  :-)

Mmmmm!  I wish you could smell them!

A Little Lightbulb...

warming me up!  That's how a lady at Ladies Bible class described what was happening to me last night and she's so correct!  I've been getting hot, just bursts of heat, and it's because of my little bundle inside me making lots of energy!  I thought before when I said to people I was due in June, and they responded that I was lucky I didn't have to go through the summer, that they were only talking about the outside heat!  But now I am understanding that they were talking about the outside heat along with the heat that is coming from me!  Ding, ding, ding!  The lightbulb goes on!  I read in my Mayo book, Mayo Clinic Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy just yesterday...

"It's not just because you're getting bigger or because the weather is warm.  During pregnancy, your metabolism-the rate at which your body expends energy at rest-speeds up.  And you're probably perspiring more as a result of needing to lose all the heat your baby is making.  This can leave you feeling too warm, even in winter."

Ah-ha!   This explains the night sweats, flashes in the grocery store, and feeling like I was in a sauna at ladies bible class last night! 

I really enjoy reading what goes on during pregnancy because it makes me realize I'm just a normal pregnant person and everything's just fine!  It's also really cool to read about what's developing on the baby each week.

Week 26:  This week, my baby will

• have well formed eyebrows and eyelashes
• longer and more plentiful hair
• continue to have fat accumulating under the skin
• have footprints and fingerprints that are now formed!
• weigh between 1 1/2 pounds to 2 pounds!
• have the components to his eyes developed!

Amazing stuff!

Love to you all!

Treasures!

These are some of the treasures we found at the beach on Friday!

Just experienced their first fresh water bath!

Scallops (we call the red ones, "Red Tabbies")

Whelks

Sundials

Jeff's Granddaddy Whelk

Jeff's Shark-eye Moon

Sand dollars

A Beautiful Day Off at the Beach!

Jeff took a day off today and so I got to, too!  :-)  I have been wanting to go to the beach and go fishing, but we were afraid that the boat ride may not be so comfortable for me.  But, I did my best to convince, so we gave it a shot!

We got to "our beach" and it was just perfect.  I say "ours" because that is where we got engaged.  It's an island and fortunately, not many people go there.  Because it was spring break, there were some people, but maybe in all two or three families.  It was wonderful!  We really like to look for really nice seashells, so we started walking along the water, but there wasn't much there.  The sargassum was along the water so we couldn't walk in it, so we decided to head up toward the dunes.  We hit the mother load!  It was so much fun!  Jeff found many whelks, two of which are the biggest we've ever found, and he also found a really huge sharkseye.

 

Sargassum along the shore

Jeff carrying the beach bag!

Almost 26 weeks

Never know what you'll see. 

Pelicans

Taking a much needed break on the suspended log!

Sand dunes

After we finished beach combing, well, how can you finish-after we decided that we needed to go back to the boat, we ate sandwiches and chocolate chip cookies while we were still anchored. 

My best friend

Gorgeous clear water

Tired and ready for lunch!

 While the sky was clear, we decided to try and do some sight fishing.  We saw lots of redfish, and I cast,  but I was only able to catch one! 

21 1/2 inches

 Another one I saw eat it, and I thought he was going to take off and set the hook, but he spit it back out.  Maybe we can catch him another day!

It was such a wonderful day enjoying the world that God made!

Oh yummy!

I found this wonderful pie recipe online while searching for a recipe I could use dark chocolate morsels in.  (I had found them for a dollar a bag on clearance at Wal-mart!)  It is Dark Chocolate Chess Pie.  Mmm, mmmm!

Dark Chocolate Chess Pie

The recipe online actually made 2 pies, so I just halved it to make one.  This is for one pie.

1 9" baked pie crust
1/2 c butter
3 ounces dark chocolate
1 1/2 c sugar
1 T flour
3 eggs
1 t vanilla
6 ounces evaporated milk
Optional:  whipped cream

Bake pie crust for 8 minutes at 400.  Then reduce heat to 375 degrees.  In medium saucepan, melt butter and chocolate over low heat, stirring occasionally.  Combine sugar and flour in medium bowl and in another bowl whisk eggs, vanilla, and evaporated milk.  Add a little bit of chocolate mixture to the egg mixture and stir, then add all of the egg mixture and sugar mixture into to the chocolate mixture on the stove. Stir to combine and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes.

Pour into baked pie shell.  Bake in 375 oven for 30 minutes.  Remove and cool.

It's good at room temperature, but better cold!  :-)

Mini Quiches

I had so much fun making mini quiches for lunch today for Jeff and me.  I started off thinking that I would make spinach quiche because I hadn't made one in a long time and Jeff was working at home today so I thought it might be a treat.  I told him what I was thinking and he said he would like his without spinach and no meat.  So I saw online where they made individuals in a muffin tin!  Perfect!  I decided to make a whole bunch of different kinds for a mini quiche sampler!

Not all of them had crust.  Actually only 4 out of 10 did because I used the leftover pie crust I had saved and frozen from the pie I made Jeff this week.  It worked well!  I've never been a fan of cooking pie crust with cinnamon and sugar, so I'm happy to have found a use for it instead of throwing it away like I had been.  Eeeek!  Imagine all that pie crust I've wasted when I could have been making minis!  So, here's the sampler:

3 cheese and black pepper with crust
1 cheese,black pepper, red and green bell pepper with crust
2 cheese, mushroom, red and green bell pepper with no crust
3 cheese, spinach, Canadian bacon, red/green bell pepper with no crust
1 cheese, bell peppers, and Canadian bacon with no crust

My favorite was the three with Canadian bacon and Jeff's was the mushroom ones except he prefers it with crust!

It was a lot of fun to make, didn't take too much time...only use 3 eggs (mixed with a little milk), fill muffin cup half full, and bake at 375 for about 25 minutes until light brown and set, and they were fun to eat!  Oh, and don't forget to spray the pan so they pop right out!  We had them with English muffins.

Tasty mini quiches!

    

25 Weeks

Here I am already 25 weeks along!  15 to go if he doesn't come early!  He is moving so much lately and this week I discovered that I can sit and watch my tummy move!  It's pretty neat.  His kicks and other movements feel pretty strong sometimes-it's going to be an earthquake in there by the time it's week 36!  :-)

25 weeks

 

Crib!

Now to pick up a mattress from some generous Christians, and get it out of the living room!  :-)  We are making progress!

Gorgeous Fruit Tree Blooms!

I don't know if I've ever seen fruit tree blooms like these!  Jeff and I went to visit my parents last weekend and were lucky enough to see these! 

24 weeks!

No picture this week, but I was reading and thought it was interesting that this week, our baby boy can get a sense of if he is upside down in my tummy or not.  This is due to the fact that his inner ear which controls balance is developed.  It's just amazing that people have determined when these developments occur and even more amazing that God didn't forget anything!  Our baby is about 8 1/2 inches long and 1.5 pounds!  He may be larger than that though since they determined he was larger than average at our last ultrasound.  I am really thankful that my pregnancy is going so smoothly and that the baby seems healthy.  I went to an appointment last week and don't have to go for another 4 weeks.  I took that to mean everything was great.

For you created my inmost being;
   you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
   your works are wonderful,
   I know that full well.
 My frame was not hidden from you
   when I was made in the secret place,
   when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
 Your eyes saw my unformed body;
   all the days ordained for me were written in your book
   before one of them came to be.

Psalm 139: 13-16 NIV

Garden Update

My plants are slowly coming up.  I'm not sure why, but all of the ones I planted in peat pellets haven't come up.  I'm not sure what to do about that!

Our orange tree is going to be covered in blooms soon and I noticed today that our American Elm tree has little leaves!

Lettuce

Peas

Sickly looking green beans

Corn