A Chat With The Fat Man!

The "Fam" went down to Tuolumne City in the rain to participate in the Community Christmas Event.  The students and parents of Summerville Parent Nursery School were to be part of the parade, complete with home made kazoos but, due to the weather, decided to skip it.  Wet kiddos = whiney kiddos!  Santa arrived in a Fire Truck and took his place in a seat next to the Mrs. When Amelia had her turn to sit on the famous lap, she asked Santa for "play dough, a Hovaround and a toy deer made of plastic."  Now, I'm thinkin' that the play dough is taken care of (thanks Nana & Grampa), the deer request is being worked on and the Hovaround will have to wait a few decades.

Snowball Fight!!!

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Let it Snow!!!!

In the last 12+ hours, we have recieved about a foot of fresh, white, powdery snow!  Amelia began the day in a Winter Wonderland and, as fast as we could get her gear on, was out in it.  She even asked for a bowl and spoon so she could eat it for breakfast!  Though there's not a whole lot of moisture in it, we attempted to build a little snowman.  The girl also found out that it's kind of hard to get up when you fall down in it but... made her way through it to visit our neighbors and have some hot cocoa.  It has stopped snowing for now and I am preparing to make potato soup and some homemade bread while Joel pushes a shovel around.  Happy Holidays!

Apple Trees and Falling Leaves

A client of ours has a great apple tree and, because the home is currently vacant, we were asked to pick the apples and do with them whatever we please.  I picked a very large box full and brought them home.  Now what?  I've given bags of them to whoever would take them and am now looking for various recipes on what to do with the rest of 'em.  So far, I've made 2 Kutchens, a crisp, a batch of oatmeal apple cookies, roasted 'em with sweet potatoes, stirred 'em into muffins & have eatin' them with peanut butter. Yes, I still have a half a box full!!!!  I've gotten a few ideas from my FaceBook friends and look forward to trying some of them.  Oh, there's still more to be picked, too.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Apple Kutchen:
1/2 C. softened butter
1 pkg. yellow cake mix
1/2 C. flaked coconut
2 1/2 C. sliced apples
1/4 C. sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 C. sour cream
1 egg

Preheat oven to 350.  Cut the butter into the cake mix, then coconut.  Press mixture into an ungreased oblong pan; slight edges.  Bake for 10 minutes.
Arrange apples on crust; sprinkle with cinnamon & sugar.  Blend sour cream and egg together and drizzle over the apples.  Bake for 25 minutes or until edges are light brown.  Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.

A Day in the Life...

It's been rather crazy since we got back from Disneyland.  Amelia is learning so much every day and has a truely amazing imagination.  I've been working more on the Real Estate part of my life.  There is so much to learn - I just don't know if there is any way to know it all.  The short sales and foreclosures are beating out the private sales here and dealing with banks in order to make a sale is quite frustrating. I'm also working diligently on getting the donations for themed baskets for the Summerville Parent Nursery School to raffle off at the beginning of December at our annual Christmas Shop event. That's right, the holidays are already upon us!!! Joel is keeping busy with Sierra Property Maintenance - he's been doing various remodels and is building a 20' Yurt for Gwynne (awesome!).
It is with a heavy heart and a sigh of relief that I report this next bit of news; Honey the Dog passed away this morning.  She lived a "great" long life and we miss her terribly.
In better news... it hasn't snowed yet.