a need for "constructions"

A little over a year ago, I was called as the Young Women's president in my ward (for my non-mormon friends - that means I get to work with the amazing youth (ages 12-18) in my church).  One of my favorite parts of Young Women is Personal Progress (PP).  PP helps the girls develop talents, skills and abilities that will help them become great moms, wives and leaders.  The program is based on the 8 values that help the girls understand their divine identity and ultimately lead them closer to their saviour, Jesus Christ.  It is an amazing program.  I want each of my girls to achieve their Personal Progress award, so that means I need to complete the program too. 
So for the past month I have been working on my "good works" project.  It all started with my desire to teach my children how to cook.  (That was something I was not taught in my youth - which made the first couple years of marriage VERY stressful!) At first I started with just showing them how to prepare a couple simple meals.  I thought it went well.  But then when I asked them to try to do it on their own, they were really frustrated and couldn't do it.  That was when I realized that they needed the "constructions" (my son's word for instructions ;-) - they needed the recipes!  duh!! 
Oh, but therein was the problem.  I don't have recipes for most of the foods I make.  Well, what could I do?  I could just have them make the dish over and over until they have it memorized.  But that would take a long time and quite frankly I don't want to eat the same food that many times in a row!  Rats!  That meant that I had to actually make recipes for my "creations".  (Maybe that's why my Mom never taught me to cook!)
It has been quite the project.   But I now have a "recipe" for everything on my menu - woohoo!!  My kids love it and I do too.  And the best part is they will each have their own recipe book to take with them when they leave home.

Once a farm girl...

As I have mentioned before, I spent about half of my childhood living on a farm. We had all kinds of animals: dogs, cats, pigs, chickens, turkeys, horses, etc. Needless to say I have a love for those critters and a yearning to return to the "farm". My wonderful husband on the other hand is a "city-boy". He has ALWAYS lived in the city and has absolutely NO desire for anything farm related - including animals.

In April, we celebrated 17 wonderful years together and I think he is finally starting to soften - hee-hee. A couple months ago I talked him into letting me get chickens. I suggested we just buy a chicken coop, but he has decided to build one instead. (This is where his perfectionism comes in.) You see, we can't have just "any" chicken coop, we have to have a coop that will be the envy of chicken owners everywhere! (He reminds me so much of my dad ;-) Well, needless to say, it takes a LONG time to build a "castle" instead of a coop - :-). So far we have a foundation (this coop will probably outlast the house in a storm!) and piles of wood. Meanwhile the chickens are growing and it is getting harder to keep them in a box! But he promises me that it will be done soon - after all the foundation is the hardest part.

As the saying goes, once you get your foot in the door...well, we couldn't just stop at chickens now could we? Of course not! So today we also got a dog. Some friends were looking for a home for their Lab/German-shorthair puppy (well, he's 2, but that's still a puppy to me!) and I saw my opportunity. We brought him home (after much coaxing and pushing to get him in the car - he is a STRONG puppy!) and the adventures have begun. He has terrorized the chickens - I think he just wants to play, but the poor chickens don't believe him; jumped into the pool at least a dozen times; staked his territory - he has already growled at the neighbors peaking over the fence; and coaxed my children into throwing a tennis ball a couple of gazillion times!

And so my "little farm" has begun. Sorry honey...once a farm girl, always a farm girl :-)