Friday, October 16, 2009

Our Yard

In a recent post, you saw Jesse cutting down the 2 dying cherry trees our yard. I was sad to see them go. Jesse had more plans for our yard though, and for this, I am excited! We have a retaining wall in our yard that was made out of cinder block (side 1) and railroad ties (side 2). Side 1 was slowly starting to fall over because whoever put it in didn't do it right. It looked terrible. So we tore out the wall and are having a new stone wall and paver patio put in, complete with a walkway to our back shed. Here are some pictures of the progress so far:

Side 1 wall removed and land prepared for pavers

Side 2 wall removed

The area directly behind our deck has always been uneven and hole-filled. As Jesse was clearing the area for the walkway, he came across what turned into a HUGE project: The retaining wall behind the deck was one 6x6 that was rotting away and some more crumbling cinderblock. Dirt was slowly sliding past it underneath our deck, thus the reason for the holes. Jesse spent all evening fixing this, working well into the night. Our neighbor's friend helped him place the new 6x6's. I helped carry them from the truck though (She-Ra!).

Measuring depth to make sure new wall will fit

Working into the night...

New wall in place

A job well done!

Next up was digging out the path for the walkway. We all pitched in and worked this time

digging the line

dig, dig, dig!

I told you, I'm She-Ra!

new pathway

Finally, I have some pictures of the progress made so far on the new retaining walls and patio. It's gonna look good!!

Side 1 new wall and pavers

Side 1

Stairs on Side 2 and part of new wall
We'll post more soon!

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Experimenting...

Earlier this week, we had Mariam from the Children of the World stay with us for 2 nights. She had to have hernia surgery earlier in the month and was staying behind until she fully recovered and was able join back with her team today.
The first night I asked Mariam what she would like for dinner, and she requested spaghetti. That's easy enough, until I discovered I was out of spaghetti sauce! I remembered all the frozen roma tomatoes from our garden I had in our freezer, and the green peppers we just picked and decided to make my own rather than run to the store. It was my first attempt at homemade spaghetti sauce, and I think it turned out pretty well. Mariam liked it at least!


homemade spaghetti sauce with turkey meatballs

Mariam

For my next meal, I decided to try to make Panang Curry, one of my favorite Thai dishes. I didn't have all of the necessary ingredients, so I had to improvise a little... I'd love to tell you what I did, but I can't remember now! I was happy with the way it turned out. Jesse said he didn't care for it, but he said the same thing when he ate it from Thai 99, so I counted it as success!


Unfortunately, with both of these meals since I was just "winging it" I didn't write everything down! I don't think I'll ever be able to recreate them!