"Something Worth Remembering"

Here is Uncle Terry's "Early Light", words of wisdom for today... really great so I wanted to share.

SOMETHING WORTH REMEMBERING

Isaiah 9:6----"For unto to us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon His shoulder........"

How good it is to live in a "blessed" nation, yet we need to realize that we are about to forfeit this blessing if we are not careful. We need to recognize that the "blessed" status is directly proportional to who we declare our God to be according to Psalms 33:12. Where we stand with God and where we place Him is vital to our welfare!! How could we even consider removing "One nation under God" from our pledge of allegiance or "In God we trust" from our money?? How could we even allow someone to pursue having a lawsuit filed to do such a thing?? Have we allowed the freedom thing to go too far?

Okay---thank you for letting me spend a little time on my soap box. Now the good news is that "the government shall be upon His shoulder"---in other words He still has it all under control. We are reassured in Romans 13 that all authority is from God or a part of His design for things. However we also need to know that this doesn't mean that we just sit back and see what happens----as Christians, we need to get informed and then go vote----that is how God's plan is put into play in America. We need to let God use our mouths to make His word heard----we need to be active and not passive. If the government is on His shoulder, then how much separation can there be between the church and the state?? Now that is something to think about. I have come to realize that there is not really any way to take God out of things-----He will be in the schools, courtrooms, congress,etc. as long as just one person who has His Spirit indwelling them is in these places. We can't remove Him but we can remove ourselves from where He and His blessings are----may we not let this happen to this great nation!!

Proud to be an American
More Proud to be a Christian,
Bro.Terry

Any fool can count the seeds in an apple. Only God can count all the apples in one seed.

~Robert H. Schuller

G Rated-Weenie Weekend

L-R: Sorella, Annie


Ok, I wrote out this entire blog and somehow accidentally erased the entire thing which has taken me a week to get over... and I started it yesterday and got side-tracked so I am finishing it today. I will re-write now.

Not last weekend but the one before, Ken and I had some great adventures. We went to the Meyerson Symphony hall on that Friday night. Outstanding! Neither Ken nor I had ever heard a symphony production and it is probably not something he nor I would want to do on a regular basis by any means, but it was such a great joy to sit and listen to those scores that Anthony "thought" up. When I saw the numerous instruments all playing their own parts to form the amazing union of sounds I was in such awe. For someone to think of each part of the song played by each instrument at the same time just boggles my mind. Anthony was amazing, and yes, he does really have that mesmerizing way of speaking just as he does in his movies. He spoke so slowly and crisply and used the most descriptive words it just made me sit still and lean in to hear what he was going to say next. It was a fabulous experience getting to hear him speak and the Dallas Symphony play. It was his world premiere of his scores he has written as well as his artwork exhibition. It was so great to scooch in so close next to Ken and hear that wonderfully peaceful music.

On Saturday we drove on to Azle, (about two hours west of Sulphur Springs) to see my parents and stay the night. They just sold their home in preparation for their move to Fredericksburg, TX, where they are soon retiring! They will be so far away- 6 hours! Their babies are Sorella, (French for sister) and Annie, two Dachshunds. They are two very sweet and loving weenies that love to cuddle and follow you around out of curiosity... and probably waiting to see if you, the stranger, might give them a cookie, of which they get several from throughout the day from their parents. They know how to work the system. Very intelligent dogs. I just love being around them and Palmer has a crush on Sorella, has since she was just a little puppy. When they spend time together you might look over and Palmer is just sitting there so still and Sorella is just licking his whole face. He will sit and let her lick his entire face until she feels like she is done. He has the ultimate patience with her. When she has finished licking, his whole face- cheeks and all, are totally wet and his hair looks like a rockstar-sticking out in all different directions. Maybe that is how she likes his hair styled- the wet look. :)~ I will try and get a picture of it when they have a date next time, it is priceless. Loves shows in so many different ways.

Annie in the foreground, Sorella in back.

Sorella

Annie

Sorella

My parents had a garage sale that weekend that started at 6:00 AM, so we were there only for some of that and then we all went to my all-time-favorite-love of a Mexican restaurant, El Paseo. The best chips and salsa my mouth will ever experience. I joke with Ken about when we get pregnant what if that is my major craving and he says we will be over-nighting some salsa!! I can eat a 24 ounce cup of it in about a day and half if that tells you how much I love it.

After the yummy lunch, we spent some very valuable time with my parents just talking and catching up. My mom went through a bunch of their stuff and loaded the entire back seat of our truck with stuff- so high we could barely see out the window. We made out like bandits! My mom mad these out-of-this-world hamburgers for supper. They have dried Lipton tea onion soup mix, jalapenos, and tons of other spices in them that were so tasty. It was so great to spend time with them. It is never enough. I appreciate and love them so much. They are so wise and I really love to hear their stories and get their advice about life. Now they and we will be building a house at the same time- just very far apart!

I emailed my mom for the recipe:

one pound of hamburger meat 85/15

1 egg

1box Lipton onion soup mix (this is a dry soup)

pepper to taste

I usually like quite a bit spicy mustard just squirted in for a few seconds. when you have all this mixed up add just a little bit of water. Careful not to add enough to make the whole thing runny. It should feel wet. You can usually count on getting anywhere from 4-5 burgers per pound depending on how thick they are. remember that they will shrink quite a bit so a little bigger is good. You will perfect your technique as you go along. good burgers to you..........MOM

On Sunday we packed up and headed home with all our goodies and when we got back everyone was at Kim and Danny's- Candace, Chase, Kris, Alisha, Kyle, Kylie, Koen, Karson- and they had gone to the pumpkin patch on Saturday and carved and painted them. So, no one had a dull weekend! It was really a great weekend for us and I am so happy to have such an amazing family- on both sides. (The pics below are great ones Alisha took and I just played with them in Photoshop.) Kris and Koen

Koen and Kylie

I am so happy this blog has cooperated and let me finish it. ;)

This weekend Ken and I are off to Lubbock again for the Texas game... don't worry, I will be checking that game-time again and again to make sure we don't have a repeat of our little mishap like last time... Go Tech!

P.S. Found these great quotes and couldn't decided which to eliminate so I kept all three.

"My dog is worried about the economy because Alpo is up to 99 cents a can. That's almost $7.00 in dog money." - Joe Weinstein

"Dogs are our link to paradise. They don't know evil or jealousy or discontent. To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring--it was peace." - Milan Kundera

"You can say any fool thing to a dog, and the dog will give you this look that says, `My goodness, you're RIGHT! I NEVER would've thought of that!'" - Dave Barry

My Amazing Brother's Amazing Eye

L-R: David, Ainsley, Jennifer and Marin at lower.


Had to post this... my brother, Adam, and Kris, my sister, Jennifer, and her husband and family all recently went on a trip together and my brother got this touching shot of them. I love all the colors and composition and everyone looks so happy! It's so great to see such a happy family- makes me smile each time I see it. I hope you and your families are enjoying all your days.

Too Close.Proud Wife.

Red Raiders Hold Off Nebraska In OT, 37-31

This past weekend Ken and I made the long six hour drive out to Texas Tech for the Nebraska sold-out game. It was so much fun! The drive was not as bad as I remembered when we went out last year. This is our second year to purchase season tickets and last year we only went to one game! So, this year we have vowed to go to at least two... we are flying to the next one vs. Texas. That should be an excellent game! The drive there didn't seem so bad, but the drive home was as miserable as I remembered from last year. I don't know what it is about the drive home that makes it so different feeling- I guess it's always good to be getting home! The last three hours are so grueling, I try to be tired so I can just sleep and wake-up and us be in the driveway... no luck. I slept as much as my eyes would stay closed and woke up ready to run a marathon with three hours left to drive. Argh. Ken said I looked so pretty sitting next to him all snuggled up sleeping, and all I could think is," I hope I didn't sleep with my mouth open and drooling." He's such a sweet man. After I woke up we made a stop at Brahms and got ice cream and milkshakes... that was so great. Ice cream or anything sweet for that matter makes me very happy. :) I just get so stir-crazy being in the car for hours and hours... never have liked it since I was little, but Ken helps make it entertaining for me!

So, I just love going to Tech with my Ken. He has accomplished so much in his life and he put himself through all his college-undergrad and grad school- while juggling numerous jobs at the same time. He is so brilliant and is one of those learners who just has to hear it once and he will have it forever. I have to see it, write it, recite it, and repeat... not really but I am a very visual learner so I feel like I have to work a lot harder than he does to remember half of what he does!! I was very attracted to his brains when we first started dating, and he still amazes me everyday. So being out at Tech and going through the buildings he worked so hard in and all his little study corners he spent so many hours in are such great little pieces to hear about. We got to check out the library this time and it is huge! He was like a kid in a candy store when telling me about when he first went to that library and saw the millions of books on shelf after shelf, floor after floor!

There were rows and rows and aisles and floors that looked like this... we found one super old book that was written in 1890.

This is a very old clock on a wall in the library... imagine how many people have depended on this clock!!

We got out there on Friday night really late and stayed the night and slept in until late on Saturday morning. We love staying in hotels because we can pull those "black-out" blinds and it will stay dark until we want! We were taking our sweet time getting ready for the 6:00PM game that really started at 2:00, unknowingly to us...

We finished getting ready and went and ate at Olive Garden and then went to the mall to get a little onesie from the Tech Spirit shop just to have for the future... it is the cutest little piece of clothing I've ever seen...it's not even as wide across as Ken's spread out hand. I can't wait to have a little one and look in his/her eyes and see him in them. Any who, after that we still had four hours so we went to the stadium shops and walked around and did some shopping there. Then we decided we'd go ahead and find a good parking spot and I could walk around and take pictures of the campus for the last three hours before the game started... or so we thought. When we finally found a parking spot, we lucked out and it was right by the stadium and Ken looked over and pointed... the jumbo tron was on. We watched from the truck for a minute and saw it was, in fact, a football game but surely... it was only 3:00...so we decided we better go check this out. Sure enough because the game was on t.v. it had started at 2:00! We were an hour late and had we not had the parking spot we had and Ken not seen the jumbo tron- we'd have been out in la-la land walking around taking pictures for three more hours and COMPLETELY missed the entire game. We laughed for a long time about this and were so thankful we got to see the game- hate to think we would have drove six hours to take pictures of the campus! So we ended up liking being an hour late because we missed the crazy crowd this year, we saw that last year and they are one crazy crowd! It turned out to be an amazingly close game that we won in overtime! It was very nail-biting and Tech won with an interception in the sudden death. TOO CLOSE!

This is a shot I got of the statue of Will Rogers... I thought it was so neat! Love to have a cool iron casting sometime in my life. I don't know what it would be of but anything looks great when cast in iron!

Even their light posts has the logo on them. We're going to get some with big "G's" on them! :)~

This one made me think of our friend Kristy Brewer, she married one of Ken's best friends, Stephen, and she graduated from Tech, too with an education degree. This is outside the education building. One of my favorite pieces they have there. I asked Ken if we could have someone make one of these for our new house! He didn't say no, but he didn't say yes either... it was a look like "oh my goodness, my wife loves way too much." This is way cool, though, don't you think?!

I loved being there with my Ken. It makes me so proud to be his wife and I get to be by his side. He is so accomplished in my eyes, (and had on these cute new jeans I had bought him and his hiney looked so good, too!) He learned so much while he was there that he is applying everyday with our growing business, Manek Energy, Inc. Side note:In just 2 years he has really grown the business quickly. We went from one set of equipment, a couple trucks and two men to now sixty men, 17 trucks and twelve sets of equipment! He works so hard at it and prays every day for knowledge and wisdom. The Lord has really held us in His hands a lot during the growth of the business.

So, after the game, Ken and I did go take our pictures and we walked around and watched the sunset together. Later we went to the drive-in theater they have there and that was really cool, and romantic! We pigged out on nachos, hot dogs, mini burritos, Frito pie, cotton candy, Fun Dip, and chocolate almonds... we love to get a wide variety for movies, obviously! After the movie we wanted to do the corn maze they have there but it had already closed by the time we got there so we decided to got to Speedy's and play pool. That was fun getting beat every game. Twice, Ken had all his in except the 8 ball and I had not made one in yet! I think he would mess up on purpose with the 8 ball so I could get some in before he would sink it. He wasn't sweet enough to let me win, though. :) (I wouldn't have like him "letting me win" anyway! I'm very competitive with sports.)

Love being there, HATE THE WIND!

So with another drive and game under our belt we have decided that we love going to the games but despise the long drive so by air we go next time!

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and gets to do something fun this weekend, too! Ken and I are off to the Dallas Symphony this Friday to see Anthony Hopkins and hear his work... then it's off to Azle to visit my family, then Sunday we are supposed to have a hot air balloon ride in McKinney if the wind cooperates. So I should have some great pics if we get to do that!

Much love and happy smiles!

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.

~Marcel Proust

The View from Above

"Smokey," in front of Danny and Kim's hanger.

Danny and Ken went up this weekend in "Smokey" and flew over our new land so Ken could get some aerial shots of it! My hunny is a great photographer! :) The land is coming along so well! Also, we have our house plans back and are so excited about it all! We can hardly wait to get the house started and have our new home beginning! I will be getting some shots of the land cleared so far- Ken's done so much clearing with his John Deere, {and he looks good doing it ;)} Here are the aerials- I love the way aerial photography looks. It's amazing how everything begins to square off and the lines of the land shape up... so pretty!

From the cul-de-sac you will go over a bridge, to be built, and then wind back through the trees to find the house sitting in the midst of all the trees on the left...the back and side of the house will view the water...

If you look very closely, you will see a silver circle at the bottom right area of this picture. That is a 7' metal culvert Ken's been burning brush in... our house will be in that area! (If you click on the picture it will enlarge it.)
This pic is from further away, obviously. Our land runs along the left side of the trees- all the way back by the lake.


This view is from the other angle. In this one, if you look closely, you will see our green canoe on the water bank... which we still have no official name for that canoe! Every boat has to have a name! Maybe we can name it "green bean" because it kind of looks like one!

Totally different note, Ken's sis and Chase came into town this weekend and here are some pics of her pretty boxer, Bentley. She's a very good model! :)




My Ken went to New York today for some meetings, but will be home tomorrow... I missed him the second the door shut behind him. I saw this quote and thought I'd go out on this one... I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!

Let the wife make the husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave.

-Martin Luther