It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!

Well, we had a very relaxing Thanksgiving yesterday and I hope that all of you did as well. We decided to get a jump start on Christmas decorating so we went to the Christmas tree lot....(a first for me)... and picked out our very first tree. It was a lot of fun. I even splurged and got a wreath for the front door. Now you all have to come visit! It looks great! Peace, Emily

There are lights on the tree...it is hard to see them in the picture. Dad, they are LED lights! 

Mom, notice the manger set and Crismon tree...both from you.

The cats were very curious...

Josie kept smelling it.

So Leo decided to take a whiff himself...

The lovely wreath...

A better view of the door...dents and all....

Happy Thanksgiving!

We know...it is a day early, but we moved Thanksgiving up this year. Andrew came to visit us from Minneapolis, MN and he has to leave early tomorrow morning (Thanksgiving Day) so that he can get home to make a flight to Australia for work. While I was at the office today, the boys spent all day in the kitchen cooking a fantastic meal: turkey legs with homegrown basil-olive oil-salt and pepper, pork shoulder roast cooked in cider-stock-carrots-onions-celery, mashed potatoes with rutabaga, Orange Mash (sweet potato spoon bread), green bean casserole, dressing (with rye and pumpernickel, bacon, onion and bourbon) and for dessert....homemade pecan pie with cream and bourbon on top. DELICIOUS! The orange mash and rutabaga potatoes are Owen family traditions. The rest of the recipes came from allrecipes.com which is a great recipe site! If you are reading this, then I feel certain that we are thankful for you and wish you a very happy thanksgiving! Peace, Emily

The Owen brothers proud of their successful day of cooking!

Getting ready to share a fantastic meal together...

A close up of the table....

This is a picture of some of the leaves as they were changing in October/early November. Pictures simply can't capture how beautiful it was...

Sorry so long...

So....it has been a while. Things are REALLY picking up at church and life is busy!!!! Installation went very well and was a lot of fun. Lots of family was able to come in for the big event. Here is a picture of me with Collier at the reception. More to come soon! Peace, Emily

Ordination Photos...

Thanks to my fabulous Aunt Sherry and Uncle Tom, I have a picture from ordination to share with you all. (Thank you for sending the photo CD, Aunt Sherry and Uncle Tom!)

Enjoy! Peace, Emily

Pumkins, Garden, Compost and Meat!

We carved a pumpkin. I guess I thought it was gross...hence the face. It was fun, though!

The final product....we got a compliment from one of our TWO trick or treaters!

A garden update...it is doing well. We don't have sugar snap peas, broccoli or cabbage quite yet, but the lettuce and spinach are doing great.

If only the weeds would stop growing!

And...a compost update! Now that halloween is over, our jack-o-lantern will become compost. You can see our collection is growing and Henry has been busy collecting leaves that people bag up. We also go to Starbucks regularly to get spent coffee grounds. Tuesday he is going to a vermiculture class to learn more about worm composting. We'll keep you updated on that.

We added some good compost to our garden today after we weeded. The stuff that is closest to be "done" is on the left. The other two were just started.

I sleep a lot on my days off. Two hour nap yesterday and THREE hour nap today. The cats love it.

And finally....we bought some beef from a local farm that raises grass-fed cows. We went out to the farm to pick it up and made burgers last night. DELICIOUS! Today we bought some pork from a local pig farmer, so we should be set on meat for quite a while!

We hope you are all doing well. Keep in touch! Love, Em and Henry