Apricots, apricots, apricots!

 In the back of our house, there is a little orchard with about 15 (ish) trees. Apple, apricot, peach, pear, cherry, fig, plum, green plums (not sure what they are called..) and maybe more that we will discover later. There are 4 apricot trees. One gave it's fruit a couple of weeks ago but now 3 are chock full. We have apricots galore!!

 We have had apricot cobbler and pie. Yesterday, with the girls help, I canned 12 liters of jam! Tomorrow, I have a lady coming to help and we will make and can apricot juice. Today, apricot chutney is on the menu and since we are borrowing a blender to make the juice.... maybe apricot milkshakes or smoothies?

 Some of the jam we made yesterday. If you have any other ideas (and if I managed to fix the comment section so that you can actually leave them!) let me know!!

On an unrelated not, can you see the bruises on Will's face? The poor boy had a small tumble down stairs. We hope his last!

Qurutoba Salad

We learned to make a new salad this summer! Anna loves it and told her Grammy Gloria all about it. We decided to show Grammy just what to do.....

 Here's what you need to make the salad: 1 lb tomatoes, 1 lb cucumbers, 3 onions, fatir non (bread, we substituted a nice thick fresh bread once...) dill, green onions, cilatntro, salt, qattiq. Qattiq is a sour milk product. I think you could subsitute yogurt or even a light cream.

Our friends here use these beautiful wooden bowls for this delicious salad. It is wide and shallow.
Lovely produce, isn't it!!

 

First, you have to chop everything up.

 The onions need to be sliced and carmelized in oil.

 Slice the cucumbers and tomatoes very small.

 Katie opted to help keep Will occupied. He is crawling and into everything!!

 You heat up the bread so that it is nice and hot and tear it into pieces into your bowl.

 Everything is ready to be added! On top of the bread, spread the carmelized onions. Then, put half of the tomatoes, cucumbers, and greens. We added boiling water and salt to taste to the qattiq (the milky stuff) to make it thin, like the consistency of a yogurt drink. Over the veggies, put half the qattiq (or whatever you substitute!) Then layer again, but put the greens (dill, green onions, and cilantro, parsley is also an option) on top. We customized for our family. Katie and Michael don't like the greens so we left a section without them. Dad doesn't like qattiq so we left that off his section....

 

Ready to eat! Our local friends eat out of a shared bowl with their hands. 

Come visit us and we will make it for you!!

Settling in.....

We are in our own home, and I am sitting at our desk, looking at the beautiful view of  rolling hills out of our window. There are snow capped mountains in other directions.... After a lot of looking, we found a very nice, brand new house in the middle of the neighborhood we were searching in. The kids are happy that we are close to our last home, and all of their friends there.

Here's some pics of our view:

This has been a challenging transition for me. It is hard to keep moving and starting over and I have struggled to simply surrender that to the Lord and trust Him and His purposes in having us here. I still haven't found the rhythm of communion with my Savior that I desire. Partially because what I want may not happen until I see him face to face. But, I know more is possible here to.

 And here is my youngest precious. I am so thankful for my kids and this littlest one has been such a delight to all of us. And I have to say that there is nothing like being the most important person in your baby's eyes. I can't believe he is almost 9 months! He is going to be toddling around this new house soon.