You gotta hear this!

Apparently you probably already know all about PS22 and I'm the last one in America who didn't know about them.... but just in case... You gotta hear them!

They are a group of 5th graders from a school on Staten Island, with a killer choral director!


My absolute favorite thing about these kids, is how they emote when they sing! YES!

They've done songs like Viva La Vida by Coldplay, songs by Lady Gaga (whoever that is;) Kanye West, Journey, they even do Crowded House which would make my Cute Kiwi so happy

... they're not your average choral group! Gotta love it! Have fun

Holy Moly Matrimony!

OK so I've thrown out more than my fare share of dares... and rhymes, on this blog....
But this is my ultimate throw down challenge... I quadrillion dog dare you to grab your spouse and listen to these two messages... AND if by some chance you're single and not a stay and home mom and read my blog.... I implore you to listen to these messages before you make a choice about whom you marry! (don't they look supremely happy!)

Trial - Marriage and Men (you won't be sorry! WOAH! that's all I can say about this one)

Trial - Marriage and Women

If, wait, when you listen, let me know what you think!

Helping the homeless

You may remember that I mentioned in a previous post that my family and some friends of mine went to hang out with and feed the homeless of Laguna on Christmas day last year.
We all had such an awesome time hanging out and talking and getting to know these guys and their stories that I said, I don't wanna wait till next Christmas to do this again!
So my awesome community group has volunteered to go with us to do another pancake breakfast this Saturday morning. And even better this time, we're gonna cook em up fresh in the back of our friend's jeep.

There is so often mixed emotions when it comes to the homeless of this world, we can feel so conflicted about their plight, seeing their suffering and wanting better for them but frustrated, by not knowing if they're being lazy or wanting someone else to do the work for them.

Well I came across this really awesome encouraging story this morning and I wanted to share it with you...

"During World War II, a little church in Strasburg France was bombed by the German Luftwaffe. When the war concluded, the people in the community cleared away the rubble, and found a statue of Jesus, the base of which was inscribed with these words: Come unto Me, all ye that are weary. It was remarkably preserved except for both hands, which had been destroyed. Hearing of this, the sculptor whose work it was immediately offered to replace the hands. But the pastor wisely declined.
And so it was that the statue was returned to its original position in front of the Church, but with a new inscription which read: He has no hands on earth but ours, for we are His Body. It’s true.
We are the Body of Christ. If Jesus is going to reach out and touch a lame person — a beggar, a hurting individual — it will be through our hands. He will use us."

But hang on just a minute before you decide where I going with this...

I think for years there has been a cultural guilt that we can feel when we see a homeless person. We can do one of two things, throw 20$ bucks at them, or turn up our radio and pretend we didn't see them.

But I feel as I'm maturing, it's not about guilt anymore, and it's not whether that person is deserving or not.

Let's look at Jesus for a moment... The guy was constantly surrounded by needs, everywhere he went we're broken people and usually someone asking to be healed... and he was constantly accused of being a winebibber, glutton and friend of sinners, but never of being frazzled or too busy.

Jesus simply did what the Father asked Him to, and that's why Jesus' yoke is easy and His burden is light (Matt. 11:28-30)

We were never meant to fix all of this world's problems on our own, but as we see what Jesus has so graciously done for us, hopefully that love will compel us to be obedient when we hear the Father saying, "you've got a few extra bucks, I want you to buy that guy a meal..."

So the moral of the story is, when you're willing to do what God has asked you, your burden will be light, you won't be weighed down by the plight of others, but simply excited to reciprocate the great love that has been lavished on you. I don't feel like I have to be His hands and feet any more, I'm just so excited that I get to be!

We'll be on Forest Ave. Saturday morning at 8:30 if His love is compelling you to join ;)

She's your new favourite!

Trust me when I say she's your new favourite... and if you don't know why I'm spelling favourite with a U it's because it's how the Kiwi's do it.

If you have not yet had the pleasure of meeting Brooke Fraser, please allow me to introduce you.

Brooke is in fact from my husband's homeland and has been one of the top or the top selling artists in New Zealand since ages ago. And Kiwi's know what they're talking about when it comes to spelling and pop/folk... (Flight of the Conchords anyone? Ok that's a little different, but folk comedy has the word folk in it and they're really popular)

Anyways, she's got insane talent and ridiculous lyricism/song writing skills that make me extremely jealous! GOSH!

Check out this song, I love it, and I know she'll be your new favourite... you can thank me later

Brown Butter Plum Tart

Sadly, I am at the end of my plums that I canned in the summer of '08. Last year there wasn't a great harvest, so we've had to make our canning exploits last.

I decided to make one of my favorite deserts for my bible study brunch and for my neighbor who just had a baby. And since everyone moans when they eat it, I thought I'd do you a favor and share the recipe.

I can't really remember where I first tried this, but I think it was my cousin Catherine that made something like it and it's been a favorite in our house ever since...

So you will need:

* either 2 cups canned plums (or peaches, apricots, apples) or about 8 fresh plums quartered

* 1/2 cup salted butter

* 2 eggs
* 3/4 cup sugar + 3 tbsp. sugar

* 1 cup flour

* 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

* 1/4 tsp. nutmeg

So lets begin... preheat your oven to 350'

then we're gonna brown your butter, and you WILL thank me for this!

Put it on medium high heat for about 5 min. but don't walk away!

You want your butter to have a nice golden color, and it will have a very distinct smell of sweet toasty butteryness! You could take it even a little bit darker than this...
then combine your eggs and sugar, mix well.... then gradually add 1/2 of the flour then the butter and the rest of the flour as not to cook your eggs with the warm butter

And there it is in all it's buttery goodness...

Next toss your plums with 2 tbsp. of sugar (less if the are in a sugary syrup) and the cinnamon and nutmeg then arrange them on the bottom of a cast iron skillet or pie pan


Then spread your dough over the top, finishing it with a dusting of your last tbsp. of sugar that will give this such a wonderful crunch!


Bake for 45-50 min. at 350' then use a knife to seperate the tart from the sides of the pan and invert on a cake stand or plate and enjoy!

I like to serve it with a little bit of vanilla whipped cream... oh yeah...

I hope you enjoy it as much as my family does... there's plenty of variations you could do here, just don't mess with my brown butter...

Your Old Time Friend...

Mystery Followers

Hey gang... I feel a posting marathon coming on... don't believe me, just you wait and see..

So in anticipation, I'm going to solicit some comments out of you my mystery followers.
(posts without photos are depressing, thus Emmy in cartoon 80's hair metal garb='s not depressing ;)


And don't try and act like you don't read my blog... you don't get 14,000 hits when you only have 19 followers...



So stay anonymous if you must but leave me a comment letting me know how you know when I've posted something new...

Ie. do you use google reader? Do you just come to my blog of your own volition? Fill me in I'm dying to know!


And if you feel so compelled, sign up to be one of my followers, I love looking at your profiles and seeing who you are!


Also you may have noticed, I've put a new voting system at the end of my posts, vote! Let me know what things you most like reading about...


And if you have way more important things to do with your life, it's cool...
I'd way rather read your comments than my page hit counter, but don't worry, I still feel the love ;)

Oh and just a quick note to my beloved Chinese readers/spamers... if you don't leave your comment in English, I will delete it... but thanks for the comment love, just the same ;)

LOVE TO YOU ALL!
-still your Old Time friend

When I was but a wee lass

About a million years ago, I was blessed to take an excursion to an unlikely place for a 14 year old. This was not a vacation to the Bahamas as most 14 year-olds would be stoked to do on their summer break.
No, it was the most bizarre place I had ever experienced in my life! The 2 hour ride on the back of a produce truck to where we were staying made my hair like straw and my skin smudgy. I'd never ridden on the back of a truck up so high and so close to the palms. Looking back my 14 year old senses were on overload! There were naked babies throwing water at cars in hopes of getting a few cents, ladies riding sideways on their donkeys, chants of voodoo ceremonies off in the distance, yellow oranges that actually tasted really good, beans and rice every day that didn't taste very good, heat so hot you could cut it with a knife and an ocean so salty and warm it offered no relief. What a place, what an experience! Still wondering where I was, I think the voodoo probably gave it away, but I was in Haiti.

I'm the second one on the left, wearing that stunning dress! (FYI kids, this is back when Target was NOT the cool place to shop, ie: you could have bought all of our dresses there back then!)

But back to more serious matters, ever since the earthquake I have been reflecting a lot on my experience there and how my time there influenced my life. I've been thinking about how this is going to affect the Haitians so radically. Wondering how Haiti is going to look in 10 years.

I have so many thoughts on the topic, so many memories of Haiti...
The picture above is me getting to meet my sponsor child and give her a backpack filled with beef bullion, which is literally like bouillon to them and hygiene items for her family... oh man what an experience for a 14 year old to see her home! No floor just a few cinder blocks and some palms for a roof... It makes me so ashamed to think how I have obsessed over decorating my home and never giving a second thought to the poor of this world...

I'm not gonna go into all my memories here, you know I don't have the time....haha, but I do want to encourage you to check out the mission I was privileged to visit and see if you feel compelled to give... Here's the link, New Missions :: Home watch their video on "after the earthquake" at the bottom of the page.
My husband and I felt like this was somewhere that we wanted to give, because they have been selflessly giving to the people of Haiti faithfully for 27 years already and meeting their most basic needs with the love of Jesus. The work is far from over in Haiti and I know as Americans we can be tempted to watch the news for a few weeks, shed a few tears, donate a few bucks, and move on... but Haiti still needs us!
One amazing story that I cannot believe didn't make our news over here, is that the president of Haiti, called off the usual Carnival festival and issued a decree for 3 days of fasting and prayer, check it out here ...

I said I wasn't gonna go into all my memories here, but I will share one, just to lighten up what is a pretty heavy post...

On one of our outings to a local village to do a food distribution and sharing time one of the boys on the trip decided he was gonna get a souvenir to take home. So as we were leaving, from the back of the truck he bartered with one of the Haitians to get a statue for his water jug.

When we got back, we were informed that he had in fact purchased a voodoo statue. Woopsy!

Major no-no! So in the mind of a teenager in a foreign land, the most logical thing to do is have your own ceremony where you burn the voodoo statue and paint your face with toothpaste and wear a girls dress while you and your friends dance around the fire banging on their suitcases like drums. Right?!

Totally appropriate...
Sorry New Missions, that's all I can say.
If you have nothing but time and want to learn more about what has been going on in Haiti in the church please watch this ... Mark Driscoll of my last post's fame...haha... shares about his unreal/amazing/horrible/very needful trip to Haiti to see how we as the church can be helping rebuild the church in Haiti... which remember, has been caring for and meeting the practical needs in Haiti for years, since the government has failed in that area!

If you don't have time but just want to give to churches helping churches, check out this link Here

And if you don't have anything to give, just stop for a moment and pray for the people of Haiti, pray for God's comfort and provision for them. My prayer is that we would be awoken to the fact that none of us is promised tomorrow, "today is the day of salvation" let's be people that redeem the time we have and pursue the good works God has planned for us!

LOVE TO YOU ALL!