A Growing Garden

We're having great success with our first garden at our new house. It is huge compared to the tiny patch I was allowed to garden at our rental over two years ago. We've been picking zucchini everyday. We've also picked some snap peas. We've picked cherries from a cherry tree in our back yard and I made a pie with the cherries. I've also made some delicious zucchini bread (recipe listed on p. 48 of our adoption cookbook). I look forward to the other veggies we planted including corn, carrots, green onions, pumpkins, eggplant, cucumbers, sweet peas, tomatoes and watermelon (I know, it's a fruit). I also planted some pepper plants, cilantro and sweet basil in containers which I can hopefully use in Thai cooking. Tonight I picked a hilarious looking zucchini. It looked like the head of a cobra. It was disfigured because it was crushed under the heavy stems of the huge plant. Here are some photos of our bountiful garden and it's produce...

Insomnia on the Home Front!

Well, since this is the second time in a week that I've had insomnia and been on the computer at 1:30AM, I thought I should add a post. Most of the time my sweet wife keeps you all informed about the escapades of the Regan family as our wait now continues into the 20th month. I'm never quite sure how to deal with the waiting for Thailand to invite us over and the emotions that go with it. A few nights ago when I was on the computer after lying awake for a long time, I even started another session of tears for the wait. I've certainly shed many over these months of waiting. I will be returning to work in four weeks for another school year at Liberty Common School. This year will be interesting in that sometime during the year I will need a substitute that will be comfortable, or at least able to hold their sanity, while playing piano, singing, dancing, smiling, giggling, perhaps even directing a concert, and the like with around 300 Kindergarten through 9th graders, all for about three to four weeks! :-) Hopefully, I will find the right person that doesn't mind short notice to step in and keep things flowing in the music realm at school.

This week I've been reminiscing about my school days growing up in Fort Collins. I've been trying to come up with ideas to help my students know that I've been "in their shoes" in many similar ways to when I was their age. So, I came up with a neat-looking poster of all of my school pictures from Kindergarten through 12th grade, which is attached to this post. Many thanks to those that put such wonderfully encouraging comments on our posts to help us through this time of waiting. May the waiting stop soon!

Jay

A Happy but a little lonely 4th of July

Jay and I had an enjoyable 4th of July. But, we've both been commenting to each other lately, "I miss our daughter." It's weird how you can grow to love someone you haven't even met, yet. We're sure hoping for word soon that we'll be able to go to Thailand to meet Penny at long last. Meanwhile, as we're waiting we're trying to stay active. For Independence Day we went hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park. We're still feeling some sore muscles after our 5.8 mile hike at over 10,000 feet in elevation. It was beautiful. We went to Nymph Lake, Dream Lake and Lake Haiyaha. We saw fireworks that night in Estes Park and took a dark, mountain back road to avoid the traffic on the way back down to Fort Collins. Yesterday (Saturday) I picked cherries from our cherry tree in the backyard and made a homemade cherry pie. We had Jay's parents over to our house to enjoy the pie together. I was saddened to hear from my parents that one of my uncles broke his hip in an ATV (all-terrain-vehicle) or 4-wheeler accident. And another one of my uncles is rapidly deteriorating with a rare geriatric disease. It's hard to face the reality of your family members aging. But, I'm thankful that my uncle Ray knows Jesus and is assured that he will see him face-to-face in a new glorified body in his home in heaven. It's just hard to see that he has to suffer on this earthly journey to his new home. Hope you all had a great Independence Day! May you all know God's richest blessings that He has freely given to us. I want to wish you new parents out there a real special 4th of July as you celebrate with your new beloved children that you have been blessed with. P.S. If you want to see more photos I may add them to our vox site as they seem to upload faster there. Visit us at www.eternityminded.vox.com