Korbyn's Photo Shoot

We have finally got some of the pictures of Korbyn ready to put on the blog. Just as we expected Korbyn was filled with fun stories and was a great sport for the entire time we took pictures. He even was giving his opinions on where he wanted to take pictures. He would keep saying "I want to take pictures in the tall grass!" So we took some picture in the tall grass and a bunch of other places.

Of all the funny things that Korbyn said while we spend the evening together, I think my favorite was when we tried to take a picture at the low water crossing near his house. This area is very swampy and has a lot of trees and shrubs. As I started to slow down and stop, Korbyn was yelling from the backseat, "Don't stop! Keep Going! Please don't stop!" Curious as to why he did not want to stop, I asked him why we couldn't stop. This was his response.

"Because there is a Yeti that lives out there!"

The little guy was as serious as a heart attack and wanted no part of stopping and risk getting attacked by the Yeti.

When it was all over I think that we got some real good pictures that truly capture the personality of Korbyn.

Let us know what you think!

Laid Back Country Living

Here at Our Little Ranch we enjoy the simple things. Like each others company, a nice sunset, sitting on the porch and watching the cows walk along as they graze. It really makes for a good life.

Yesterday, Catherine and I drove over to Hungerford to do a little photoshoot scouting. You see, we are taking pictures of one of the funniest kids I have ever met. It happens to be Catherine's cousin, Korbyn.

On a little side note, one of my all time favorite Korbyn tales happened when I was not even there. Catherine and here dad were driving around waiting for Frank and I to arrive with two trailer loads of recips. We were moving them to a new lease place in Hungerford. While killing some time, Catherine and her dad ran into Bob Hudgins, Korbyn's grandfather. Apparently they were sitting on the tailgate of the truck killing some time as well. The radio in the truck was playing and when Catherine walked up to the truck Korbyn yelled out "BOB"S LISTENING TO RAP MUSIC, BOB'S LISTENING TO RAP MUSIC!!!"

Which if you know Bob Hudgins he is a pretty laid back guy and I cannot invision him bustin' a move to Ludacris's What's Your Fantasy. I can just imagine the excitement on Korbyn's face as he told the story. I sure hope that we have some real humdingers to tell tomorrow.

Back to the main part of this post. When we were looking for places to take pictures, as the sun was beginning to set, we looked out into a pasture and found what we thought was a very serene, peaceful, pleasant view. It really made Catherine proud to know that we were looking over the same pastures that her relatives did way back when. If you didn't know Williams and Hudgins are related. I will cover that later. The point is that we liked the view, took a picture, and wanted to share it with you. Enjoy!

Wilma BaDilma

So after mowing the lawn at the church today, I came back to the house. This is what I found.



Apparently Wilma decided that she needed to sort the mail, laundry, and help out with the dishes. Or so she thought! But with a face like that, how can you get mad at her.

The little girl is laying underneath my feet and giving me a look as to say "Dad, you are not going to tell everyone about this on that blog thing of yours are you?" Sorry Wilms I have to.

Catherine's Birthday Gift Debacle!

Last Wednesday was the day of Catherine's birth. With the magazine's quickly approaching deadline Catherine could not get away for a birthday celebration. We ended up having a rather quite evening at home. But while Catherine was working during the day, I was busy trying to get things together for her birthday.

First the cake.

Catherine's has one of the most amazing birthday cake recipes in the world. It is delicious. It is filled with extracts and a few little extras that just put it over the edge. I will also say that Catherine is the only one that can make it. She is the dessert queen. I normally cook everything else, but when it comes to desserts I just let her handle it.

But, who can ask someone to bake a cake for their very own birthday. Not me! So I took on the daunting task of trying to recreate this sacred cake.

Everything was going according to plan. The batter tasted wonderful, and it came out of the oven just perfectly. I took the cake into Catherine's office to show off my recent handy work. I was like a little kid that just made a tank out of Lego's and wanted to take it to their parents to seek praise. Catherine commended me on my cake and I headed back to the kitchen.

Normally I am pretty sure footed, but for some reason I stumbled. I caught myself on the island in the kitchen and kind of threw the cake pan onto the island as well. Wouldn't you know it as I flung the cake pan onto the island the cake separated from the pan and got a little air underneath it. It landed back into the pan, but in about 5 big pieces. After the idea of calling the local baker to order a replacement, I got the genius idea that I would just put it back together and when I iced the cake, no one could tell that it wasn't one solid piece underneath. So that was the plan. I made the icing, slathered it on top of the cake, wrote "Happy Birthday," and put it back into the fridge to get ice cold.

I went on about my duties and then I heard Catherine get into the fridge. I thought she would see the final product and praise me for my extreme confectionery talent. Not so much. This is what she said. "Luke, did something happen to my cake?" I thought there is no way she could tell what happened and went to investigate why she asked such a question.

Upon entering the kitchen, I could see it. It icing had settled into the cracks and the top of the cake looked like the Mojave desert with cracks in it 3 feet deep. Damn! I thought that my patchwork would be fool proof, but I guess it wasn't.

In efforts to take the spotlight off the botched birthday cake, I thought that I would order some flowers to be delivered to the house. After all, what girl doesn't like flower. I knew this would go smoothly. Or so I thought.

I went into the office and found some flowers online and ordered them. Catherine was oblivious to what I was doing. So I ordered the flowers and went back to completing my original birthday present, cleaning the house. (Needless to say, Catherine will not be getting that present again!)

I was Pledging the dining room table and heard my wife bust into boisterous laughter. Great, what now, I thought to myself. Then another question was asked by Catherine. "Luke, did you order me some flowers?" I was thinking that the florist already called and asked if someone would be around to deliver the arrangement. I played it cool and said "No, why?" Thinking I would really be Rico Suave and hold out until the flowers got here and she read the card.

"Well I just got a confirmation to a flower order that was just placed by you."

WHAT!!!!! How could this have happened! As luck would have it, when I entered the contact information, I somehow put in Catherine's email by mistake. So my surprise was blown.

Well I thought, oh well we will get the flowers and it was a nice gesture anyway. That is when the phone rang. It was the florist saying that they could not deliver the flowers until tomorrow. I responded with "Are you kidding me?" They weren't so the flowers were delivered the next day.

Just when I thought that all the birthday bloopers and blunders were over, they flowers arrived and were nothing like what I ordered. I ordered Dahlias and got Spider Mums. The arrangement was supposed to be big, the one I got was the size of my first. At this point my mojo was gone and I just hung my head, extended my arm with the flowers to Catherine, and walked into the other room.

Then I took a picture of the stupid flowers to send in with my complaint to the florist. I haven't heard back.



Here are those stupid flowers!



So I am just going to go out and sit by the fire pit and watch the cows walk by as they casually eat the fresh grass growth. Maybe I should let them take care of the birthday events next year. At least I have a year to plan for the next one.

Sunday Night Meal Idea - Continued

Alright, if you have not read the post below this about the roasted vegetables, please do. It's okay. I will wait right here.

If you have read the previous post, continue on.

The recent development of me discovering how to make Fried Rice has changed my life. I thought that it was a very long task and something that I could never do.

But it is 100% easy. Here is all you do.

1) Throw some oil into a pan.
2) scramble an egg or two in the oil.
3) add some precooked white rice (if you have not stumbled upon boil-in-a-bag rice, go get it now)
4) shake in some soy sauce, around 3 tablespoons (more or less depending on how you like it)
5) add the left over roasted vegetables and mix.
6) prepare to be amazed.

If you are feeling a little frisky and want to add some more things to boost the flavor, here are some suggestions.

-red pepper flakes
-beef/chicken bouillon
-garlic
-anything else you think would be good.

So go out and get the ingredients to make these two dishes. They are super easy and super good!

Or you can forget all about it and go drive through McDonald's or something. Your choice. Choose wisely!

Sorry for the lack of a picture, Catherine ate it all before I could get the camera.

Sunday Night Meal Idea!

So it is 9:42 and we need to leave in 18 minutes to be to church on time. Catherine is designing ads and I am doing a couple of things.

1) I am trying to get the wrinkles out of my shirt to wear to church. I put it into the dryer with a wet towel. I got that brilliant idea from the infomercial that had the ball you fill with water and throw in the dryer. Who knows if this will work.

2) I am cooking a cinnamon crumble cake for breakfast. It will be done in 5 minutes. Not sure if this leaves me enough time to properly butter the cake, get dressed, and get to church on time.

3) Writing this blog.

4) Wondering if I have my priorities right?

Anywho, if anyone does their grocery shopping on Sunday here is a wonderful side dish idea for you. And if you have leftovers it can turn into a completely different dish!

Ok so here it is. Drumroll por favor!

ROASTED VEGETABLES



I know I said if you are going grocery shopping today, but actually you can just use what you have. Here's what cha do:

1) chunk up veggies into similar size pieces, here I used turnips, sweet and normal potatoes, zucchini, squash, small onions, carrots, and a few mushrooms.

2) mix vegetables pieces with some oil and salt.

3) pour them onto a baking sheet.

4) preheat oven to 375 - actually this should be #1, oh well.

5) cook for about 45 minutes, until they are browned. I should have let mine go a little longer.

6) serve and enjoy.

If you have leftovers, you can make another wonderful and SUPER SIMPLE dish. But I cannot tell you about that now, because the timer on the oven went off, and if we do not leave in the next 2 nanoseconds we will be late to church again.

I will tell you more this evening.

Peace out!

Orange Juice, Frogs, and some other stuff.

If you are into taking pictures like we are, have you ever been going through your photos and realize that you took random pictures of stuff that doesn't even belong together. I mean there is no congruence between the shots, like one picture of a glass of orange juice, another of a frog, and then some more random stuff.

Well that is what happened to me. I just put in my memory card from the camera and I am not sure what happened, but I had a bunch of pictures that were relevant to nothing and I wasn't sure why I even took them.

So what to do with these pictures, BLOG WITH THEM of course, so you can enjoy a Saturday morning of randomness.

Here goes nothing...



Widget(Catherine) and I have been on a recent fresh squeezed orange juice kick and here is a glass of our wonderfulness. In color and black and white no less!



Ok so the rest of these pics do have a little bit of a story behind them. Luann (Catherine's momma) call me the other day when she was outside mowing her yard. She said that she found some young birds (are they called fledglings?) and a nest and wanted me to come over and take a picture of them. So I jumped in my truck and headed down to the ranch headquarters.

I took the pictures of the bird and egg (see below) but also she had a hose shoved into a hole. After the hose was flooding out the underground lair of something, we saw this emerge. I was certain a snake would come out, but it was some cool marked frogs.



Here's the egg (above) and the bird (below).





I also ran into this mean lookin' mamma jamma! After doing some research this is a Black and Yellow Garden Spider. Eeeee Gads!


Senior Frog again.



Here are two pictures of the Spanish Olive tree that Catherine's Mom and Dad have in their yard. Kinda pretty if I do say so myself.





Mr. Toad trying to find the culprit of flooding his newly furnished home.