Wedding, briefly

I'm sure we'll have about a million more pictures soon, but for now here are a couple of pictures from the wedding the kids were in on Saturday. It was Stefan's brother's wedding and the whole weekend was basically one big party (we literally had 5 parties in 3 days!) I didn't take very many pictures, but the photographer was crazy about the kids, so there should be a bunch when those get done. In these pictures Aidan and Bridget are enjoying the snacks I brought, before the ceremony. I'll write a huge post later, I'm sure, detailing everything that happened, but I'm still recovering from the weekend right now . . .

Counter-culture(s)

I have been wanting to begin making sourdough for the past few months. After reading about how much more nutritious it was than commercial yeast, and learning how much better soaked grains are for you (and that sourdough bread combines both of those good things), I knew I had to try it but I didn't know anyone who made sourdough and would give me some starter.

I read about this website where you could send a self addressed, stamped envelope and they would send you a starter. Not only that, this starter came west on the Oregon Trail and was kept "in the family" for generations until it got to a man named Carl who decided to give it away to anyone who asked! I sent away for the starter and got it a few days ago.

Today I made my first loaf of whole-grain sourdough bread. I used a "No-Knead" recipe (really it's low-knead) and it turned out pretty good! I think my starter needs to get a little more bubbly so that it will rise a bit more, but it's supposed to be a flatter loaf anyway. I'll try another recipe for a sandwich loaf tomorrow and see how that goes.

Also in the picture is my second batch of kombucha (I bottled the first batch last night and we've already drunk a couple of bottles), the sourdough starter and some kefir. It's my "fermentation lab" according to Stefan :)

Garden pics

Our garden is really taking off these days, with the tomatoes (all 36 plants!) growing like crazy along with beans, corn, herbs, lettuce, carrots and peas.






We've been picking tons of peas and harvesting lettuce over the last couple of months. I just pulled our first bunch of carrots and found 4 ripe cherry tomatoes! This is our first try at gardening and so far it's a success! We'll see if we can figure out a way to use all those tomatoes though! At least we're sharing the labor and the harvest with a couple of other families!

Beach weekend

This weekend we headed to the beach for the 4th. We went out Wednesday night with some friends and Stefan got to go surfing Wednesday night and Thursday. Thursday was beautiful and we took the kids to the beach for a long time.

Thursday night Stefan's sister and her family came down, and the rest of the family arrived on Friday morning. We celebrated two kid's birthdays and the 4th of July all in one, like every year. It was a lot of fun to be with everyone but the weather was pretty miserable on Friday and Saturday so the kids were stuck inside. That's not so bad for 2 year old girls, but 4 and 5 year old boys get a little stir-crazy. Of course, Sunday morning when we had to leave the sun came out! Oh well, we love Oregon for other reasons!

Aidan enjoys his crepes

Bridget's hair is long enough for a (tiny) ponytail! Very handy for the beach.

All 4 cousins in the morning (Aidan and Evan are sporting awesome pirate tattoos)

Omi reading to the girls . . . serious cuteness

I-171H

We received our approval from the Department of Immigration to adopt an orphan! This was really fast, it came only 2 weeks after we got our fingerprints, and sometimes this takes months! From here we have to make sure it gets to Ethiopia so that when we get a referral there are no hangups. That sounds simple, but apparently many people's are getting lost somewhere between the local Immigration office and the National Visa Center so I'll be spending some time on the phone soon making sure that everything is happening the way it's supposed to.

Dossier done!

I sent in our dossier today . . . finally! It seems like the last couple of things took forever to put together but it's finally done . . . all 33 pages of it, plus photocopies! Hopefully there won't be anything I have to redo and we'll be "officially waiting."

Fingerprinting

We got two things in the mail on Saturday - our notice that the Department of Immigration had received our I-600A and that our fingerprinting would be on Saturday the 14th. We also received the last documents for our dossier - our local police clearance letters - so as soon as I can get everything notarized and authenticated, I can turn in our dossier! Then we will be officially waiting!