Pictures + run on sentences

Don't you love those days when you get a new shirt and you decide to get off your glutems maximus, pick up your camera+tripod and go take some pictures, and when you're done, and you come back inside, eat some apples and cheese, download the pictures, and edit them, you get fabulous inspiration for your April design, and you're so pumped that you do the whole thing in only a few hours, put it up online, edit your HTML, rearrange some things and write up a post to share with the world so that everyone knows how amazing you are? Yeah, I love those days too. I love run on sentences also, but not as much as the thing stated above. Because run on sentences make me dizzy, and I want to stop reading them and shout- "PLEASE STOP MOVING THE WORLD! I WOULD LIKE TO GET OFF NOW, THANKS VERY MUCH!" Boy, writing in caps-lock is annoying.

Anyway, I really have nothing of importance to write about, no life changing words of wisdom (ha) or lovely poetry or anything. Wait, scratch that. I am hear to inform you that I started for myself a Tumblr blog, just because I wanted to. If you are pleasant, you should go look at it. It may change your life. Or not. If you do choose to go there, you may, in fact spy some life changing stuffs, like my post about The Hunger Games. No spoilers about the movie there, folks, no spoilers about anything actually.  It's kind of long though. Take caution.

Okay, I'm done now. I think I'm going to go watch Sherlock Holmes or something. Maybe take a shower. Draw a mockingjay pin or something...

Goodbye. How'd your day go, friends?
Johanna

Weekend Loves.

i.Waking up early and watching the sun come up (okay, I watched come up over our trees, but it was still early.)
ii. Playing cards with my not-so-little brother
iii. Thanks for showing me what you have, John
iv. Being interrupted by an adorable angel faced child.
v.Winning because HE CHEATED and I am smarter than he thinks.
vi.Apricot flowers.
vii. Daddy bought me a new baby goose, we named her Annabelle. Because Finnick needs an Annie.
viii."Three tickets to The Hunger Games, please."
ix. Waiting in line for the doors to open.  THG was amazing. I started crying at the reaping and really didn't stop until the credits were rolling and One Direction was playing softly in the background.


I'm not going to discus the movie yet, one because I'm still in a state of euphoria about it. Two because it wouldn't be fair to all the lovelies out there who haven't seen it yet. To those of you, please see it soon so I can talk about it till my heart is content.

I'll just say this about it; Gary Ross is genius, Jennifer Lawrence is a beautiful and amazing actress, and Josh Hutcherson played Peeta so perfectly I died. So much more I can say about it, but I wont. For your sake. Because I'm nice.

Church tonight! Off to go clean something...
May the odds be ever in your favor, friends!

Johanna

Giveaway || alanainlove

Happy first day of spring everyone! Today (for me at least) doesn't really look spring-ish, we're having thunder storms and chances of flash flooding. So, what better way to bring spring into your home than to bring the sunshine in? Sweet Mrs. Alana from the great blog Mrs. Alana's Miscellany was kind enough to donate this lovely print for you all to enjoy.

This is an original hand drawn piece of art, it's drawn on a thick white 9x12 paper using water colors and black ink for the writing.  I would love to have this on my wall, and if you are thinking the same as me, then enter below!
(Note, as much as I adore my international readers, this giveaway is only open to the continental U.S.A. So sorry, shipping is very expensive though...)


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Have a great first day of spring!
Johanna

Lets go outside

Stephen and I have gotten into a habit. In the morning, he finds his shoes, brings them to me and I help him put them on. Then he reaches up as far as his little arms can, takes my hand and leads me to the door. He points and babbles something that I've taken to mean- "Lets go outside, big sister!" So we do.  We go feed and water my 200 chicks, pat them on the head and scream at them. (Only he does that though. I'm much to ladylike to be seen yelling at chickens.) After that, we might go swing, or pull some weeds. Or bury our faces in one of the Pyrenees fluffy white coats.  We'll go see the pigs, the ducks, the goose, the peacock. Or torment the cat (visit my sister's blog sometime today to see that... hilarious.) 

He's getting to be quite the poser, too. Which is not necessarily a good thing, because he stops and sticks his face in the camera and grins crazily. I think that might have something to do with his big sister Lydia. She likes to do that all the time. Monkey see, monkey do. Right? And he is most assuredly a monkey. A farmer boy monkey. A monkey farmer boy. A boy farmer monkey. A farmer monkey boy. Never mind.

The point is, he and I like to go outside and have fun. He's getting very big and he likes dirt.

Oh yeah and, only four days until The Hunger Games. Just thought I would point that out, you might have forgotten. Or something. The world will be watching.

How's your Monday going, loves?
Johanna

Chicken with Wine and Spinach Sauce

Rachel and I decided we needed to make some food for the family a couple days ago. We get these weird ideas like this sometimes. We'll be doing nothing then suddenly- "Hey! Let us go, my fine friend, and cook some kind of lovely delicacies, together!" Then, arm in arm, we prance into the kitchen where we make exclamations of how good these certain spices smell, or the slight need for more wine in the sauce. No, more, more wine! And and a little bit more cream while you're at it, okay? We also rant about The Hunger Games, quote randomness from Sherlock Holmes, and sing  Les Misérables at the top of our lungs. We have memorized the first 30 minutes of it by heart. Maybe more, actually. 

I think the rest of the family avoids the house during these little spasms of ours as there is never anyone in sight. Hm. Too stunned by our awesome abilities, I think.   

Anyway. This is what she and I came up with last time. No recipe or inspiration... we're just cool like that.  Here's what you should have on hand; 

________________________________________

For the chicken-

4 BONELESS CHICKEN BREASTS* 

1 LARGE ONION- Cut into half-moon shapes 

1/2 LEMON JUICE 

1 TBSP CHOPPED FRESH SAGE

1/2 CUP WHITE WINE**

4 GARLIC CLOVES, HALVED

SALT AND PEPPER

Preheat oven to 350*

Brown chicken and onions until golden, place in a deep baking dish. Squeeze lemon juice over chicken, and throw in the sage.  Heat up your frying pan and warm up the wine, salt, pepper and garlic together. Make sure you scrape the bottom of the pan so you get all tasty juices from the chicken, as soon as it's steaming and all the juices are mixed in, pour it over the chicken. Cover cook in oven for 1 hour.

________________________________________ 

For the pasta-

1 BOX OF SPAGHETTI*** 

Cook pasta as directed on the box. (Actually, you really should know how to do that...)

________________________________________ 

For the sauce-

4 CUPS FRESH SPINACH

1 TBSP LEMON JUICE

1 CUP HEAVY CREAM

1/2 CUPS CREAM CHEESE

SALT AND PEPPER

Wilt the spinach on low heat, add lemon juice, heavy cream, cream cheese and salt and pepper. If it's too thick, add milk, one tablespoon at a time until it's the right consistency. 

To serve-

Put your noodles on a pretty plate, or a downright ugly plate because this is so good your plate won't even matter. Spoon a little bit of the sauce on top, make sure you have plenty of spinach! Set a piece of chicken on top, with some onions, of course. Then, drizzle a little bit of that lovely wine sauce the chicken cooked in on top of that. (Heavenly) Then, you must set a little sprig of rosemary on top of all of that. Just because. 

And now? It's time to (thankfully) eat up! 

Now tell me you didn't just drool all over the place? Never mind, don't tell me, that's nasty. But in all honesty, gosh this stuff is delicious. All the flavors compliment each other beautifully, nothing is too sweet or too salty. It's just perfect. 

*(Mine had bones in them, and I was quite perturbed. I thought about hacking on them with a butcher knife just to see if the bone would magically disappear, but that didn't seem like a very good idea.)

**(Remember that cooking wine makes the alcohol go away. No one gets tipsy on my watch!)

***(Our box was probably something like 12oz or something, but I threw away the bag and I'm too lazy to figure it out. Just make what ever you would normally feed your folks.)

 I'm off to go do some more cooking now! Ta-ta! (Lunch time.. grr.)


What have you enjoyed lately, dear?


Johanna

Whilst Boating

With all the rain we've been having, our pond is now officially full to it's limits. The kids dug a rubber raft out of the barn, blew it up, and have been enjoying it ever since.  I ventured out on it for the first time yesterday. I don't really like going out on boats for some reason. I guess I've seen too many movies about ships sinking and people dying and getting eaten by sharks. And kidnapped by pirates and shanghaied by meanies, and marooned by mutineers, and ships being swallowed by giant whales and fabulous beasts. Not to mention vicious mermaids and star fish. Those star fish. Gotta watch them, you do.

I like my imagination.

So anyway, my reaction to finally getting out on that precarious dingy? Um, fun. I don't know why it's taken me so long to do it. It was so fun that very soon after these pictures were taken, I jumped into the freezing water.  Then I realized that there are man eating turtles in the pond so I got out faster than I got in. I have a celebrity status now among my younger siblings. They came back to the house singing my praises. Although they still left me with the boat to carry home...

Ah, well even a celebrity needs to do some work every once in a while.


Johanna
PS. Speaking of celebrities, who watched The Hunger Games premiere on Yahoo! last night? (Raises hand above you all) That was fun.
PPS. Rachel just walked in and told me the pond has leaches in it. Holy cow. I am going to go take a shower now. Good bye.

A Rather Dreary Day

It's been a dreary sort of day both wet and cold. One of those days that either leaves you with the choice of cleaning the house and doing school, or lounging around in a blanket with a mug of hot tea + cookies, either filling in a notebook or journal, or reading books and discussing the wonderful merits of The Hunger Games with mama and Rachel. Today, it was a little bit of each for me. Except that I read Beatrix Potter to the little ones and my mother was in town. Beatrix Potter is good too though.

Then of course since I went to the library for work yesterday, we watched the lovely Lady and the Tramp and wept, and sobbed and laughed our hearts out. Well, okay, I did. Everyone else just looked at me funny. What?

Moving on.

I said in my last post that we were taking some orphaned goat kids to a rescue farm that has wallabies. Saddest thing in the world, I didn't see them. No, you see, sometimes I forget that there are crucial things in life like personal hygiene that must be taken care of before you go to orchestra. And because I get up at such a lazy time most days, I didn't get a chance to take a shower that morning. So, I voted that I would stay home, mind the fort, feed my father, and take a shower.

It's nice to take a shower without people telling you it's their turn. Luxurious even.
Okay, enough of that showering talk.

Hold on, I forgot why I even brought up the subject of showering, er, actually it was something about a rescue farm, oh yeah. I didn't see the wallabies, my sisters did. They said they were cute but stinky. (Sounds like someone needed to take a shower...) Then the people who took our orphans gave us a mama sheep and her lamps, er, I mean lambs. I'm a little bit tired, can you tell? So all in all this is what happened; 1. I saw no wallabies. 2. I saw no wallabies because I stayed home to take a shower. 3. We have sheep. 


Why do people read my blog again?  Anyway. 

It's movie night tonight and we're going to watch a movie. Wait, that was pretty obvious... never mind. The point is, it's movie night tonight and we're going to watch a movie, that means I need to make some pop-corn, which means I need to delegate some children to clean up the house, which means I need to have someone turn on the TV and get everything ready, which means that we first need to eat dinner, which means that Sarah needs to make it, which means I need to remind her, which means... I need to go.

That run on sentence? It felt great. You should try it sometime.

(See what dreary days do to me? Go crazy I will.)
Johanna

Of late

This week we celebrated Sarah's 12th birthday. Yay Sarah! Our grandparents came over and we ate cake+ice cream and had "Chinese" food at our local buffet. Fun and very non-healthy. Best combination ever. 


Spring is here to stay on the farm, I have been loving the weather, grass and flowers. Just gorgeous. Yesterday Rachel and I had to go to our ortho appointment, get our braces tightened and such. Can't say I'm feeling that great as a result today though. On our way home we stopped at a dollar store and bought some things to cheer us up. Namely, hair extensions! I got bright neon blue and I feel awesome.  

Now today, we have orchestra but before that we are taking some orphaned infant goats to an rescue farm. They have wallabies. I'm excited. Gosh, I love homeschooling.

Have a great day everyone!

Johanna

Green Grass

When the grass is green; the farmer is happy. (Normally)
When the grass is green; animals stuff themselves on tender shoots. 
When the grass is green; the world feels a little bit more alive. 
When the grass is green; birds seems to sing a little louder. 
When the grass is green; blue skies are a little bit bluer. (Except when it's going to rain)
When the grass is green; I make up little non-rhyming things and post them on my blog. 'Cause that's how I roll. 


Have a great rest of your day everyone!

Johanna