Upping the Anti--Two for the Price of Nothing!!

So far, Congratulations are in order to  Lorraine, Terri, Jessica, Beka, Katie and Carol for becoming a "follower" and winning a free Principia Reddo undereye creme. Your eye creme is coming soon.)

In addition,  I just want to let you all know the free offer is still available and I'll even up the anti!  If you post it on your web/facebook page, I'll add another free skin care item!  Yep, two for the price of nothing!!  It's simple!  Become a member on my blog page and send me your address (for the eye creme) or get the eye creme and another free skincare item by posting it on your Facebook or Blog page.  (I'll take your word for it!)

And I think I failed to mention before that this one ounce eye creme retails for $26.00--a bargain when you compare like, organic products that usually retail in the 1/2 ounce size!

And don't forget to vote on the poll I've got posted on the blog.  We want to hear from you on your baby gender predictions!

Thanks all and have a great day!

Marmee's Halloween Gift

Look what Marmee's getting for Halloween? 

And I bet you thought it was a pumpkin...

No!  Its a Munchkin! 

And I can't wait to see what this little Korean Kross will look like!!

We're taking bets on gender.  What's your vote??  A boy or girl? 

Hurry up!!  Only 23 days to go.  (Be sure to click on my baby widget.  It's fun!)

Let me know soon!!

Where does a month go?  When last I blogged the locale was in sunny Southwestern France, sitting on the top of the world in the village of Beynac, gazing at pie-plate-sized raspberry flowers and watching a matching colored hot air balloon floating past my cafe table.  Ahhh, the memories linger and don't worry, I have more journals to post about France in future days!
But today, I am sitting on the edge of the Zumwalt Prairie looking on the Wallowa Mountains, with not a cloud in the blue, blue sky.  The day promises to be extra fine, hitting 80+ temperatures.  I must say, it's a glorious time of year here on the Shire, with some of the finest weather of the year.  

Jason and Aileen's Country Weddin'


 So, what's been keeping me busy these last thirty days?  Well, sounds mundane, but mostly catching up with my family and life on Full Circle Ranch.  In that space of time we have had two major weddings to attend (Katie Boyd Moss and Aileen Rice Helsel) and every other weekend full. 


Katie G. Moss, ain't she gorgeous?

 I've made two trips to Moscow, Idaho to be with Henry and Anna, as her baby-time draws near. (I intend to be up there a lot more in the days and months to come! In honor of that, check out the cute, new little widget I've added to my blog!)  Yep, my life is settling into a pleasant hum centered around my loved ones, and I cherish it. 
On Tuesdays I help Christi with her two youngest, Isabella and Alden, while she is at our local homeschool co-op teaching high school history.  We have a ritual on that day of going to the library, picking out books and then on to Heavenly's, a favorite little Enterprise restaurant, for an ice cream cone--in that order!  On Wednesdays I pray with three other lovely ladies during the lunch. 


One of the cabins on Joseph Creek

  This weekend, our entire Wallowa County family is packing up and heading for the bottom of Joseph Creek Canyon to stay at Dub Darneille's Nine Bark Outfitter's lodge.  We are celebrating Isabella and Nana's birthdays down there.  Here's a sneak peak of some of the main dishes for the weekend:

Panko Burgers on the Grill (Check it out on the back of the Panko Box-DEEE lish!)
Black Bottom Birthday Cupcakes-an old fav!

Brazilian Chicken Curry Slow-cooker (Woman's Day issue June 2010)

Nine Bark Lodge Kitchen

Spaghetti w/ the ultimate quick & easy pasta sauce (Cooking Light Issue September 1998)

In the meantime...life calls!

Raspberry Heaven

Sitting in a little cafe at the top of the world in Beynac, France (at least our world of the moment) were flowers bigger than pie plates in a bed next to our table. Their papery thinness made me suspect they were fake--they had to be,  right?   Wrong!  In all my life I don't believe I've ever seen a more lucious shade of raspberry on anything, including a raspberry!  But wait!  There it goes again!!  
I was about to experience the exact color phenomenon one second later. Hearing a  loud whooshing sound in the sky next to us, we looked over and much to our amazement up popped a huge hot air balloon, floating so close to us we could almost reach out and touch it.  Even more unbelieveable, it was in the same shade of raspberry. 
Wow! Two extraordinary serendiptious happenings and both in the same shade in one day.  It was sensory overload and a grande finale to another long but lovely day in France.

~au revoir~

French Blues

As I lie in the warm afternoon sun I gaze lazily towards the sky. White clouds piled up like baked meringues at monsieur’s bakery shop in Saint Cyr (Sahn Cyr) float through a sky of the deepest blue. Now I understand why the color description “French blue”. The contrast of white clouds against the sky is startling and appears deeper on a hillside in Lyon, France than at home. I can only imagine it to be even more brilliant in Provence and further South.

Besides the words “French blue”, I now understand better the word “layering”. France seems a country of layers and if you tune up your senses, you can see, hear and catch it everywhere…sliced bright red, juicy strawberries layered evenly on a fresh tart; paper thin apple slices arranged in a circular pattern on pies just from the oven; baguettes piled up high in crisscross fashion, layers of hills in the distance with golden stoned homes scattered across the landscape, orang-ey terracotta tile roofs in perfect patterns, radiating the noon day heat; wispy wisteria with its fronds and foliage winding and reaching up over trellised balconies, cobblestones cut in neat herringbone patterns, the echoing layered soft sounds of cooing everywhere from downy gray doves calling to their mates and the soft breezy laces fluttering at French doors and windows. Could one ask for more?

~Au re voir~

C' Est a Mourrir

Death by Pleasure
My friend Lindsay asked me if I would blog about French fashion; and I hope to. At the moment, however, I am having an outrageous love affair with the French bakery shops and particularly the one located in our little village in Saint Syr. This hamlet sits on the side of the mountain and overlooks Lyon, a most beautiful view. We go there nearly every day (except their days closed--Mercredi (Wednesday )and Jeudi (Thursday). Like most shops in France, they are closed every day from one until four in the afternoon, reopening again until about 7. I am coming to appreciate this long lunch time and I suspect the incredibly hot weather dictates closing early, because air conditioning in these little establishments is scarce.
But also, the French are lazy (or so I am told by a French person I met). They have 5 weeks of Government paid holiday, take two hours each day for lunch, often do not work on Mondays and work about 5 to 6 hours a day. On the other hand, they often live into their 90’s and seem to enjoy life. So, you decide if they are lazy or just smarter than us.

Every time I show up at Monsieur’s shop I vow to stay away from the dessert counter. But it’s NO use! I invariably convince Rahn we need something in the way of sweets to leave the shop with us. I have never thought of myself as a “dessert fanatic” and especially not a “chocoholic”. In France, I am both. I cannot seem to pass up a dessert anytime I walk through that door! Not only do the after dinner treats look positively scrumptious, but in the taste department, they are also exquisitely luscious. And when it comes to presentation? Gorgeous! How often have you been fooled by a fancy looking recipe only to find a mediocre tasting product underneath? Not so in France! How it looks and tastes are equally important.
As to presentation, I make my purchases carefully (it is so hard to decide) and each piece is then lovingly wrapped up or boxed, complete with pink ribbon, while the breads are enclosed in pastry paper with a twisted flourish at the end. Nothing is mundane or haphazard, including garnishes on the freshly made desserts.
In addition to presentations and garnishes, they are also tres clever at what to serve desserts in. One evening we spent a particularly delightful time at an outdoor café in Julieanas, part of the Beaujolais Country wineries in Burgandy, where we were served dense chocolate mousse in small old fashioned glass canning jars with French bales. Sucrees!

As I write this I am realizing words will never really do it all justice.  And even though they say a picture’s worth a thousand words, mine pale in comparison to “being there” . Still, it’s better than nothing.

Enjoy and Bon appétit!

Gatwick or Bust!

We taxied to Victoria station without incident and found our way to the “Gatwick Express” which leaves at regular intervals to that airport. As luck would have it, the Express had not left yet. We quickly purchased a ticket and hopped on board. My nerves were strung tighter than a Stradivarius with Rahn wondering what was wrong with me. He said we were in good shape, but like I said, "Murphy’s Law" is always in the back of my mind.

EZ Rahn

But this time, he was right. We arrived at the airport and figured out where EZ Jet was with minimal difficulty. Someone told us this plane carrier was more like loading cattle and now we know what they meant--definitely no frills and kids serving on board! There was no real booth to check flight status. All we had was a huge monitor that showed all the EZ Jet flights. The one to Lyon kept flashing “To be announced”.
We watched and waited…and waited…and waited. While every other flight came up with a departure number; yet, ours kept saying the same thing—to be announced. Our flight time came and went and still no announcement as to where we were to board.  Fear and panic was setting in again! Were we at the right place after all? I have to say, EZ Jet was beginning to get a lot more complicated.
Suddenly, a departure number magically appeared. Everyone started moving and pretty quickly people were running in stark panic. I wondered why, and looked up at the monitor a second time, which now said-- “boarding closed”. How the heck could that be? It had hardly been two seconds ago that it announced a place where we could board!
We made it on the airplane and assumed the high drama was over, but was it? We were now over an hour and a half behind schedule. The Lyon time change put us 2 ½ hours later and our arrival now at nearly 11:30 at night. (In addition, we had now been up almost 24 hours.) At that hour, would we find a ride from the airport to Lyon?
(Stay tuned for another installment, coming soon, of “My French Memoirs".)
~avoir~

(July 29, 2010) Singing the Blues over Red Tape

Believe it or not (and here, I want to give Rahn ALL the credit) we easily navigated Heathrow to London via the underground, making the appropriate changes in between. Rahn is simply brilliant with maps and the like. I, on the other hand, am “geographically challenged”. (We already had an address for the Embassy, thanks to the very helpful information desks at Heathrow.) Once we surfaced in sunny London and discovered the Embassy was so close, we decided to walk there. Rahn felt SURE we had lots of time to accomplish this and get to Gatwick too. I, however, am a “Doubting Thomas” and an ardent subscriber to “Murphy’s Law”!
True to Rahn’s prediction, the walk was easy; and lo and behold, before we knew it, looming in front of us was the United States Embassy in all its red, white and blue glory. Getting in was not such a piece of cake, but we finally managed to convince them we needed to be there. Surprisingly, once there, there was no line at all. In fact, only one other person seemed to be waiting--like us--in the deserted looking passport office. Funny, behind the booths there was a myriad of workers flying back and forth. What do they do all day? We wondered.
Still, we had to take a number and get into a numbered line; which we did. Once my turn came, I had to go through the whole rigmarole again with the new person about my passport debacle. The man was also very nice. (Again, I was surprised by that). He did mention, however, it was highly unusual the customs agent didn’t confiscate my passport. None-the-less, they were going to issue a temporary 6 months passport, give me back the old passport and when I got home, I had to replace the current passport (stashed somewhere back home), because it was now rendered invalid. “Did you follow all this??” I said, turning to look at Rahn. Luckily, he did.
And of course—such a deal--it all cost only an additional 130 pounds!! (This was not including going down stairs to the photo booth to get another set of passport pictures. And by the way, you can imagine what those photos look like after 15 hours of travel!) “So much for staying within the first’s day’s budget,” I muttered under my breath. (Rahn was surprisingly gracious about the whole thing, I must say.) With the new passport and the cost of getting there and back, we had shot through more like the week’s budget! Oh well, what’s a body to do? Like Grandma Wenzel used to say.
Naturally, we had to step out of line and go to the cashier in the next booth over to pay our dues. Then we had to get back in a (different) line and wait some more. This happened about three times, and each time it was a new line. By the end of it, I felt like I was doing the “Two Step”! We finally explained we had to get to Gatwick to catch a flight to France, but the current agent we were working with seemed extremely skeptical it could be done within the time frame we had given him. Yet, hope springs eternal, as my mother always said. (My family is full of funny, old sayings.)
By the time we got to the final phase where I could sign the papers, our cushy lead time to get to Gatwick was diminishing faster than a thoroughbred down the track! But it was still possible. However, while I was waiting in line, Rahn became a little impatient about standing around and decided to go back down to where he had left his cell phone with the guards. He thought he could quickly check his messages. Unfortunately, in his exit, he had taken the new passport receipt with him.
My turn came again and the agent—naturally--asked for the passport receipt to finalize the deal. I couldn’t believe it! I got out of line, sprinting back down to the guard station—a distance away from the building. I grabbed the receipt as quickly as possible from Rahn and headed straight back up to the office. I got back in line, yet again!!! They took the receipt, asked me a bunch more questions about how my passport came to be stolen (by now I was making it up as I went along and they knew it); yet, they finally allowed me to sign the papers. I waited one last time and Voila! A temporary passport was pushed into my, now, very sweaty palm.
Unfortunately, the drama was not over. As we got back to the guard’s gate and collected our belongings, we could not find the Blackberry Rahn handed back to the guards when he came up to join me the second time, after checking his messages. They said they had  placed it back in one of our bags. We rifled through everything twice, but came up empty. The guards could have cared less and acted like they didn’t even notice our now, nearly hysterical rummaging. I am sure they were amused. We were not.
On the third round of frantic bag sacking, up from the dark recesses came the Blackberry. We shot out the door and headed straight for a taxi, which would take us to Victoria Station, where we would connect to Gatwick. Did we make it?
(If you’d like to know, dear reader, stay tuned for the next installment of “My French Memoirs”)
~avoir~

Do NOT Pass Port

Greetings, dear reader.  Finding Wifi in France (pronounced wee fee here) is a little like finding a needle in a haystack, not that I am complaining.  Actually, I've been frantically banging away at ye olde typewriter keys, but alas, no easy way to post.  Our home has internet but the French keyboard is a killer. At any rate, at last I have found a spot to hit the internet waves while touring the lovely & famous Beaujolais Wine Country in Burgandy!  Voila! Here is the first installment of "My French Memoirs".

                                                                        ***

July 29th turned out to be a day the French bound Hostetters will never forget—for two reasons. Though it had been a long flight from Seattle to London, the trip had been smooth as silk and virtually uneventful. Yes, it had been a long all-nighter and another all day of travel, but we were very tired, but happy all went so well.



We arrived at Heathrow 20 minutes ahead of schedule putting us there at 12:00 PM. It was a relief to touch down, even though we knew we had another leg to go on EZ Jet bound for Lyon, France. That flight left at 6:00 PM out of Gatwick. We were feeling prit-tee smug about how we’d planned a good amount of time to make the next flight.

“This should be a piece cake,” I said to Rahn. And until we hit the United Kingdom’s Customs counter we were blissfully unaware of the obstacles that lie ahead. But, as usual (for us), things don’t always go as planned. The lovely customs agent looked at us kindly asking to see our passports. I eagerly pushed mine towards the little pass through, anxious to get going. “Hmmmm,” she said, after a bit. “Do you realize this passport has been reported lost or stolen?” (Reason # 1 on the scale of unforgetable was about to unfold.)

“Hunh?” I said, giving her a totally blank stare. By this time my heart was racing a mile a minute and my brain was doing the same. “How could this be?” I asked myself over and over. I had slid through the Seattle airport liked greased lightening! I had even had my passport scanned there in the check-in kiosk without a hitch. It all seemed crazy and hard to believe.

“Yes, yes...I am afraid this is a stolen passport and my records show it was replaced. Do you remember this?” She asked.  My next intelligent remark was: “Ummmmm…..Well, I’ve had a couple replaced, so I guess that could be. (If you know us at all, you don’t need any further explanation here.) “But look, it says it isn’t expired until 2013. So, it must be the correct one—right?” (I think she detected my lack of self assurance.)
“No, I’m afraid not. In this case, we are required to confiscate it. I will have to speak to my supervisor.” (I must say, she seemed extremely kind considering she was a government agent and was about to nab my passport.)
The wait seemed like forever as Rahn and I bantered back and forth on how the heck this could have happened. We had been so proud of ourselves, being able to so easily find our passports at home. And surely if we had the passport replaced we would have destroyed the old one….surely....The more we thought about it and the picture on it, the more we realized this was probably not the passport we’d used two years ago to go to Italy. Mon Dieu! Once again, God was smiling down on the Hostetters. The British government decided to allow us to keep the passport, though they would not stamp it with the proper documentation. They did, however, stamp a piece of paper with an explanation. The choice was ours, we could “take our chances” and try to get into France on the old passport or go to our Embassy in London and get a temporary one issued. They were not at all reassuring France would let us in.


The latter option seemed smartest, but it was questionable as to whether we could pull that off. Would we be able to navigate the underground to get to London? Once there, would we be able to find the U. S. Consulate? And if we did, how long would the red tape of the bureaucracy tie us up? Then, would we quickly and easily find our way back to the underground to get back to Heathrow? In addition, if we made it to Heathrow, could we quickly find the right connection from Heathrow to Gatwick? And last, but certainly not least, would we make the flight connection from there to Lyon, France?

(Stay tuned, dear reader, if you’d like to know what happens next and Unforgettable #2!)
avoir~

Our French Connection

Off the Hostetters are about to go on their month long vacation in France where they will, no doubt, butcher that beautiful, romantic language. But we will try to speak it despite our severe limitations.  (Anna and Julie could tell you stories about our pathetic attempts to speak Italian!) 
Just like in the movie, The Holiday,  we are about to embark on our very first home exchange through http://www.homeexchange.com/. 
Destination?  Lyon, France, the second largest city in France and the Gastronomical Capital of the world!  We will be gone for  a month with two weeks in Lyon, and then another two weeks in Southwest France and the Dordogne region---home of fairy tale castles, story book chateaus and medieval stone villages. 

With two days to go, we are almost ready, but it's been no small job.  Not only do we have to prepare to travel for a month, but we had to prepare our home for our French family, Shireen and Laurent Vernay and their 4 children, not to mention writing a complete manual on how to run the house.  Believe me, there's nothing like someone coming to live at your place to kick you into high gear and Spring cleaning in July!  We tore into closets, drawers, cubby holes and all the rest, hauling loot to the Brann's upcoming yard sale or to our barn storage loft.  I guess I'm feeling a little insecure about the Vernay's since they own a boutique hotel in Lyon that famous travel author, Rick Steve's, gives a big thumbs up to.  That's a little daunting. They are an adventureous family who "vacationed" in far off Mongolia, so I guess a remote Northeast Oregon ranch will be a breeze for them.

Now we are down to the packing--The Dreaded Packing.  For one brief moment I almost adopted my friend, Carol Macardle's parent's strategy, of going with an empty suitcase, buying clothes at the Salvation Army, getting rid of them at journey's end and filling the bags with gifts to bring home.  How ingenious!
But, being feint of heart, I opted for paring down to one carry on bag. 

So, I thought I'd share with you what I'm taking for the month--mostly because I'm so proud of myself!  First, I threw in five pairs of pants:  white, black,brown, tan and a pair of blue jeans.  Then, four tops or tanks in a variety of colors, plus three shrugs (black, white & tan), one jacket, one maxi dress, one skirt, 2 pair of shoes, a hat and 7 pairs of underwear; plus, the various and sundry toiletries.  Like I said, it will all fit into a carry on bag, which we carefully measured to be sure it passed airline specs.  We will have our computer, for chronicaling our journey along the way and our Blackberry, for international calling. This is unfortunately necessary, since Rahn has several big deals going on in the law office right now. 
While all this work makes me sometimes wonder:  Is it worth it?  I am reminded of what Frances Mayes in her book Under the Tuscan Sun claims.  Traveling should change us, she says. I agree; and for us, it does. So, yes, it is worth it. I'm excited about what we will learn from others and how God will use us in this month.  We've even discovered our church's denomination has a work in Lyon, so we look forward to worshiping with the believers there.
For us, there are so many things to love about travel but at the top of our list is the commonality traveling brings. I still remember a sweet encounter at The Leaning Tower of Pisa when we were in Italy.  We met an older couple, obviously very in love, who asked Rahn to take their picture by the famous monument. The woman was carrying a large bunch of fresh flowers, a present from her lover upon greeting her at the airport. They were so happy that their story spilled over to us like a bubbling brook.  It was basically a tale of young love gone awry.  They broke up after college and went their seperate ways, but they never forgot each other.  Years later, they rekindled their relationship and decided to meet up in Italy--the day we too were there.  By chance (is there any such thing?) we were caught up in their story for that brief moment, never to see them again.  Yet, their sharing brought us together in an unusual way we will never forget.
We can only imagine what wonderful stories are awaiting this time around. One thing you can be sure of, I'll be journaling all along the way. But for now, I must bid you adieu; however, stay tuned!  I plan to share all about our serendipitous travels in the sunny, South of France right here on A Covenant Life.