Contentment

Have you ever gone through a hard season in life where you grumble in your heart towards God. Things are not quite what you thought they should be or what you want them to be and it rocks your trust in God's goodness. That's the season I'm in. We went to church this Sunday and our Pastor, a man who hear's the voice of the Lord, brought God's message. Amid tears and brokeness God spoke to me. Reminding me that He is in the midst of what I'm experiencing and that our circumstances will never define His goodness. If you're interested in hearing the sermon from Sunday go to www.hillside4.org and click the podcast options.

-Teresa

Roller Coaster of Life

What a crazy roller coaster life can be. This is a season with big drops and lots of hard climbs to the top of the next hill. Being self employed with a new studio location is quite the challange. It affects every area of life, every moment of the day. Emotionally, every day is a new ride on the roller coaster. You would think that you could start to predict that ups and downs. Somehow that has not been the case. I've come to realize I'm normally an emotionally stable person and do not handle roller coaster emotions well. Bryan seems to cope emotionally a lot better.



We are learning so much through this time. In some ways, entering a new stage of marriage and family life. Learning how to flex and let go of the small stuff so that the truly important things are taken care of. A lot of life changes all at once.



In the midst of it all is our beautiful, and amazing sons, Jacob and Noah. A daily reminder that stress gets us nowhere but grumpy. They have such joy and passion for life. They haven't learned that life is hard and the struggles continious. They only know that they are fed, loved, and have freedom to run and laugh. Oh, how I need to relearn what they already know. How is it that we loose sight of that freedom? Our kids know we cherish them and we take care of them. Their job is to have fun and experience life. To ask questions and learn. I wish I had that kind of trust and dependance on my Heavenly Father.

Peanut Sauce

For those who have asked for the peanut sauce recipe. This is from the South Beach Diet Cookbook. I usually make a single recipe (as listed below) for the family or double it for company. This freezes well.

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3/4 cup water
3 TB fresh lime juice
1 TB fresh, chopped ginger
1/4 tsp ground red pepper (for the kids' sake I use paprika)
1 TB brown sugar (or brown sugar substitute)
1TB sugar (or substitute equivalent)
2 cloves garlic pressed

Put everything in a heavy bottom sauce pan on high heat (I use the number 7-8 setting) and whisk continously until boils. Once boil is achieved, turn off heat, remove, and promptly serve.

Our First Post

Well, tonight we lost our 'blogger virginity' courtesy of our friends Jesse and Sarah Montes. We've had the privilege of hosting the Montes family for a few days as they travel the US. Their visit has been a wonderful stress break for us as things with the business have been really crazy in this past week. We've really enjoyed watching the kids play together and just sitting around catching up on each other lives. We realize it's been almost 5 years since we've seen them.