Morel Mushroom Time

It's that time of year again when all the crazy mushroom hunters get the fever to tromp out into the woods to their secret spots and find the ever elusive morel mushroom. While many consider this fungus a delicacy, I find it just what it is, a fungus! Many families spend weeks on end hunting and even make it an annual trip. My husbands' family has had a tradition for over 35 years of going to Michigan each spring to hunt morels.

Imagine the surprise on my husbands face when I sent him this picture and text message......

Your beloved mushrooms in our very own backyard!

You see I was out cutting grass when all of the sudden I saw a morel mushroom standing tall right in my very own backyard! My reflexes weren't fast enough and I (morel fans may cringe with what I'm about to say) ran over it with my riding lawn mower. I didn't mean to, it just happened. Anyway, I climbed off the tractor and went searching for the morel and found a little one, kinda bent over but fully intact. That's one, then I found the big one, fully intact too. That two! Two morels in my backyard. I quickly pulled out my camera phone and snapped a picture and sent it off to my hubby. A few days later Dennis said "Now show me where you found those mushrooms" so we tromped back out to the yard and low and behold he found another! That's three. This time I went in and grabbed my camera and took a much better picture of it. We'll keep watching the yard this spring, who knows maybe we'll find more!

In memory of James Minniear (1939 - 2007) the best morel hunter there ever was. Thanks for teaching your children the fine art of mushroom hunting. The legacy lives on.

This one's for you!

Click Here to See how many we found in the yard in 2009!

The "Root" of all Evil

Since we moved into this house about 10 months ago we have been tripping over the stupid sidewalk outside of our front door. Seems the rather large Cottonwood tree that should have been removed when the house was built, in my opinion, was left standing in the front yard and allowed to become a true menace! Yesterday we put an end to said menace, not the tree unfortunately, but to the ROOT of all evil. (or should I say roots, or perhaps underground tree trunks would sum it up better!)











The Big, Bad tree in my front yard













See the bump in the sidewalk. It was about 2 inches above the rest of the sidewalk which caused a tripping hazzard.
















Dennis, the Paul Bunyon of the axe world















Just scratching the surface

Logan, just like dad. He's a hard worker!

We dug and dug, then we hooked a rope to the truck and got one root out. Still there were more. The neighbor got some chains and we pulled the remaining two out. 3 huge roots. Here are some pics of the bad boys! And now the sidewalk is pretty close to level! Hooray!

Did You Feel That!

Whoa, my rumbling and shaking house woke me up at 4:38a.m. this morning. It was a midwest Earthquake! About a 5.2 - 5.4, nothing too big, but being about 30 miles from the epicenter, we certainly felt it! It woke my middle son up and he tried to walk down the hallway to our room, but kept loosing his balance. Our ground rumbled and the house shook up and down for about 30 seconds. Then at 10:17 this morning we felt an aftershock. Crazy. First it snowed in April and now this!

Ok, on a different note, I hate blog messages that don't have pictures, so here's just a random photo that I took of a field of purple weeds this morning after taking the kiddos' to church for a weekend retreat.

Sunset through the Trees

We live in the woods and during the summer we never get to see the sunrises and sunsets due to the leaves. So during the spring the sun is in just the right place where we can see it rise and set. Here is the sun setting through the trees. I like how the fallen branch leads your eyes to the sun and how the sun is flaring.

Dinner for Five

Ok, so I'm not a cook by any means. Truthfully, I hate to cook, I'd rather you do the cooking and I'll clean up the kitchen. Choosing the dinner menu is not enjoyable, it's just something I do to feed the hungry boys at my house. My boys are the meat and potato type. I never make spaghetti because my boys don't like red sauces, but when I ran across this recipe for Meatballs my mouth started watering. So I whipped up a batch and yum they were so tasty! I made it again this week and wanted to share the recipe with you. They are called Easy Baked Meatballs. (anything with EASY in the title is good in my book!)

Here are some photos of our dinner and the recipe will be at the end. Bon Appetit!

Easy Baked Meatballs
1 lb ground beef
1 env. onion soup mix
1 egg
Bread crumbs, to desired consistency
1 tbsp milk
Dash salt and pepper

Mix all ingredients together, roll into balls. Place in baking pan. Bake in preheated oven at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
Let me know if you try it and what you think.

It's a Spring Thing

A few snapshots from the yard this morning.

My azalea's are budding

A Child of God

Today my 8 year old son made a decision to be part of the family of God. He was baptised in water at our church by his favorite Sunday School teacher Mr. Jim. My parents came down to be with us during this wonderful occasion; however, shortly after they arrived my brother called to say that his wife was in labor and they were on their way to the hospital. So Nana and Papaw missed the birth of little Miss Autumn Nicole who entered the world at 5:00 a.m. this morning weighing 7 lbs 2 ozs and 19 inches. They left for home and to see the new bundle of joy after Isaiah's baptism. Busy and wonderful day for the whole family! Anyway, here are photos of our big day, I hope to get some baby pics soon!

We got Isaiah a cross necklace and Nana and Papaw got Isaiah a silver coin with a scripture from the book of Isaiah on it to keep in his pocket to remember his special day.
Nana and Papaw with Isaiah


Dinner to celebrate at Logan's Steakhouse