Random and...Merry Christmas.

So, it's been such a long time since I've posted and I do apologize. So much has gone on...

I had surgery on Wednesday and have been in recovery the past few days. I won't share many details about the surgery. The surgery was about 3 hours long and it was a loooooooong day...I was supposed to have the surgery at 1:30 but there was a lady before me that had a tumor and it took longer than expected to remove it so I waited in the surgery room until 5:00 p.m. Talk about being prepared for surgery...I had a few hours to get my nerves out. Anyway, I am finally off pain meds and feeling better...recovery is never fun but it's great knowing the surgery is behind me.

In other news...we are in California visiting my family for Christmas and we are enjoying the time we have. I decided to style my brothers hair. Now, you must know my brother, to appreciate the hair style. He plays amazing guitar and actually gives guitar lessons. He is phenominal. He loves every style and genre of rock music and he is very free spirited. He also got is Drivers Liscense on Monday, which is so great, he can now drive himself around to his gigs and church and run errands, leaving mom to feel not as stressed with her time.



Dan and I are enjoying our time here and of course, he is enjoying being able to upgrade my parents wireless and reformat their home computer and make it faster. So my parents are grateful for that and Dan is happy to help!

I know this entire post is random but that is how life has been recently. Sporatic is the name of the time right now!

We love and miss all our friends and family this Christmas and pray that the Lord blesses you and your loved ones.

Merry Christmas!!

I'm a Pampered Chef Consultant!!

Hello my friends and family!

I hope you are all doing well, I just wanted to let you all know that I just started my own home-based business and am now an official Pampered Chef Consultant.

I'm so excited about the products! If you're not familiar with Pampered Chef®, their website is www.pamperedchef.com They sell a wide range of kitchen products. Please share the news with your family and friends!

The holidays are around the corner and this may be a great opportunity for you to find the perfect gift for your friends and family. If you're interested in hosting a home or catalog show or to receive more information, I would be more than happy to call or meet with you and talk about the products.

There are great benefits for hosting.

As a host, you can always earn:
• FREE products of your choice.
• Half-price and discounted products.
• 10% discount for a year.
• FREE shipping on your order.

Please let me know if you or someone you know would be interested in hosting a show or placing an order!

You can take advantage of the guest specials when you place an individual order.
To place an order, please visit the website at:

https://www.pamperedchef.com/ordering/shopOnline.tpc

Select the item numbers from the catalog, price and quantity that you want and call or e-mail me with your name and phone number to submit your order. We will talk about payment at that time. I can have it shipped directly to you by Christmas.

I hope to hear from you all and Happy Holidays!

Sarina Grasham
Independent Consultant
The Pampered Chef
Phone:559-905-7260
E-mail: danrina@gmail.com

California Visit

So, I received a call on Friday that inspired me to go home to see my family. Also, my brothers birthday was on Friday so I surprised everyone except mom who picked me up from the airport. I found a plane ticket on Friday for $318.....that's a steal...normally tickets to Ca are about $800+ But, I just happened to look and American had a sweet deal that I just could not pass up. Having said all this, I went home to visit.

The stay was just not long enough. The Lord is good and he knows how to bond a family together. We had so much fun...mom, Trevor and I hung out in the hot tub for a few hours and we went shopping and talked and talked and talked and talked some more. It was wonderful. Trevor had a jazz band concert while we were there and he had two solos actually. I am so proud of him and who he is becoming. He is so talented. (I'll post the video below--later) I enjoyed the concert and was proud that my brother was up on stage performing, doing what he is passionate about. That's special to me. Following his performance we were able to take some long time needed family pictures.

Enjoy the pictures below...sorry I didn't think to take pictures other than at the concert.

Trevor playing on stage...video to come later.

Trev and his guitar

I sure feel like a small person compared to him ;-)

Pregnancy Center

Well, I know it's been a while since I've posted and so much has been going on. I will try to catch you up.

I started working in the pregnancy center in October. We are getting ready for opening in December. We are praying for funds. Whenever you are in ministry, part of the work you hope to do is "if the Lord provides". Being faithful and praying that the Lord will provide can be difficult. So, ask that you would continue to pray for the ministry. I am taking a few weeks off since finances are low. We know that the Lord will provide the finances and I will be able to go back to work. So, as of right now, I am off from work and at home. I am praying that the Lord would continue to work there and to provide as he has thus far.

Dan is doing well. He loves his job. He still travels from time to time for a day or two but I am blessed that he is home almost all the time. We've been able to enjoy reading, exercising, playing the old school Nintendo together (we beat the Donkey Kong, now working on all the mario's), sharing meals together, playing games and enjoying our married life. The first few years of married life were challenging with Dan being away, but the Lord is faithful and good. We say we are on our second honeymoon now. We are adjusting well and love all the time we have together without travel.

We hope you and your family are well. We miss you all and pray for you often. Have a blessed weekend!

Tagged by Tanya

Here's the rules:

Grab the nearest book.
Open the book to page 56.
Find the fifth sentence.
Post the text of the next two to five sentences in your blog along with these instructions.
Don’t dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.
Tag five other people to do the same.

from Reach 4 Life, the choice is yours, Hoily Bible, NIV

"34 Hearing that Jesus had silences the Sadducees the pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law? 37 Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'"

So, there you have it, the greatest commandment is to Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind. This is pretty self explanatory.

I tag Jessica Warfield.

Beef and Pepper Recipe

Well, I have been staying with Wilson and Tanya this weekend and it has be a privilege!
Here is a recipe that I love and I finally asked Wilson how to make it and watched him make it.

Beef and Pepper

Marinade:
1.5 lbs. Tender beef sliced in bite size pieces (Tops sirloin, Flank Steak, Round steak, etc.)
2 Cloves Garlic
1/2 cup Soy Sauce
1 Egg
1 Tbls. Corn Starch
1-2 Tsp. Pepper
1 cap full or 1 Tsp. Sake (Rice Wine)

1. Marinade for 30 minutes in refrigerator (Longer it marinades, more flavor)
2. Slice 2 bell peppers (red, yellow or green) into bite size pieces
3. Place 1/3 cup oil in skillet.
4. When oil is hot, place meat mixture in it.
5. Brown meat mixture in skillet. When it is 1/2 done, add the pepper pieces
6. Cook until meat and peppers are tender.

Best served over sticky rice (brown rice works well too)

Alles Gute Zum Geburtstag!

So, while in Conway, two of my best friends Jessica and Laura were so sweet to make sure that I had a wonderful birthday.

First, I woke up to a wonderful card that said, "Oh Happy Day..." and then stuff on the inside like, "this is the day that the Lord made you"...I know, I know--cheesy! But I liked it. It was all decorated pretty and thoughtful :-)

And then later on Jessica decorated the house for me and bought balloons. She put Happy Birthday! in like 10 different languages on her door, it was cute...she even included German and Hungarian since she knew that those were "family" languages. We went to dinner at Pia's (a small family owned Italian restaurant) with some friends and then headed back to Jessica and Laura's house to enjoy a wonderful tasting cake that Jessica made herself. She tried hard to do it while I was not home.

So, below are some pictures from my birthday! here I go...23 and only two more years till I am a quarter of a century.

Happy Birthday in different languages!

Megan, Rachel, me, Laura and Jessica at dinner.

Drew, Laura's boyfriend, Laura and Rachel

Blake and Megan, me and Jessica

Me and Jessica! I think we take great pictures ;-)

My free home made hot fudge sundae cheese cake...it was amazing!

unexpected gifts at Jessica's...
I love cards with written novels :-) they are the best as my love language is words of affirmation

Believe it or not...I had to take two breaths to blow these out...I'm getting old already :-(

Beautiful cake Jessica made with cream cheese frosting, my favorite!

Our Home is Safe!!

Dan made it home this evening as he spent the last few days with Tanya and Wilson (Thanks for taking him in).

Dan said that the house looks great. The windows are all in tact and there was no flooding. The grill hadn't even moved from where it was in the back yard. There was one piece of wood on the fence missing but that will be repaired. The electricity is on and the internet works.

We praise the Lord for keeping our home safe and for protection. Our thoughts and prayers go out to those who are still without power and we are grateful for your prayers through all this chaos in Texas.

We love you all! I just love having this blog as a way of communication. :-)

Conway #1

I planned a trip to visit my friends in Conway, Arkansas before I knew about this hurricane and I was here before it hit. I had a very very disturbing drive as the "Love-bugs" were out like rain on my windshield, which i had to stop and scrub off twice. I have posted some pictures as it was very nauseating as I was driving. I wasn't sure people would believe me so I had to post some pictures before I washed the car--and they are STILL stick in the grille and other areas, any idea for how to scrub them out??




So, here are a few pictures from our fun as we went to Fuji Japanese Steakhouse for lunch after church with our church group...a special treat for my birthday. And, Jessica taught me how to make my hair curly and I think I like it, what do you think?

Jessica and me

Laura, Jessica and me.

Laura, Jessica, Becca and me

Chris and Tiffany

Japanese Guy

Laura and her boyfriend Drew

Hurricane Ike Update 9/14/08

There is not much to update.

All of Houston's power was out as of yesterday morning and we received news that our power had been restored in our area last night.

We still are unsure if there was any damage to our home, wind or water damage. We are waiting for our landlord to make it over there, he said many power lines were down and it wasn't possible yesterday.

When we find out more information, we will update again. Until then, have a blessed day!

Thursday Hurricane Ike Update

Hello Everyone,

Since I have been receiving many calls/e-mails I decided to update everyone on our actions as Hurricane Ike heads our way. Fortunately, I am in Conway, Arkansas visiting friends this week while Dan was in Houston. He headed to Austin, Texas to stay with his sister, her husband and their two kids. So, for now, we are safe.

As for our house, we wont know until after the storm. The Lord is watching over us and we pray that He will watch over our home and what he has blessed us with.

The Hurricane is a Category 2 right now, but it is expected to strengthen to a Category 3 or even 4. The Gov. of Texas has issued an evacuation for the Galveston/ Houston surrounding areas and President Bush has issued a state of emergency for the entire state of Texas. The weather meteorologist's are saying that Houston will receive a lot of thunderstorms, rain and tornadoes.

At this time, we are safe and we have taken the necessary precautions in case our home is wind damaged or rain damaged. We do have renters insurance so we are praying it won't flood, but we have made sure everything important to us is off the ground. We have taken video and pictures of everything.

Please be in prayer for us as we wait to see what damage it any at all will be done.

We love you all and are grateful for your prayers always. We will update as we receive more news.

A first for me and a tribute to my Dad

This may sound weird, but I mowed the lawn today for the first time, it was tiring. I really give lots of credit to those of you who do it. I mowed and edged and used the blower and fertilized and watered the lawn and now I have 10 blisters to prove it!!

Growing up, my Dad would never let my brother or me mow the lawn because he wanted the lines straight (now he let's my brother). I must say, he ALWAYS has the greenest grass on the street and the most comfortable to play and lay on and I will always remember that. I don't think anyone could beat him with his grass :-)

So, the next time I'm mowing the lawn I will be thinking of Dad and all you who mow your lawn. This may seem silly but let me tell you, it is "tough" work!

Hope you all are well, have a nice weekend!

And a reminder...we are officially Texans now...we have plates and D.L

Bill's Visit

Bill was here this past weekend(Dan's dad) and we enjoyed his visit. He travels to Mexico for work during the week and decided to come stay with us for the holiday since he was not able to go to Ohio.

We played Settlers twice and spent a lot of time talking, laughing and reminiscing. Bill was so kind to take us out to dinner on two occasions and I cooked for all of our other meals. We went to an Asian restaurant here in Sugar Land that is called PEI WEI, owned by the same company that owns Pf Changs, it was yummy.

Here is Dan and I at dinner...I think it turned out pretty good.
(I'm kind of glowing in the white...not sure what that's all about)

So, here they are...pictures of our new house...finally

Here are the pictures some of you have been anxiously awaiting...enjoy! :-) We love our new home.

Welcome to Texas! haha

Ok, I need ideas...what should I put in these indentations in the wall???
...the picture and mirror are just there for lack of a better place for them now.

Guest Bathroom

Guest room please come visit!!!

Kitchen skylight....my favorite feature of the house. We never have to turn our light son because there is always so much light in the house from the skylight and windows, it is wonderful. Even when I cook dinner the light doesn't have to be turned on...How great is that?

Kitchen and the skylight is directly above...no light are on in this picture.

Family Room

Another indentation in the wall in the hall leading to our room

Our bedroom

His sink...

Her sink...mine is lower haha

His closet
Her closet