"By Our Love"

As I was running a few errands on Saturday, I turned on some worship music.  Christy Nockels has always been a favorite artist of mine.  If I could sing like anyone in the world, it would be her.  Not only is her voice beautiful, but the lyrics of her songs speak to me and really help me worship God.  This song came on and even though I have heard it a few dozen times, it really hit me yesterday.  I listened to it several times, each time praying it for my family.  I hope that every day my husband and my daughter will see the love of God in my life.  I will be honest and say that frequently the distractions overcome me and I do not focus on this as I should.  My only hope is in the fact that God is gracious and that He gives me a chance to start over.  And oh that the people around me would be able to see the Grace of our Heavenly Father in my life.  God has given each of us unique abilities and I think Christy Nockels does a lovely job encouraging the strengths of men, women and children.  Here are the lyrics... I hope they touch you and if you have a chance to download the song, please do so. 


"By Our Love"
Written by Christy & Nathan Nockels from the Album "Life Light Up"

Brothers, let us come together
Walking in the Spirit, there's much to be done...
We will come reaching, out from our comforts
And they will know us by our love...

Sisters, we were made for kindness
We can pierce the darkness as He shines through us...
We will come reaching, with a song of healing...
And they will know us by our love!

The time is now
Come Church arise...
Love with His hands
See with His eyes...
Bind it around you,
Let it never leave you,
And they will know us by our love...

Children, You are hope for justice,
Stand firm in the Truth now, set your hearts above
You will be reaching, long after we're gone,
And they will know you by your love!


© 2009 worshiptogether.com Songs / sixsteps Music (admin. by EMI CMG Publishing) (ASCAP)

Let's go, USA!

We're in world cup fever over here. Yesterday the USA was scheduled to play Algeria, so we decided to get decked out to show our support for the Stars and Stripes!

USA wins!!!

Banana and Nut French Toast

It seems like I blog about food a lot.  I'm always happy when I make a meal that everyone seems to enjoy, and even better if it's healthy! 
A friend of mine loaned me the "Organic Baby and Toddler Foods" cookbook by Amanda Grant, and it has proven to be an inspiration on more than one occasion.  I saw a recipe called "Peanut Butter Eggy Bread" and decided to adapt it (still haven't tried peanut butter with A... I wll one of these days!).  Using her recipe as a guideline, here is what I came up with:

Banana and Nut French Toast

4 tbsp. smooth walnut paste (or peanut butter)
4 slices whole wheat bread
1 egg, beaten
2 tbsp. milk
cinnamon (to desired taste)
1 banana, mashed
small amount of butter

Spread the walnut paste on one side of each slice of bread. 

Mash the banana and spread in a thin layer over the walnut paste. 

Mix the egg and milk together in a shallow dish and add cinnamon.  Dip the bread into the eggy mixture.  Heat the butter in a pan and fry the dipped bread, turning over after two to three minutes, so that each side is golden brown. 

It isn't really a beautiful process... you have to carefully turn the banana and nut paste side so you don't leave it on the pan. 

Serve immediately.

Nutritional: a good source of protein and fibre, potassium and iron. 

I chose walnut paste over peanut butter because the walnuts have more nutritional value and the paste doesn't have added sugar.  With the mashed banana you don't need the sweetness of peanut butter. 

You'll want to eat your vegetables!

Once again flipping through the family cookbook, I ran across a recipe from my mom to serve for dinner.  You'll need your grill.  It's great to go along with steaks or burgers.  If you do chicken, make sure your chicken marinade isn't too strong, because the flavors might compete. 

Gingery Grilled Vegetables

6 to 7 c. sliced fresh vegetables (tomatoes, onions, summer squash, zucchini, mushrooms, peppers) cut 1/4 to 1/2-inch thick.

1/2 c. white wine vinegar
1/3 c. light soy sauce
6 T. olive oil
2 T. sesame oil
2 T. fresh ginger, minced
1 T. brown sugar, packed
2 large cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 tsp. hot pepper sauce, or to taste
Salt and black pepper, to taste

Place sliced vegetables into a 1-gallon, resealable plastic bag or other large container.  In a medium mixing bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients.  Pour the marinade over the vegetables in the bag or container.  Refrigerate 30 minutes to 1 hour, turning bag over once or occasionally tossing the vegetables in the container. 
Prepare medium-hot fire in charcoal or gas grill.  Place vegetables on a lightly oiled grill (or vegetable grilling basket) about 4-6inches above the heat.  Grill firmer vegetables such as squash, zucchini, peppers and onions about 10-15 mintues, turning once.  Grill more tender vegetables such as tomatoes and mushrooms about 5 minutes, turning once.  All vegetables should be lightly brown and still crisp-tender.

I didn't really measure any of the ingredients.  I didn't want quite as much oil, so I trimmed back on that a bit.  I also put mine in the vegetable grill basket and cooked them all for about 7 minutes, stirring the vegetables a couple times in that period.  Stu and I really enjoyed it.  The little one prefers plain veggies, but she ate quite a few chunks.  I was so disappointed when the bowl was empty.  I probably could have eaten just this for dinner!

Randomness

A conglomeration of thoughts and musings! 
Last weekend we met some friends of ours in the Fränkische Schweiz (Franconian Switzerland).  It is a historic region made up of small towns, forests and big hills and valleys.  If you are interested, you can read more about the area HERE.  The goal was for the men to get to do some climbing and the rest of us would relax and play.  The weather turned out to be quite cool, so we didn't get to spend as much time picnicking as we had hoped, but we enjoyed a nice walk.  Even Giraffe was able to go.

Abigail has discovered that she really likes to carry things around.  We bought a new pair of shoes for her and they don't quite fit yet, so I left them in the bag.  It has since become her favorite purse.  She scootches around with it (she still doesn't crawl) and when she walks, a lot of the time she'll carry it.  It's really adorable.  We also received a pull-duck as a gift, and she is trying to pull it.  She generally just ends up picking it up and walking around with it, though.  

Mouse snack: 

I was in the store the other day and there was a nice looking seedless watermelon, so I decided to buy it.  I left a few chunks on the rind.  It was so funny watching Abbey crunching away at her watermelon.  She loved it... every time she would take a bite, she would get a huge smile and look at us.   

Yummy in our tummy!

Watermelon

The Wonders of a Tape Measurer

Abbey discovered our tape measurer the other night and was quite intrigued by it!  She spent several minutes pulling the tab and watching the tape come out, then letting it go so it would fly back into the cartridge.  She would then look for the tape on the other side of the cartridge.  She couldn't quite figure out what was going on...

On another note, I love it when the weather is warm so she can wear her cute summer clothes!

As you can see, I love the H&M plaids!

Biergartens

One of our favorite things about summer in Germany are Biergartens.  Yum!  Not particularly because we like beer, but because they are just fun!  They usually open around March or April, when the weather gets nice.  Biergartens are really just outdoor restaurants.  You don't have to do anything special or buy anything special... you just walk up and grab a seat.  Frequently you will have to share a table with other people, but that's a great part of the culture, I think!  The Biergarten that we like serves very tasty traditional Bavarian food... everything that you think of when you think of when you think of German cuisine.  They have sausages, all the different types of Schnitzel, Sauerbraten and a lot of other things.  For beverages they of course have every type of beer (from Pilsner to Hefeweizen and everything in between), and then soda and hot drinks, as well.  We particularly like Biergartens because they are all very kid-friendly.  Most Biergartens have a Spielplatz (playground) and you see kids of every age running around.  The Spielplatz at our Biergarten isn't particularly elaborate... it's just a sandbox, but Abbey seems to enjoy it!

Lots of strollers!

I ordered a Radler the other night, which is half Pilsner Bier and half lemonade.  It sounds gross, but it's very refreshing!

Walking off our dinner!

The Zoo

When Stu was out of town last weekend, Abbey and I decided to go to the zoo, or Tiergarten as it is known here in Deutschland.  Tiergarten is, incidentally, one of my favorite German words.  I love the literal translation... "Animal Garden."  If you are a kid and learning a language, you really don't need a definition... it's all there in the word! 

When we arrived it was super packed because it was a beautiful, sunny day.  Germans love beautiful, sunny days because they are somewhat of a rarity, so they do everything they can to be outside.  I made a bee-line to find the animal map and our main objective was one of the first things to see:

Abbey loves giraffes.  She has a stuffed one (that I lost but managed to replace) that she carries around by the neck.  It's awesome.  She loved seeing the giraffes.  She laughed, and waved and pointed and stared and looked at me.  And then she laughed, and waved and pointed and stared and said, "Dah-tee," which is her way of saying, "I like you!" 

We walked around a bit more and finally made it to the kinderzoo (the kid's zoo), which was at the very far end of the zoo.  The zoo near us is very nice because you can get pretty close to the animals.  It is great for little ones because they can really see the animals well.  The kinderzoo was similar to an American petting zoo... you could go into the goat pin and they had pigs and bunny rabbits.  When we went into the goat pin, Abbey wasn't quite sure what to think of it.  She was laughing and enjoying it, but she was a bit scared and holding on to me very tightly!  We enjoyed a nice lunch (in the wrong spot.  As I walked a bit further I discovered a wonderful Biergarten with a huge playground at the top of the hill.  Rats).  Then it was homeward bound!

A note about German safety laws.  I have been amused on numberous instances about the lack of precaution taken at times.  They definitely do not have the regulations that we have in the US, in terms of pedestrians having to cross to the other side of the street if there is work being done on sidewalk, etc.  I am not sure if the pictures will show what I am referring to, but I had to try to capture this.  There were some big bulls in a pin and a big tall metal fence (as expected) between the bulls and the pedestrian walk.  As we got closer, I noticed that a man was bringing food in for them.  During his feeding process, he left the gate open.  Wide open.  Awesome German safety regulations.  I decided to maintain a bit of a distance, from the open gate of an animal that is known for stampedes.  

After the gate was closed, we walked around and turned right after their pin, and this is what I saw.  The big tall, metal fence separating the bulls from the pedestrian area abruptly ended and it was replaced with a foot-high wooden rail that Abbey could have stepped over.  Even more awesome.  I laughed and of course took a picture.

They did seem a lot more interested in their food than anything else. 

Wish I could have taken more pictures of Abigail enjoying the animals, but it was difficult as I was holding her most of the time and couldn't operate the camera while doing so.  She waved at a lot more animals and said, "Dah-tee!" numerous times.  Aside from the giraffes, the bunny rabbits up close and personal seemed to be a big hit. 

Mango Salsa

Salsa?  I don't know if that's the correct word for this recipe.  Maybe my brother the chef would supply me with a different word.  I made salmon for us the other day and served this along with it and it was definitely the little one's favorite part of the meal.  She ate the majority of it (unfortunately, for me!).  There really isn't a recipe you have to follow... these are the ingredients and ratios I used.  You can have as much of a certain ingredient as you would like, though! 

Mango Salsa

1/3 of a mango, diced
1/2 of a tomato, diced
1/4 cup cucumber, diced
1/2 of an avocado, diced
1-2 tbsp. diced red onion (or whichever color you prefer)
juice from a lime (however much you would like)
Salt (optional- I didn't use it and I didn't think it needed it)

Mix them all up in a bowl!  It's best if you can make this 1-2 hours before you plan on serving it, so the flavors marry.  We served it over fish, but I made it again and served it with chicken and it was just as tasty! 

Summer

We woke up this morning to sunshine coming through our curtains at 5:15 am (and then went back to sleep).  It had been quite a few days since we had seen the sun in our town, so Abigail and I decided to take advantage of it!  We went on our normal walk, but we made a stop in a park downtown so Abigail could get out and stretch her legs. 

I generally don't mind cloudy and drizzly days, but it does limit what we can do outside quite a bit!  We crawled around and played in the grass for awhile.  I seemed to be (once again) one of the only moms that was acknowledging the warmer weather.  There were quite a few other kids with jackets on! 

This was my favorite part:

My first flower picked by my daughter.  We were walking along and she stopped dead in her tracks, plopped down and picked the flower.  She touched it, felt the petals and studied it, then she turned around looking for my hand and placed the beautiful little flower in my palm.  So lovely.  A few minutes later I was the lucky recipient of two rocks.  She really enjoys sharing her treasures.

On the way home we had to stop for some Eis (ice cream, that is).  Eis is an amazing phenomenon here in Germany in the summers.  On a warm sunny day, I would say 1 in 2 people, no matter their age is consuming ice cream outside in the sun.  It is so cool and a fun part of the culture!  So I had to indulge myself and I bought eine Kugel (1 scoop) Mint Eis in Waffeln (waffle cone)!  I also couldn't help myself with this... Abigail's first real taste of Eis.  I am pretty anti-sweets for her and we tend to eat pretty healthy.  I really was just curious to see what she did with it.  She barely stuck her tongue out and tasted it.  Then it was a full-fledge lunge to suck the ice cream as fast as she could.  She didn't get much, but she enjoyed what she did!  I can't say that I'm surprised... it was quite tasty.  I think more than anything she liked how cold and wet it was!

Remnants of our ice cream (as she tries to grab my phone):

Happy Summer!

Vegetable Casserole

Yesterday I was trying to come up with a better way to serve vegetables to my family.  I pulled out our family cookbook and then I remembered a recipe that we used to eat when I was growing up.  It's also a recipe that my grandmother frequently makes.  So I made a batch tonight and it was super tasty... just as good as I remember.  The best part was that Abigail ate a huge portion! 

Vegetable Casserole
Makes enough for about 6 people

Broccoli, 1 bunch
Cauliflower, 1 head
1 Carrot
Squash (1 each: zucchini, acorn and yellow squash)
Brown rice or bown and wild rice, cooked (enough for 1 serving per person)
Monterey Jack cheese (1/2 pound, grated)
Cheddar Cheese (1/2 pound, grated)
Large Can Tomato Sauce

Cook rice.  Cut vegetable into bite size pieces and steam all together (approximately 15 minutes).  Grate cheeses.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Put cooked rice in 1-2 quart casserole.  Add one layer grated Monterey Jack cheese and one layer Cheddar cheese.  Pour tomato sauce over top and bake until bubbly (approximately 20 minutes).

I couldn't find acorn or yellow squash, so I ended up just using extra zucchini.  They also don't sell Monterey Jack cheese in Germany, so I used Swiss cheese. 

Black Beans and Coconut-Lime Rice

My mom and dad are always keeping their eyes open for recipes for us.  They made a salad that was in Southern Living and scanned the recipe for us.  This recipe was on the same page and I thought it sounded fantastic!  My brother tried it out first and confirmed that it was good, so we gave it a whirl!  Yum!!  We all enjoyed it, and Abigail ate a very large portion of it.  She really liked all of the spices. 

Black Beans and Coconut-Lime Rice

From Southern Living, May 2010
Makes: 6 Servings
Hands-on Time: 35 Min.
Total Time: 48 min.


1 cup flaked coconut
1 ½ cups chicken broth
¼ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. pepper
3 Tbsp. butter, divided

1 ¼ cups uncooked basmati rice

1 small onion, chopped

1 poblano pepper, diced

2 (15-oz) cans black beans, drained and rinsed

2 tsp. chili powder

1 tsp. ground cumin

1 lime
2 green onions, thinly sliced
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro


Toppings: lime wedges, diced mango, sliced radishes, sliced fresh jalapeno peppers, sour cream


1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake coconut in a single layer on a making sheet 8-10 minutes or until toasted.
2. Bring broth, next 2 ingredients, 2 Tbsp. butter and 1 cup water to a boil in a 2-qt. saucepan. Stir in rice. Cover, reduce heat to low, and cook 15-20 minutes or until rice is tender and water is absorbed.

3. Meanwhile, melt remaining 1 Tbsp. butter in a medium saucepan over med-high heat; add onion and poblano pepper, and sauté 5 minutes or until tender. Stir in black beans, chili powder, cumin and ¾ cup water. Cook over med-low heat, stirring occasionally, 15 minutes.

4. Grate zest from lime, avoiding pale bitter pith, into a bowl; squeeze juice from lime into bowl.

5. Fluff rice with a fork. Fold lime zest and juice, coconut, green onions and cilantro into hot cooked rice. Serve bean mixture over rice with desired toppings.

Next time I make it, I think I'll make some fresh tortillas to go along with it.  Super tasty!