Wednesday, April 30, 2008

A Contest!

Teresa is holding a new contest over at her personal blog. Those entering have a chance at winning a lovely and uniquely designed dandelion handbag by Rebecca Weis. Teresa is willing to ship this item anywhere, so anyone can participate!
She will turn comments off at 11:59 May 2nd and announce the winner by the afternoon of May 3rd. So,go on over and sign up to win this great handbag!

Sunday, April 27, 2008

HomeMade Spanakopita

This afternoon we made some homemade "Spanakopita" AKA Spinach Pie.
We have always enjoyed trying foods from different regions. As a result we like all types of foods. From Greek to Russian. You have most likely tried Spanakopita before but if not... you should! (: Here is the recipe.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Our State Flag

For curiosity's sake we have been doing a little research on our state flag.
Here is some info we found out about South Carolina's Flag.
The flag of South Carolina is believed to have been originally designed in 1775 for use by South Carolinian troops during the American Revolutionary War. The blue of the flag was borrowed from the militia's uniforms and the crescent from the emblem on their caps. However, elements that compose the current flag were seen in as far back as 1765, in a banner used by South Carolina protesters of the Stamp Act.The current version of the flag was adopted on 28 January 1861 as the "national" flag of the newly seceded state. The only change was the addition of the palmetto tree, which represents the defense of Fort Moultrie (constructed of palmetto logs) on Sullivan's Island from British attack in June 28, 1776. The flag remained the official state flag after the end of the American Civil War.
~ South Carolina's flag was ranked as being the 10th best designed state or provincial flag in North America by the North American Vexillological Association in 2001.
~
Have a great Weekend!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Earth Day

Today after school, we went to the BMW Spartanburg plant (where our Dad works) for their annual Earth Day event.We didn't get any good pictures of the inside booths because of the crowd but we did manage to get a few pictures of the outdoor area. Hope you all had a great Earth day!

Monday, April 21, 2008

Our Recipe Blog

Hey! We just want to let you all know that we have started a recipe blog.
Go check it out.
Have a great rest of the day!

Friday, April 18, 2008

Here is a picture of the house that was discussed in the last post. We wish you all a wonderful weekend!!

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Sidney Lanier

The other day we were driving through a quaint little town about 25 min. from our home.It is a beautiful "little" town located in the foothills of the blue ridge mountains. The name of the town is Lynn,NC.We started seeing these historical landmark signs and of course we had to stop and check them out! We passed by a few of them which were pointing to different landmarks of the civil war. We ran across one in front of an older looking house that seemed interesting.It was stating that the "older looking house" was the place in which the poet Sidney Lanier died in the year of 1881. I had remembered seeing his name on something I had read in my American Literature book while scanning upcoming chapters.And sure enough... there his name was on page 372! Here is some info I learned on Sidney Lanier. Sidney Clopton Lanier was born February 3, 1842, in Macon, Georgia, to parents Robert Sampson Lanier and Mary Jane Anderson. He began playing the flute at an early age, and his love of that musical instrument continued throughout his life. He attended Oglethorpe University near Milledgeville, Georgia, graduating first in his class shortly before the outbreak of the American Civil War. He fought in the Civil War, primarily in the tidewater region of Virginia, where he served in the Confederate signal corps. Later, he and his brother Clifford served as pilots aboard English blockade runners. On one of these voyages, his ship was boarded. Refusing to take the advice of the British officers on board to don one of their uniforms and pretend to be one of them, he was captured. He was incarcerated in a military prison in Maryland, where he contracted tuberculosis (generally known as "consumption" at the time). He suffered greatly from this affliction for the rest of his life. Lanier finally succumbed to complications caused by his tuberculosis on September 7, 1881, while convalescing with his family near Lynn, North Carolina. He was only 39. He is buried in Green Mount Cemetery in Baltimore. Baltimore also honored him with a large and elaborate bronze and granite sculptural monument, created by Hans K. Schuler and located on the campus of the Johns Hopkins University. Sidney Lanier is considered to be the best southern poet of the late nineteenth century. A little FYI Lake Lanier (the largest lake in Georgia) was named for Sidney Lanier. Here is one of many of Lanier's poems. This brief poem,one of Lanier's last,portrays the Saviour being fortified for His experience in the judgement hall and on Calvary by His time in the Garden of Gethsemane. A Ballad Of The Trees And The Master Into the woods my Master went,Clean forspent, forspent.Into the woods my Master came,Forspent with love and shame.But the olives they were not blind to Him,The little gray leaves were kind to Him:The thorn-tree had a mind to HimWhen into the woods He came.Out of the woods my Master went,And He was well content.Out of the woods my Master came,Content with death and shame.When Death and Shame would woo Him last,From under the trees they drew Him last:'Twas on a tree they slew Him -- lastWhen out of the woods He came. ~Sidney Lanier

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Our Spring Flower Garden...

Hi Everyone,We hope you all are doing well.
Today was a beautiful day here,
a great day for planting a spring flower garden.
And that is what we did!
We cleared out all of the pansies and made room for what
we call our spring "bouquet".
Here are some pictures from today.

We planted Pink,Red,White,and Yellow Dwarf Snapdragons.

Pink Dahlia

Zinnia

Dianthus

Summer Daisy's

The finished product
An Azalea plant in our back yard.

Friday, April 11, 2008

Dr. Samuel Mudd's Home

Finally, Here are the last of our trip pictures! We really love history so anytime we go somewhere and there is a historical landmark on the way or nearby,we make an effort to stop and visit it. On our way home from MD we stopped by Dr. Samuel Mudd's Home located in Charles county,Maryland. It was closed but we did get to see most of it from the road.

On the way home. Going over the Chesapeake Bay.

Have a great weekend!!!

Monday, April 7, 2008

Maryland Picture's...

Here are a few more pictures from our trip..yes... I know you're probably thinking more picture?..needless to say we took a lot of them! There are actually a couple more left..But we haven't uploaded them yet, they will be coming up in a later post.
These pictures are from our visit to Maryland.
Beautiful green fields.

This is our pen pal's cousin's home.

Below is our pen pal's home.

Here is their Old Order Mennonite church One day while we were in MD we went for a drive on Solomon's Island. It is a very beautiful place!

More Pic's to come! (-:

Friday, April 4, 2008

A Year Has Past!

Our 1 year blogging anniversary was April 1st.We have really enjoyed sharing the past year of our lives with you all, we hope to do it for many more years to come!There are many blessings to blogging but the biggest for us is all of the friends that we have made! Thank you all for your comments ,We count each of you as our friend! Here is a slide show that we made of some pictures that we have taken since we first started our blog...(a very small portion of them) ...They are of different trips,local events,snapshots,etc.Enjoy! We hope you all have a great weekend!
We have a few more picture from our trip that we have not posted yet. We will post them soon!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Beautiful Lancaster PA

Here are some more pictures from our trip!!
All of these are from Lancaster county, PA except the first one which was taken while driving through the underwater tunnel in Baltimore,MD.

Hope you all enjoyed these.

This was our first trip to Pennsylvania, We absolutely LOVED it there! We got to visit with one of our pen pals while there.She was in Lancaster helping her older sister out with her two small children.They are Old Order Mennonites.They drive the horse and buggy's and they choose to live the "plain life". They were really nice to us,they welcomed us into their home for over 3 hours.we really enjoyed our visit.We didn't get any photos of them because they don't like having pictures of themselves taken.Old Order Amish and Mennonites forbid photography of their people, and their objection is based on the second commandment, Exodus 20:4: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth"."

We knew this before hand so we didn't even take our camera's that day.

Katie and I are fascinated by their way of life. We are so thankful that the Stauffer family counts us as their friend's, as we do them!