Chili powder recipe

I was making southwestern chili today when I realized I was out of chili powder. I had read the ingredient list before and knew I had everything I needed on hand . A quick google search landed me on the following recipe from food.com. I'm pretty sure I won't be buying premixed chili powder anymore!

Chili Powder

2 tablespoons paprika
2 teaspoons oregano
1 ¼ teaspoons cumin
1 ¼ teaspoons garlic powder
1 ¼ teaspoons cayenne pepper
¾ teaspoon onion powder

Mix all ingredients well.

Lent 2012

I posted about this year's Lent over on my homeschooling blog. I hope you will take time to go check it out!

I would love to hear your thoughts!

Chimpsy

Yesterday Annie and I took a photography class with Chimpsy. We met at Chamblin Book Mine downtown and at first it appeared that we would be the only two students but after a few minutes another mom and son pair showed up. Israel, our instructor, was friendly, patient with our (*my*) questions and very informative (in a "for dummies" kind of way, not in a show-offy, see how much I know kind of way). He walked us through the intricacies of shutter speed, aperture, ISO, Exposure Compensation, and White Balance. Here are some things I learned:

• Use an inexpensive gooseneck lamp with a Sylvania natural spectrum light when shooting indoors to add light.
• Macro mode shoots real close up (flower setting on my camera)
• If skin tones are off indoors, set white balance.
• Set to the lowest ISO as possible to keep the picture from looking grainy.
• "Large" and "Superfine" pictures render the best quality pictures but also eat up your memory so if you are running out of memory, change it to Medium and/or Fine or Normal to get some more pictures out of your memory card.
• Shutter speed is for movement so if the pictures are blurry, change settings.
• Aperture (this is where f stops come in) is for focusing on things up close and letting background be blurry. (On my camera I cannot control the aperture; that's what my settings do: changes the aperture.)

After an hour of talking through the technical stuff and helping us program our point-and-shoot cameras (set camera to take Large pictures in Superfine settings) he discussed Composition for a while using examples of pictures on his Ipad. Again, some things I learned:

• Rule of thirds. Don't put everything in the middle of the picture. You want to draw attention to something in the picture. If you are photographing a sunset then de-emphasize the foreground bringing the horizon to the lower third of the picture, emphasizing the beautiful colors in the sky. Or if you are photographing a field of flowers and the sky is boring, bring the horizon to the top third eliminating the expanse of boring sky and focusing on the field. For portraits, focus on the eyes. 
• Enhance 3D sense of buildings. Don't shoot a building straight on but at an angle. This adds depth and shows that a building is a "cube" and not a flat surface.
• Frame your subject against other things. Shoot with something in the frame that is familiar to give a sense of scale (i.e. Castillo de San Marco with a palm tree in the picture so you see just how big the fort is). Or watch your angles (tilt camera, get down low) to emphasize how tall a building is or how long a dock is.
• When shooting pets and kids, get on their level. You see the world from their point of view.
• Simplify composition. Get rid of distracting background "noise". Pay attention to what is in the background. You can do this by shifting your angle to get rid of people/stuff from the shot or change your aperture so that the background is blurred and you don't "see" what's there, like a closeup of a single flower. Simplify colors. One bright flower in a sea of green.
• Use leading lines to emphasize depth. Like a row of runners coming in to the finish line. The lines lead back giving you perspective and depth.

After an hour of teaching we went outside to put what we'd learned into practice. (We ran into the Halls and the Lebhars! Too funny!) The first activity we did was to photograph a building with dark windows and very light walls in order to play with our white balance. Here are my shots:

 My camera in normal mode. Had I needed more lighting I could have upped the white balance. When I did, this is what I got:

 The building got a little washed out and I lost details in the facade, as well as in the clouds. When I turned down the white balance...

 the building again lost detail because this time it was too dark but the clouds look cool.

Then we went around the corner and tried to play with the shutter speed. My camera doesn't allow me to do that. I tried several of my settings such as portrait and landscape hoping to get a blurry background or blurry wheels to convey a sense of movement. Unfortunately my camera is too smart and it wouldn't do that. So my shots of moving cars look like cars parked in the middle of the road.

 Annie snuck into this shot...

 Nothing I did could get my camera to mess up. Oh well. No motion shots for me.

 Then we got to play with our macro setting. I got real close up here... (see how the background is blurry? I wanted to do that!)

 Closer still...

 Here I tried a camera angle...

 and played with my white balance again...

 All in all, I learned a lot about the point and shoot camera I've had for years. I've always shot on the "Auto" setting. Now that I've learned a few things, I'm not afraid to try some new stuff! Hopefully this means better photos for my blog!

The 10 Second Rule

The 10 Second Rule by Clare de Graf is a book I received as a gift from Sonlight Curriculum, the homeschool curriculum that we use. It's a quick read  and it has really inspired me to live in such a way that if I feel a nudge to do something, to just do it. Not to wait or rationalize it away. But to do it. I hope to report the things I feel prompted to do.

If you decide to read it, let me know what you think about it! I'd love to hear!

Resolutions 2012

I finally crystallized the resolutions that had been rolling around in my head. Many are similar to what I had resolved to do in the past, but since we are creatures who are always growing, always improving, I am still a work in progress so I must progress in the work I have set before me. So here the things I am going to work on this year:

Physical
Get fixed. I have been complaining of a hurt left shoulder and right ankle. I also have a persistent (chronic?) cough. I will schedule appointments to look into solutions for these annoyances.
Train for a race. I was hoping to run the Donna half marathon for my friend Libby who was diagnosed with breast cancer but with the pain in my foot, I'm off track for that race. So I've set my sights on the Gate River Run.
Log food and water. The best way to weight loss and maintenance is to log my food. I can't do it any other way. So I resolve to log every day using My Fitness Pal. If you plan on using that program/app, you can friend me and we can keep each other accountable.

Spiritual
Live the 10 Second Rule. After reading the book, I decided I would try to do what I reasonably felt God was telling me to do, in the next 10 seconds, without thinking much about it except to obey. Trust and obey. A song I learned with the kids in BSF. A good rule to live by.
Read through the New Testament in One Year. I'm being realistic. I've tried the whole Bible in a year and I've always come up short. So I'm taking a smaller step. The NT this year. Maybe the OT next year? I do listen to the Daily Audio Bible but I know there will be days that I miss. So this goal is more attainable.
Read 4 Spiritual Books. This is something I do every year. This year I have picked the following four books: One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp, Made to Crave by Lysa TerKeurst,  Out of the Saltshaker by Rebecca Manley Pippert, and Walking in the Dust of Rabbi Jesus by Lois Tverberg. I am also using Jesus Calling as my devotional this year. I have plenty of reading to do!

Mental/Personal
Blog. I've done better this year but my goal is to write something weekly. I didn't realize how time consuming writing is! You have to think of what to write about, then write it, then edit and then add pictures and finally fix all the formatting.
Photography. Annie bought herself a new camera so for Christmas we gave her a photography class so she can learn to take better pictures. Knowing she wouldn't want to do that alone, I signed up too. Hopefully this will help my blogging too as clear, crisp pictures are a vital part of a good blog.
Pursue hobbies. Continue knitting the sweater I started several years ago. Crochet a hat (just learned how to crochet). Sew quilts for Tommy and Timothy (just finished one for Michael.) Gives me a great reason to use my new Bernina!
Read with Timothy and Annie. 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens with Timothy and Beautiful Girlhood with Annie. We started these books last year and put them down during the summer and never picked them back up. Going to finish them by spring.

And there you have them. There's so much more I will actually work on.

Holding my tongue. Trusting others. Keeping up with the laundry. Decluttering the house. Making the bed. Being a good wife. Being a good mother. Being a good friend. Forgiving when I've been hurt.

So much to always work on. But my official list is the first one. They are the things that are measurable (and more easily attainable?) so I will stick to focusing on these for now.

What about you? Do you make resolutions? What are they?

Reflecting on 2011

Last year I didn't make any resolutions. Just never got around to it. Part of the problem was that I’d not accomplished the goals I’d set in 2010 so I was feeling a bit apathetic towards the whole thing. What’s the point? I don’t accomplish much anyhow…blah, blah, blah. Stinkin’ thinkin’. 

I spent a little time reviewing 2011 and despite the fact that I hadn't set any new goals, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I actually accomplished quite a few new things that I would never have known to even strive for. The Lord really stretched me this year to try new things that I would not have thought possible or even probable. Here are a few things of those things:

1.      1. Taking on a new, larger convention. I’ve been working as a SonlightCurriculum Consultant since 2004 (7 years?? Wow!) and the largest convention I had ever done has been about 1200 people. This year I joined the big leagues with the Southeast Homeschool Convention which was about 2500 attendees. Felt great to take that next step as a consultant.

2.      2. Go on a mission trip. This wasn’t even remotely on my radar screen. Michael was going to take Tommy to Honduras to visit La Esperanza de Jesus, a missionary our church supports. But in the end I ended up being the one to take him. It was my first missionary trip and it was powerful.

3.     3. Run a 10K race. I have been struggling with plantar faciitis for a number of years and had just about given up hope of ever running again. But during a conversation with a friend who suffers from the same condition, he mentioned that hard orthotic inserts have helped him. I had been trying cushioned inserts but hard?? I was skeptical. But I decided to give them a try and started walking in them. No pain. In June Timothy and I began a couch-to-5K program, an app on my Iphone. As the weeks went by and the distance increased but the pain did not, I was able to run and complete a 10 K race. A new niggling pain in my ankle has arisen which I plan on tackling in the new year, but the plantar is doing well. It feels good to run again.

4.    4.  Emcee our women’s retreat. The past two years I have served on the women's retreat planning team as the “hospitality coordinator” which is an area I feel comfortable with. But this year I wasn’t feeling called to that. I didn’t really know what my role should be. You can imagine my surprise when at the first meeting when it was suggested I be the emcee. REALLY?! Me? A borderline introvert who stutters?! Despite the fears I immediately had, I also had a peace that this is what God wanted me to do. And so I did. And I got through it.

5.    5.   Learn a new hobby. I’ve wanted to learn to crochet for years now but never found anyone who would teach me. I would ask people who knew how but it just never worked out to get together. However just last week my friend Natalie taught me. She taught herself with the help of YouTube videos and made a lovely scarf for her daughter. I begged her to teach me and during a coffee date she did. I’m already halfway through my scarf and I’m really enjoying it. It’s easy to do and very portable. I look forward to making more fun projects with this newly-learned hobby!

6.     6.  Sing in the Christmas Choir. This is something I NEVER thought I’d EVER do! Way back in 4^th grade I sang in a school choir called Los Cantantitos and the choir directory discreetly told my parents that I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. Years later they shared that comment with me which has forever scarred me. Oh I sing in church, as long as others are singing too. So when Jessica talked me into auditioning for the special Christmas choir and then telling me I’d made it, I couldn’t believe it! I have to say that it was probably the hardest thing I’d done (harder than emceeing). I worked at it a LOT, following her instruction on how to breath and trying to sing “dark” and attempting to “raise my soft palate.” I admit that I sang timidly and lip synced the really high notes that I couldn’t hit. But again, I did it. I overcame that fear and did a hard thing (Ever read that book?)

       So there you have it. These are the things that came to mind as I thought back over the year. I wonder what the Lord has in store for me next year?

This year I’m back to setting goals. They look remarkably similar to some old ones but I'm going to keep following the old adage “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!” I’m going to keep trying!

• So goodbye 2011 and here's hoping for a happy new year! What about you? What do you feel good about last year?

First of the Year Cleaning and Organizing Challenge

Ask Anna has thrown the gauntlet down...the cleaning and organizing gauntlet! And I'm going for it! Anyone want to join me?

14 Days to Get Clean and Organized