Business name ideas, anyone?

Hi everyone! Allen and I are down in the Pueblo mall today running a kiosk for Daddy's caramel apple business. (I'm posting via Allen's phone with his 30 day free internet trial...) We were thinking, and we're really in need of a catchy name. Any suggestions? Right now, our signs just say, "Caramel Apples and More." The official business name is "Andrew's Kitchen." That name is so-so... We were thinking maybe we could incorporate our last name somehow since it is fairly unique. But we're not tied down to that. Right now, my best idea is "Ann & Andy's Sweets." Anyway, I know we have plenty of smart and creative friends, so I thought I'd throw this out there. =)

First Walk

These are the promised photos of the first walk in our new house.

That is not a giant multicolored turtle on the far left. It's Avery with one of their cardboard shields strapped to his back.

Snapshots

These are some pictures I got of the last walk we took when we were at our old house. The five little ones and I used to go down to the coffeeshop and get ice cream. There was a little park on the way, and the little ones loved it. Sometimes, on birthdays, we'd take sandwiches, sit up in the big oak tree, and have a picnic.

Our new home!

On our sidebar there is a little blurb about us. Part of it says:

Currently, we live in the suburbs in Northern Colorado. That will be
changing soon. Lord willing, we will be building a log cabin on some land,
debt-free, and closer to our church family in the very near future.
Meanwhile, we have to be out of our house in a matter of months, so we are
looking for a place to rent.

Well, we have found the place to rent and moved completely! We are now in Elizabeth, Colorado. It is a beautiful part of the state; half prairie, half trees. Where we are it is mostly prairie. We love the openness and still being able to see some of the mountains.

A Belated Happy Birthday

to Andrea Grace! I love you, Andrea! May God bless you even more in the coming year!)

Andrea turned SEVENTEEN on October 28th.

We had a party with some girls from our church and their families. Abby and Rachel share a birthday with Andrea. Daddy made a really neat tiered cake for them.

Hailey (whose birthday was the 26th) and her family were supposed to come, but were sick. =(
By the time we found out that they weren't going to be able to come, it was too late; Daddy had already piped Hailey's name on the cake. Abigail cried out,"Oh no! They can't come? Who is going to blow out Hailey's candles??" Haha...

                                                                          The Cake:

Many to come

Our poor blog has been sorely neglected, and for that I apologize. But, but, but, I think my excuses are valid. For one, we MOVED last Saturday! Yes, more to come on that.
Anyway, our internet is now set up, and I will try to add a bunch of posts and try to get the blog caught up.

That's all for now!

Fun at the Corn Maze

The month of October has been fairly busy for us. I don’t really even know why…
Anyway, I thought I’d update the blog with atleast one highlight.
Last weekend we invited the church all the way up to the corn maze, where we are selling apples, for a potluck. Even though "only" three families were able to come, there were over 30 kids in our group. =) We had a GREAT time. The weather was perfect, and there were so many fun things to do there.
As usual, the pictures tell the story:

I took these ones...

Some of the handsome boys.

Abby!

They have this box full of dried corn. Waaayyy more fun than a sand box!

However, as Becca Storrie and I learned the hard way a few weeks ago, you still get dirty. =)

Avery emerging.. and Mr. Searcy telling him he looks better under corn.

Luke, burried. Hahahaha.

Goin under.. these boys are way too much fun.

Cutie Aidan A. She reminds me of a Norman Rockwell painting.

Someone else getting burried...

Anna! and Abby! The pedal carts. The boys (and men...) loved these.


Elijah hanging out in our booth, and rating our products. =)

Andrea manning the booth.

Yummmmm.

Hahaha Mr. Adams and Mr. Searcy racing. Mr. Searcy took the inside corner and won. Click on this picture to enlarge it and look at their faces...

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And Andrea took these...

Abigail and Emma!

Awww.

Pumping the water for the rubber duck race.
Abigail and Emma really got into that one!

Friends.

Avery, A.T, Sawyer

Sisters.

I love those girls!

This one, too.

And her, too.

My Aidan!


I guess the pictures don't tell the whole story- about all the fun, the memories, and the fellowship- but they do an okay job. =)

Here We Go, Rockies!

We went to two Rockies games in the past couple weeks. We LOVE the Rockies. The reason we even got dish tv was to watch Rocktober 2007. We're cancelling dish, and it turned out it's just in time to miss the postseason. *Sigh* I do really love listening to them on the radio though. Daddy has always had the radio on listening to them for as long as I can remember.

We've always gone to atleast a couple games almost every season. This year since things are tight, we all pooled some cash together for Daddy's birthday (... I just found out that it was for his birthday... haha. Even better!) so we were able to go.

Andrew T. and Abigail baptized!

Two Sundays ago..

Abigail's friend, Katrina, was baptized the same day!

There's a New Photographer in Town

who is certainly not nearly as skilled as the old one, and considerably less fanatical (just kidding). However, I do have the desire to take pictures (however regrettable that desire may be), and I propose to burden our longsuffering public with some of my efforts. Enjoy!

We've had lovely rainy weather a few days lately, and the sky is a most comforting and attractive shade of grey, absolutely perfect for pictures. So I clap boots on some of my young brothers and sisters, drag them to all sorts of places (bless their cooperative little souls) and snap away. They like being models.

Caramel Apple Business at the Corn Maze

Videos and Pictures included...

Quick OverviewA few months ago, we started up a new family business selling caramel apples. Our first event was the 4th of July Festival in Thornton, where we've gone every year as a family anyway. That didn't go too great, but we learned a LOT. Since then, we've mainly been going to farmers' markets while we try to find better venues. We know that the best places for us to be are at things like carnivals and fairs. They're hard for vendors to get into, though. We weren't sure what we were going to do this fall, but a few weeks ago a big door was opened for us. At one of the farmers' markets, our booth is next to a man who owns and operates a corn maze and was there selling his corn. He invited us to come operate there this fall. We are so excited! I think that may be the perfect place for us to be, and means for God to provide in big ways. This weekend was the first weekend (after it was rained out the previous week), and business for the maze was a little slow, but we still did okay in our sales. Not as well as we had hoped, but Septembers are much slower than Octobers for places like that. So we're still very optimistic. It's been a rocky start for the business, but we're just riding it out. (If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, right?)

The Product

Oreo!

Cinnamon

Caramel Pretzels

We make them with all kinds of toppings.

Marshallows dipped in caramel-
yum.

Making the Apples
We make the caramel from scratch and dip them all ourselves. It takes over two hours just to make the caramel alone. It is an art that we take pride in. =) We take turns going with Daddy to a commercial kitchen in Loveland to do all the work. A BIG thank you goes to Mr. Searcy who did all the electric work to get our stove up and running there!

Here's a few videos of Aidan helping make the caramel. (Please don't report us to the health department. As you can see, he wasn't wearing a hair net...)





At the Corn MazeAt the farmers' markets, we setup a portable canopy and that is our space. At the corn maze, Mr. Langridge built us a small booth. He just put up a box frame, and we covered it with some tarps. Simple; but it looks great, and it's so nice to have something more permanent. (Thanks again, Mr. Langridge!)
Here's Daddy, Allen, and Mr. Langridge working hard to built the box.



The time of building wasn't all sweat and tears, though. There were some fun and games involved.
Mr. Langridge (at Allen's suggestion) checking how far he could shoot a nail from his nail gun... :



Here's a video documentary of the almost finished product:
(Allen bumped my elbow...)


Open for business!

As always, we really appreciate your prayers in this endeavor!

Anna's 5; Allen's a deck builder

I realized I skipped a birthday!

Twelve days ago, Anna Banana turned 5.

We celebrated in the usual way: having cake and icecream with Grandma and Grandpa (this time at their house), and singing about 6 birthday songs while the candles melt and the wax starts to drip onto the cake.

Itchy Eyes, Stuffed Up Nose, God's Provision

For those who are interested in the lame tale of my life with allergies and the light at the end of the tunnel.


Some of you know I've had horrible allergies since I was about 13 or 14. They used to be really, really bad in the late spring and all summer; itchy eyes, runny nose, clogged up sinuses, etc. Then the symptoms started changing a bit and my eyes aren't bad anymore, but I can pretty much never breath through my nose, and I've had terrible pain and pressure in my ears almost constantly (which is why you'll see me trying to pop them all the time... haha it doesn't work.) and they lasted this whole year instead of just a season. Because of my allergies, my immune system is low, I think, so whenever half of my family gets sick, I'm always in the half, and instead of a 3 day cold it drags on for 2 weeks or so.

We All Can Use a Laugh..

A few of my favorite random YouTube videos...

Quote

"Duty is ours; results are God's."
-John Quincy Adams, sixth President of the United States

I love that quote!
Thank you, HSLDA magazine- I had never heard that one before.

July and August Happenings: Pictures, Pictures, Pictures

So. These aren't really in chronological order, or any order for that matter. But, here we go!

First thing's first (obviously):

Birthdays!

We had Grandma and Grandpa over on Saturday to celebrate 3 birthdays:

Grandpa's- August 15th- He turned 79!

Allison's- August 16th- Her 14th! (That hasn't quite sunk in for me yet..)

Andrew T.'s - August 9th- He reached double digits; 10!

Grandma made her famous "Shrimp, Noodles, and Broccoli." It is a Fountain favorite.

The Birthday Trio

Allen and Grandpa
Aidan Boy

Grandpa appreciating Anna's drawing, complete with a note written in her cute, wobbly script.



Anna Banana

Laughing about the 10 lb fishing pole... or something. =]
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Okay, this wasn't in July or August, but it still needed to be put up.

Annina hosted a book tea at their house (with one of the most beautiful views ever... I think that view is what made me appreciate the prairie and want to move there as opposed to the forrest.)

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The Fourth of July in Thornton.

They've never had these guys drop down at night before! It was really cool.

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Hanging out with the Kaisers

Andrea in her element.

This made me realize just how long her hair is. Beautiful!

Ethan terrorizing me with a chicken...

One of Daniel's cute puppies.

Sam making puppy smile (Ethan in the background getting into the barn with the puppies through the only entrance, unless you can figure out a broken combination lock.)

Allison thinking about walking off with him.

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Nathan Clark George Concert at the Fine's

It happened to be on Daddy's birthday and also Mr. Martinez's birthday.

Beautiful property!

They were so generous to host this.

Very talented! One of Andrea's favorite artists (second only to Josh Groban).

Some of the boys.

Avery, Peter, Trent, Brice, Luke

Seth Cohen!

I got to hog the baby for a bit.

Pretty Andrea!!

Sammy (I think?) Fine

caught with a messy face. =]

Wary of those who wanted his cake.

Haha I love this!

holding his fork, but not using it

sunset

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Days at the Park
A few times after church some families have gotten together and played softball and volleyball, and sometimes basketball and ultimate frisbee. It's a very fun time of fellowship.

I still don't know what Jared's plan was here...

If you click on the picture you can see it enlarged.

Becky Martin

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The Fawn

One day while most of us were playing volleyball, some of the boys were in the nearby field of waist-high weeds playing with their airsoft guns. Out of the weeds came running this little fawn. I have never seen some of those boys run so fast. Pretty soon, Isaac Nabeta brought it down with a graceful diving grab. Apparently, "it's just like catching a goat!"

I can't believe we got to pet a baby deer!

At first, we thought it might die of fright, but it calmed down soon enough and we kept him long enough for each of us to pet him. What an experience!

Bradley.

He chased the fawn down, and Isaac is behind him.

Fun times!
We got mostly everyone in on this one.

Good thing Timmy has Anna's stuffed cat wrapped up in a blanket! =]

We let him go and later saw him walking with his mother and sibling.

We've gotten rained on a couple times (some times worse than others...) but the weather afterwards is always well worth it. I don't know how well this will show up, but there's a rainbow in this picture.

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Mr. Chapa's Retirement Ceremony

At the US Air Force Academy

Mr. Chapa happened to actually fly that very plane sitting there years ago.

We were fortunate enough to end up in Mr. Chapa's group for the tour. It was so fun getting to hear his experiences and getting know him in that way. He has such a neat story. It was also was also great hearing someone we knew explain everything.

And I love the picture above. I took it thinking it would come out looking cool because Mr. Chapa, a great leader, is in the foreground and the next generation of men is behind him... or something like that.

It looks pretty good at first glance, but then you look again and it's hilarious because every single one of the boys is doing something strange... haha =]

Awww...

Oh, Andrea and I got a new pocket sized Canon camera because a) I really wanted something to take some videos with, b)Andrea wanted a camera, and c) I didn't want to always have to carry around my camera bag full of lens and everything when I just want a simple picture. Anyway, it obviously doesn't zoom as well as my Rebel does, which is why I even thought of mentioning this in the first place.

"Aw," again.
Bradley and Anna.
She loves being held.

20 years, and he accomplished more than most men will in a lifetime in that occupation!

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Wow, I don't know if I'll ever do a blog with this many pictures again...

Guess I'll just have to keep up! =]