Category: family

around 10 years ago the terrell family started a tradition of killing our tv for the month of august. since we were going to be away from home for two weeks during august we decided to move our month without television to september (it seemed against the spirit of the tradition to do without tv merely because we were somewhere else). as computers became more a form of electronic entertainment we starting moving them into the month also.

so starting today the electronics in the terrell house will be nixed for a month except for work purposes. this means i can use my computer for work but nothing else. i’ll still update my blog every few days because pam and i agree that form of communication is essentially work related. i will also check my email and send a tweet from my phone every now and then but checking twitter or facebook are out.

see you in a month.

20 years ago pam promised to be my wife. i am eternally grateful for august 11, 1990.

this is pretty much what they do the second i finish walking them. when we picked up montana (left) from the basset rescue society they told us that “a tired basset is a good basset” because they tend to get into a lot of trouble if they are not decently worn out. these two aren’t going to cause any trouble tonight. 🙂

as many of you know pam is presently in brazil leading a study abroad course. this means i am briefly playing the single parent role (5 mores days and then she’s back). a part of this is cooking all of our meals. pam is the more creative cook of the two of us. she joined a a csa this year (community supported agriculture) and she has been making incredible things with the products that we have gotten each week. last thursday she picked up another batch of of fresh produce and she was very concerned that i use the vegetables that we had picked up. i’ve made some salads with the produce but tonight i used the beans, green onions, and basil that we received to make supper. it’s not really as good as the stuff that pam makes but it was decently tasty and filling.

tonight’s menu was grilled green onion and basil pork chops, green beans (the csa lists them with some specific name but i don’t remember it), steamed broccoli (not from the csa), and pudding (obviously not from the csa either).

the terrell family eats very well. among her many wonderful attributes pam is an excellent cook. just ask anyone who has ever eaten at our home. my wife knows how to cook and brings a great deal of variety to the terrell family menu. this is yet another reason that i am a very blessed boy. i on the other hand require an open flame to cook. i’m not helpless. we will not go hungry while pam is gone. still, i realize that most of my cooking is specialized in it’s nature. it is event cooking. it is meal preparation for when we have guests coming to join us. basically this means grilling out.

i can grill a world of things. i have entire meals (except for dessert) that are cooked on one of my weber grills (i have three so there is plenty of grilling space). pam would tell you that you don’t really know what corn should taste like until you have tasted my grilled corn – it really is good. i love cooking on a grill but it is a good bit of work and not something that i want to do every night until next weekend.

once i start cooking in the house i am a little more limited. years ago, thanks to a start from my father-in-law, i worked on perfecting a chilidog recipe. my father in law taught me a recipe that was from a chili dog place in Alabama. I continue to adapt it little by little.  it’s pretty good and the whole family loves it but i don’t want to eat chili dogs for 7 days. i can cook some other simple things but i don’t have as much variety as pam.

so here’s where i need your help. since pam is gone to brazil for a week the boys are depending upon me for sustenance. as a family we try to avoid processed foods because they are not as good for you and they are relatively expensive. do any of you have easy recipes that you would like to share with this single dad for a week?

thanks.

i just hung these skateboards in adam & noah’s bathroom. the guys have been pretty proud of the boards they have broken and i thought this was as good of a way as any for displaying the abuse they have put on their boards. i think it looks pretty good and pam has agreed that she can live with it until the boys move off to college.

today i order the platinum version of the trek fx 7.2 that i mentioned yesterday. part of my goal has been to save up enough to buy the entire family good bikes. the plan has been to buy pam and i new ones (pam needs a comfort bike because of her back) and find good used ones for the boys. as of this week i hadve saved enough money with some good buys to accomplished this goal. a month ago i found noah a used trek 800 antelope for $55 (an excellent deal) and i snatched it up. i’ve been looking for one for adam but i haven’t had any luck yet. i was able to order pam’s bike today. it is a raliegh venture comfort bike that should keep her from having to bend very much. my bike should get to the shop tuesday and pam’s should be there thursday. now i just have to find adam a decent bike that i’m not afraid of him beating to death. another trek antelope would be great. the problem is that adam is now almost as tall as i am (6’1”). he needs around a 20” frame. people my size tend to keep their bikes. i’m presently bidding on a trek 800 on ebay but i’m sure it is going to go for more than i am willing to pay. i’ll find one eventually and then the whole family can ride bikes around the green circle trail.

of course the real problem here is that in my mind i have built up the idea of the family riding around the green circle trail. i have pictured a wondrous time of family togetherness full of butterflies and unicorns. when it happens the actual trip around the green circle trail will probably have more in common with national lampoons’ vacation than it does the day dream i have built it up to be. this could be really bad. yet for now i still get to live in the dream.

pam has convinced me once again to take a ballroom dancing class. we tried this once before and i failed miserably (of course pam did great). i love trying new things. i’m not afraid to experiment with things that i have never done before and i am definitely not afraid to struggle and fail at something new. it is pretty much impossible to embarrass me so i’m not afraid of looking stupid in the class. i am however terribly scared of stepping on one of pam’s feet, losing my balance and accidentally smashing pam into the floor. i’m a pretty clumsy person and this is a legitimate fear. ask anyone who knows me – i am a bodily disaster waiting to happen. pam has already been through one back surgery, i couldn’t live with myself if she had to go through surgery again because i have two left feet.

let’s all hope and pray that i don’t accidentally damage pam through my klutzy attempts at rhythmic movements. adam and heidi holte are in the class with us so there will be witnesses if i injury pam.

btw, in the above photo you can find pam and heidi in the back row.

SIDE NOTE – after months of scrimping and saving i have enough money to buy bikes for pam and i. i don’t splurge on big things often. when i do i tend to want it to be something that i have to save and work for. therefore i have been saving to set enough money aside for the purpose of pam and i getting decent bikes. this way the whole family will finally have good bikes and we can start hitting the green circle trail. i think i have decided on the trek fx 7.2. it seems to be a good bike and eric glaze recommends it. now i have to decide between the candy apple red and the platinum. they both look pretty awesome.

we love wisconsin BUT there are a few restaurants from the south that we miss. some of these are nice restaurants and a few are fast food chains. chick-fil-a is one of the fast food restaurants that we miss. there is only one chick-fil-a in the entire state of wisconsin and that one restaurant is 3 1/2 hours away from the point area. this is a terrible thing! it seriously makes me question the intelligence of my new home state that i love so much. every now and then there is simply nothing like a chick-fil-a sandwich. even more important there is NOTHING LIKE A CHICKEN BISKET FROM CHICK-FIL-A. they are incredible. how can the great state of wisconsin not realize this and proliferate chick-fil-a’s all over the state? i just don’t understand.

a couple of months ago we were visited by sarah r., a former student from the parkview youth ministry and an impressive young lady who i am sure the world will hear about in the near future. we took sarah around central wisconsin, introduced her to tubing on ice, made her walk on the frozen wisconsin river, brought her to tapestry, and introduced her to the little slices of heaven called wisconsin cheese. sarah was nice enough to send us a chick-fil-a gift card as a thank you for her time in point. anyone who visits us needs to know that we just enjoy your visit – no gift cards are expected – but if they are sent we won’t return them 😉 anyhow the gift card was enough of a reason for us to travel 3 1/2 hours to racine, wisconsin to eat at the only chick-fil-a in wisconsin.

now it may seem a little absurd to you to travel 7 hours total to eat at a fast food restaurant. of course, such a thought simply means that you had never eaten at a chick-fil-a. you should correct this inadequacy in your life right now – drive to racine this moment. i promise it will be worth every mile. it definitely was for us. i’m sure the cost of our sandwiches probably works out to around $15 each but that’s a small price to pay for a southern fried family memory.

mhmmmm! waffle fries!