Saturday with Ashlynn

This morning, Ashlynn arrived at my house and spent most of the day with Brendon and me. What a treat to spend the day with this precious little girl! Here's some of our activities:

Dancing with the GoFish Guys! She loves clapping her hands and stomping her feet!

Feeding Sonia and Freddy pizzas at the store.

Watching all the pictures flip through the digital picture frame.

Loving on Gracie. Ashlynn is so very, very gentle with Gracie.

Singing with Uncle Brendon.

Eating PBJs for lunch while playing computer games on Sesame Street.

Going to JuJu's library to check out books and movies.

My favorite part of the whole day was when Granddaddy and Ashlynn sang, "Singaba Hambayo Thina" while doing crafts. This is one of the Sindebele songs Granddaddy learned while he lived in Africa. As you can tell, they both enjoyed it very much.

This was an incredibly wonderful day. What a joy to spend a day with your granddaughter! Making memories that I'll never, ever forget.

SNOW! SNOW! SNOW!

We had a record snow in the DFW area. 12.5 inches! It was beautiful! We've never seen anything like it and how cool of God to give us such a special treat!

Black Bean Soup

The sun is shining, there's not a cloud in the sky, and it's quite chilly today. I found a new recipe for Black Bean Soup and it was a perfect day to eat it. Here's the recipe:

2 cups dry black beans
1 ham bone
6 cups water
4 cups chicken broth
1 tablespoon broth
2 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 onion, chopped
1 tomato, diced
1/2 pound chopped ham
1 tablespoon white vinegar
Sour cream

Prepare dry beans as directed (I soaked mine overnight)
Simmer beans, water, ham bone, broth, and salt for 1 1/2 hours
Discard ham bone. Puree about 1/2 of soup; pour back into pot.
Saute onion, tomato, and ham in oil until onion is soft. Stir in vinegar, and then add mixture to beans. Simmer for 20 minutes. Serve hot with a scoop of sour cream on top.

(My soup ended up a little thick so I added another can of chicken broth to make it more "soupy".)