P&R Seeds

Peter and I started a company a few weeks ago. We are both really excited. We are going to be selling Peter's anthocyanin tomato. It's healthy and really beautiful. I will have to take a picture soon. I thought that I had a photo on my computer, but Peter must have them all at work.

We are looking forward to the opportunities that this business will bring us. I am sure the Lord has plans to use this business. It's fun to see something new unfold!

I am also so amazed with who the man I married is and what he can do. He works hard at his paying job to do the tomatos on the side. And he spends time coaching Samuel's soccer team as well as the responsibilities he has taken on at church. Today is a long day for him. He left early this morning for work and won't get home until about 9 because he has a deacons meeting that he leads. Oh, and he teaches Abraham chemistry. What a blessing my man is!

Playing with black and white

I wanted to try something new with Elements.  Peter's picture looked a ton better when I had it surrounded by black.  I definitely like the lower picture better.  Better contrast.  The top one has too much sky and not enough contrast.  I used two different methods of conversion to black and white.  The lower method wins hands down for me.  What do you think? 

Raised veggie beds

We recently made some raised beds for veggies in our backyard.  Okay, it was really Peter.  I think the idea of me with a power tool terrifies him, but he was nice and said that it was my job to make sure Esther didn't get in the way.  If you want a how to and wonderful, helpful pictures go the Pioneer Woman's page on building your own raised beds.  If you want to laugh and not really be informed stay here.

Okay step one in our version is be Dutch.  Go ask business landlord for some really old wood from a building that he is tearing down.  You didn't have to buy any wood, what a good Dutch person you are!  Next completely forget to take pictures of the pile of really old wood.  Isn't that easy.  Okay, now that we are this far let's jump to laying out the wood for where you might want it to go.  

As you can see we decided to put ours in the corner.  And I made sure to get a toy and some trash in the picture to make sure you know this is our yard and I didn't sneak into someone else's yard and pretend that we are industrious.  Peter put the drill in to show he was going to be part of the project.

You can see here the pitfalls of being Dutch.  You get wood with jagged edges and have to make your bed smaller than you may have wished.  But the wood won't warp, it's been prewarped for you.  Now comes the tricky part, you have to leave it there for and get carried away with real life.  I know it's hard, but in order for this to work you have to coach soccer and make money to eat.  There have to be Easter egg hunts.
Now that your week of doing other things has gone by you can get back to work.  Make one bed without your wife even noticing, aren't you awesome now!  Next call her outside to show her the ripping apart of a door from the torn down building.  

Doing work stealthy can make for disjointed pictures, but we aren't professionals so it doesn't matter.  Next your wife has to forget that she is supposed to keep taking pictures and goes inside to make dinner.  Next thing you know have built two beds and there aren't any more pictures of work being done.  It can make you seem like magic.  You sure are awesome now! 

Now add soil that you get from the same landlord for free again.  

Now the raised beds are ready for veggie seeds.  And you have a very appreciative wife.

I have learned alot from this little adventure.  I really appreciate what Peter does around the house.  And I also learned that I have to take more pictures and they have to be closer to the work being done.  Oh, and I need to keep the yard picked up better.  Peter was a full cooperater in this and no Dutchmen were harmed in the making.

Pictures from Peter's trip

Here are some pictures from Peter's trip.  The pictures are descending in order date wise.  The pictures start in Israel and end in Turkey.

I'm done

Seriously, I'm done with my husband being gone.  I realize that others have it harder, their husbands are in the military and are gone for months at a time.  I married a plant breeder.  I didn't marry a superhero.  He's wonderful, so I'm not saying that to demean him in any way.  But when we got married his unrealistic promise was that he wouldn't travel at all.  We were so young and stupid.  (It reminds me of my Grandpa Abie's promise to not die before Grandma Joy.)  How can a person make a promise like that and keep it?  I love that he is endeavoring to keep his promise, but it was unrealistic to begin with.  So I in my "I'm so above it" way have let him out of that promise.  I'm the superdeduperest wife ever, right?!

Let me tell you how wonderful he is.  He lets me sleep in most of the time right now.  He is funny in his own special goofy way, which is a wonderful way to keep me real.  I love that as grown up and driven as he is, his favorite Christmas gift was the Nerf supercool gun he got himself.  He likes to play Nerf gun battles with his boys.  How awesome is that?!  And he usually doesn't even shoot me in the rear!  He likes my crazy way that I get all riled up about some seemingly insignificant idea.  He even enjoys the arm waving and everything!  It may be that he's laughing at me, but I think he likes that I surprise him when, and at what, my crazy comes out.  Well, that's enough of a peek at his awesomeness.

Back to the original reason for the post, I miss him terribly.  I feel so alone without him around.  It helps that he calls, but it really isn't the same.  We have another week until he comes home and I can't wait.  I talked to him a bit ago and he is fine.  There is some Lebanese dessert that he choked down in Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan that he had this evening in Israel that tasted good there.  (Did you understand with the thats?) The way he told the story was funny and I was glad to hear his humor and laugh.  I never noticed how much I enjoy his company until now.  He is truly my best friend, how blessed am I to have married someone so wonderful.  It's amazing really, when we wed nearly ten years ago, we had only known each other for almost 6 months.   God really had His hand in our lives.

I tried to find a picture on my computer to photoshop to make look even awesomer, but I took some really horrible pictures over the last month.  I can't even photoshop them to make them look good.