Banana Bread & caramels!

Finally, I have no more frozen bananas left in my freezer!  I made tons of banana bread to clean out all the bananas, as I had accumulated quite a few in the last few months.  I buy a ton of them when they go on sale for $.29 lb. which is not often, it's an amazing deal lately.  Then our family doesn't quite eat all of them before they get super ripe, so in the freezer they go.  Today was a chilly, wet day, perfect for baking!  Love the smell of banana bread wafting through the house.  We were able to get quite a few huge bags of leaves off of the lawn yesterday - but not wanting to do it today, as it is raining & cold.  We are supposed to get a little snow tonight.  If we do, it will be our first snow of the year.  Weather has been super warm, we have been spoiled, so I guess it's time to get cold now.  The warm weather is so nice for walks & just enjoying being outside & doing yard work, but not so great when it collides with cool weather fronts.  About 4 days ago, at least 50 tornadoes, they think maybe 75 tornadoes, hit south-central Illinois, a small section of Missouri and parts of Michigan.  Some towns had sections of houses that were completely destroyed & just missing.  The houses were carried off elsewhere.  It was quite the destruction where the tornadoes touched down.  Eight people died in the storm.  When compared with the Phillipine typhoon, considering that so far, they figure about 5,000 people have died, but they are not sure they will ever know how many people are gone, as many of the islands that were hit are fairly isolated & it will be a long time before all the dead are accounted for.  Awful to read the news & see the dead lined up in body bags - that they don't have enough of - and being buried in mass graves.  All of the LDS missionaries are now safe & accounted for, but what a lot of work there is to do now to help the Philipino people recover.   They are facing shortages of food, no electricity, no water & it's so hard for relief trucks to get into where the people are needing help, as the roads are impassible & destroyed.  The devastation is unbelievable.  They were just hit with an earthquake last month that was pretty hard in some areas.  There have been alot of earthquakes, floods, volcanoes erupting in the last month or so.  It seems like the weather is getting pretty intense in many areas of the world.   Or maybe I'm just paying attention to it so much because of Typhoon Yolanda, as they call it in the Phillipines.Phillipine Typhoon Haiyan in Nov. 2013
     Tonight is a busy night, as we are trying to decide whether to brave the weather and head to Liberty for the girls Christmas Tree lighting ceremony and get back to Excelsior in time for Seth's opening night for the high school play he's in @ 7:30.  It's going to be tight, but I think we can make it.  There is also R.S. tonight for the Wood Heights ward that I wanted to go to, but can't, so I'm sending alot of my banana bread & caramels for the baked goods swap.  I'm sad I can't go to the Interfaith choir rehearsal either, as they are singing "My Kindness Shall Not Depart from Thee".  It's such a beautiful hymn about Joseph Smith & his sufferings in the Liberty Jail.  I first heard it when I attended the historical presentation @ the Liberty Jail to celebrate 50 years since it was first dedicated as a visitor's center.  Elder Ballard also spoke there & it was a wonderful conference.  I realized after listening to the presentations that we have been so immersed in the early Saints history since living here in Missouri.  We've had the chance to learn so much about the early days of the church & the things the saints experienced, just by living here & being so close to historical sights.  I felt truly blessed that our kids know so much because of the many experiences we've had while living here.
    Thanksgiving is just around the corner.  I'm always amazed at how fast the holidays approach.  Time seems as though it is getting so fast all the time, no matter how hard I try to slow our pace of life down, it just keeps zooming past us.  I probably need to be a better time manager, as it seems to slip through my fingers so quickly.
     We are currently trying to get our renter to vacate our farm in Gallatin, as he hasn't paid rent for 3 months now.  We have heard that he may be moving to a new place at the end of November.  Hope that's true, as we don't have excess funds to go through the legal system to get him out of there.  It's frustrating to have to deal with these kinds of situations & people that take advantage of another's kindness.  We had offered to lower the rent for him, with the understanding that there was work to be done that he was welcome to do if he felt like he wanted to.  Because we had lowered the rent to help his tight financial situation, we didn't have extra $ to fix things up.  We thought he understood this arrangement, he seemed very willing & happy with it before he moved in, but after he moved in, things changed & he began complaining about all the things he wasn't happy with & expecting us to come up & take care of it.   We tried to work things out with him, but he became very unreasonable, & so now we are hoping to get him out of there, as we have new renters that will pay more & are willing to sign a contract (this renter refused to, at which point we should have never let him move in).  They also are not worried about what needs to be fixed up and this time, we'll have it in writing, so they can't change their tune once they are in our property.  We've learned some hard lessons, that it doesn't always pay to try & help out those who you feel bad for.  It's sad that people do these kinds of things, but what you send out comes back around, so I guess I should feel bad mostly for our renter, who takes advantage of others in this way.  He sure has made it hard for us to be carrying 2 mortgages, at a time when we're supposed to be supporting Daniel on his mission.  We've had to ask family for help with his mission costs, and that was hard to do.  So many have offered to do what they can each month, but it feels wrong to rely on them so much for our responsibilities.  I sure hope our current renter truly is out by the end of this month.  That would help us so much, as we have better renters waiting to move in as soon as they can.  I was not very happy when we went up there to hand deliver his eviction notice and saw how bad our property & farmhouse looked.  To  make matters worse, they didn't do anything with my precious apple trees & apples were rotting on the ground.  I told him I was going to pick the ones still on the tree.  He said he didn't care, he didn't like apples anyway.  I picked a couple of bushels of apples & brought them home to can.  We have lots of applesauce for the winter.  Grateful that we were able to avoid wasting all that fruit.  I was amazed that the apples had no bugs in them & were a huge size & in such good condition,as there has been no one to tend my sweet apple trees.  That was the hardest thing, leaving my fruit trees.  They were just starting to produce profusely & then we had to move.  I really miss my peach trees.  That is my favorite fruit of all time.  Hoping to get more fruit trees planted this next spring at our new house.
     Well, there is so much to say about the scary things that our illegal citizen/President Obama is implementing.  Too much government control, ridiculous changes to the Constitution.  If ever there was a time that the constitution was hanging by a thread, it is now.   I think the U.S. is headed for a financial crisis in the next year or two.  I would be surprised if we even have a year left before the economy crashes.  Things are not headed in a good direction.  There is alot to worry about, yet I am grateful for the wonderful days we still enjoy as a family.  I know that this won't last for too much longer, so I feel grateful for the many blessings we still enjoy.
      Daniel has been on his mission for almost 3 months now and is learning, little by little, how to speak Castellano.  Chilean Spanish is quite fast and different from the Spanish that we learn here in the U.S.  I would so much love to go and pick him up from his mission when he is done, as that is where I served my mission as well.  I've always wanted to go back, but never have been able to.  It would be so amazing to take our whole family there as well, but just way too expensive for our tight budget.  I hope I get to travel alot in the next life, as I really had hoped to do more in my lifetime.  I love making travel plans, figuring out the best route and places to see along the way.  There is so much to learn about in this wonderful world of our Heavenly Father's and I so wanted to spend alot of my days seeing as much of it as I could.  I hope to have that opportunity some time in my life.  I have much to be grateful for, good kids, a good husband & knowing the truths of the gospel.  I love how much learning there is always available to us in the gospel & in many other areas of life.  This is such a great learning environment.  God knew what He was doing when he designed our mortal lives.  If you refuse to learn, life just is orchestrated that you have to learn something.  Your life becomes very challenging if you refuse to learn certain lessons, those challenges help us to learn things that we probably otherwise wouldn't have without having to figure out how to overcome obstacles that come up in each one of our lives.  I just am amazed at how God orchestrates things for each one of us.  He truly is all powerful and all knowing.  It's our job just to trust Him & try to follow where He is leading us.
     I've been called to teach Gospel Doctrine in the Wood Heights ward and I really love it.  It's challenging, but so rewarding, as I study & prepare to teach gospel truths.  I really enjoy teaching alot, esp. about the gospel. So rich & inspiring.  I love how I feel after a good class discussion.  I love the insights that people share with each other.  It just is a very fulfilling calling for me.  So grateful for this opportunity.