June Ohio Trip

Three months have flown by without me even realizing it. By the end of the week, I will catch all of you up on the things that Will and I have been doing this summer. The first of which is the trip I took to Ohio.

My cousin Brian Muhlenkamp had his wedding the weekend I was in Ohio. It was a beautiful wedding and I had a great time chatting with family members. It was a great way to see everyone during the short time that I was with them.
Of course my mother never looses an opportunity to take a family photo.
The latest from the "Buening" family.






Rygh and I went to Sunday services at United Christian Church in Englewood. I couldn't wait to hear Coleen preach again. Will and I truly miss her. She has such passion about the Word, and delivers such a powerful message. Only those with completely hardened hearts would dare say differently. We are blessed to have Coleen and our other friends from UCC in our lives. We think of them often.
After Church we went out to lunch at La Rosa's.

Rygh was very excited about the cross bracelet that Coleen gave him.








Group shot of Coleen, Karen, Heather and myself.








After Church on Sunday, Mom and Dad had a wonderful picnic style get together. I had such a great time visiting with everyone.







I also had an opportunity to have dinner with two of my close friends, Kate and Jenny. It was great to see them again and spend time together.

Thanks to everyone that helped make my trip a memorable one!

Cooking!

Being that I am a working wife and mother, sometimes I feel like there just isn't enough time in a day. One of the things that tend to take up most of my time it seems, is dinner. So, as some of you know, I am taking a different approach to cooking. I make up a menu, or dishes that I want to eat that month, make out a grocery list based on the food I pick out, print out coupons, and hit the grocery store. I am finding that we are eating much healthier, spending less money, and spending more time together. I usually do this over a weekend because it usually takes me all day Saturday and sometimes Sunday to make up all the food and freeze it. I just decide a day or two in advance what we would like to eat, and pull it out of the freezer to thaw. For some of the dishes, I found it was better to prepare them and bake them after I unfreeze it. I am beginning to realize that I like to cook a lot more than I thought I did. Rygh and Will are being wonderful at trying all of the food I am making. (Vegetarian dishes and all)

In combination with making food for the family, I have been making my own soups for my lunch. I was getting tired of Turkey noodle soup, so I decided to branch out. I made an incredible batch of Tomato, Butternut Squash, and Herb soup.

I was able to get 11 servings of soup from one batch.
Will likes to joke about all of this is helping me prepare for "the jungle". I laugh, but he is probably right. Knowing that I can make food that isn't from a can or box is a good thing.

Mission Aviation Fellowship

On Saturday MAF dedicated their new plane - The Kodiak. Each time MAF adds a plane to their fleet, they dedicate the plane to God and his work. This time was no exception. As MAF president John Boyd put it "We are experiencing history". This is the first time that a plane has been engineered, created, and built for the sole purpose of furthering God's Kingdom. The Kodiak is impressive to see and look at. We are all excited about the new addition. MAF has 15 more Kodiaks on order.

We were all able to check out the new plane. Will spent quite a bit of time explaining all the controls to Rygh.
Rygh is standing in front of the Cessna 206. This is considered the "workhorse" aircraft of MAF's fleet and is being used for most of their missions throughout the world.


As you can see the Kodiak is much bigger and can be of more use in the remote areas.
One of the reasons that Mission Aviation Fellowship wanted a Jet engine plane was because of the cost savings in the jet fuel. ($4/gal) Jet fuel is easier to come by in underdeveloped countries. All of the 206's use Aviation Gas, which can cost up to $13 per gallon in some countries.

Even though the day was mostly raining and overcast, quite a few people showed up for the dedication. John Boyd recognized a father and son that drove all the way from Sacramento California for the event. The son, who is only 14, wants to be a MAF pilot, and is a faithful supporter.After the dedication we took a tour of the headquarters. Rygh was able to see the wreckage from Nate Saints plane. He was a MAF missionary pilot in Ecuador. The movie "End of the Spear" was about his life and work and that of his family, in the mission field. It was an incredible movie.
We were glad to be a part of the celebration and can't wait to be more involved in this ministry!

Finally Caught One!

That's right, we finally caught a fish. It actually fed the entire family the next night. (4 pounds, 20 inches)We believe it is a male brook trout. I am looking forward to stocking our freezer with fish! Hopefully Will and I can start fishing soon. That may be a little trickier than it would have been before the men decided to get a new hobby. The metal detector arrived on Thursday. I am not sure if they will want to go to the river to fish or hunt for buried treasure. We will see.

Tis the season....for fishing

We just got back from fishing. There is something good about the sound of water, geese, fish jumping, and crickets chirping. It makes for a wonderfully relaxing time.
We agreed that Rygh needs a new folding chair! He outgrew his about 3 years ago, and I just haven't replaced it yet. We didn't get any fish, but we were only out for a short while. We are hoping to go again on Friday.
Will and I would like to get our fishing license, but we need to get Idaho drivers licenses first. They will charge us for out of state licenses otherwise. Crazy racket! So far, Rygh is the only one fishing. Will found us a wonderful spot, about 5 miles from home, to fish. The sunset was glorious!

Ask and you shall recieve

I seemed to have totally bypassed our Easter on the blog. It was a very nice, quiet day. We didn't do too much. Our church had an egg "hunt" on Saturday Evening, and Rygh came home with 24 stuffed eggs. This year the pastor asked for help with gathering and stuffing the eggs. On major holiday events we get about 4000 attendees between all of the services, and Pastor Steve knew that he would need people to bring in the eggs. He was aiming for 9,000 plastic eggs this year. He said he had been praying about it for a while. When all of the egg donations were in, he ended up with 17,000 Easter eggs! Ask and you shall receive. It took 5 adults 2+ hours to put them all on the baseball field, and 6 min for the kids to pick them all up!

The mad dash!

Total chaos!
Rygh with Pastor Steve.

John Boyd, the President of MAF was also there with his family. I was able to get in a quick photo op with him and Will.

We colored eggs on Saturday night as well. We rose Sunday Morning, hunted eggs, and enjoyed the wonderful day. Evening Service was great.

Shoshone Falls

Of course there are many wonderful things to do in Idaho. And with the weather getting nicer, it is better for traveling through the mountains or anywhere for that matter. Shoshone falls is just one of the wonders to be found here in the great Gem State (nicknamed because it is one of only two places in the world where star garnets can be found (the other is the Himalaya Mountains, in India), and is the only place six pointed star garnets have been found).
The shoshone falls is a waterfall on the Snake River located approximately five miles east of Twin Falls, Idaho. Sometimes called the "Niagara of the West," Shoshone Falls is 212 feet high--36 feet higher than Niagara Falls-- and flows over a rim 900 feet wide.
Because of drought and irrigation, the levels of water of the falls are only about 1/2 of what they used to be. And in late summer much lower than that.
If I would have remembered my camera I could have shown you the incredible pictures. They would have turned out something like these:

http://www.csi.edu/virtualTourSI_/shoshoneFalls.asp

We drove about 2 hours to the falls, spent time looking at the incredible display of water power, fished for a couple of hours and headed home. It was a wonderful time.