Tamee and Jason – 6 wings and a prayer . . .

Got asked for a before and after pic –

For my fabulous fellow foodie Marc Schelske – as requested, the cardamom lime sweet rolls . . . and don’t kid yourself, these are one roll = a serving – I dare you to bake them and then stick to one roll – I made them yesterday because my parents were here, and between them and Jason, a full 18 disappeared faster than fresh roadkill in Cheatham County Tennessee . . .

Dough:
1 pck dry yeast (2 1/4 tsp)
1/4 c warm water
1/2 c reduced fat sour cream
1/3 c granulated sugar (i use demerara)
1/4 c unsalted butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 tsp salt
1 lg egg, lightly beaten
2 1/3 c flour, divided

Filling:

1/2 c packed brown sugar (light)
1 tbsp lime zest
3/4 tsp ground cardamom
2 tbsp butter, melted, divided

Glaze:

1 c confectioners sugar
3 tbsp fresh lime juice

1. Dissolve yeast in warm water; let stand 5 minutes.

2. Combine in large bowl until well blended, sour cream through egg. Gradually stir yeast mixture into sour cream mixture. Lightly spoon 2 cups of flour and stir until soft dough forms.

3. Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface. Knead until smooth and elastic (about 8 minutes)(I used my stand mixer with the dough hook). Add remaining flour up to 1/3 c a tablespoon at a time until dough is tacky but doesn’t stick to hands.

4. Place dough in a large bowl coated with cooking spray, turning to coat. Cover and let rise in a warm place (85) free from drafts, 1 hr or until doubled.

5. To prepare filling, combine zest, brown sugar and cardamom. Divide dough into two equal portions. Roll portion into 12 x 10 rectangle, brush with butter, spread filling evenly. From long edge, roll dough, pinching side seam to seal. Repeat with second portion of dough. Slice each into 12 rolls, place in greased 13 x 9 pan cut side up. Cover and let rise 30 minutes or until doubled in size.

6. Preheat oven to 350

7. Uncover dough, Bake at 350 for 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool five minutes on rack, then add glaze.

130 cal, 3.8 g fat, 1.9 g protein, 22.2 g carb, 0.5 g fiber, 19 mg chol, 0.8 g iron, 102 mg sodium, 17 mg calcium

I’d like to sing a rousing chorus of “queen of my double wide trailer” here, but that would be quite unkind, since we are living in the lap of luxury compared to all of the third world and a good share of this great land we’ve just crossed . . .

So it’s not done, most of the wall art is still boxed, and there are odds and ends cluttering things up, but below are the preliminary house pics –

My office – yes, MY office – I have my very own space! No Jason allowed!

Our bedroom – there’s a little quarter bath in the righthand corner too, didn’t think you needed to see that ;o)

Guest room – still a mess, but better get in order cause my parents are coming in two days!

Living room as seen coming from the bedroom hallway

Dining/Living room seen from the deck/back door

Kitchen from the dining room/back door

Back yard – our property goes waaay back into the woods back there – lots for jas to mow!

Deck – duh – that bald guy came with the house, I can’t seem to get rid of him . . .

He’s pretending to study – don’t let him fool you

My herb boxes – just outside the kitchen window -

There’s that bald guy again – a man and his traeger, it’s a beautiful thing . . .

so i learned that you can’t tell gpa you want to do ANYthing outside, because he and his buddy Ray Lyons will just show up and make it happen – I have a “garden” because I made the mistake of not being specific enough when I said I wouldn’t mind having a tomato plant or two, meaning, in a pot, on my deck, easy to care for, no work, etc. The next day I came home to find they’d been here with the tiller, and had left strict instructions that I was to call when I had my plants so they could come over to help me put them in. I dutifully bought some maters, peppers and zucchini, and called gpa and Ray. They showed up with tools and a bucket of, I kid you not, cow patties. I’ll let you know how many neighbors die of e. coli.

My “garden”

My first banana pepper, if the deer or our pet groundhog don’t get it first . . .

Front of the house – a landscaper’s dream, and trust me, I’m dreaming

The man cave, from the stairs – laundry off to the right – isn’t it a sty already? boys are gross . . .

Man cave from the laundry room – stairs off to the left . . . what happens in the man cave, stays in the man cave . . .

So that’s our little casa, actually, that’s our enormous casa – I just realized there’s no pics of the front yard, but it’s just another half acre of lawn and old hickory trees – guest room will be vacant and clean by sunday, so ya’ll come on down, we’ll leave the light on for ya!

We got wired today – what a production to get everything installed so we could get back to our virtual life . . .

So here’s the rundown of our Tennessee Family, so in future I won’t continue my annoying habit of explaining for the millionth time who everyone is:

Kevin and Alison – Jason’s parents, they live about 14 miles from us
Nan – Jason’s maternal grandmother, she lives with Kevin and Alison
Jeremy & Jeanette, Steve, Grace, Elizabeth and baby Joey (due in August) – Jason’s older brother, his wife and their 3, soon to be 4 children, they live about 10 miles away.
Paul Howard & Lavon – Jason’s paternal grandparents, they live about 25 yards across our back yard.
Ann & Milton – my mom and step-dad – they live about 4 hours away, just north of Knoxville.
BJ & Sharl, Vincent, Daniel and Emily – BJ is one of our closest friends, Jason and I have known her longer than we’ve known each other – she and her husband Sharl live 20 minutes away, and BJ is the mom of Vincent, Daniel and our Goddaughter, Emily.
Annette & Lee – Annette is like a second mom to me, she and her oldest son Lee live very close.

That’s the core, there are several aunts, uncles and cousins, and no Ben, there are no “my uncle/cousin” connections.

Father’s day -

Father’s day – four generations of handsome . . .

Princess Gracie

Lizzie – yes, we call her Lizzie

Lizzie – yes, we call her Lizzie

Jason about to say something incredibly profound – that’s Steve in the foreground, he won’t sit still long enough for a good picture

So it’s been a busy week, we got unloaded very quickly, but getting unpacked and settled is a different story – my parents are coming from east tennesse on wednesday, my mom is an expert organizer, so I’m planning on putting her to work, and my step-dad is an expert putterer, so he’ll be busy as well.

Jason finished his stats homework and takes his final via a proctor this thursday, then gets to finish preparing for his GRE which he sits on July somethingorother.

Could this have been any more random of a post? I’m tired, gimme a break.

Sorry for the post delay, won’t have internet at home for another week, so I’m down the street using the wifi at the school while Jason does his admissions stuff. I can’t thank ya’ll enough (like my appropriate use of ya’ll, Tom?) for your hilarious posts – we were overdue for a good laugh. The house is about 3/4 done, I’ll upload some pics when all the boxes are put away and the floors are swept. Henry is loving watching the squirrels in the back yard, we don’t want to let him out for a few more days yet, but once we do, I’m sure we’ll find a decimated squirrel carcass placed lovingly on our back steps. Puddles is right at home of course, she can be at home anywhere as long as her smelly green chair is there waiting for her.

To the newlyweds, I just hung my campy little Multnomah Falls thermometer on my kitchen window this morning, so thanks for helping me identify what EFFING HOT looks like on a thermometer.

To KDM and the boy posse, I hung the star Willy made for me on the bathroom mirror so I’ll see it every morning.

To P – Found your note in the box o’ kitchen stuff – made me cry – so thanks, I think? ;o)

To K & C – Our new framed pic is the only photo that’s made the grade so far, thankfully I can see what we look like with Jason’s face shaved and me without a do-rag on my head!

BM, got anything I can put in my corncob pipe?

More later –

xo – t & j

Actually, we are for a couple more hours – below is a compilation post from Wednesday and Thursday . . .

Corncob pipe dreams. . .

Laramie to Wichita (hey, there’s a country song in there somewhere) – It was in the low 30’s last night. We had toyed with the idea of utilizing the camper last night in an attempt to make this feel like a vacation rather than a drudgery – thank goodness we didn’t do it, we’d have frozen! There are some REALLY cool mountains just east of Laramie – they are sort of fairytale-ish, like big round boulders perched atop each other, looking both precarious and indestructible all at the same time. So that’s my nod to gorgeous scenery, the entire rest of the day has been one flat cornfield after another . . . oh, wait, don’t forget the bean fields, one after the other . . . . and the cattle ranches, one after the other . . . you get the idea. Much like day one, it’s all very beautiful, but enough already!

We’ve been in Kansas for a couple of hours now, with plans to make Wichita before dark, that should put us in a good position to roll on in to Nashville tomorrow, a day ahead of schedule. Two SUPER things about today, relative to Oregon/Idaho/Utah, fuel in Colorado and Kansas has been cheap, we just paid $3.59 for unleaded, and we could use every break we can get! The other marvelous thing . . . it’s been gorgeous all day, sunny, warm, perfect to have the windows down with the eclectic mid-Kansas oldies station on – a little Eddie Arnold and some Loretta Lynn. We’re soaking it up, because we’re skirting some wicked looking weather, according to the news, these are the storms that have been dumping massive weather on much of the Midwest – so not to be tangled with. We’re hoping to be bedded down in Topeka long before we meet up with the storms.

Beginnings of the storm

Into the eye of the storm . . .

Ooooookkkkkkkk – so THAT plan didn’t work out so good. I wrote the previous parts of that post just before we drove into the eye of swirling bowels of satan’s own little tea party. I didn’t get the pictures uploaded, I’m sorry, we were so exhausted by the time we got in, I couldn’t get my head around the wi-fi instructions so I’m writing this on Thursday morning from breakfast at Cracker Barrel. Just as we came into Russell we entered hard rain, hail, and driving wind. Jason found a station with the weather, actually, ALL of them were broadcasting the weather because we were entering a storm cell that was spawning tornados, hail, and 60 mph winds. The freaking out broadcasters were informing us of the constantly changing wind speed and the visible hook echo (we don’t know what it is either, but it’s VERY dramatic to hear on the radio when you’re about to wet your pants). We had to pull off and park under an overpass because of the hail – when that let up (the only good thing about a storm that’s moving 43 mph means it passes over a whole lot quicker than rain in Portland), we moved on to Russell.

Dissipating storm . . .

Just as we were entering Russell, they broadcast that a tornado was on the ground in Ellsworth, six miles ahead of us. It was moving NE, away from us, so dad kept driving. I’ve been in a tornado as a child, and a hurricane and an earthquake as an adult . . . I have to say, I’ve not really been more scared ever in my life. There was just no safe place to be – there’s NOTHING out here, no shelter, no place to go. We passed through Ellsworth, Kansas about four minutes behind the tornado. There wasn’t any evident damage from the highway, but the storm was still pretty intense. We heard this morning that the storm we came through leveled a boyscout camp, no one died, but if I was scared, I can’t imagine how a bunch of little boys on a camping trip must have felt.

We made Wichita by 9:30, bedded down at the luxurious Motel6 just in time for the municipal tornado alarm to go off. We were so tired, we just turned the fan up and went to sleep. We were still alive this morning, so our plan of denial just have protected us from harm.

Breakfast is here, so I’m going to down some coffee and nutrients. I’ll upload pictures from yesterday at our next stop – I got a couple of pretty impressive pictures as we were coming into the storm.

Best to all – we’re missing you like crazy, keep posting, it makes us laugh at every stop. Big love.

Pic of big hill in wyoming

Another Pic of a big hill in wyoming

Today was wind, weather and wildlife day. After a restful night in Twin Falls last night, we hit the road, taking the cutoff on I80 just before Salt Lake City. Jason was disappointed, he has never been to SLC before, and after hearing me describe it, was sort of hoping we’d change our route so he could check it out, but alas, we put Alison in charge of the route, so no detours today . . . she’s a very strict tour guide.

In a shout out to Paula, I drove the leg that took us through Devils Slide in Utah. About 15 years ago she and I crossed that pass westbound in my little old Honda in the dead cold of a February snowstorm. She was married to Austin and AC’s dad at the time, and she called him from a little hole in the wall gas station in the middle of nowhere demanding that he come get her immediately because I was trying to kill us via vehicular homicide. We survived, but our friendship barely did. We found out after we got home to Portland that she had been pregnant with Austin on the trip, which explained the high emotions going on.

We weren’t in Utah for long, and the most relevant thing I can say about Wyoming is that it’s only slightly less boring than eastern Oregon, and is only less boring because it has some pretty majestic mountains, more grass and trees, and less tumbleweed. In addition to a monster thunderstorm today, we saw many many many wind farms. We had never seen a wind turbine in person before, they are really remarkable. I’m including a picture, but they really don’t do it justice, they’re incredibly tall, and each blade is enormous. We also came through some gale force winds, which I guess must be common in the wide open spaces of Wyoming. There are snow drift barriers everywhere and every 20 miles or so there are arm barriers like railroad crossings along with giant signs and warning lights saying “I80 closed when flashing, turn around ahead” . . . makes me thankful we’re doing this in June instead of January.

Pic of Wind Farm

We saw a real live cowboy at lunch, the only disappointment was that we saw him at Wendy’s . . . oh well, we’ll take our western culture wherever we can find it. Wyoming also boasts a whole lotta antelope – they’re looking pretty scraggly this time of year, they appear to be shedding their winter coats, so they all look slightly leprotic (yes, I made that word up, sue me). We also saw a mess o’ prairie dogs, rather cute little rodents, but they made it hard to find a place for poor puddles to take a leak without getting her leg gnawed off. Henry is faring pretty well today, we drugged him, but only a mini dose, so he’s been up and around, checking out the scenery any time we open a window.

Pic of prairie dog

We’re almost to Laramie, where we’re stopping for the night. There is a G & T in Jason’s immediate future, and an ambien in mine.

Pic of the penske, almost to Laramie

Our mailing address has been requested – so here y’go – 1002 Jasperson Drive, Madison, TN 37115. Our phone numbers won’t change.

ex’s and oh’s, T & J

Pic of the Road Trippers

That pretty much sums up the day, but honestly, except for the bad coffee, what could go wrong if you have Jimmy and John along for the ride?

Wow, there is a WHOLE lotta nuthin in eastern Oregon – and by nuthin, I mean some really pretty mountains and some tumbleweed. Now don’t get me wrong, we think mountains and tumbleweed have a beauty of their own, but enough already. We are stopped at a gas station waiting for Kevin and Alison, Jason’s parents, to catch up to us. They are driving the moving truck towing the Honda, and have Puddles with them. We’re in the Hyundai towing the camper with Henry in a big kennel in the back seat. We had to separate the “kids” because Henry kept reaching out his little kitty paws through the bars in desperation and every time he got within a foot of Puddles, she’d snarl at him. Henry is on some killer kitty tranquilizers, so it’s kind of fun to watch him interact with the world because he’s verrrryyyyyy sssssslllloooooowwwwwwwww.

Pic of HenryPic of Henry

So were planning to make Twin Falls tonight, not as far as we COULD go, but as far as we NEED to go. Alison has had surgery on her knee, so she get’s pretty miserable if she has to sit still for huge amounts of time, so we’re going to shoot for 550 miles per day –

Ok, so we’ve arrived at our luxurious quarters in Twin Falls – pics below of the gorge and some CRAZY guys who were parachute jumping off the bridge.

Pic of Twin Falls

Pic of Crazy Bridge Jumping Peeps

Pic of Bridge the Crazy People Were Jumping Off

A quick upload and I’m heading to bed . . . but before I do I have to say again, if it’s possible to enjoy loading a truck to move, we thoroughly enjoyed having the invaluable help of Chris, Kelly, Lisa and Tom – it was cheerful, funny, festive, and in spite of the backbreaking work, it went by quickly.

If you’re reading this, we love you – and we miss you already. 1 day down, 933 days to go . . . we’ll be home soon!

broke fast with the rents, ran the rounds to say goodbye – started out getting misty at Kelly and Chris’s last night, moved up to crying at Rod’s work, ramped it up a little for Lisa and Tom – then dealt a little emo three card draw for paula and the boys. I’m tiiiiiirrrrred. It’s emotionally exhausting to leave people you love. I guess we’re pretty lucky though that there ARE people we love.

Speaking of people we love, Jason’s parents, Kevin and Alison are here with smiles on their bright shiney faces – all ready for a grueling cross country marathon with us. Our parents have all stepped up on their own way. My mom and step-dad sent us several hundred dollars worth of professional packing supplies. My dad and step-mom sent us an incredibly extravagant donation to help fund the move. And all have offered to help pack, help drive, help unpack, etc. We’re lucky lucky kids, and we know it.

we’ll have a picture post up tomorrow – I’m started to bob and weave, so i’m turning in now. Rumor has it, big daddy kev wants us on the road by 0500 – so i need some beauty sleep.

love to all.

T&J