Bertram Family News

No, we are not pregnant. I do feel like I should be telling everyone that I am expecting a baby, but it's really too much to explain to a stranger in the Wal-Marts. Many of you know this already but as our family has begun moving forward, I decided it's high time the blog world knows our bidness. We are at the beginning stages of becoming foster parents. See, look, I've even been fingerprinted! Yay for background checks!



We had our first home walk through a couple weeks ago and submitted our first round of paperwork. We are going through the Call, which is an acrostic for Children of Arkansas Loved for a Lifetime. You can go here to read more about this wonderful organization. We will have our training in September followed by physicals, TB tests, CPR courses and more paperwork. We hope to have our home open to foster children by the first of the year. At this point we feel lead to take one child at a time, under one year of age. We are very excited about caring for the baby the Lord brings our way. We are open to foster care and adoption. Basically, we are open to love. It is our heart's desire to love, nurture and cherish the life of every little one He entrusts to our care however long or short that time may be. The unity that my man and I have felt through this whole process has been amazing. I will post the full story as time allows.

I do want to recommend a book to anyone interested in foster care or adoption. This book pushed me over the edge and just yanked so hard at my heart strings. It's The Middle Mom by Christie Erwin. I am giving one copy away to a randomly selected commenter. I've had the pleasure of getting to know the author and she has blessed me immensely and encouraged J and I as we begin this process.

So, comment away, peops. And, I must clarify this post and all future foster care/adoption related posts with the following statements: God has lead our family to this task. We do not think that every single family should adopt our views or foster our opinions. Pardon the puns. Teehehhee. Love to you all.

Julie/Julia Dinner Party

Last Friday, I had the honor of hosting a dinner party (with lots of help) for some very special folks. In attendance were my mom, my Nana, my mom's cousin Teresa who came all the way from Californ-I-A, my two older sisters, Amy (longtime friend of my two older sisters), and Julie and Krystal who were my two extra special guests. :) The party was inspired by the opening of the movie Julie and Julia and my obsession with Julia Child. We went to see the movie afterward and it was quite good, though not nearly as good as the before -the -movie part-ay. A little info about the party, I planned the menu meticulously with recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking (Julia's cookbook). This was a four course meal and it was a lot of work, but sooooo worth it! Onto the party, see the menu below:

Is it hard to read? Well, take a look at these pics....first off, as an appetizer we had a blue cheese ball with Carr's crackers (my ma's fave) and pineapple. Delirsh. Even non-blue cheese lovers said it was fantab.
Then we had french onion soup, topped with homemade croutons and swiss cheese. Julia's recipe for onion soup was quite a bit more time-consuming than I expected. My sister, ASA, who despises onions, ate her bowl of soup gladly claiming that it was "really good, and I don't like onions." I lurved it. I heart onions. And croutons. And cheese.


The main course was a mound of crepes filled alternately with a spinach and mushroom sauces and covered in a buttery, scrumptous bechamel. The crepes were paper thin and made by my sweet, sweet pal, Julie. I made three different sauces for this dish. It was insane. The sauces were a spinach cream, mushroom cream, and a bechamel. It took a loooooooong time to make the sauces. I made them ahead of time and just heated them back up the day of the party. Each mound had about 22 crepes. The mounds were cut into wedges and served with an extra dollop of bechamel and a garnish of fresh, minced parsley. We also had glazed carrots (super easy) and herb bread. The carrots took, you know, like five seconds to put together and they were fabulous. The bread is not a Julia recipe. Gasp. It's from The Pioneer Woman's site and it is some of the best bread I've ever made. Ever. In my life. And, it contained fresh basil from my garden which makes me feel so domestic.



And, dessert was a cream cheese tart topped with some lovely fruit. The crust was made from some lard I rendered a while ago and it was delish. The tart was prepared by my lovely sister, ASA, and it was a huge hit! The perfect end to a great meal.


I am so blessed to have such a fun mom who jumped right on board with my crazy plan. She graciously volunteered to have the party at her house. My nana was my right hand woman and helped me plate the food and serve all our guests among other things. I had a blast feeding people I love. Granted, throwing a dinner party for 10 people when you have three small kiddos is not a walk in the park, but I had a blast and learned a lot in the process. One of the biggest things I learned is this: If I am going to labor for a week over a meal, I should really invite my husband to the party or make sure he gets a plate the night of the event. I really love to cook for him and to not see his face at the table or hear what he thought of the meal made me realize how much I value his thoughts on what I cook. I really think my love language is food. :) Oh, and did I mention that I even dressed like Julia?


Me and two of my faves...Krystal on left, Julie on right.


I do have a few leftovers. Come over and raid my fridge. :)

Overdue Vacay Post

Here are a few pics from our vacation. We had so much fun in Colorado and enjoyed lots of family time. We ate out a ton, I cooked very little and actually went shopping with three kiddos in tow. :) My man and I read The Count of Monte Cristo together during naptimes and at bedtime and it was great. I really enjoyed the book and the time with my babydad. We broke up the trip on the way there and here are a couple pics from the hotel room.


We celebrated the big boy's 4th birthday while in Colorado. It is so hard to believe that this sweet boy has been in our lives for four years. He has been a blessing from day one. I love his smile, his laugh, his voice and his sweet little boy smell. :)
Eating his birthday breakfast of choice; a "cashbrown".
Birthday dinner...he wanted mac-and-cheese, corn and fish sticks.

He'd been asking for chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing, marshmallows and chocolate chips for his birthday for months. Love the randomness...


Below are random pics from our trip:
Viv:
Brook:

Vacation

We went to Colorado last week for a wonderful vacay. It was our first vacation as a family of five and we all loved it. I'd be lying if I said driving 2400 miles with three small children was the easiest thing we've ever done. All in all, it was great and we'd do it all over again. I will post pics soon. We are enjoying getting back to normal life and seeing all our peops.

In other news, I'm obsessed with Julia Child. My mom watched her when I was a wee tot and I feel like my love for cooking somehow ties back to Julia's show. A really neat movie is coming out August 7 that highlights some of her life and the life of a blogger who took on the task of cooking every recipe in Mastering the Art of French Cooking (Julia's cookbook) in one year. I have the cookbook and have already cooked two recipes from it's pages. I sleep with this book under my pillow. I love it. I am also reading My Life in France. Julia wrote this book, with help from an author in her fam, chronicling the time she and her man lived in France. It is amazing. I can't put it down. I need a bigger pillow so this book will fit under it along with the cookbook that is making all my culinary dreams come true. On opening night of the movie, I am planning a small feast consisting of a few of Julia's specialties for my ma, Nana, sisters and my gal pal, Julie, who is soon to become the fifth Alford sister. After dinner we are going to see the movie. I will hopefully have pictures to show the fruits of my labor. The Babydad is not totally on board as he thinks I am crazy. Anyhow, the blog has gotten enough time today and I will post pics lata. Peace.

Rum Cake

The first time I ever tasted a Rum Cake was in 2002 when I was working as a waitress at Macaroni Grill. One of the manager’s wives had made several Rum Cakes and they were dispersing them as gifts to other managers. A manager who received the cake as a gift was kind enough to give me a piece of her cake. I had never tasted anything like it. It was extremely moist, not too sweet, not too dense with an out of this world flavor! I went to the manager whose wife had made the cake and told him it was absolutely delicious and that I just had to have the recipe. He refused to give me the recipe saying that it was “in his family”. So, I searched for four years for this recipe. I tried one recipe after another thinking that it would be it with no success.

In the fall of 2007, my family and I had lunch with a couple of Charlie, my step-dad’s, relatives. Somehow we got on the subject of cakes and I mentioned the Rum Cake and my frustration in not being able to find the recipe. Charlie’s Aunt Vi piped up and said she had the recipe and would be happy to send it to me! Within two days, I had the recipe, cut straight from one of her cookbooks. I made the cake that day. Aunt Vi helped me hit the jackpot. The recipe is below. It is amazing, unique and wonderful.

Aunt Vi passed away last weekend. She was in her eighties and had a good life. She loved Jesus and I'm sure she's loving Him right now. Her funeral is tomorrow and I made a Rum Cake tonight for her sweet daughter who will miss her very much.


Rum Cake
½ cup chopped pecans
1 box yellow cake mix
1 small package instant vanilla pudding mix
½ cup light rum
½ cup water
½ cup vegetable oil
4 eggs

Grease and flour Bundt pan or 10” tube pan. Spread nuts in bottom of pan. Place cake mix and pudding mix in large mixing bowl; add rum, oil, water and eggs. Mix for 2 minutes. Pour batter into cake pan. Bake at 325 for 60 minutes. Remove cake from oven and immediately pour on Hot Rum Glaze. Hot glaze will cause cake to settle but don’t be alarmed for cake will be yummy. Cool cake for thirty minutes then remove to plate.

Hot Rum Glaze:
1 cup sugar
1 stick butter
¼ cup light rum
¼ cup water

Place ingredients in a small saucepan and boil for 2-3 minutes.

Homemade Laundry Detergent

After much experimentation I have perfected my recipe for laundry detergent. The recipe along with a few tips and suggestions follow:

Homemade Laundry Detergent

36 cups water
1-1/2 cup Washing Soda
1-1/2 cup Borax
1 bar Soap (grated) I use Dove white

• In a large pot, heat 18 cups of water. Add the grated bar soap and stir until melted. Then add the washing soda and borax. Stir until powder is dissolved, then remove from heat.
• Then add 18 cups water to the heated soap mixture. Transfer to storage containers. I reuse big liquid detergent or fabric softener containers. The mixture will gel and will need to be stirred or shaken a little before each use.
• Use 1/2 cup per load.

When I make this I make the whole thing in my huge stainless steel stockpot…it holds about 14 quarts. Do not use a coated or Teflon pan, the borax is a cleaning agent and will strip the inside of your pot. Trust me on this one. A key is really letting the bar soap heat up quite a bit until the shreds are almost dissolved. It doesn’t have to be perfect, just be sure the shredded soap is not in any big clumps. Then, when I add the borax and washing soda (both of which I buy at Kroger in the section with cleaning products), they dissolve quickly.

A few tips to using this detergent:

• It is not color safe. Do not mix your reds, blacks, or dark blues with any light colors. Tide spoiled me and kept me from really doing the best sorting job.
• If you are doing a load full of black clothes, add an extra rinse cycle. Occasionally, my black pants will come out with white streaks or spots on them from the soap.
• When I wash white towels, I will often throw in a scoop of Oxyclean (I buy the Wal Mart brand, Sun Oxygen Cleaner). This is not necessary, but our white kitchen towels get really nasty and need a little extra whitening.
• The detergent is not perfumed at all. You can add essential oils if you want to go that route.
• I use Sauvitel fabric softener, which is gentle on my babies’ sensitive skin and mine. I also really like the scent of Sauvitel, so it makes up for that fresh Tide smell that I miss.
• Making my own detergent has saved us quite a bit of money. Dollar for dollar, I don’t know how much cheaper it is than store-bought detergent. I do know that one box of Borax and one box of Washing Soda (each less than $4) has lasted me nearly a year and I do a lot of laundry.
• This recipe is very easy to make in smaller quantities. When I first started making my own detergent, I made one third of this recipe and it turned out great.
  

Below is my huge pot of detergent:

I use a funnel to transfer the detergent into an old container.


Both fabric softener bottles were filled with detergent and the ice cream bucket was a little over half full.

And, the babies: :)

My Man

How do I love my husband? Let me count the ways.

• He is intentional about relationships. He loves with his whole heart. He rejoices with his friends and weeps with them, too. He isn't afraid to say "I love you" from one man to another. (top pic, J and Uncle Copas with the big boy at ten months old. bottom pic, the big boy and one of J's best friends, Matt)
  

• He doesn't lose it when our kids lose it. He doesn't lose it when I lose it. He stays cool, calm, and collected. He delights in our children. Sometimes, we laugh when they cry. See below.

• He loves me unselfishly. My husband is a servant. It is not uncommon for me to come home from running errands and find the house straightened and kitchen cleaned. He knows I love order and cleanliness, but I'm busy with our three babes and the house is not my top priority. :) He used to do this same thing for his Mom when he lived at home. And, I have to mention, my husband has great parents. The selflessness was learned by the example his parents set before him. He always puts me and the kids before himself. J with the parentals at his 30th birthday part-ay.
  

• He lets me talk his dang ears off. I can talk the paint off a wall and my sweet, somewhat introverted husband asks the best questions and listens to my 30 minute long answers.
  
• He gives great hugs.
  
• He still opens my car door when we go on dates.
  
• He tells me I look good almost every single day.
  
• He likes the way I dress.
  
• He lets me decorate our house the way I like it with few exceptions.
  
• Even when we didn't have much extra cash, he still let me spend a little mulah on things to make our home beautiful because he knew that mattered to me.
• He will sit and play with the big boy for hours.
  
• He won't let our baby girls wear two piece bathing suits. Ever. When I was pregnant with the twins, I brought home two 6 month sized mini skirts. My man thought they were a little too short. :)
• He is a man of courage. He doesn't shrink back at a challenge.
  
• He prayerfully makes decisions and moves in faith.
• He constantly reminds me to look at the bigger picture. That Jesus is our hope, our life, our love.
  
• He doesn't talk bad about people and he won't let me either.
  
• He reminds me to have hope, even when my prayers seemingly go unanswered.
  
• His biggest fear is not following Jesus.
• He is not materialistic.
• He is committed to being in community with other believers.
  

I could go on and on and I already have a bit.

Thank you, J, for being a wonderful husband and selfless father. Thank you for following Jesus. The more I know you, the more I love you. You are a dream.