When a Midwest girl moves out West

I have lived out here for over 6 1/2 years. I have found a job (on my 4th), bought a house, got a dog and dating a fantastic guy. So I figured it was about time to introduce some of my home traditions.

October: Apple butter!
It has been quite the process. About a year ago I purchased a 20gallon copper kettle on Craigslist.
I am having an iron stand made. Brian and Jeff made a paddle (with an ergonomic grip....for the physical therapist ;). ) Brian and I have purchased 20# of sugar, Sam's size cinnamon, 15 gallons of cider, and.....with the help of Shelly and Guy turned 2 bushels ( 80#) of apples into applesauce.

I never realized how much work my family did. Making applesauce was exhausting (so much so I dropped a boiling hot pot of apples mid -way through the process).

Praying for beautiful weather October 15th. I am hoping I can bring honor to the DeWeese name with our Ohio-in-Colo Apple butter festival. We'll be carving pumpkins, having a marshmallow roast that night, drinking beer and apple pie moonshine as well as playing yard games and listening to football games all day! I just hope my little 864 sq ft house with be able to hold it's own. So wish us luck! Pictures to follow. These are the precursor...making applesauce.

Hello New Year.

My sister-Beth

Dad

Amy-Cozumel

Grandma, Dot and Mom

Miss Harper.

Carolyn!

The Boy~ Brian


How cliche to start with "New Year- New You". So I am not going to say "New You" but how about a "Better You". And when I say You, I mean Me!


Major events of 2010-

Moving out of my apartment and into an interim place. My amazing friend Carolyn housed me until my house was ready to be moved into.

In exchange for loaning my house to another family in need of temporary shelter~they did some beautiful, necessary, fantastic renovations for me.

After spending Easter with my childhood friend in Denver, I came back to Fort Collins to find out my mom has been hospitalized and very sick. 10L of oxygen- sick. In Ohio. Which effectively means she can't come and visit me in Colorado. After many prayers being answered she began her recovery so she was able to come out and visit in May.

May- I move in my house. My friend Rachel comes out to visit and we run the Boulder Bolder (5 yr anniversary from when I had first moved out here). I start volunteering for the Fort Collins Foxes Baseball team as their trainer. I adopt a rescue 6 year old weimaraner- Harper.

June/July- I take my first real vacation in about 5 years. My aunt and uncles cabin in Canada. No running water, no electricity. We boat to the island. My cousin Katie (who just graduated from culinary school- so yes, we ate amazing!), my aunt, uncle and mom.

August- I start dating Brian. Very important! One of my best friends, becomes my boyfriend. I visit Cozumel for another best freind's wedding. Where my role is armature photographer. Photos turned out fine. The partying turned out fine. Ok, maybe too fine.

September- My cousin's San Francisco wedding. I love San Francisco, you really should visit if you haven't been~ I get super sick....but never fear, a wedding must go on. And a party must be had....despite the fever. Family is amazing. My youngest aunt, cousin (bride's brother), the new mother-in-law...and of course me....ensured there was a dance party! The end of the trip tied off with a nice tour of Sonoma Valley!

October- My brave boyfriend decides he wouldn't mind meeting the family. The farm. The apple butter. Did I mention how amazing he is? Well. He's fantastic! We see much of Cincinnati including Skyline, childhood/ college friends, Jungle Jims.

November-Dad is hospitalized. I make a weekend trip home to say goodbye. He makes it out of the hospitalized despite constant low blood pressure.

December- Christmas. For some reason this year~ I just didn't feel it. I blamed it on the 60 degree Colorado weather. Christmas comes and goes. December 26th Dad dies. I fly home New Year's Eve.

So with this all said. I am so grateful for family. friends. love. acceptance. understanding.

I have learned you attend funerals for those surviving. If your close to a survivor. Attend to give support even if you never met the deceased.

I have learned family~ even those that you have seen in 20 years, are still family. They still love you despite the gossip spoken. I am awed that cousins I hadn't seen in so long, rushed (literally rushed....were there within an hour) to help during a very difficult time! Thank you Steve, Cindy and Vickie!

I have learned life is good when you best friend becomes your boyfriend.

I have learned to ask for help. Sort of. (I'm still working on the pride thing). Thank you to the Trainor's and Jeff and Brian on all of the house work.

I have learned that I love my job. They are great in bettering my skills and challenging me. And provide support when my life is rough. I also love that my co-workers are my friends and take care of me.

I have learned that fitness is a yo-yo and ongoing battle. So my resolution is to eat better and exercise. Not to beat myself up if x pounds aren't lost in x weeks.


I have learned that people surprise me. For better and for worse. But the truth is anger is generated out of hurt feelings. And we are all just trying to make it the best we know how.


So. Go out and love. My dear and wise friend Abby and I have had the conversation that I am humbled as I age. I use to look at people and think~ I will never do that when I am in that situation....and then something funny happens, you are in that situation and find yourself doing the one thing you swore you would never do. Or you wonder how could anyone ever make that decision, and then you start listening to their story and realize....Wow. All things considered, that makes sense now. So don't judge, when you do you're letting God know you are more capable of doing His job than he is. All he ever asks us to do is love.

(I am sure I left out more major events that occured in 2010- Please don't take offense if I forgot to mention them. I love you no less. I am sure they will appear on her shortly :) ).

Snowshoeing March 2010! I love my backyard!

The trailhead to Bear Lake.

Jane Pfeiffenberger. While her husband is out of town I have a partner in crime to explore the wilderness!

I just love this tree trunk. If it could speak I would love to listen to the stories it could tell.

Yep! That's me!

All done. Nope, didn't follow a trail. Can't really say that part was intentional; the fun we had absolutely was intentional!

It's amazing the brilliant ideas that arise on a Friday night at the Rio. Who would have thought we'd be snowshoeing Sunday morning?! Oh, and that little bit of Colorado factor helps as well.

Hey Lisa, what did you do this week?...I'm so glad you asked.

Hey Lisa. What did you do this week? Well, lets see...Thursday night we bottled our first batch of beer.

Brian worked on the physics of siphoning. The goal was to drain the carboy without disrupting the sediment in the bottom.... we were successful...pretty much.

After filling the bottles we then crimped the caps on.

Isn't that just a lovely sight? We had two boxes full. Now, the hard part...waiting for 4 weeks while the rest of the fermentation/carbonation process occurs.

The previous pictures were Carolyn's. She was able to catch much better action shots. Me, I like my 50mm lens which is not all that conducive for human photos in a small space. I also enjoy macro shots. Casey B., please correct and educate me on my terminology. Can't wait for "Casey Photography School" when you come home for the summer.

I didn't capture all of the sanitization process... Carolyn and Brian were awesome enough to start that process before I came home from work. *Yawn* boring.

The left over sediment. Bleh.

So there is our first attempt. Now mind you, this beer is very flat. The last step (not captured on the camera) was to add the sugar to finish feeding the yeast, which will create the carbonation.

Tasting....wait for it. Wait for it.

Ah...yes! Success! It has a sweet nutty, caramel flavor. It was rather heavy. So either it will be a sipping beer or the carbonation will lighten it up.

Oh yeah. Two happy girls. Gotta say, pretty darn proud of ourselves!

Brian. Did I mention he's a crazy man? Well, just look at the picture, I really didn't need to say anything.

And then Saturday rolled around the corner. I have been MIA from the gym/running for about 6 months now due to a shoulder injury. That's a whole other long story for another time. Bottom line: It's the weekend before St. Pattys Day and a town 5K run was in order. So seeing as how I own an excessive amount of green (thanks to the running Diva's), it's always put to good use on this holiday. I scrounged up some pretty outrageous green eye shadow as well (thank you Janie). Carolyn and I did well. 28 min. Not bad for not regularly running. But I have to say the bug for running bit again. I think though this time, I don't feel the need to prove to myself I can run another marathon (3 seems to be enough), but the approach will be to take on running for a lifetime. So If the morning is feeling like a 5 mi run, well then cross training or a fast walk up-hill will be just fine.

The next two pictures...well this is called envy. I can't wait to get settled in my house and save an awesome Weim. I am hoping this will be me next year.

So, not having attended CSU, I'll just let you know this is the mascot. The ram. Yes, he does have a name. No, I don't know it. But I am sure someone will be sharing it with me....Cam? maybe?

And then there was Satuday night. My first exposure to MMA fighting. No, no pictures of the fights, just the girls. Monica and Laura.

Irma, and me.

...there's that Laura again. It was way less intense than I had expected. It was amateur. There were two pro fights. One girl fight. Wow. Not that I am interested in fighting, but possible Jiu Jitsu. Of course if it comes to fruition, you will be informed with photos and all.

Brewing Beer-

So after it's been a few weeks since the last post. Carolyn, Brian and I finally had a weekend to get together and start our next "arts and craft" project.

Brewing beer Mmmmm.....

So 10:30a Saturday morning we met at Hops and Berries to pick out our ingredients. Brian was great; he spent time in his Beer Bible to pick out recipes he thought all three of us would enjoy. To our/his dismay not all of the ingredients were available. So we reverted to the brewing recipes at Hops and Berries. We found a brown ale recipe with caramel, nutty flavors.

Hops (the green leaf) wheat (grain), and the yeast(tube).

The grain go into the bag.

We start with boiling water (almost) to 160 degrees. Carolyn is monitoring the temp.

The grains are dipped in the water, similar to a tea bag method.

Calculating our total investment. Initial batch of beer will cost us about $5.00 per bottle. Following batches are projected to be around a $1.00 per bottle.

*if you drink beer with pop-off (not screw-off) save the for us.*

Our next step is to stir in the malt. It looked yummy enough to try. Our instincts were right. It taste like molasses...and is sticky just like molasses

Hops are added at intervals. The first batch into the tea bag and steep for 40 min. This is for flavor.

The second batch for 20min. This batch adds to the complexity of the boquet.

Keeping track of the temperature.

Pull the hops, and cool as quickly as possible from boiling to 80 degrees. This is the concentrate. We will add it to cold water and then add the yeast.

Ah! The yeast. Final step.

Now we (we, as in Brian) have to agitate the beer.

It starts fermenting in the bottle for 10-14 days.

Then we bottle....and wait 4 weeks for consumption.