Hambone? It's what's for dinner!

I'm at this party and there's some trouble cutting the ham off the bone. I hold back trying not to be to pushy but after 20 minutes or so I can't take it any more. I wonder on over and offer my assistance. After extracting a bit more meat the host says, "that should be fine, we can toss the rest." Red flag alert, throw away a perfectly sumptuous ham bone! Gasp! Quickly I ask if I might take it home with me. "Sure," the host says as she reaches for a Ziploc bag.
Several hours later I've left the party and I'm half way down the road when I remember the ham bone. Without a second thought I swing the car around and call the fabulous host to make sure that the bone is still available and that I'm coming back to get it. "She must really want the ham bone cause she coming back for it," says the host to her other guests. Tragedy averted, I happily walk back to the car feeling all is well and having visions of ham and black beans in my head.
Moral of the story is NEVER, EVER throw away a ham bone. Oh, the dishes you can make! Makes my mouth water just thinking about it. For the unfortunate few who have never made or tasted food made with a ham bone I offer you some recipes, because honestly, you're missing out on some of the most delicious food ever!!! But don't take my word for it...

NOTE: the ham bone should have some meat on it. :)

Ham and Bean Soup
Wash 1 quart beans. In large pan add beans, 3 quarts water, 1 teaspoon salt, ham hock (or ham bone with some meat on it), chopped white onion, and 4 stalks of celery, chopped. Boil on low for 2 to 3 hours until beans are soft. Or cook in a crock pot on High 2-3 hours. Remember that new beans will be done sooner than old beans. I've had this with lima or black beans and it was wonderful. If using lima or navy beans serve with chili sauce. If using black beans serve with salsa, cheese, sour cream, cilantro, lime, or just eat it plain, or over brown rice.

Ham Scalloped Potatoes
Put ham, sliced potatoes, milk, cheese, little bit of onion, salt and pepper in a crock pot or oven wear dish and cook until potatoes are done. If you need measurements just find a scalloped potato recipe for some inspiration and add the ham bone. Mmmmmm!

Ham and Green Beans
Put ham bone, fresh green beans (washed and cut), some water, little onion, salt & pepper in a crock pot or ovenware dish and cook until green beans are done to taste. I'd give you measurements but I don't have any so just pretend that your a "Jazz" cook and eye ball it then taste, taste, taste.

Bon Appetit!

P.S. I'd love to know what y'all are cooking with ham bones too!

Random Pics

Thanks to Troy for initiating the whole drinking water from a cup thing.

Makena is getting really good at it.

If only I could get her to enjoy solids from a spoon.

Makena in the Afternoon sunshine.

The Lights at Temple square

Makena is asleep in this picture. Troy is just hiding behind his sleeping daughter.

The lights were beautiful! This picture doesn't do the lights justice but at least you can see our faces instead of a blurr of lights behind us.

When enough is enough

One More Day

Elder Ballard came and spoke in our sacrament meeting a couple months ago. He didn't say anything new but rather reminded us of the essentials. Talking about prayer he mentioned that often we have a laundry list of things that we ask for, but that Heavenly Father already knows what we need. He mentioned that he and his wife kneel down at night and thank the Lord for one more day together. So I've tried to make this a habit when we say our bedtime prayer. What a blessing this has been to be reminded every night how grateful I really am to have one more day with my sweetheart and my daughter. Wouldn't want to be without them. Here's to many more days together!

We're back!

We're back! Please forgive our blog vacation. We were busy with our many adventures. I know that's hard to believe so we took some pictures for documentation.

Makena chillin' with her cuz.

A Nacho Libre Party with Encarnacion, Steven, and a wrestler.

Here we have Nacho and Chancho.
Thanks Tony for the yummy chili and to all the others who came!

Visiting with my nephew.

My nephew's baby. So cute!
It's so crazy that my sister is a Grandma.

My sister got married to a wonderful Dude.

The wonderful Dude was baptised a month later.

They had to call the fire truck to help fill up the font.

Yes, that is a fire hose coming in through the window.

Spent a few days in Park City with family

The family

I finally finished knitting a blanket for Makena.

It only took me nine months.

Symbolic of her gestation.

Makena taking a nap in her swing

Makena after her bath.

Makena and Daddy after her baby blessing.

Thanks for making the dress Becca.

Our Halloween Party with fam. and friends

Homemade root beer from said party.

It bubbled all over the wall, the table and the floor.
But it was sure good drinking.
Thanks Jenny and Steve for the recipe.

Makena has discovered her toes. Yummy toe jam...her first solid!

The scary couple and their offspring.

Time sure goes fast when your having fun. We love being back with family and old friends but sure miss the good times with our friends in Rucker. May you all have a wonderful holiday season. May Christ be at the center of your daily lives and festivities.

Love,

The Wikles

Some random pics and Makena laughing!!!

Here are a few pics from our brunch in the canyon adventure, hope you enjoy!

Nieces Nicole and Alisa!

Elora and Makena!

My bro-in-law Stan and my sis Kristie with the Richardsons. Check out the sexy pose on the right. Woo Woo, you go Jon.

3 of my nieces: Elora, Amanda, Nicole and my beautiful Makena.

My sister Kristie, and Jen Richardson (she's OK, kinda weird though!)

3 of Jen's girls: Emma, Alisha in back and Haley in red. The best one of all is the shorty in the back right- my cute wife Rebekah.

Draper temple!

It only took 2 months but we finally got it.

Settling in!

So after a month and a half of being in Utah, we finally got an apartment! As much as we love our families, staying 4 weeks with different family members was getting a little old. We had our stuff in storage and finally moved into our apartment 2 weeks ago. It's been nice to have our own place and be able to unpack our stuff. It's a nice central location to all of my workplaces and a quick trip to shopping places. We live in Bluffdale, Ut and have been loving being back.

Makena has started to grow and grow up. In the last few weeks she has really started to talk, laugh and smile. She's a sweet and beautiful little girl that has given us so much joy. She has been such a little trooper with all the travelling and uncertainty that we've encountered along our move back. She's already got over 4000 miles of travelling under her little tummy and she's done the vast majority with a good demeanor.

Rebekah has been loving having a place to decorate and nest in. She's done a good job with the unpacking and arranging. We've already hosted many people for dinner or visits and a few for overnight stays. You are all welcome to come also. Thanks again for being so kind and helpful to us. We couldn't ask for better friends, thank you all!!!!!
Thanks to Katie Foote for the great going away party, it was great, and good job on the Apache cake.PS- So to all those that I forgot to mention in my "visited in Utah" blog, nothing personal, just old age. We still love you.

Here are some pics of our latest happenings, hope you enjoy!

Back In Utah

Sorry it's been so long, we've had a rough move back. We left the 24th and had trouble the whole way. The rental truck had no AC and had issues 4 times on the way home causing us to take an extra day. The trailer didn't want to stay hitched, we almost had the front tire on the truck blow out, once that was fixed the trailer tire did blow out, followed by the e-brake coming on and sucking down 30 gallons of gas in 40 miles. Just when we thought we'd seen it all, the drive shaft broke (on a hill with a 30 foot drop at the end). Thank goodness the wimpy guardrail was just barely strong enough to hold the truck until I could block the tires. I thought for sure all of our stuff was going to plummet down the small cliff with our car on the back. We finally made it to Utah late Saturday and were able to spend some time with family up from Texas, Panama, Vegas and Monticello. It's been nothing but driving back and forth since we got back but we've had a good time. Little Makena has been a trooper through the whole thing and we are so blessed that she's such a wonderful baby. We are still homeless but I've been able to get paid for studying here at the unit and they will also put me on AT orders for a few weeks since I just barely missed ours. I have also been hired as a contracted security guard for working at the National Guard Headquarters in Draper. Doesn't pay much but at least it's a job and I didn't have to really look for it. We've been blessed to meet back up with friends we made down in Rucker. We've seen the Tarbets, Taylors, Jenkins and Larsens so far. It is nice being back and we've loved seeing mountains and snow.

Once again we would like to thank all the great people we met down in Alabama and the great kindness that was shown to us. You are all wonderful people. Thanks to the elder's quorum and all that helped us move. You were life savers!!!!! Sorry I wasn't quite prepared but thank you sooooo much. And thank you to the sisters who helped clean, you don't know how much it helped. Thank you!!!! We have been blessed to meet all of you and wish to say thanks. You are welcome with us anytime.

Sorry we haven't put any pics up either. Once we finally get a place to live, we can unpack the computer and upload some for you (I'll spare you the horror of any that have me in them, Makena is much more fun to look at). Goodbye for now and God bless you all. Good luck to those still in Rucker and congrats to those that have moved on.

Coming Home!!!!

Some bittersweet news! We are coming (or going) home to Utah in a month. I tried to take 18 days of leave that I have saved up but the cadre said no, so we are finishing flight school June 25th. I have one last 3 week class and then we are out of here. We expect to arrive around the 28th but don't have a job, residence or any prospects of either. We should be home in time to visit my bro coming up from Texas so that will be nice. We also get to spend some time at Rebekah's parents in LaVerkin. That means I get to learn how to milk goats and do some other random chores. I'm disappointed that I don't get to take a little time to visit Reb's family up in DC so we'll just hope another chance presents itself later. We're sad to be leaving all of the wonderful people that we've met here. There are so many great people in Alabama that have touched our lives, we'll always be grateful to everyone. GREAT PEOPLE! Rebekah likes the green South and the fact that she's been able to visit so many romanticized places while here. As for me I need mountains, dry air, places to go hiking/biking/climbing/rappelling and clean looking water. I have missed the snow these last two years as well. But most of all, we're just glad to be able to see family again. It's been an adventure here. I hope we've grown for the better while being down here but it always takes me time to see. Maybe in a few years I'll be able to recognize how far we've come. If anything, WE NOW HAVE MAKENA. That's been the best adventure. What a sweet little child we've been given. We're excited to share her life with everyone back home. We wanted to say thanks to the wonderful people in our lives that have done so much for us, those we left in Utah and those we've met and are leaving here in Alabama and elswhere. Thank you so much for all the kindness, patience and service you've shown to us. Hope we've been a blessing to you as you have to us! To those of you we've met at flight school, thanks and hope we see you again. To those in Utah thanks for always being there for us and we're excited to see you again.

She's Here!!!!!!!!

It all started when my water broke Sunday afternoon, Mother's Day. I wasn't absolutely sure if this was for real so I didn't pay attention to the light contractions or leaking that followed. It wasn't until 10pm Sunday evening that things started to pick up and I knew that she was ready to make her entrance. It was a long sleepless night for both of us that ended with me saying it was time to go around 5 am. Of course we did exactly what my doctor said not to and went to the infamous (meaning more than famous) Waffle House for a light snack. We crossed the road and checked into the hospital at 7 am. Ten hours later we had a beautiful baby girl weighing 7 pounds, measuring 20 inches long, and looking like the alien heads from the last Indiana Jones movie. (She's looking more human now.) She has grey blue eyes and light brown hair. She has my little ears and big hands and Troy's button nose. Her name is Makena Wikle. Makena means "abundance" in Hawaiian and "The happy one" in Kenyan.


Hope you enjoy the pics!

We sure love her and are grateful that the Lord has blessed us with such a beautiful baby girl. She already has Troy wrapped around her fingers. When we left the hospital he said, "I get to hold her first when we get home." Awwh! I must say that Troy was wonderful throughout the whole experience and I couldn't have done it without him. He's an excellent father and husband.

He's got the Lovesac Blues

Troy has been officially booted off the Love sac and now sleeps on the futon. Why the futon? Because anything is better than the bed. Why has Troy been booted off the Lovesac? Because his Roley-Polly wife Rebekah has taken over the Love sac.* She claims that she can sleep on her back and it doesn't hurt. Rebekah has never been a side sleeper and never will be. Don't worry too much for Troy though. In a few weeks things will go back to normal and he will have the Love sac all to himself again. That is of course unless their freshly hatched egg joins him from time to time. :)
*Disclaimer: Troy has been invited to join Rebekah on said Love sac but Troy can't take the "HEAT." "It's like sleeping next to the oven." Oh, Troy!

Savannah

A few highlights from my Savannah trip. I didn't take many fabulous pictures because I was too busy playing tour guide but my sister MaryAnna took enough for all of us. Hopefully she'll send me copies.

Feeding the birds at Tybee Island

Brother Ben and family at the River Walk

Brother Seth and family at the River Walk

Hunting for eggs. Just after taking this picture JoyeLoni in the green dress shook her egg so hard that it burst open. She quickly picked up and put in her mouth every last M&M she could find.

The Olympic rings in Atlanta

River walk in Savannah

Victorian house in Savannah

Paula Dean herself...just teasing it's only a cardboard cuttout but we did get to taste her yummy food.

Beautiful but we had to pay to drive down it.

You know what the best part was?

Being with family and friends.
Let's do it again!