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This past Christmas (2019), we received a cake pop maker. We were at a White Elephant Christmas Party with some friends and the cake pop maker landed on my lap. As soon as I (Jay) opened it, I knew how I wanted use it - for an episode of KidsTalk!

It's episode 28, and Breya and I are making cake pops. This is the Brentwood Cake Pop maker. We had never seen one before, so we couldn't wait to try this out. So this week we are unboxing our cake pop maker and testing it out! Watch the vlog below!

The Brentwood Cake Pops maker works. Simple to use, and with some time to "bake" and decorate the cake pops, this would be a great family activity. We found the cake pop maker on Amazon, and surprisingly

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Let's start with our pickles and cucumbers. We planted 9 pickle plants and 9 cucumber plants. 
The problem was finding a place to plant them. I like to vine up the plants so they grow up. This gives the plants support to grow and keeps the fruit off the ground. It also keeps the cucumber and pickle vines from taking up a lot of ground coverage, leaving more space for other plants.

I built the trellis with some furring strips. Super inexpensive and easy to do.
I'll probably have to add some support as the vines grow, but for now it's working great.
​And as you can see, it won't be long before we're pickling.

Along with the tomato seeds we started, we picked up extra tomatoes from a local greenhouse. Our started seed looked like they were struggling a bit, and we didn't't want to miss out on the growing time. These are our Lemon Boy Tomatoes. When ripe they should be a nice yellow color. You can see just how well these plants are doing. We have 6 plants, and each one has a number of large tomatoes growing.

Our peppers are also doing really well. We planted 6 banana peppers, 6 red bell peppers,
6 yellow bell peppers, and 6 green bell peppers. The bell peppers are coming along slowly. Lots of buds and shoots, so I'm expecting plenty of fruit. But look at the banana peppers, they are actually exploding! Look at all the peppers coming in!
We've already picked a number of the peppers.

So good. So many peppers!
Now we just have to find some good recipes for the peppers!

Not pictured is our small strip of carrots, a couple corn stalks, our peas, herbs, squash, and cantaloupe. 
​I'll try to get an update on them next time.

There you have it, garden update #2.
Things are really looking good. The nice thing is, with the pandemic, we're not traveling to two many places this summer. And since we've already been on vacation, we're home for the rest of the summer. That means, we'll be able to care for the garden and see the harvest from all of our work. I say that because in summers past, we have planted our garden, worked it, then left at the end of the summer for vacation or a ministry trip. But this summer, we can't wait to see what the garden produces.

We'll be back in a couple of weeks with another update, so stay tuned!

​- the higham family -

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This past weekend we made our way to the community garden that our church runs. It's a beautiful piece of property that's been cut out for fruits and vegetables. It was started a number of years ago as an outreach to the community. When we came to the church and learned about the garden, we were super excited about helping out with the weeding, harvesting and sharing of veggies.

We went out to the garden in May to help plant. It was great because we were able to help with the garden while still being able to social distance ourselves from the other volunteers. This Saturday was one of our first garden work days. So we decided to go over and see help we might help.

​Check out this weeks family vlog post.

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Our kids are getting older, life is changing. The kids are all teenagers, and with the exception of our youngest, no one really wants to continue with the family vlog as it is; capturing random family events to share. While we never really mastered daily vlogging, accept during the summer months when we almost made it as daily vloggers, we enjoyed sharing our lives on YouTube. YouTube is also changing. Daily family vlogging isn't what it used to be.

Same with the blog, while we are still enjoying those sweet family moments, our kids are less inclined to see those moments shared with the world. In fact, if you have been following us for awhile, you might have noticed that we didn't share our vacation the way we have in the past. While we will share some of our vacation, there will be parts that we'll keep for ourselves.

So that brings us to what happens next.

First, we're not going anywhere. The blog and website, the family vlog, and our social media accounts will all continue to share content. Our goal will be to post a mix of family activity and encouragement. Instagram will host pictures of family activities, promotional graphics, and encouraging thoughts and ideas. We'd love to have more interaction with our followers so you might find a few post that give you a chance to respond, ask questions, or share comments.

The blog will slowly make the shift to sharing more ideas, resources, stories, and content that encourages intentionality within the family. We have learned that when we (Amy and Jay) take some time to think about how we want our time with the kids to look; what goals, hopes, outcomes, we often get more out of the activity. Even more, as we realize the reality that our teens are quickly becoming adults, we want to create memories and experiences that will later result in the laughter and story telling as we gather around the dinner table. 

The vlog will also take on some new features. With our recent move to a new state, we've made the decision to try to explore as much of the state as possible. With state parks, hiking trails, gorges, overlooks, historical and cultural sights, and new towns and cities to see, (not to mention the plethora of areas just over our closest state lines) we hope to make several mini-adventure vlogs featuring these amazing locations. For example, not long ago, we visited Coopers Rock, a state park with hiking trails, picnic groves, and incredible scenic views. That vlog should be coming shortly.

KidsTalk will continue with ongoing challenges, recipes, activities, projects, and fun. While Asher has outgrown the idea of KidsTalk, Breya loves to create fun videos to share! We hope to make a series of new videos with fresh content starting this month. Most videos will probably be Breya and Jay, but when we can, we'll try to include the rest of the family.

We're still talking over the possibilities of a podcast or LIVE Q&A's that focus on parenting, marriage, ministry, and family life. While we think a podcast would be helpful and fun, we're waiting to see how these changes to the website and vlog take. But Jay hopes a podcast is in our future.

​Here we go, life changes. The family continues to grow, and with that growth comes change. So, we're adapting to the change and learning from. Our hope is that the new direction of the site and the vlog will continue to helpful and encouraging!

In the meantime, thank you. Thank you for the many years of continued support for the site, the vlog, and our family. We love sharing our lives and what God is teaching us with you and look forward to growing with you. Feel free to reach out to us. Comments, questions; whatever. We'd love to hear from you.

​- The Higham Family