Thorhauer Family Happenings

2009 Fall Hike

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:09:00 +0000

I just got back from my fall hike. We had a great time. The weather was much better than expected on Friday evening and not as good as expected on Saturday. However, the Roaring Plains area was absolutely beautiful with the Huckleberry covering the hilltops in bright red and the mist blowing across the landscape. It created quite a stunning contrast as you will see.

Here is a link to the pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7950582@N03/sets/72157622440574003/

Here is a link to some info on the areas we were hiking in
http://www.midatlantichikes.com/id121.html

Happy Birthday to my wife and best friend

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 09:53:00 +0000

Today is Shannan's birthday. In honor of my wonderful wife and a magnificent mom I have decided to tell all of you about some of the GREAT things I have discovered about Shannan in the almost 15 years that we have been married. If you know Shannan then you probably already know some of these things about her. Feel free to add this list!

Great things that Shannan DOES:

Creates incredible meals. Some of my favorites are:

Zuppa Tuscanna

Kung Pao chicken

Pasta Carbanara

Chicken Picata

Buckeyes

Texas Sheet Cake

Makes our house a home

Makes peace in our family when there is strife

Makes time with extended family fun and relaxing

Picks the best flowers to surround our home and make it beautiful on the outside as well as the inside

Lets her husband buy strange foods at the grocery store

Maintains great vegetable garden

Remembers where everyone is supposed to be and when they are supposed to be there

Keeps a clean and orderly house with a husband, a teenage daughter, a teenage son, a big furry (i.e. furball producing) cat, and a not quite potty trained puppy, all doing there own things and going in opposite directions at times

Gladly serves her family day in and day out when we see it AND when we dont

Always takes care of her family when they are sick and seems to almost never get sick herself

Tolerates her husbands inclination chase dreams both small and large

Great things that Shannan IS:

A gift from God

A great friend

A loving mom

An wonderful conversationalist

Quick witted

Funny

Steadfast and tough minded

My extra set of eyes on the road

Beautiful and lovely

The earthly cornerstone for our family

A lover of great books

My cliff notes to great books

A fierce competitor when it comes to board games and Rock Band 2

The display of God's grace in my life

My eternal sister in Christ.

When the blades stopped

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 22:24:00 +0000

I stood outside and looked and listened
I could see, I could feel,
I thought I could hear.

The blades stopped spinning,
the air moved as it wished.
The tongues of nature
were unleashed.
The woods came alive
with a symphony of sounds.

I heard it,
I heard God's symphony.
I loved it.

The insects chirped.
Some with the rhythm of a single drummer
perfecting His rudiments over and over.
Some with the random burps and chirps
of a babbling brook, yet no water was to be found.

And over, above, and behind these was the swell,
the swoon of a stringed symphony of insects.
Providing the rolling platform on which the
rhythms danced.

The dragonflies danced
as the beat went on.
The blades whirled into motion,
the performance continued
and deafness resumed.

New Idea 21213 by Derek McCauley

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:02:00 +0000

Here is the latest from Derek titled ' New Idea 21213'. This one was written, performed, and recorded by Derek.

I think it is pretty super kewl. Take a listen and comment to let Derek know what you think.

Morgan's Piano Recital

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 16 May 2009 13:56:00 +0000

Morgan performed 5 pieces at her piano recital last night. She did a great job and we are very proud of her.

Here is the program. Click on the image for a larger view.

Here are video clips of a few of the pieces she performed.

Trumpet Tune

Spanish Caballero

German Dance

Spring hike and Derek comes home

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 16 May 2009 13:48:00 +0000

Derek finished school on May 8th. John decided to take advantage of the trip to MTSU and do some hiking on the way. So John and his friend Chad spent a couple of days hiking in the Smokies before picking up Derek.

Here is a link to some of the pictures of the hike and some pics of Nashville.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7950582@N03/sets/72157618246791504/

Morgans Spring Orchestra Concert Music

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 16 May 2009 12:10:00 +0000

Morgan performed at her spring concert on Tuesday. Here is the program.

If you click on the image below you will see Morgan listed in the middle school viola section.

Here is a short video clip of part of the performance. They are really sounding great!

Garden Prep and Planting

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 16 May 2009 11:20:00 +0000

Shannan and I decided to use the space left when we got rid of the swing set for a garden.

Lola, kept a close eye on things and enjoyed laying around in the sun

John had fun using his tools!

We decided to do 2 separate gardens. Once will have veggies that grow on vines and everything else will be in the other one.

Morgan asked if she could create labeled markers for the garden.

Shanan carefully placed each plant to strategically get the exact right amount of sunlight, rain and anything else hey might need :-)

An here is the end product. the two Thorhauer girls and their garden! Wooohooo!!!!

Lola is on the loose

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 13:26:00 +0000

Our newest family member finally arrived home last night. Lola is a miniature dachshund. She is very very cute. Here are some pics of Lola and some video.

Here is a picture of Morgan, the woman we bought Lola from and Lola the evening the final exchange took place.

Here is Lola looking quite cute.

Lola and Ash seem to be getting along ok. Although at times Ash is convinced that Lola is simply a new toy for him to bat at and Lola is at times convinced that Ash makes a nice chew toy. Yikes!

And finally, here is some video of Lola in action

Times, they are a changin

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 13:16:00 +0000

When we first moved into our house Shannan and I were both so happy to be able to afford a swing set for our kids to play on. The swing set quickly became the focal point of the backyard for our kids and many others in the neighborhood.

So it was a little sad to decide that it was time for the swing set to move on. Some friends of ours have younger children and we knew they would get much more use out of it. So we partially disassembled it and sent it on its way to its new home. It brought us many good memories. Here are some pics from the tear down.

Morgan and Shannan make Valentines day special

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 23:15:00 +0000

We decided to stay home for Valentines Day and enjoy a great meal together. So Shannan prepared a great dinner. We had twice baked potatoes and a wonderfully marinated flank steak. Then for desert we had a real treat.

Morgan had asked for and received a creme brulee kit for Christmas. So she whipped that up for desert. Unfortunately the torch that came with the kit did not have any fuel in it. So it was Daddy to the rescue with his propane torch. As you will see from the pics below Morgan did a great job and had a lot of fun in the process. And the creme brulee was awesome!

For Valentines Day we decided to stay home and have a great dinner together as a family.

Winter Pruning

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 22:58:00 +0000

I finally got to the winter pruning of the vineyard. Here are some before, during and after shots.

The vines were in pretty bad shape due to the disease that got them last summer.

Here we are all nice and tidy and ready for spring buds!

Recordings done by Derek at College

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Derek has posted a few recordings that he has done recently while at MTSU. These are recordings that a friend of his has performed. Derek did the recording and mixing. I think they are great! Enjoy.

Just One Word
written and performed by Ramsey Tyson
recorded by Derek McCauley

Hop on the Train
written and performed by Ramsey Tyson
recorded by Derek McCauley

Christmas Friends and Family Recap

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 02:07:00 +0000

It has been a while but here it is. Here are some pics of all of the great visits we had with family over the Christmas holiday.

Above is John's Dad, Ron and sister Lisa. We all got together at our house before Christmas.

Above is a picture of our visit at Jim and Elaine's. Morgan's friend Emily came with us to Oakland so the two of them had a great time together.

Above is a picture of (left to right) John, Derek, Shannan, Morgan, Dwight, and Virginia. We had a fun time together and enjoyed the Wii we just purchased a few days before.

The above is a short video of my mom, Virginia, bowling a strike on the Wii. Do ya think she is excited?

Morgan was invited to perform with the all-county orchestra. Above is a picture of her just before her performance. We could not really get a good picture of her performing. They always put the viola's around the back. Bummer.

For New Years Eve we had a great time with our friends Chad and Crystal Fike in Oakland, MD. One of Chad and Crystal's traditions is to put on goofy hats and pose for pictures so here we are posing away!

Above is a picture of the Sharpless side of the family. In the back row (left to right) is Cheri, Shannan, and Clark. Front row (left to right) is Morgan, Ryan, Allen, Bret, and Nick. Both sides of the family (Sharpless and Thorhauer) come from long lines of Steelers fans. Woohoooo. Welcome to SixBurgh baby!

And last but not least is Ash chillin as we watch the Steelers grab their record 6th super bowl.

Christmas Morning

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 15:04:00 +0000

We just finished off a nice Christmas morning with the family. It is nice to have Derek back and to spend time together as a family. As you can see our children love to be together and adore each other.

Morgan has created her own Christmas tradition. She has worn the exact same pajamas to bed Christmas Eve and then opening presents Christmas morning since first grade! Let's just say that each year it gets more 'interesting'. The toe socks were a gift this year.

We hit a great milestone on this Christmas. Derek and I desired and received the same gift! We each received the 'tech hoodie'. It has a zillion pockets and it is strictly for geeks so I guess Derek and I qualify for that.

Here is a great picture of the Thorhauer women. Shannan is wearing her necklace that Morgan gave her.

We were sure that Derek was going to ask for a pair of studio quality monitors (i.e. speakers) for Christmast. Much to our surprise and delight, he instead asked for studio quality headphones! Wooohooo! And there was much rejoicing! We are hopeful that Derek gets a lot of use out of these in his future JOB!!

John was decked out in Steelers gear this year. He got an awesome Steeler mug from Derek that will be nice to taunt people with at work. John is also holding a DVD set of all 5 of the Steelers Super Bowl victories. Nice. And to cap things off Morgan (with some help from Mom) made John and incredible comfortable, yet fashionable, pair of Steelers pajamas.

And to finish the morning off we enjoyed our traditional Christmas morning breakfast featuring mom's Monkey Bread. Yummmmm.

Here are a couple of short video clips from Christmas morn:

Morgan opening her ipod

Christmas Tree Hunting

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 19:52:00 +0000

Shannan was busy with preparations for the church Christmas dinner so Morgan and I went Christmas tree hunting today and bagged ourselves a nice one! Woohooo! (flickr pics here)

Thanksgiving 2008

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 01:38:00 +0000

For Thanksgiving this year we went to Dwight and Virginia's. We had a lot of fun preparing the food together

and eating the food together......

Dwight and I went down to do some work on the boat while the women did a little shopping:

All in all it was a nice relaxing time with family. I hope you had a great Thanksgiving as well! Here is the link to the rest of the pics for Thanksgiving.

Weekend of fun

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 00:31:00 +0000

This past weekend was a fun one. Shannan and I went to Philadelphia for the weekend. It was a late celebration of our 14th wedding anniversary. We had a great time and got there and back without any problems thanks to Derek's GPS. It is amazing how much stress is relieved by that little computer stuck to the windshield. The little voice can give us directions with various accents. I prefer the Australian woman and Shannan, of course, prefers the Australian man.... Go figure!

Meanwhile Morgan was invited by Uncle Allen to accompany him and his family on a tour of the Whitehouse! So while Shannan and I were in Phili Morgan was at the Whitehouse. Once she got back from the Whitehouse she spent Saturday and Sunday with some dear friends of ours, Jim and Shari Auldridge and family. Jim and Shari belong to the same church that we attend. They have a great family and we love getting to spend time with them. I work with Jim so we see way too much of each other and Shari is very involved with the mentoring program that Shannan and I participate in.

Shannan and I had a great time. On Friday we ate at an Irish restaurant called Ryan's Daughter. I was really excited to eat there but was a little disappointed. I think that the food would have been wonderful except that it was lukewarm when it was served to us. So that was a little disaappointing but we had bigger and better things to move on to.

We stayed in the square in downtown Phili. On Saturday we had a great Amish breakfast that the Reading Market Terminal.

The Dutch Eating Place

The market actually turned out to be our favorite part of the weekend and we ended up going back to the market Sunday before we left.

We then went to the National Constitution Center where we spent a couple of hours reading and listening. It was interesting and made me more thankful for the constitution and also made me appreciate how unique it was and still is. We then moved on to a quick self guided tour of the historic area of the city. It was a little cold and the wind was blowing so the emphasis was on quick.

Sunday morning we attended church at Tenth Presbyterian Church before heading home.

Here is a link to the rest of our photos in flickr. For some reason they are showing in reverse order. Doh!

Date Night

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 16:09:00 +0000

Friday night was bunko night in our house. This meant that Morgan and I had to find something to do for the evening that involved getting out of the house. So it would be a date night for Morgan and I. I had not really thought much about what we might do so I was thankful to find out that my company, Yakabod, in support of the Maryland Symphony, had purchased several tickets for the Friday evening performance and was offering them to employees. First come first served.

Needless to say, I put our name in for a pair of tickets. Morgan and I had a nice date night which started with a dinner in downtown Frederick at Isabellas. Isabellas is a tapas bar. Here are some pics of the wonderful food we enjoyed:

Here are a couple of pics or Morgan and I:

Here are the rest of the pics.

Hot Stuff!

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 23:52:00 +0000

Shannan fixed some great soup tonight. It is called Chicken Tortilla Soup. The recipe called for 2 tablespoons of chopped chipotle. Here is what the finished product looked like:

But wooohoooweeeee, it was spicy!! Why am I mentioning this you might ask? Well, because Morgan actually enjoyed it! Yet another sign that our little girl is changing and maturing. Her taste buds will not be left behind! She now likes spicy food. This is nice for the rest of the family since we now can enjoy some food that has a little kick to it.

Fifteen Mile Creek Hike

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 22:06:00 +0000

Morgan and I just got back from our fall hike. It was a perfect hike with incredible weather. The hike was about 5.5 miles and was pretty difficult at times. Morgan and I really enjoyed it. The location is in Green Ridge State Park which is at the M.V. Smith road exit on 70. We were not expecting the great views we found. Here are a few pics. You can find the rest at our Flickr page

Much of our hike was on some very steep hillsides like this one. The rocky outcroppings and the tall hemlocks provided for great scenery.

The campsite that we stumbled upon was all ready for us. The previous tenants had left a nice pile of wood for us and a make shift chair that Morgan and I spend several hours enjoying Saturday night.

Here is a picture of Dad and Daughter first thing in the morning after packing up. Ready to hit the trail!

A picture in the middle of Fifteen Mile Creek. The creek was low but still beautiful.

Like I said. The terrain was very challenging and Morgan did a great job!

The last view of the creek on our way out.

One last posting of some priceless video. Morgan is drinking from a titanium cup. So this is Morgan's attempt at a 'manly' endorsement of the titanium cup.

Harvest brats

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 22:20:00 +0000

The last cookout of the season. Celebrating the great harvest of the brats. It was a good crop this year.

Halloween pics

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 23:59:00 +0000

Dress by Good Will....
Alterations by Elain....

Hair by Shannan.......

Pumpkin by Morgan and Shannan.....

Raven lunatic

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 01:42:00 +0000

Those of you who know me well should make sure that you are seated before proceeding to read this.......

I did something that I thought I would probably never do this weekend. I went to a Ravens game in which the Steelers had absolutely no involvement! Zoinks. You might wonder what inauspicious turn of events might have precipitated such a revolting development. Well it is not as bad as you might have guessed. I was not forced at gun point or threatened with bodily harm.

A guy a work with, Derek, invited be to go with him. He has season tickets and his wife could not go. NFL games are a great event to attend so I took him up on it. It was a beautiful day and the Ravens won. I have to admit, however, that it was a bizarre experience at times. Especially when the guy next to me, whom I did not know, gave me a heartfelt high five when the Ravens made a big play. That made me feel a little dirty. If he only knew that he was celebrating with a Stillers fan he probably would have punched me out!! Yikes.

I managed to keep my identity a secret and enjoy the game with my friend Derek. All in all a nice time.

The great pumpkin debate of 08

noreply@blogger.com (jthorhauer) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 01:00:00 +0000

Nice rhyme huh? he he he.