My Sister Ruined Us!

In the past, I've posted on a couple of different occasions about my sister, Megan. (If you're interested, they can be found here and here and here and here.)

Well, I have another sister. Her name is Dawnette. She is the mother of Audrey's BFF, Talea. (To read about her, go here and here.)

Dawnette is 11 years older than me, so I don't have as many childhood memories of her. We have always been in different "places" in our lives to really connect. There's not a whole lot in common for a one year old and a 12 year old...

(big cat, Me, Dawnette, Megan)

(clockwise from left: my Mama, Grandma Hedy, Dawnette, Me and Megan.)

By the time Dawnette left home for college and went on a mission, I was only 8 or 9 - hardly even aware of anything.

I think this next picture was taken sometime after Dawnette got back from her mission. By that time I was 12. But, then she got married right away and I became a totally self-absorbed in the way that teenagers do - not exactly a recipe for building our relationship! (Especially when you consider that I stayed in California and she moved to Utah to start her new life as a wife... and then very quickly became a mother too.)

(me, Dawnette, Megan... you've got to love our handmade dresses!)

Since I moved to Utah 9 years ago, our relationship has definitely grown. As the youngest of eight in my family, I think I spent a lot of time being pretty clueless about the lives of my older siblings. Because many of them were just in different stages of life from me, I don't know if I related very well with them very often. Like a typical child and teenager, I was more consumed with my own life. It's unfortunate, but so, so true. Even after I moved to Utah and had the chance to see Dawnette more often, I still found it hard to relate sometimes because we were still in different "places". I was married but still without kids, while she had her hands very full with five of them! So it really wasn't until I was pregnant with Audrey (and suddenly had a million questions) that I started having more significant and substantial conversations with Dawnette. It was also kind of cool because we were pregnant at the same time... both with girls.

(me, pregnant with Audrey, Megan, and Dawnette, pregnant with Talea.)

Being pregnant at the same time, and then having a brand new baby at home, really brought us closer together. I would call Dawnette all the time to ask her different questions about all sorts of different things. There was just more to talk about, more to relate to, more opportunities to connect. And since our little girls are so close in age (just two months apart) and because they love each other so much, they have just reinforced our bond. (And I'm so glad!)

(Dawnette, Talea, Megan, Audrey, Me.)

Dawnette is one of the sweetest people you will ever meet. She's very kind; it seems like she's always doing something for someone else - whether it's cooking delicious meals for her kids, baking treats for a neighbor, or making jewelry for friends and family, she's so giving of her time and talents! She is always willing to make time for special occasions - she has come for our babies' blessings, birthdays, and random surprise trips. She came at that critical time in a new mother's life - just a little over a week after I had Audrey, she was there (with her two month old Talea!) making meals, cleaning and reassuring me on the innateness of Motherhood. It meant so much to me, and brought me so much peace to have her there at that time! I can't imagine taking a two month old (and leaving five other children at home with their dad) just to be with a new mom for a few days! But she did it. And made it look so easy, that clueless me didn't even think twice about the sacrifice it was! But that's the kind of person she is. That's the kind of sister she is. It has been such a blessing to know that if I ever have a question, I can call her! She makes us feel so special and loved.

(Lucas, Me, Dawnette... sacrificing again to come for Luke's blessing.)

Dawnette is wonderful.


The thing that I really wanted to talk about today has to do with Apple Sauce. That's right, Apple Sauce.


See, the last time I saw Dawnette was near the end of September. Adam and I took the kids up to Dawnette's house for Talea's third birthday. It was a great day. We had a lot of fun. When we were getting ready to go, Dawnette gave us a large, quart jar of homemade apple sauce that she had just canned a few days before our visit. Not only was the apple sauce freshly canned, it was made from apples grown on the tree in their garden - we are talking about the real thing. Home grown apples (as organic as you can get), made into apple sauce, sealed in a big jar. It was beautiful. We were excited. Along with the jar of apple sauce, she gave us a small (pint sized?) jar of pickled beets. Again, grown in their garden and freshly canned. It was also beautiful. We were excited about those too.

A few days later, we ate the pickled beets. They were delicious. In fact, the tastiness of my sister's beets incited a compulsion to compare a few store-bought versions.

Needless to say, there was no comparison.

And now, as you may have inferred from the title of this post, we will never be happy with pickled beets!



And what of the apple sauce, you ask? Same damn thing. We are ruined! Her apple sauce is amazing. Well, no it's not. It's out of this world. Actually, truthfully, it WAS out of this world. Because it is not around anymore.

It's gone.

We ate the whole jar... I won't tell you how quickly. It's kind of embarrassing. I also won't tell you how I painstakingly scraped the jar, making sure to get every last delicious drop of apple sauce out. It's also kind of embarrassing. It was the best apple sauce either of us had ever tasted. And that means a lot for me because I'm not usually a huge fan of apple sauce. I like apples, but I've never really enjoyed apple sauce. I'd never had her's though, and I guess that's what the problem was.

Now the problem is we can never eat apple sauce again. (We are ruined!)

...unless I can have her give me a tutorial on how to make apple sauce just like her.