Competing with Mom

I grew up in a home where mom always cooked and baked. She made (and still makes) amazing pies. Pies seem to be the bakers nightmare, working to get the crust nice and flaky and the filly just perfect. I have to mention that I LOVE pies, and seem to be in our little family.  Well, recently we have been participating in a food coop called Bountiful Baskets.  It is amazing. Pay $15.00 and get 50% veggies and 50% fruit. Some of it is stuff I've never bought or tried, and others are way yummy.  For instance, we've gotten Swiss chard -- mmmmm; also fresh figs.... maybe yum, but not really. But there is a ton of produce for the amount that is paid.  One week we got 6 Grannie Smith apples.  All I know to do with Grannie Smith apples is to make pie.  I thought of eating them, but then the pie would creep back into my brain. So Angela and I made pie. She was so excited to pay with the dough, mix the apples, but she would never taste it. I tried a new recipe (sorry mom). I did use mom's crust, but the apples after peeled I mixed with the sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg (without cooking). Then poured into the crust and cooked.  Figures - when it's not going to anyone, or having company over, the pie turns our beautiful.

I have to say, it tasted as good as it looks.  I ate one piece, ok really 2 1/2, and threw the rest in the trash. It made me sad, but I really didn't want to admit to myself that I ate a whole pie, so I had to get rid of the temptation.  However, there was enough pie dough left over for "pie dough cookies."  we LOVE pie dough cookies. Basically you just take the left over dough, and cut it into circles, poke a fork in it, and then sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar, bake. Mmmmmmmm..... could eat those all day, fortunately so could Angela so I save them for her as a treat.

Angela's Birthday

Yes I know that her birthday was back in June and it is August now.  Call it laziness or life either way I am slow. We can hardly believe that 3-years have gone by since Angela has blessed our home. She is growing up so fast and becoming very independent, which is both good and bad. We were so excited to give her a bicycle for her big 4-year-old day.  We had her with us at REI and she loves to play on the bikes. So we let her play. When it was time to go, Blake went back and bought the bike and arranged to pick it up the next day after work (her b-day). She was sad to leave it behind but she always it, so it wasn't anything different for her.  

We also had a little party for her. Her sunbeam class in Primary is all little girls and they have so much fun together. So we invited them over for some play time. I didn't tell them it was her birthday because I didn't want the gift thing and all that - I just wanted her to have fun and know that she could have fun without all the other stuff. The girls had such an amazing time. They played in her little water table. Yep - it is a table, but they found a way to get in, then they all played dress up, then we decorated and ate cupcakes. It was a lot of fun - Can you believe that next year will be school?!!!



Happy Valentines Day

Today is Valentine's day. A day I don't particularly care for, but the kids have lots of fun giving treats and notes of kindness. So over the weekend Angela and mom were pretty busy making valentines for her friends and her school teacher. We had fun making them. This morning when I dropped her off at school at the kids were there to see what she had brought. Her teacher loved her bouquet of flowers, one of the boys asked if there was something for boys in her little basket - of course there is.  They all wanted the flowers and I had to keep saying they were for Miss Shauna (they did turn out pretty cute). I told them they would all like their valentines and treats. It is crazy when making crafts with a little 3-year old but when the kids get so excited, it makes it fun and happy - the craziness just goes away.

 

Merry Christmas 2010

So Christmas has come and gone. It's kind of like Thanksgiving dinner... a lot of prep work and a little bit of playtime.  In the case of Christmas it is days prepping and one day of playing, and we had a great day of playing. With the holiday being on a weekend it feels like it lasts so much longer. Christmas is quite different with a child in the house. We used to sleep late, play video games, watch movies, have Nerf gun fights, and have some fun. Thankfully she hasn't gotten all excited and waking up at early hours, we still slept 'till 9:00, which was very welcomed since we were up quite late finishing the "big" present. Blake had built Angela a barbie size doll house and then we got to decorate it. the decorating and finishing didn't end until about 1:00 am, then it was on to wrapping it and the other real stuff. Now the day after was a different story; she was  up at 6:00 AM and wanting to play with barbies and stuff. But once she got back to sleep - I had to wake her up AT 11:00 (good thing we had 1:00 church).  So check out the pictures below and see how much fun we had. 

Check out this cute video when she sees what Santa brought to her. Her face is priceless. And Santa has brought hours and hours of playtime. She plays and plays. Today during Sacrament meeting she was heard saying, "please, please, please can I play?"  not just once but multiple times. Even the folks in front of us commented on how cute that was. We do have to admit, Angela does use polite kind words - some of the time, just like any other 3 year old.  We hope y'all had a wonderful Christmas and felt the spirit of Christ in your homes.

Blustery Days

So it is starting to get blustery in Utah, Not really ready for the cold. Sure it is fun to see the leaves change and things like that. But clipping back all the plants, digging up the garden, winterizing the yard - just lots of work in horrible cold weather.  At least so far the snow has been cooperative and stayed in the mountains - we like that - unless you're 3 and want to play in the snow.  This particular day was extra cold and windy, so we watched a movie.  Angela had to get all her dollies and animals and have them watch too. She covered them all up so they would stay warm, then she joined them.  I was in the kitchen cooking and could hear her talking to them trying to get them to sit up and not fall over. It just made me smile. Not sure I can remember the movie, it was either How To Train your Dragon or a princess movie, I'm guess it was the former as it has been one of her favorites of late.  The music in it is fabulous so I don't mind hearing it over and over.   

 

Halloween 2010

Halloween... not a favorite holiday in our house if you are older than 3.  Of course, like all kids, Angela loves to play dress up, and what's better than dress up when you get to add candy on top of it?  She had a blast.  Trick-or-treating at Lorena's, Blake's and Aunt Marci's office she had a big bag already. Saturday night (since Halloween was on Sunday) she got even a little more, despite the rain.  Yep, rain, and more rain, but it stopped about 6:30 pm.  Angela made a beautiful Snow White.  Lorena stressed over the costume, like always, and put it off to the last minute, like always. After trying to be smarter than the pattern, she had to ask for expert help - HUGE thanks to Melanie and Tami for saving this costume. Turned out way better than the store bought ones, and will last longer through all her dress up days.  The big white collar only came out on trick or treat night.  Lorena's office goes all out for Halloween. One department decorated like the 7-dwarfs' cottage, complete with pumpkin painted faces, so we had to take the picture, and of course the preschool party, she had a great time.

First Snow

So this past week we had our first real snow day - we had about 4 inches of snow in our yard.  Why is it that kids are always more welcoming of snow than their parents? - at least in this house.  Angela was so excited to have the snow. We had to hurry and find the snow clothes so she could play in it before we went to preschool. The thing was that we we having to leave earlier than normal because of the training that Lorena was taking - preparing for the Project Manager Professional Exam.  The teachers said that it would be the hardest exam I would ever take - and it is 4 HOURS LONG!!  So now it is just study, study, study.  I want to pass the first time.  ok... back to snow..... While we had this much in the morning, it is gone now as I am writing this... in fact, it was gone that afternoon when we got home. So luckily she played in it that morning, and luckily it hasn't come back down to the valley.