Brrr

It is currently 34 degrees outside and snowing. It is April 29th. Can you believe this never ending winter?!? I don't think we have ever had snow this late in the almost 10 years that I've been in Utah.

Today is library day. We are going to go to story time this morning and then this evening they are having a Zoo Mania show with a bunch of different animals. We're all pretty excited.

This weekend I have several awesome coupons to take advantage of. Borders Rewards sends me 40% off any item coupons every once in awhile. I got one for this weekend. I'm thinking about finishing off my Twilight series collection. I am only missing Breaking Dawn. Then I can start collecting the Goosegirl books. I also have 50 free 4x6 prints at Sam's Club and a $10 off $20 purchase at Kohl's. The trick is to only spend the $20. :)

These photos are from our second trip to the Tulip Festival on Tuesday. We went a different route through the garden this time, but still managed to end up at the waterfall. I really want to do some more serious exploring of the gardens though. Apparently there is a secret garden and I want to find it.

Sigh

Today it rained/snowed. It was cold. I didn't have plans and I didn't feel like doing anything. Luckily I forced myself to shower (barely) in time to go grocery shopping for the week. I am doing cash this pay period and I still have $17.24 left for the week. Go me.

Weston brought home a sunflower he planted in a Dixie cup from preschool. I can't decide if I really want to plant it in my yard. We'll see.

This afternoon I cleaned bathrooms and baked peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. Weston didn't nap, but he didn't really help me either. He just sort of followed me around all afternoon asking what we were going to do. So we played a little bit of indoor soccer.

We are having leftovers for dinner tonight. It doesn't sound very good, but I hate wasting food, so we will eat it anyway. The kids don't like the leftovers we are having and I don't feel like a fight. I will be making them macaroni and cheese instead.

Tonight I am looking forward to Ian coming home from work! And watching Modern Family. It never fails to make us laugh out loud. And tonight I could use a good laugh.

Slacking

I have been a major slacker blogger. I just feel like there's not much to share lately. We've been doing our thing. Last week was rainy and cold and we did a lot of kicking around the house. Literally. Weston got a Bernstein Bear book about soccer, so he's been all into it lately. Davin looked so cute wearing Weston's hat backwards. He put it on like that himself too.
Davin got a haircut. It's adorable and makes him look like such a little blondie! On Saturday we went swimming at the indoor pool. Both boys loved splashing around and swimming in the current circle. That night we went to my cousin, Blake and Whitney's, open house reception. It was beautiful and had an amazing dessert spread. You can see Dav's haircut in the horrible picture of me. Yikes that's a bad angle. Oh well.
Ian has been really busy at work for the past couple weeks. The day he finished up a big presentation they got another rush job for 12, yes 12, videos. So he had been at work Saturday afternoon. We went to drop him back off at work on our way home from the open house and amazingly Batman was there for a photo shoot! (It was really just a co-worker of Ian's who was doing this for fun with his cool camera) Weston thought it was awesome. This is off to the side, but they were photographing Batman and Catwoman in a black mustang convertible. Pretty funny. Davin was freaked out. He went close enough to high five Batman and then ran back to me.
Weston talked about it all the way home. He told me that Batman is just in the movies and that this guy must be someone who wanted to be Batman. He asked what Batman's powers are. I told him it was mostly that Batman had awesome toys, like his flying cape and his batmobile. Then he said, "Yeah, but can he spin around on his head with his legs and arms out?" Break dancing powers? I don't think so, but I guess that would be cool.

Weston is a rather precocious child. We love him, but there's no fooling this kid. When Ian was getting ready to go into work after we came home from swimming, he came into the kitchen where the kids were eating lunch in the outfit he was going to wear to the open house. Weston looked at him for a second, then said, "So what are we wearing tonight? Because it looks like you're just wearing your regular clothes but with church shoes." I told him that he didn't have to wear a tie or anything and he picked out his church khakis with his stripey sweater. He also enjoyed all the attention he got from telling his potato joke at the open house.

Ian and I started watching Dancing With Wolves on Saturday night since I have never seen it. But about 30 minutes in we realized that the version Ian had downloaded was missing the Sioux Indian subtitles. I don't think I would have a very good idea of what was going on without them.

Yesterday evening we curled up and watched Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. It had been awhile since I'd seen that one. It made me smile. Hooray for old movies!

I can't believe it's the last week of April! Holy smokes this year is flying by. I completely spaced that Mother's Day is in just a couple weeks. I need to get on that. My job this week is to work on whittling down my ginormous pile of un-read magazines. Other than that we are going to try to enjoy the nice weather until another several days of storms and 40 degree weather. Brr.

Tulip Festival 2010

This weekend was pretty busy. It was sunny and warm, so we spent our Saturday working on the yard and running errands. That night Ian and I went on a date. We ate In N Out then wandered around Lowe's and priced out all the materials we will need to re-do our den. We ended the night seeing the movie Date Night. Tina Fey cracks me up, but it wasn't the best movie ever. Definitely a nice night though.

Last night we had some friends from the ward over for Family Home Evening. It was really fun. We had a prayer, song, and spiritual thought then played some games. Later that night I went and helped clean the temple. I had never done it before. It was kind of neat to be there after hours and to help keep it clean and beautiful. I just vacuumed for about an hour. I had to take a nap today to make up for not getting to bed until after 1am last night though.

Today was gorgeous, but a little windy because a storm is blowing in. The rest of the week is supposed to be rainy and colder, so I wanted to go to the Tulip Festival today. Ian was swamped at work and couldn't come with us, but luckily my friend, Tara, was up for the last minute outing. We really had a fun time. We did a lot less walking than we did last year, but still got to see lots of beautiful tulips. We spent most of our time at the giant waterfalls. The kids ran up and down the grass hill while we ate our lunch at the top. After we ate we walked up the trail that goes behind the waterfall. We saw a goose sitting on her nest and an owl! It was really cool. What a great Earth Week outing!

How are you celebrating Earth Week?

Sprung

Spring has finally arrived. The thermostat says it's 70 degrees today! Hooray. We have been getting out and enjoying the sunshine this week. Yesterday we took Weston's bike that he got for his 3rd birthday with us. He is finally getting the hang of riding it. I think it's about time he gets a real bike though. I actually think he would do better on a non-plastic one. He especially loved riding/coasting down this little hill.
Speaking of my non-jock child, Weston, he is rather fastidious about his clothes. He thinks all his pants are too long and rolls them up every day. Even if that makes them look like highwaters. This is what he did to avoid getting them wet on our Easter Sunday walk. What a dork. I fear for his high school years. At least he could possibly have a manly career in construction? Can you tell he likes to pose? That might be a problem in the construction world.
I have been really enjoying our time outside too. This is my favorite weather, so I am trying to get us to the park almost every day. This morning we went to the library. I took back all the library books on Monday, so we have been without any library books the entire week. It has been a minor travesty. I let Weston pick 10 books today to make up for it. I'm so grateful that my kids love reading.
I'm looking forward to a gorgeous, productive weekend. My plans include weeding out the front planter. I didn't get any tulips this year and I think it was my fault for not weeding that planter. Sad. Ian is going to work on the lawn. The kids will no doubt run around and get dirty. Ian and I are going on a date tomorrow night too. Yay!

Happy Weekend!

Home Sweet Home

This photo was taken on Monday afternoon during a rare moment of brotherly love.

It's been a few days since I posted. We have been keeping pretty busy. We are on the mend too! I'm feeling much better. Davin finished his antibiotics, so I sure hope he's feeling better. Weston's good to go. Ian has a cold, but is managing. Spring was in full force on Saturday with gorgeous sunny weather. We took the kiddos to the park around dinner time. It was packed, but we still had fun.

Yesterday we woke up to snow. Again. It was ok though because my parents stopped in for a quick visit! They went to Rexburg, ID to stay with my sister Melanie, but on their way back the spent Tuesday with us. We all went to the aquarium to see the penguins, then got lunch at Chick Fil A. By the time we got home Davin was more than ready for his nap. While the kids napped, Mom and I went to Macey's so that Mom could stock up on some food storage deals. When we got home it started snowing again. Crazy weather.

The rest of the afternoon we just hung around and played. The kids got read to. We played peekaboo with Davin. I made BBQ shredded beef sandwiches for dinner. They were yummy and easy! After the kids went to bed we played some Rumikub. Mom and Dad drove down to Provo after that to spend the night an hour closer to home. Today is their driving day, so hopefully it's going smoothly.
In other news, I am proud to announce that I bought my first ever rotisserie chicken at Sam's Club today! I have never de-boned a chicken and I'm not a fan of eating any kind of meat off the bone, so I usually stick with boneless skinless chicken breasts. I read an article about the ease of using a rotisserie chicken to start recipes on allrecipes.com the other day and wanted to try it. So I got the chicken home and just used my hands to peel off the skin, pull out the bones, and shred the meat. I was really surprised at how much meat there was! The bowl I got out for it wasn't big enough. I put enough for greek chicken pita sandwiches in the fridge, then froze the rest in 1 cup portions in ziplocs.

I have no idea if I did the right thing with the meat. Do you freeze it differently? Use it all? And most importantly. . .

What is your favorite recipe using rotisserie chicken?
I need some ideas!

Be Prepared

I am feeling very accomplished and peaceful this morning. Today I finally bit the bullet and started my food storage. It really, truly is just a start, but I have to start somewhere, right? My whole life being prepared has been an important topic of counsel from my church leaders and from my parents. For the past 6 years (since I have been married and responsible for my family) I have found excuses why I can't have food storage--it's too expensive, I have no place to store it, I don't know how to cook with it, etc. Well, with earthquakes hitting various parts of the globe with alarming frequency and pandemic scares, I decided it was high time I take a little responsibility. If other people can do it, then why not me?

Today I took advantage of some fantastic emergency preparedness sales and bought $100 worth of food storage. Here's what I'm starting with:
50lbs. flour
50lbs. hard white wheat
20lbs. long grain rice
24 cans corn
24 cans cream of chicken soup
24 cans sliced peaches
12 cans assorted beans
2 containers of iodized salt
1 #10 can honey cornbread mix
1 #10 can dehydrated chicken bits
1 5 gallon storage tub for the flour

Things I still want to add:
oil
sugar/honey
water drums
dehydrated beef jerky
dehydrated chopped onions
wheat grinder

Some of these items I will rotate regularly in my normal cooking, like the canned fruit, veggies, and soups. I will use the rice and flour in my regular cooking too. I will have to get/borrow a wheat grinder to use the wheat, but that's one of the things I want to learn. I also am interested to see if I can try making some regular recipes using the chicken bits. I'm sure this is extremely unimpressive to some of you pro food storers our there, but I'm still excited about our start and if you have any tips, recipes, or deals please email me!!!