Emily's Recipe

Tonight as we watched more snow falling, Emily and Ashley were eating vanilla yogurt.
Emily finished her snack and told me that she thought she could make more yogurt by taking snow and adding salt, pepper, milk, etc. I told her I'd like to see that, and so she showed me. Here was her recipe for making Special Cranberry Yogurt: 1 banana, 3 drops (TBSP) of shredded cheese, 1 cut of butter, 1 egg, 1/2 bowl of hard packed snow, 2 1/3 c milk, 4 hand-fulls of craisens, 3 scoops (TBSP) vanilla yogurt. Put all ingredients in a saucepan. Stir with a wire whisk and then a rubber scraper while on low heat. Add 1 slice of cutie, 1/2 cup oatmeal and 2 TSBP hot chocolate mix. Mix together until thickened.
Upon sampling, Emily decided that she didn't end up making yogurt but Oatmeal Soup. I tried it and found out it was delicious. I had two bowlfuls of chocolate banana craisen oatmeal. The girls loved it too. Emily was so proud. She asked Ashley if she liked it to which she replied, "It tastes slimy." Emily agreed and they both laughed. Who knew a 4 year old could put a bunch of stuff in a pan and it could turn out? And I've been stressing about cooking food. I am obviously the wrong choice for the job.

Husband Away, Sad Me

Anyone wondering what would be a good idea of a bedtime snack for a pregnant, hungry for chocolate wife who is missing her husband? My great idea- a huge cup of hot chocolate. Now I will be missing my husband even more as I get to take additional trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night (already it's twice) and get to climb back into a cold bed by myself. He's been gone 12 hours and already I am going through withdraws. I think I am addicted to my husband. Thankfully 3 1/2 scoops of hot chocolate mix has 4% iron and 6% calcium so maybe this could be my new thing.

Christmas Joys

CHRISTMAS EVE SINGING SONGS











CHRISTMAS MORNING OPENING STOCKINGS










WE ARE FAMILY









DELIVERING FOOD TO MEXICAN ORPHANAGE

Make a Smilebox greeting

We are still here

I feel like I fell off the blogging planet, but we are here and all doing well. The main reason I haven't been on the computer is that Bryan's two brothers, who live in our basement, have been on the computer most of the time.
Bryan has been super busy at work saving the planet one patent at a time. He loves being at his new office, though dislikes the commute time. His business is going extremely well and he likes his coworkers. He enjoys spending time with the young men at church. He is still the best car-ride-giver, all time prince, and our most favorite guy in the whole world.
Maegan has been busy growing a new baby. We are going to find out the baby's gender on Bryan's birthday on Jan. 13th. I taught the last few lessons for Joyschool preschool and got to teach the story of Jesus' birth to the kids. I helped coordinate the nativity program the kids put on at our house. Last month I stopped running and took up my new hobby of napping. I love it, but totally miss the talking/counseling sessions with my girlfriends.
Emily and Ashley are very busy creating and playing in their own world. Most days they live in polly-pocket world, followed by Barbieland, Mary & Joseph-ville, pet-shop place, mom & sweetsy-pie, restuarant chef, cat & mouse, mom & baby dolls, teacher & student, etc. Sometimes they come meet with reality and we eat or go shopping, then they go back to fantasy with books, kid TV shows, playdough.
The girls are the best of friends most all of the time. Emily's specialty is being imaginative. She loves you to read her a book and loves asking questions. Ashley is opinionated and insistent. She loves princesses, pink, purses, and girly everything. Here they are with their new haircuts.
We are headed to AZ to spend Christmas with Maegan's family. We had Thanksgiving with the Hanks and enjoyed having 4 out of the 6 siblings together.

Baby News

I went to the doctor last week and found out I am farther along than I thought! I am now 12 weeks along (I thought 9) and Bryan and I got to hear the heartbeat at the appointment. It was in that minute that the baby became real to me and the information I knew in my brain went into my heart and I loved my baby through that sound. We have a due date of June 3rd. Emily was very disappointed that she won't be getting a baby for her birthday present at the end of July. But I am feeling good that I will have the baby before the summer heat. We will find out the baby gender at 20 weeks which will be around the 15th of January.
Today we went on a tour of Mrs. Cavenaugh's Chocolate Factory. I ate 4 chocolates and bought 3 other bags of candy. I loved every bite and got excited for Christmas treats. For anyone asking- milk, not dark. :)
Thanksgiving plans for next week are to have Bryan's parents, his sister & her husband, possibly his 2 brothers and our friend Kadia from Iowa. Should be good times. In our church primary class we've been talking about being thankful- seriously we are so blessed!

Halloween

We made our second annual trek to the Barnyard Boo in Lehi. Emily went on 4 pony rides and we made bead bracelets, frosted cookies, got balloons made and watched a spooky movie. We all had a good time. Here's our spider ring collection. Emily picked out the white bride spider for me and the black groom spider for dad.


We carved our pumpkins on Monday night. The girls each carved one of their own design and Bryan carved his monster pumpkin into a surprised face. Emily got brave and reached her hand into the pulp-seed goosh. Ashley didn't want anything to do with gooey guts and was mad they were in her pumpkin.

For Halloween night Ashley dressed as a princess with a crown, a pink hat, one glove, a magic wand, pink dress and tights. Emily was a black cat with whiskers, a tail and ears that could light up. Dad was a pirate and I was an M&M. We went out trick-or-treating for an hour and let the kids eat 15 candies and then we were done with candy. The girls got out dress-up clothes 2 weeks ago and have made this their new game every day. So I am guessing it will seem like Halloween every day in my house for a while.