Sitting on Santa CHAMP

Last Christmas, by the way he howled, making Rody sit on Santa's lap paralleled disowning him.

This year, our kid was a CHAMP! He asked for a ball (baseball, of course). He even smiled in a picture. And, the blue teddy bear Santa presented has become the new best friend of his all-time favorite horse that Aunt Marci gave him last year.

His horse, Pioneer (Rody chose the name himself), pulls the wagon (empty graham cracker box) with the blue bear riding inside all around the living room.

Beet Soup

I'm a big fan of beet soup. It always seems to come out yummy even when I change up the ingredients.

Saute peeled and chopped onions, garlic, carrots and celery in butter.
Add a quart or two of chicken stock.
Add peeled and chopped beets and lots of potatoes.
Boil it all until the potatoes and beets are soft enough to puree in a blender.
Make the puree (leaving some of the beets and potatoes in the soup) then stir it back into the soup.
Add a tablespoon or so of vinegar or lemon juice for a very tiny little kick.
Add lots of dill weed, salt, pepper and any other herbs that sound good at the time.
Simmer 'till you can't wait any longer to eat.

Yum!

horse transformer

A few weeks ago, I made a very homemade hobby horse of cardboard and duct tape for my horse-loving boy. He named it "Pioneer."

Rody loves the amazing, high-tech transforming ability of this horse: the stick becomes a baseball bat when he pulls it out.

I might put a picture up sometime, maybe . . . if it becomes a horse again.

"Look, Mom! I'm Angel Moroni on top of the temple."

When I heard the proclamation, I came around the corner from washing dishes to behold my little climber atop the exercise bike. He proceeded to make a trumpet noise and shouted, "Jesus is coming! [more fanfare] The gospel is restored!"

Olive Fingers

The baseball glove shown is the one I used as a kid. Now, my kid rarely takes it off. Luckily, for him, he only needs one hand to eat olives.

Backyard in Autumn

Our leaf pile became a campfire for roasting hot dogs

   

That was fun; now let's play baseball. (surprize, surprize)

Kindle a Fire

Isaiah 50:11
"Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks; walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of mine hand; ye shall lie down in sorrow."

For years, I was intrigued by the imagery of kindling sparks, fire and light in the first sentence of this scripture. But, I never understood and even felt slightly disturbed by the seemingly strange juxtaposition of second sentence, especially considering the discordant ideas presented. First, the beautiful imagery of light, hope, faith, then sorrow??? and at the hand of the Lord? What is going on here?

Several times in the last couple months, I've pondered over this scripture. In the last few days, I've received additional insight that presents a profound beauty and wisdom of the previously disturbing juxtaposition mentioned above.

When the scripture above is considered with a connection to Genesis 3:16 and Moses 5:11, a whole new meaning opens up in my heart and mind.

Genesis 3:16
"Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children . . . ."

Moses 5:11
"And Eve, his wife, heard all these things and was glad, saying: Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient."

When I think of the sorrow at the hand of the Lord as mentioned in Isaiah as the sorrow that comes with the creation of children and families, then the juxtaposition makes sense. The positive imagery in the first sentence comes to life with such a deeper meaning.

"Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks; walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled."

Sparks become Children. Fire becomes Family. Light becomes Love.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the LOVE OF MY LIFE!

I could, but I won't get all mushy about how much I love my amazing husband and how grateful I am that my best friend will be with me for all eternity.

Instead, let it suffice to say that because they played on Pedro's birthday, [deep breath] I'm glad BYU's football team got lucky and barely beat my Utah State Aggies.

Happy Birthday, Love!

Grandma and Grandpa come to Minnesota

What did we do while G&G were here? What didn't we do?

Hopefully, I'll get a highlights video made and posted in the next few days.

Thanks for coming! We LOVED having you here.

Sesame Street Glee

My friend's post that I stole this clip off stated, "Sesame Street has made all my dreams come true! A G-rated version of Glee - YESS!!"  Awesome!

Kites and Talking Milk

Before lunch, Rody colored all over a piece of paper which we turned into a kite and attempted with some success to fly in the back yard. Fortunately, he has no idea how little air time we achieved compared to normal kite-flying expectations. He had a magnificent time running with the spool in his hand, the kite mostly dragging behind him catching a couple feet of air every lucky second or two.

At lunch, Rody turned his head sideways, put his ear down on top of his cup of milk, and said, "The milk says 'Come play with us.'"

At the lake

We spent a memorable weekend with our friends at their cabin near Bemidji, Minnesota. (Isn't that the coolest name for a town?) Both Pedro's had the time of their lives fishing for bass, pike, minnows and plastic blue fish tied to the end of the line.

After seeing four-year-old, Tate jump off the floating dock, Rody begged to go swimming. So, we stripped him down to nothing but a life jacket. So excited, Rody bravely jumped off about 30 times as long as we held his hands to pull him back on to do it again and again.

I had a great time chatting with my friend, Charis, and watching our boys have a great time playing with friends and fish. I enjoyed taking Rody on a kayak ride around the small lake at sunset, too. Beautiful!

We were really grateful our friends just happen to be doctors when Rody somehow got his elbow popped out of place at church and she was able to quickly fix it, saving him lots of tears and a trip to the doctor.

I got some video of the boys on the dock, but I forgot to visually document most of the trip. Oops. I wish I had on video Rody making sure he, his papa and his mama each had a horse to ride (you know the kind with stuffed heads on half a broom stick), all of us riding around the cabin, and his prayer later that night "bless Papa,  Mama, Pedro and bless Papa's horse and Mama's horse and Pedro's horse."

We had a fantastic weekend! We're sure grateful for good friends!

Ode to my Aggies, who very nearly toppled Auburn, the defending national champs

Aggies, oh Aggies, you were so close
to beating the team that you wanted to most.
With a record to set, this was the day.
You were up by 10 POINTS with two minutes to play.
At the end, those Tigers got through with a trick,
but I'm proud of my Aggies for being so quick,
for playing so well from beginning to end.
You played like true champs with a message to send:
"We'll bring you our A-game! - forget an easy win!"
College Football is here. Let the challenge begin!

In honor of an awesome game played, enjoy "the Scotsman" - only the greatest song every sung at a football game, behind the national anthem. (pause the music to the right)

Twins baseball

Rody LOVES baseball.

When I first introduced him to the game we used a tennis racket to up his odds at actually hitting the ball. Now, he can get a hit off the end of his bat/fishing pole stick if it's a good pitch. He carries around my old glove and wants to play catch all the time.

Pedro's firm (he started two weeks ago, yes, it's going well) rotates season tickets to Twins games. Sitting in awesome seats, we got to see the Twins totally defeat the Yankees 9 - 4. We all had a blast (well, the Yankees didn't, I guess).

Goo Goo Goggle Prayer

Last week Rody's personal prayers were generally very short: "Heavenly Father, Thank Thee, In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

This week he began to add more details. Below are direct quotes from Rody's personal (no help given) prayers the past three days:

"Thank Thee por Mama, Papa, Pedrito . . . and Pedrito. Please bless Grandpa Blake, Nana, Darla, Brette, Andrew, Pedrito."

"Please bless Grandma, Grandpa, Kelsey, Devan, Darla."

And, my favorite (after reading Dr. Seuss' ABC's book):

"Thank Thee por goo goo goggles, Mama, Papa. Please bless Papa, goo goo goggles."

UTAH

WE HAD AN AMAZING TIME IN UTAH. MORE DETAILS TO COME, probably.

WE LOVE OUR FAMILY!!!

Paper Towel Butterflies

I got this idea off the Make it and Love it blog (link to the right). It is so easy (and inexpensive). And, Rody loves making and playing with these butterflies. He gave some to a few neighbor kids who thought they were cool.

1. Add a drop or two of food coloring to a little bit of water in different bowls for each color.
2. Fold up a paper towel in half then half again and again into a small square or triangle. 
3. Dip the corners or sides into the various bowls of colored water.
4. Unfold the paper towel and set it out to dry on whatever you have (newspaper, empty cereal boxes or paperbags cut so they lay flat, whatever).
5. After they dry, bunch the center of a paper towel and tie it with pipe cleaners or whatever you have (produce twist ties, rubber bands, paper clips, etc.)

A pretty simple, no-worries-if-it-breaks toy. Enjoy!

Granola Recipe

As requested, here is the recipe for delicious, easy granola. I half this recipe because I don't have a big enough bowl nor a big enough oven. I've never been very good at following recipes with exact measuring. It bites me back sometimes, but I've made this granola twice and it came out yummy both times.

Preheat oven to 325*

Heat and whisk:
1 cup oil (I used part coconut oil and part canola oil)
1 tsp vanilla (I used 3 tsp even with a halved recipe because I really like vanilla)
1 tsp salt (optional)
3/4 cup honey
3/4 cup maple syrup (I used a maple syrup made with brown rice syrup because I'm trying to reduce corn syrup in our family's diet, but I'm too cheap to buy real maple syrup.)

My recipe didn't say how hot to heat this mixture or for how long. My guess is that you heat it because it helps the oil combine with all the other ingredients. I keep it on a low heat and whisk it occasionally for only as long as it takes me to dump all the other ingredients in a bowl.

In another bowl, mix any combination of oats with nuts or seeds that you like.

This is what I use:
12 cups regular rolled oats (I think you could use quick oats, but they have a different texture/flavor. I get the regular oats from the LDS Cannery).
1 cup shredded coconut
1/3 sesame seeds
1 cup almonds (I add a cup even with a half batch)
1 cup sunflower seeds (raw or roasted)
1/3 cup flax seeds (I think I upped the amount of flax seeds, too - gotta love omega-3s)
1/3 cup pumpkin seeds (raw or roasted)

Stir the liquid into the dry ingredients and mix well. Divide in half and spread on to shallow pans. Stir every 10 minutes. Cook until golden about 20 - 30 minutes (mine took 30).

Tip: I line the pans with aluminum foil so when it is time to stir it is easy to lift the foil by the corners and dump the granola back into the big bowl, stir it up, then pour it back on the foil in the pan.

When the granola is cool, add dried fruit of your choice.

This morning, I halved the cooled granola, added chopped dates and craisins to one bowl and dried cherries to the other. I have long been a fan of craisins, but, for the granola, dried cherries are by far my favorite. They have so much flavor, you don't need to add very many. I bought a bag at Costco and I think it will last for about 4 - 5 batches of granola.

Some where online I read that you should store granola in an air-tight container in the refrigerator, so I do.

ENJOY!!!

Delicious Homemade Granola

Delicious Success!

Pedro and I just finished off two bowls each of my homemade cherry vanilla granola. It tastes amazing, is much healthier for us and is less expensive than other cereals we might eat.

This is the first time I've ever made granola. It was so easy to make, I might not buy another box of cereal for a long while.

Thank you Relief Society for the recipe!

Puddle Jumping Diaper Hat & Sticker Make-Over

I like this dog

If we ever get a place where we can have a dog, I hope it is a Brittany Spaniel like this one.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRYCEN!!!

Eat Clouds!

Does a suit made entirely out of DUCT TAPE itch terribly?

 I like it!

 I like to look at that view of the mountains, too. I think your shoe lace is untied.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MEGAN!

I kinda knew Meg would be my best friend as soon as I met her on the bus on my way to my first day at a new school the middle of my sophomore year of high school.

Megan and I have had so many great adventures over the past 12 years. In fact, Pedro and I met when Megan and Pedro were set up on a blind date and we doubled (thanks Meg and Grant).

Today is Megan's birthday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

I LOVE YOUR GUTS!!!

         She writes cool songs (note guitar in background)

                At the Logan temple after all four of us came home from missions

     After a walking self-guided tour of Washington, D.C. sin umbrellas

Meg and her husband Tyler making brownie sculptures on a double date with us

Happy Birthday America, America!

Pedro hung up our flag off the porch. Hooray! I love seeing the flag every time I walk in the front door.

I haven't been able to capture it on video yet, but Rody sings the most adorable rendition of "America the Beautiful".

I LOVE THE 4th of JULY!!!

I took Rody to his first parade. I think he would sum up his reaction as so: horrifyingly loud, intriguingly fun. We potluck-lunched with church friends at a park. That night we exposed our son to the joys and terrors of driveway fireworks. He loved waving around a sparkler - until it went out and he touched the hot part. Oops. Sorry buddy. If I remember, I'll post the video of that experience.

I randomly sang patriotic songs throughout the day and loved every minute of it.

While Papa is studying

 Bubble Beards

 Cotton ball Sheep Art

 Color Time

 Shadow Bunnies

 Froot Loop Fun

Extracting bone marrow for nearly authentic Bolivian Saltenas