Rawlins Family

Rawlins Family

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Subheads for my Subheads. I defy you to beat that, Deb.

Subheads

Why Subheads are so hot right now

Subheads are so hot right now because of Deb. She's the master of cool. Or maybe I'm cooler because I have subheads for my subheads. You be the judge.

Deb, huh? What does Deb backwards spell?

Bed

Alyssa

Wearing spandex is cool

But only cool if you're a high school/college athlete who was once asked to play for the National Handball Team.

National Handball Team

Come on, Alyssa. National Handball Team? Really? That's funny because I was once asked to play for the I-Totally-Made-That-Up National Team. Only the name of my team is more creative than the name of your team. Seriously, I can imagine you trying to come up with a name and all you could think of was your hand. And a ball. And thus the National Handball Team was born. Nice.

Random childhood memories

I really appreciate when my sister's share their childhood memories. Has anyone noticed that our brother's actually have NO MEMORY of (almost) any childhood event? Here's a conversation between me and Sam:

Me: Hey Sam, remember that time...

Sam: No

Side Ponytails

On 80 year-olds

Um, seriously? Shouldn't someone report that to the supervisor. It seems like unstable behavior.

On Me

P1020036 Bringin' sexy back.

The Gym

I Don't Understand

So you're telling me that eating ice cream with hot fudge every night for the last, say, 28 years is why my butt looks like this? Crap.

Alright, already, so I'll join a gym

But explain to me again how that piece of paper is going to shrink my bottom? Wait, what? I have to GO TO the gym? And do what? On the what? Crap. Pass the ice cream.

Dogs

Dog spit

Look out, world. Dog spit. It's all the rage. Check for it in your local Penzey's or Williams Sonoma soon!

Dog Beating

Down with dog beating!

You saw it here first

I'm pretty excited to share the newest Olympic sport! It's neat because it's one of those combination sports, like some kind of -athalon. It's called "Trying to Walk Through My House Without Breaking a Limb." I'm hoping that as it catches on it will be known by the more commonly recognized names, like, "Watch Out, Watch Out, Watch Out!"; "Who Left THAT There?!"; "Ooh, I Think That's Gonna Leave a Mark"; "Freaking Toys!"; and the ever-popular "Didn't I Just Clean This Place Up?!"

The event begins with the Hurdle through the kitchen over the baby gate and moves right into the High Jump over the lego tower. Next is the 10 meter dash to catch the naked boy before he makes it to the mail box (to say hi to the mailman, of course), which goes seamlessly to the triple jump down the broken front stair. Gymnastics comes next as the athlete gracefully tumbles back through the front door after tripping on the muddy shoes (tripping required; missing the trip is a deduction) placed directly in front of the entrance instead of to the side as a reasonable person would do. After the tumbling portion the athlete will skillfully complete a cross-living-room-dive to catch the baby who was just pushed off of the ottoman (placed there, no doubt, by officials). The event comes to a close with the athlete scrambling to her feet for a soccer-style goalie maneuver to catch the truck that was launched at the TV screen.

The event will appear at the Winter and Summer Olympics.

P1020796 Clearly, uniforms are not required.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Everyone's Favorite Superhero

Cameron turned five on Friday so I want to give a shout out to my cutest little "big kid." It's amazing to me that it's been FIVE WHOLE YEARS since Cameron joined our family! I still remember the day (and night, and following day) that he was born and it's been a great journey so far. Cameron had a rough first few months but soon turned into a little sweetie. His temperament is very much a mix of mine (the quick temper) and Chase's (the easy, laid-back mellow-ness).

It's been my privilege to watch as he's grown and overcome obstacles, from learning to climb the ladder at the playground, to learning to share toys and get along with friends, and so many other things. I'm so grateful to have been there for almost every moment. Since his birth I have only spent 4 nights away from him! Granted, I could probably use more of those... But honestly I wouldn't trade it for anything. He's my buddy, my helper, my monster-slayer. He takes seriously his job as big brother and role model and does his best to show Miles and Sophia the ropes.

So Cameron, I want to tell you how much I love you. I love you bigger than the sky. I love you more than all the water in the ocean. I love you farther than the moon. I love you deeper than the Grand Canyon. I love you better than chocolate. I love you!!!!! Happy Birthday, Spidey!

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This morning I had the privilege of sitting through 2 HOURS of church and listening to (almost) every minute of it. I'm pretty sure the last time that happened was about 5 years ago, so this was monumental.
We had a special Stake Conference with Elder Bednar presiding. Chase and I sang in the choir and our family were kind enough to watch the kids while we sat on the stand (about 10 feet away from Elder Bednar!). I can't begin to thank my family enough for this blessing because of all the meetings I've been to in the last five years THIS was the one I needed to hear. This was the one I needed to be able to focus on. So, family, thank you. A MILLION TIMES, THANK YOU! No, YOU rock, and you know it (line, anyone?).
Anyway, the reason I'm writing this blog is because of my experience this morning. It's not very often that I walk away from a meeting with a better understanding of my self, my worth in the eyes of the Lord, and a better vision of my divine potential.
I started to write a summary of his talk, but I just can't do it justice. And honestly the bottom line is this: the gospel of Jesus Christ is true. Our time on this earth is a probationary period. Because of this we are given trials and tribulations. Some come as part of our mortal experience, and some are given to us individually to test and refine us. What matters in life is the priorities we set and the goals we are striving to accomplish. If we find ourselves making excuses for not doing those things we know we should do - and which will bring us true and lasting happiness - it is NOT because, "we don't have time." That's a lame excuse (those are Elder Bednar's very candid words). It's because we don't think those things are important to us. If we're not having Family Home Evening, scripture study and prayer, it's because we are simply choosing not to. If it's important to us, we'll do it.
On the flip side there is the message of hope. We can change. The atonement and saving grace of our Savior Jesus Christ is the one thing that can truly enable change in our lives if we seek after it. It often seems we are asked to do too much. Or we feel that our challenges and trials are just too great a burden to overcome. When we feel this way it's easy to forget that the Lord is there and will strengthen us and give us the ability to overcome ANYTHING. We may think no one else can ever understand our pain/weakness. But the Savior has overcome every trial and hardship and knows how best to succor our needs. In Him we can find true relief.
I could literally go on for days about how awe-inspiring it was to hear Elder Bednar speak today. It is truly wonderful to be in the presence (did I mention I was 10 feet away from him?) of an Apostle of the Lord, a sacred witness of Jesus Christ. I'm grateful I was able to be there. Moreover, I'm grateful for the strength I gained in my testimony of God's Only Begotten Son. I am filled with a knowledge that God our Father lives. He sent His Son to live on this earth and teach us a better way; a way that, if followed, will lead us directly back to live with Him. He has, through the Prophet Joseph Smith, restored the fulness of the gospel on the earth in this dispensation. Through this we are able to have the Priesthood, the literal authority to act in God's name. Through this sacred authority we can become families, united for eternity. I find so much strength, hope and happiness in this sure knowledge.
I love my Savior. I know that He loves me as well. If any among my readership does not have that knowledge I would encourage you to get on your knees and get back in touch with the Father who created you. Regardless of denomination I think we all can benefit from a relationship with God and His Son. May we ALL do what we know is right and live to the potential within us.

Friday, September 12, 2008

1. Apparently the trend du jour in my family is to write numbered blogs. And since I can't let anything die I have to jump on it.
2. If I ever figure out how to put people's blog links on my blog you would be able to blog-stalk my family and see why I am currently blogging in numbers. But I can't figure it out. Because I'm a moron sometimes.
3. The other day I was reminiscing about how far my cooking skillz have come. Sara, do you remember the first summer I was your au pair and I asked you how to make Minute Rice? You just looked at me.
14. If Bono can count like this, so can I.
15. I've taken to typing gansta-type. I like it. I think it's classy.
16. Today is Cameron's birthday. Big #5. There will be another post dedicated to my favorite 5 year-old.
17. Chase just walked in. It's only 4:30. Angels are singing.
18. Miles has spent most of the week naked. And he's averaging about 6 showers a day.
19. Tomorrow we're supposed to do a 5K with Chase's firm. We do this every year for American Heart Association. We get Grant Thornton team shirts but Sophie's won't fit her which is why I'll be crafting an "I *heart* Hearts" t-shirt for her tonight. I'm hoping to get her into the company newsletter.
20. The reason I'm MOST excited about the 5K tomorrow? The breakfast bar beforehand. Last year they had Corner Bakery cater it. Scrum-dilly-umptious. Though, I'm pretty sure the 'Death by chocolate" muffins are anything but heart healthy.
21. I've also been blog-stalking Nicole since Bird mentioned it. I'm obviously not as cool as Sara.
22. If Deb and Nicole throw us under a bus and run off I would cry. But mostly because I was just hit by a bus.
23. I'm almost positive I'm voting for Obama, but only because I whole-heartedly support his assertion that Sarah Palin is a pig who wears lipstick.
24. I think I'm going to go ahead and do 28 of these. one for every year of life.
25. The shirt I'm currently wearing smells a little bit. I think I left it in the washer too long before it went in the dryer. I hate that!
26. In the next month I need to buy about 6 pairs of shoes. Both boys need new sneakers and church shoes. I need new black pumps and Sophie needs new pink converse All Stars. I officially feel like I have a big family.
27. I think Alyssa makes an adorable pregnant woman even if her blog has had several pictures of animals on it lately. One of whom she talks to and has named "Arnold."
28. I'm pretty sure I passed another UMC milestone yesterday. It has to do with potty training, poop and the public restroom. I'll spare you the details but let's just say that maybe I should be president now?
Peace out ma lovelies. Fo shizzle!

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Big week for the kiddos!

This week has been eventful for each of the kids. I need to blog it before I forget it!

Sophie is making big strides lately. First with the crawling, now with standing. She can pull herself up to stand on things. She loves to do it! She's working on getting down gracefully; she's only fallen over once. She also wants to hold our hands so we can help her walk around. She gets upset if we just sit her on the floor and try to do something else. She will whine until we grab her hands and hoist her onto her feet so she can get in some laps around the house. Miles thinks this is great and loves to run up and say, "BOO!" She laughs like crazy. And I have to admit I'm pretty excited for her to walk because I've been waiting not-so-patiently to buy these puppies for her!

image SO CUTE!

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Sophie has also learned to clap. Well, she could do it before but now it's a pastime not a skill. She'll be crawling around thinking about something and then all the sudden you can see she just remembered that she could clap. She stops whatever she's doing and sits there and claps with a big grin. I caught it on video!

Lastly for Sophia, she has a big mouth-full of teeth coming in. She cut her first tooth yesterday (bottom left-middle as you're looking at her)! And today she got it's companion. You can barely see them but you can feel them on her gums. If you look in her mouth her top gums are all swollen and you can see the teeth about to come through. So far she's done well with it - no excessive crankiness. I don't expect that to last.

Miles. The kid is doing really great with potty training! Today he was taking himself to the potty whenever he needed to go. Still a few accidents but all pretty minor. I'm still too nervous to leave the house with him but I can see the light at the end of the PT tunnel. Today we were in the kitchen and the gate was locked and he stopped what he was doing and told me he needed to go potty. So I'm hopeful.

(Sorry. No pic of Miles. Potty training isn't so pretty!)

Cameron started pre-school on Tuesday and he's so excited to be back. Being delayed a week was rough on him because he's been ramping up for a couple weeks. He was really happy when I dropped him off. In a couple of weeks we'll start Open Gym and Tumbling classes and that will be even better!

P1020747 First day of school!

NOT COOL! SO NOT COOL! I hate dishonest people. And I really hate dishonest people who circulate their dishonesty and nastiness via the web. Grrrr! Now they've really done it!
http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Is it bad that I'm currently using the shower as a means of giving myself a few minutes of "me" time? I'm not IN the shower. The kids are. It's 3 PM and we just picked up Cameron from pre-school. It's day 2 of potty-training Miles and while it's going pretty well overall I had forgotten just how messy and EXHAUSTING it is! It's even WORSE when you have a baby crawling around! You have to be ON every minute the kid is awake. If you lose your focus for even a minute all the sudden the kid who "didn't need to pee" five minutes ago has developed an overly full bladder and is relieving it in every corner of the house...while laughing. Who says a 2 year-old doesn't understand the meaning of "spite?"
So in an effort to just sit down and relax for five minutes I put the boys in the shower and here I sit checking my email and writing a blog.
Only 4.5 more hours until we start the bedtime wind-down.
Okay, but seriously, I have to add that Miles is doing REALLY well. He's kept the REALLY messy stuff in the potty and had only minor accidents on the carpet. For that I thank him.

Sunday, September 07, 2008

Pee pee and other random mommy moments

In the midst of the craziness with the house my children didn't give us any breaks. Sophie learned to crawl, Cameron's pre-school was delayed a week because the building was being used as an evacuation center for the Gustav victims, Miles was all about the pee pee.

Over the last few weeks Miles has been potty-training himself. He would randomly take off his diaper and head for the potty. Every night before tubbie/shower he would sit on the potty and pee and then get in the shower. If Cameron was running around in his underwear - as he is wont to do at times  - Miles likes to stand behind him and stare at the various superhero's starring on his backside. The kid is just a little obsessed. I know he's been ready to potty train and I've been avoiding it like the plague! It's so much work!

Sometime during this last week Miles decided to start parading around in Cameron's drawers. Usually with both legs stuck through one opening. So I gave up and allowed it here and there, but let him wear the underwear I had bought him. He insists on wearing it backwards (because that's where the cool pictures are, of course!). Eventually he would have an accident and I would decide we were done with underwear time for the day and he'd go back in his diaper. He would object but not too loudly and we'd move on.

Until this morning, that is. This morning Miles threw down the potty training gauntlet. It was a lovely scene, as most Sunday mornings are. Chase was gone for meetings and I was trying to keep the kids from killing each other (and me from killing them). Miles took a shower and when it was time to put on the diaper he took a stand. He didn't want anything to do with the diaper! He wailed, he gnashed teeth. He screamed so loudly I was sure the neighbors were, at that moment, dialing 911. I told him we just didn't have time for underwear at the moment. We're going to church and I can't deal with accidents in the pew at church. I won the argument for the moment; Miles wore his diaper to church. But Miles is winning the war. Guess who is getting potty-trained this week?

Saturday, September 06, 2008

Baby Steps

It's been a long week since the last update. I'll start from the beginning but give you the Cliff Notes version.

Thursday and Friday: Dismantling of cabinets, sanding/scraping, more sanding and sraping. I swear I thought we were done sanding numerous times. Thursday night I emailed Steph and said, "we're done sanding," to which she replied, "You're an animal!" Well, yeah, we would have been if we were actually DONE! But no, it was late day Friday before we put the sandpaper and sander away. What a grisly, messy, laborious, terrible, horrible, no-good job! Friday evening we started priming cabinets and wainscoting.

Saturday: Priming. Over and over and over again we primed. That's DARK 70's wood under there, people.

Sunday: Our day of rest. It wasn't the most restful considering we had a demolition zone in the kitchen but oh well.

Monday: More priming, maybe even some more sanding in spots? By the end of the day we got to PAINT finally! The wainscoting was finished by the end of the day. Blinds were all taken down Monday as well. I don't know why, but I really love to spackle. Chase also got the cabinet doors painted which literally took 5 solid hours in our hot, sweaty garage. We didn't want to open the garage door for fear of dust blowing around - it was windy. Chase deserves major props!

Tuesday: Last day of Chase's vacation. We finished painting everything and got the new blinds up. After inspection we decided the cabinet doors looked good and didn't need anymore coats (much to Chase's relief).

Still to do: re-assemble cabinets. Texas is humid. Gustav came through at the same time as our kitchen renovation and made it even more humid. So the paint is taking awhile to cure. Once the paint loses it's tacky-ness we'll be able to put doors back on and drawers back in. I'm still living out of boxes and it's driving me insane. But it's worth it because I'm loving the results in our kitchen! Here are a couple before/during/after pics.

P1000055 Before - notice the super mini-blinds and the weird color scheme. It was gray on bottom, white chair-rails/baseboard, beigey creamy walls and weird backsplash. Four different colors. All in flat paint. It got SO STAINED and gross from our kids spilling food.

P1000057 Different view. Notice the 2 skinny windows with individual mini-blinds. Chic.

P1020703 Day one of sanding.

P1020704 Close up of the awesome flat paint.

P1020705 Day 2 sanding scraping.P1020739 Finished wainscoting and walls. P1020740Major improvement.

 

So while we were doing all of this disaster work in the kitchen Sophie was learning to do this:

Super convenient timing.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Gah! I've done it now! I've been needing a kick in the pants to get me back on a better running schedule (one where I actually go running) and this should be it! Thanks to Kelly (if the internet were her dojo, she'd be my running sensei) I'll be running a 10K on September 20. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...
In other "Gah!" news, we're about to embark on a LONG weekend of kitchen remodeling...of sorts. Starting on Thursday we'll be taking apart the cabinets and stripping/sanding them and then repainting them as well as painting the walls and wainscoting. It's going to be a LONG project and Chase doesn't head back to work until next Wednesday. Pray for us. I'll post before and after shots!

Monday, August 25, 2008

Favorite move lines

My SIL had this on her blog and it's a kick to read people's favorite lines from movies.

So what's yours?

Gare Bear's going on a mission!

Garrett received his mission call on Friday! Chile Santiago West! He goes to the MTC November 5. Hooray for Gare Bear!

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Frontiers of Flight Museum

A couple weeks ago our playgroup went to this cool flight museum near Love Field. The kids had a blast!

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(Never mind the Sepia...I forgot to turn it off). This is a picture of Miles throwing a tantrum on the floor because he couldn't get onto the seat.

P1020605All over the museum they had these airplane seats. Who cares about planes? Let's get in the seats!

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Our tour guide was a WWII vet and he's showing us a picture of him and his plane.

P1020615Checking out a Huey!

P1020618 That's for you, Christy!

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P1020626 This is that REAL Apollo 11!!! That's what the bottom of it looks like after having been burned up on re-entry.

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Recent Happenings

So I'm taking Chrysta's suggestion and going with Live Writer. So far? Love it.

Anyway, it's been a long time since I've updated with anything rational. The month of August got started with a bang when Scott and Christy and their brood came to town! My bro just got back from Iraq and it was good to see them. They showed up on Saturday and we ate lunch together before Christy and I took off to Grapevine Mills outlets for some shopping. Can I just say how refreshing it is to leave the kids and spend time with an ADULT?!?! And one of my very favorite adults too! Lucky me!

After shopping we had dinner together before heading back to S&C's hotel to swim. It was, like, 800 degrees outside, the pool water was warm and yet we all ended up freezing! Christy and I couldn't figure it out and whenever we would complain CK would go on with some extraordinarily scientific reason for why that was happening. I just thought it was windy.

Anyway, the kids were all little fishes! Zach is a super swimmer. He was doing so well Christy and Scott were staying busy just trying to keep up with him. Of course that got Cam even MORE excited to keep doing his underwater swimming. Peer pressure can be a good thing sometimes. Ty, on the other hand, was hilarious because he was SO laid back. He had his life jacket on and would just bob around in the water. He'd swim here and there and just kinda go with the flow. He didn't feel any real need to be clinging to mom or dad. He was just pretty content to splash around in the deep end by himself and occasionally he'd paddle over to see us before drifting off again. Funny, funny kid.

Sunday we met back up at our house for dinner. I made homemade tortillas and we had chicken fajitas. At first I thought, "Yeah, fajitas! That's a good, easy Sunday dinner." Obviously I hadn't made fajitas in awhile. It took forever!!! oh well. I thought it was pretty yummy. We had cookie ice cream sandwiches for dinner. The kids didn't like that idea. They just wanted the cookies!

After dinner it was time to say adieu. We're so glad to live close to them so we can see them often. We'll be heading up there in October and Christy and I are going to run a race together. WE LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!!!!

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After Christy and Scott left my life was consumed with Breaking Dawn, which you all know. The kids, however, maintained an active social life.

Sophie had a quick trip to the cardiologist to get her heart murmur checked. I have one, Cameron has one, I think some of my siblings have them. I wasn't worried. It came back clear and we'll go back in 6 months for a check up. She did relatively well during that appointment, though. I say relatively because the next week was her well child appointment and that went terribly. I hate shots! Poor Soph had to have four. She was a champ, but it's tough to watch them go through that.

One funny thing that came up during that appointment: Sophie's head circumference is literally off the charts. Like, she's in the 120th percentile or something. Little smarty pants! I love her ginormo head! And it complements her 18 1/2 pound body perfectly, I think!

In other Sophie news, that girl wants to crawl so badly she can taste it! She's always pushing up onto her hands and knees and reaching for things. Last Wednesday she started scooting. She looks just like that inchworm puppet from Sesame Street. She puts her face down in the ground, hikes her bummy up into the air and gets her toes under her and then pushes off. It's HILARIOUS! I could watch it for, like, tens of minutes. But, alas, after about 20 seconds of that she gets pretty ticked off and screams at me until I rescue her. She's ALSO trying to pull herself up on things. She's done it once and was able to stay up on her feet for about 10 seconds before promptly falling on her face. She wasn't deterred, though! She's a fighter.

Lastly, she's on table food now. I know that's not exciting for everyone, but it is for me! I think it's so fun to feed her REAL food. And she doesn't seem to be picky...yet. That will come. I know it will.

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Moving on to Miles. There's not much to update. He's still not napping much, which has taken a lot to get used to. Every now and then he'll put himself down for a nap, though, and when he does it is the most adorable thing. He'll just grab his blanket and puppy and climb up in his bed and I'll find him snoring away. I love the little angel face of a sleeping child. So perfect and innocent.

The thing that's wearing Miles out these days is probably his newest obsessions: soap and bikes. Now that Miles has figured out how to crawl up onto the bathroom counter I usually keep the guest bathroom door locked. Before he wouldn't ever think to go down the hall to the master bathroom, but now he looks for any available bathroom with pump soap. If I don't hear him for a minute or so I usually take off in a mad dash toward the bathroom and that's where I'll find him sitting with his feet in the sink, rubbing copious amounts of hand soap all over his face, arms, legs, clothes. When I find him he'll say, "All keen, mommy!" At first this was cute, now it's just getting expensive! So the soap was retired to the cabinet above the toilets (right next to the toothpaste he used to compulsively eat). He hasn't figured out how to get to it. But like my dad says, all kids are like squirrels. They'll just keep working on it until they figure it out.

When he's not soaping Miles wants to be outside riding his bike. He got a trike for Christmas last year and hasn't been that taken with it until recently. He's really got the pedal action down and loves to cruise down the sidewalk and say, "I so fast, mommy!" That kid is just the embodiment of awesomeness.

P1020600 (I like this picture of Miles because his diaper is on backwards. This is how my babysitter put it on him! Awesome! We love our babysitter!!!)

P1020643 This was supposed to be Sophie's photo shoot but Miles wasn't having it...

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Cameron. My boy has taken off this summer! He's so different in so many ways! He's gotten really independent and is coming out of his shell. I'm kind of sad that he won't be starting kindergarten this fall because I think he really could have done well. But that's cool.

So Cam's big accomplishments this summer have been swimming, writing/reading, and overcoming some of his shyness.

Swimming: at the beginning of the summer Cameron HATED to get water on his face at the pool. To be honest, he didn't even like going to the pool that much. But little by little he's gotten more and more comfortable with it. We've spent lots of time at our friends' pools this summer and the peer pressure of seeing his friends swimming has helped a lot. I could see him really concentrating and focusing on each new step and it helped him gain a lot of confidence whenever he would master another step. Sometimes I look at him and I'm so proud I think my chest is going to bust open. In three months time he has gone from being scared of the pool to be a fish! I love it and I'm so happy for him!

Cam's also really excelled with identifying letters and words recently. He's such a cerebral kid. He'll often come up to me in the middle of the day, or shout out from the back seat of the car, "Hey mom! P comes from Pizza Hut!" Or whatever sign he just saw. And he loves to take out his magna doodle and write letters on it and then ask us what he spelled. Usually it's ARB. I'm not sure what that means, but who knows, maybe it's the secret to curing cancer and we just don't know it yet. Sometimes, though, he'll switch it up so it says "BAR" at which point I think he's probably already dreaming of the day he passes the Bar exam.

Lastly, my kid is getting so dang independent! He's always been so cautious and he has a pretty shy/quiet side to him. He would get nervous whenever he had to pray or give a talk in primary. But not anymore! He's making friends left and right at the playground or pool. At church he's always raising his hand to give the prayer or help with singing time. When we're out riding bikes he wants to zoom across the street by himself (after checking to make sure it's safe, of course). I don't let him do that yet, but it's amazing to me that he wants to do it!

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So that's it for us. If you're wondering why I had to write a 40 page blog just remember that this is really my family journal so I want to make sure to get all of these memories recorded for the future!

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Talk about good news on a rainy day! This was taken from Stephenie Meyer's website. I know I sound obsessed ( I am ). Don't think I'm weird that I keep blogging about it. I'm just weird in general.
So, anyway, I guess this is BAD news if you're a HP fan (Not I, said the crazy, Twilight-blogging-freak-girl), but good news for the rest of us.

August 15, 2008

Movie News Flash!

So, many of you have heard that the release of the sixth Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, has been moved from this Thanksgiving to next summer. First and foremost, please know that this schedule change has absolutely nothing to do with Twilight, me, or Summit Films (so enough with the imdb death wishes, okay?). This is Warner Bros. decision, and it was not motivated by anything Twilight-related.

Now for the good news! Though we're all sad to have to wait for Harry Potter, this open spot at the theater creates a cool opportunity. The good people at Summit were thrilled to let me know that now Twilight fans are going to get their movie three weeks earlier than scheduled. That's right—Twilight will be released in theaters November 21st! Let the merry-making commence!

--Stephenie

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

And for the Bellward obsessed, check out this blog. Hi-freakin-larious.
http://mormonhusbands.blogspot.com/2008/07/breaking-dawn-spoof-part-i.html

Monday, August 18, 2008

I have all sorts of blog entries jumping around in my head right now. However the combination of my Bellward obsession (I just opened up Twilight for the THIRD TIME!!!! WHEN WILL THE MADNESS END?!) and my Olympics obsession (a.k.a. my obsession with watching annoying-ly fit and gorgeous people run, jump, twirl, kick and swim their way to super-stardom - it's bordering on masochism, honestly - oh, and speaking of Olympians, has ANYONE in the Kilgore family noticed that Michael Phelps and Jerry look A LOT alike?! It's getting creepy...) has kept my brain otherwise engaged. I did, however, find this blog and I think every UMC member needs to check it out!
http://nomoremomjeans.blogspot.com/
It's a hot mess.

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

This is for my peeps (well, mostly for Chrysta). This is a banana bread recipe that I found and it's fantastically amazing. Scrum-dilly-umptious.

  • 1/2 cup butter, melted
  • 1 cup white sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  • 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
  • 2 medium bananas, sliced

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
  2. In a large bowl, stir together the melted butter and sugar. Add the eggs and vanilla, mix well. Combine the flour, baking soda and salt, stir into the butter mixture until smooth. Finally, fold in the sour cream, walnuts and bananas. Spread evenly into the prepared pan.
  3. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Cool loaf in the pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.
As a note: I use mostly whole wheat flour. I've made it with white flour plenty of times, but I like the nuttiness (and healthfulness) of whole wheat. I also use fat-free sour cream. The next time I make it I'll be experimenting with substituting applesauce for PART of the butter. I've never had much success replacing ALL of the butter in recipes. Food just needs fat, people. Especially if you want it to taste delicious. I prefer my food tasty. Anyway, if someone beats me to it and tries it with part applesauce please feel free to let me know how it goes.
Also, I don't "slice" the bananas, rather, I mash them really coarsely with a fork so that you have all sorts of lovely banana clumps. Alyssa, did you mash or slice? I'm curious.
Lastly, when I add the sour cream/banana mixture I am really careful to FOLD it in and not overmix it. Who wants tough bread? Not me.

Also, pics of the kids and our fabulous weekend with Scott and Christy are coming up...