My quilt my mom made

Well, I am babysitting Miles and Ruby. I went to Portland on Saturday, we went to Bob's bought some grains and had lunch and then went to the new Pooh movie. It was fun! I think you will all like it. It is new but in the style of the old ones. I brought them back with me on Sunday. Jake and Lyndsey are coming on Thurs to stay the night and then leave on Friday to go camping. I will post pics and more info about what we have done later.I haven't done my new grain this week because Miles and Ruby have to be Gluten Free so next week.

I have been meaning to post the quilt my mom made me for Christmas and my B-day so since I have a lot to post and not time to do that, I thought I would do this today so I can catchup a little. Just for the record, I didn't get this quilt until a month and a half to two months ago. It is so cute and whimsical! Love you Mom!BackClose-upThe border

Have lots to blog, but.....

I am not going to catch up everything right now. I will catch up on Friday or Saturday. But I am excited about something that I am going to do and want to share it with all of you! I emailed all of you and told you to watch Chef Brad online or on the BYU channel. I have been watching it and re-watching them and am very excited about it! I am going to try a new grain every week and blog about the things I do with that grain. I am hoping it will inspire all of you to try also and share the things that you do!

This week has been barley week. I bought the Hull-less barley another name for whole barley, it is the least processed. I cooked it up in my new best friend, my electric pressure cooker.You could also cook it in a pan on the stove. This is how it looks when it is done.When you watch his show, it doesn't look creamy, so I got paranoid and called the phone # on his sight. Guess who answered the phone? Chef Brad!!! I was so surprised, I was expecting one of his employees. We had a good chat on the phone, he was very nice. He said the barley was supposed be creamy, and the only time he rinses it is if he is putting it in a salad. The whole point of making a bigger batch is to put it in things throughout the week. He says if you don't have it in the fridge ready you won't use it. Soooo this week I made one of his recipes for a salad. Now one of the things I learned was to taste the dressing before you put it on the salad. I loved the salad before I put any dressing on it. Then I put the dressing he recommends on it and I liked it (not loved it), but your dad didn't like it and so quit eating it. He thought it looked beautiful and delicious. So I wish I had tasted the dressing first. He would have loved it I think if I had left the mustard and garlic out of it. I wouldn't be surprised if Megan and Greg would love the dressing. I also put some barley on one of my regular lunch salads. These pics didn't show the barley as well as I wanted, but I didn't have a card reader so couldn't tell what the pics looked like until I had eaten them. Oh well. I also added about a 1/3 of a cup to my smoothies, and couldn't tell at all. I want to make some bread next. He made a french bread and added it to that! I am very excited. Another thing I did in my electric pressure cooker, is make steel cut oats, YUMMY! Lizzie helped me with those and had me put some coconut butter in them mmmmmmm it was so good!! Well, I need to go to bed. Will blog more another day! Love you all!!

So much to blog

Well, life has been crazy busy since Rebecca's wedding. I came home and spent a few days just catching up, then I had all these things I had to do and every day I think of something I want to blog, but don't have time to blog everything I need to blog from the past. Sooooo I am just going to catch up and try to blog more often so it's not so overwhelming for me and those that read it!!!

The visit to California for the wedding was wonderful!!! We had all of our kids there. Most of the spouses were unable to come, but it was actually kind of fun to just have the kids by themselves for a change. It was fun to watch Jacob in particular. He was sleeping in the exercise room all buy himself and he was having the time of his life going from the sauna to the pool to the steam shower and etc. He was able to sleep in and that almost never happens when you have small kids.

I spent the first 3 days finishing Rebecca's dress and making cupcakes for the refreshments after the wedding. The dress took longer than I thought it would, shock! I was basically happy with it, part of it didn't turn out like I wanted , but Rebecca was thrilled and that is what matters. I didn't get a pic of the whole dress, or very many pics period, but I will add them later when I get some from Lizzie, and let you know so you can scroll down and see them. For now I will post the pics I took on that wonderful day!! Back to the cupcakes, we did about 100 cupcakesThis is the pic I took at the wedding, I'm hoping Lizzie got a better one, I don't like mine, it looks crooked and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't straighten it!Everyone helped decorate them or we never would have gotten them done. The next day several people did about 200 strawberries. Before the wedding we had a party, at Lizzies, it was fun we had good food, some people swam and Jake played the guitar while people danced. It was fun! Such classic Jake and RebeccaSteve #1 and Steve#2 as Jacob named themBeautiufl Aliese and Elle

Beautiful Kate!

The swimmers

Doesn't this make you want to know what they are talking about! Time to eat!

Anna's b-day after dinner, what do you think that beautiful face is wishing?After dinner and Presents, Jake started playing his guitar and everyone started dancing.Last but not least, the future bride and groomA couple of days later we had the wedding. The bishop did a really good job. He talked to the girls as well as Steve and Rebecca. When the Bishop pronounced them man and wife, Rebecca was all but jumping up and down, and Steve had tears running down his face. It was a wonderful ceremony and day! I again am hoping Lizzie got more and better ones that I will add later, but here's some: Lizzie and Shad

I loved this one!

I thought this was so sweet!Isn't she beautiful! Just like her mommy!Can you be more beautiful than this? I don't think so!The random people there were Steve #2's best friends back to high school, they couldn't have been sweeter or have said nicer things about Steve. They were so helpful also. Jacob wrote a song for Rebecca and Steve, it was very Jacob, funny as well as very touching. He wrote a copy for them to read while he sang it. It was fun to watch bachelor with all the girls. I never watch it unless I am with one of the girls houses and they are watching it. It was great to be with the grandkids that were there. After the wedding I was free to play, so we swam and I attacked them all on the floaty thing and dumped them over, they all loved that-even Aliese.

We made cookies with my new sprinkles also, a little overwhelming with so many kids at once, but still fun. That night when I went to bed I couldn't sleep thinking about how to make cookie making easier, espceially with so many grandkids at once. I came up with a new plan for doing cookies in the future. I am going to give each kid a sheet of parchment paper about half or the whole size of a baking pan. Then I will roll out or have them help me roll out the dough, give them some cookie cutters and let them cut out their cookies. They can then take the extra dough away from the cookies and set in a pile, I will then lift their parchment paper onto the cookie sheet and bake it. No impatient little kids waiting for their turn to cut out cookies and no broken cookies while transfering them onto the tray! I will also give them all a little bowl of frosting and a plastic knife, (I have observed they are easier for little people to handle) to decorate their cookies with. I basically let them do all their own sprinkle work anyway so this way they can just do what they want. I think it will be a lot less stressful and way more fun for the kids. I'm excited to try it!!! Will let you know if it works. I wish I had pics of the whole expereinces but I was very busy at the time and noone eles thought to take pics of us I guess. I should have asked someone to grab my camera and take pics. Next time!!

This was so sweet and I can't believe I got it on camera!!!

All in all it was a great week! I was exhausted, but a good kind! love you all!!

catching up

I have decided if someone wanted to make big money off of me all they have to do is show me some cute sprinkles and I will buy them. If someone invited me to a sprinkle party, if there was ever such a thing, I would probably spend my life savings and have to come home and eat my food storage. It is pitiful! I went to Wal-Mart to look for some sprinkles for Rebecca's wedding cupcakes and on the end cap was the sprinkles you see above. I couldn't buy just one of them... oh no I had to have them all! I started with one then thought well the boys need one too. Then I thought "well I don't have any thing like the Tinkerbell one, so all that was left was Mickey Mouse, so what the heck, I threw it in my cart. So I went in for wedding stuff and a mic for skype, I came out with a mic and 4 sets of sprinkles and two candy necklace kits.

I loved the finale on American Idol. It was the best I've ever seen. It gave me hope in America that the last two people they voted for were clean, wholesome, humble people. The winner, Scotty was a downright gentleman. It made the last 2 episodes a lot of fun.

I have really enjoyed having my camera (well, one like it) back. I love taking pictures. I don't know what I will do with all of them, but can't resist a beautiful sunset, or a pretty flower. If I take it to my green house I can't resist taking pics of the veggies. And of course if my grandkids are around I want to take pics of them too!

Speaking of my greenhouse-every year especially now that we live up here, I have to say to myself, "be grateful for what you can grow and don't get up tight about not planting every square inch! If I don't tell myself that I start getting discouraged especially at this time of year. My tomatoes look fabulous (the little plant in the middle is basil)-that is the ones in the beds. The pic above was taken about a week ago. 3 days ago they had grown a good 4-6 inches. The experiment of hanging tomatoes.... I am not sure about. They are growing much slower. They don't look any bigger than they did a week ago. The one that I put their special soil and fertilizer in doesn't look as healthy as the one that I put my regular special soil that I add to my beds every year and my regular fertilizer. I had a crazy spinach plant that tried to take over the greenhouse. If we had been living at our house by the greenhouse, it would have been eaten instead of growing all over the ground. It started going to seed so I pulled it up. :-( Oh well.This year has been the year of the rhododendrons. It has been so beautiful! The wild rodies are more in bloom than I have ever seen them. They are blooming all up and down the highway, I love it! Our purple one bloomed.I finished Rebecca's dress as much as I can until I get down there, it is going to be pretty.

Well, tomorrow is my last sharing time for two months. I am glad. I know that did well, but I could do better and I am looking forward to feeling like I know better what I am doing. Last week the stake was there observing. I told them that I still don't feel like I know what I am doing, and they all said you sure couldn't tell. That made me feel better, but I still am grateful that I get to observe for a couple of months.

It seems like I had more to say but I'm tired and have company coming tomorrow.

Love you all bunches!

Well, it seemed like I had

Guess What I Got?!!!

Well, I took my camera to a painting class and on the way there I left it on the plane! Talk about a depressing thing when you love your camera as much as I do. I called 7 airports and no one turned it in. So you guessed it someone stole it. Sooooo I look on line at Costco and then called Lizzie to get her opinion, she says, "go on eBay and get your same camera, unless you didn't like the pictures or etc. " I thought I loved my camera, plus she said that way I wouldn't have to learn a new camera. So I took my first real serious leap on eBay. I put in a bid and then was worried I put in to high of a bid, but I was the highest bidder. There were 16 people bidding on it. When it got close to the closing time I noticed someone had out bid me. I upped my bid and was about to go on a walk. I noticed that if I went on my walk, I wouldn't be there at the end. So I got paranoid and sat down and watched it. About 5 minutes before it closed someone out bid me. I then clicked on the little 1 click bid, and so did the other person, that went on for a couple of more bids, then it had about 2 minutes left and I was high bidder, I sat there so nervous wondering if this was an experienced bidder and would out bid me at the last second. But the last two minutes clicked away and I got it!!! I was so happy. It came in about 2 days later. I didn't have any way to get my pics off of the camera, so I couldn't tell if it took good pics or not. So Saturday I went to walmart, got a card reader.

Today it was beautiful so I went outside to take some pics of the Rhodies that Steve planted last summer and voila, beautiful pics. Ahhhhhhh.... I am so happy. I will be blogging more again!

I decided to blog my paintings I did with my sister in Missouri. It was an interesting experience. I enjoyed the time with my sister, enjoyed painting most of the time, but didn't like the teacher. I guess she is amazing and famous, but as teaching goes, I thought she was okay. She was a "fixer". I like to do my own work and I if I dont' like something or want some help, I like to ask and not have the teacher "fix it" for me! Oh well, live and learn. It made me want to experiment with oils again.I have several things to blog, a new dress, Danielle's present and etc. But will do that when I look more presentable. Enjoy the pretty flowers and the paintings. Love you all!

Jakes Show and other Things

Last night we went to Jake's show at the Secret Society Ballroom. It was a quaint building that used to have some kind of Secret Society in it. It was fun to see Jake and his band having a great time and playing amazingly great music. They are all very talented. It is great fun to watch Jake, I wish everyone could watch him. He is definitely in his element up on stage. He has a great time and it just makes me smile to watch him. I wish I had a camera, it would have been cool to post some pics. He had a cool wool felt hat that someone made for him. They have some new songs that I really liked and were a big hit. Can't wait for you all to hear them. They are almost done with their new album.

I told Jake that no matter how old your kids get it is a great joy to watch them do something they love to do. Steve and I were so glad we went. It was a last minute thing. We found out about it on Thursday. We both had a good time! It was fun to see the kids and Lyndsey also. We both read a lot of books and got jumped on a lot by guess who? You guessed it Miles. He is all boy. What a riot.

Aside from the wind it is really pretty outside. If we lived at Idaho Street, I would go out to my little corner on the deck that is protected from the wind and pretend I was in Hawaii and start tanning my legs. The deck here isn't the same. It's more a walk outside for a minute and come back in deck. Oh well. Hopefully in one year, 5 months and 2 days we will be signing papers and moving back. I know I am ungrateful. Oh well, I'm still mortal so still very human.

Working on a dress for myself. It is really cute, but it is like walking through very deep mud to make myself work on it. I think it is residual mental garbage from being obese. One of these days I will be past that. I was talking to Amy about it on the phone the other day. Being obese made me feel I wasn't "worthy" of beautiful fabric. So it is hard to sew for me. I go through fear and all sorts of weirdness as I sit and sew for myself. It feels like that when I think of painting by myself also. I think it is a Satan not wanting me to be happy thing. I hope as I push myself I will get passed this. I used to love sewing for myself and was as confident doing that as I was sewing for anyone else. Time.... boring. I want all the crap feelings to be gone immediately. Oh well, it will come!

I'm going to be doing my first Sharing time tomorrow, excited and a little nervous at the same time. Loving being in Primary.

Love you all!

Favorite talk

One of my favorite talks in conference was this: http://lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/the-atonement-covers-all-pain?lang=eng We read it today for our Family Home/scripture study.
It moved me as much or more the second time. I HIGHLY recommend it to everyone.

It is different when you are together 24/7 and have no children at home. So we have family prayer and scripture study when I eat my breakfast. On Mondays we read a conference talk instead and I count that as Family Home Evening. We read 1 page a day in one of the Standard Works and as a result of that we have completed the Book of Mormon, the Pearl of Great Price, the Doctrine and Covenants, and now we are reading the New Testament. It's like the scriptures say "out of simple things proceedeth that which is great." I think half the reason we don't do certain things is because we make then too hard.

love you all!