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October

January 18th, 2010 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, random, spencer, tina

In the spirit of catching up…

This past October (2009) we decided, nearly on a whim, to pack up and take a trip to California/Disneyland.
Disneyland is always a fun place, and it seemed like good timing where we were out from under our mortgage payment, and hadn’t starting building the house yet.

We went the week before Halloween – and had a ball!

Spencer was just a tiny bit nervous about the characters (and some of the rides). He never cried, but he sure clung to us a lot.

This was “The REAL Snow White” – She was an awesome actress and completely wonderful with Bridget. We were incredibly impressed. Bridget still (almost 3 months later) talks about the real snow white and how she lives in a castle in the sky.

Believe it or not, Bridget’s favorite ride was the Tower of Terror. She was tall enough to ride this year – and did at LEAST 14 times during our trip.

At the princess’ dinner. Cinderella was in second place for most impressive princess.

She loved Splash Mountain too… the kid is fearless, I tell you!

Dumbo…

Aunt Jenna came and hug out with us out there for a couple of days!! We had a great time with her!

At the blue bayou with Aunt Jenna!

At Halloween time Disneyland does this trick or treat thing at night. It was pretty fun to see all the characters dressed up and wander around collecting candy – which was handed out by the handful, by the way. Here we all are with Mickey and Minnie.

The witch from Snow White did an awesome job staying in character. She just kept this sour mean face on the whole time – I don’t think Bridget knew what to think.

We also bet the Bowler Hat Man (Goob) – Very cool!

We spent a lot of time at Disneyland, some times later into the evening too. It was not uncommon for one (or both) of the kids to just crash mid festivities. Here are some cute sleeping pictures of our tired little troopers!

While in California, we also went to a beach in La Jolla. It was a bit chilly, but still tons of fun!

One of Spencer’s favorite activities was chasing Seagulls. He couldn’t ever catch one though – and actually sat and cried a couple of times because of it.

Dave buried Bridget in the sand – she thought that was great!

Spencer also loved playing with the seaweed. Weird kid.

We (mostly Dave) made this cool looking crater out of sand. It was a challenge to build it quick enough that water didn’t pour in when the tide came up. The little girl in the pink came over to ‘help’ toward the end, and laid claim on our masterpiece as we were leaving.

We also went to the San Diego zoo…

The Pandas were the coolest thing there.

And we got to stop in and see my grandmother and my uncle Carl in Long Beach. The kids took an immediate liking to Carl.


It sure was fun to see them. Love you guys!!!!

THEN THERE WAS HALLOWEEN…
We made it back from California the day before Halloween. Just  in time to dawn our outlandish costumes and trick or treat in my parents’ neighborhood.

You may remember the chaos surrounding our costumes last year…
If not, let me refresh your memory. Look here, here, here and here.

We decided to use the same costumes again, figuring that Bridget may not be big enough to fit into hers again next year. But we didn’t have one for Spencer, so we decided to turn the stroller into a cart of scream canisters. It proved to be nearly as lengthy process as any of the costumes from last year… but that seems to be just how it goes around here!

I’ll spare you the ‘making of’ pictures this time – but here are some pictures of the finished scream canisters:


And here we all are, ready to roam the neighborhood.



I would have to say that we had a pretty fun October!
Happy Halloween (in January) everyone!

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Once upon a blog…

January 18th, 2010 · a day in the life, random

You know, there was a time on this blog where I wrote something (anything) every single day – or at least most every day. Those days seem to be a thing of the past, and though I miss having new content on my blog daily, I find that I lack the motivation to actually put it there. I need some blogging elves – like the ones the shoemaker had – that will just take care of posting things to this blog while I sleep.

I’m not really sure what changed that made me loose the motivation to write here. I know I slowed down a bit when Spencer was born, but the near screeching halt didn’t really come until sometime this past summer. Was it the move? The newly cramped quarters? I honestly, don’t know.

At any rate, I also realize that I am, and always have been, a horrible journal keeper. And as cliche as I think it is to say that “this blog is my journal,” there is a certain amount of record keeping that takes place here. And there really is a lot that has transpired over the last several months that has yet to be written down or recorded… a lot of significant things even.

So, today, I try again.
I cannot vow to write weekly, or daily, or to keep up with any regular schedule – because I don’t think I’d stick to it. All I can do is try to catch up, even a little. So, I will commence at this moment in writing a post that at minimum moves me in the direction of catching up. Look for that post later today.

In the meantime, if any of you hear of any blogging elves, please let me know!

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The Pioneer Woman in Salt Lake City

November 12th, 2009 · a day in the life, random, tina


The picture above (taken by Missy Drummond) was posted on The Pioneer Woman’s blog! How cool is that!!!!

How many of you follow The Pioneer Woman’s blog?
(http://thepioneerwoman.com)

I started reading it about 2 years ago after seeing something about it on a photography forum. And I’ve been captivated ever since.
The woman is talented writer/blogger with a vast number of topics to address. Some posts are humorous or absurd, others talk about life on the ranch, homeschooling, or home improvements, etc. She also has a section devoted to recipes and cooking, she has a series titled “Black heels to tractor wheels” where she chronicles her unlikely courtship to her husband, and frequent giveaways. You should check it out if you don’t already read her blog.

At any rate, The Pioneer Woman recently published a cookbook and went on tour around the country meeting people and signing books. One such event was held in Salt Lake City last week. I was on the fence about going since it was a 2 hour drive and we were right in the middle of closing on our construction loan… kind of a busy time. But then Michelle called me, and basically said, “I’ll go if you go.” Michelle and I have been trying to get together for the past several months, so I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to hang out with her and see PW all in the same night.

Fast forward to that night…

The gallery was scheduled to open at 6:30 for a 7:00 presentation by Ree (Pioneer Woman). We got there about 6:00 and there were already 200+ people ahead of us – some having arrived earlier than 4:00. The gallery was packed wall to wall. It was standing room only. So far, not too different than what I expected.

Around 7:30 they started book signing at the neighboring Kings English bookstore. Everyone was assigned a slip of paper with a letter on it. We were to form a line with our letter was called… 20 A’s, 20 B’s, etc… Michelle and I were assigned the letter “J,” but letters were assigned through “R” and there were still a couple hundred people that showed up late, were not assigned letters and stood outside in the cold waiting until the end to see if Ree was still up for signing books. At 8:30 (one hour in) they were still on the letter “C.”

The Kings English bookstore is small, and although it looked to be a pretty cool store, it wasn’t prepared for the mass amounts of people that this event brought in. Most people waited outside for hours for their turn to come in an meet the woman of the hour. We were among them until someone told us that there was a room inside where we could go to keep the babies out of the cold.

That’s when things started to get interesting…

First… Missy came and took our picture! It was great to meet Missy. She was a very kind and down to earth woman. We visited for several minutes before she asked us how far we’d driven to get here, how old the babies were, etc… She quickly had compassion on us realizing that the babies were getting tired and we still had a long wait ahead of us. Before long were were being whisked to the front of the line an allowed to meet PW and get our books signed.

It all happened so quickly. We were not allowed to pose for pictures with her, or visit for any length of time at all really. The staff at the bookstore were doing their best to push us through like a herd of cattle (ha, reference intentional). Ree barely had a chance to look up from her signing before we were being sent on our way. It was wild. I know that there were a lot of people to process and I am grateful that we were allowed a hint of priority (or the babies were at least), but I guess I was hoping to get 3 or 4 minutes at least to say “Hi.” Alas.

Oh… on the way out we also asked Missy to sign our books. I’m glad she did. 🙂

I’d say it was a fun evening and I’m glad I went. And I might even do it again. But I think there would be a few things I did differently next time.

Here are some more images from that night:

Oh, by the way…
If you want to witness our 5 seconds of fame on PW’s blog you can check it out here: http://thepioneerwoman.com/blog/2009/11/a_recap/
(Note: The image itself can be found on PW’s flickr page at http://www.flickr.com/photos/pioneerwoman/4088475482/)

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Do you know what we did this summer?

November 7th, 2009 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, domestic attempts, family, high school, random, siblings, spencer, tina

Its no secret that I am further behind on my blogging than I have ever been before. The thought of catching up one post at a time was quite daunting, and just pretending like the last several months never happened (and not blogging about them at all) didn’t seem right either.

So, I went through my pictures… Everything from late May through the end of September. And came up with 72 images representing much of what we did this summer.

Yes, seventy-two.

So, I’ve chosen to throw it all at you in one giant lump! Be prepared for one overwhelming post. After this blog post I will only be one month behind schedule.

Here we go…

This summer we did lots of fun things,

We played in shaving cream. And made a huge mess.

Did you know that shaving cream makes an excellent canvas for practicing letters.

We went hiking and geocaching on the Shoreline Trail.

Attended the 24th of July parade.

Where we collected lots of candy,

saw some pretty cool floats,

and took an occasional break on some lawn chairs.

We managed to bathe from time to time.

We even played together and laughed.

We spent a lot of time outside with friends, playing playdoh.

We attended my 10-year High School Reunion. (Man, I’m old)

Bridget took swimming lessons at the Aquatic center.

She did a pretty good job listing to the instructions.

And got pretty brave about jumping in.

We were pretty proud of her.

This summer we moved into our apartment… and had to find some creative ways to keep Spencer entertained.

Bridget got a cute new Sunday dress, and very willingly modeled it.

We spent all of 5 minutes at the Cache County Fair one day after swimming lessons. While we were there we found this carriage – surely it must belong to Cinderella.

We had many a happy morning.

Had a tea party outside.

Played on the soft play at the mall.

Ate lots and lots of Popsicles – and even shared a few.

Painted…

and painted some more.

Daddy went on an all day hiking/geocaching expedition with his friend, Craig, and found this fun tree.

This was the view from their hike.

Spencer learned to crawl. He’s quite a mover now.

We went to the Treehouse museum, where we pretended to be teachers,

ate at a Japanese restaurant,

rode a wild bull,

built some stuff,

and drove the fire truck. It was a busy day.

We did even more geocaching – a popular activity for us especially at the beginning of the summer.

And found some nifty treasure.

We went camping. Bridget set up the tent herself (kidding).

We climbed a tree while we were there,

made some new friends,

practiced a little Croquet,

ate some yummy food,

and woke up happy and ready to play!

We pretended to be doctors, listening for heartbeats,

and taking blood pressures.

Uncle Ken and aunt Marci came to visit with their family. This is a picture of Ken with Spencer and two of his cousins.

We took some pictures of the kids for grandma Ernstrom’s birthday.

Spencer wore this studly little suit,

and Bridget her cute new dress.

We did lots of art projects this summer.

We taught Spencer how to play “fingers,”

and got creative when it came to needing a little space of our own.

Spencer got some teeth (two on the bottom) and spent time eating things like teething cookies and Popsicles to help with the pain.

Our super stylish Bridget was also super good and helping me cook,

and clean up afterward.

We attended an orientation at Bridget’s new preschool,

where we met some of Bridget’s wonderful teachers.

We played in the pool at our complex quite a bit.

Often with friends.

After a short time in the water, Spencer always seemed to get a little sleepy and want to cuddle.

On September 1st, Bridget left for her first day of preschool.

We played at grandma’s house a couple of times this summer too, even tired on her glasses.

Bridget got inked at the Treehouse Museum’s “Pirate Party” on Labor Day.

Aunt Jenna came with us.

Check out her pirate hat. Its says “Bridget Pirate” if you can’t read it.

There were even sword fights involved.

Spencer showed off on the corn popper and finally got to feel like one of the big kids on a “bike.”

We sold our house, but you already knew that.

We played in the rain

with friends.

And got super wet. But it was fun!

We even got in trouble every now and then, and lost some privileges.

We went hunting for the perfect piece of land on which to build our house. We took many a drive and ended up all over this valley. We finally settled on some land in Cove (at the location in the photo).

We played a lot with friends.

And painted (did I already mention that we painted?)

And at the end of September we got together with my family for my sister’s baby shower!

So there you have it. A summer synopsis. Whew!
Now you know what we did this summer. What did you do?

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Spencer’s First Haircut

September 26th, 2009 · domestic attempts, spencer

At the end of July (nearly 2 months ago now), I gave Spencer his very first haircut! I sat him on a towel in the sink and had an array of objects he could hold, hoping that it would keep his attention long enough to get the job done. It almost worked.

He actually really loved the sink and looking at himself in the mirror. But, instead of his play things, he wanted the scissors I was using. In the end he probably lasted 20 minutes or so, and I made it to a “mostly done” status. There were a few spots that were not well blended though… easily hid when I actually styled his hair – but who does that regularly with a baby boy?!

Though he looked all cute and studly with his new do, I ended up putting some clippers to his head a couple of weeks later. I just couldn’t handle the choppy edges.
I will admit that the buzzed look made me sad for awhile too though. That took some time to grow on me.

His hair is already starting to grow out quite a bit now though. Not sure what I’ll do next time. Hm. Now that he can crawl though… oh dear. Adventure!

Maybe I’ll strap him down and give him a cracker…
But hair in a slobbery cracker sounds gross. He’s not into movies or TV, so that’s out.

What do you do to keep your baby boys entertained when its time for a haircut?

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A long time coming…

September 13th, 2009 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, random, spencer, tina

Well, its officially been more than a month since my last blog post, and very likely my longest blogging hiatius to date. It was not my intention to stop blogging or drop off the face of the earth, I simpy haven’t had much time to breath much less blog. To say that life has been busy these past couple of months would be a gross understament.

On June 18th, I posted that we were moving. We did that, and officially began listing our house on July 6th (after a couple of weeks of mad packing, cleaning, and basement finishing). Daily since then we’ve been back to clean, feed the fish, get the mail, and/or mow the lawn. On August 22nd we found that we had buyers for our home, and by the first week in September we were moving over our large furniture and trying to make sense of all that was left to move and do at the house.

Last Friday (Septemeber 11, 2009) we signed the papers. WE SOLD THE HOUSE!
It was a bittersweet occasion. Selling means that we can now move forward with plans to build, but it also meant saying goodbye to a good house, a house that was ours for the first 4 1/2 years of marriage, a house that provided shelter for us, and for our 2 kids. We have had a lot of memories in that house.

Now we are working to find places to store and hide an array of misc things that were once in all the nooks and crannies of our house. Our apartment looks like Kansas after a tornado and we are feeling crampped more than ever. We’ve made an offer on some land in Cove and we’re nearly done hammering out our house plans, so hopefully things will take off with that project soon.

In other recent news…
Bridget started preschool, Spencer got his first haircut and started crawling, Dave got a new (2003) truck – we’re selling the explorer, and I struck a sweet deal trading photography for ad space in a local baby magazine. Of course, there are plenty of other things we’ve been doing and plenty of other pictures yet to be blogged about, and hopefully all that blogging will happen soon.

Do you ever feel like everything is happening all at once?

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Character Pancakes

August 5th, 2009 · domestic attempts, family, food, random

Since you all asked…

I went ahead and posted my dad’s recipe for Pantry Pancakes on The Slotted Spoon. You’re welcome.

It should be noted that the character pancakes from my “Grandpa’s Pancakes” post can acutually be made with any pancake batter, as long as its thin enough to flow from the tip of the squeeze bottle. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t try the pancake recipe. You should. Its fabulous.

Making the character pancakes is actually not very difficult at all.

Step 1: Make batter, trying to remove as many lumps as possible. If using a mix thin batter down a bit so it flows better. Place batter in a squeeze bottle such as this one. (The bottle pictured is intended for candy melts and can be found in the candy making isle at your local craft store. The opening is approx. 1/4″. Anything similar will work.)

Step 2: Using the squeeze bottle carefully outline the shape you wish to make. In this case, a giraffe. Add additional details as desired (e.g. spots, an eye). Cook a minute or so.

Step 3: Once the edges have cooked a bit fill in the voids. You can either use the squeeze bottle or a ladle for this (depending on the shape and size of your pancake). Cook until pancake is ready to flip, as you normally would.

Step 4: Flip, and continue cooking. Notice the edges that were drawn first are a bit darker than the rest of the pancake. The longer you leave the edges cooking (step 2) before filling it in (step 3) the greater the contrast between the light and dark portions of the pancake. You may need to experiment a little to determine what length of time is best for your stove/skillet.

Step 5: Serve and enjoy!

When I’m down to the last of the batter and burned out on crazy shapes, I’ll usually make some of these tiny little bite-sized pancakes. Bridget loves them. This is actually something that started with grandpa as well. He likes to give Bridget a little bag of these to snack on throughout the day or when she leaves his house.
(Note: If you are making the Pantry Pancake recipe, these as pretty tasty to eat as snacks later, even cold. No butter or syrup required. Not sure they’d be as yummy with the mix.)

Of course, if you’re not into the characters, you can always just do this:

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Smurfettes

August 3rd, 2009 · a day in the life, bridget

We ended a hard day of playing at the apartment last week with Bridget and her friend, Katie, drawing on the sidewalk with chalk… at least it started with the sidewalk. Before too long, both girls were a lovely shade of smurf blue.

I’m pretty sure that the blue wasn’t completely accidental either… I occasionally caught a glimpse of the both of them coloring on their hands and arms. They made a great mess, but they also had a great time. Oh… and apparently chalk is a dangerous, high impact sport too (as is evident by the helmet my girl insisted on wearing).

P.S. There was enough chalk on Bridget that even our tub got some blue tinting that night when she was bathed.

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From the Archives

July 23rd, 2009 · bridget, spencer

I’m behind in my blogging. Its no secret.

I’ll catch up one of these days, but in the meantime, here’s a picture of my girl in curlers! Its from back in May, just prior to the “Damsel in Distress” photos we took on the tracks. I think she looks adorable in curlers!

The first image was taken in our living room with Spencer (He was nearly 5 months at the time). The second is the next morning after removing the curlers… I called her “Shirley Temple” all day that day. She loved it.


Here’s another example from January 2008…
She was just over 2 years old. Wow, how she’s grown! (Image from this old post)

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Landslide in Logan’s “Island”

July 12th, 2009 · random

My friend, Michelle, lives in the area of the island affected by yesterday’s canal break and landslide.

Her home was spared, but many of her friends and ward members were evacuated, and their homes flooded. She posted some information on her blog, but I thought I would repost it here for those that were unaware of what happened. Besides, a lot of these people can use our prayers.

Here is a video from KSL.com

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Michelle’s husband, Chris, was part of the cleanup effort and was interviewed briefly in the newscast.

Its really an  interesting thing to have something like this hit so close to home. For me (even removed from the situation) its surreal. This morning I’ve just kept thinking about my food storage at home… some of it is in cans and bottles or 6-gal buckets, but there’s plenty of cardboard boxes or bags (e.g. pasta)… in an emergency like this a lot of that would have been distroyed. I guess there are some improvements to be made.

Anyway, here are a couple of pictures of this chaos.

And some links in case you want to read more:
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=7125186
http://picasaweb.google.com/STylerRiggs/LoganIslandLandslide?feat=embedwebsite# (pictures)
http://hjnews.townnews.com/articles/2009/07/11/breaking_news/breakingnews04-07-11-09.txt
http://hjnews.townnews.com/articles/2009/07/12/news/news01-07-12-09.txt

Please pray for this people, their homes, and ther rescue/clean-up effort.

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