(If pictures are too small, just click to enlarge - if print is too small, you need glasses! ☺)
dear boston marathon, I was watching you online or on my phone whenever I had a second or two. It's just so exciting! I knew about 10 peeps that were running this year. I felt bad the weather was so crappy for them, but they all did great! I really hope someday I get to run it too!
dear spring, there is no better spring scent than the lilac. I just wish it lasted a bit longer! Three weeks is a total rip-off for this gorgeous and amazingly scented bush! Of all the flowers on the earth, it is my favorite!
Both of these ↑↓ were taken in my backyard. Spring is the best time of the year to me!
As well as this one ↓...Dave and Bryce have really been working hard!
dear monday, let's just say it was a full day of excitement and many firsts.
dear mr. cat, if I were as soft and furry as this blanket, maybe you would hang around me more often!
I was surprised when I sat down on the couch to study for my Jesus the Christ study group, that you actually joined me. That is very rare! It was so nice!
dear trail run photos, these were taken last week when Jen and I ran the trail in Sardine as part of my 20 miler. I forgot to add them and so I am just going to add them here. The scenery is beautiful even though it has a long ways to go to be in full blossom.
I was worried I was going to seriously biff it because I had on my Hoka shoes. They pretty much feel like clodhoppers and I was not used to running trails with them.
But I made it through without any tripping or falling flat on my face. Whew! What a relief!
dear planking, I have been planking after I run everyday. Well, nearly everyday, there are still some days I forget, but for the most part, I have done it right after I get home. I am so excited because I have got up to THREE full minutes! This week I got to 3:15. These things kill me! They are so hard. And if I miss a day or I have ran really far, I can only hold it for two minutes. But I know they are doing me some good. At least I hope they are!
dear lunch at a new restaurant! Yay! Costa Vida finally opened in our city! Taylor stopped by and so we took him out to lunch too. It was SO good! I LOVE that place!
dear little miss daisy, my friend's little one broke her leg on the trampoline! I felt so bad! I dropped off a little toy and some fruit snacks for her but no one was home and so Brooke sent me these pictures of her opening it. She is the cutest little thing and I hope she heals quickly!
dear serves you right! My friend Robin had just delivered my Norwex cleaning stuff and all the boys and Dave were home and so I was telling them how great this stuff is. I bought some washcloths for the boys to help with their acne because everyone swears by it. I was telling them how it works and because of the silver and the microfibers it is antibacterial. I was going on and on about it and they were all pretty much rolling their eyes, just being polite as I did (what they called) my little "info-mercial" about it. I said that the fibers in that cloth were so tiny that they could wrap around the world like 800 times, but when I said, "This is going to change the world!", well Dave lost it! He just couldn't hold it in and he started to laugh so hard that he had tears rolling down his face. He couldn't talk or breath. I haven't seen him laugh that hard for a long time.
He laughed so hard that he hurt himself! Serves him right for laughing at me! Hah!
dear relief society, I was so excited to go and learn how to make Becky's breadsticks. When she passed out the recipe I realized it's actually my recipe that I use to make breadsticks and the one that I posted in our ward cookbook. She just adds some Garlic Bread Sprinkle to hers and makes them into twists. That was pretty much the only difference! I went out and bought me some of the Garlic Sprinkle because it really made them delicious!
My Favorite Breadstick Recipe
- 1 Tbl instant yeast
- 1 1/2 cup warm water
- 3 1/2 cups flour
- 2 Tbl sugar
- 1 tsp salt
Instructions
- Put all ingredients together in a mixing bowl and knead for 3-5 minutes. Add 3 cups of flour to begin with and the add the rest slowly. The dough should be soft.
- Dump onto counter and make dough into a long roll. Cut in 2" pieces.
- Take a piece of and roll it into a long roll then twist and put on buttered cookie sheet.
- When cookie sheet is full, brush each breadstick with melted butter. Cover with sprayed plastic wrap and let raise for about 20 minutes.
- Before baking, sprinkle very generously with Garlic Bread Sprinkle. Bake @ 400° for 10 minutes or until brown.
- After remove from oven brush with melted butter and sprinkle with garlic salt. You can use any seasoning. Grated Parmesan is also good as is Salad Supreme.
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Taylor had a basketball game tonight and so I left early so I could catch some of it, but it was all but over by the time I left. They won by a landslide.
dear hill repeats,
Hills, hills... run up... run down... then repeat,
Four miles of torture, we were all pretty beat.
Seven miles total on a gorgeous spring day,
"I LOVE HILLS!", is something I'll never say!
We busted out 11 or 12 repeats today. I like doing 15, but I was okay with the 11 or 12 because we ran there and back totaling seven miles.
We had some fun with our pictures! We were feeling like celebrating on that last down! Those things are tough! I do feel like I am getting stronger though.
And look what I found! A heart shaped rock! And on Earth Day! How cool is that? I didn't want to carry that thing home and so I hid it until I can get back up with my car. I just remembered I forgot to go get it. I hope it's still there! #rocksforbrains
And look what was on Dave's slice of bread? Lots of love coming from heaven today!
dear big day has arrived! Yep, my Invisalign arrived and so I headed to the orthodontist to get them! I was nervously excited! But that soon changed to very disappointed! I was a bit shocked that he had to attach some brackets to my teeth in order for them to stay in place! I had no idea! I thought if I took them out, I would look normal! Nope! Now I look like I have a couple of fangs on my front teeth when I'm not wearing them. Most people don't notice, but I do and it bugs me!
I took this with the Invisalign in. I should have taken one with them out. I am not sure I would have gone ahead with them if I had known about the brackets on my teeth. I think I would have just gone with regular braces because then I wouldn't have to worry about removing them every time I eat. I am still trying to adjust to them, but I am not a fan so far! I have never brushed my teeth eight plus times a day in my life. And I have to floss at least four times a day! I am a grazer and I like to snack all day. I am not the kind of person who eats three square meals a day. I can't eat that much at one sitting. I eat more like six to eight small ones. AND, I like to nibble on Jelly Belly's, chips, chocolate, etc. (all that stuff that I shouldn't be eating) throughout the day. Not a lot, but a few here and there, but now it's just not worth it to take them out to eat a few Jelly Belly's or a bite of a brownie. So that will probably be a good thing! This is going to be a huge adjustment for me. I am supposed to wear them 20-22 hours a day as well.
Gonna be FUN! What have I done?! Hah! Hopefully I will adjust quick and it will be worth it to me. I am looking forward to having my straight smile back! I will be wearing them for at least 13 months, but probably more like 18.
dear 10 mile run, I have really been slacking on the miles the past few weeks mainly due to being sick, but now I am feeling better and I still am slacking due to my crazy schedule at times. I was able to get in my 10 miler on Thursday and it wasn't easy. By now 10 miles shouldn't feel too tough, but it did! I hope I haven't lost more fitness than I can afford! Kinda worried!
I left earlier than normal because I had to be home and in the shower by 9 a.m. because I had my study group at 10. It was a gorgeous day! I love running in the early hours. I wore my Hokas hoping that I won't feel the Plantar or IT band issues. Thankfully I didn't, but my knees hurt. That is not normal. Sigh....
dear Jesus the Christ study group, I have really enjoyed this so far. I love hearing everyone's insights and I enjoy sharing mine. I am grateful for the group because it gives me a deadline for my reading or else I am not sure it would happen! Today we talked about the temptations of Christ and someone mentioned that He probably thought it was kind of a joke that Satan was tempting Him so much because of who He was, but I disagreed and tried to explain why. Christ had to be capable of sinning...had He not been there would have been no real temptation or test. Christ was sinless but He was capable of sinning had He willed to do so. If He wasn't capable of sin, then He would have been denied His free agency...and the reason He offered Himself was for the purpose of safeguarding man's free agency. He offered Himself as a sacrifice to insure our agency. He COULD sin, but chose not to. He was tempted. He had to be so He could understand our temptations and infirmities fully. He just was able to overcome all temptations even though I am sure it was not easy!
dear lunch with bonnie, after I got home from the study group, Bonnie picked me up and we FINALY got our lunch in. We have been trying for a long time but things kept coming up. We headed to Maddox and both had the soup and salad. I love that place. I love their rolls and their salads. I actually pretty much love everything on the menu with the exception of the seafood and buffalo. We were able to catch up finally. I love Bonnie. She is just a very classy and wise woman. I always learn so much from her example. I forgot to get a photo! I ran into Matt and Sally while there and we chatted a bit. Sally has braces and I told her about my new Invisalign and she said she had to go with braces because she wasn't disciplined enough to do the Invisalign because of all the in and out and all the brushing of your teeth and she said she's a snacker and couldn't give that up etc. I told her I was rethinking my choice! It was fun to see them. Matt introduced Dave and I at the Institute at Weber State. He now practices here in our town! Small world! But we don't see them as often as we should which is sad because they live so close and are so much fun!
dear zoe, Troy asked if I would take care of his cat Zoe while they are out of town. I call her Zofran. She is so cute and so loveable! Dave is taking care of his fish. Check out what Zoe does when Dave is feeding the fish. She gets right in the sink and just watches intently!
She is the funnest and most playful cat. She is still a kitten so who knows if she will stay like this, but for now I take advantage of being able to spend some time with her. Just love her to pieces! And love to kiss her to pieces!
dear mr. GQ, yeah I drove Taylor crazy trying to take his picture when he showed up on Friday. He looked really nice and so I tried to get a few shots of him. He wasn't cooperating.
But I still got a few good ones even though I had to be sneaky.
I even got a few of him and Bryce playing soccer. Bryce tried to hide too. Boys!
dear fiasco! At my study group one of the women told us how she had just been diagnosed with MS in January. I felt so bad for her. I asked her what we could do and she said that she had someone coming in to clean her house and that she was doing okay but one thing she wished for was if someone could make a cake for another sister in our ward who was having a birthday the next day. She had planned on doing it for her but wasn't feeling up to it. So I told her I would be happy to do that for her. She then told me that she had a specific recipe because this lady has been trying to find the perfect white cake recipe. I told her I was okay with using the recipe.
I mixed up the batter and it looked pretty normal. I say that because the recipe was not a normal one. It called for 3 cups of sugar. Yes THREE! I knew better BUT I followed the recipe anyway because she asked me to. I was afraid with all that sugar it was going to be really crumbly. I was right. Luckily I had lined the pans with wax paper so I could get it out, but the edges stuck horribly to the sides and I had to really work to get the cakes out. One came out great. The other one came out in pieces. It totally fell apart! I was pretty frustrated and figured there was no way this was going to work. But I have done a lot of repair work on cakes in my day due to making many birthday and wedding cakes over the years and so I thought I would at least give it a try. I was able to slide the one layer onto the other and then glue it together with icing. It looked pretty good I thought. I was a little concerned if it would cut okay because it was just so crumbly. But I delivered it and thought that was the end of it.
But the next day the woman who I gave it to told me thanks but... the but part was basically a question asking me what I had put in the center of the cake. She said when they went to cut it, it wouldn't cut. And then she said there was something there besides cake. I assured her there wasn't, but then I thought maybe it was the wax paper! Yep! I had forgot to remove the wax paper off the one layer because I had to slide it on in order to even salvage it. Lovely. Just lovely. Oh my, I was so embarrassed! But I also had to laugh! That is something I WOULD do on PURPOSE on April Fool's Day! In fact, I HAVE done it before. Once I decorated a roll of toilet paper with frosting and made it super cute for Taylor's girlfriend's birthday that was on April Fool's Day. I put paper in between pancakes one year. So this is something that I would normally do. Too bad this time I hadn't planned it! HAH! I was ready to just drop it, but this woman kept informing me of more details of it like it was really crispy in the center....she used the word hard I told her it was crispy because of the recipe and that I threw the recipe away and that I was very sorry. Oh my.... I will never live this one down!
BUT...when you do (or I should say TRY to do) something nice for someone, you always get blessed 10 times over. My friend Audrey, just out of the blue, brought me this pan of warm brownies and that made up for it all! Thanks Audrey! They were so heavenly! And still warm!
dear girl's night out, my sister in law Karen called me and asked me if I was interested in a girl's night on Friday. That was a no brainer. I wasn't just interested, I NEEDED one! It had been one of those weeks! McKay stayed home from school sick that day too. Anyway, I was ready for dinner and a movie. But we ended up just doing the movie because of tons of crazy things that interfered on both of our parts. This picture is of my niece Aubrey eating her soup and bread after the movie because the theater wouldn't let her take it in and eat it when it was hot as she arrived.
She wasn't feeling too well either and her bro Weston was stranded at the airport in Ogden because his flight to Arizona was delayed due to rain so we weren't able to go to dinner after. But we did chat and try to catch up after while sitting in the theater. Karen and I decided we are going to do lunch next week so we can actually sit down and talk! The movie was a Nicholas Sparks tear jerker! It was called The Long Ride and it was really good. I was not happy with one part in it that was totally gratuitous and didn't need to be in it. But I really LOVED the story! One part that I particularly liked was when one of the characters said that love always requires sacrifice. That is so true. SO TRUE.
dear last 20 miler! Oh man, I was so excited this was my last one in this training! It will be #3! I also did a 19 miler and 18. The problem is all of my 20's have been broken up due to scheduling or me not wanting to run alone. Today was the latter. No one was going 20 and so I had to break it up so I didn't have to do the full thing alone. Robin and Sam were going to do 11 but Robin said she would do a couple more with me if I wanted her to. She is so nice. A true friend! I got up at 5:30 a.m. and headed out and got in six miles. I called to see if Dave was going to be able to drive us up to Sherwood Hills, but he wasn't answering. He was helping the boys cut down trees at the clinic. So I came home and text Robin and told her there was a change of plans. I figured I would just go another two but time was running out and so I changed into some non sweaty clothes and headed out to get in what I could. I only got in one more. But I still was happy because that meant only 13 to go and with Robin doing 11, I'd only need two more alone after. Sounded good to me!
I did laps around the park to get in what I could (one mile) before we left to go to the sheds and run down Sardine. I checked out Tyson's tree while I was there. It's the best it's ever looked! I was happy to see it finally doing well!
Grant took us up to the sheds. We ran down and into Mantua and around the campground. Then back down Sardine. We kept going west until we got to Main and then ran up Main and then up 3rd north and to Robins. I still had to get in 1.5 miles and so I did more laps around the park. It really didn't feel like a 20 usually does and for that I was grateful! Breaking it up really helps. I'm not sure if it does what it's supposed to, but oh well.
We saw this golf cart for sale on our route and it was a photo opp screaming for us to take advantage of it, so we did! I was really sore and tired. Once I got home it definitely felt like a 20!
dear lumberjacks, Bryce was hired by the clinic to remove a bunch of trees. He recruited McKay and Taylor to help him. Taylor's always up for work since he is so poor. Dave also pitched in only he did it as free labor. They worked on it for hours and hours on Friday and then got there around 6:00 a.m. on Saturday to continue. Dave had to stop and work until noon and went back and helped some more. They worked so hard. If there is one thing my boys are, it's hard workers! They really put most people to shame. They just get going and don't stop! And they always do such a good job.
Bryce was able to borrow a cherry picker truck from his boss which helped immensely.
They went to town. I am just praying no one will have an injured back after all this!
They still aren't finished and it will take a few more days to complete it all. Then the real work will just begin. Cutting up the logs!
dear zofran, on Saturday when I went to take care of you, it was raining and so you were super loveable. Not sure if that's why or if you have just been missing your masters. Whatever reason you were just crawling all over me and purring and rubbing your cute face on me and cuddling up so cute. I am so not used to that. I tried to get some good pictures but every time I put my phone out you would get distracted and try and go after it and so I missed the great snuggling shots. But we had some fun just snuggling for a while. I wish I could train Mr. Cat to do this. It's so much fun!
dear ward fund raiser, every year we have a youth fund raiser so the kids can earn money to pay for camp. The ward always has a silent auction where ward members contribute things to be auctioned off and all the money goes to the kids. Pretty much every year I donate my homemade Twix Bars. This year unbeknownst to me they became hoemade Twix Bars. Yep. Several people pointed that out to me when I arrived at the dinner. With much laughter I might add!
Maybe I will deliver them wearing a sexy apron. Hmm.... Thanks so much auto correct for slacking off for once in your life! I have my friend Troy to thank for this one. The fun just keeps on coming!
The food was great and the kids had a lot of fun putting it on.
I was watching these boys all night realizing that this was one of those "lasts". It would be the last time they did this event after probably seven years of doing it together. It will be the last time they run around the gym messing around and laughing. It will be the last time I get a photo like this. Next year two will be on missions and one in college waiting to go on a mission. They have been best buds since they were babies. Sadly Cooper (in the middle) is moving this fall - and he will then go on his mission. So things will never be the same even when they all return. Why is this so hard for me? Ugh! I hate change especially when it's good things that change!
Oh man... this just gets to me. I love each of these boys so much. They have spent countless hours at my house as McKay has at theirs. But it's ALL GOOD right? Right!
Here they are at the church during a Halloween carnival. They attended this nearly every year of their lives, first to go as kids, and then to put it on as teenagers.
The boy on the far left (Tanner) moved last year.
These pictures were on the tables and people were supposed to caption them. I snagged up the ones of McKay.
