Cherries For Sale

A while back the boys and I went to my nephew Kaden's baseball game. While we sat and watched the game Grandma Kathy was talking to McKay about coming over to her house and picking her cherries and then selling them. McKay jumped at the chance to do it & when Preston heard the idea he had to get on the action too. So the next evening McKay, Preston, & there friend Evan went over to Grandma's house and picked 2 five gallon buckets of cherries. The next morning they meet at our house and bagged 60 sandwich bags of cherries. Then they made a couple posters and loaded a table, chairs, and an umbrella in the van. I then drove them to my brothers house who lives on a busier street then we do and they set up there cherry stand. They sold all 60 bags in less then 2 hours and each made $20. They were so excited. The money was burning a hole in there pockets until we took them to toys R us to pick out a toy. They keep asking grandma if they can do it again. Good job guys I am so proud of you! Way to work so hard!!!



By Preston's face you would think he was having no fun! But really any excuse to do things with the big boys he is in heaven!!!

I Love to See the Temple

Awhile back we(as in Utah) have had the amazing opportunity to get to go to 2 open houses for Temples in our area. Back before school got out we went as a family with Korey's family to the Draper Temple open house. Then my brother Mark & his family were in town and we were able to get tickets and the boys and I went with them to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. I am so pleased with the way my boys acted while at the Temple. They were very reverent and would ask lots of great questions. I feel that we are so blessed to live in an area with so many Temples. The boys love to look for them as we drive around. Parker thinks that every church is a Temple too. It is very cute! Parker loved while we were at the Temple to find all the Jesus pictures while we walked around. Thanks guys for the invites it was fun to hang out with you guys!!!

Orem Summer Fest

Who in Orem does not love the Orem Summer Fest! Alright do not answer that because we love it at our house!!! My Dad is a big, HUGE parade guy. So we hit a lot of parades in the summer time. I think the OremFest is my favorite. Here is my top 5 reasons. 1-It is at night so it is usually cooler. 2-It has amazing fireworks. 3-You gotta love all the high quality people that come out to it. 4-Great family time together. 5-Running into all your friends from way back when. So I have always been in charge of saving a spot for this parade. It use to be that the morning of I would get up early and go and lay out a blanket or two. Then a few years back I had to start laying it out before I went to bed the night before. Last year and this year I had to take 3 huge tarps and go on Thursday morning to get our sacred spot. I do have to say that I got a great spot this year with lots of shade and lots of space for us to all spread out.






I was very proud this year because my son's scout troop was able to be the flag boys for the start of the children's parade this year. McKay and his buddy Evan & Tanner and the scout leader Sister Moultan. Walked the whole parade with the flag. Good Job boys you guys looked great.




The weather this year was a little crazy & you where never sure what it was going to be like outside. So the whole parade it was great & then right at the end a big storm cloud came rolling in. So we gathered up the troops and headed home. After about an hour we drove back to a church and backed the mini in to watch the fireworks. I do have to say that Orem puts on a great firework show.

Festival Day

Back at the beginning of June the boys and I went down to Provo to the Children Festival of Arts. It is a really fun event that Provo puts on every year & me having the great hook ups that I have is able to go and enjoy it for free. So My Brother and his family came along with us. Provo City takes a big park with lots of volunteers and sets up tons of tables and at each table they have a craft. The kids love it & I do have to say that they have some really unique crafts. The boys could spend all day there. But after a dozen crafts I am usually hot and done helping 4 boys make crafts.




On that same day there was also the Utah Lake Festival. Which it is only their 2nd year doing this. It was pretty fun too. They had booths set up with different games and things to look at. They also had free fishing, boat rides, hay rides, and food. I think the kids had more fun throwing rocks into the lake then anything else we did there. But hey as long as they had fun that is all that matters.






After a couple hours there we were all ready to go home and take naps.I think the boys had fun & to this day they still play with some of the crafts they made that day.

Phase 1 Done!

Today to McKay's surprise he got his braces off. WAHOOOOOO!!! We are so happy for him. So until the rest of his permanent teeth come in he will have to wear a retainer. Then he will have to have braces put back on for phase 2, but it will only be for a shorter time period then if we would have started this whole thing later in life. I am so proud of him he has been so tough through this whole thing and has hardly complained. Read HERE for all the things he has had done to his poor "jacked up" mouth. His smile looks so great now and we looked back at pictures of before and were in shock of what a mess things were. We did not realize how bad they were until we see them now. When he got his braces off today he had a lose tooth and the Dr offered to pull it. But McKay nicely declined. So a little bit after he went to bed he came out complaining about how wiggly his tooth was. So Korey looked at it and it was hanging by a thread so he made him wiggle and wiggle until it came out so that it would not fall out in his sleep. I hope the Tooth Fairy realizes how hard he worked today and gives him a little extra. I am so proud of my guy for being so brave. Way to go bud you look great!!! I will have to post a before and after picture sometime!

S'mores

Last night we had a block party at a neighbor's house. I was assigned to bring 2 dozen cookies. Well I was not in the mood to make cookies. So instead I made a batch of rice krispies treats. My kids like to make them different colors each time we make them. So Ryan picked orange as his color today. Then I made some S'mores. Oh how I love s'mores they are so yummy:)My Grandma Beth would always make these and I would eat the whole pan. Since she is no longer around to do so I have taken it upon myself to make them for different family things. Well do to popular demand I am now adding the recipes here so that you to may all enjoy this very yummy treats too!!!

1 bag (10.5 oz) miniature marshmallows (5 1/2 cups)
1 1/2 cups milk chocolate chips (9 oz)
5 tablespoons butter or margarine
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 box (13 oz) Golden Grahams® cereal (8 cups)

1. Grease 13x9-inch pan with butter. Reserve 1 cup of the marshmallows. In 3-quart saucepan, melt chocolate chips, butter, corn syrup and remaining 4 1/2 cups marshmallows over low heat, stirring occasionally, until completely melted. Remove from heat; stir in vanilla.
2. Pour cereal into large bowl. Pour marshmallow mixture over cereal; stir until evenly coated. Stir in remaining 1 cup marshmallows.
3. With buttered back of spoon, press mixture in pan. Cool at least 1 hour or until firm. Store loosely covered at room temperature. For bars, cut into 6 rows by 4 rows.

Enrichment

Tonight for our Enrichment Activity we made fleece blankets that tied around the edge for the "Linus Project" and had dinner. I opened my big mouth at one of our committee meetings a while back that maybe we should do "Cafe Ri*" salads. The ladies in the group got all excited and decided that we must do it. Well since it was my great idea I got to be the lucky one in charge of food. We did sign ups for things like beans, salsa, guacamole, lettuce, cheese. Then we as a committee did the rice, chicken, tortillas, dressing. Well it was a huge success and everyone really seemed to like the food. It was also nice not to have so many things to do. We were able to work on tying the blankets and got a lot of visiting in. Which sometimes it seems we are so busy doing things at these activities that we do not get time to just gab. I was told by everyone that they want the recipes. But of course the copier at the church was down. So I told the ladies that I would put it on my blog & my face book. If they did not have access to these things then they could email me and I would send it to them or have copies by Sunday at church. So I would have to say that tonight was a lot work but was well worth it. I love to cook for people. It is not a stressful thing to me, I actually really enjoy it. So I hope everyone else enjoyed it too.

Café Ri* Dressing
1 Ranch Dressing Packet (make as per recipe)
2 Tomatillos (remove husk)
½ Bunch of Cilantro
1 Clove of Garlic
Juice of 1 Lime
1 Jalapeno (use seeds if you like it spicy)
Use a food processor to blend all ingredients well, and then refrigerate.

Café Ri* Chicken
1 (8 oz) Bottle of Zesty Italian Dressing
1 Tablespoon Chili Powder
1 Tablespoon Cumin
3 Cloves of Garlic (minced)
5lbs of Chicken Breast
Cook all together in a crock pot 4 hours on medium, shred meat, cook 1 more hour, and then enjoy!

Café Ri* Cilantro Lime Rice
4 Cups Water
2 Cups Rice
4 Teaspoons Chicken Bouillon (or 4 cubes)
2 Cloves of Garlic
½ Onion (chopped)
1 Large Lime
½ Bunch Cilantro, Chopped Fine
1~Chop onion & garlic & cilantro (remove stems) small. Set aside.
2~In a 4 cup measure squeeze lime so that all the juice is extracted. Fill the container with water until it equals 4 cups total. Place liquid in a sauce pan, add bouillon and bring to boil.
3~When liquid comes to a boil, add onion, garlic, cilantro and rice. Cover and cook 25 minutes, or as long as instructed on the rice package.

Summer Fun

So you would think that with school out that it would be hot and that we could go to 7 peaks & the Scera pool all the time. Well I guess since we live in Utah you never know what the weather is going to be so here is hoping to some good swimming weather sooner than later. But until then I can look at the picture of the one time we have gotten to go so far and think about how cute my boys look in there new swim suits and buzzed summer haircuts.

I love how they are so shiny. Maybe I should have waited until the sunscreen dried to take the picture. Oh well they still look cute:)


I think it is so cute that Parker tries so hard to be just like his big brothers!


I love how easy it was to get ready for church. We had no fighting about who gets there hair done first and no one got left out and wound up at church with messy bed head. Maybe we should do summer buzz cuts all year long!!!

Timp Caves

A couple of weekends ago we went with Korey's family and hiked up to Timponogas Caves. It is only a mile and a half up. But it is a steep mile and a half. When we pulled into the parking lot we realized that we had left our backpack for Parker sitting at home in the carport. We were so mad at our selves for leaving it. But oh well life goes on. At least we did not leave the treat bag at home or my kids might have died. It was the perfect weather for hiking. It was a little over casted and every now and then it would sprinkle just enough to cool us off. The boys did awesome and made it the whole way up and down without being carried, except for Parker of course. But even Parker on the way down wanted to walk. He had no shoes on and no shirt on but he wanted to walk like a big boy down the trail. He even walked through the cave. It is so tight in some places that there would have been no way that I would have fit if I were holding him. So he walked the whole tour. The boys had a lot of fun. Like I have said before anything that includes there cousins they are all for and they have to show how tough they are by walking the whole way. Thanks Larsen's for coming with us it made it a lot more fun!!!

Here is the whole group just after getting to the top!!!


Here is our little family(along with my nephew Cameron)


Here the boys are inside the caves!

Bitter~Sweet

Today is bitter sweet. Korey and I have been talking a lot lately about me quitting my job. I know I do not work that much but the time I am away seems like a lot to me, especially when Korey has to work late one night a week too. So we do not see each other that much. It is also a very hard time of day to get out of the house and to be to work on time. With dinner, tball, soccer, naps. So the time has come for me to quit. I went in today and gave my boss my notice.It was a little harder then I thought that it would be. I have to admit I was a little sad even though I am scheduled until the end of the month. Then I will no longer be employed. It has been the best job ever. I really enjoyed my 2 1/2 years there and learned so much and made so many great friends. I hope that I get to talk to everyone and still be friends. I will still be in often since I take my boys to the Doctors there and will get to see people then. I do not think I would trust my kids anywhere else. Now I will just have to pay copay which will not be fun. But I am so happy that I will get to be spend even more time with the boys and my sweet hubby. I may even get to go to the gym again. So lets just see what is to come next in life. I hope I still will love my boys even without my little break from them twice a week.