John's First Suit

We recently bought John his first Suit. He was so excited that he would look just like Dad on Sunday with his suit coat.
The only problem was getting pants that fit. We had to buy such a large suit to get the pants to fit that the jacket goes down to his knees. I had to hem the pants and the arms of the coat. But he looks so grown up and cute. Thanks to Walmart for having inexpensive suits so I could justify such a fun purchase!

Ashley's Baptism

Today was a special day. Ashley was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was a beautiful program and we felt the Spirit so strong. It was wonderful that her Dad was able to confirm her and give her the gift of the Holy Ghost. We are so proud of the good choices Ashley makes and that she chose to be baptized. We were so glad for the friends and family that were able to attend and help participate.

The ward provided this beautiful dress for her to wear into the font to be baptized so she didn't have to wear a jumpsuit.

Here is Mark and Ashley getting ready for the baptism.

We had bought her this beautiful dress to wear after the baptism. But I just realized the only picture we got of her wearing this dress today was with the whole family. So here is the picture of the dress when we first purchased it. We'll have to take pictures tomorrow when she wears it to church.

Re-entry is Painful!

After spending 8 days with just my husband and no responsibilities, coming home is like hitting a brick wall. It hasn't helped that Mark got the stomach flu the day after we returned. Or that it snowed AGAIN this week. Or that I had two shows and Ashley's Baptism to get ready for this week. But 5 days later I'm still ready to run away and bask in the warm sun some more.

I should be getting ready for Ashley's baptism as I write this, but decided I needed a time out. Especially after Jessica just asked why I always stress. She told me it doesn't help to stress. Thanks for the advice. But just talking doesn't get the bathrooms cleaned or the food prepared or the talk written that I'm supposed to be giving in 15 hours.

So lets take a break and remember the 10 best things about our recent vacation.

1. Hands down the Dolphin Encounter in Nassau was the best activity we did. It was amazing playing with those smart animals.


2. Laying on the beach at CocoCay. But you must realize that Mark was under a shade tree with his shirt on and a towel over his legs so they would not get sun burned anymore. While I was laying in the sun, sipping a Coco Loco (virgin of course), reading a book (Pride and Prejudice) and wishing I had gotten tanner than I did. The only thing that could have been better is to eat chocolate, but it is kind of hard to do that and not have it melt in the sun.


3. Shopping!!!! Mark and I extended two days in Orlando after we returned from the cruise. Most people would have spent that time at Disney World or Universal Studios. But after seeing the prices for just a day or two we decided the money would be spent better buying new clothes. I believe I have gotten in trouble for mentioning how many new clothes Mark got and not disclosing my finds. Lets just say they were too great to number. But two of my favorite larger size clothing stores were in Orlando and the closest ones to Orem are in Las Vegas. So the last time I shopped at Catherines and The Avenue was a year ago during last Spring Break. There may have been a new dress, new skirt, several pants, many tops AND two pair of jeans. I was most excited about the jeans. I have a very funny shaped body and finding pants that fit my big birthing hips and are not too big in the waist are hard to come by. I haven't owned jeans in several years. Catherines just came out with "Right Fit" and they had pants cut specifically for a curvy shape. Yea!! Now if I only looked as good in them as the model does.


4. Eating at Cheesecake Factory! I know there is one in Salt Lake now, but we haven't braved the crowds and wanted to wait over an hour for a table. So we hit the one in Orlando on a weekday for a late lunch and got right in. Then took the cheesecake back to our room to enjoy after swimming at the pool.


5. No one yelling "MOOOOMMMM" 5,000 times a day. Really, how many times can one 4 year old say "Mom" over and over again??? Just this afternoon I asked my Mother-in-law while we were on the phone if she thought he would stop after not getting a response after saying it 100 times. No, then he just came into the room to interrupt the phone call. Though he was priceless this week when he decided he was going to give some of his money to Primary Children's hospital because they had cans up at Costco asking for donations. He even went to every member of the family to ask for donations. He wanted to go to the neighbors, but we stopped him there. We made a special trip to Costco so he could put all his coins in himself.


6. Someone else cooking food for me 3 times a day. I do enjoy cooking, but if I could I would probably eat out every meal. Having someone else fix it is just so much nicer. Though it has inspired me to try new recipes since returning. My new favorite site that I added to my Google Reader is CDKitchen. I've tried two new Crock Pot Recipes from there this week. Tonight's was especially good, French Onion Beef Casserole. The only one that didn't enjoy it was Ashley, no surprise there.


7. Having someone clean my bathroom on a DAILY basis. And on the cruise our little steward had to clean it twice a day most days. I'm lucky to get to them once a month.


8. Flying in an airplane. In 5 hours we crossed more ground than the pioneers did in months.


9. Pampered Chef paying for most of the trip. We would have never been able to enjoy such a great trip if I hadn't earned it through Pampered Chef. When they were paying we stayed in a 4 star hotel. When we were paying the last two nights we stayed in a 2 or 3 star hotel. It was probably ranked 3 star, but should have been 2!


10. Driving around in our cute red little PT Cruiser that we rented for the last two days. I believe Mark commented that maybe getting a new car might be nice. He drives the 15 year old Toyota Camry around that John just put scratches down the side as he brought his bike into the garage this week. Mark's goal is to hit 150,000 miles with the Camry and he is almost there.

Alas, reality is here and I must face the world. So I'm done with my time out and must go finish getting ready for tomorrow. But while I've been hiding in the bedroom I've heard the tables get set out and the front room vacuumed. Thank you honey!

Dolphins!

As promised, here are some of our Dolphin pictures! Here is Salvidor showing off his jumping skills!

Mark feeding Salvidor

Dancing with Salvidor and Sean

Salvidor giving me a big kiss! A little salty but very caring.

And the best part, giving us a hug! It was amazing.

Dry Land

We are back on dry land today. At .55 per minute for Internet access on the ship we figured we'd wait to post anything until our return. We are staying another couple of days in Orlando and have free Internet in the hotel room, yea! It has been an incredible 5 days and I'm not even sure where to begin. The above picture was when we first got on the ship. We are right outside our state room. Yes, people could walk right by our window. Needless to say, the curtains were closed most of the time.

When we arrived on the ship Pampered Chef had waiting for us in our rooms T-shirts, backpack and a bottle of champagne. We asked the PC desk if we could return the champagne and get sparkling apple cider instead. They said they would take care of it for us. But to our surprise they replaced it with an Alcohol Removed Chardonnay. I had never even heard of such things. When we popped the cork we thought for sure we would break something in the room. We poured our glasses and toasted. We both tasted it at the same time and had the same response, YUK! It was the grossest tasting liquid I have ever had. I guess it is an acquired taste I won't be trying again.

On the first day before dinner Pampered Chef hosted an appetizer gathering by the pool for us. Between achievers and their guests there were about 750 Pampered Chefers on the cruise. If you can't tell in the picture the ice carving is of the PC Chef Hat logo! They looked amazing.

When we returned to our rooms that night Pampered Chef had sent to everyone's rooms a plate of chocolate and strawberries. Boy were we feeling pampered!

We were looking forward to Day 2 on the cruise in CocoCay, Royal Caribbean's private island. We were just waking up at 8am to start getting ready when the Captain came over the intercom to let us know it was too windy and we could not stop at CocoCay. So we moved onto Nassau. We spent the day exploring the ship. On the top decks it was really windy, but we found a spot that was sheltered but we could still enjoy the sun. It kept hiding behind the clouds and would get cold, but we sat and read and slept for about an hour and half. Oops, the sun was strong than we thought and Mark and I both burned the top of our legs.

We pulled into Nassau around 4 pm. We passed this cute little lighthouse on the way in. This is when we started to realize the incredible turquoise colored water. It is so beautiful! And they huge buildings behind the lighthouse are part of the Atlantis resort. We had time to do a little shopping that night and get gifts for the kids. I hope you guys are being good so you get your gifts when we return!

On Wednesday morning we headed back into Nassau and over to Paradise Island where we took another boat to the Blue Lagoon Island and the Dolphin Encounters. We thought this would be something fun to do, but it far exceeded our expectations. We were able to get into waist deep water and play with the Dolphins. We experienced a heart-warming kiss, a hug, a dance and opportunities to rub down the dolphins. I had a huge grin on my face the whole time. It was awesome!!! We took some pictures with our waterproof camera so we still need to get those developed. But the above picture is of the dolphins swimming around the bay. We were so glad we did this excursion.

We then went back to Paradise Island and got to see more than we planned when we took a wrong turn. Got an extra mile of walking in, but got to see the incredible yachts docked at the Atlantis Resort Pier. These yachts were HUGE and amazing! We finally made it to the public beach. Isn't that the prettiest entrance to a beach!

I was determined to get into the waters of the Caribbean. We were still not sure if we would be able to go to CocoCay the next day because of the weather. So we wandered into the water. I was only planning to go in to about my waist, but the current was stronger than I realized and oops, there I went, under the water. I managed to loose my sunglasses and flash a few people at the beach. Mark was on the shore enjoying the whole scene. Luckily for everyone, our camera doesn't take pictures that fast, so we don't have proof of me flashing the beach! Hopefully you can tell from these pictures how incredibly beautiful the water was. And the water was so much warmer than the California waters we played in as children. I loved it!

And of course, what would a cruise be without towel animals in our stateroom. My favorite was the monkey dangling from the ceiling!

Thursday morning dawned and the sea had calmed. The ship can't get close enough to dock at CocoCay, so they put down their anchor and ferry us to the Island. Mark and I signed up for snorkeling and we got our equipment first thing. Neither of us had snorkeled before. So we put on our equipment and started to head out. The bay is really shallow so we were able to walk out ways before we started swimming. We discovered that claustrophobia and snorkeling masks don't go together well. So Mark hung back and I kept going. Royal Caribbean has put a sunken ship and plane out in the bay. I loved swimming out and seeing all the fish. Hopefully our pictures from the waterproof camera will show how beautiful it was. I was starting to not feel so good. The gentle waves were rocking me a little too much and it was almost time to switch out my seasick patch. I guess I should have done it before coming on shore because the fishes ended up with a little of my breakfast to feed on, oops!

The rest of the day was spent laying in the sun, sipping virgin CocoLocos, enjoying the barbecue, collecting shells and just relaxing. It was a wonderful day.

Here is a picture of our ship (Sovereign of the Seas) from the shores of CocoCay. You can see from the clouds another storm was starting to come in. The ship took off around 4pm and we started to head back to Florida. What a wonderful couple of days it has been. The food on board was incredible. It was so much fun being with so many other Pampered Chefers on the ship. And I love having someone make my bed every morning! As we went to bed that last night the waves were really rocking the boat. By this point I had put on another seasick patch so I was able to be lulled to sleep. Mark said it got pretty rough after I fell asleep. But we woke up back in Cape Canaveral and we had to say goodbye to our beautiful ship!

Pampered Chef shuttled us back to Orlando where Mark and I picked up the rental car we had arranged for and headed into Orlando. We are spending a couple more days here just relaxing before heading home on Sunday night. We did some shopping for Mark this afternoon. Seven new shirts and two new pants will give him a brand new wardrobe! Had lunch at Cheesecake Factory. Their portions are so big we brought half of it back to the room and had it again for dinner later on. Lounged by the pool for about an hour. Tomorrow we go shopping for my new wardrobe, I can't wait! And do whatever else we feel like doing!

We'll see you soon kids! Be good for Grandma Pat! Love ya!

Day Two!

We have been relaxing this morning around the hotel. We have to wait until 12:30 to get on the bus to head to the ship. I'm sure once we are on the ship and our Internet is no longer free you will not be getting so many updates!

Here are the pictures of us from outside Fishlips last night. We didn't have our camera so we had to wait for Christy to e-mail them to us. It is scary how connected we are even at the same hotel!

We enjoyed made to order omelets for breakfast. I loved the fresh spinach in mine! Then we lounged by the pool while writing postcards to the kids. We sent them to Grandma Pat's, so check the mail when you get there, kids!

There is a 60% chance (depending on weather) that the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket will launch a mobile communications satellite for ICO North America at 4:12 pm this

afternoon. We are hoping to be able to see it take off while we are on the ship!

Bon Voyage!

We've Arrived!

Day One of our Pampered Chef Trip

We've arrived in Florida, yea!!! The flight was smooth and we love traveling with Pampered Chef. It is so fun to come off the airplane and have someone standing there with a clipboard waiting for you. Then they whisked our luggage away and boarded us on a bus for the 45 minute trip to Cape Canaveral.

They have us staying at Raddisson Resort at the Port. And they have us in a beautiful suite. We walked in and it kept going and going. Three rooms for just the two of us. And Mark can't wait to try out the Sleep Number bed. He may be wanting to purchase after a good nights sleep. We may even have time in the morning before boarding the ship to enjoy this gorgeous pool!

By this point in the day it has now been 10 hours since our breakfast of oatmeal. We've had a few snacks along the way, but dinner was calling. One of our traveling companions had scouted out a restaurant for us. How can you go wrong with a place called Fishlips! With 18 of us in tow (some of whom we just met on the airplane), off we went to eat seafood by the shore. My Seafood Paella was incredible and Mark loved his Prime Rib Steak sandwich. But the real entertainment was our Crab Leg Cracking lessons from Christy! I never knew she was such an expert and I never knew anyone could get so much meat out of a crab leg. It truly is an art. You go girl!

We loved talking with the kids for a few minutes today amongst the craziness. Glad you are having fun with Aunt Carole and Grandma & Grandpa. Love ya!

Stay tuned for more fun to come!

Let them eat Cake!

I've become obsessed with this chocolate cake. My cousin posted on her blog this picture and story of the amazing cake she made. Then her sister, Eden, raved about it on her blog. Eden even came over to my house and described the cake in great detail. When they FINALLY posted the recipe I was dying to try it out. Of course between trying to get my kids ready to go stay at relatives and getting us ready to leave town there was no time to make it.

A lass, I broke down Thursday night and made it. I could not imagine waiting almost two weeks by the time we returned to try it out. This really is the richest, dense, moistest chocolate cake I've ever had. Thank you Sam! It is so rich you can only eat a very small sliver at a time. But I have enjoyed every bite I have had.

Eden can't say enough about the frosting. And it is a great frosting recipe. But I really think you need to try my Debbi Field's chocolate frosting recipe. Once you see how much butter is involved you'll understand this is the creamiest chocolate frosting ever.

22 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
4 1/2 cups sifted powdered sugar
1 cup sifted unsweetened cocoa powder
1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk

Cream butter until fluffy, add remaining ingredients and combine well. This is the full recipe. I always cut it in half for a 9 x 13 cake.

When we return from Florida we will have to make the cake again and try this recipe and see what you think!

Who Needs Sleep?

I am normally a very sleepy person. I go to bed around 10:30 and get up at 6:30 but would rather sleep until 8:00 if I had a chance. So why, why, why did my body decide 4 am was wake up time this morning???

At first I thought it was because I was stressed about leaving town in 5 days. I'm so excited to be going on a cruise and getting to a warm climate. But I'm realizing there is a lot to get done before I can reach that point. And it dawned on my that not only do I have to get myself ready, I have to get my kids ready to stay at 3 different houses while we are gone. Yikes, more suitcases to pack!

I'm sure my husband would tell you I stress too much. I went to bed stressing about a new carpool situation and what to do about it. He told me whatever I decided would be the right choice. Not the help I was hoping for. But I really was not stressing about that at 4 am.

Then I thought it was because my tooth was hurting. Quick check of bitting together and my tooth felt amazing, no pain. I've had tooth pain since Friday and could not bite on my left side without sharp pain. So I went to the dentist yesterday to find out what was going on. The best case scenario is that they will have to remove an old crown, redo a root canal (who knew they only last 10 -15 years???) and replace the crown. Now you might think if that is the best what could be the worst?? Yes it does get worse. If they can't fix it and the root is actually broken like they think it might be then they will pull the tooth. We didn't talk about options after that. My money brain shut down at that point.

So 5 am rolled around and I decided to get out of bed and actually do something. But then I realized everything I wanted to do would make noise and possibly wake a sleeping child. So to the computer I went. Amazing how much e-mail you can get through at that hour of the morning! At a more decent hour some lunches were made and muffins put in the oven. Tried a new recipe. I didn't think they tasted very good, but my picky children ate almost all of them.

I finally realized the cause of my insomnia. I have a feeling it has something to do with the steroid the Dentist put me on yesterday. They are hoping to stop the infection and cut down the swelling before we leave so they don't have to do anything invasive before Sunday. Thankfully it seems to be working except that slight side affect of no sleep. Should be interesting to see if I am coherent at my show tonight! Luckily I could probably make the Warm Carmel Nutty Brownies in my sleep.

So when the carpool ride didn't come (see stress above) I hauled everyone in the car with 5 minutes to spare (it takes 10 minutes to get to the girl's school). Girls got to school before the actually tardy bell.

And best part of the morning -- I had every intention of stopping at Sonic for a Route 44 Diet Coke with lime to help me with the day. But to our surprise outside of Jamba Juice was a banana holding a sign they were giving away FREE smoothies!! Even John got one for free. They are only giving them out until 10 am, you still have 30 minutes to get yours.

So I'm now sitting happy sipping my Caribbean Passion dreaming of next week laying on a beach sipping my Bahama Mama (virgin of course)!

Ashley's Birthday Party

Ashley and her friends had so much fun at her Birthday party. We went to a local hair styling school and the girls got their hair done in up dos and then got their finger nails painted. They all looked like princesses afterwards!

Parents of the Week

Our children have official given us the Parents of the Week title this week. Yea! Win one for us! And they are amazingly doing anything and everything we ask them to do with a smile on their faces. The trick, pure bribery.

It has been at least 10 years since Mark and I went to Stadium of Fire (the one year my brother was working on the fireworks and got us free tickets.) Mark went a few times with his parents before that and absolutely loved it. Every year he says we should go and every year we do not go. We barely stay awake to watch the fireworks from afar!

Well, yesterday morning he called me with excitement in his voice to let me know they just announced the headliners for Stadium of Fire. And if you haven't heard it is Miley Cyrus (aka Hanna Montana) along with Blue Man Group and Glenn Beck is hosting it. When he suggested we get tickets I said sure, whatever, we will check on Friday when the tickets go on sale. Two minutes later he calls back to let me know he has 5 reserved right now and should we buy them. How could I turn him down. He was listening to Glenn Beck and he had just announced they had 1,000 tickets they were doing a presale with. Mark snatched ours up and within minutes all 1,000 tickets were gone.

Since we are not doing a family vacation this summer I guess this will substitute for it. John is so excited for the fireworks. Just ask him to sing the theme song to Stadium! The girls are beside themselves over Miley Cyrus. Mark can't wait to see Glenn Beck. And I have always been interested to see the Blue Man Group. You can't ask for a better family outing.

And I am so glad I'm not going to have to be one of the people standing in line for hours to not get tickets or trying to get them over the Internet and be disappointed. Thanks Mark, you are awesome!

Remember Good Friends

I was caught off guard this afternoon. It is interesting how one small thing can make you stop in your tracks and change the whole day. Today was just a normal ordinary day. I was doing a little blurking and trying to regroup after two really busy weeks.

I finally got the newspaper off the porch and opened it up while eating lunch. Most days the newspaper doesn't even get opened it goes right into recycle since I really only care about the Sunday coupon issues. But I was surprised when on the front page of the "Our Town" section was a cute picture of one of our favorite babysitters, Taylor. She is on the Little Miss Lindon court and they were spotlighted for making quilts and taking them to the cancer center in American Fork. What is so special is Taylor's sweet, sweet mom passed away this past year because of breast cancer and so the Miss Lindon pageant picked this project to honor and remember Taylor's mom. Here is the link to the article. http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/260827/17/

It has caused me to stop and reflect more today than usual. I don't know anyone that has not been affected by someone they know who had cancer. And in the past two years I've had three good friends all pass away from breast cancer. An amazing story of strength and love is my friend Kari's. She lived her life to the fullest. If you haven't read it here is the link. http://karimasonfund.org/pdf/wasatch_woman.pdf

It has reminded me of my favorite song from my favorite musical. For Good from "Wicked"
It well may be
That we will never meet again
In this lifetime
So let me say before we part
So much of me
Is made of what I learned from you
You'll be with me
Like a handprint on my heart
And now whatever way our stories end
I know you have re-written mine
By being my friend:
Like a ship blown from its mooring
By a wind off the sea
Like a seed dropped by a skybird
In a distant wood
Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you:
Because I knew you:
I have been changed for good

So here is to the courageous women who have passed on. I love you and miss you Dorothy, Kari & Maggie!