Dinner Tonight!

I LOVE Cafe Rio and I know many of my friends enjoy this obsession as well. Unfortunately most of my immediate family members do not enjoy Mexican cooking. I love Mexican. I grew up in Southern Calif and had Grandparents that lived in South America on multiple occasions. We used to have enchiladas for the extended Family Christmas dinner. Tonight I put together several recipes I'd collected thanks to one of my hosts, an Enrichment dinner and the web to make our own version of the great Pork Barbacoa Salad. I was shocked when almost everyone at the dinner table enjoyed it (it is hard to please Ashley). Let me share the recipes with you!

Pork Barbacoa
4 lb pork roast (I used a 6 lb roast and you could easily get a bigger one. I put part in the freezer for another night)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp cumin
1-2 Tbsp molasses
2 1/2 cans tomato sauce
1 to 1 1/2 C brown sugar
2 C Dr Pepper
1/4 tsp salt
pepper to taste
Cut fat off pork. Place pork in crock pot. Mix ingredients and pour over pork. Simmer in crock pot until meat pulls apart easily. (6-8 hours) Remove meat from crock pot, shred, skim fat off juice and mix back together and let simmer another hour to let flavors blend.

Cilantro Ranch
1 packet TRADITIONAL Hidden Valley Ranch mix (not BUTTERMILK)
1 c. mayonnaise
1 c. buttermilk
2 tomatillos, remove husk, diced
1/2 bunch of fresh cilantro
1 clove garlic
juice of 1 lime
1 jalapeno (if you like it spicy keep the seeds in it, if you like it mild, just remove the seeds)
Mix all ingredients together in the blender then refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Cilantro Lime Rice
1 c. uncooked rice
1 tsp. butter or margarine
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. freshly squeezed lime juice
1 can (15 oz) chicken broth
1 cup water
1 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lime juice
2 tsp. sugar
3 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro
In a saucepan combine rice, butter, garlic, 1 tsp. lime, chicken broth and water. Bring to a boil. Cover and cook on low 15-20 minutes, until rice is tender. Remove from heat. In a small bowl combine lime juice, sugar and cilantro. Pour over hot cooked rice and mix in as you fluff the rice.

I only had sticky rice on hand so I just cooked it about 10 minutes longer.

I also bought the flour tortillas from Costco that you cook at home. I have made flour tortillas from scratch many times, but these ones from Costco are almost as good and save a TON of time. And we had guacamole from Costco in the freezer, they never put enough of it on at Cafe Rio! We had some romaine lettuce, cheese, sour cream and chips to add to everything above.

Everyone loved that they could put what they liked on their tortillas and I loved the whole thing! Enjoy!

Memorial Weekend

We are just wrapping up a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. I don't remember a Memorial Weekend that has been this cold and this rainy ever. But we have made the best of it.

Friday started a little crazy ;) but luckily it has calmed down. Saturday morning was spent on the yard working on sprinklers again, but I think they are now all fixed! Then we spent the afternoon in Santaquin with Mark's parents. We headed over to the cemetery to visit the Peterson graves. Unfortunately my kids and I have never met any of these relatives.

I've never been much of a grave visitor. I grew up in La Canada, Calif and our closest relative was 3 hours away. I don't ever remember going to visit graves on any holiday. On the other hand Mark was born and raised in Santaquin and visiting graves was a tradition.

When my father passed away in 1981 my mom had him buried in San Diego near distant relatives and because we were planning to move there. We visited a few times before we ended up moving to Utah instead of San Diego so we still never had a chance to visit graves regularly.


Then in 1993 my mom and I flew to San Diego for the San Diego Temple dedication, rented a U-haul and made arrangements to bring Dad to Utah. The cemetery loaded him in for us and off we went. It was a great trip. Since it had been 12 years since he passed away the emotions weren't so raw. My mom and I stopped at all the shopping outlets along the way. By the time we got to Utah we had lots of shopping bags around the casket. It was a trip I will always remember taking with my mom. We were then able to re-bury Dad in Orem and rededicate his grave.

We decided to visit the Orem graves on Sunday. We cut snowballs from our yard to place on the graves. We were able to visit my Dad's mother's grave, Orla Pritchett (picture to the left with my Dad, myself, and my sister Kim) and my Dad's brother-in-law, David Horlacher which are together underneath the tree with the bench at the North East corner of the cemetery. We then went to my Dad's grave that is at the North part about in the middle at the very top of the hill. He is buried next to my Mom's parents, Jim Jesperson and Doris Bender Jesperson. And just down from them are Grandpa Jesperson's sisters, Lenora Brown and Vera Jesperson. And just to the East by a couple of rows is my cousin, Chase Jesperson. We had a good time telling stories to the kids and wondering if they will remember any of them.

Cute Grandma Jesperson after her stroke

We've also been able to enjoy a few BBQ's with family. Kids enjoyed Grandma Pat's Wii. And we had a great time with neighbors on Saturday night when they invited us over for a campfire in the back yard to roast S'mores, yum!

Crazy Friday

This school year Fridays have become the day of craziness. John would get out of preschool at noon in North Orem at the same time the girls were getting out of their Charter School in South Orem. Throw in Ballroom practices and piano lessons and I would just plan on not getting anything done after about 11:45am on Fridays.

Well just when I thought they could not get crazier this last Friday topped them all.

John graduated from Preschool at the same time the girls had Awards Assembly and we were strongly recommended to be there. So Mark and John went to Preschool Graduation while I headed over to the Charter school. I love these pictures Mark took at the graduation. How could you not love that face! John has attended this great preschool for the past two years and has loved Ms. Brenda and Ms. Angie.

I took the old digital camera to the Charter School and was quickly reminded why we upgraded and let the kids use the old one. Needless to say I didn't get any pictures worth posting. But both girls earned the "Golden Sneaker" award for the activities they did outside of school. Mark and John joined me for the last 20 min at which point we sneaked out of the last 5 minutes and headed over to Costco.

We had about 45 minutes to pick out new frames for Mark's glasses that he has needed for the last two years and to get some shopping done. Didn't think we would squeeze it all in, but we did. Picked up the wonderful Costco Hot Dogs for everyone for lunch and made it back to the school in time to pick the girls up from car pool. At this point Mark headed off to work.

Grandma Pat has created a great distraction in my kids lives. I had informed the kids earlier in the week that Grandma had gone Wii, Wii, Wii all the way home. Which created great squeals when they realized Uncle Brent had convinced Grandma to buy a Wii. Since that moment every time the kids thought we had a spare moment they begged to go to Grandma's. Of course, we hadn't had any spare moments this week. But finally on Friday the kids convinced me to take them over since we had an hour before piano lessons. By the time I got it unboxed and set up the kids only got about 30 minutes in of play, but they loved it.

Off to drop the girls off at Piano Lessons and run home to get the food from Costco put away. Luckily it was a cool and overcast day, so nothing got spoiled while at Grandma's. Back to pick girls up from piano and stop at our friends, The Smarts, to pick up their 3 oldest to come play since their mom was out of town and Dad needed to get some work done.

This was supposed to be my moment to breath for the day. I hadn't really been home since 9:30am and it was now 3pm. John had been a little testy the last day or two, but I thought it was because he wasn't getting to bed on time. But about 30 minutes into play date he breaks down into tears to say his ears hurt. Not one, but both ears. Friday at 3:30pm on the beginning of Memorial Day weekend. Do I go to the Dr or not???? Didn't take me long to decide to make the call and pray they could get me in, but not too soon so I'm not dragging SIX kids to the doctors. Yea, they had a 5 pm appt, great! Kids still got to play and then drop off friends on the way to Dr. And yes, it was confirmed that both ears were infected. Probably from the swimming that occurred earlier in the week.

Tried to pick up prescription from pharmacy on the way home since the doctors now have a fancy system that will fax it for you. The Pharmacist laughed in my face and said kindly, "We just received that, it will be 25 minutes." Thank goodness this was through the drive up window so I hadn't dragged all three kids inside store.

Get home and now I'm so glad I picked up that rotisserie chicken from Costco earlier in the day. At the time I thought I was splurging, but in the end it saved us a trip to Wendys! And how does Costco make their chickens taste so good??? I probably don't want to know the answer because I'm sure it involves extra calories.

After dinner I run back to Rite Aid to pick up prescription while Mark starts to mow the lawn. I still had a few coupons for a $20 gift card with new prescription that expire next week, yea! So I pay for my $15 prescription and get the $20 gift card. I now wander slowly through the store, not really wanting to rush home. Pick up $10 worth of items on the gift card and both items are free after rebate, so I'll be getting the $10 in cash next month. What a bargain!

Get home in time to help Mark finish up the yard and fix the slide on the new swing set. But can you ever finish the yard??? I don't think so . . . a few weeds here, cut back a limb there and next thing you know the green waste trash is full!

After getting the kids in bed we both finally got a moment to crash. Wow, I'm getting tired just remember the day. Glad we have a week to recover before the next Friday, which will be the last for this school year!!!!!

Stephenie Meyer Signing

So it has been almost a week, but here is my post about the Stephenie Meyer book signing Christy and I went to last Friday, May 16 at Thanksgiving Point. We have a million of these pictures of the two of us sitting together from all the Pampered Chef conferences we've been too, but this picture doesn't have our name badges hanging from our necks, so I had to post it too!

My plans had been to arrive around 3pm because that was the earliest I could get there after Ballroom and Piano lessons. I was planning to sit in line with my kids until Mark could come save me when he got off work. Around noon Mark called to let me know we had been put on "the list" Yea!!! His connections finally paid off. We could sit in the Thanksgiving Point reserved section. Christy and I are excited, my kids are now bummed they don't get to go to Thanksgiving Point.

Since I didn't have any other plans for the day we ended up heading out there at 3pm, but instead of sitting in the VERY long line that went around the corner (women got there are 3:30 am) I took the kids to Farm Country, where of course they had a blast. We had pony rides and fed the animals. They got good at teasing the goats to get them to stand on the fence. Is that considered animal cruelty???? Eventually the kids would give them the food.


So after handing the kids off to DH I went to find out where we would be sitting. So excited to find out it was on the 3rd row just off to the side (thank you Val!)

Stephenie came on right at 7pm. She answered questions from the audience about her Twilight books as well as her new book "The Host" There are others that took better notes than me, so if you want to find out some spoilers and insider info go to the Twilight Lexicon Blog and see the entire 20 min video. Then she moved on to book signing. The entire Barn was full. They sold 1,000 tickets and I'm sure there were a few VIP's that didn't have tickets. She personalized our copies of The Host and would sign two other Twilight books. That is over 3,000 signatures. The benefit of being in the 3rd row is we went up on the stage by row. Christy and I were out of there by 8pm. They say it takes her about 4 hours to go through an entire venue like that. And she was doing it the next day in SLC at another book signing. I guess that is the price you pay for being famous.

The night was amazing and I was so glad I went. My kids are still confused as to why I would want to get someone to sign my books. Someday they will understand!

Spa Day at the Petersons

You would think by looking at these pictures my kids are pampered. This was just too cute not to post. Last Wednesday we took the kids to the Rec Center to go swimming. When we got home Mark was cutting up cucumbers for a snack and the kids were complaining their eyes hurt from swimming. So Mark told them to go lay down and put the cucumbers on their eyes. Apparently Ashley got a little hungry before Mark could take the picture and started eating her cucumber.

It must have helped though. Yesterday afternoon I took the kids swimming to my Aunt's pool (yes it was 90 degrees at 4pm) and when we got home the kids wanted to know if we had any cucumbers for their eyes. I guess I had better stock up for all the swimming we plan on doing this summer.

Tag . . . Jessica is It!

Jessica as a baby

Jessica at her Aunt's wedding in 2003

Jessica got tagged to answer some questions about me, her mother.

1. What is something mom always says to you? "Jessica, could you please . . . "

2. What makes mom happy? "If all our homework is done."

3. What makes mom sad? "When we don't mind."

4. How does mom make you laugh? "Asking me these questions"

5. What was mom like as a child? "Shy"

6. How old is your mom? "40"

7. How tall is your mom? "5' 2" (close, 5'6")"

8. What is her favorite thing to do? "Cook"

9. What does your mom do when you're not around? "Go shopping"

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? "For writing a book"
11. What is your mom really good at? "Cooking"

12. What is your mom not very good at? "Sports"

~Jessica loosing teeth~

13. What does your mom do for her job? "Cook"

14. What is your mom's favorite food? "Seafood"
15. What makes you proud of your mom? "Cause you take care of me."
16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? "Rachael Ray"

17. What do you and your mom do together? "Shop, cook, homework"

18. How are you and your mom the same? "Same eye color" (And she likes to organize and plan just like me)

~Jes at DisneyWorld in 2005 ~

19. How are you and your mom different? "Don't have the same hair color."
20. How do you know your mom loves you? "She kisses me"

I love you too Jessica! Love, Mom
Jessica 'tags' Hailey and all the other kids out there that love their mom!

~Jes in 2007~

Ballroom Spring Performance

Just for the record (I have to put this down in writing) For Mother's Day Jessica's card to me said she loved me because I was a COOL Mom. I realize this idea is short lived and in a year or two she will regret ever saying it. So for now I will relish in the fact someone, especially my eldest daughter, thinks I'm cool and not a fuddy duddy!

Okay, onto the real post. Monday night was the final Ballroom performance for Jessica's School. They did an amazing job and it was so great to see their improvement. Here is a little slide show featuring the kids.

And while I'm blogging, can I tell you how much fun couponing can be. It has been a couple of weeks since a really good sale, but today I scored. Albertsons was doing some funky buy $15 of certain items and get $5 back. I've now done this long enough I was able to figure out the good buys on my own and didn't have to wait for Amy's e-mail from Savvy Shopper. I spent $19.99 and saved $83.67! The best buy was the Lawrys Marinade I got for 16 cents a bottle. Came home and threw some chicken in the Lemon Pepper marinade for dinner tonight, yum. But also excited for the All Small and Mighty laundry soap for $1 a bottle. And I'm sure the Bertolli Pasta Sauce I got for 38 cents a bottle will be tasty.

12 Years

I was planning on posting this on Friday, May 9, our actual Wedding Anniversary, but of course there were complications. I could have sworn I scanned in some wedding pictures a few years ago. I searched and searched the hard drive and couldn't locate them. Friday was too busy of a day so I didn't have time to scan any then. Sunday afternoon . . . a perfect time for scanning. I went searching in the basement for the Wedding Album. Found my baby book, college photos, mission photos, Mark's mission photos, Mark's missing passport from his mission, after mission but before marriage photos, photos of all the kids. I'm sure I put the wedding pictures somewhere "safe" when we moved but my 40 year old brain can't think of where that may have been. So here is the one picture we still had sitting out on the mantel. Yes we were both much thinner and younger looking then. (Mark just came in after I was done with this and informed me where the wedding pictures are, oh well)

Anyways . . . yes Friday was our 12th wedding anniversary. Great time to reflect on that wonderful day. That day could not have been more perfect. The weather was similar to what it was this year, a little cool with some clouds. We got married in the Jordan River Temple because Mt. Timpanogos was under construction.

Our wedding luncheon was at this cute little restaurant owned by an English Couple in Orem by the bowling alley. My Father-in-law had wanted Chuck-A-Rama or Golden Corral, but was kind enough to honor my wishes of a nice sit down lunch. We went back on our second or third anniversary and it had closed down, we were so sad.

The reception was at the Historical Provo County Courthouse in the room upstairs. My goal was to have it someplace that did not have basketball courts painted on the floor. Whenever we drive by with the kids we always point it out. In fact on Saturday when we drove by someone was out front taking wedding pictures, great choice! We had a TON of people come to the reception. With Mark being from a small town (Santaquin) almost everyone came that was invited. And my big extended family were all there. I was especially excited for my childhood friend, Robynn and her mom Mrs. K who came down from Idaho. We could never pronounce their last name so we shortened it! I've known Robynn since I was 5 years old when they lived down the street from us in Tustin, Calif. The whole day I just felt like such a queen. It was so fun to see so many different people. And I don't remember anything that didn't go as planned.

Since we just got back from our Cruise we didn't have many plans this year. I was surprised when Mark told me he had something planned and to be ready at 5:30. He even arranged the babysitter! We headed up to Salt Lake for dinner at Trolley Square and then we saw the musical "The Producers" at the Pioneer Theatre Company. It was a fun night to get dressed up, not knowing what we were doing until we were actually there.

We have been so blessed these past 12 years. Mark is such an amazing husband and father. I am so lucky to have him in my life. And we have 3 amazing and wonderful children. It was cute to see big little John sing all the words to "Mother I Love You" in Sacrament Meeting for Mother's Day today. And the girls were cute with their cards and gifts for me. It upset them that I helped them make the one we did in Activity Days and I knew what it was. They were extra careful to keep their school gifts a secret.

This past year has been especially exciting with buying a house and moving on from our townhouse. We love our new neighborhood and neighbors. And the house is perfect for us. We are truly blessed in our lives to have the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are one blessed family.

A Week of Lines

I've consigned myself to standing in line this week. It began on Tuesday when my friend Christy and I headed out the door at 6am to get in line to purchase tickets to Stephenie Meyer's discussion and book signing for next week. Doors opened at 8am at Borders and we had to purchase her new book, The Host, along with the ticket to the book signing event. We were not crazy enough to be part of the tent city that spent the night, but we did have fun for 2 1/2 hours waiting in the cold. Forgot it was colder by the mouth of the canyon in the mornings. Thanks Mark for bringing us Hot Chocolate to warm us up! Should have worn warmer clothes. Also forgot my camera, but someone from TwilightMoms.com was more prepared and took pictures of our fun line. We are somewhere back there around the corner.

Wednesday is pay day, which means it is shopping this week, which means I'll need to go to at least Walmart and Costco. You can guarantee more lines at those stores!

I've decided to put the girls on the Orem Swim Team this summer. I think it will be really good exercise for them and they LOVE to swim. Hopefully they will be able to really learn and master all the strokes they teach in the upper swim lessons. Anyone else from North Orem putting their kids in? I'd love to carpool. The Rec Center is doing a special registration for Orem residents only on Thursday night and you have to go in person. I'm sure we will have to stand in line for this. Not as fun as Tuesday's line since I'll be managing the 3 children in line with me this time!

And then there is the eternal line of children waiting for mom to finish 'just one more page' of the great book she is now reading. Thank you Stephenie for another amazing book. I can't wait to meet you next week. At least I'll have a good book to read while standing in all these lines! And I may have left early to pick up the girls just so I had an excuse to sit in the carpool line and read!

Beautiful Day

What a beautiful afternoon we had. We finally made it out to Thanksgiving Point to see the tulips. Mark was still working when we first got there, so the kids and I started down into the incredible gardens.

Just after the butterfly garden the kids decided they were too tired to keep walking.

Then Dad came to the rescue!

And what child can resist rolling down the huge hill of the Waterfall Garden. Not my three!

The kids tried to convince us to let them drive the golf cart.

My girls that are so afraid of bees are brave when the bees are behind glass!

And after walking through the gardens Mark and I played on the Segways for a few minutes.

What a great afternoon we spent as a family.

Tomorrow we try to conquer the sprinkler system. You can take bets on how many swear words may be uttered.

Don't Turn Me In!

I've lost the Mother of the Year contest this week. At 7pm Thursday night I realized I had never fed my 4 year old son any lunch, Oops!


This story actually starts on Tuesday night when I started to not feel so good which quickly turned into -- oh no, I got the stomach flu. Mark had it a week before and I thought we were in the clear when no one else had come down with it. Silly me for thinking that. Wednesday was spent in the bedroom or bathroom ALL day. So for lunch on Wed I told John, "You know where the Dinosaur Chicken Nuggets are, go heat some up." I did have to leave the bedroom for a small technical difficulty with the microwave and a 4 year, but he managed.


Thursday I did see some improvement. Mark of course was taking care of getting the kids up and out the door to school. I came into the kitchen long enough to know he had fixed omelets for the kids and knew I was not ready to eat yet. So around 10:30 John said it was time for lunch and he wanted waffles. Thanks to a freezer and microwave I was able to fill his request. At this point I realized he never ate Dad's breakfast. Around lunch time I thought about eating food and quickly decided that didn't sound so good. When the girls got home from school we headed over to set up the Pampered Chef booth and the Thanksgiving Point booth for the Women's Expo. We were heading home around 7pm and John informed me he was STARVING. At this point I realized not only was dinner really late, I had never fed him lunch. Luckily he has enough food storage on him that he survived.

For the record he has already had two meals today and I do plan to feed him dinner tonight ;)! And if I'm really lucky I might just actually want dinner tonight since it will have been almost 72 hours since this whole mess started.