Please shine down on me

I have started blogging less and less. I don't know why for sure. I just go with my desire to post, and that ebbs and flows. Apparently.

We had been enjoying some particularly beautiful springtime weather here in the otherwise tundra of Cache Valley. Spring is like that here. Actually, any season is. Except winter. That's always just cold. We were up in the 70's and everybody had come out of hibernation, jogging, biking, walking, playing basketball. I even spied my neighborhood kids dressed in dark clothes last weekend for night games! Remember those, I loved kick the can. What were the other ones we played? Sort of drawing a blank on actual names of games.

But now, this week has been so stinking cold! Rain is fine, I love a good rain storm and thunder, etc. That's awesome. But it's been about 40 degrees. I already put away the winter coats. Tomorrow is May, I mean, come on! It snowed the other day too. Good inch or so. It melted promptly but I was considering pulling the boots out of storage. Naomi's not giving up, she's staying optimistic. Today, before I realized what she was wearing, she made it out the door in flip flops and leggings. Freeze. She insists she is fine.

Life is speeding up. Things just get more complicated and busy. It's inevitable. I feel like I'm watching the last few months of calm I have right now. Summer is always busier than it is lazy. It seems like that to me.
I have a month of bona-fide spring left, if the weather will cooperate! I am planning a little trip next weekend to St George to see Talia and Wes, and their boys! Then I am going farther South (see, if the sun won't come, I'll go to the sun), to visit Cassie and her kids while they are in California at her parents. SO nice of her to let us come visit. It's been a year since I have seen this girl! That is far too long. California here I come. We will hit the beach and probably Disneyland too. It's awesome, I'm a junkie now too. I also have a 5k race with my sister Ginger the weekend I get back from the sun. It's all good stuff, busy, but good.

This summer I have swimming lessons in June for Naomi planned and I'm teaching a Summer Camp group one week that month too. July will bring (my birthday!) family-get-togethers, and a Lake Powell trip. August, I'll be getting ready and starting school again. And Noami will start preschool in September. Me in school will probably be the biggest change for us. More structured mornings, more baby sitters, less mommy. I feel good about going back, I'm starting a graduate program that I am really excited about. But even as easy of a load as I will have, and how consolidated my schedule is, I will feel the time exchange. And I will welcome the change of pace, and scenery and challenges, but I will miss that time with my babies too.
So here's to a Summer of excitement and the beginnings of a new stage in life!

*post edit. One more awesome thing to look forward to this summer, Brook, Jesse and their boys are coming to visit, for a MONTH! hooray!

Naomi, Naomi, Naomi

Naomi. She is my sweet, helpful, feisty, smart, observant and beautiful four year old!
I love my girl. Her favorite snacks are pickles, banana pepper slices, olives, cheetos, popsicles, jelly beans and gum. She has a thing for band aids, and all sorts of animals. She is curious and daring. I am always reminding her to be careful, not so high, not so fast. But she does it anyway and succeeds. She is also a little bit shy around new people. She loves to draw pictures, write notes and deliver them to our neighbors. She thrives in the outdoors. She smothers her little brother with love and attention, and makes sure he shares! They are two peas in a pod. Naomi is loving and forgiving. She teaches me new things and makes me laugh every day.
These are the darling photos that Sarah took of my little Naomi.

Mozzarella Stuffed Meatballs

Mozzarella Stuffed Meatballs over Spaghetti Squash.

(image courtesy of makeitandlove.blogspot.com)

I stumbled across this recipe the today and decided, "what the heck, I can make that!" I was lucky enough to have the ingredients, more or less, on hand. I made due a little, but didn't compromise the integrity of the meal. Seriously. These are great.
The meatball recipe is from Pioneer Woman, click here. And the whole meal idea and squash recipe is from Ashley at Make it and Love it.
I made this for dinner and it was a huge, enormous, wonderful SUCCESS!
Although, I also cooked up some bow tie noodles. Pasta is always, without fail, a hit for the 4 and under crowd at my home. So just to be safe, I added that to the menu.
Total it took one hour to prepare the meal, frozen ground beef to sit down and eat.

I just happened to have a spaghetti squash sitting  forlornly in the bottom drawer of my refrigerator. And I keep ground beef on hand, and pasta and sauce too of course, otherwise the kids might starve...
So I had only about one pound of ground beef, instead of the 1 and 1/2 so I adjusted the recipe accordingly. Also, my bread crumbs were of the plain variety. So I added my own spice mixture to make them "Italian." I did a dash and a pinch of each of these; sage, marjoram, rosemary, oregano, garlic powder, onion powder, seasoned salt, and fresh chopped basil! Also the recipe called for fresh parsley. I just added some dry. It doesn't taste much, it's just for show and the fresh basil covered that.
Also, I didn't have fresh mozzarella. That's a shame, because I'm pretty sure it would be awesome. So I used what I had. String cheese. Yes, I chopped up two string cheese sticks to use as my meatball centers. They were yummy.
Oh, and one more thing, I didn't have worcestershire sauce. Too bad. They were awesome anyway. It calls for only just a teaspoon anyway. So I fudged there and it was fine. See, you too can make a recipe work without a trip to the grocery store!
The spaghetti squash was surprisingly good, and it's a really low-calorie alternative to pasta. Probably not much less fat with the butter I added while it was baking though. And surprise, pasta sauce is really good on spaghetti squash!
My quash came with a sweet little label with cooking instructions, so I followed those and Ashley's. I sliced my squash in half, put them cut-side down on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (that stuff is awesome) and cooked them for 45 min at 400. Then I flipped them over, added butter to the hollowed out inside and lowered the temp to 350 because I was putting the meatballs in the oven right then too. I cooked both for about 10 minutes and the squash was done the same time as the meatballs. Perfect.
I added some grapes and called it a meal.
Share your favorite not-too-hard recipe with me. I am always looking for new things to make for dinner!

James, James, James

My good friend Sarah took these seriously cute photos of my kids. She is amazing! I love how they turned out and I wanted to share!
Here's a set of Sweet Baby James. He's 2 years old and such a funny little boy. Stubborn, but mostly silly. All loves and cuddles

Hello Spring (summer)

We have been having the best weather here. The best, I tell you!
I've been to more playgrounds and parks this past week than is probably good for me. Actually, that's not really possible is it?
Today was bordering downright hot. Naomi was outside frolicking, literally, in a sleeveless sun dress and I put James in a little muscle shirt. He's so cute in anything, I swear.
This morning we went exploring a little bit of our nearby wilderness. Spring Creek runs along the road we live on and it's quite the animal attraction. Last week I saw some deer, several geese, a muskrat and a pheasant, all at close range. Today we were graced with the presence of a funny little muskrat (we think?) that was popping up and down from his burrow. Naomi insisted on giving it a few pieces of the bread she brought for the ducks and geese. She dropped them down his hole and we left it alone. She was tempted to put her hand down, until I told her that the dang thing would probably bite her if she did that. That convinced her.
We eventually gave up on the geese and ducks, they must have been hiding. We packed a lunch to take to first dam, at the mouth of Logan Canyon. There's always a flock of birds hanging out there. We fed all the ducks, geese and gulls and threw sticks in the water until I was too hot to stay any longer. I had to keep my eye on Naomi, she was determined that she wanted to go swimming in there. It's kind of gross. With all the bird poop and all. And it's cold. We did see a duck egg before we left though, almost the highlight of the trip!
We swung by Lowe's and got ourselves outfitted with a hose, watering can, several pots of varying sizes and one plant each of Lavender, Sweet Basil, an Orange Bell Pepper. The tag said that the bell pepper will produce after 70-80 days. I hope we get one little pepper, I'd be happy with that.
And Lavender! How exciting! I'm going to learn how to use it for baths, we could all use some relaxation.
Or course Basil is just awesome. I will have to learn some new recipes, it's just so pretty sitting there, saying "cook with me!" If you have a favorite recipe using fresh basil, let me know, I am always, always on the lookout for new meal ideas.
Naomi helped me pot all these plants and our sad little pansies we bought at the grocery store last week. They were borderline dead. I think they'll be ok though. I assigned Noami as the official Pansy Gardener. No drowning of the plants allowed. She asked me what "drowning" meant. Too much water sweetheart. We got really messy with the potting soil. Naomi helped pour in the soil and was especially helpful with the watering. We made a mess but it was really fun. Activities like that help me to learn patience with Naomi. I mean that I learn to sit back and let her do it, her way. I'm still learning though.
All the while James was supposed to be napping in his crib. He took an hour to fall asleep. All that water foul was pretty exciting! Then when I went to get him after he woke up I found that he had thrown everything from his crib on the ground, had a very messy diaper and had broken one of the crib slats. Seriously...
Nothing a little wood glue won't fix. But something about James is a little bit destructive. He doesn't' know his own strength. The slat was actually first fractured by Naomi, and we tried gluing it but the crack came apart again, and  yeah, then we put James in there without really fixing it. Ooopsy. But he went two years without finding the crack until today. then he broke the darn thing clean out. Sheesh. I have a feeling that this is something I had better just resolve to accept as part of parenting a boy.
I was able to go for a run this evening while Zach tackled getting the kids ready for bed. I went too far, and the problem with that is that you still have to get back home. Sigh. So I walked until I felt like I wasn't going to collapse. I've been getting soft running on a tread mill, road running is different, harder, but so much prettier.

So today was a really great day, I love being home with my kids, warmer weather makes all the difference. It's great to be outside so much more. And I know it's part of being a kid, but it still takes me by surprise just how strong the draw to get outside is for Naomi and James.
Welcome Summer!

This photo is not from today, but I love it.

Baby Animal Days!

Last week My mom came with me and my kids to Baby Animal Days at the American West Heritage Center in Wellsville. We went early so we could spend all day there, letting Naomi and James see all they wanted to. It was so cold when we got there! I had the kids in double layer shirts, jackets and then coats, gloves and hats too. But I forgot sunscreen. I don't remember that I need that, even if it's cold!

We were there all day, by the time we went home it was much warmer, we had peeled off a lot of layers. It was such a fun day there. They really make it into a festival. There were all kinds of activities, a mini rodeo, experts on different animals. Crafts, bug collections from USU, and even the Easter Bunny!

We decided to meet the animals first.

These pygmy goats were pretty funny, they didn't seem to even notice the kids milling around their pen. They just kept looking for stuff to eat.

The ducklings were so sweet. No claws there. The volunteers/workers would hand the animals to the children, instructing them how to hold them to keep them safe and warm. They would switch out the batch of animals every 20 minutes or so to give the babies a break. My children included, the kids were pretty enthusiastic about holding these babies and I'm sure it's stressful on the animals.

Just look at his happy face, James loved these little "duckies".

The baby chicks were pretty cute too, but less snuggly. They were starting to get mature wing and tail feathers too, Naomi thought that was interesting, she wanted to know if they could fly yet and when they would be able to.

Here's my mom handing a little chick to Naomi, they had all colors of animals.

Oh the bunnies! Naomi was so excited to hold one of these, James too, in theory! Naomi just snuggled one right up and asked if we could have pet bunnies. Um, nope.

James was scared of the rabbits and their sharp claws didn't help. He got poked through his jeans and started a panicked cry. I tried to calm him down and keep the bunny calm too. No good. He got down and sat with Grandma, they held a bunny together and then suddenly that little stinker of a rabbit bit both of them on their fingers! James lost it, we got out of there and helped poor James stop crying. Traumatic experience, he's still talking about where the bunny bit him.... sigh.

Pony rides were next. And they were so fun! Naomi was a pro and picked the biggest pony to ride. They had helmets for them to wear. The ponies just walked around a few times and everyone was thrilled.

Happy rider.

Then we went to see the baby bears! Bear World from somewhere in Idaho brought down some black bear cubs. They were seriously the cutest things ever. My photo is grainy but I wanted to show them anyway. They looked like little teddy bears. They would crawl over and climb up on the trainer peoples laps. Awesome.

Choo-choo! This is a mini train that we took a ride on, the conductor plays it up and the kids just sit and wave and wave to everyone we passed. It's kind of like a ride at Disneyland. 

Naomi on the mechanical bull! She had a great ride and stayed on for the last "eight seconds" as the operator counted down for her. She says she "won"!

James getting up close and personal with the piglets. They were sleeping so James got down on his tummy to get a closer look, maybe try out the soft hay for himself.

This little calf was sweet and docile. It let the kids just pet and touch her without a problem. I was told it was between 1-2 weeks old.

We made it back to the ducklings for round two. Still in love with them. They were my favorite too. They have the coolest feet! I showed James and he kept telling me back that they had "webbed feet"!

Naomi waiting for her turn at Mutton Bustin'. Seriously, I was nervous for her to do this, but she was determined that she wanted to. They suited the kids up in a protective vest and helmet. Then they helped them onto the back of a sheep, told them to hold on tight and let the sheep go! These kids got tossed and went flying, rolling and a few were even stepped on a little bit. A good handful got up crying. Naomi watched it all and still was game. In the end the cowboy ran with her and caught her for a soft landing. Phew. I was nervous. She was thrilled and loved it. I might put her in the rodeo again this fall! Look at us turning back into country folk. What city?

Here she is, ready to ride!

Beautiful Easter

Happy Easter!
I love this holiday. Last week I enjoyed so much preparing and teaching my little primary class about Easter. It was so touching to watch them from the beginning of the lesson saying that Easter was about candy, bunnies and eggs, to understanding that it's all about Jesus Christ's resurrection. We did the same hands on lesson with Naomi and James for Family Home Evening the next day. From the manual I had cut outs, similar to a flannel board story and the children just loved it. Visual and tactile materials are exactly what most little ones need to understand a concept.
But not to entirely dismiss the secular side, it is tied together and I think Eggs are the most beautiful example.
We have been busy planning and preparing all kinds of fun for Easter. My favorite "craft" this year is from Megan at Not Martha, her Easter Surprise Eggs are so pretty and fun, and a relatively simple activity. Naomi liked helping to empty the eggs, dye the eggs, fill and then assign name tags to each. Although I admit, I usually like to do it all myself, I like perfection and I have to remind myself to just let it go and let my little girl get in there and do it herself too. We had fun with these. They are filled with candy! Here's the LINK

We also had fun decoupaging hard boiled eggs the kids had dyed with their Grandma Linda earlier. We separated all the tiny paper flowers from my stash, poured some newly purchased Mod Podge and then got messy. James was great at this one. Naomi wasn't sure she really wanted to hold the gooey egg but she got into it finally. Talking to herself about how to get the flowers to stick to the egg, not the brush. So cute.

And finally, Easter Morning goodies from the "Easter Bunny." I like pretending to be all these generous people. Naomi was so excited that she wanted to go to bed an hour early last night.
It's been such a fun day so far, And I love listening to conference, it really is food for the soul.
And we have more fun in store at Grandma and Grandpa's for dinner soon.

Happy Easter, He is Risen!

 Those stuffed animals are also banks! I remember receiving a new stuffed animal every year at Easter, a tradition I loved.

The best way to empty an egg...