Haulin' Wood

This past Sat. we went up to our neighbors cabin to hang out for the day and cut up some trees that he wanted gone. We had a fun day, the kids rode the four wheelers around, Paige fed her baby doll dirt, we hauled four cord of wood (that is alot!), we cooked out over a fire, we enjoyed the scenery and just enjoyed getting away for the day. All in all it was a good and productive day. We got our wood for winter and plan on going back up and getting more wood, there is a lot of bug kill to cut up and take.
Here is James in motion, doing what he loves!
*It amazes me what that man can do, he can lift a 250 lb. round of wood and throw it into a tralier. How many men do you know that can do that?

The Best Banana Bread, EVER!

I have found this banana bread recipe and it is the best! I have been loving to bake, since James got me my Kitchen Aid Mixer and I have made this recipe way to many times since. Enjoy!

Moist Banana Bread

1/2c butter/margarine
2 eggs
3 large, ripe bananas
1 1/2 Tbsp. sour cream
1 tsp. lemon juice
1 c. sugar
2 c. flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 c. chopped nuts (optional)

Combine dry ingredients in large mixing bowl. Place butter, eggs, bananas, sour cream, and lemon juice in blender; whirl until smooth. Pour over dry ingredients, add nuts and stir just until moist. Pour into greased loaf pan. Bake at 350 for 55-65 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

This recipe make one loaf of bread, just double it to make two loafs. I always make two, we love it and eat it really fast.


*On another note: I will not be cutting Paige's hair at this time. Thanks for all of your advice and help.

Flour BABY!

Yeap, this is what I get when I forget to close the flour bucket after making chocolate chip cookies this morning (thanks Missy for the yummy recipe). Lucky me! Amazingly enough she didn't find the flour for about 1 hour after the cookies were done and she was playing outside in her swimsuit. She really wanted the kite that was behind the flour bucket and just happened to play in it while trying to get to her kite. Yeah, right! And wouldn't you know it, I was on the phone to my insurance company at the time, so I stuck her outside to play and I dealt with it after. Yes, she does can the kite string in her mouth. Isn't it lovely!?

*You can kinda see how short her hair is in these photos, but here is one from the back to really see. I still don't know what I am going to do with it. I will let you know if I cut it.

Garden Update

I just thought that I would post some pictures of some the the things growing in our garden.

Here is one of our three tomato plants. We aren't big tomato eaters, but we love yellow tomatoes.

Here is some of our carrots. These are my favorite to watch grow. Doesn't it look like hair?This is our lettuce, it is sooooo good from the garden!This is one of our squash plants. We always have tons, but we love them!

HELP!

I really need all of your wonderful advice before I go and do something stupid!
I have been thinking about trimming Paige's hair!
Don't get me wrong, she doesn't have a lot but enough in the back that there are two different layers and I want to cut off the bottom layer so they will all be the same length. Here's the problem, once it's cut it won't be very long and I am afraid that I will cut off the little bit of curl that she has and it won't grow back. I wonder if it will look better and will come in better all one length in the end. But I am afraid of doing it! Any advice or ideas?

Old Habits Out-New Habits In

New Habit:
For the past week or so I have been working with Paige to get her potty-trained. And guess what she has done so well, I think that I will have to say that she is "POTTY TRAINED"! YEAH! I think that she has been my easiest when it has come to potty training, maybe that is because she is a girl or I have gone through it three other times, I really don't know what made the deference other than I am glad that is was so easy. I was a little slower in getting her going than with the boys, I had them all potty trained right around their 2nd birthday and with Paige I had been putting it off. But last week I decided to go for it. She had been going potty on the toilet for 4 months or so, whenever I would put her on, she would go. I realized that I was the one not wanting her to potty train, one because I have been lazy and potty training takes work and alot of bathroom trips during the day and two because she is my baby and I don't want her to grow up too fast. But it is all good and she has been really great and really ready to be done with diapers, although she has tried to get me to put them on her after the bathroom a few times, I just have to remind her that they are only for bedtime and during the day she get to wear big girl panties. YEAH! I also took her to St. George on Sat. with only one accident, not bad for only being in panties for three days. I think that we have had a total of three accidents since we started. I couldn't be happier!

Old Habit broken:
The other great news for Paige is that she has given up her Binky! Hallelujah! We have been throwing them away one by one, when they would get cracked or a hole in it that she was able to put her fingers in and hold it. One thing that really helped, was having her throw them away, then she would cry for it we would say "remember that you threw it away, because of the hole in it" and she would pout for a minute and get over it. Bedtime was the hardest she would cry for it and really be upset, but I calmed her down, by laying with her in bed and reading stories. Now for the past two nights she hasn't even asked for it. I think that this is a good sign.

*Now if I could only get Logan to stop sucking his thumb, we'll be set.

More Baptism Pictures

These pictures came from my sister. I tweeked them a little bit. Aren't they great looking kids?!

Austin

Logan

Tanner

Paige
She really didn't feel well, can you tell from the drool bubbles on her chin?

Everyone

The Joy of Gardening!

It has been about three weeks since we planted our garden and we now have things starting to come up. YEAH! It is so exciting to me to see these little plants growing, I always have a fear of nothing coming up. Case in point, we planted a whole row of peas (about 30 feet) and I have only about 12 little pea plants coming up. Paige and I planted some more this morning and I hope that they will grow.

Although the weather has been really weird this Spring, we have had really late frost (earlier this week, was the last one), snowing on the mountain, it will get really warm and then get really cold and freeze things. We lost some of out bell pepper plants and a tomato plant. I had bought new plants of all of these items and had been waiting to plant them because I didn't want them to freeze and die. I finally planted them today, hooray! Now I am just keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't get cold enough to freeze at night.

We all thoroughly enjoy planting a garden and reaping the benefits later in summer. The kids all help plant the seeds, hoe the weeds (not the funnest job), water the garden, pick the veggies and of course eat all the yummy things!

Here is a list of things that we planted:
Peas
Carrots
Lettuce
Radishs
Turnips
Bell peppers
Tomatoes
Corn
Jalepeno Peppers
Broccoli
Watermelon
Cantaloupe
Pumpkins (2 different kinds)
Cucumbers

We can't wait to eat all this yummy Food!

Tanner's Baptism

Tanner was baptized yesterday evening and confirmed by his dad. What a special and neat experience for us. Tanner had been really looking forward to getting baptized and was quite pleased that his dad was able to do the honors, even with his broken toe. He was glowing from head to toe after he came out of the water and looked peaceful and happy. To see Tanner enter the waters of baptizm made my hear swell with love and pride!

We celebrated after at our house with a dinner and fun. All the cousins had a great time playing with each other and eating cake. What more could you ask for, when you are a kid!? We were really glad to have most of our family members here for the special occasion and missed those that weren't able to make it.

Here are a few pictures that I got with my camera. I had my sister take pictures with her nice camera and she has yet to get them to me, I will post some when I get those.