Catching Up

I just have a bunch of random pictures and odds and ends to catch up on so here we go.

I've been a bit frazzled with work lately. Friday morning my alarm woke me up and I noticed Sam was still sleeping, which is bad. He is usually gone before I wake up. I shook his shoulder and exclaimed "You missed your bus!". He said "no I didn't, I took the day off." I couldn't believe he surprised me like that! It was wonderful because he totally took care of the kids all day so I could just focus on work. What a great husband!

He took Parker and Cameron to the park and got a few shots:

I guess it was a little chilly....


My favorite picture, so typical! Apparently Sam wanted him to drop 2 feet to the ground and Parker had other ideas.


Artsy


I've been meaning to blog a few items Carson has come home from school with for the past month and I just kept forgetting! So, without any further ado...

This page was full of "Problem" and "Solution" puzzle pieces. This is how far Carson got:

Problem: "William wants to fly, but he can't"


Solution: "Climbed a tree, happy about his plan."


Problem: "Sad and bored, William got laughed at."


Solution: um, well, I guess once you are in a tree, bored, and being laughed at, you are at a dead end my friend. No solution for you!


Here's another gem. Carson brought his spelling test home this past week.

Don't you just hate it when you forget the "r" in 'shirt'?


I wonder what his teacher thought?

Sam likes to freeze Parker's toys in water sometimes. No rhyme or reason as to why, but it always makes me laugh. The other day he froze Parker's Ben 10 toy, 'echo echo'. It was sweet.



On Friday night Sam and I went to Tepanyaki with some long-time friends. It was so much fun, thanks to everyone who came and played! Let's do it again soon!


This here is Natalie. Natalie and her husband set Sam and I up on our first AND second blind date. Good thing they kept trying! I remember on our second blind date (long story), Sam was like 4 hours late because he ran out of gas. Natalie's husband, Neal, looked at me and said "This is quite normal for Sam. If you can't handle it, run away now." 10+ years later, I'm glad I didn't run!



I have some awesome pictures of everyone catching shrimp in their mouths, but because I want my friends to STAY my friends, I won't post them.

I've been having some fun with the picnik website:





Have a great week!

Cinnabon!

Have you ever had a cinnamon roll from Cinnabon? If not, you are missing out! I'm not even a huge cinnamon roll fan, but cinnabon's are INCREDIBLE!

In my ward in Seattle, there was a family who really liked cinnabon's but they could't afford to buy them whenever they wanted. The dad used to take his kids to the local Cinnabon and ask the employees if his kids could LICK the parchment paper the cinnamon rolls were baked on!!! I'm not kidding. Mom, Dad, back me up here! I'm laughing right now just thinking about it!

Anyway, today I had a hankering for a cinnamon roll. I flipped through a few recipe books and internet sites looking for an interesting cinnamon roll recipe. Then I remembered that my mom had emailed me a 478 page recipe book awhile back that has recipes from different restaurants in it. I looked, and sure enough, there was a recipe for Cinnabon cinnamon rolls.

I'll admit, several times in the process of making these cinnamon rolls, I was completely overwhelmed...especially when I had rolled out a huge rectangle of dough that took over my whole counter! I kept laughing and saying to myself "I'm in over my head...just walk away!" I persisted though, and the results did not disappoint! I'm not even kidding, these cinnamon rolls tasted EXACTLY like Cinnabon's! So, roll up your sleeves, be prepared to be a little overwhelmed, and have at it! Oh, and make sure you know who you can share these with because it makes about 20 huge rolls!

Cinnabon Rolls



Rolls:
1/2 cup warm water
2 packages yeast
2 Tablespoons sugar
3.4 ounce package vanilla pudding
1/2 cup butter, melted
2 eggs
1 tsp. salt
6+ cups flour

Filling:
1 cup soft butter
2 cups brown sugar
4 tsp. cinnamon

Cream Cheese Frosting:
8 ounces cream cheese
1/2 cup butter
1 tsp. vanilla
3 cups powdered sugar
1 Tablespoon milk

In a bowl, combine water, yeast and sugar. Stir until dissolved. Set aside.

In large bowl, take pudding mix and prepare according to package directions. Add butter, eggs, and salt to pudding. Mix well. Add yeast mixture. Mix well.

Have 5 1/2 cups flour in mixer, fitted with dough hook. Add pudding mix to flour to combine. Knead until smooth. I had to add about 1 1/2 cups more flour until the dough held together and cleaned sides of bowl while mixing.

Place dough in a greased bowl. Spray top of dough with non-stick spray and cover bowl with plastic wrap. Rise until double.
Punch down dough and let rise again.

Roll out dough on floured surface to a 34" X 21" rectangle.
Take 1 cup softened butter and spread out over dough.
In bowl, mix 2 cups brown sugar and 4 tsp. cinnamon. Sprinkle brown sugar mixture over butter.

On the long side of the rectangle, roll up very tightly and pinch the edges closed.

With a serrated knife, cut the roll every two inches.

Place on parchment lined cookie sheet, 2 inches apart.
With your hand, lightly press down on each roll.
Cover and rise until double.
Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes.
Remove when they start to turn golden. DO NOT OVERBAKE.

Mix all frosting ingredients and blend until smooth.
Frost warm rolls with cream cheese frosting.

Bon Apetite!

Laura and Tom, thanks for letting us hang out in your new house tonight! I hope you enjoyed the goodies!

Just Playing

I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing with this new camera. Admittedly, I haven't read the owner's manual yet, but I flipped through it, and it's like a foreign language. Over time, I'm sure I'll learn more tricks, but for now here's some amateur shots from today.


This one is totally blurry, but Parker's reaction to Cameron's hand makes me laugh!


So serious...


Again, blurry, but brotherly.


Anyhow, that's all for now. If anyone has tips on taking better pictures, in terms I can understand, let me know!

Hide And Go Seek

One of life's lessons my kids have taught me:

This afternoon Carson and Parker were playing hide and go seek. I should point out that my kids are hard core players of this game. They absolutely will NOT reveal their location, even if you are begging them to show themselves. There is no such thing as "I give up" or "Ollie Ollie Oxen Free". Trust me, I've 'lost' my kids more than once, only to find out much, much later, that they were playing the game. Of course, a discussion ensued immediately afterwards that went something like "you have to TELL me we are playing hide-and-go-seek BEFORE you hide!"

Anyway, today while they were playing, I had to use the restroom. I walked into the *ahem* bathroom, locked the door and just as I was about to...well, you know....I had a strange feeling. I looked behind the shower curtain, and there was CARSON! I freaked out and said "why didn't you say something when you heard me come in and lock the door?!?" His reply: "I didn't want Parker to find me!" For the love.

Then later, Carson couldn't find Parker. We fully ate lunch and everything while Parker was still hiding because after calling his name a hundred times, he still wouldn't reveal himself. He finallhy appeared after we were almost done with lunch. I asked him where he was and he wouldn't tell me. I guess he figures that is a good spot for the next time he plays that game.

Sam and I got ourselves a new camera so this afternoon we took a few shots of Cameron, just to try and figure out the new features. We have a lot to learn, but so far I LOVE the camera!

We have the resolution/megapixel set pretty low right now, but I love this picture!


Hey, Sam and Cameron both have the same tuft of hair on their heads that sticks up. Cute!


Oh crimeny - I got roots to boot. D-A-M gray hair. It's impossible to maintain, especially for such a low-maintenance person like me. One day I'm just going to let it go all gray. I may also start eating prunes, talk about the 'good ol days' and warn everybody that a storm is coming because my knee hurts!


Tonight we had our monthly 'cousins dinner' at Nalani's house. It was lots of fun, as usual. Here is a cute picture of my cousin's little girl, Maddie. I'm going to go out on a limb here, I think she LOVES chocolate cake.


Uh........anybody got a tissue? Photoshop would be a good thing for me to learn how to use.

Shameless

The past few days have been a little on the rough side...Cameron's helmet gave him a bunch of sores, he has a cold, and Carson has quite the ear infection that kept him home from school. But, instead of droning on about it, I'll just show you some cute pictures.

Besides, how can I get too serious about life when there are constantly things to laugh about? Not even an hour ago Sam dropped the toothpaste in the toilet so he had to brush his teeth with Carson's strawberry toothpaste. If you can't laugh at that, you should stop and smell the roses (or strawberry toothpaste) a little more.

I'm just glad I had already brushed my teeth tonight. Not sure about tomorrow morning....If you are my friend and you live close, don't be surprised if I call you asking for toothpaste early in the AM!

Last night Cameron was just chilling in a chair with me so Sam took some pics:





Today Carson was sad that he couldn't go play outside in the snowstorm. Yep, I'm a mean mom who made her son stay inside so his ear wouldn't start hurting again!


Tonight Carson read to Cameron to fulfill his "15 minutes of reading, every day" requirement. It was a huge hit with Cameron!

Carson's Baptism!

How is it possible that I still feel like I'm 21, but I have a son who has been baptized!? Doesn't seem real.

Carson was baptized yesterday, November 1st, and the whole day was just perfect! I was slightly worried that Halloween would be tons of excitement and then Carson wouldn't be as excited for his baptism the next day. Not the case though, Carson was very tender about his whole baptism experience. Even today he told me he loved being "clean" and he is still sin-free! So cute! We gave him scriptures for his baptism day, my parents gave him a scripture case, and Fern gave him scripture pencils. He loves them! He looked all grown up carrying them around in church today. Good times!

Father and Son at the Stake Center.



Carson and his grandparents:



The baptism and confirmation were awesome. The Spirit was strong and Carson took everything in and quietly digested it. He acted very grown up, it was super special!

After the baptism we headed to my ward building for some dinner! Fern treated Carson to a ride in her hot car.


Dinner was yummy, Hawaiian Haystacks. Thanks to everyone for contributing and helping with the dinner! Just before dinner Sam had Carson give his testimony to all of us. It was very tender, and very heart felt. I was a little nervous as to what he would say, but he just spoke from his heart, it was great!

Pictures from dinner:






After the dinner we were all exhausted and ready for bed. But instead, we went to "Jumpin' Jacks" and totally wore all the kids (and dad's) out!




Hey Sam, I bet you can't fit into that kiddie-ride helicopter!




This picture doesn't even come close to showing how disgustingly sweaty all the boys were. Gotta love places like this! I had no idea there was one in West Jordan. It was fun, not quite as fun as Kangaroo Zoo, but a very close second.

Dexter was so funny in this picture. He kept his arms folded the whole time, even when all the other cousins ran away. Finally Curtis said "amen" and then Dexter unfolded his arms and ran off as well.


Amen!