Our company

My mother-in-law landed on time and is en route to St. George on a van shuttle and the boys (Dustn and his dad) are on the way to pick her up.  I think Austin finally went to sleep, he took a late nap this afternoon and was super wired tonight.  I was afraid he would still be up when everyone else gets back after midnight. 

I whipped up this cake for my mother-in-law, I don't like the way the lettering came out, but the rest is good.  Today is her actual birthday, but since she is flying in so late we will have birthday dinner and cake tomorrow night.  I got a ham and will do homemade rolls, mashed potatoes/cauliflower and gravy, and fruit salad.

We had scheduled an event at work today for the community, but it was rain/snowing so we postponed it.  We have done this event every year for about 4 years now, we call it the Spring Celebration. In the past we invited gardening experts and had seminars, then lunch and followed up with planting the flower beds at the Community Building.  This year we were going to do a field trip to see a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), but we were unable to find one that would work with us so our alternate plan was to do a hike and then plant a huge flower bed in front of the new tribal daycare.  We will probably reschedule the planting for next weekend.  We did get to go inside the daycare building and it is way nice!  Austin had a blast playing with the toys that they already had set up inside.  I think he will really like the new facility, but we will miss our current daycare provider too.  

Aloha Friday

Aloha Friday is the day that they take it easy over at An Island Life and look forward to the weekend. So I thought that on Fridays I would take it easy on posting, too.


Therefore, I’ll ask a simple question for you to answer. Nothing that requires a lengthy response. If you’d like to participate, just post your own question on your blog and head over to An Island Life to link up. Don’t forget to visit the other participants! It’s a great way to make new bloggy friends!

My question:


What is/are your go to meals when you have company?

My in-laws are visiting for the next week.  My father-in-law loves to eat out, so we usually go out quite a bit, but mother-in-law is more frugal and likes to eat at home so we need balance.  I am feeling uninspired, so give me some ideas!!!  I made lasagna last night and it was good, but I probably need 3-4 more meals to prepare.

You know your the parent of a toddler when...

I knew there was at least one other thing I was going to write about that I forgot earlier.  So my father-in-law calls yesterday to let us know that he is about 2 hours away and will be arriving that night.  I went ahead and pulled out the vacuum cleaner to give the carpets a once over.  I notice right away that it is not sucking in anything and the air thing is not spinning the way it is supposed to.  I check all three filters on it and none seem to be especially dirty or clogged.  I start investigating the different components.  I'm really getting concerned because we just bought this vacuum a couple years ago, so it should not be old enough to be broken yet.  And coming off the washer experience I was just not happy about it.

So I check out the tube in the back and sure enough there is a big blockage.  Upon further investigation I find that the culprit is a matchbox car that some how mysteriously ended up in the tube, and has cause a blockage which then filled up with all the dirt the machine tried to suck up.  After taking it apart and fishing the car/dirt out with a clothes hanger, the vacuum was back to normal.  I'm not even quite sure how he got it in there, only a skill a two year old could master!

Do I ever live in the wild west or what?

I came across this at work a couple weeks ago.  I am not really a gun person, but maybe I should start packing one.  Or hopefully we will get a job somewhere else and move away from this crazy place!

Where does the time go?

I am behind on my blogging and have been hesitating to do recent posts because I wanted to blog about stuff from last weekend, but didn't get to it yet.  So here is a nutshell rundown:

• Saturday I went to do a load of Austin's laundry and my washer bit the dust.  It filled up with water and then made this awful noise when it was supposed to kick in to agitation mode.  I went over and opened the lid and this powerful stink of burned electrical filled my nose.  We took all the clothes out, drained it, and loaded it up and drove it 80 miles to Sears to see about getting it repaired.  They don't take them there and said they would have to send a repairman to our house.  The problem is we live 80 miles away and they have a minimum charge to get the guy over here, so if the repairs ended up being higher than a new one we would be out the standard service call so we decided to buy one then.  I decided that we should just buy a cheap close out model since we weren't anticipating this purchase.  We got it home and installed it and that was A BAD IDEA!  It was awful, there was definitely something wrong with it.  We loaded it back in the truck and I had to go back to the big city on Monday for a work meeting anyway so I drove it over and exchanged it for a brand new floor model.   The bonus thing was Monday morning before I left I checked my email and Sears had sent me a message with a 10% off coupon, score! The new one is a Kenmore and had been working beautifully so far!
• Monday and Tuesday I had to drive 80 miles to St. George and back for work.  Monday was a planning meeting for a youth camp that I help teach at.  Tuesday was an ALL DAY meeting for the Lake Powell Pipeline project.  They are starting the feasibility studies for the NEPA process and presented their findings for the first 22 studies.  That is right, after driving 80 miles I had to sit through 22 power point presentations and then drive 80 miles home.  I came in at just under 12 hours that day!
• My father-in-law made it in yesterday.  He drove here from Iowa making a big loop through the southwest to visit his other son and go sight seeing.  My mother-in-law will be flying in on Saturday.  She still works so she cannot take off as much time as my semi-retired father-in-law, and it's a 3 hour flight for her versus 22+ hours in the car.
• Austin is doing so great!  His vocab improves every day.  One funny thing to me is now instead of calling me Mom or Mommy, he calls me "My".  He is such a Mamma's boy!
• We got the title for our truck in the mail yesterday.  It is so nice to have both of our vehicles paid off!
• I really love the new song "The Cave" by Mumford and Sons.  It's not really important, I just constantly have that song in my head so I thought I would write about it.

That is all I can think of for the moment.  I think I have forgotten some things I was going to write about since I waited so long to finally sit down and get my thoughts out. 

The Challenge

Well, good news and bad news...

Good news: I did TRX today!

Bad news:  I weighed in and was 155, boo!

It was a bit of a rough week to work out with the time change and getting Austin adjusted since his daycare is in Utah.  I will get with it though, I can do it!

Wordless Wednesday

Piece 5 out of 12 done!

How does he do that?

I know every parent thinks their kid is the smartest, best looking, most advanced kid ever.  I just have to share for a moment what my kid is doing that has been blowing our mind.  He has this wooden puzzle that has the alphabet.  Each piece has the letter and a picture of something that starts with the letter. On the board of the puzzle it has the word of the picture spelled out in black and white.  Each piece is actually the same shape and size, so any piece will fit into any space.  A few weeks ago Austin mastered putting the alphabet in perfect order, and he can't even say any of the alphabet yet. He has done it numerous times since and it still just blows our minds. 

Birthday business!

Dustin's 30th birthday, aka the first anniversary of his 29th birthday was last Friday.  I didn't mention my plans before because I tried to keep it all on the down low.  But in the end all of my plans unfolded before the event, so I should have just come out and talked about it. 

Friday night I arranged for some friends to watch Austin so Dustin and I could go on a romantic dinner date.  The guy in the couple works with Dustin and apparently did not realize it was a surprise and mentioned to Dustin at work that Monday that they would be happy to watch Austin on Friday night.  When he realized it was supposed to be a surprise he and Dustin decided to just pretend like he did not know.  Thursday night I told Dustin I was concerned because I saw that family pick up their kids early from our daycare, so I was worried that they were sick and wanted his opinion about if we should cancel.  He revealed that Pat spilled the beans at work.  They ended up being well so we were able to go on our date.

We went to a restaurant that is about 30 miles from our house at the east entrance of Zion National Park called The Buffalo Grill.  I really wanted to try their specialty, buffalo steaks, but since it was the first Friday of Lent I went with their fish special.  It was pretty good, a broiled sole fillet with white asparagus and pine nut medley on the side with balsamic glaze.  Dustin had a Kobe beef steak, which looked incredible by the way.  It was a quaint place that was rustic, but yet romantic with a fire place.  We were the only ones there when we arrived so had the undivided attention of the waiter. 

Saturday I planned a surprise BBQ open house for Dustin's co-workers.  I kind of planned it last minute since I had to work out the babysitting details from the night before, and the only way I had to let people know was through Facebook.  I have nine of Dustin's co-workers, or their spouses on there, and was hoping they would spread the word to everyone else.  So I knew there would probably be limited turn out since it was short notice, but I failed to think through that most of the people I have in my friend list are women.  Of course most of them usually come with husbands, but two of the guys were on travel for work, one was suffering from gout, and another family was all sick.  Two wives of co-workers come over and each brought their two kids.  Austin had a great time with four of his daycare buddies to play with.  Then a guy showed up that heard through the grapevine, thank goodness!  Two other single ladies showed up so it was a good turn out, just very female oriented.  I think everyone had fun, the ladies mostly hung out in the house with the kids and the boys headed to the back porch to drink beer.

Kids say the funniest things, two things stood out with this group:

• S who is a  6 year old boy "Wow, you guys have a lot of tractors, you need to come to my seventh birthday!"
• R who is a 4 year old boy says in response to his Mom wanting to leave "But we haven't done the most important part yet"  Mom says "what is that?", R says "the cupcakes!"  I explain to him that we aren't having cake or cupcakes, R says "but why?"  I explain to him that some times adults don't want to do the whole birthday cake and candles thing because they don't want to think about how old they are getting.  He looks at me like I am from a foreign planet!  That or he is so utterly upset about not getting a cupcake even though he scarfed down two peanut butter cookies already.

And the birthday celebrations are not over since I ordered Dustin's gift through Amazon, and it has STILL NOT BEEN DELIVERED.  I really think they have figured out some way to stall their products to encourage people into paying extra for expedited shipping.  I used to order stuff from them and it would get here way faster than their estimated delivery date, but the last two things I ordered have taken forever.  Today was the latest expected day that it would be delivered, but no sign of it.  On the tracking log the last entry had it leaving Phoenix, AZ last Thursday.  So it takes us about 6 hours to drive to the heart of Phoenix in traffic, so I'm having a hard time figuring out how it still has not gotten delivered here four days later.  Are they running Pony Express or what?

Oh well, everything else turned out well and we had a great weekend so I guess I should not complain.

Aloha Friday

Aloha Friday is the day that they take it easy over at An Island Life and look forward to the weekend. So I thought that on Fridays I would take it easy on posting, too.


Therefore, I’ll ask a simple question for you to answer. Nothing that requires a lengthy response. If you’d like to participate, just post your own question on your blog and head over to An Island Life to link up. Don’t forget to visit the other participants! It’s a great way to make new bloggy friends!

My question:

What is your favorite hobby?

I  am working on my son's quilt at the moment so I am doing  a lot of embroidery at the moment.  I started to prep my garden area though, so I am getting excited about gardening again this year.

The Challenge- back on the wagon!

I have been so bad, I have not worked out since I had the flu about three weeks ago.  Today I finally got back up on the wagon and did TRX this morning at work.  It felt so good to kick myself in the butt and work out.  I am hopeful that I will get back into my daily routine. 

ABC's of Me

A. Age: 32
B. Bed size: Queen

C. Chore you dislike: laundry, it never ends!
D. Dogs: Do not have one currently, not crazy about them, but will allow the boys to get one some day
E. Essential start to your day: Coffee with a lot of creme brulee creamer
F. Favorite color: blue

G. Gold or silver: White gold
H. Height: 5'5

I. Instruments you play(ed): I first learned the piano.  In middle school I played clarinet in band.  In high school I switched to percussion during marching season.   I would like to learn the violin.
J. Job title: Water Quality Specialist
K. Kids: Austin, aka Sweet Pea
L. Live: Arizona
M. Mom’s name: Doris
N. Nicknames: Babe, Sarah Bear, munchkin, Sarap
O. Overnight hospital stays: Last was when I had Austin, it was c-section so there for 3 nights.  I was in the hospital after a bad car accident when I was 11 for months in traction.
P. Pet peeves: hypocrites and people who talk politics non-stop
Q. Quote from a movie: "I'd rather have 30 minutes of wonderful then a lifetime of nothing special!"
R. Righty or lefty: Right

S. Siblings: all older +Kenny (20 years), Doug (19 years), Cathy (15 years), George (12 years), and Sharon (8 years)
T. Time you wake up: 6:15am
U. Underwear: today they are black
V. Vegetables you don’t like: Lima beans
W.What makes you run late: procrastination
X. X-rays you’ve had: teeth, femur, ribs, knee
Y. Yummy food you make: I'm a pretty good cook, my favorites are pizza, dutch oven dinner, stuffed mushrooms, and I decorate delicious cakes
Z. Zoo animal favorites: I like anything that moves and is lively, I hate when you go to a zoo and the animals are all strung out and lethargic

Where’s the Boy?

We had a fun weekend with the highlight being a visit from our friend Brandi and her husband Mike and daughter Marlee.  We met Brandi in college when she used to hang out at Dustin’s Fraternity.  Austin and Marlee are four days apart in age so we shared a lot during our pregnancies and both thought it would be fun to get the kids together someday.  They are on a huge road trip around the southwest and they stopped by for a day. 
It was so fun to finally meet Marlee, she is such a sweetheart!  She already has quite the vocabulary and talks really well.  When they arrived Austin was still napping and Marlee kept asking “where’s the boy?”  When my sleepyhead finally woke up they had a great time playing together.  The weather was awesome so we played outside all afternoon.  The kiddos loved playing in the sandbox, and we did bubbles.


Brandi got some pictures of the kids in the sandbox, so I’ll share those when she sends them to me.  After dinner the kids took a bath together and had so much fun splashing around. 
In the morning Austin slept later than everyone else and again Marlee was asking “where’s the boy?” so I guess she did have fun playing with him on Saturday. 

After they left we went to Church, then had a restful Sunday.  It’s such a treat to have back to back company, and Dustin’s parents are coming here in two weeks, so we have their trip to look forward too. 

Grandma!

We finally were able to pick up my Mom this past weekend.  She was down in Phoenix to watch my nephew after he had eye surgery.  She wanted to come up here to see us before heading home and two weekends ago we planned to pick her up, but we got a bad snow and I had the flu.  This past weekend we made it to Flagstaff where we met my brother and his kids and brought her home.  My brother also sent up two HUGE boxes of kids books for Austin.  He has had a ball going through them and reading the stories.  Mom has kept him home from daycare this week and he has enjoyed spending the time with her.

She is heading home tomorrow, and we will miss her a bunch!