Me and My Boys: June 2013

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Baking Class

I love to cook and bake and consider myself fairly proficient at both. I love trying new recipes and can easily follow a recipe and typically get great results. Even though I consider myself a confident baker, I know I have lots to learn still. So when a friend at church, with a culinary background, wanted to share her expertise in baking and hold some summer classes, I jumped at the chance. Here are some of my creations:

I should preface by saying everything was so delicious... to the point where I sampled one of the finished product at the class, and then went home and consumed at least a few more after each class!

Lemon-Blueberry scones

I grew up where scones were fried bread eaten with powdered sugar, butter, jam, honey. It was fun to make "traditional" scones.

Cream puffs

I've never made homemade cream puffs so these were really fun!

German Pancakes

Same idea as the cream puffs where the eggs serve as the leavening. I've never made these before and just decided to make them with the boys for breakfast one day before swimming lessons. We had so much fun watching it get super big and puffy in the oven! I thought they were so yummy!

Killer brownies

In my opinion, homemade brownies have never been as good as a box you buy at the grocery store. The box brownies are so fudgy and delicious! I haven't experimented a ton with homemade brownies, so this class was fun as our teacher had made several different batches of brownies with slight variations in the recipe for us to sample in order to show us how they affect the final result. (i.e. different types of cocoa, amount of mixing, baking time, etc.) It was a fun class.

Cinnamon Rolls

I love my family recipe of cinnamon rolls. When Matt and I got married, we argued over whose mom's recipe of cinnamon rolls was better. I argued that my mom's cinnamon rolls were better because they contained a secret ingredient. He responded that his mom's rolls also contained a secret ingredient. We soon realized that both recipes are very similar and both contain the same secret ingredient! The key to good cinnamon rolls is mashed potatoes. So with two recipes of cinnamon rolls that we love, I was not prepared to find one that I liked more. I was wrong! These were so delicious (and also contain mashed potatoes!) and just might replace my other cinnamon roll recipe. We'll have to do a taste test one day and make all 3 recipes to really determine which are best!

I've learned over the years of baking that a recipe is not ruined if you don't perfectly level off the flour. I sometimes will "guesstimate" measuring certain ingredients like sugar, peanut butter, shortening and still get great results. Christin, my friend and the teacher, calls herself a "baking rebel" because she measures even less than I do! She encouraged us to be baking rebels along with her in each class and do things like using your hand to measure a teaspoon or half teaspoon.

I had a fabulous time. Thanks so much Christin! In each class I learned at least one new tip or trick to help in my overall baking experience, not to mention a handful of new and yummy recipes! It was so fun to try a few new recipes that I've never done before and also to get out and bake with some other ladies from church once a week.

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Caleb the Bike Rider

Caleb is super competitive. (So are his parents!!) He had a very difficult time when his cousin, Dallin, who is 6 months younger than him, learned to ride a bike without training wheels before him. He went out and tried one time with Matt, but didn't go in with the best attitude. It ended up that both Caleb and Matt got frustrated with each other, and Caleb gave up. He's refused to try again ever since and gets along just fine on his scooter. With some bribery, this past Monday after Family Home Evening, Caleb agreed to give it one more shot. Matt and I both knew he'd pick up on it quickly if he just tried again. 30 minutes later, Matt came running into the house to tell me to come outside and watch Caleb. And this is what I saw...

One happy kid!

I love this kid so much!

Summer Reading Program

I never paid attention to the summer reading program that our public library does each summer because I didn't have a kid old enough to read. This year we decided to participate, and I learned that it's for all ages. Here was the kick-off party:

Petting Zoo

Face Painting:

Dragon

Tiger

Live snakes

Mommy did not take a turn!

Jumping in the moon walk

They've already received their prizes: lots of coupons for free kids' meals, ice cream cones, hamburgers, etc.

7 months

2 bottom teeth have popped in! Bryson has experienced his first fever (associated with teething), his first rash (turned out to be a virus...I worried for a few days if it was a heat rash or food allergy), and his first bump on the head. :o(

Thursday, June 6, 2013

7 Year Anniversary

One way to spoil your anniversary is to move on or near that date. Moving is so busy! Especially when you have a deadline of when your house needs to be presentable i.e. a small wedding reception at your house 17 days after you move in. It's all coming together though. The garage needs a little more work and all my preschool stuff needs some more organization, but we're getting there. In the past two weeks, I've had some of my most exhausting days ever. It's difficult to move, clean a house spotless, or unpack on top of all the other daily requirements. We've survived the toughest part though.

Due to the busyness, celebrating our anniversary was low on the totem pole. Matt bought me flowers, I got him a small gift, and we went to the temple in remembrance of our special marriage day. It was simple this year.

Moving is high-stress and can be a time when tempers flare, but Matt and I were able to work great together throughout the whole process. For about a week, we spent every night apart after the kids went to bed with him moving boxes to the new house and me at home packing and/or cleaning. We were both exhausted and spent every night, but I kept reflecting on how grateful I was that I married someone that knows how to work hard. We make a great team.

Ever since having kids, it's been more of a challenge to put my husband first because my children always take precedence. But Matt is so good about putting me first in his life. He is so helpful around the house because he knows it makes me happy. He is always so thoughtful, considering my opinion on everything. We disagree on things for sure but never have an argument or fight because it takes two to fight, and he refuses. He serves me in a myriad of ways and is so unselfish. It seriously makes his day if he can do something to lighten my load or something to make me smile. You see why I had to work on doing better in our marriage for my goal last month? It's because he sets the bar so high! I recognize how lucky I am to have him in my life. Happy 7 years Sweetie!

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Month 8: Love to My Spouse

I attempted this goal on a previous month and, sadly, was doing poorly by day 2, so I decided to save it for another month. I knew I was going to set this goal to treat my husband with more love and respect for one month of my happiness project, so I have been making gradual changes leading up to this goal. I used The Love Dare by Stephen Kendrick to guide my days. There are some great day goals in the book; one that was really good for me was Day 7: Love believes the best. In general, I worked on not nagging my husband, greeting him in a good mood when he came home from work, having more patience, allowing him more guy time (and not complaining about it!), not complaining once about picking up after him, and I tried to set aside quality time for him each day. I also read or listened to Elder Clayton's talk from General Conference frequently throughout the month to serve as a focus and reminder.

For the first half of the month, I was feeling pretty good about how I was doing. There's a group that plays Ultimate Frisbee, Matt's favorite sport, on Tuesday nights and Saturday mornings for a couple of hours. The time they play on Tuesday night is during dinner/bedtime hours, so I usually say no for that night. On May 7, I suggested he go, and even when the night ended up being more difficult than usual, I didn't complain to him about it. Matt got plenty of back scratches (which he loves), and I left a few surprises in his car to let him know I was thinking of him.

I thought May would be a great month to focus on this since it led into our anniversary on June 2. But the closer we got to our moving date, the more things started tapering off. Our to-do list was always a mile long each day (it still is!), that we literally fell into bed each night exhausted and prayed that there would be no interruptions from our children that night so we could get a full night's sleep.

So I definitely could have done better, and Matt would probably be surprised reflecting on the month to realize that this was my goal for the month. I still worked on having more patience and I did accomplish not complaining once about picking up after him (he takes his shoes and socks off and forgets to put them away), but it became too much to try to do anything "extra" with how busy we both were with preparing to move on top of our other daily duties. I'm looking forward to continuing to try to do something extra each day to let Matt know that I love him.

Also this month, I managed to fit in some indexing, not quite my goal of 200 names, but close.

I am SO excited about my goal for the month of June! This month I'll be focusing on my children...giving them more of my time and focus and love. I'm also doing the 30 day Orange Rhino challenge with my sister where you yell less and love more. I loved Sister Wixom's talk from General Conference about turning off technology and spending quality time with your children. That will also be another focus. These three boys are my world, and I don't want them to have memories of Mommy losing control or getting angry or yelling. I love them to pieces and there are definitely ways to show that more.