Advent Calendar - A New Christmas Tradition

As a Christmas tradition with my Grandchildren I bought a wooden advent calendar last year and Ethan, Ella, and Livi had fun opening the little doors each day to see what was inside. Mostly it was some kind of treat, but once in a while I would slip in a surprise gift. Since we don't have a lot of fun outdoor things for the kids to do at our house (except the pool, which is too cold in the winter time) I decided I wanted to get something that the kids could enjoy but would not belong to them...just something they could use when they visited. I decided to go with electric scooters for Ethan and Ella to ride and a Power Wheel for Livi to use. The scooters I chose looked pretty safe (not too fast) but the box said for 8+ years old. Since Ella is only 6, I worried a little bit that she might be too young for it. However, I purchased them anyway and I am glad I did. After a brief lesson on safety rules and how to operate them Ella and Ethan both took to them like a fish to water. They love buzzing around our driveway. Livi loves the Power Wheel too...although she is a little too big for it (she is tall for a 3 year old). She will outgrow it very soon. I tried to download a video of them on the scooters but have been unsuccessful at that. If I can get it to work, I will post it later. Until then, I guess these photos will suffice.

Holiday Treats

One fun thing about Christmas is the excuse to make and eat all kinds of goodies.  Last Friday I spent all day making Christmas tree sugar cookies, red velvet cake balls, and chocolate covered pretzels for the families Alan and I home/visit teach and also for the residents of an assisted living center near my home where our young women went to sing Christmas carols to and share Christmas stories with.  We had a great time there.  (I wish I would have thought to take pictures.)  I was so pleased to be done with all my baking and proud of the results until I received this photo from Cheryl of her chocolate covered pretzels.  Don't they look yummy and festive?  Great job Cheryl!!! She informed me that everyone at her work is enjoying them.

 When you compare hers to mine, there is really no comparison. Mine are drab and boring, but I can attest that they are yummy even though they are not as colorful or as good looking. Cheryl, you will have to teach me how to make yours when you come down for Christmas next week! Happy Holiday baking everyone!

For Ella & Livi

The last time I posted a video it disappeared. Hopefully that won't happen this time.  This is of Ella & Livi on the slide at the school.  They couldn't get enough of it.  They kept going back for more and more.

Nice Getaway, part 2 (Highlighting Ethan)

In my last post I mentioned that I didn't have any photos that included Ethan....but evidently Cheryl did so she forwarded them to me.  This post will highlight Ethan.

This first photo is of Ethan eating the Thanksgiving feast in the school cafeteria.

Ethan loves to "wrestle" with Tonks.  They seem to get along quite well.

I made caramel apples with the kids. In this photo Ethan is my helper.

Ethan's favorite thing to do is draw.  He spent many hours at the table doing his artwork. I should have taken a photo of the deck of 54 cards he made as a gift to his parents.  He is very talented and creative.

Nice Getaway

Last month I flew to Salt Lake City and then Cheryl and I drove from there to Scottsbluff Nebraska to watch Eric's children so he and Nicole could get away for their anniversary.  This was not only a getaway for them, but it was a getaway for me and Cheryl too.  We had a lot of fun as we took over the duties of parenting Ethan, Ella, and Livi for a few days.  Ethan somehow avoided all of the photographs (camera shy guy) but we were able to capture the girls without a problem.

One thing that was fun that I hadn't done in a while was doing girls hair.  Remember, I only had one daughter so I never did get that great with hair but it was fun to try to resurrect some old skills.  Cheryl did Ella's french braid and I did Livi's hair.  I can't remember what Cheryl called that style...but you make the pony tail and then pull it through.  This photo doesn't really show it well.

Another thing we got to do was eat a Thanksgiving feast with the kids at their school.  (Note: these pictures are a little out of order. See cafeteria photo closer to the end of the post. I didn't know how to fix it).  After we ate lunch we were allowed to go out on the playground with Ella.  I could tell she loved having us visit her "turf".

Having taught elementary school for three years, Cheryl felt right at home helping Livi with the slide, the swings, and the climbing equipment.

Taking care of Tonks was another one of our responsibilities.  She loves to sit on the dishwasher door and lick the dirty dishes.  She is so little and cute!

This is the photo of us eating the school lunch together. Ethan is straight across from me, but of course you can't see him.

I love Livi's smile in this photo. You can tell she is genuinely happy...and so was I. I was happy to be able to spend some time with my grandchildren.

While Eric & Nicole were away, we took the kids to Walmart so they could buy their parents an anniversary gift.  We also decided to surprise them by decorating the livingroom with streamers and balloons.  The kids really enjoyed putting up all the decorations but then had to patiently wait for their parents to return home from Lincoln before they could see the surprised looks on their faces.  

Altogether too soon it was time for us to head back to Utah.  Cheryl had a job to get back to and I had to plan a Thanksgiving meal for our family in conjunction with Jane and her family.  Sorry, I forgot to take photos of that event, but I really would like to thank the Airds for letting us crash their Thanksgiving. We really appreciated their generosity, the great food, and fine company. It turned out splendidly!

Pleasant Surprise

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday morning when I arrived at the Los Angeles Temple (5:15 a.m.) for my weekly shift and the Christmas lights were so beautifully lit.  I pulled out my handy dandy new iphone and took some photos.  I discovered that it is very difficult to take pictures of lights and give them justice.  Sorry if they are a little blurry.  I am still learning how to use the camera to get that perfect shot.  I didn't even know how to zoom until yesterday. 

 I love how the palm trees light up so beautifully.

 Just a view with the temple in the background.  Not all of the trees are lit up yet but I'm sure more will be added as the days go on.

 Two different kinds of palm trees lit up.

 More palm trees on the right.

A garden patio area

Scarry Shower Buddy!!!

Ok, so after I took my shower this morning and cleaned the loose hair from the drain (a very common event after a shower), I noticed what looked like more hair close to the shower door where the wall meets the floor. Without my glasses, I couldn't tell for sure what it was, but assuming it was more hair, I picked it up and noticed that it was a little firmer than hair should be. I dropped it immediately and I couldn't wait to dry myself off, get my glasses on, and take a better look.  Imagine my surprise when I saw this!!!  Although we live in the desert, we don't see scorpions around here, especially in the house.  I am just glad that it was dead before I picked it up.  I could do without a scorpion sting today, thanks. 

Double The Pleasure, Double The Fun

Both of my counselors in the YW Presidency are expecting babies within the next 2-3 weeks, so I decided to throw a combined baby shower for them for the YW, their mothers, and other sisters in the ward to attend.  This took place last week.  I had help from our YW board members for the shower, but the food was taken care of by me.  I saw a cute watermelon fruit bowl stroller online and decided to give it a try.  There was a video I followed so I wouldn't mess it up too badly.  I took photos along the way to document my progress.  I just cut the shape out first and removed the watermelon fruit from the insides.

Then I cut the zig zag pattern around the whole thing.

then added the wheels and handles

Can you believe I forgot to take a photo of the finished product with the fruit added?  Here is a photo of my two counselors, their two diaper cakes I paid someone to make, and the watermelon stroller is visible on the table.

I wish I could say that I made this cupcake cake, but I didn't. Vons did, but it was a big hit!

One of our Mia Maids, Marissa, was in charge of the games.  She decided to play the game where there are 3 to a team and one person directs the two blind-folded teammates in spoon feeding either chocolate pudding or apple sauce into one person's mouth.  It was hilarious, but messy so we had to move that game from the livingroom into the kitchen.  This is Emily (1st Couns.) feeding Jen (2nd Couns.) some chocolate pudding while Emily's Mom does the coaching.  It was a very good thing that we wore garbage bags over our clothing as it got pretty messy.

Another game Marissa chose was the telephone line game where someone starts with some good advice for the new mother's-to-be and see if it could get all around the room without any changes.  This was funny as well as the end result only slightly resembled the beginning advice.

Jen & Emily opening their first gift together.

Last week was crazy busy for me with our Young Women In Excellence, two temple shifts to work, and the baby shower so I was happy when the shower was over.  I was just pleased that everything turned out so well.  Everyone said they had a great time.

Young Women In Excellence

For our Young Women In Excellence this year my counselors and I chose a pirate theme.  I know what you are thinking....pirates are bad guys so why would you pick a pirate theme for a church activity.  Well, pirates seek for treasures and so do our Young Women.  The mutual theme for this year was "We Believe" and centered around the 13th Article of Faith which ends with "we seek after these things".  Also, Pirates was an acronym for us:  Personal Integrity Raises All To Eternal Standards. 

This first picture is of me and my two very pregnant counselors (due 6 days apart in about 3 weeks)

We had tables set up with a picture of each girl where she could display things she had done this year to show her "excellence".  I took this picture too early.  Only one display was set up.  Oops.

We have a small YW group and many of the girls were missing.  I think we had 11 girls in attendance of our 18.  They had fun dressing up as pirates.  We had an activity night where they decorated their hats and another activity night where they decorated the frames for their pictures.  They turned out great.  Besides the hat, we supplied the eye patches and bandanas for their costumes.

One of my counselors made some awesome looking cupcakes with crumbs on top that looked like dirt (buried treasure) and had a chocolate coin on top.  They were a big hit.

At the end of the evening we had a scripture treasure hunt that led them to clues scattered throughout the church and finally to this treasure chest hidden on the stage.  It was filled with small treasure boxes like the one on top pictured here.  Each girl got one of these and it held things that they should treasure, i.e. testimony (from their parents), scriptures (chocolate version made from two Nugget bars with the 13th Article of Faith as the pages, the temple (a picture of their favorite temple as a reminder to go there some day, and their favorite candy bar because "sweet is the peace the gospel brings".

Our YW Board (minus 3 people)

The cultural hall was decorated with 8 of these awesome palm trees borrowed from my counselor's mother in a bordering stake.  They really added to the ambiance of the whole evening.

This isn't in focus, but it shows how we made our own little set of scriptures for the girl's treasure chests.

We also had a puzzle center where the girls and their parents could put a puzzle together with the 13th Article of Faith on one side and a "treasure map" on the other side.

All in all, a great time was had by all.  I especially loved it when our YW sang their two songs - one fun song to the tune of "A Pirates Life For Me", but I changed the lyrics to go along with the 13th Article of Faith so it was entitled "A Virtuous Life For Me."  The other song they sang was a Jenny Phillips song entitled "We Seek After These Things."  Both songs were perfect for the evening.

Central California Coast - The Final Chapter

The last leg of our trip included Solvang and Santa Barbara.  I didn't take many pictures at either place, but here is a sample of what we did.  Right close to Solvang there is a restaurant famous for their split pea soup.  It is called Pea Soup Andersen's.  We all found it rather funny that a place could be famous for split pea soup, but it does exist.  We couldn't resist the urge to give it a try....well at least most of us ordered the split pea soup.  Some of the more picky eaters (Cheryl) didn't go for it.

Pictures of outside and inside the restaurant.

I have to say that I don't know why they are so famous for their split pea soup.  It didn't pass my taste test and I am a pea soup lover.  I can check that restaurant off my bucket list.

Cheryl having some fun with a dutch shoe in Solvang.  I can't believe this is the only photo I took there.

Of course we had to stop in Santa Barbara to see Kristen & Andrew's new son Jaxon.

He is such a cutie!  Congratulations to the happy couple.  Santa Barbara is such a beautiful community.  I guess that is why Oprah decided to live there.  Kristen & Andrew seem to be enjoying it !

Our last stop before heading back to Lancaster was to check out Oprah Winfrey's estate in Santa Barbara.  Unfortunately, you can't see much from the street.  Her house is past the gates you see in the front.  Oh well, at least we can say that we went to Oprah's house.  The guard made sure we didn't overstay our welcome.  :-)

Central California Coast - Part 4

Hearst Castle is a definite must see for anyone vacationing in Central California.  This was our 4th or 5th time to go on one of their tours.  This was our second time to take the evening tour, which is the best tour of all.  It is a compilation of all of the other tours.  It takes a little longer, but well worth it.  The castle is magestic and oppulent, especially for its day. The land (40,000 acres) was purchased by George Hearst in 1865 and was initially used as a summer camping spot for the family.  George's son William Randolph Hearst later inherited the land and decided to build on it. Construction began in 1919 and by 1947 it had become an estate of 165 rooms and 127 acres of gardens, terraces, pools, and walkways.

Hearst Castle at the entrance

 This is the spectacular outdoor pool

 One benefit of the evening tour is that they have "dinner guests" dressed as if in
 the 1950's ready for a fantastic weekend with William Randolph Hearst

 A view of the grounds from inside the castle

 Another view of the grounds

 I love that you can see the Pacific Ocean from high up
 on the hills where the mansion stands

I took pictures of the inside of the mansion, but they just don't do it justice.
I guess you will just have to go visit the castle yourself so you can see
 the inside and really appreciate all the architecture and beauty there.

 

A big highlight for me on this trip to Hearst Castle is that I found this beautiful vase

in the gift shop.  I practically never purchase anything from gift shops,

 but after drooling over it for a while, I decided it needed to find a

permanent home in my family room.  I think it fits perfectly with the

other decor.  I LOVE IT!!!  That, alone, was worth the trip up the coast.  :-)