The Schumann Family

Renovations

2012-01-27T10:34:00.000-08:00

Late April last year we received a letter from the HOA telling us that we need to paint our house because we were in "violation" of some code they gave. Anyway, I was really excited and not happy at the same time: excited because I HATED the color of our house especially since our next door neighbors house was the EXACT same color, not happy because we really couldn't afford it. They gave us until the middle of July to get it done. Well, the months came and gone and before we knew it it was the middle of June and we hadn't looked into painters yet. I called around and we chose this really nice company and we picked our colors. Now, mind you we have an HOA, so we had to get the scheme approved before we could paint. We FINALLY got approved and we were able to get it done before our deadline. I LOVE IT!!!

Before:

After:

It is so pretty. I absolutely love it. We have gotten a lot of compliments on it. In fact, around the corner there is a house that also had to get painted and their colors are almost identical. It was pretty funny when I saw it.

Well then, the months came and gone again and Reed was starting to outgrow the cradle in our room. We knew that we were going to convert the TV/play room upstairs into the nursery when we found out we were pregnant. I had an idea of how I wanted to paint it since I had never had a nursery before and then we had the idea to also paint the girls room while we were at it. We had to start that process by getting the TV out of the room and putting it downstairs. We had to get a new TV stand and totally rearrange our family room.

I don't have a before picture, but we put the TV where the couch was and the couch where the chase lounge and chair were. Then we got rid of the 3 little end tables that were in the middle. It worked out nice. I'm glad, I was a little worried at first.

After we got the TV moved we could start painting the girls room so that they could sleep in the nursery before we moved Reed in. It took longer than anticipated because we had strep running ramp-id through the house and Spencer had to work a lot, not to mention our high maintenance baby. Anyway, we had the Young Women come over for a service activity and they did an AWESOME job. They had the walls completely painted and the molding almost all done by the time they left that night. It didn't take Spencer and I too much longer to get the rest of the room done.

Before:

After:

Their new dresser is actually one that I used when I was little. I painted it and put new handles on it so that it would go well in their room. I LOVE how it turned out. They were way excited about it too. We sponged butterflies, dragon flies, flowers, and leaves all around their walls in the colors of their dresser.

Well, then it was Reed's turn. I had changed my mind from the first idea that I had to paint his room. I was actually inspired by Village Inn. They had renovated a few of the restaurants around us and I got the idea of the colors that we ended up with from their colors. It took Spencer and I for-EVER to get Reed's room done. We thought that it was about done, but I didn't like a detail, or lack of one, but we finally got it done. It was well worth it.

Before:

After:

I LOVE this room!!! I love how it turned out, WAY better than in my head (I love how that happens). I had originally thought of the orange stripe, but I didn't like how the orange looked against the green on the walls, seemed to not "pop". So then I had Spencer add the small brown stripe along the bottom and it REALLY made a difference. The monkey's are all too fitting for Reed, he loves to jump and climb all over. He even makes a monkey sound. The monkeys, writing, and trees are all decals. Spencer painted the leaves in the corners and on the ceiling. Better Homes and Gardens here we come! My mom made a quilt for his crib that is all jungle animals in the same colors as his room and for Christmas I made him a fleece blanket that also is a jungle theme. The kid is so dang wild it fits him perfect!!

Well, those are the improvements that we made to our house last year. Our next big thing is to redo the kitchen floor, it is driving us CRAZY! But I think we will hire someone to do it instead of doing it ourselves.

Happy 33rd Birthday Spencer!!

2012-01-23T14:16:00.000-08:00

This year was hard to plan. Spencer is the WORST person to shop for and he is HORRIBLE at making decisions. As I was looking for something to make him for dinner, I came across a recipe that sounded so yummy and then I expanded from there. As I went on it started to feel like an elegant dinner so what we did was set the "mood" by dimming the lights with a lace table cloth and we all dressed up really nice.

When Spencer got home he was pretty surprised. It was awesome! We even ate like we were at a fancy restaurant: first salad, then entree', then dessert. It was fun.

We started off with an apple and celery salad with homemade blue cheese dressing:

The girls didn't like the dressing too much so we put ranch on theirs.

After the salad I served dinner. We had a Sicilian Beef Roll with polenta triangles and mushroom sauce. (Glorified meatloaf. By the way, thank you Aunt Sy for the Junior League Cookbook that you gave us for our wedding.) It was way good. A LOT of food, but yummy. I think Spencer was the only one of us that actually finished the plate.

After dinner we skyped with his parents for a while. He opened his present while we were skyping. Like I said, he is the worst to shop for. I remembered something that our cousin, Rachel did for her husband once and so what I ended up doing was getting him a gift certificate to this indoor skydiving place we have here in Denver. He seemed real excited about it. I'm glad that I FINALLY got him something that he will enjoy. (Thank you Rachel for the idea.) We even sang to him while they were on skype, it was pretty neat.

This years cake was a different one, but delicious none the less. It was a lemon cake with lemon coconut cream cheese icing and covered with toasted coconut:

Happy birthday Dear. We all love you very much.

Our Cruise

2012-01-21T22:11:00.000-08:00

Well, we are back from our fabulous cruise. We've actually been back for a week, but it has been a chaotic week to get anything done so today I am finally able to blog about our cruise.

We had such a WONDERFUL time. Although, I do believe it is my last cruise. The "motion of the ocean" sorta got to me for the majority of our trip. I had to be doped up on Dramamine and therefore slept a lot. But we still had fun. The pictures of the islands are in collages so look at them good because I am going to talk about things in the pictures. Also, I am going to just put in random ocean photos throughout the post. We were obsessed with the way the ocean looked.

Before I start, I want to give a PROFOUND thank you to my brother Shaun and his family for making that sacrifice for us. We never worried because we knew the kids were in great hands. Thank you SO much!

On our Way

We left VERY early on a Thursday morning, the 5th. My brother Shaun flew in the night before so that he could help my mom with the kids while we were gone. It was really exciting because I haven't been any further East than a Podunk city in Kansas to pick up our beef from a meat locker. Also, it was the longest flight that I had ever taken. Lots of firsts. Spencer and I flew "first class" on Frontier. What that meant was that we got to check in two bags per person with out any charge, we sat up in the front of the cabin, and we got to watch their TV for free. It was nice.

As we were approaching Fort Lauderdale we were surprised at how much water surrounded the homes.

Every home had water in their backyard, it was so interesting. We then had to fly over the airport, over the ocean, and then we turned around to land at the airport. I have to admit that when we were over the water an unease arose inside of me. Safe to say, I feel much safer over land, not water.

We were able to see our ship from the plane (picture is in the collage coming up) and it got us really excited. We got off the plane and we had paid for transport to the ship from the airport. After we got our bags we had to wait for the bus. While we were waiting we had a little visitor that was quite a surprise to us:

It was so odd seeing birds walking around in the airport. The lady told us it was because of the automatic doors because when they open then the birds fly in and they can't fly out.

I guess they get their food from people eating on the go.

The bus finally came and it was about a 7 minute drive from the airport to the dock, it was really close. We were able to walk onto the ship after going through about 3 check points, worse than an airport. The ship was HUGE! I was overwhelmed by how big it was. I knew it would be big, but you never realize how big until you are right up against one. I felt like and ant.

Setting Sail

When we got to our room we were still so wiped out from getting up at 4 am that we decided to take a little nap. When we woke up we were just setting sail and the sunset was just stunning. The majority of the pictures are taken from our balcony. The one of the ship and the one in the top left corner is from the plane coming in, and the sunset one with the plain flying in and the one in the center on the bottom is from the sun deck of the ship.

Our Room

The room was actually smaller than I thought it would be. I don't know how more than 2 people could share a room. This is Spencer standing in our bathroom,

Definitely NOT meant for more than one person to be in....VERY crowded.

This is our balcony:

It was so nice having a balcony. The first half of the cruise we would sleep with the door propped open and it would cool our room and we would fall asleep to the sound of the ocean. It was blissful. I slept really good those nights. Unfortunately as we got closer to the equator it got too warm and humid to leave it open and then on the way home we couldn't really leave it open because our neighbors around us decided to carry on loud conversations on their balconies and the smokers had their fixes.

This is our room:

Like I said, it was really small. I took the picture standing at our balcony.

Our Boat

When we were on our way, we decided to explore the ship.

It was so easy to get lost on that thing. Thank heavens they had the deck numbers on the carpet when you got off the elevators and when you reached the top of the stairs. Not to mention the "you are here" signs on every floor around every corner. Every night and through out the day they had photographers offering to take your picture in front of a backdrop. Spencer and I finally decided to opt out of the picture sessions. They felt weird anyway, they would pose us in high school prom poses and it was physically uncomfortable.

Fun on the Ship

There were some fun things to do on the ship, but the majority of the "fun" happened at 3 am when Spencer and I were watching the back of our eyelids and usually was for people that drank and gambled. We did find some things to do though.

We started off sunning ourselves since parts of our skin hadn't seen sun since the beginning of time. We knew that we had to get used to the sun before we set foot on any of the islands or else we would burn to a crisp. Spencer quickly found the library and checked out a book that he actually finished and we started to get some sun.

They have "Elegant Night" where you dress up in your fancy clothes and then party. We actually had two on this trip so one night we got kiddie cocktails and the other we went to Nick and Nora's.

We saw a couple of comedians, one in particular was very funny and he juggled too. He was from Korea and could juggle just about anything, it was really awesome.

The food wasn't too bad. We ate breakfast and lunch everyday at the buffet and at night we went to Bacchus Restaurant for dinner. Nick and Nora's was the best though. Spencer ate his first Reuben sandwich on the ship and didn't think it was too bad (he HATES sauerkraut). They also had 24 hour soft serve ice cream that we took advantage of. It was very refreshing.

They had ice carving one day. I wasn't going to go, but then I decided to go and I'm glad that I went because he carved the ice in 20 minutes by hand, no power tools like I had previously seen.

We played miniature golf towards the end of the cruise because we had had enough of sunning ourselves. They also pulled out the chocolate fountain the day before we got home.

When we would go into our room after they would freshen it we would have little "visitors". They would make things with towels and it was fun to see what would be awaiting us every time we would come back from being on an island, breakfast, or dinner.

St Maarten

St Maarten was the first island we visited. It was such a fun place!

We went horseback riding there and we got to swim with horses in the ocean, that was my favorite part of horseback riding. My horses name was Hercules and Spencer rode his mom so all he did was follow her until it was time to go into the water. They try to match your experience up with the right horse, but I think they matched the personalities or traits up with the horses. Spencer's horse had gas so bad. I never smelled anything, but I sure heard it. Mine was stubborn! When it was time to get into the water my horse just sat there and wanted to eat. He would not budge. It was the funniest thing.

After we rode horses we caught a water taxi to the beach. It was so much fun. As soon as we stepped off the pier a lady caught me and offered to braid my hair. I told her I would think about it, my hair had been driving me a little bonkers because of the wind and humidity it wouldn't stay in the pony tail. She pulled me off to the side and said that she would do a couple to see if I liked it and before I knew it my whole head was done.

I'm so glad I got it done though because it saved me a lot of frustration. Anyway, while she was pulling me off to sit me down another lady was following us holding up a really pretty dress that I had commented on. I ended up buying it because I couldn't say no. I was afraid that I would hurt feelings. Well, lesson learned. I started to say no after that.

We shopped a little and then ate lunch at a beach side restaurant. We then went for a swim and collected a plethora of shells for our girls. While we were in the water, I was wearing my sunglasses that attach to my glasses, Spencer noticed that I no longer had my sunglasses on. I was absolutely sick to my stomach and really bummed out that I lost them. They were the only pair I had brought because I had forgotten my extra pair at home. I felt all over the bottom for them and then we finally decided to get out of the water. On our way out I hear, "Sierra! How much do you love me right now?!" I turn around and he is holding my sunglasses. It was a miracle!!! Neither one of us could believe that he had found them. He had felt them and thought that it was an odd sea shell, but it wasn't a sea shell!!! Boy, my mood sure picked up after that.

We caught the last water taxi back to the ship and on the way back one of the workers reminded me a lot of Bill Cosby. His picture is in the collage. On our way back to the ship there was some really awesome music going on.

When we got back to the ship we got showered and went up to the sun deck to watch us depart. It was such a beautiful night.

This is the best picture of the moon I have ever taken and it was the "Moon over St Maarten" (you know, like "Moon over Miami". Tee Hee). Anyway, it was a fun filled, exhausting day. We had a lot of fun.

St Lucia

On our way into St Lucia we could see neighboring islands. This is a picture of one we saw that had this cool looking rock that looked like a gateway of some sorts from a distance:

We had booked a tour on St Lucia, that's why in the collage of pictures it is mostly scenery. Anyway, we were really glad to have done the tour because we were really tired from the day before in St Maarten.

We started on this tour and Spencer and I quickly realized that it was more of a "geriatric" excursion. Spencer and I and one more couple were the only "young" ones on the tour. It was pretty funny.

We started off by going up this hill that I wouldn't even call a hill, more like a quick drop off the mountain that was made into a road. It was called Stone Hill, I don't know why, but it should have been named something more on the lines of, "You think you can drive up me? Go ahead, give it a try" Hill. Our driver said the motto of the tour was "Don't worry, be happy" because we were going up steep windy roads, around sharp corners, and coming within an inch of every car we passed. Not to mention they drive on the left side of the road there. Ya, scary.

The views were amazing. We started by going to this private residence that served us some refreshments. They had these fish fritter kind of things, I forgot the real name, but they were SO good! They served them with the island's infamous banana ketchup, yes banana ketchup, and their hot sauce. Spencer got a bottle of each. I personally didn't care for the ketchup and I didn't even go near the hot sauce. We were free to roam the grounds, the majority of the scenic views and flower pictures in the collage are from that house.

After the private residence we went driving ALL around the place. It was very bumpy and windy, but I survived....barely. We visited the islands batik shop where they make batik fabric. The picture of the sunset with the ship in the back ground that I took a picture of is actually fabric hand dyed at that shop. I learned how they make that style of fabric, my sister and my mom are obsessed with it. It was really interesting actually. They hand paint and/or stamp this white fabric with wax. Then they dye it in however many dyes they decide and then they boil the fabric to get the wax out. This is a picture of a batik dress:

The orange part is the batik fabric.

Then we took a tour of the college grounds. What is interesting is that all the schools, even the college is uniform enforced. The college has 3 different uniforms and the color uniform you wear is what you are studying in school, such as the blue is medical, black and white is hospitality, and the brown is agriculture. Also, there are banana plantations all over the island and we learned that a banana tree only produces fruit once and then is cut down and then feeds other banana trees, or something like that. In one of the pictures in the collage, there are blue bags in the trees, they do that to keep the birds from sucking the nectar from the banana flowers. Very interesting and informative.

This is a picture of the State Fruit.

I don't know what it is called, but it in inedible. They actually use the fruit husks for bowls and baskets.

We drove downtown and I saw this building.

I thought it was so interesting because it was the exact same colors as the sky and the ocean.

We made it back to the ship and I was ready to call it a day!

St Kitts

St Kitts was the last island we visited and I think it was my favorite. We had booked a snorkel and kayaking excursion on this island so we were VERY grateful that we had the tour in St Lucia the day before to rest up and preserve our energy.

When we got off the ship we went through the gates and the first thing we saw were these men with little monkeys letting people hold them. We just about died, they were SO cute!! I started taking pictures and this guy came up and the monkeys jumped onto Spencer. I took some pictures and then he brought them over to me to hold. Their little hands were SO soft and they were so cute, I started wanting a monkey. After Spencer took some pictures of me holding them, we gave them back and said thank you. The man looked at us and said, "Ten dollar." Ah, now we understood. That was the island of "NO!" So many people wanting us to buy and pay. It was overwhelming at times.

We started by shopping first and then we hopped on a bus to go to our snorkel site. Incredibly beautiful island. Wow!! The bus driver was really funny and friendly. It was so much fun. She took us on a little tour before and after our snorkel and kayaking. At one point she stopped so that we could take pictures. There is a picture of Spencer in the collage where he is standing between two bodies of water, the one on the left (the really blue one) is the Atlantic Ocean and the one on the right (the more pastel) is the Caribbean Sea. They said that the Americans like the Atlantic side because they like to be wild. The Atlantic Ocean is way more wild than the Caribbean Sea. Spencer said he heard that it was colder too. Glad we didn't go swimming in the Atlantic!

Anyway, we made it to our site and we snorkeled first. The guide was so dang funny. EVERYTHING he told us he would then follow it with "It will not kill you, BUT........it will hurt like hell." He was so funny. There is a picture of him in the collage. Spencer put the snorkel in his mouth and jumped in, then he started to choke. It was hilarious. I know that sounds bad, but it was. We saw a load of awesome fish. Especially at the surface, we saw these little silver and blue fish, just TONS of them and when you would poke out your head just slightly you could see them jumping out of the water. It was pretty surreal.

After we snorkeled for about 30 minutes, we then set off on our kayak. Spencer was in front and I was in the back, the rudder. Spencer thought he could steer the kayak from the front and kept sending us right instead of ahead. He was so funny. We kayaked about 2 miles to a black sand beach that was stunning. There we ate some local refreshments. We had fresh coconut that our guide had cracked open himself waiting for us, star fruit, grapefruit, tamarind balls, pineapple, fresh guava and passion fruit juices, and these roll things:

There was a coconut one and a raisin one, both of which were good, but the coconut one was divine!!! I could have eaten that whole plate of them. Wish I knew how to make them. The guide told us not to wash our feet off in the ocean because it would make the sand stick and to instead let it dry, so then what does Spencer do...he goes and washes his feet in the ocean. We barely made it to the bus to go back to the pier and when we got to the bus the driver was really funny. She told Spencer that now she will beat him (she was beating our shoes clean and brushing the sand off our feet) because he didn't listen. It was really funny.

We got back to the pier just in time to get back on the ship when we were supposed to. It was a good thing because we were tired.

Coming Home

By the end of visiting all the islands we were ready to start coming home. I REALLY missed the kids. We made sure to Skype every night with them, but towards the end I was needing some mommy time.

We had a really spectacular sunset the night before our last. We had a couple ships within our sights for the last day and when we awoke on that Friday the 13th, they were right behind us rolling into Fort Lauderdale. We got there while the sun was rising, but it was overcast so we got some red sky on that morning.

We got off the ship before 8 am and made it to the airport by 8....our flight left at 1 pm. We had to wait a while. We couldn't check our bags until 10:30 so we just sat around checking our email and facebook because we were finally able to use Internet without being charged. Boy! They sure know where to ding people with expenses on the ship! The Internet on the ship cost $.75/min. We just used it for the Skype, but it put a dent in our wallet for sure. We flew "first class" again which was nice because coming home we ended up checking 3 bags and it didn't cost a thing. Coming we only had 2. The souvenirs get ya!

We got home at about 4:30 pm and it was such a relief. It was a VERY long flight home. My brother had brought the girls in the car and I just couldn't stop kissing them, I missed them so much. When I walked through the door Reed was sitting on the couch and when he saw me he got a huge smile on his face. Just melted me right there.

We had such a great time. I am SO glad that we were able to go. Now I can FINALLY say that I have been somewhere other than Utah, Colorado, California, Arizona, and Idaho. I have officially been out of the country for longer than 4 hours. I'm an adventurer!

Here are the rest of my random ocean shots:

Yes, it was actually that blue.

I love these kind:

Reminds me of marble.

Reed's First Christmas

2012-01-03T20:07:00.000-08:00

This was such a fun year for Christmas. The girls were EXTRA excited and Reed, well Reed didn't know what was going on, but I think he had fun anyway.

We started our Christmas on Christmas Eve. Geewah (my mom) did her traditional new Christmas jammies on Christmas Eve thing. Reed was so funny opening his present. Here is a little snippet of what he was like:

He was way more interested in me and the camera. SO cute! Anyway, they all looked REALLY sweet in their new Christmas jammies.

Santa was really good to us this year. He even rearranged our furniture so that we could see all our presents. He left his letter on the tree this year testifying of Christ. I didn't really think the girls really payed attention to it, but this year CJ noticed it on the tree and she knew exactly what it was. I was so happy to hear her mention it. We all read it together as a family and talked about it. It is a nice tradition that was started in our household. I think it really helps the kids, now that I know the actually pay attention to it.

Santa even left the kids new Christmas church clothes in their rooms.

They all looked so sweet in their new clothes. We ate our traditional Christmas morning breakfast, cardamom bread with hot chocolate and fruit salad and then we went to church. It was a really nice meeting. When we got home, the girls INSISTED that they get to wear their new jammies to open presents. I wasn't going to argue, I wanted to be in my jammies too.

We all got really great presents. I made Reed a nice fleece blanket like I did for CJ and Avary for their first Christmas.

He really seems to like it. He likes to be toasty warm at night so it was a good thing. We had our traditional prime rib roast for dinner and I made sticky toffee pudding for dessert. I figured what would it hurt to let Reed try some, so we gave him a little:

He REALLY enjoyed it. So much that it actually gave him a little tummy ache when it came time for bed. Nothing that a little mylicon couldn't fix. Anyway, we really had a nice Christmas.

Santa gave the girls an Easy Bake Oven. They sure had fun with it today making their own little treats:

Over the winter break we have been getting all our doctors visits taken care of. We all went to the eye doctor and Avary ended up needing glasses for reading:

She is SO excited to wear glasses! I love her enthusiasm.

Reed's First Thanksgiving and Such

2011-12-11T20:43:00.000-08:00

Well, this is a little belated, but Happy Thanksgiving! It has been quite busy since Thanksgiving, I apologize for the delay in my blogging.

Our Thanksgiving was really nice. It was just the 6 of us and I cooked it all. I made executive decisions on what to and what not to have and it turned out quite nice.

I brined our turkey this year and I will do it now EVERY year. It turned out SO scrumptious! SO juicy and TENDER!! We had a wild rice stuffing, homemade rolls, a squash and apple dish, and then a yummy salad with apples and pomegranate and of course cranberry chutney. It wasn't too much food and it really turned out nice. I then made a chocolate pumpkin pie and a "mystery" pecan pie. The mystery was that it had a layer of cream cheese in it so it was like a pecan pie cheesecake.....our new found favorite! We used my grandma Stockman's china, it was really nice. Reed sure enjoyed it. He got to eat turkey too and he sure loved the rolls. The day after Thanksgiving we gave the girls a little early Christmas present. Spencer and I took them to see The Lion King on stage here in Denver.

It was SO neat!! The girls were just spellbound the entire time. I am so glad that we were able to do that with them.

We were able to get our Christmas decorations up early this year because of really warm weather. We have this tradition that when it is the first Christmas of any child in the house they get to put the star on top of the tree so, this year was Reed's turn. I think he was mostly interested in the camera light than putting the star on the tree....he's so cute!

The girls decorated the tree yet again this year. It is actually really nice to have them do it, they do a pretty good job.

They are so excited for Christmas this year, well, they are ALWAYS excited for Christmas, but I think they are more so this year. For what, I have no idea, but they are.

CJ gave a talk in primary today, it was so sweet and good. She is sure growing up fast. Her prayers changed over night (more mature sounding) and she is starting to assume more responsibilities around the house....kinda breaks my heart a little, the growing up not the responsibilities part. She is doing alright in school except with some problems with bullies. The mother instinct kicks in and I want to go kick some little tooshie of the kids that are mean to my sweetie. She seems to be making new friends though, at school, ballet, and at church which makes me happy. Every Sunday after Sacrament Meeting, this little girl in her class comes and gets her to walk with her to primary. It warms my heart. Ballet is going really good. She is in ballet 3 and she is also taking beginning lyrical this year. She is learning so fast and is doing so good, I can't WAIT for the recital this year!

Avary is bossy and thinks she's always right, as usual. She is doing exceptional in school and she says the most cleaver and funniest things of anyone in the household. Today we were at tithing settlement, and she had gone to the restroom. When she came back she was panting and I asked her why she was panting because she wasn't supposed to be running in the church. She looks at me and without missing a beat she says, "CJ was running." And she left it at that. Like it was CJ's fault that she was panting. It was so funny. Avary's ballet is also going really good. She is in ballet 2 this year and she is zooming through swimming. She takes after her mommy in that area....we were both born to swim, little fishies we are. She was tested for the AGATE program at her school. We haven't heard anything, but her teacher already has her in more advanced groups.

Reed is growing SO fast we can hardly keep up with him! He started to army crawl and was hauling pretty good at that. Then he started to sit himself up and within a couple days he was crawling on his hands and knees and not his tummy anymore. A week after he started to actually crawl, he started to pull himself up on furniture. This kid is going to be walking before we know it! He is sleeping in his own room now and he is doing great! He usually cries around midnight, but then we give him his pacifier and he goes right back to sleep, except the other night when he didn't make one peep! It was nice! He is clapping now and he is amazing us every day with his progress. He sure has been a perfect addition to our family. He just warms us all through.

Spencer is doing well in work, no big surprise there. They love him there. His boss was so impressed with the work that he and the rest of the team did that he gave them 5 extra days off next year! So, instead of 3 weeks they get 4. That helps seeing how we will be leaving on our cruise in LESS THAN A MONTH!!!!!!! I am so excited, I can hardly stand it! He is the second councilor in the Elders Quorum and is SO awesome to help me at home when he gets home from work.

I had monkeys on the side of the cake as well. I was REALLY happy with it. Especially since I think I just perfected my recipe for chocolate cake! Every time I made it it would fall......BAD! I think I found the "formula" to fix that little problem.

Anyway, that is what we have been up to lately. Just waiting to celebrate our 10 year anniversary, Christmas, New Years, and then we are off on our cruise. I am sad to leave my kids, especially Reed because he doesn't understand, but we got set up on Skype so we will be able to see and talk to them everyday. Spencer and I have been wanting to do something like this ever since we got married. We really didn't have a "honeymoon" so now we are going to take advantage of our 10 year anniversary and take an 8 day cruise to the eastern Caribbean, visiting the islands of St. Kitts, St. Lucia, and St. Maarten. It will be fun. But I'll be happy to get home, I'm sure....I'll miss my kids too much.

Love to all and I will work on being better at my blogging.

Have a Merry Christmas!!! I'll post again soon.

Halloween Fun!

2011-11-04T20:00:00.000-07:00

Happy belated Halloween! It has been a REALLY busy month for this household. The end of September my mom had major abdominal surgery to remove her appendix and her sigmoid colon. Then two weeks after her surgery she threw some blood clots to her lungs and landed in the ICU twice and a total of 2 weeks in the hospital. She is home and doing well now though. It was a rough month, but we also had some fun.

This year for our ward trunk-or-treat the Young Women were in charge of planning it and I offered to make the cupcakes for our traditional cake walk. I had so much fun doing them. I went on a search for "Halloween like" candy and found some good ones.

I found gummy worms and I used upside down octopi for spiders.

Then I found gummy brains:

And nice big corns:

I got a lot of compliments on them. I sure loved doing them. I wish I could do them more often, but people don't ask me to. Anyway, we sure had a good time.

We had our traditional Halloween feast again this year. I believe this WILL become a tradition, I enjoy doing this too.

We had Roasted Baby Fingers ('Lil Smokey's wrapped in bread), Garbage Salad (coleslaw, probably the best one I've made, it turned out SO yummy!), Cheddar Bones (Cheetos), and Witch's Brew (Lemon Lime Punch with dry ice). The girls LOVED it! Later we took Dirt Dessert (chocolate pudding with Oreo crumbs and gummy worms) to my mom in the hospital.

It was a really nice night for trick-or-treating. It was really warm and we all dressed up. The girls were little hula girls:

And Spencer and Reed were Curious George and The Man in the Yellow Hat. I wore tattoo sleeves and a green and black wig with dark makeup around my eyes. My mom hardly recognized me when I walked through her hospital door. I got a lot of laughs and comments on my outfit. I liked it. I'll use it for future Halloween's.

My chiropractors daughter got married on the first of November, which was Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead) and I wanted to give her something special. She wasn't the typical bride. She isn't into "show" and "excess" and she was getting so stressed with everyone TELLING her how to do her wedding so she opted to just have the ceremony in the temple and then a lunch with just her family afterward instead of a huge reception. She was VERY happy with that choice and I'm proud of her for doing what SHE wanted. I hate it when people try to make someone else's wedding about them. Anyway, I wanted to make sure she had a cake, so I made a "Honeymoon Cake" for the two of them, just the two of them.

She LOVED it! I had SO much fun doing it too. Spencer, of course, did the carving of which turned out PERFECT, and then I decorated it. It was so fun because the more I did to the cake the better it looked. I really miss doing cakes. I mentioned to Spencer that perhaps I should just tell people to pay for the ingredients and then I will make their cakes for them just so that I can decorate more. I was so rusty on this cake, it was frustrating, but thanks to some big and elaborate decoration I was able to cover most of the mistakes.

Birthday Mania!!

2011-09-21T20:13:00.000-07:00

Well, another year has come and gone for our birthday's. I think this week is the most exhausting week of the year for me...besides Christmas. We sure had a lot of fun this year. On my birthday the girls had an early release day from school, SO my mom and I picked them up and we went to Georgetown to have our own little Victorian High Tea Party at a cute little store up there to celebrate all our birthday's.

EVERYTHING was SO YUMMY!!! CJ drank us all "under the table" with the tea. She had to use the restroom a lot after that, but the girls sure had a great time. I couldn't believe how yummy everything was. There is no way to pick a favorite. We had meat pies, bacon spinach tartlettes, deviled eggs, scones with lemon curd and devonshire cream, fruit cup with oranges grapefruit raisins and coconut, fruit tartlettes, lemon bars, peanut butter squares, cucumber sandwiches, black walnut cookies, and white chocolate cameos. CJ had extra eggs and Avary had an extra fruit tartlette while my mom and I had extra bacon and spinach tartlettes and meat pies. It was bliss. We really had a wonderful time. When we got home, Spencer had put a BBQ pork shoulder in the crockpot and he made dinner that night for me. Complete with fresh corn on the cob and rice. For my birthday "cake", Razzleberry Pie with Vanilla ice cream. I was utterly spoiled!

For my moms birthday, the day started with her sleeping in while I got the girls ready and took them to school. Later that night we went and picked Spencer up at work and we went to The Cheesecake Factory. Another blissful dinner! They wrote happy birthday on mine, my mom's, and Avary's plates.

It was the first time the girls had gone there. I don't think there is anything that I have tried there that I haven't liked. Everything was absolute de-lish!

Unfortunately for Avary's birthday, she spent the day at home with strep....AGAIN! CJ had a cold and it was another early release day at their school so I just let CJ stay home that day with Avary.

Her day started off with pancakes. I made her pancakes and wrote Happy Birthday with whipped cream, but as you can see in the picture it melted. I also had sprinkles, a cherry, and powdered sugar to make it perfect for her. She was SO thrilled with them. I also made her hot chocolate and put whipped cream and chocolate sauce in it. (My mom and I had McDonald's hot chocolate the Saturday before while we were on our way to Kansas to pick up some beef that we bought through my brother Spike. They put chocolate syrup on the whipped cream and it was so yummy that I did it for the girls for breakfast. It was yummy too!) Anyway, she then wanted her hair done really special so I did an experiment and it worked out quite nicely. At first she wanted a braid that went across the top of her head, but then I expounded with all around her head. She really liked it and felt special. For dinner she wanted ravioli, so that's what I did. Poor thing didn't eat much because she wasn't feeling good. She opened presents after that and she was THRILLED with what she got. Everything she got had something to do with horses aside from her leotard and fingernail polish. She got horse pj's from my mom, a My Little Pony from "Reed", and then she got her own chapter books called The Horse Diaries, along with a couple other things. She was ECSTATIC! She wanted an Oreo birthday cake this year and wanted to decorate it herself, but seeing how she had strep, I ended up doing it for her. It isn't my best job, but I think it turned out quite cute for the supplies I had. But the most important thing is that Avary loved it. She even said it was exactly how she wanted it....sweet girl. Aside from being sick, she had a good day and I am SO glad. I hate being sick on my birthday and I totally sympathized for her. We had plans to go miniature golfing on her birthday, but we told her we would do it a different day when she was feeling better.

Just as a side note,

isn't he CUTE!!??!!??

Blanding Trip and other August Events

2011-09-07T20:55:00.000-07:00

From our last post you know that Spencer's grandparents died in a car accident the beginning of August. Well, we all went to Blanding, UT for the funeral....even the dog. It was a really good trip, I'm so glad we all went. Anyway, having kids we had to keep them occupied with fun things to do. There isn't much in Blanding, but we found some things to do to keep the girls happy, which in turn, kept us happy.

The first place we went was the dinosaur museum. I had heard so many stories about Spencer and his family going to the dinosaur museum that we had to take our kids. It wasn't what I expected, but it kept them busy for a little while. Especially when Uncle Tyler and Aunt Shelly decided that they would come with us. Thank heavens they did or it wouldn't have been a "successful" trip.

Reed slept through the whole thing.

Spencer thought that this was pretty cool. I guess it is a replica of the model used for the King Kong movie.

I LOVE the look Avary is giving Uncle Tyler in this picture. I don't thing she knew what to think about him. We LOVE Uncle Tyler.

CJ sure had a lot of fun with Uncle Tyler. Like I said, if they hadn't have come with us, it would have been a flop. Here is a little video of the fun they had:

I think we were actually the only ones at the museum besides the one worker there. It was good though.

Later that same day we went do Grandma and Grandpa Johnny's cabin. They were on their way to the cabin when they were hit head on by a Penske truck. It was really pretty up at the cabin. When we got there, there was a deer hanging out looking for food. I guess that was what Grandma and Grandpa Johnny would do, they would go up and feed the local deer. It was really neat to see. Jersey went NUTS! The deer didn't get too close because of the dog, but we got some good wilderness time with the deer.

They have this beautiful reservoir there called Recapture Reservoir. It sure was beautiful. The pictures don't give it justice, but I like this one that I took.

Every time we drove past it, it just took my breath away. I loved it.

The next day we found a little water park that they just opened up so that the kids could swim. It was SO hot in Blanding when we went that water was more than welcome! This was the first time Reed went swimming

He didn't like it so much. The water was a little chilly for his liking, but after I got him out I let him wade a little. He liked that, just didn't like the immersion. Too much I guess. He sure loves his baths though. Just too cold I guess.

The girls really had a good time and so did Spencer. Uncle Ryan, Aunt Cami, and Aunt Addie all went with us to the water park. It was so good to get out and have some fun.

At one point Spencer and Ryan got the whistle blown at them because they both had a girl on their shoulders playing "chicken", you know, where they try to knock each other off the shoulders. Silly boys. Not really a game for little girls.

The next day was the double funeral. They did such a good job, both the families. It lasted only about an hour and 20 minutes which was, I think, record breaking...ESPECIALLY for a double funeral and two different families. It was beautiful though and really neat to hear all the fun things about the two of them.

The family was able to move the plot that Grandpa Johnny bought over by Grandma which was so neat. Grandma is buried next to the two men she loved dearly, Grandpa Burdett on her Right and Grandpa Johnny on her left.

When we got home the girls started school. CJ is now in 3rd grade and Avary is in 1st.

My my my....where does the time go!!?? They are really enjoying school this year. They both are doing so well and I am so proud of the both of them!

Reed started eating cereal this month as well. At first he wasn't sure what to think:

But he REALLY enjoys it now. He is growing SO fast I can hardly keep up with his clothes. He is such a joy though. The girls love him more everyday.

I made another cake this month. A friend of our Bradley Teacher called and wanted me to make a Gluten Free, low sugar, organic cake. It turned out really yummy (I know because we always get scraps!) :) She didn't have any specifics about the decoration, she just wanted chocolate with "Happy Birthday Chandler" written on it. I think it turned out really cute:

The cupcake on top was for Chandler, he turned one so he got his own little cake. I love decorating cakes. I wish more people would ask me to do them. If I could I would decorate a cake every day.

Till We Meet Again

2011-08-01T20:55:00.000-07:00

Tonight during our Family Home Evening we got a phone call from Spencer's dad telling us that Grandma and Grandpa Johnny were in a car accident and that both of them had passed away. Spencer has lost all 4 of his grandparents within 11 months of each other. We are devastated by the news, but we know that they have been welcomed into our Heavenly Father's kingdom with open arms.

Your love and kindness will always remain with us. We will miss you terribly. All our love.

The Four F's of July 2011

2011-08-01T20:49:00.000-07:00

This has been a VERY busy July for us. As I recount everything we did this month, I realize that everything we did started with an F. Every weekend we have had something to do. So here we go!

Fourth

For the fourth we went up to Georgetown. My mom was FINALLY home for the fourth instead of in Alaska, so we took her up to Georgetown to see the parade, like we did the first fourth we were here. It was really fun.

The girls made their own flags to wave during the parade. We had yummy house made ice cream before the parade and the girls got a nice load of candy.

After the parade my mom and I did a little shopping and then we went to the town park to have our picnic that we took. On the way there I had to stop and take pictures of this house that I just love!

I love how the river goes right past it. I just love how majestic it seems. Anyway, after our picnic we decided it was time to go home. Good thing we left when we did because it took us an hour and a half extra to get home from Georgetown because there was a semi turned over on the freeway going into Denver. We had to take one of the only two detours we could and it was just HORRIBLE. What a NIGHTMARE!! Poor Reed was NOT a happy camper.

When we finally made it home, things started to look up for Reed so we decided to go to the Aurora Fireworks that they do not too far from our house. They were AWESOME! They were the best I've seen since we moved here. The best, by far, is still Disneyland, but the finale was just spectacular. I don't think I have ever seen a city do fireworks the way that Aurora did. It was a pretty good day aside from the horror of trying to get home.

Fun Place

Every year the city of Aurora puts on this Kidspree that is free. They hold it in this huge park and everything you do there is free, aside from the food. This was the first year since we found out about it that I was able to go and I am SO glad that I did. They have a maze that the girls and Spencer went through before I got there.

I got there just in time to watch CJ and Avary ride their first pony. I thought Avary was just going to flip out, but she didn't and Spencer and I were a little disappointed in her lack of excitement. Although they had been in line for a LONG time waiting to ride.

We then went and stood in another long line to get their faces painted. Reed even got a little "tattoo" of a frog trying to catch a fly. It was really fun.

After the face painting we found this booth where they can make their own hats. CJ made a hat out of a CD and Avary went a little nuts with a headband. They did a good job! I especially liked this venue because it had air conditioners going in the tent.

We left just in time because as soon as we got to the car, it started to pour!

Family Fun

This seems kind of random, but one day we let Jersey in and when she came in she had something on her.

We couldn't figure out what it was and then I looked outside. We realized that she had sat on the blue chalk that the girls drew on the back porch. We had a good laugh about it.

My brother Shaun was here for a couple days and we had him over for dinner one night. After dinner, Spencer got into the bubble gum. He can get a little crazy with the gum sometimes and this was one of those times. He was blowing bubbles and he blew one that got pretty big. I bet you can guess what happened next. He was wearing his glasses, too. We all just about peed our pants, ESPECIALLY the girls. So, he continued to make a mess of himself. This was the finished product:

Spencer went up to our bathroom to clean up and pretty soon I hear, "Sierra?! How do you get gum out of nose hairs?!" My mom, brother, and I answered at the same time, "Peanut butter!" Ya, he was a MESS.

Fair

We promised the girls this year that we would go to the county fair. It was really fun once we got there, but BOY it was expensive. We know now the days to go, during the week NOT weekend. Anyway, we got there just in time to go on a ride, get some grub, and head over to the rodeo that they were doing. Avary got to see horses in action. She was pretty excited.

I LOVE this picture of her! After the rodeo we went over to the petting zoo. They had some really cute baby goats and baby pigs. I think Reed and this Llama are reading each others minds.

After the petting zoo, Avary started to complain that she wasn't feeling very well so we took CJ on some rides. They had a roller coaster there that was a dragon so we went to take her on that. Spencer couldn't ride with her because he was too big so she got to go all by herself. At first we weren't sure because the expression on her face, but pretty soon she showed us how fun it really was.

We all had a really good time. It was the last night of the fair so we got an extra special treat....FIREWORKS! They were pretty awesome, but what was really the entertainment that night was Reed. This is him watching the fireworks.

Everyone around us was just in awe that he was so calm during the fireworks. He LOVED the fireworks. He closed his mouth once to swallow and then it dropped open again right after. His eyes were fixed on those lights like they were going out of style.

It was a great July, busy, but great. Glad it is over because now we can relax....a little.

Before and After

2011-06-24T09:51:00.000-07:00

So, at the end of April we got a letter from our HOA saying that we need to paint our house. This was bittersweet. Bitter in the fact that we really wanted to use that money to pay off debt and sweet in the fact that I could FINALLY change the color of my house. (I hate blue. ESPECIALLY next to another blue house.) Well, after a funeral, baptism, blessing, about 5 painters quotes, and a month waiting to hear back from our HOA, we got it done.

Our house before:

Our house After:

I'm so happy. SUCH a difference! We have been getting a lot of compliments on it and all the cars that drive past slow down and we catch them looking, it's pretty funny. Our beautiful house.....

Now I need to get the yard done. Hmmm........

Happy Father's Day!

2011-06-19T19:05:00.000-07:00

Well, I do believe Spencer had a good Father's Day today. It started with cinnamon rolls and milk at church instead of cookies and ended with one of his favorite desserts, berry shortcake. All the stuff that happened in between was pretty fun. He was able to get his nap, in fact we ALL got a nap today and I think that made all the difference.

I love these kind of pictures. I have so many of Spencer asleep with the girls that whenever he naps with Reed, I steal my chance and start shootin'. My boys, they are so sweet. Anyway, after our naps, CJ had the idea to make Father's Day hats. I thought that was pretty clever of her so Spencer sat down with the girls and started to make hats.

The girls had found the paper and everything and they all made hats while I cooked dinner.

They even made one for me and and my mom.

In order from left to right: Top row: the "Queen Chef", the "Queen Mutha"; Bottom Row: the "Second Princess", the "King", the "Little Prince", the "First Princess". (The girls named us, can you tell??) It was fun. I'm glad that they made hats, it really added to the day.

After a pot roast dinner (Spencer loves my pot roast), we had him open his present:

We gave him a Work basket. Everything in the basket was for his work. He got food that he could take for lunches and he got 4 new work shirts. He really liked it, he was out of food at work and wanted to go shopping, but I beat him to the punch. After he opened his present we had the berry shortcake. It was really yummy and we all have enjoyed the day.

Spencer is such an amazing dad and husband. We are so lucky to have him in our lives. He has blessed me with 3 BEAUTIFUL children and he works so hard to keep us going. He makes us laugh every day, even if he doesn't try to. He helps so much at home and is always willing to take over for me when things get too overwhelming. He is a million more things than I can even say but most importantly he is the love of my life, one in a million, and I couldn't have found a more perfect man. I love you so much Spencer.

Happy Father's Day!

2011 Ballet Recital and Other Fun Stuff

2011-06-15T20:28:00.001-07:00

So the girls had their Ballet Recital last weekend. It was so good! We are SO proud of them. CJ danced to the Golden Ticket song from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It was SO cute. Avary danced to a really pretty instrumental song that was very sweet. We are really proud of them.

A couple weeks ago we got some very special visitors. My nephew, Jake my oldest brother Spike's son, had contacted me on facebook and asked if we would mind entertaining him and his son, Daniel, for a couple hours. Of course I said yes! I haven't seen Jake in forever and I have NEVER met my great-nephew Daniel. Spike drove in from Kansas to pick Daniel up and then they went to the airport to pick up Jake. It was SO fun! I am so glad that they were able to come and visit with us. My mom was in Utah at the time so we got them all to ourselves which was pretty darn cool!

I sure love these guys. Daniel was a hoot! I just fell in love with that little dude. The girls really had a great time with him as well.

Well, my doula is officially paid off. She contacted me not too long ago and asked for the last payment on her services, which was a cake for her sons birthday. He wanted a dragon cake and it had to be a specific dragon, Terrible Terror from How To Train Your Dragon. Of course it had to be a hard one.

I think it turned out pretty OK, considering I can't draw worth a lick. It certainly isn't perfect, but he knew what it was and that was ALL that mattered.

Well that is it for now. More stuff to come so stay tuned!

First EVER Schumann Family Vacation and Other Family Activities

2011-05-31T20:27:00.001-07:00

So, a week after CJ was baptized and Reed blessed, we had the opportunity to go camping. We had some friends who weren't able to use their reservations and we took the reservation for them. We went camping down in Colorado Springs. We didn't know what to expect. I guess KOA Campgrounds has this thing every year about caring and camping and our friends usually go every year. Well, this year they had a ton of other things come up and she posted on facebook about it. I guess you buy one night and get the second free. They had booked a cabin down in Colorado Springs and we offered to take their reservation. We had SO much fun! This was our very first family vacation and it was great, aside from the cold and rain. We left Friday afternoon and came home on Sunday. These are pictures of our cabin:

There were two bunk beds:

(The girls each got their own)
A queen size bed:

(We had to bring our own sheets)
and a quaint little corner for Reed to sleep in in his port-o-crib:

The first cabin they tried to put us in, Spencer found bed bugs so they upgraded us to this one with a porch and balcony. Sweet deal I think! (No worries, he looked EXTREMELY close for bed bugs and found zero!)

We had never been anywhere in Colorado, so we asked friends and family of what we should do and we followed a few of their suggestions. We woke up on Saturday and, after a yummy pancake breakfast cooked by yours truly, we headed off to Garden of the Gods. Now, we had no idea what to expect when we went there, but we weren't disappointed:

We were kinda expecting something like Zions National Park or Arches, but it wasn't NEAR that big, but it was beautiful. It was like a little bit of southern Utah plucked up and sat down in the mountains. It was funny though when we got there because we were reading about mountain sheep. When we looked up we saw some animal like things at the top of one of the structures. We were thinking, "COOL!! There are some sheep!", but then they started to hop a little and we thought, "COOL!! Eagles or Hawks!", but a wonderful zoom on my camera revealed something that we did NOT expect:

Pigeons. Yes, pigeons. Spencer didn't believe me and quite frankly I don't really blame him because that structure looked a WHOLE lot bigger than it was because those birds looked HUGE from down on the path. We had to laugh about it because we thought it funny that we were in awe over pigeons.

After Garden of the Gods we went to North Pole, Colorado to visit Santa's Workshop. Again, had NO idea what to expect. We thought, "OH! A fun little place for the kids to play around in and see fun little crafts!" When got there it was a different story:

An amusement park.....in the mountains! And when I say "in the mountains", I mean it was all built on the slope of the mountain. It was actually opening day for them and it was FREEZING! Not to mention it started to rain there as well. It was really fun though. The girls and Spencer had so much fun. I had fun watching them until I couldn't feel my hands anymore and then it stopped being fun. We went back to our cabin and turned the heaters on and watched movies for the rest of the night because it was raining so bad. We are SO glad we did it though.

Memorial Day Weekend
Well, we started the day, Memorial Day, with the annual Buckley Ward Memorial Day pancake breakfast. It was so yummy! Spencer was made Cub Scout Master and the breakfast was sorta for the Cub Scouts and this was Spencer's first event as Master. He did a good job. THEY did a good job. They had pancakes, oranges, orange juice, milk, bananas, and BACON!!! I was so happy. A lot of people came, it was really fun.

Afterward, well, let me tell you this story first. A couple days before we left for camping, I was folding the kids clothes and had the TV on. A Colorado morning show called "Everyday" was on and they were talking about "Pirates of the Caribbean 4". They mentioned if you text something to a certain number then you would be entered to win tickets to the screening of the movie and be entered to win tickets to the Real Pirates exhibit at the museum. What would be the harm, right? Well, I entered and while we were camping they informed me that I had won both things. I was in shock! I have NEVER won anything in my life. We weren't too excited about the movie, (way overdone in our opinion), but the museum exhibit we were excited about. Spencer seemed real impressed with me for winning, which I think is hilarious!

So, now back to Memorial Day festivities. After the pancake breakfast we went to the museum. We got 4 tickets and they included the entrance fee into the museum as well as the pirate exhibit. It was so neat, the exhibit. It is centered on a slave ship called The Whydah (wi-duh) that was a slave ship turned pirate ship in the early 1700's. This guy was told stories by his uncle about a pirate ship and where it sunk and when he grew up he went searching for it and found it. They had so much stuff there. They had the fully intact bell from The Whydah. It was awesome. They had so many rifles, actual rope from the ship, cannons, medical syringes, commode, and the coolest part, I think, was the real pirate treasure that they had found. It is the only treasure ever found in the world. Pretty cool. We were even able to touch some of it!

I'm so glad that I entered that contest!

We then went and saw some other things at the museum. The girls wanted to go to the space exhibit so we went there. They have an infrared camera there and we had some fun with that. I walked in front of it and once was all I could do because it showed a little too much heat in a particular area that was quite embarrassing (let's just say "headlights" and you will get the picture.) Although, now I have scientific proof that my husband is indeed a "hot head":

This is Avary, Spencer, and Reed.

Spencer had taken today, Tuesday, off as well. So, we decided to go on another little adventure. Spencer had to go to the Scout store and it was so far on the other side of Denver that we thought we would go up to Lookout Mountain and see what was up there. It was SUCH a beautiful day today that it would have been a shame to waste it indoors.

The wilderness was so refreshing today it was wonderful. The air was so sweet and clean and smelled wonderfully of pine. So rejuvenating.We visited the Boettcher (becher) Mansion, which was FABULOUS! I have decided that that is where the girls are going to have their wedding receptions.

We then set off to Buffalo Bills Grave. These are views from the road to the grave.

While we were there, we saw the "lookout".

I made some little additions to give you an idea as to what we were looking at. It was so breathtaking! The picture doesn't give it justice.

We then started for the actual grave.

On our way back from the the grave, we saw some hang gliders soaring above us:

It was pretty neat to see these guys gliding over us.

We are FINALLY starting to experience Colorado and we are having a blast! We are making some really good memories with the girls and we are so happy that we have this opportunity to spend this time with them. We have been eternally blessed.

PS
These are just some random pictures that I took. CJ and Avary have been such a big help to me with Reed. They rock him to sleep so I can get little things done.

They like to play on my phone while they do it, actually I think that is how I get them to hold him so long is offering my phone up as a sacrifice. It works.

We had to put Jersey in a kennel while we went camping and she stunk so bad that we asked them to give her a bath before we picked her up. She was really happy to see me, but the fun thing is is that they put a little bandanna on her after her bath:

She looked so cute when they brought her out. I love my doggy.

Baptism, Blessing, and Mother's Day...Oh My!

2011-05-16T11:14:00.001-07:00

It sure is hard to get things done with a baby who demands so much! But, alas, I am finally able to post.

Baptism
May 7, 2011 Cynthia Jo Schumann entered the waters and was baptized. We are so proud of her! That day went so well. Family was able to be here to support her in her decision to be baptized and it was such an emotional day for all of us. Spencer and I can't believe how much she has grown and how fast this day had arrived. It was a beautiful day. It was the hottest of the year so far.

When we got there, we were expecting to get a pant suit for her, but in the closet they only had dresses, so she was able to be baptized in a dress. When we got to the ward, there was a little bit of a panic. The water had been filling the font for about 2 hours and there was hardly any water in the font. We were thinking that they would have to sit and then have her lie down to be baptized, but it finally made it to 28 inches and we were able to baptize her. We also did the confirmation on that day. We made that day all about CJ. It was quite spiritual and very emotional for us. I have never loved Spencer more than in that moment of baptizing and confirming our daughter. Again, we are so proud of her. My mom made the dress she wore after her baptism:

She looked like an angel. I love this picture, aside from her beautiful grandma's it shows her dress the best!

Blessing
May 7, 2011, also Mother's Day, Reed was blessed. Interesting fact, CJ was blessed on Father's Day, Reed on Mother's Day. It was very special indeed. It was a great blessing. Spencer is so in tune with the Spirit and I couldn't be more impressed and proud of him.

My mom made the booties and the blanket. Our first idea was to have him blessed in the same outfit Spencer was blessed in, but he got too big for it and we had gotten this one as a back up. It fit him just right, thank heavens! That was such a special day for us all, but especially me because it was Mother's Day and I was able to share that with CJ and with Reed.

Mother's Day
So, after everyone, except for my dad, had left to go back to Utah, it was time for us all to wind down. I fell asleep on the couch with Reed, Spencer soon followed on the chase lounge, and apparently my dad in the chair all while the girls were in quiet time. When I woke, my dad had been helping the girls make cards for me. I went upstairs to feed Reed and this is what I found on my door:

I told CJ that I had to get in there to feed Reed and she informed me that I could go in, but not to look under my pillow. She is SO bad at keeping secrets. We are going to work on that though. Anyway, after I fed Reed they gave me their cards. This one was from Avary:

She LOVES her stickers. BUT, these two were from CJ:

Front:

Inside:

Back:

And then this one:

I guess she loves stickers more! They were so sweet! I LOVED the cards, but those girls I love beyond words. CJ was so proud that she used a WHOLE sheet of stickers. I'm just so happy that they aren't on the walls, windows, dressers, etc. etc.

It was so fun to have everyone here that weekend. I am so grateful to all of those that came. It meant the WORLD to us to have you here. Thank you.

Happy Easter!

2011-04-24T18:58:00.001-07:00

Well, this was a good Easter for the kids. I heard the girls this morning at about 6:30 downstairs SO excited about what the Easter "Bunny" had brought them. Having church at 9:00 though, we had to wait until after church to "find" the eggs that were hidden.

I think these are my favorite dresses that they have gotten for Easter. They looked SO cute today. CJ looked like Alice in Wonderland and I LOVE the little jacket for Avary's dress.

Reed looked pretty studly himself. This was his first Easter, and he had a good day. Even Jersey had a good Easter:

We gave her the ham bone from our ham tonight. Her eyes roll back in her head when she gets ham. It is actually quite amusing. At one point her eyes were closed, she was laying down, and she was licking the marrow out of the bone. She got pretty deep in there too.

It was a good day. I had the lesson in Young Women's and I think it was pretty successful. I cried through the whole thing and I got other people crying too, I consider that successful.

Happy Easter everyone!

8 Years Old

2011-04-20T06:45:00.000-07:00

Well, it has finally arrived. Our Cynthia Jo is 8 years old. Holy cow!! Where did it all go??!! It was a little bit of a rough birthday for the rest of us. We had a virus going through the house, but luckily CJ snapped out of it for her birthday so it was a happy one for her.

I was thinking about how I should decorate her cake. As I thought about it I just couldn't come up with an idea, so I asked her if she wanted to decorate her own cake this year. She was SO excited! Her eyes lit up and she got the biggest smile on her face and said "YES!" All I had to do was bake the cake and she did the rest.

Here is an up close picture of the finished product:

She chose strawberry cake, which the grown ups in the house weren't too excited about, but she loved it. And to tell you the truth, the cake gets better the more you eat it, especially with lots of vanilla ice cream. Anyway, she was so proud of her cake and I was so proud of her.

She got some really nice things for her birthday, but the one she was excited about most was her Barbie head. She wanted a Barbie head so that she could practice doing hair, like braids and such. She was SO happy when she opened that, never mind her constant assumptions that that was what she was getting. She also got some chapter books for her to start reading. We figure we need to get a jump on those now since she will be in 3rd grade in August. She also got a really pretty necklace from her Grandma and Grandpa Schumann along with some candy and it was all in a neat mailbox that they dolled up. She had a great birthday!

Spencer Reed Burdett Schumann

2011-04-01T10:18:00.000-07:00

Well, he made it here and I'm finally blogging about it. It has been quite a whirlwind getting used to 3 kids! We named him Spencer Reed Burdett, but he is going by Reed. A little complicated we know, but It sure suits him, and it seems right. Reed is from my side of the family. My grandpa, my mom's dad, was Reed. Burdett was Spencer's mom's dad. Seeing how this could be our only boy, it seemed appropriate.

Here is the story of how he came into the world:

I had been put on bed rest the day before, Monday the 21st, because my blood pressure was really high. I wasn't happy at ALL when she did that! I was hoping the doctor would induce me then, but she wanted to run the tests first to see if I had eclampsia (toxemia). I went home in tears and went straight to bed. My water broke at 1:00 am Tuesday, March 22, 2011. (Now I understand what they mean by "gush".) We called the doctor, our doula, and woke up mom, then went to the hospital. We got there around 2:00 am. The hospital is only a 10 minute drive from our house so it wasn't quite a rush to get there. When we got there, I wouldn't really say that I was having contractions. Not any that I could really feel anyway, so we walked around the delivery floor (not really big, but the room was GINORMOUS!) We did that for about an hour and then I got pretty tired and wanted to rest. I think we stopped walking at about 4ish, 5ish. I laid down and I started to feel more contractions, not too bad though. My doctor got there around 7:45 that morning and they checked me at about 8, I was dilated to a 5, but my cervix was still far back. They wanted me to walk some more to see if I could bring my cervix forward, but right then my contractions boosted quite a bit and I wasn't going anywhere, according to me and I was the boss at that point. At around 9:15 I felt like I needed to push. (This is all non drugged, by the way.) The doctor came in around 9:25 am and I started to push. He was born at 9:31 am March 22, 2011. What an experience, ALL natural. Probably wouldn't do it again, if I were to have more kids, but then again it is still REALLY fresh in my mind. I really couldn't have done it without the team work of Spencer and our doula Kristy. When he was born I looked at Spencer and he had tears streaming down his face and I had a rush of emotion myself.

He was so alert when they put him on my belly. They kept him there for quite a while, it was really nice. I was bleeding quite a bit after the birth, so they had to put me on pitocin to make me clot. He weighed 7 lbs. 2 oz. Was 20 1/2" long and perfect beyond belief. We are so glad he is here. As you can see by the picture above, the girls are QUITE in love with him. They came and visited that day after they were out of school. They are such great big sisters. They have been helping out a lot and I'm so proud of them. The dog on the other hand is quite jealous because she doesn't get as much attention from me anymore and she is starting to act out, didn't see that one coming. We were able to come home the next day, which was really nice. It felt good to bring him home. During his exam that day they realized that he was tongue tied and they made an appointment to have that clipped on our way home. He had also had his circumcision that day, so it was a rough day for him. He kinda went into shut down mode. Poor guy. The tongue clipping went rough. He bled quite a bit and was NOT happy about it. I'm glad that is all over though. On the other hand, he did REALLY good during the circumcision, the doctor and nurse were really impressed with his high pain tolerance.

His cry is so unique. We had heard it somewhere before and we didn't figure it out until a couple days ago. We knew it sounded like a bird, but we couldn't figure out which one...until now. What do you think?

Here are some of our favorite snapshots so far of him:

This was his coming home outfit...the shoes BARELY fit him because his feet are SO big!

Speaking of his feet.....

...we measured and they are ACTUALLY 3 1/4 inches long! I knew the SECOND I saw them what was hurting and where when I was pregnant with him.

Thursday morning...our little bur-Reed-o. He LOVES to be wrapped....TIGHT! Reminds me of my niece, Myriah, when she was a baby.

His first sponge bath. He had peed all over himself because we have had to put Vaseline in his diapers because of his circumcision, to make sure it didn't stick to the diaper. For a little bit we were putting too much in and thus the peeing on himself. I think it happened 3 times that day.

After his first sponge bath. His shirt says "Daddy's best friend". I think Spencer is a little happy about having a boy.

Wednesday morning while I was still at the hospital, I got a phone call on my cell phone from the school. CJ was throwing up at school, so I had to call my mom to go pick her up. Of course about an hour later we found out we were going home that day. The next day, Thursday she had to stay home again. Her friend, Corinne, from school and church made her this cute little "get well" card:
It says, "FEEL BETTER CJ! You are such a cute "nerds"! You "snickers" alot. Feel better and travel through the "milky way". You will "burst" with excitement as you eat all of this candy. You are a juicy and "gum"y friend to me. From: Corinne". Apparently she did it all by herself, and CJ just LOVED it. She still hasn't eaten her candy though.

Our Primary music leader had a baby last year. I had offered to make her shower cake, but when it was time for her shower I got REALLY sick and I couldn't. So, to make it up to her I offered to make her son's first birthday cake, which was this past week (yes, a week after Reed was born). I mustered up ALL the energy I had and made the cake. It turned out REALLY cute.

My last cake for a little while though....I was EXHAUSTED afterward.

Yesterday we had our pictures taken (coming soon) and afterward we took just the girls out on a little date while Reed stayed with Geewah, to this frozen yogurt place called Yogurt Land. SO YUMMY!!! There is one in Utah for all those in Utah, by the way. Trust me.....YUM! Anyway, afterward we came home and the girls wanted to play with their make up. Sure why not, right?

Um......ya. Avary was actually starting to scare me. After the picture was taken I had Spencer go and wash their faces.....scary.

Well, that is it for now. The pictures coming are WAY cute, wait till you all see them!!! I'm REALLY excited.

A While

2011-03-15T10:25:00.000-07:00

So, I know it has been a while since I posted on our blog, but to be honest with you nothing really has been going on with us. We haven't been too "eventful" here in the Schumann household. I thought I would just catch you all up on what HAS happened and other random things before the baby is born since there WILL be a lot to talk about there.

Good News
We found out the last part of January that Spencer was approved for a promotion and a raise. We sorta knew about the promotion but weren't expecting much of a raise, but they surprised us and gave him a great raise. I am so proud of him. He was made Staff Engineer and also put in charge of a small team. Shortly before that he was also hired as a private consultant for a company he worked with in Utah so he can work from home. It is so strange living with sometimes not enough to get groceries to being able to get groceries AND pay off debt. I'm still a little "shell shocked" and trying to figure out every other week what I have forgotten to pay. We have been praying and fasting for a while for help and guidance and now our prayers have been answered.

Randomness
One morning while the girls were out of school, I was calling to CJ to do something, I can't remember what, but she answered me from my room saying "Just a minute". I wondered what she was doing in my room, she knew better than to play in there. So, I asked her what she was doing and she said that she was making my bed for me. I was stunned. She went down to my room all by herself and decided to make my bed for me. I was so touched I had tears in my eyes. Avary thought that that was a good idea and offered to help. When I went down there to see the good job they did, they were naming all my pillows, "This one is Daddy, this one is Mommy, this one is me (CJ), this one is Avary, and this one is Reed!" It was so adorable. When they were done, Avary looked at me and said, "Do we get money now??" I was so taken back that she would ask that. I told her no because then it wouldn't mean as much to me because they had offered. CJ piped up and said, "Yep! It is a service!" I love my girls. Here is a picture of the job they did:

I was REALLY proud of them, especially since the bed goes up to their necks. They did an AWESOME job!

On another note, the girls were playing in their room one day and loving all their stuffed animals. They called out to Spencer to take a picture before they went to bed and, well, here it is:

They never really got into dolls. All the dolls that we have have been stripped of all their clothes and now their stuffed animals wear the clothes. Go figure.

And last but not least, I did another cake for our birthing class instructor. Her son was turning 5 I believe and he wanted a world cake. I thought it turned out pretty good:

He really liked it. He was so excited when he saw it and so was she.

Well, I believe this will be the last post until I have this little dude. Ta ta for now.

32

2011-01-21T07:34:00.001-08:00

Yesterday was Spencer's birthday. We didn't do much but what we did do I think makes up for it. I made cupcakes yesterday so that after school the girls could decorate them. They were REALLY excited to do those.

It was really fun to do those with them. They did a really good job. Avary would hold her cupcake so tight that it would end up a muffin top so what I did was have her squirt the frosting on, I spread it, and then she decorated it. After we started that we didn't have anymore muffin tops. After we finished the cupcakes I hid them in the oven so Spencer wouldn't see them. The girls were really funny about that because they thought I was going to bake them more and melt the frosting, but I assured them that the oven wasn't on and that they wouldn't melt.

When Spencer came home we ate dinner and then his mom called, which was great timing on her part because I kicked him out of the kitchen into the family room to talk to her while we set everything up. When we were ready we called him back into the kitchen and started to sing when we saw him. When he came in he saw what we were working on:

There aren't 32 cupcakes, only 24, but they did make a GREAT "32". He thought it was pretty cool. The girls were really excited about them and they had their sights set on the cupcake they wanted to eat. It was a good day. I think he enjoyed it. We all made our own cards and gave them to him. He seemed really happy. The only draw back to his birthday is that I'm pregnant and being on my feet all day really wiped me out so I asked him to help with the pile of dishes. He willingly accepted and then I had a birthday cake to do for our doula so he carved that.

Her son is turning 8 and she wanted a volcano. We are quite happy with it. It amazes me how Spencer can get a 9x13 cake and make something out of it like this volcano. I never could see anything like this in a 9x13 cake.

Anyway, Happy birthday Spencer. I hope it was a good one for you.

Milestones

2011-01-17T12:43:00.000-08:00

So, we have been reading scriptures with the girls every night and the other night we had asked CJ to read 1 Nephi 16:1. She started to ask why they didn't have a number 1 at the beginning of the verse and we started to explain why. In the midst of us trying to explain to CJ about the 1, Avary started to read the verse.....BY HERSELF!! She read the ENTIRE verse by herself with very little help (only on the really big words). We could NOT believe it! We all sat there with our mouths gaped open while she continued to read. Had no idea that child could read like that. We all knew she was learning how to read, but she sounded out words and read the whole verse. We were so proud. Well, then the next day we were going somewhere and Avary was putting on her shoes. I went into their room to do something and she is in there tying her own dang shoes. I just about died because we really haven't been working on it with her like we wanted to. I asked her who taught her to tie her shoes and she looked at me with a huge smile on her face and said that she had just been practicing. My baby is growed up. It's a good thing that I am having another baby in a couple months because this is starting to be a little too much for me. Not to mention CJ will be getting baptized in about 3 months and starting activity days, which means I will be taking her to Young Women activities with me because that is when they have activity days. Next Sunday is her first "fireside", the "8 Is Great!" fireside. My head is in a whirl wind. Where did the time go?????

Happy New Year!

2011-01-01T07:49:00.000-08:00

Well, here is our official first post of the new year! We FINALLY got some snow about 2 days ago. It looks so pretty here now. The temperatures dropped pretty fast, I think it was -8 last night. Anyway, we are sure hoping that this new year brings better health for us all, particularly me, and we can't wait for the arrival of our new addition to the family, Reed coming in March. CJ will start 3rd grade this year and Avary will start 1st grade. This year has a lot to look forward to. The only thing that I'm NOT looking forward to is 9 o'clock church. The majority of last year was spent with me sick, or recovering from surgery, or sick again because of pregnancy and trips. I just don't want to do that again.

Spencer took the girls sledding for their first time yesterday (the new blog picture). They sure had fun, but came back crying because they got too cold. It was REALLY cold yesterday. Spencer said the second they started to cry because they were too cold, they came home. We immediately put them in the shower to get warm, then they spent the majority of the afternoon curled up together in their Christmas jammies and about 3 blankets eating soup. They loved it though and went to bed VERY easily last night.

From our Christmas post, I mentioned that I made the girls some new quilts for their beds. Here are the pictures of those quilts:

This is Avary's, or course....purple.

CJ's...green and pink, her 2 favorite colors. Turned out WAY cute! I actually picked these fabrics out, Avary's was a kit that I got at a quilt shop. she loves it, but I wish I was able to pick the fabrics out like I did CJ's.

The new beds for Christmas. First time they looked that nice.....and the last. They sure love their new beds. They look really nice in their room, adds some character other than their stuffed animals scattered all over the floor.

This is my latest cake for our birthing instructor. She and her husband are taking their kids to Disney Land on the 10th of January and wanted a cake to celebrate.
It turned out pretty cute, I think. She REALLY loved it. When she saw it the excitement just exploded out of her, it was fun to have been a part of it, a small part but fun none the less.

Well, we hope everyone has a great new year. We sure are looking forward to this one.

Happy New Year!!!

Merry Christmas!

2010-12-25T09:45:00.000-08:00

This week has gone by in a whirl wind, I swear! Anyway, Our anniversary was good. Spencer took the day off so that we could do fun stuff. I kinda woke up with a headache, but I had an appointment with my chiropractor that morning so I thought he would help it. He didn't, but he sure helped my sciatic nerves (they are both giving me grief). Anyway, Spencer folded the clothes while I took a nap and then we went to a matinee showing of Harry Potter part 1. I think we will be going to more matinees because it was VERY inexpensive. We saved the expensive part for dinner, The Cheesecake Factory. It was WONDERFUL. We ordered the fried artichoke hearts and Spencer understood why I loved them SO much. Then we both ordered different sandwiches so we could share. He ended up eating all of his and half of mine, they where so good though. It was a good anniversary.

Thursday is our birthing class and we are doing an exchange with her, her classes for my cakes. She lives in our ward and has been really fun to get to know. They have a birthday cake every year on Christmas for Jesus and she asked me to make that for her this year. She had one request, that Mary be holding baby Jesus.

Christmas Eve was really exhausting. We had the missionaries over for dinner. We had prime rib, which I think is now going to be our traditional Christmas dinner. It was a 6 pound roast and we have ZERO leftovers! One of the missionaries, Elder Hunt, is the smallest missionary I have ever seen (he has Cystic Fibrosis) and he ate about 1/4 of the roast, it was AMAZING!! Spencer had carved the roast and I had told him to cut it like bread, when I turned around his first cut had been about an inch and a half thick. I about died! Elder Hunt ate half of that piece AFTER he had already eaten a whole steak. When he was finished with that half, he ate the other half! We were all amazed. To accompany it I made mashed sour cream sweet potatoes with a little blue cheese mixed in, not much of that left either and I made a HUGE batch. The potatoes were so yummy, I think Elder Hunt ate the majority of those too. Then I made a salad that was probably the BEST salad I have ever made. Oh my heck! It had Granny Smith apples in it along with pomegranate, mushrooms, and bacon. Then I got the Blush Wine Brianna's Dressing...need I say more. It was so good that the other Elder, Elder Stafford ate the rest of the salad with the actual salad serving fork that we used because my mom had already taken his plate. It was pretty funny. I then made some baguettes to go with it all, and it was awesome. We had gingerbread for dessert and during dessert Elder Hunt shared a really interesting message with us, it was really neat. It was snippets of Zacharia Chapters 1 and 2 and it made it sound like they were talking about Santa, it was really neat.

Christmas morning was fun. I love it when the girls come down stairs and see all the presents, it brings the magic back in Christmas for me. I kind of lost the magic when we had kids and they were old enough for Santa. But today really healed that for me, I hid in the kitchen while they came down the stairs and it was childhood all over again. Very special.

A tradition we have started is a letter from Santa talking about Jesus and the true meaning of Christmas. We are really glad that we have started that tradition. CJ had found it and read it then came into the kitchen while I was making breakfast and started to read it to me.

We had our traditional breakfast of cardamom bread, hot chocolate, and fruit salad. I made an adjustment on the salad and added pomegranate to it, I think I will start making that our tradition because we ALL LOVED it. I also made orange rolls to go with breakfast, it was sublime. We then opened presents. Avary was so excited she was about ready to crawl out of her skin, she could hardly wait.

We opened presents youngest to oldest, Avary couldn't wait any longer so we let her go first.

CJ got a special gift this year, she lost a top tooth and got a dollar from the tooth fairy. They both got what they wanted from Santa, Avary got a Lego Horse Jumping kit and CJ got a dolphin Pillow Pet that she has now named "Squeaky". They both got their own suitcases so now we won't get their clothes mixed up when we travel. They were really happy with their Christmas. I finished quilts for their beds just in time for Christmas and they were really happy about those, we also got them new sheets to match. My mom has started a tradition with them, new PJ's that she gives them on Christmas Eve. This year I talked her into making them, the girls were BEYOND thrilled. They were really sweet and drew pictures for each other and wrapped them and put them under the tree. I love it when they do sweet things like that. They got a few more things like new bath towels, art supplies, new dresses, and $5 each from their Grandpa Herb. Avary made a noodle wreath at school that she gave to me to open. I love treasures like that.

Spencer got one of the girls' pictures. It was from CJ, a night sea dragon, go figure. The girls gave Spencer a Snuggie and they were happy to help him test it out, although it is FAR from cold here (yesterday when I was dropping some goodies off at a friends house there were kids outside at a park playing soccer. Sure, I remember playing soccer on Christmas Eve....NOT). I gave Spencer my traditional gift of hot sauce. He has found a new Tobasco, Chipotle, that he REALLY likes, so much so he practically drinks it. Santa brought us new sheets for our bed and he gave me a fun little magic wand with a mini-pillow (center picture). In case you are wondering, the bottom writing says, "The magic will work as soon as the elves can refill the enchanted bank account." I love Santa, he has great humor. I'm having problems sleeping because of my sciatic nerves and I could really use a body pillow, so when the "elves" refill the "enchanted bank account" I will be getting one. I also got a pair of really nice slipper shoes to walk around in. They have cute pom poms on them that Jersey REALLY likes. Going to have to watch that particular adornment. My sister made my mom a really neat stone plaque and Santa brought her the new Tom Clancy book. She got a lot of stuff from my siblings too that she had opened during the week and then she put them back in the packages and put them under the tree, it was pretty funny. All in all I would say that we had a good Christmas. It was nice not to have a ton of stuff.

Merry Christmas to everyone from us. We love you all and are thinking of you this time of year!

Winter Wonderland

2010-12-18T12:25:00.000-08:00

No snow yet. I think we might still be holding out hope for it, but I'm not going to hold my breath. The decorations went up really nice this year. The weather was so nice and warm, I asked Spencer to hang the lights outside. Of course, the day he did it was the coldest day that week. He did it anyway and it turned out GREAT!!

The girls take turns every year putting the star on the tree. Last year was Avary so CJ got to do it this year. They could hardly wait to get that star on top of the tree, it was so funny.

The girls decorated the tree all by themselves this year. I helped with the high stuff, but they basically did it all. They were really excited and it really turned out cute.

We decided since we don't have snow outside, we should have snow inside. The girls, Spencer, and my mom all cut out paper snowflakes and we hung them from our ceiling in the living room. It turned out really neat.

I'm thinking we should do it every year.

We are all getting excited for Christmas, especially the girls. We have an advent calendar that my sister made us and every day they make sure to put the next day up on the calendar. They keep counting down the days until Christmas. It is really funny because everyday they get more and more excited, if that is even possible but they do it.

Road Trip to Utah

2010-11-30T08:55:00.000-08:00

So, about a week before we left for Utah for my brother-in-law's wedding, we had our ultrasound done. We found out it was a boy, in case you all didn't hear by now. The tech was so good at getting good photos of the baby. There was one where he was laid out with his feet crossed and a hand behind his head. She even showed us a his bicep, it was really neat. Anyway, here is a picture of our little boy:

We are ALL so excited! The girls jumped up and down and cheered when they found out. We had balloons filled with "baby boy" confetti and we had them pop them. They were really excited. My mom was in the hospital at the time, so we made a little puzzle for her to do with the boy symbol on it and she was able to do that in the hospital (we didn't think the staff would be too pleased with the confetti in the balloons trick at the hospital).

Spencer's brother, Ricky, got married this last week, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. It's funny because I didn't meet Courtney, his new wife until we saw each other in the Sealing Room of the Temple. It was bizarre, but she is so cute and they are so cute together. We did talk though over the phone a lot. I can't wait to actually get to know my new sister-in-law! Of course I did the cake! It was really fun, despite the blizzard that came into Cache Valley before and during the reception. Anyway, I'm getting a head of myself here. We left for Utah the Friday before Thanksgiving. The girls did a really good job with the travel. They were pretty cute:

We took my mom with us and dropped her off in Salt Lake at my Aunt's house so that she could spend Thanksgiving with family. We didn't run into any weather on the way there or on the way back. We kept a really close look on the weather. Ricky and Courtney got married in the Salt Lake Temple so we decided to stay with Spencer's cousin, Rachel (she used to live here and we became good friends). They live in Farmington and we thought the girls would really have a good time playing with their cousins Sabrina and Oliver. They had SO much fun! So much in fact that the girls wouldn't calm down when it was time to go to bed so Sabrina ended up having to sleep with her parents the whole time we were there.

They have a fun little playroom that the girls spent most of their time in. Avary thought it was our new house and CJ decided that when we move, we need a house just like Rachel's. It was such a fun time staying with them. They even introduced me to a new game called Settlers of Catan. I'm strongly addicted to it now, thank you very much! I was able to finish the cake at the house, with the help of Rachel and Spencer. It was probably one of the easiest cakes I've done.

The ceremony was beautiful. The wind was blowing quite a bit and there was a blizzard warning for Cache Valley for around 3:00 that afternoon, so we had to leave the Temple a little early and get back to Rachel's so that we could make it through Sardine Canyon before the blizzard hit. We made it just in time!! I wish I could have taken pictures of what blew in, but our camera ran out of batteries. It was a COMPLETE white out. I don't think I have EVER seen a snow storm like it in my life. What was even more impressive was the amount of people that actually showed up to the reception in weather like that. The reception was at a beautiful new event center in Hyde Park, just North of Logan, called Castle Manor. It was breathtaking! We were able to get there around 2:30 so I was able to spend a lot of time making sure the cake was perfect.

Of course now that I look back on it there are some things I would do different, but it really turned out beautiful and most importantly Ricky and Courtney LOVED it! When I knew cakes were my passion, I knew that when Ricky got married I would do a surprise groom's cake for him, so I did:

Ricky LOVES John Deere. I knew I was going to make him a John Deere cake and so I did. It turned out so awesome! All the kids loved it and it was a great surprise for Ricky.

By the time the reception was about over, the snow had stopped and it was alright to drive. We stayed the rest of the week in Lewiston with Spencer's family spending Thanksgiving with them. Well, everyone but Ricky and Courtney, they were in Jamaica on their honeymoon.

It was a good trip. We even drove down to Salt Lake on the Friday after Thanksgiving and had lunch with my Dad. The girls had fun playing with his Playdough and CJ "asked" Spencer to make her a dragon out of the Legos (I say "asked" because it was more of a demand) so he did. It was good to see him.

We decided to leave a little early because of more storms blowing in so we left the next day for home. We made it in not great time because we stopped off in Cheyenne for dinner. We first had stopped at a Village Inn and it took 10 minutes for someone to actually acknowledge that we had stepped into the room. We had decided to take our business somewhere else when they FINALLY came to seat us. We still left. The girls were really wanting breakfast for dinner, so we found an IHOP about ten minutes away. We were sat right away and everything seemed fine until our waitress came back AFTER taking our order and asked where our menus were AFTER she had already taken them away. This was about 20 minutes after we had ordered. THEN she proceeded to take our order AGAIN and in the middle of writing our order, she dozed off a couple times and then snapped back awake acting like nothing had happened. Her handwriting reminded me of the movie "Awakenings" with Robin Williams and Robert De Niro, it would start fine and then trail off. You can imagine our hesitancy after the experience we had at the Village Inn. Spencer asked her if she was OK and she said yes. After she had left, he found the manager and told him what had happened. He said that he was sending her home, I guess she had a rough day, and that our ENTIRE meal was on the house. We felt really bad for her and made sure that she had a proper ride home, we didn't feel good about her driving home. We were even prepared to pay for her cab, but the manager informed us that her daughter was going to drive her home. He made sure our order was put into the computer and when we got our order it was right except a few additions. It was all good though, we left her a $10 tip because we figured she needed it. Later on Spencer told me that while I was in the restroom with Avary, the waitress had come up to the table and had apologized and explained that she has kidney problems. The only thing I can figure out is that the medication she takes makes her tired and forgetful. Needless to say, we are NOT going back to Cheyenne to eat again. That was enough for us! It was an all in all good trip though, but we are sure glad to be home!

Halloween Festivites

2010-11-02T07:39:00.000-07:00

It was a fun week of Halloween festivities. It was the start of the girls fall break from school. They got a whole week, I like having it during Halloween. We started the week with our ward trunk-or-treat. It was really fun. We had a Chili cook off and I entered my unchili chili (loaded baked potato soup). That soup went faster than any of the chili's, it felt good that people liked it, but I didn't win. They only had prizes for ACTUAL chili, go figure. I was impressed because it was the first time I have EVER made it. Doubt I can make it that good again though. Anyway, it was a fun night. I even got my mom to dress up, took a lot of convincing but the girls helped quite a bit! Spencer was a bat-man (not THE batman but a bat-man):

He was pretty clever about it, he threw it together about 20 minutes before we left for the trunk-or-treat. He used a garbage bag for his wings. The girls were tooth-fairies. We used recital costumes from CJ's first year of ballet and her last year ballet recitals. It worked out well, we thought:

Avary said she was a "Princess ballerina tooth fairy", but we just said a tooth fairy. I dressed up too, I went incognito. We took pictures but I had a couple "accessories" in the pictures that I really didn't want to "show". I went to Walmart because all my pants that fit me were dirty and got some Halloween camouflage pants and wore a black shirt and one of my black chef hats from school. I got a lot of compliments on it. LOVE the pants, so comfy!!!

The Tuesday and Thursday before Halloween, the girls did their Halloween dances at ballet. They did such a great job! I took video, but I don't know how to post it to my blog yet. Hopefully Spencer can help me out one day.

The following Friday we went to Spencer's work to trick-or-treat there. There are 3 buildings to his work and we only went to 2......we had to empty the girls buckets TWO times and they filled them up a third. They always clean house there. Avary had changed her mind by then what she wanted to be for Halloween so she is a cat and CJ is still a Tooth Fairy:

On Saturday CJ had a birthday party to go to for one of the boys in her primary class. She got to eat "Mummy Dogs" while she was there. I thought it had spoiled my plan on having mummy dogs for dinner that night but she was all for having more. So, we had mini-mummy dogs for dinner that night with sweet potato fries. They were good too! I had sliced my thumb pretty good earlier that morning and I couldn't really roll the mummy dogs, so Spencer and the girls did it for me. At first Spencer was helping, but then they started to run out of dough and Spencer was doing that and the girls ended up making most of the dogs. I was so proud of them, they are really growing up and learning a lot!! That night they decorated a pumpkin with a kit that their Grandma and Grandpa Schumann sent them. The pumpkin turned out really cute:

The girls woke up on Sunday wanting special pancakes. They weren't the "special" I thought they would be, like pumpkins or something like that. Spencer was up and letting me sleep in and they went up to him and asked for "Hello Kitty" pancakes. When they ask, they get:

I am always so impressed when he does stuff like this for the girls, especially when it is stuff he has no idea about, but the girls had a puzzle of Hello Kitty so he could figure it out. Halloween on a Sunday is sure different here in Colorado than Utah. We were hopeful in having kids come to our door on Saturday, but none showed. They showed on Sunday though, but we had made a decision to not hand out candy on Sunday, so we put a "Sorry, no candy" sign on our door. We heard kids screaming almost all night though because of our next door neighbor, Eduardo. He ALWAYS does something awesome in his garage for Halloween that makes kids run screaming down the street. We were hoping to get rid of all the "gross" candy by handing it out to trick-or-treaters on Saturday, but our plan didn't work. Now we have two ginormous bowls full of candy. Hope everyone had a great Halloween!!!

Last Post From the Past

2010-10-11T08:40:00.000-07:00

In July, my oldest brother Reed (Spike) came with his daughter Lara and visited for a couple days. We had a LOT of fun with them. We took them to the beach. He thought we were kidding seeing how it is Colorado, but he realized that we had a good spot to go to. We went to Aurora Reservoir and had a really good time.

Spencer really did have fun, I think.

Lara wanted Spike to bury her in the sand. I think he had a little too much fun:

She didn't take in account that sand goes everywhere. She spent quite a bit of time in the water after she got out.

We had a little scare while we were there. The girls were playing with the buckets and wanting to get water to put in the hole that Spencer built. Avary swam out a little too far and filled her bucket and it sort of dragged her under. We heard the whistle and when I looked I knew it was Avary. The little stinker wouldn't let go of the bucket. Spencer was down there with the girls, but he didn't realize it was Avary that the lifeguard was going after. We took a little break after that. But then she wanted to go back into the water. We explained to her that she can't use the buckets like that and if that was to EVER happen again, to LET GO! I think she got the picture.

After we ate lunch, my second brother Shaun called to come and visit. When Spike told him we were at the beach he thought he was kidding too. I guess Aurora Reservoir is pretty new and when Shaun lived out here with his family a while back, they didn't have it. They ended up coming and visiting with us at the beach until we had to leave.

After the beach we went home and had an early dinner and we got all gussied up and went out on the town. Spike had bought us all tickets to see "South Pacific" while it was here. It was great. The girls liked it for about 20 minutes and then they played on mine and Spencer's gadgets the rest of the night. We got home pretty late because on the way home we ran into a check point to see if we had been drinking. The girls were SO tired! The next morning Spike and Lara left and we all realized we didn't put on enough sunscreen and we were all lobsters! We had a great time though.

Happy 5th Birthday, Avary!!!

2010-10-03T12:01:00.000-07:00

Well, this years September birthdays were not too exciting except Avary's. Spencer's grandpa had passed away and he was out of town for my birthday so my mom took me out to Texas Roadhouse to celebrate. Then when Spencer came home we all went to Olive Garden to celebrate mine, my mom's, and Avary's birthday. Since mine and Avary's birthdays were on Sundays, we just hung out and relaxed, we did presents with Avary though.

Avary had a really good birthday, she got a lot of horse stuff.

This is her Pillow Pet from Spencer and me. She was SO excited when she opened it up, it's a Unicorn.

These are paint and play horses from my mom. CJ got dragons for her birthday and Avary wanted the horses. She was excited to open these too.

She got this cool ball from her Grandma and Grandpa Schumann. At first we didn't know what it was, but then Spencer figured it out.

The girls really had a fun time with it. Unfortunately it popped a couple days later. CJ gave her a book of horse puzzles. I didn't get a good picture of those so I don't have them on here.

I asked her what she wanted for dessert on her actual birthday. She decided that she would wait for cake for her birthday party so.......

She settled for fresh peach cobbler.

The next Saturday we had her birthday party for all her friends. I talked her into a costume party, it wasn't that hard to talk her into it. She had a lot of fun that day.

Of course, a My Little Pony cake. I didn't make this one. When I was pregnant with Avary, CJ had a birthday and I bought that cake from the store so I decided I was going to do that this time too. It sure was a lot easier. It actually tasted really good. I took her to pick it out and she picked all the flavors herself. She had a chocolate cake with strawberry filling and a whipped "cream" icing. We were impressed.

We had a pinata that was a Unicorn. I can officially say that my girls HIT like girls. All the other kids whacked the snot out of that unicorn and CJ and Avary barely tapped it, it was pretty funny.

More horse stuff.

I was glad that I was feeling OK for her birthday. I was afraid that I wouldn't feel good, but it worked out. Especially since we also fed the missionaries that night.

Summer Wildlife Roundup

2010-09-23T16:34:00.000-07:00

This summer, I've been riding my bike home from work most days. Along the way, I've seen quite a bit of wildlife. I took a few pictures (with my phone, so the quality isn't great). I saw about 10 to 15 deer total, and here is one of them:

You might have to look hard, but it's in there!

I also saw two coyotes, but I didn't take pictures of them. One was running under a fence and was only about 10 feet away from me.

Today, as I was cruising up a gentle hill, I saw a snake on the bike path directly in front of me. I saw it just in time to skid to a stop with my front wheel about 3 feet away from it. It was a rattle snake! It coiled up but didn't try to strike. You can just barely make out the rattle in this picture (click for a larger view of this and all the other pictures):

After I took the picture and calmed down a bit, I decided to detour around it through the grass. Here are a couple more pictures from the other side. You can see some skid marks above it in the pictures where I came to a stop. One of those is mine. I don't know if the other one is an old one or if someone else did the same thing.

To give this a sense of scale, I'd say the path is about 6 to 8 feet wide. I didn't try to stretch the snake out and measure it, but I'd say it was about 3 feet long.

I'm pretty sure I saw another rattle snake in this same area a couple of years ago, but that time I was going downhill and I just swerved around it and kept going.

So that's my wildlife roundup. Maybe next summer I'll start carrying around a better camera for some better shots!

Grandpa Schumann

2010-09-08T08:55:00.000-07:00

"God saw you were getting tired
when a cure was not to be.
So he put his arms around you and
whispered, "Come to me".
With careful eyes we watched you.
We saw you pass away.
Although we loved you dearly,
we could not make you stay.
A golden heart stopped beating,
hardworking hands to rest.
God broke our hearts to prove to us,
He only takes the best."

-Author Unkown

Dear sweet Grandpa Schumann passed away last night at home. We will miss him so much. He was such a fun and loving man.

Spencer and I have been reminiscing about some things that we remember. I think the favorite memory of ours is when we had a "spoon on the nose" contest. It was so fun. Spencer, Ryan, Cami, Addie, me, and Grandpa all put spoons on our noses after some big dinner at my in-laws. We all had a contest to see whose spoon would stay on the longest. Grandma Schumann sat there saying, "Oh Henry" and we all waited to see whose spoon would stay on the longest. Grandpa won by a long shot! I have NEVER seen anything plastered on so tight in my life!! He would shake his head and that poor spoon was stuck on his nose until he pried it off. We were all laughing so hard, except Grandma of course, but we all had such a fun time with that. I tried to find the picture but I can't find it.

This picture was taken when we went to Utah for Ryan's farewell. The girls had so much fun with the dog. They ALWAYS loved to see Grandpa move his little "finger". (He was missing a finger on his left hand, you can see it in the picture.) Anyway, they always asked him to show it to them. He will be missed.

We love you Grandpa! We will always remember your laugh and your love of family.

(I love the song I put on our blog for Grandpa. Especially the last verse, I think of him when I hear it.)

Ballet Recital

2010-09-06T08:00:00.000-07:00

The girls had their Ballet Recital in June. They both did so well, we were SO proud of them! This was Avary's first year and CJ's second. I LOVED their costumes. Avary's dance was to Celine Dion singing "What a Wonderful World". CJ's dance was to Tim McGraw's "My Little Girl". They were such beautiful ballerinas and the songs just fit them both.

This picture above was taken before the recital. They were so precious!

Avary's dance was first:

A few dances later it was CJ's turn:

They did so good. After ward I went backstage to get them. When I found them they both had been crying. CJ, because people were being too loud and she had a head ache from allergies, and Avary because she wanted me, I guess she missed me.

Spencer gave them both flowers. CJ was funny because she kept telling him not to forget her flowers. It wasn't too much of a surprise but they really enjoyed them. The flowers stayed around for a while too, I was really impressed! Anyway, we got a DVD this year, but it wasn't as good as last year's. At least we have it though.

More Updates - Preschool Graduation

2010-09-01T20:34:00.000-07:00

So, back in May Avary graduated from preschool. It was quite an ordeal. I was really impressed and happy with the preschool that we chose. I am definatly going to go there again. Anyway, for graduation the kids put on a "Music Show". It was one of the cutest things I ever did see. They sang and danced and looked awesome. They told us to dress the kids up like American Idols. It was really fun dolling Avary up.

She sure had a lot of fun, I was so glad.

Her teachers just loved her, who wouldn't. Here are some pictures of her teachers.

This is Ms. Teddybear. They give fun names to themselves so the kids remember their names. I don't even remember their real names!

And this is Ms. Jellybean. It was funny because her actual license plate said "JellyB".

It was a lot of fun. They even had root beer floats for us after ward with some snacks, Spencer was ALL over that!!

Back to School

2010-08-19T10:38:00.000-07:00

Well, the girls started school earlier this month. CJ's first day was the 4th and Avary's was the 11th. They started quite early this year and they are getting out WAY early, April 28th. I keep thinking that the kids are going to start their "Summer" break when there is still snow on the ground, insane!

Avary is now in Kindergarten! They started all day Kindergarten this year. When she gets home she is pretty tired. I love her teacher. She is young and very spunky. I think Avary is going to do real well in her class. She was so excited to start school. Everyday when we would drop CJ off she would ask how many more days she had left to go to school. It was real sweet. She begs me for hot lunch, which is different, but for now we are just doing cold lunches. Avary couldn't carry her backpack the first day because it made her topple backwards.

CJ is now in 2nd grade. She is really enjoying it. She seems to be doing better in 2nd grade so far than 1st grade. I'm hoping it keeps up. We are having a hard time getting her to actually EAT lunch. It is so funny how the two of them are so different. CJ's backpack was really heavy this year. She was funny carrying it because she had to make sure she walked hunched over or else she would loose her balance and fall back. She thought it was pretty funny.

It sure is different having them both in school all day now. I'm getting quite bored, especially lately because of feeling so sick all the time. Hopefully I will start getting used to it a bit more. I know it will be better when my mom gets back from Utah. Then at least I can talk to an actual person instead of the dog.

Update

2010-07-19T08:31:00.000-07:00

Well, sorry it has been a while, busy summer I guess. You will all have to forgive me because I have some catching up to do and I will have to post later blogs that happened earlier. But, I will get it done. We have some fun stuff coming up, so bear with us. I will start with the most recent and then move backwards until I'm all caught up, and I apologize if it turns into just an explanation of pictures and stuff instead of an actual story.

So, for CJ's birthday her Grandma and Grandpa (Candy) Schumann gave her, I don't know what they are called, but it is where she kinda "sews" yarn through a canvas type thing that has a picture on it. (If you understand that, BLESS YOU!) Here's a picture of her attempting it:

We accidentally left her alone with it with a pair of scissors near by and she "cut it out". She hasn't worked on it since, but I hope she will be able to do it. She cut a little close to the colored spots so I don't know if it will work or not. I've never done one, Spencer seemed to know what to do with it.

We are doing Family Home Evening now in our home. It sure has been fun. We have had some fun activities and some not so fun activities but this one was fun. I found it in one of the Friend magazines:

We cut apart an egg carton and painted them. Then we strung them with pipe cleaners and put tissue paper inside. They really turned out cute. We still have them in our family room.

My mom decided to make skirts for the girls. She had this cute pattern and found some really cute fabric that she wanted to make into skirts. They took her FOREVER, but the girls really love them:

These are the skirts that go along with CJ's "Crazy Quote". There is a woman in our ward that we have really become great friends with. She saw the skirts my mom was working on and begged her to make her girls one. Those took forever too. It's a lot of skirt and they are surprisingly heavy. I think she figured that a skirt like CJ's has about 21 yards of just the ruffles.

For July 4th we didn't really do a whole lot since it was on a Sunday, but we did make a special breakfast. Flag Waffles:

They are definitely a once a year type of treat, they took a while to make. They tasted really good. We celebrated the 4th on the 5th. It was Family Home Evening so for the activity, of which I had, we lit off some fireworks. I found probably the last standing fireworks stand in Colorado and they had an awesome sale going on that day, buy one get one free, or everything half off. I got some really awesome big fireworks for nothing at all, we had a blast!

It was Kidspree again in Aurora. Spencer took the girls last year and they wanted to go again this year. They call it the fun place. They had a ton of fun. I didn't go because I was busy getting ready to feed the missionaries that night. Here are some pictures of the stuff they did:

I'm going off of what Spencer told me. There is a TON of stuff to do at this Kidspree thing, and it is all free. I guess there was a guy there actually making Tops for the kids and then the kids got to paint theirs the way they wanted. They both came home and were so excited about their tops. They are really good Tops too. This next picture is from their Musical Petting Zoo. They have a ton of instruments there for the kids to play with.

I guess CJ liked the Cello the most.

This next picture is from their life size Candy Land:

And then they got to paint. When the three of them got home they were ALL covered in paint. These are houses they are painting:

Well, I guess that is it for now. Stay tuned for more stuff that we did 2 months or so ago.

Spirit Week

2010-05-14T09:07:00.000-07:00

This week was Spirit Week for CJ at her school.

Monday was pajama day. CJ wore her unicorn pajamas to school. Poor Avary wanted to wear her pajamas that day too, but we were actually going shopping and she had ballet that day. I told her that when she is in kindergarten she will have a pajama day and she can wear them then. She liked that idea.

Tuesday was twin day, but CJ didn't really coordinate with anyone, so she didn't do anything special.

Wednesday was stuffed animal day. Avary and CJ got all the money they had and each bought themselves these stuffed horse animals from Barnes & Noble. They are actually kinda cute, they are all sorts of different colors. Anyway, CJ wanted to take that to school. I told her that she needs to leave it alone when it is time to do work, but she didn't and she had to lower her star once that day.

Thursday was crazy day. They told the kids that they could just go crazy and wear crazy clothes. CJ was so excited for this. We got her clothes out in the morning and got her all gussied up.

I put four braids in her hair and attached Halloween socks to two of them. She wore two different shoes, and leg warmers. She had a lot of fun. Avary thought CJ was sure crazy when she left for school.

It was really fun dressing CJ up. It was hard to dress her crazy because she is just too dang cute. When I finished with her hair, it didn't really look crazy, it looked really cute. Four more days of school for CJ and she is done, I can't wait!

Happy "Mothter's" Day

2010-05-11T13:17:00.000-07:00

I had a really good Mother's Day. The girls get up earlier than I am wanting to get up, but Spencer got up with them so I could sleep in. The girls made sure that they were quiet while I slept, the first in....ever! When I finally woke up, Spencer and the girls were making pancakes for my mom and me. They tasted so yummy. The girls were really excited about them. After church, Spencer made dinner for us. He made baked potatoes and all the fixings for them. It tasted so good. For dessert he had gotten a frozen Razelberry pie, my favorite, with some vanilla ice cream. It was really nice to have a day off. The girls drew us cards of their own. Earlier in the week Avary had made me a little hanging glove with flowers in it for Mother's Day. CJ had made me this cute little poem teapot thing at school. It has a really cute poem in it:

"Here's a gift for Mother's Day:
I'll try my best in every way.
But when you get upset with me,
Relax and have a pot of tea!"

It is really cute. Spencer gave me a yogurt maker and he also made his own card. He has written on the front of the card, "Happy Mothter's Day". He didn't notice the extra "T" until he was coloring it in. Extra special. Anyway, it is like a little book. He drew pictures and everything. Inside it says:

"This Mother's day, I want you to know how much I love you.
I love you more than ice cream. (I'd rather make you melt any day.)
I love you more than watching sports. (which I'm sure you already knew.)
I love you more than candy.
I love you more than rollercoasters.
I love you more than video games.
I love you more than computers. (They could never love me back.)
I love you more than airplanes.
I love you more than I can measure.
I love you more than the sunrise.
I love you more than all the treasures of the world. (Their bling is nothing compared to yours.)
I love you more than all the world.
I love you more than all the universe.
I love you with all my heart,
Now and forever."

I love it when he makes me cards. It is really cute. The pictures are pretty funny like the airplane picture he drew his airplanes that he has and he shows one crashed and missing a wing. It is pretty fun. I have a great husband. He even did all the dishes.

We hope every mother had a great Mother's day.

Happy 7th Birthday CJ!!!

2010-04-17T19:35:00.000-07:00

Our first born is now 7! I can hardly believe it. We sure had a fun day for her birthday. So fun in fact that we were ALL ready for bed early.

We started the festivities last night, Friday, at Chuck-E-Cheese. Not great food but we ALL had a blast! Aunt Analee (my sister from Alaska) was here and we had a lot of fun.
CJ especially had fun on the little race horse that they had there:

She really couldn't get enough of the dang thing! It was pretty funny watching her on it.

This morning we started with waffles. CJ wanted a pajama birthday party with her friends so we did that. We played games that CJ wanted to play. When we asked her what games she wanted to play she told us "Pin the Tale on the Dragon, and Musical Chairs." We don't have enough chairs or room for chairs so we came up with the idea of Musical Pillows. Spencer drew a Dragon for the Pin the Tale game and CJ colored it:

She even chose the picture for Spencer to draw. It was really fun. Here are some fun pictures from her party:

CJ wanted a vanilla cake with raspberry icing and green dots, so that is what she got. It tasted pretty good.

This is Abby:

This is Gaby:
It was fun trying to specify between the two. After we had cake we opened the presents. CJ got some really fun stuff. Her friend Jamie gave her a stuffed bear that they all got to sign, Corinne gave her a really cute lunch box, Abby gave her some make-up, Gaby gave her a dress-up Barbie, Avary gave her a package with two Barbies in it with puppies to "walk", Aunt Analee gave her a box of Bendaroos (she has really wanted those), her Grandma and Grandpa Schumann gave her some fun craft stuff, Grandpa Stockman gave her some money that she is protecting with her life, and then she came to Gee Wah's present. A while ago the girls and Spencer were at Barnes and Noble and CJ found these things that she called "Painter Dragons". Well......

Need I say more? She was SO excited she had tears in her eyes. Then Spencer and I gave her a Dragon kite, a new bike helmet and:

A brand new bike that she can actually fit on. She was so happy with her birthday. I think all the kids were:

Bottom row: Abby, CJ, Corinne. Middle row: Gaby, Jamie. Top: Avary.

They have these fun lip whistles in their mouths, it was really hard to get a good picture because they were all so hyper and moving all over the place. It was really a great and fun two hours, but I'm so glad it is over. For her birthday dinner we went to Cici's, her choice. She loves the Mac n' Cheese pizza there. I'm glad we pulled it off because a couple days ago I got really sick. we were afraid that we were going to have to cancel the party, but fortunately it was just a 24 hour thing. Doing much better now. I think I surpassed my quota for the decade!

Happy Birthday to our little girl!!! WE LOVE YOU!!!!

P.S. These are just some pictures from a while ago. The girls in their Easter dresses:
Pictures really don't bring these two justice!!

A cute outfit that CJ put together all by herself:

It actually looked pretty cute on her, I was really impressed because usually I have to make a couple adjustments, but I didn't have to with this outfit.

The Thomas the Train cake I did for my nose doc:

It really turned out really cute. I was really happy with it and so was she. I guess her son just had a fit when he saw it and she wants me to leave her some cards next time I am in. Here's hopin'. Keep your fingers crossed!!

HAPPY EASTER!!!

2010-04-04T07:58:00.001-07:00

Happy Easter everyone! Our Easter started WAY too early this morning. The girls were up and around at 6, WAY too early, but the girls were very excited about the "goings on" in our house. We had quite the busy household last night. Of course the Easter bunny came and left the girls some fun goodies and stole the dresses I got for them out of my closet and displayed them with their baskets:

Then, we had another visit from the Tooth Fairy:

Last night at dinner, CJ was eating cherries and lost her other tooth. It was really funny because every time our waiter came by our table she would show him her hole in her face by grinning and sticking her tongue through the hole. He got a kick out of it. (Every "girls night out" we go out to dinner while Spencer goes to Priesthood.)

We had a fun week. The girls had Spring Break this week so we were able to do some fun stuff. Tuesday we went to the park by our house. The weather was so beautiful that day. I think it actually got up to 80 that day, but the breeze was nice and cool. The girls really had a lot of fun. I think they are ready for the summer to start. On Wednesday we went to the Zoo. That was an adventure because when we got there at 10:30 (they open at 9) there were NO parking spaces! The line of cars was ridiculous! We were in the line for about a half hour just to drive by the zoo and find another parking area. We had to park about a mile away from the zoo and walk to the gate. When we got there the line was so long that we had to stand there for about another half hour. By the time we got through the gates, went to the restroom because we had been in line so long it was 12:30 and time for lunch. It was SO crowded, especially in the buildings with animals. The girls had fun though. By the end of the day, I so didn't want to walk back to the car, but we had to anyway. We were ALL so tired that night and the next day. On Thursday we tried shopping but didn't make it that far due to cranky kids, go figure. Friday was our huge shopping day. We went and got all our groceries for Easter. The girls love to get out and go shopping. They were still a bit cranky that day too. They need to sleep longer in the mornings. We went to Costco and got these strawberries that are...well, see for your self:

Spencer calls them apples. I think he might be right. They are the biggest strawberries I have ever seen! Very yummy too! Saturday we colored eggs:

The girls had so much fun coloring and decorating the eggs. They each chose 3 colors and we all shared. The Easter Bunny had hidden them around our main level this morning. The girls had fun looking for them. They found every egg so we won't have to worry about strange smells later this week.

It has been a fun and VERY exhausting week. School starts back tomorrow, I hope they won't give too much grief. Happy Easter!!

First Tooth, Recovery, and Weather

2010-03-23T14:06:00.001-07:00

Well, it has finally happened! CJ is officially physically growing up! She lost her first tooth yesterday, March 22, at school. (I know she is growing up, it's just the whole loosing her first tooth thing that has really slapped me in the face about the whole thing is all.) She has another one that is loose too. I think she is going to loose her teeth the same way she got them, all at once! She was so excited about loosing her tooth. I guess when you loose your tooth at school the office gives the kids a little treasure chest to keep it in. She brought it home from school and ran up the stairs to show me that she lost her first tooth. A couple weeks ago my mom made CJ a special Tooth Fairy pillow case:

It is really cute. It has little Fairies all over it and on the rim of the case is a little pocket for the tooth:

Avary wants one so bad. She can't wait to loose her first tooth, she is SO funny! Anyway, the tooth fairy came last night and left CJ a very special, first time only reward of $5:

The Tooth Fairy is going to get cheaper from this moment on. CJ came home from school one day not too long ago excited that her friend, Jaimie, got $5 from the Tooth Fairy. Spencer and I just looked at each other and rolled our eyes. We figure for the first tooth it is OK, but every tooth from here on out is another story. It was funny because last night I bet Spencer that the first thing I was going to hear in the morning would be Avary saying: "The Tooth Fairy gave CJ $5!". So, what was the first thing I heard this morning: "The Tooth Fairy gave CJ $5!" in her, not so cute at 6:30 in the morning, shrill voice. Now she REALLY wants to have a loose tooth.

My surgery went good. I'm recovering well, still a little tender and scratchy in my nose, but my doctor said it will start feeling better from now on.

I had my surgery on the 16th of this month. For some reason I was really nervous about it. Spencer gave me a couple blessings, bless his heart. I went in Tuesday morning still a little nervous, but I was calm and trusting. When I was coming out of anesthesia, I felt them remove the breathing tube from my throat. The nurse was starting to annoy me pretty fast. I finally mustered enough energy to tell her to leave me alone, Spencer laughed. I guess I wasn't breathing good enough and she wanted to wake me up fast so I wouldn't have to stay the night. Before surgery, there was a guy in the space next to me waiting to have a hernia operation, it was his first surgery. It was funny because my doctor came in: (She looks almost EXACTLY like this actress. I love my doctor she is so fun and really funny.)

...and we were talking about her son's birthday cake that I'm doing for her and I apologized for talking about food when we both hadn't had anything to eat for hours. He laughed and said it was OK because it had was already spoiled for him because the first thing he could smell when he walked into the hospital was bacon. Well, that opened up a whole new conversation about bacon. It was nice to talk to people before the surgery because it kept my nerves down. Well, when I woke up from anesthesia, I heard the same guy talking about bacon. It was so odd because it was the EXACT same conversation we were having before I went into surgery. I finally got my oxygen up so I was able to go home and when I got home we immediately started my regiment of alternating ice and micro-current, something my chiropractor suggested. (REALLY glad he did, it was awesome, helped SO much! I licked my lips at one point and accidentally touched the wet tissues I use with it and it felt like a 9 volt battery on my tongue, it was so funky!)

Above is the micro-current and below is the ice pack.

The blood you see is not from my nose. I had a LOT of drainage in my throat and I had to spit it out. It wasn't as bad as it looks. The pictures really make it look terrible, but I expected to hurt a lot more than I did. I wasn't really groggy when we got home from the hospital. Spencer was at my side 24 hours that day. He would give me water, pain meds, food, switch my ice and micro-current, help me to the bathroom, empty my bucket full of tissues from spitting out my drainage (sorry for the detail, it was worse than I am making it), he was AWESOME! I married a WONDERFUL man. He would set the alarm to go off 6 hours after I took my pain meds for bed so he could keep me comfortable and well medicated. :)) It really worked out well. My mom took over the next day, she did a good job too, especially having to take care of the girls as well. It will be so good to be well. I am SO tired of bed! I have a hard time going to bed these days because I have spent SOOOOOO much time in bed this year. In one of the blessings Spencer gave me he mentioned that I would be able to overcome the illnesses that have plagued me this year and I have faith that this will be the end. Poor guy, it is a good thing he had 3 weeks vacation this year because now he is down to 2, give or take a little. It is really sad when he has to use his sick days because of me. He never gets sick anyway, but it is still really pitiful.

Anyway, I went for my post-op check up yesterday. she said things look great, still a little swollen and crusty, but healing nice. I can blow my nose, softly, now and I don't have to use anymore nose sprays, HALLELUJAH!!!!!!!!!!! I almost passed out in the exam room though because she was suctioning my nose out. It was pretty stupid and scary, but she says it is pretty common. I'm back on my feet now, in fact I made dinner tonight, but I am quite tired. I can't wait until this road ends!

Now we are dealing with a TON of snow! We are getting hit pretty hard today. I hope it gets it out of its system because last year CJ had a snowy birthday, I'm hoping for warm this year! She wants a pajama birthday party with her friends. It will be fun to throw a birthday party for her.

Valentine's, Volunteers, Victories, and Verdicts

2010-02-28T08:21:00.000-08:00

Valentine's

Sorry it's been a while since my last post, it has been a little crazy. Valentine's was fun for the girls this year. Avary got to make a Valentine's box for her preschool. It was really fun. I think she used just about every sticker I got out for her.

She was really pleased with her self. It actually turned out really cute. I remember when we did that in grade school. We would have the paper doilies that the teachers would bring. It brought back a lot of memories, it was fun to make a new one with Avary. While Avary was making her box, CJ was doing her own craft project. If you look closely, there is a bug sticker on the end of the tongue (that was her own idea):
Spencer and I went out the Saturday before Valentine's, naturally, and we had a lot of fun. We went and ate dinner at Ruby Tuesday's (ate way too much) and then we went to Chili's for dessert (because Ruby Tuesday's has crappy desserts). When we got home we were both so full, we were in pain and not enjoying it at all. The girl's got stuffed flowers from the Cupid. When they woke up on Sunday, they were wrapped around their beds and they were so happy.

Volunteers

CJ and Avary are starting to take on more responsibilities. I guess this could also fall under the "Victories" category, but what I am really impressed about is how they help without being asked. They are both making their beds in the morning all by themselves, they do a pretty good job too, and they are both helping with the dishes.

CJ got up from dinner one night and started to help my Mom put the dirty dishes in the sink. We were so proud of her. We are still having a little trouble getting them to clean the playroom, but when they do clean it, they clean it really good. I can't believe my girls are growing up so fast!!

Victories

Avary is now in the same swimming class as CJ. She has really soared through her swimming classes. I think she takes after me in the arena (grin). We are really impressed with how well she is doing.

In our ward there are at least six or seven pregnant women and they are ALL having boys, no joke. I was "hired" to do some baby shower cakes. This is a picture of the first baby shower cake I have done, the next one is this week:
I think it is probably the cutest cake I have done so far. It turned out cuter than I had imagined and they were really pleased with it. It tasted way yummy too!

Verdicts

So, after two weeks of being off my really powerful antibiotic, I got ANOTHER sinus infection. When I went to the doctor, who hired me to do her son's 2nd birthday cake, she dropped the bomb that I need to have surgery. The bone spur in my nose is preventing the drainage I need to get rid of all the mucus that is causing the infections, so she is going to go in and remove the spur. I'm excited about not being sick anymore, I have had a sinus infection for 5 months now, but I am NOT excited about the pain and aftermath of surgery. I won't be able to blow my nose for two weeks and I have to sneeze with my moth open so I don't blow out my stitches. She told me that there is a 90% chance this will cure me. I hope I don't fall in the 10%. Wish me luck, I'm going to need it.

Party Festivities and Updates

2010-02-02T21:57:00.000-08:00

Well, I know I'm late getting this out. At least I'm getting it out! Spencer's birthday was fun. It would have been funner if we had more people to share it with, but he enjoyed himself and I was still recovering so I think it worked out great. He got a lot of snacks for his birthday, it's the only dang thing I can think to get that man!! Anyway, it was good. The girls and I decorated the kitchen for when he got home:

It was really fun. I curled the ribbon and the girls strung it on our chandelier. The girls wanted to open presents before dinner so Spencer opened his gifts. Like I said, he got a lot of treats. His parents sent him a big box full of candy and other yummy stuff, he was happy. Avary got a little silly with the tissue paper after Spencer got a little crazy with it:

We ate a chili dinner and then we had cake:

I still was recovering so it wasn't a grand cake, but it was good. I made a Poppyseed cake and then got some English Toffee ice cream, the two really blended well. It was all good. I dressed the girls up really nice for the day. Avary wore her new birthday cake shirt, thanks to Rachel, and I did CJ's hair special:

She got a lot of compliments on it at school that day. I LOVE doing her hair, it is SOOOO fun!

On a bonus note, I went to the ENT... (with thoughts and flashbacks of my parents sitting in the ENT's chair getting needles jabbed up their noses holding a basin and watching puss and blood drain into it)... to find out why I have had problems with sinus infections. Turns out the CT scan showed a bone spur in my nose preventing good drainage, go figure! Leave it to me to have a bone spur in my NOSE!! No surgery, at least not yet. She is going to treat me with other things first so hope those go well. It was really odd, they numbed my nose. That was a freaky feeling. It numbed almost all my top teeth as well. She numbed my nose so she could put a scope up it, another freaky feeling, but all is well. The antibiotics are doing their thing. YAY!!

Happy 31st Birthday Spencer!!!

2010-01-20T10:10:00.000-08:00

I wish I had Spencer's talent for scanning. Enjoy the show!!!!!

Happy New Year!

2010-01-16T09:32:00.000-08:00

Sorry it has been so long. This year, so far, has not been the best. My dear Uncle Keith passed away before New Years and I went to Utah for his funeral. Here is a copy of his Obituary:

Keith Henry Swenson, age 83, passed away peacefully at home on Wednesday December 30, 2009, after enduring a multitude of physical ailments in his old age. He knew much of pain and suffering without complaint in the final ten years of his life and fought valiantly to extend his life. He was born June 10, 1926 to Magnus Henry and Earlinn Eaby Barratt Swenson. He was an only child, but considered his many, many friends as siblings. He always had an amazing love for his beloved parents, and set a great example of devotion and service to them. He graduated from West High. He served a 2 1/2 year mission to Sweden, the land of his ancestry, from 1946 to 1949. His missionary companions and associates became his life long friends, which he maintained through consistent mission reunions. He learned the Swedish language and used it throughout his entire life, keeping in touch with his friends and relatives in Sweden right up to the end. He attended the University of Utah and was on the football team. He married Mary Louise Cummings for time and all eternity on November 6, 1950 in the Salt Lake Temple. They had four children, David (Shelly), Reid (Nola), Mary Ellen, and Paul (Elizabeth). Mary Louise preceded him in death on June 1, 1985. Keith then married Reida Jean Johnson for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake Temple on September 3, 1986 and they have shared a wonderful life together. Reida filled the role of wife, mother and grandmother with love and devotion. Having lived through the Great Depression, Keith valued a good job and frugality. He worked for Bullough Insulation & Supply Co. for 37 years becoming its President. His customers became his close friends. He was a great provider for his family and was honest in all his dealings. He was a faithful and valiant member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was an Elder, Seventy, and High Priest, and served in many callings including Stake Executive Secretary, Bishopric, Stake Missionary, and teacher. Keith was thankful for and loved God's amazing creations and traveled the world to see, photograph, and enjoy them. He loved fine music and enjoyed recordings and concerts. He cherished his pioneer heritage and had a great love for America which he instilled in his family. He felt the urgency of family history and capturing special moments. He will be remembered for voluntarily recording hundreds of meetings, including missionary homecomings, farewells and funerals as a service and gift. Keith had a tender heart and was easily moved to tears over little things. He leaves a legacy of gratitude, love, and testimony. He is survived by his wife Reida, his children, grandchildren David C., Devon, Marcus, James, Cindy, Anika Orrock, Nathan, Jacob, and Emma, and six great-grandchildren. A special thanks to John and Kaloni Taumoha'apai, their live-in care givers, who showed tireless love, kindness, and gentleness right to the end.

It was a beautiful service and a beautiful day.

I stayed with Anthony and Rachel while I was there, Spencer and the girls didn't go, we couldn't afford it. I'm so glad that I was able to go though, it didn't seem right not to. A day before I went I went to an Urgent Care for another sinus infection. The medication started to work, but staying with Anthony and Rachel proved to be too fun and I didn't get much rest due to fun games and the medication stopped working. After the funeral, on my way back to Anthony and Rachel's I got a phone call from a bakery that I interviewed with before Christmas. They offered me a part time position as the only pastry chef. I started that the day after I returned from Utah. I didn't get much sleep because I was so busy trying to get stuff done that they needed in the bakery. Being the only pastry chef I don't get everything that I would like to get done done. Well, a sinus infection turned into a worse sinus infection, flu, and what my doctor calls a "run of bad luck". I have been bed ridden this entire week, so forgive me for not posting earlier. Spencer has been a gem. He has taken great care of the girls and me. I went to the doctor and he did a bunch of tests to see why I have been sick for so long. Most of them came back normal. A CT scan of my sinuses showed that I had a sinus infection (duh) so he started me on a double dose of a stronger antibiotic. I'm done being sick. No more this year!

Before I got really sick, I did CJ's hair like I had mentioned in a previous post. I took pictures so I could show everyone how cool it looks. Avary wanted her pictures taken too so here are a couple pictures of my beautiful girls before church:

Everytime I do their hair like this, a lot of moms come up to me asking me to show them how I do it, it's too funny. Anyway, I think it turns out really fun and the girls really like it when I do their hair.

Well, that is what has been going on in our house since it turned 2010. Spencer's birthday is this week, so I hope I can feel good enough for that so we can celebrate it good.

Happy New Years!!!

Merry Christmas from the Schumanns!

2009-12-26T08:44:00.000-08:00

What a great Christmas we had here in Colorado. It was cold and WHITE!! It was fabulous!!! We hope everyone had a great Christmas! Santa treated us right this year.

The girls wanted a Barbie Vet Table this year for Christmas. CJ even said the blessing on our Christmas Eve finger food dinner and prayed that they would be able to have fun with the Vet Table on Christmas, it was really sweet. Well, Santa couldn't resist:

They really loved it. They didn't react quite as big as I thought they would, but they were really happy. Jersey was really happy too because she got a bunch of new chew toys for Christmas.

We started off by having our traditional hot chocolate, cardamom bread, and fruit salad breakfast. Then we divvied up the presents and started to open them:

The girls were really cute about opening their presents. They helped each other open each others presents:
And then by the end they were opening ALL our presents. I didn't open my last two or three, the girls did it for me. It was really fun. They got some new clothes, Barbie movies, some toys, books, the Barbie Vet Table, and new leg warmers (a lady in our ward that I visit teach makes these for a business and makes hats and hair things to go with):

The girls were so excited about their new leg warmers. They put them on and started dancing around like the little ballerinas they are. Spencer had fun opening his gifts too. He got a laser remote control car that drives on the walls and drives me nuts (from the girls), a remote controlled helicopter, a transformer, ginger ale, and socks. Lots and lots and LOTS of socks (he's been using mine and now I don't have any):

So he wouldn't know that the gift he was opening was socks, I put a little something in the bottom of the box that made it a little heavier:

Our George Forman Grill. He thought it was pretty funny. Among other things, I got a new stereo for our bedroom and a baguette pan so I can make baguettes and not burn towels. Also among other things, my mom got curtains for her room with a curtain rod and a light for her closet. Santa gave the family a Wii and a Wii Fitness Plus. I can't believe we have missed out on all this fun! We wish Anthony and Rachel were still here because we think they would really love it, especially the Tennis (of which I am terribly sore!). We really had a lot of fun for Christmas:

After their bath the girls wanted to go outside and play in the snow. Spencer and I had got them some long johns, snow boots, and hats for Christmas and GeeWah had got them some nice warm gloves so they got all ready:
And headed outside. Jersey had fun playing with them too:

Spencer went outside with the girls while I tried out the Wii, tee hee!! He later told me that Avary would try to do Snow Angels in the snow, but then Jersey would come and start licking her face. She didn't get a Snow Angel done, but maybe today since it is snowing again, WOO HOO!!

We fed the Missionaries last night for Christmas dinner. We had prime rib, mashed sweet potatoes, pomegranate salad (courtesy of my mother-in-law), asparagus, fresh rolls, and Spencer made a Sticky Toffee Pudding for dessert. It was so yummy! I think prime rib is going to be our traditional Christmas dinner.

Merry Christmas and lots of love!!

Anniversary, Cute Hair, Decorations, and Cake

2009-12-20T20:45:00.000-08:00

Today is our 8 year Anniversary. It has been a great first 8 years and I hope it will be a great 88 more.

The weekend before Spencer's cousin moved away, Avary had a sleepover with their daughter, Sabrina. When I went to pick Avary up, Rachel had done her hair up really cute and matched it with Sabrina's. She told me how to do it and when I got home I did CJ's the same way. It was really fun and ever since then, I have been doing their hair that way.

Today for church, I did CJ's hair this way, but I weaved gold ribbon in with it. It was really pretty and everybody at church asked me how I did it, it was pretty funny. I meant to take a picture of it, but I will do it later.

This year we had the girls decorate the Christmas tree. Last year I vowed I would let them make all the decorations and decorate it the way they wanted to.

They have really had a lot of fun doing this. We FINALLY got it finished this last week and we put the star on Saturday night. I think it is quite possibly the cutest Christmas tree I have ever seen, they really did a good job:

The pictures really don't do it justice. You have to see it in its full glory. Anyway, they are quite pleased with themselves and I am very proud of them. I think I will have them do it again next year, we will see.

Avary had her first Birthday party invite for a friend of hers in primary. She had the party Saturday the 19th. It was a princess party and how I wished I had taken my camera. I offered to do the cake for her and her mom was very happy to hear it. She is becoming a good friend of mine, we have WAY too much in common. Anyway, since it was a princess party, the first thing I saw for a cake was this:

I was really happy with the way it turned out. I expected a silver crown, but it worked out really nice. When I took it to the party the mom and little girls were just beside themselves. I love making people happy through food!

All Is Well

2009-12-16T19:19:00.001-08:00

About a year ago, my doctor had found a lump in my right breast. He didn't feel like it was anything to be worried about, but he wanted me to get a mammogram to be safe. I couldn't get the mammogram last year because of funds. When I went to my physical this year, he still felt the lump and still wanted me to get the mammogram. Well, after talking to Spencer, we decided I should get it done. I had my very first mammogram today. I am sure all you women who have had a mammogram can agree with me when I say it was a different and STRANGE position to be in.

Anyway, after the scan, the doctor said that the pictures look normal and not to worry, but they wanted to do an ultra sound as well to make double sure everything was OK. It is. There was nothing there. She called it, "globular tissue". Good to know I have globs in my breasts. Anyway, I thought I would let everyone know I was fine, just in case it got out that I had a mammogram. Now, you have heard it from the horses mouth. I knew I was fine, I have been promised a healthy body, and Spencer gave me a blessing last night. I never felt nervous, I knew everything was going to be fine. I am so blessed to have the blessings and faith to know if something is wrong.

Catch Up

2009-12-03T09:56:00.000-08:00

It has been such a busy time with recovering from all the trips this last month and getting back into our routines, but it finally has happened.

My Grandma's funeral was beautiful. I love Idaho! They gave us a police escort from the freeway exit all the way to the cemetery. We were second in line from the limo and when I looked in the rear view mirror, it was such an awesome sight seeing the line of cars on their way to the cemetery. My Grandma has a big and wonderful family. Before we left, we ordered flowers to put by her casket from the girls and from Spencer and I. When we got to Idaho, I went to the florist to see the flowers. When they brought them out, tears overcame me because they were so much more beautiful than I had imagined.

This one was from Spencer and I. I wanted Calla Lilies so bad, and when we went into the viewing they were placed right by her head, it was perfect.
This one was from the girls. The ribbon on it said, "Gee Wah Great". That is what they called her. It was really special and we are so glad that we got these flowers.

They were such an awesome florist, I wanted to put them in my pocket and bring them back to Colorado with me because all the florists here suck.

Thanksgiving was good for us here. It was just us 5 here at home to cook for and even though there was only 5 of us and not as much food, it still took all day to cook! Amazing how that happens. Avary came home from preschool with a pilgrim hat. When she showed us she said that she was a "pildrum". It was really funny trying to correct her because she was absolutely sure it was "pildrum" and not "pilgrim". Anyway, here is a picture of her in her cute little hat:

She sure likes to pose, too.

Last year I made the promise to the girls that they get to decorate the tree this year. So, we are making all the ornaments for the tree. It has been a great walk through memory lane. The girls are having a lot of fun.

So is Spencer:

We are making things that I used to make as a child for our Christmas tree. We have a long way yet to go, but I think we will make it before Christmas.

In Memorium

2009-11-11T01:52:00.000-08:00

My beautiful Grandma, Cynthia Nebeker Johnson passed away this morning around 2:30, returning to our Heavenly Father and her eternal companion. This slideshow is in memory of her.

My Grandma was the BEST Grandma anyone could ever ask for. She was the sweetest , most loving woman. She was so fun to be around. She always made us laugh, especially playing word games like Scrabble and Quiddler. She had a way of warming your heart even on the coldest of days. Words can't describe my Grandma, she is too special. I'm so blessed that she was in my life and that my girls had the opportunity to know her.

We love you and we will miss you, Gee-Wah Great!

Tyler and Shelly Olsen

2009-11-09T16:22:00.000-08:00

We had the opportunity to go to Spencer's sister's wedding this last week in Logan. We were so happy that she found a wonderful guy to spend her life and all eternity with. He is a great guy, we met him in July I think. Anyway, she asked me to do her cake, of course I said yes, but I also offered to do 300 verrine desserts of the Ginger Pumpkin Torte that I made for my graduation. It was a lot of work, but it all turned out great.

Shelly had a beautiful wedding. The weather was absolutely perfect! It was such a beautiful day and the ceremony was even more beautiful. I found out that the sealer is the second cousin of my Uncle Gordon, which was pretty cool. Anyway, Shelly glowed! She was absolutely RADIANT! It was obvious that these two were matched in heaven. This is a picture one of my favorite bridal pictures of Shelly.

I love the whole standing on a road idea. The pictures of her dress don't bring it justice!! She looked amazing! After the ceremony at the temple we had a luncheon at his home ward near Logan. It was so yummy, though I could have done with more salad! They had us go around the room telling stories about either one of them. CJ wanted to get up and share something, so I let her. It was really sweet. She said that she loved Shelly and that she loves to read and wants to give Shelly a big hug. It was really cute. I ended up getting up to help her put the microphone down and when we were walking back to our seats, everybody started clapping. CJ then stopped and started to bow, it was really funny and cute! I think she stole the show!

They had the reception at the new Athletic Center at Utah State. It over looks the football field which was awesome because he used to play football for the Aggies. Here is a picture of the cake, you can kind of see the football field in the background.

She had seen the cake that I did in school with the chocolate drape and chocolate roses and she fell in love with it. When she told me that she was going to get married, I knew it would have a drape. Her colors were so pretty. The cake turned out really pretty. I is 98% Styrofoam. I only put in a 4 x 4 cake in the corner in the back for them to cut into.

Shelly later told me that it turned out better than she had imagined. I'm so glad that I didn't disappoint her! I really wanted to make it perfect for her. Here is a picture of them enjoying the lemon cake with almond buttercream and white chocolate fondant:

It was a really long day and by the end we were all so tired! One of us didn't quite make it back to the house though:

I couldn't resist taking a picture! She looked so sweet and cute asleep in the car holding onto her flowers. The girls really had fun and loved seeing Shelly in her "beautiful princess dress". They love their new Uncle too. Tyler is really great with the kids. He kind of reminds me of my brother Connin, I think it is the bic-ed head! Anyway, it was great and fun. Welcome to the family, Tyler!! We love ya!

Halloween and other stuff

2009-11-01T19:39:00.000-08:00

So, I was importing pictures off our camera and it fell and bent the connectors, or something like that, and we weren't able to import pictures for a while, but know we have something so I apologize for the "catch up" on stuff.

Here is a picture of my latest cake. I did a first birthday cake for our cousin's, Oliver, birthday.

I did this the end of September. Avary had gotten really sick right before we had to go to the party so she and my mom missed the party. It was really fun, but we missed them.

Then, kind of like my other post, the weather here has been nuts! We had some pretty thick fog come in one morning.

This was taken from our front porch. I was really impressed how thick it was and how fast it rolled in. I love the fog, despite the scary movies my brothers watched around me.

We took a little trip to one of the grocery stores after dinner one day to see the new state record for largest pumpkin.

It looked so fake! It was really weird to see a pumpkin that big and pale. I expected it to be more orange. They said it was real. I wanted to touch it just in case, but it was out in the open. The girls sure loved seeing it. It weighed 1283 pounds. Pretty big!

Then the snow came in. It started Tuesday night and literally didn't stop until Thursday night. We got 12+ inches at our house. It was hard to tell because the wind blew too, but it was pretty cold and wet for a couple days. This is a drift that the wind made in our backyard.

It went all the way up over our tomato plants, or at least what was left of them. The snow even covered the flowers in the flower beds in our front yard and they are big, tall flowers! It was funny to watch Jersey go out and try to explore because she would start and then chicken out. She is happy now to have the yard back to herself.

Now to Halloween. CJ wanted to be a Dragon and wouldn't you know, just our luck that they don't have Dragon costumes for kids, toddlers and babies yes but not kids. Anyway, I searched online for costumes and I found a template to make your own Dragon costume. I emailed it to Spencer and asked him if he thought he could do it and he said he could so Spencer made CJ's costume this year and she helped. She was so excited! Every morning she would want to try it on just to make sure she didn't grow out of it over night, she is so funny!. Avary wanted to be a Fairy Princess. I found her wings and wand on sale and I made her crown. I was very impressed with out everything turned out this year. We went Trick-or-Treating at Spencer's work again this year. The girls really love going and doing that. We met up with Rachel and Anthony and their kids and went around together. We had a lot of fun.

We had missed our Trunk-or-Treat this year because we were all sick, so Rachel and Anthony invited us to theirs. It was so crowded, but the girls again had fun. It wasn't too cold.

The girls wanted to go do more so we started at a friends house that doesn't live too far from us and walked home. It didn't get too cold until we had made it home. When we got home the Trick-or-Treaters were in abundance! CJ even helped give out candy!

She had a lot of fun, they both did. The costumes were great and everybody thought so. Funny thing is, we got a lot of comments on how cool CJ's alligator, no, crocodile, no, dinosaur costume was. In what world does ANY of those have wings!!!???!!!??? It was annoying, but she loved it. At the end she even started to store her candy in the mouth, thanks to Spencer suggesting it.

Tonight we had Rachel and Anthony over for our Halloween dinner since we weren't able to do it last night. It turned out really yummy, I should have taken pictures but I didn't. We had baked bones (manicotti), garbage greens with moldy dressing (salad with blue cheese dressing), snake sticks (garlic bread sticks), blood (pasta sauce and also Hawaiian Punch), and dirt dessert (chocolate pudding with Oreo crumbs and gummy worms). It was really fun. They broke the news to us last week that they are going to be moving to Salt Lake in December. We are so sad that they are leaving. We have really grown close and we are going to miss them, TERRIBLY!

4 Seasons in a Week

2009-10-21T20:18:00.000-07:00

So, the weather here in Colorado is always "interesting". The last 6 days, every season has been represented here in Colorado. Every morning it is cool enough to be Spring mornings. Saturday and ESPECIALLY Sunday it was summer. I think the temperature actually reached high 80's on Sunday. Monday it was a little cooler, so that would be fall as well as yesterday. Today, it has been winter. We woke up this morning to a ground covered in snow and it didn't stop ONCE the whole day. I don't think I have ever seen it snow ALL day here in Denver since we moved. Crazy weather we are having here! The girls absolutely love it though, which makes it all worth while.

Graduation

2009-09-28T19:40:00.000-07:00

Well, I did it. I made it through college. Now, I have all the time in the world.

Graduation went really well. I was so pleased with the way things turned out for my table that I decorated. I accomplished everything I wanted to do for the table and my design worked perfectly for the size of table we were given, 6' x 3'.

So, for graduation, it is required of all the students to do what they call "Portfolio Review". It is where potential employers come and look at things that we can do, want to do, and have learned while we were in school. The school has awards for the best tables. They give one in the Bachelor's program, the baking and pastries, and the culinary program as well as all the other programs in the entire school, but I only really care and know about the culinary awards. It was my goal to get this award, I worked really hard.

Anyway, Friday the 25th was the day. Spencer went and helped me set up and my mom and cousin, Rachel, came a little later. Rachel took pictures for me. She did such a wonderful job, I am so grateful to her for doing that.

Well, here are some pictures of the stuff I did. I decorated 3 dummy cakes, had my physical portfolio there, a framed resume, the laptop showing pictures with music put to the slideshow, and two samples of some desserts that I do, a ginger pumpkin torte and my lime cake.

These are my desserts, the pumpkin ginger torte and the lime cake.

These are gumpaste Mango Calla Lillis that I made. I had a vase of 5 real ones sitting next to it to compare the likeness of them. A LOT of people approached me saying that they thought they were actually real, it made me VERY happy.

My loving and wonderful mother spent all day Thursday stringing these beads for me on wires. Thanks mom!!! Unfortunately you can't really see the beads in the pictures because of the dark background so, I will post another picture of it where you can see the beads later, we haven't gotten around to it yet. And, yes, it is supposed to be lopsided, it is called a Topsy Turvy Cake.

These are two of my good friends that I met during my last year in school. Karen is in the middle and Jennifer is on the end. They are both amazing and talented ladies, and it was an honor to have met them and to call them my friends.

Before we walked for graduation, we were told who won the awards for the three categories in the culinary area. The first time ever there was a tie in the baking and pastries. Two other friends of mine received the awards for the bachelors and the culinary.

I graduated with honors, Magna Cum Laude, and received the "Award of Achievement in Excellence in Baking and Pastries". I was one of the ones that tied! I am very happy and lucky with all the talent that surrounded me.

I am so glad that it is all done and over! I can't wait to spend the holidays with my family instead of doing homework and stressing about the next quarter of school, I am FREE!

Avary's Birthday Party

2009-09-20T08:52:00.000-07:00

What a great birthday Avary had. Thanks to Kathleen, the owner of Mulberries Cake Shop where I did my externship, we were able to have a birthday party for Avary free of charge.

A couple days before her birthday, Avary took cupcakes to preschool for all her class mates and teachers. This year it was a butterfly theme.

They really enjoyed them and when I dropped them off at the preschool, a lot of the parents commented on them and how cute they were. They really did turn out quite cute, Avary was really excited about them.

Then Saturday morning I started making her birthday cake. Like I said it was a butterfly theme so her cake was a butterfly. The deal at Mulberries is she has a room that she rents out for birthday parties. She charges per child and the price includes a 6 inch cake for each child to decorate themselves, a balloon, and a cookie. Kathleen insisted on me having Avary's party there free of charge as a way to thank me for everything I did for her. She is really a nice lady and when we got there, the room was decorated to the hilt, which she normally doesn't do.

We had Sabrina, Avary's cousin, CJ, Alicia, a friend, and Gabriela from next door at the party. They seemed to have a lot of fun.

Here are pictures of the final cakes:

This is Gabriela, our next door neighbor. Avary and CJ adore her. The first thing Avary said that morning to me was she was afraid Gabby wasn't coming to her party. We are so glad that she was able to come. She is just the sweetest girl. They are the BEST neighbors.

This is Alicia, the daughter of some friends we met through Rachel and Anthony, Spencer's cousins.

The birthday girl. She went a little crazy with the icing, but not as bad as CJ.

See what I mean??!! It looks like a jungle, but I don't know exactly WHAT she was going for.
And Sabrina. She kept eating the candy and by the end of the night she was pretty hyper!

After decorating cakes, we had dinner. I made Mac and Cheese from scratch since it is Avary's favorite food in the whole world. She would eat that stuff for breakfast, lunch, and dinner if we would let her. It turned out really yummy. Here is a yummy tip. Instead of bread crumbs on the top of the mac and cheese, try crushed goldfish crackers. We didn't have any bread crumbs so we improvised with goldfish crackers and it was YUMMY! After dinner she opened presents.

She was so funny opening the gifts. She would say, "Oh my oh my!" She gets so excited when she opens presents. She got a bunch of stuff. She was really excited about the pony shirt Alicia gave her, the DR. Barbie we gave her, and the ladybug bean bag that her Grandma and Grandpa Schumann gave her. She was excited about everything. She got some new clothes. Funny story, when she woke up that morning my mom wished her a Happy Birthday and Avary looked at her and said, "My clothes are too small." So, she got some new clothes from her Geewah. She was especially excited about the skirts my mom gave her. Avary does love skirts. After gifts we had cake.

It was a strawberry cake with fondant. The filling icing was strawberry buttercream. It was so moist and yummy. I gave a piece to Kathleen, the owner of Mulberries, and she loved it. That made me feel good. Anyway, it was a great day. Avary had a lot of fun. Earlier in the day while my mom and I were shopping, Daddy took them to the park. The weather was perfect and it was a great day.

Now, off the subject a little. I had a wedding cake to do for the son of a man that Spencer works with this week. The wedding was on Friday. Here are the pictures of the wedding cake and the grooms cake:

The wedding cake from top to bottom was, chocolate cherry with chocolate buttercream filling, lemon cake with lemon curd filling, and almond cake with cherry filling. The groom's cake was chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream filling.

Happy Birthday Little Belle!

2009-09-19T09:57:00.000-07:00

We love you Avary and hope you have a great 4th Birthday!!!

Exit Practical

2009-09-16T22:41:00.000-07:00

So, everybody in either the Associate program or the Bachelor's program has to take an Exit Practical. There is a practical for the savory kitchen and now they have one for Baking and Pastries. An exit practical is where you have a certain amount of time to accomplish a menu of sorts that you are given. Yesterday and today were the days of my Exit Practical. I am SO glad it is over.

Things went well, sort of. Tuesday didn't go great. I got to the practical and found out that the instructor didn't get my ingredients list, that I handed in 3 weeks ago in his in-box, until yesterday. Who's fault is that??? HIS!! He ended up getting all the stuff I needed anyway, but it threw me off and I had an off time. We had to make a torte, 9 truffles with 3 different finishes, a custard dessert and plate it twice, and 2 dozen rolls with 3 different flavors. I scorched my lemon curd for the torte the first time I made it so I wasted a half hour of time I could have used to do more stuff. Then, the top for my torte turned to rubber because I had never made it before and it wasn't setting so I kept putting gelatin in it. I had already put it on my torte when I realized it was rubber. However, when he tasted my torte today, he said the top or gelee was good. Go figure!! Anyway, today was MUCH better. I got everything done, I was very happy. I was actually jumping up and down in the halls laughing and screaming because I was so happy. Here are the pictures of my stuff that I thought up and prepared:

White Chocolate Lemon Almond Torte: Almond cake with lemon curd, white chocolate Bavarian cream, lemon gelee, and tempered white chocolate band with toasted sliced almonds around the bottom.

Open Faced Creme Brulee Sandwich with berry relish, chocolate sauce and raspberry sauce (we had to have 2 different sauces AND a fruit component. The sandwich part was an almond cake that I had used for my torte).

Chocolate Truffles with crushed toasted almonds, white chocolate drizzle, and cocoa powder.

Last, but not least, hard dinner rolls: Kalamta feta rolls, sundried tomato Parmesan rolls, and lemon artichoke basil rolls (they turned out REALLY yummy).

Well, that's it for that. I don't know how I did. I will find out on Friday so, until then!

Happy 70th Birthday Mom!

2009-09-14T20:45:00.001-07:00

This is a tribute to my beautiful mommy. She is 7o years old, acts like 20, and looks only 50. We love you so much Mommy! Happy Birthday.

CJ's First Talk

2009-09-13T21:04:00.001-07:00

Last Sunday, CJ gave her very first talk in Primary. She did so good. She read about half of it by herself and hardly needed any help. We are so proud of her. Here it is:

"My talk is about how I strengthen my family by listening to the prophet. President Hinckley said that when we pray together as a family it will help our homes be happier places, and we will love our parents, brothers, and sisters more. When my family prays together it helps us not to fight. I am nicer to my Mom and Dad, my Grandma, and my sister. Praying together makes us happier.

President Hinckley also said that we should always work to take care of the Spirit of love and respect for each other. If we look for the good in each other and not the bad then there will be more happiness in our homes. When my sister and I fight we always say we're sorry and then we forgive each other, then we are happy again. We should always forgive others. When we do, it makes us happy because we are doing what Jesus and Heavenly Father want us to do.

Choosing the Right and listening to the prophet make us and our families happier and stronger."

After she said "Amen", she leaned in closer to the microphone and said:

"Thank You!!"

It was really cute.

Snowboarding Cake

2009-09-09T20:10:00.000-07:00

Happy 9/9 of 09 everybody! So, I've been doing my externship at a cake shop here in Denver called Mulberries Cake Shop. It's been alright. I would like it better if I were actually decorating cakes, but right now I can't be picky. Anyway, we don't do carved cakes, but I do. A guy called me wanting a mountain cake with a fondant snowboarder. Sure! Why not!? Right? Well, here is a picture of the finished product. Turned out great if you don't mind me saying:

It was a strawberry cake that turned out really yummy, I put fresh strawberry puree in the batter, yummy! Then he wanted it iced in cream cheese icing. It turned out really yummy. Spencer did the "little man" and I did the snowboard.

Spencer was so funny. I got home from Mulberries and saw that he had put facial features on it. I was just going to draw dots for the eyes and mouth. I am so glad I married an artistic man!

Well, as of tonight I have 15 days left to graduation!!! SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited!!! Have lots more stuff to do though, but I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel, so that is good.

Preschool

2009-08-25T19:52:00.000-07:00

Avary started pre-school today. She was so excited to go. She has been wanting to go to school for a couple years now. I'm glad we got her into a pre-school. She isn't crying in this picture I promise. The sun was in her eyes so she couldn't look at me, but it shows the name of the school:
Yes, it is a rec center. They have a pre-school there that actually seems nicer than the one CJ went to. It is really open and bright and they have a door to the outside playground right in their room, they don't have to cross the parking lot like CJ had to. She was sure milking the picture taking for all it was worth:

When we got into her room, they gave her a name badge and she went right to "work":

Playing of course is hard work when you are almost 4. When my mom picked her up, she said that she was really grumpy. They REALLY needed to sleep in this morning, but something tells me that they will sleep in a little longer tomorrow. I hope she get acclimated to going to pre-school quickly. She only goes 2 days a week, but if she is anything like her mommy she will be tired by just one class a week.

Sleep Over

2009-08-08T20:57:00.000-07:00

The girls had their first official sleep over last night. Sabrina, their cousin, got to come over and sleep over last night because her parents, Rachel and Anthony, got a bee in their bonnet and decided to run in a marathon. (Just kidding you guys!) Seriously though they ran in a marathon today and we watched their kids for them. Sabrina and the girls really had a great time having their first sleep over. We had corn on the cob, sloppy joes, weird watermelon, and cookies for dinner last night. Then we stayed up until 10pm watching Bolt. We had a great time. This morning Rachel and Anthony dropped off their little boy at 5:15am so they could get to Georgetown on time. That little boy is so stinkin' cute!

Bless his little heart, he went right back to sleep after they dropped him off. THANK YOU OLIVER!!!!! When the girls woke up this morning, too soon, we had pancakes and fresh peaches for breakfast. Oliver really chowed on the peaches, but he didn't care too much for the pancakes. We gave the girls a bath and it was a little snug in our tub for about 10 minutes:

But they enjoyed it anyway. After the bath I unfortunately had to leave for work, but by the sounds of it they all had a great time. Spencer turned them loose in the back yard with a water toy for a while. Then he let them go back out side in their play clothes and played with the water "gums", as Avary would call them:

I'm so glad that we were able to have them over to our house. We all really did have fun. The girls can't wait until we can have another one.

1st Grade!

2009-08-05T21:09:00.000-07:00

CJ started first grade today. (The parents stood around reminissing about when we all started school after Labor day, this is REALLY early.) I can't believe she is ALREADY in first grade. I was not prepared for her to start school so soon. I was talking to her last night about going back to school and it seemed like she had grown up over night. I can't wait for school to be over so I can enjoy my kids.

She was really excited to go back to school. I packed her lunch wich she is holding in the picture, and I literally STUFFED her backback FULL of all the supplies they had us provide this year. I don't remember ever having to stuff my backpack full of school supplies in grade school. Anyway, I wish I had gotten a picture of it, it was REALLY stuffed. She put it on this morning and lost her balance, it was pretty funny. Avary helped me drop her off at school this morning and was sad when we had to leave. Avary wants to be in first grade too, she says. We really hope she does well in school this year, adjusting to the full day schedule thing. We are really lucky because her first grade teacher was her kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Pacheco. She knows CJ pretty well, so I hope that works to our advantage.

I picked her up from school and she looked hammered.

She put her backpack on her head and started wondering around a little bit.

I think she was ready to go home. I have mixed feelings about first grade. I am really excited for her, but I am also worried about her and wishing I was a fly on the wall to see how she is REALLY doing. Oh well. We all have to let go at some point, right?

Wildlife

2009-07-28T19:08:00.001-07:00

I rode my bike home from work again today. It's a 13.5 mile ride, and it takes me just over an hour. On the way, I saw some deer. They were right off the side of the road. I stopped and took some pictures:

This one was probably only 10 feet from me. It turned and ran just as I took the picture.

The deer were on the south side of the Cherry Creek resevoir, at the X in the lower left corner of the map below. Later, I saw to more deer at the X in the upper right hand corner.

KidSpree

2009-07-18T17:09:00.001-07:00

Here's something different: a blog post from Spencer. Back when my family was visiting from Lewiston, we went and saw Aurora's 4th of July fireworks. The grand finale was the best one I have ever seen. Click here for a video of them that someone posted on youtube. The finale starts at about 1:45 in that video, in case you want to skip right to it.

When I was looking online for info on the fireworks, I also found out about a free kid's festival that Aurora had today, and I took the kids to it while Mommy and Geewah were shopping.

There was lots of fun stuff for kids there. We spent about 5 hours there, and we didn't have time to do everything.

Some of the image links for the larger images are broken for some reason. Sorry about that. I'm having a hard time with pictures today. I brought the camera, but left it in the car. So, I just used my phone. The first thing we did was a life-sized Chutes and Ladders. They had a pathway of squares to follow, and some of them said to do things like touch their toes or spin like a top. Along the path, there were also 10 or so little slides.

After that, we came across a dog. CJ tells me his name is Harry.

The next giant board game was Hi-ho Cherry-O. They had chunks of swim noodles cut up that they put in the holes in the trees, and the girls picked them and put them in baskets.

One of the highlights was something they called the "Musical Petting Zoo." I was expecting animals and music; instead, the zoo was a collection of musical instruments that the kids could play with. They had volunteers there that were sterilizing the mouthpieces between kids.

I shot some videos of CJ and Avary playing music, and here they are:

After the music, there was a pile of PVC pipes and fittings to build things with.

These kites were pretty cool. They were all strung together in a group. They are stunt kites, so the guy flying them made Them swoop and dive all around.

The maze was fun. It was one of the things that CJ wanted to do when she first heard about this festival. I could see over the walls, so it was easy for me, but it was a good challenge for the girls.

CJ had so much fun the first time that she had to go right back through again.

I let them lead the way. At the dead ends, they had pictures of different landmarks. Here are CJ and Avary, posing at one of them.

Continuing with the board game theme, here's Candy Land.

I think this thing is the chocolate monster. He had a crank in front that would move his eyes.

At the exit, they had a tent with hundreds of swim noodles hanging down. The girls thought it was so much fun that they ran back and forth through it several times instead of just exiting. I had to stop them when they started running in to people.

There was a frisbee dog group that put on a show. We didn't stay to watch for too long, but they were fun to watch for a bit. The ones I saw dropped the frisbees a lot, but they also had some good tricks and some good catches.

They must have found a good deal on those swim noodles, because they were everywhere. They had a huge pile of them, along with some foam connectors so that you could build things with them.

CJ found out she could wear them, and Avary had to follow along. I had some fun here, too, and I built the ball the girls are playing with.

After that, CJ made a snake. She seems to have snakes on the brain since our visitor came along.

To go along with the guy in the dog costume, there was also a giant inflated cat.

Next up was a round of (very) miniature golf. CJ was so helpful, pointing to Avary where to hit the ball.

Another thing they had was a big pile of sand under a tent.

This one is called Wildly Beautiful. They had costumes to dress up like local plant and animal life. CJ is a snake, and Avary is some kind of grass.

I'm not sure if this one is a dinosaur or a dragon, but we called him a dragon. Avary was scared and hid behind me. When we were getting ready to leave, she was sad because she wanted to hug the dragon. I told her that it was gone, but we happened to see it again as we were walking out. Avary got scared again, and he turned around and acted sad. Then, Avary blew him a kiss and he blew one back.

This one is a Dress Up and Dancing station. Avary really wanted to go there, of course. They spent a lot of time there.

The last thing we did was go through the inflated castle maze. The girls are in there...somewhere...

Oh, there's CJ.

It took a while to finally get them out. In fact, the girl that was helping out there had to crawl in and tell them to get out and that their turn was over.

It was a fun day, and I'm glad we went. It looks like they do this every year, so we'll all need to head out again for it next year.

Return of the "Garden Visitor"

2009-07-16T18:31:00.000-07:00

No, you are not seeing a repeat post. Today I went outside to water the garden and while I was out there Jersey was too. I looked over to see her on the back porch of the house and I saw her jerk away. When I looked closer there was this snake slithering up the steps along the house and back down the steps to under the deck. When I say along the house I really mean along the house. If the door had been open to the house, it could have slithered in and I wouldn't have noticed. Anyway, I freaked out, of course, and called Spencer. Bad decision. He said cool, take pictures, when I get home I'll see what I can do, non helpful stuff like that. After I basically hung up on him, I ran over the the neighbors house and asked him to come over and take care of it. I am SO glad he was home. He came over with a pole with a hook and tried to get it. He had it too in a bucket but at that time I hadn't come back with the lid for the bucket and it escaped. He was over here for about an hour trying to get the snake for me (what an AWESOME neighbor). We had scared it into the front yard and it curled up in a bush out there in the front by the front door. Next year, those bushes are going away. Anyway, I called Animal Control and they came out and got it. The Animal Control guy said it was a Bull snake. He said that when the weather is hot they like to come out and bask in the sun. He noticed we have red brick stones on our property and he said they especially like that, great. He also mentioned anything that attracts mice or rabbits will draw them out as well, we have a vegetable garden. But the upside of this particular snake is that it eats Rattle Snakes. I'm cool with that. He reassured me that it isn't poisonous and it doesn't eat anything larger than a small rabbit. He assessed the length of the snake to be about 3 feet, "A big one", he said. When I had called he asked me how big it was and I told him anything larger than a worm is too big for me. He laughed. I liked him, he was nice. Thank you to my new heroes! Eduardo, our neighbor, and the Animal Control guy!!!