autumn envy

Today April and I headed up to Park City to get a little closer to being ready for winter. PC is hit and miss with good deals and today was ok. The kids were so good though and it was beautiful weather, so there were no complaints from me! The drive was beautiful, April tried to take some pictures through the car window but none of them do justice to the fall colors. (I didn't realize she had taken a picture of me too)
It makes me miss Virginia in a bad way, this was my most favorite time of year when I lived back east because all of the incredible green turns the most amazing colors you think you're in a painting. Especially the drives to church, our building was located right on the George Washington Parkway and the view of the water all lined with countless trees was breath taking. In Utah we have to settle for the mostly brown mountains with spots of red and yellow. I guess I will take it because it's better than nothing but I feel like the people who've never seen the trees in fall back east have no idea what they're missing! I tried to look on line to find a picture of the GW Parkway in the autumn time but didn't find anything great. This is the best I can do for now, at least you get the idea...I will keep looking, it would be worth having the reminder.

I was thinking the other day about Ethan and how much time this poor kid has to spend in the car, (today included) I guess that's your lot when you're the caboose of the family, he gets drug around everywhere I have to go. I try to make it as fun for him as possible and he doesn't really seem to mind. I let the kids play at the playground while we were in PC today, to try to let them stretch their legs and have a break from the stroller/carseat.

Ethan has been loving going to parks lately with all of our Tuesday play dates with the cousins, he is learning to be more brave on the slide but only if it's a small one! We did find some killer deals at Old Navy and I even bought some things for ME - that never happens! I'm glad to be nearly all done with the winter shopping, I think all I have left are coats and boots, yay! I'm so glad tomorrow is Friday! I'm going to have a long meeting with Kristy about gift baskets (for our school's fundraiser). I feel so sad that I have only been blogging for a few months, last year was one of the best years I've ever had and I wish that all of the fundraising and volunteer work was well documented. Oh well, I guess I will have to do an extra good job this year....more on that later. Great day!

sisterly love

It's been a fun but busy couple of days around here. Wednesday my mom took the day off work and we had a fun little "girls" lunch at Mimi's Cafe, if you haven't eaten there you need to, EVERYTHING is good, especially breakfast, and lunch, and well, everything is good. My favorite is their corn chowder soup and a bran muffin. Yes, I said bran muffin, they're super yummy especially when you don't spare the sweet butter. I neglected to get a picture at lunch, I always forget to have the waitress take a pic for me, and this time I really regret it because I'm sure we were quite a site! The highchairs/booster seats out numbered the adults, but it was a suprisingly uneventful lunch, thank you kids! I really am grateful to finally have sisters, I've waited a long time for them and I'm so lucky with the ones who've married in, my mom and I both agree on this point. I have actually lucked out on both sides of the family when it comes to sister-in-laws, I have the cream of the crop for real. It's so nice to finally have more than just boys to talk to and hang out with at family gatherings!This picture was taken Labor Day weekend at my mom's house, and although it's not the best picture of any of us, it's one of my recent faves because it reminds me that I'm no longer the only girl in the family (beside mom of course). We are all very different from each other and usually that is a great thing, we all bring something unique to the table although I'll admit that sometimes this has gotten in the way of our friendship. But, we know each other's intentions are always good and so in the end we always come back to being friends and sisters. I especially like that they are having babies with whom Ethan can grow up with since he's kind of a loner. The most important thing about having extended family though, is that my mom has the cutest grand kids, no ugly babies in this family! After lunch grammy entertained the babies while April ran with Makenna for a potty break. The grandkids LOVE their grammy, no doubt about it. You maybe can't tell from this picture, but both boys are squealing with laughter because of the "bumble bees" rhyme she does that always ends in some kind of tickling. What a fun day!

girl's day out

For a few weeks Patsy and I have been trying to pull together some girls from our card swap group to have a girl's day out! We finally were able to pull it off and let me just say that it was the treat I needed, for sure! I have been dying to go to the new Archiver's store in Orem, I've heard it was a great scrapbook store and it was. It was smaller than I thought it would be and didn't have quite the selection that I thought it would, but it was definitely worth visiting. I found some great sale items and that's always nice. We ate lunch at the Brick Oven which was so yummy, especially because we took so long at Archiver's that we were starving by the time we got there. That diet coke really hit the spot for sure. The BEST treat of all, was that Ethan went to Ann's house to play so I was able to look at every piece of paper without chasing a toddler around! YAY! Thank you Ann! It was definitely the break I needed and soon we're going to find a day to get together to make our cards and maybe scrapbook. I need to get on that band wagon again soon. (L to R - Sky, Lauri, me, Patsy & Linda)

muffaletta goodness

My little, well, younger brother Brandon works as an asst. mgr for Jason's Deli, has now for a few years and keeps asking me to come see him at work, but it was so far to drive for a baked potato, so I never made it down that far. Then he opened a store in Layton which is too close to have any good excuses not to go, so last week Lauri, Ethan and I drove up and at the yummiest lunch! If you've never experienced a Muffaletta, or "Muff" to the sandwhich zealots, you need to try it for sure. It was sweet, but a quarter muff was definitely plenty of sandwhich for me. I found this picture on line, because I ate it before I thought about taking a picture of it. It has lunch meat but also a really yummy anti-pasta kind of olive spread that also goes on it. YUM.It was way fun to visit Brandon at work, besides the good food, it is a beautiful restaurant and Brandon sat with us for a few minutes and when he left Lauri said, "he's just so entertaining". That he is, not usually a dull moment with Bran. My camera was out of battery, so Brandon had a co-worker shoot one with his camera, someday when I get a copy of that picture, I'll edit this post and stick it here. So check out Jason's Deli and two thumbs up for the Muff from this food critic.

crepe master

One of our favorite traditions is having crepes for dinner or especially Sunday lunch. Taylor was feeling bummed out on Friday evening that none of his friends could get together to hang out, so I offered to teach him to make crepes. Lately he has been concerned about not having enough kitchen experience, he wants to beef up his repetoir before he leaves on a mission, he's concerned about starving I think. Anyway, I told him it would be a good mission thing to prepare because it's cheap and easy and if you can cook a crepe to perfection, his elder roommates will fight over who gets to be his companion. So, he watched carefully as I buttered and ladled the batter into the pan and then carefully turning the pan to make it spread as thinnly as possible. Then we learned the art of the flip, and that sometimes you have to sacrifice the tips of your fingers to accomplish this task. So after a few "coached" crepes were made, he did the rest of the batch ALONE! I know this may not seem like that big of a deal to those who have never made a crepe, but seriously, I never really got until I watched Martha Stewart one day, it's not really that easy. I'm sure if I went to France they would laugh at me, I'm probably not doing it right, but they sure taste good to my family. We filled them with mixed berries and sprinkled sugar and had a fabulous dinner. Where are the pictures you ask? Well I took them, but I had my camera set on the wrong mode and so they were lost, I'm so lame! But pictures or not, Taylor was definitely crowned the crepe master.

random acts of kindness

Spencer is all about secret random acts of kindness. Almost every Saturday he tries to make my bed in secret and it always makes me smile when I see it later. It's really lumpy and bumpy and the pillows are not in their right places, but he feels so good being able to do this service for me that I never fix anything about it. My favorite thing is the monogrammed pillow my sister in law Jen gave me for Christmas last year, it's really an "M" for Moore of course, but Spencer thinks it's a "W" for Wende and so when he makes the bed, it's always upside down. On Saturday I came upstairs sweaty and dusty from working on our formal room (that's another blog story) and when I saw the bed a big smile spread across my face. Man I love this kid! Spencer is such a handful sometimes, he's such a different thinker than the rest of the children that Rich and I have a harder time parenting him with some things. But it's hard for me to stay mad at him for too long because I know he has a kind heart and wants so baddly for you to love him back. What a good kid, we are lucky to have him.

king of the castle

I promise to post something about my other children sometime soon, but Ethan is in such the hillarious stage of everything changing that I feel like I must take pictures all day long to capture it all. Lately dinner time has been miserable because he does not want to sit in his high chair any longer. Rich would like to remind Ethan of the price tag on the highchair because maybe that would motivate him to sit in it, but Ethan could care less. So, yesterday we moved Allie's cute little wooden table upstairs to the dining room so he has his own little place to sit for dinner. He thinks he is king of the castle with all of this excitement, but it has made eating slightly easier. He actually sits in a booster at the table with the rest of us for dinner, but the table has been great for setting out a plate of food and letting him come and graze whenever he feels the need. I am constantly aware of how quickly this baby is turning into a boy, and while it's fun to see him grow and develope, it's also really stinks!

fashion icon

This is Ethan's latest look lately, always trying to walk around in someone else's shoes. I hate to admit it, but it's usually mine or allie's that he tries to wear most often, maybe he'll be a shoe salesman when he grows up? He also loves to sport sunglasses as you've seen in previous blog pics, but if no one is there to help him them on his face, then they end up around his neck. I think he actually thinks that this is where they are supposed to go. He holds them there by putting his chin down and walking around while trying to still see where he is going. We've decided that we didn't know we were so starving for entertainment before Ethan was born. Taylor actually took this picture because he thinks that it's so funny that Ethan wears our shoes all over the house and no one's photographed it yet! Hey, does Ethan know that his shoes are on backwards? Maybe someone should tell him...

soap box moment please...

Growing up in Washington, D.C. it is impossible to avoid being caught up in some body's cause, unless you live in a cave or have a heart of stone. There were many crazy zealouts there, someone is always picketing something, usually more than one group every day! Once I heard someone from the feminist movement giving a speech about how Barbie should have realistic breasts and hairy, yes I said hairy, armpits and legs so that little girls don't grow up feeling like they have to shave to fit in to society. Now tell me, who has time to fight for something so ridiculous? Not I said the blogging lady. However, there were many causes that I truely enjoyed being part of, things that I continue to feel passionately about to this day. One of them is taking better care of our mother earth. I really am not a granola eating, tree hugging vegetarian girl or anything, I love my super-rare steak just like the next girl, but taking care of our earth just feels like common sense to me. I do think global warming is a very big deal, it makes me wonder what quality of life will be like for future generations. Now tying this into the church-going girl, I feel most strongly about taking care of the home that Heavenly Father created for us. So, it makes me especially ticked off that UTAH does not have a decent recycling program, why is this? You would think that of all the people on the earth, Mormons would appreciate the earth the MOST because we know it's history and importance in the life to come.

Ok, now that I'm down from my soapbox, I would like to say, that recycling has always been a big deal to me, but lately I've been trying to kick it up a notch. I found out Bountiful City has a recycling center and so for the last few months we have been recycling all of our plastic. I have to say that last year when we found out that any kind of paper including cardboard (you wouldn't believe how many things come in boxes, cereal, fruit snacks, everything!) could be recycled at our school and then the money was turned into books for the library that the recycling bug bit me hard and we started recycling paper products in full force. So it was natural to take the next step into recycling everything else that we could. I tried to make it a family affair so my kids could learn the value of all of this. It used to be that we would never have enough room in the garbage can for everything that needed to be chucked. We would sneak extra bags into our neighbors cans and talked a few times about ordering a second can, but I just couldn't do it. Since we started recycling our plastic and papers, we always have extra room in the can and I can't tell you how happy this makes me! :) - like this. On Friday we took our one months recycling to the recycling center and it filled the back of our van with the seats down! I had to take a picture, it made me feel so good.

the dark master

Let me just say this, there are days that only a diet coke makes me feel better. Judge me if you will, but I figure it's a lot better than the many illegals out there to choose from right? We all have our vices, and I of course, have many vices, but diet coke ranks up there in the top two, second only to ice cream. Diet coke is of course a lot more portable than ice cream and less calories obviously so I turn to it more often than I should. But in my defense (now this is the part of the confessional where I start to justify my nasty little habit) I don't drink it as often as other people out there. Infact, I only drink it from the fountain, no cans or bottles because those could be stored at home and let's just say that I know my limitations. So, it ends up being when we go out to lunch or dinner (ok, once I had with breakfast), and so that's only really a few times a week. Not bad right? Like I said, it could be worse, my kids could have a crack mom right? Anyway, back to my opening line of "there are days that only a diet cok makes me feel better..." these are times that I am in the drive through of Dairy Queen just to get a diet coke. Now, if you've ever been through the Centerville DQ drive through, you know that this experience alone could make you need a diet coke, so it's only on rare occasions that a day is stressful enough to actually make me sit through it. Once I was talking to Rich on the mobile phone, he called to see how my day was going. Our conversation went like this: Rich-"Hi hon, where are you?" Me-"I'm sitting in the DQ drive through line to get a coke." Rich-"oh, why what happened today?" True story. You may wonder why it is I don't go through a speedier drive through to find relief, and sometimes I do, but Dairy Queen has the best diet coke with the best ice, so special days are for the DQ coke only, no other coke, speedier as it may be, will do. So, today, no really, this month hasn't been as stressful necessarily as I just feel like I'm in a bit of funk, like a little flat I guess. I'm sure part of it is due to the kids being back in school and feeling lonely all day, but this particular bout of funk has been a little harder to shake. So, today I caved and sat in the DQ line (today it was only for about ten minutes, not bad!) and got my self a little pick me up, well actually an extra large pick me up. Let's cross our fingers shall we?

lucky thirty-three

Today is my thirty-third birthday, or "double threes" as Allie put it today. It's been a fun day so far, my favorite part every year is all of the birthday wishes left on my answering machine for me to listen to when I get home. It's so nice being part of such a big family, on both sides, because so many people remember your birthday. My dad even called to sing happy birthday to me, what a cute man. So this year, Rich and I met Frank and Jenny at Happy Sumo for a sushi lunch and of course I forgot to get a picture, Rich is crying about that I'm sure. Jenny also has a September 12th birthday and we were even born the same year. Sushi is kind of a tradition for us, we try to celebrate together when we can. April kept Ethan for me so I could actually have a conversation with my lunch table and I'm so grateful. Afterward I did a little shopping, again, with no stroller and no toddler that I had to bribe with a sucker just to get through the store. Thanks April! It was nice to meet Rich in the middle of the day for lunch, that doesn't happen often enough and I need to make it a priority. The downside to date lunch was that I didn't see Lauri very much today, we decided to celebrate another day which is great because it just makes the birthday celebrating drag out, nothing wrong with that.

So, birthdays sometimes make you reflect on your life which I started to do while giving Ethan a bath tonight. I was thinking about what I would write here on my blog and what I came up with is just how incredibly grateful I am for my wonderful life. Life is good at thirty-three, I have no complaints. I am married to a wonderful man and I very much enjoy being his wife and I can't even think of anything I would rather be doing than raising these fantastic kids of mine.Rich has a great job and it affords me the opportunity to stay home and be a mom, for which I am extremely thankful. We live in a great neighborhood, we have wonderful friends and family who love us, good schools, healthy bodies, testimonies, seriously, what else is there? So, I know I already posted this pic a week or so ago, but it's just so appropriate to me today, to put it here. It sums up what a lucky thirty-three year old I am.

tuesdays with...drew and sam

My sister-in-law Jenny had a fantastic idea to put together a play date every Tuesday morning for the cousins to play together, ok and the sister-in-laws too. I jumped at the idea because we aren't having a sibling for Ethan any time soon, or ever and since we don't have a puppy to keep him company, cousins are a great alternative. And, who couldn't use a little girlfriend time? I know I can always use some more of that! So, today was our first official meeting at Layton Park, we actually met to put together a little schedule for the next few months while the kids played. I love Layton Park, if you haven't tried it you should, it's wonderful. There are giant trees so it's nice and shady and there's a little pond/creek place with tons of ducks all very happy to eat the bread you feed them. In fact, today the ducks got a little too up close and personal for Ethan's scaredy-cat taste but he saw Sam and Drew (a.k.a spidey) going for it and so by the end he was loving it too, no fear. I'm super excited for girlfriend times especially, the Moore's need this coming together often kind of thing. We're hoping as the twins grow and it's a little easier for Lisa to get out of the house that more cousins will join in the fun. Plus, we can't forget about Daniel and Joey, (look at the sweet face)who will soon be up and running to keep up with the rest of them. But for now, Ethan is happy to have some playmates and some scheduled time outdoors, I'm happy too.

no nap today

Toddlerhood is a difficult time for any mother, and toddler for that matter, but it is also one of my favorite times of their development. They are such a handful but they are so funny with all of their new discoveries and letting their personalities out more and more each day. We laugh all the time around here because there's always something new to laugh about with Ethan. He has had an easier time adjusting to the kids being gone than I thought he would, but that's maybe because we are playing so much. He toddles around the house and we sing silly songs and do chores and sometimes just lay on my bed reading books. It's funny because I don't really know how to parent just one toddler at time, and I've decided that it's kind of fun! There are definitely pros and cons to how far spaced your children are. Unfortunately, when you are the caboose baby of busy older children, your nap schedule sometimes takes a backseat. So, the other day when Ethan didn't get a nap due to a crazy schedule, he carried around his blanket all afternoon and then finally just laid down and crashed in the middle of the living room floor. I guess you have to be pretty tired to just stop like that, poor kid. Where's his mother?

are you ready for some football?

I was snapping away at some funny picture of Ethan when I noticed a distracted husband who didn't notice me pointing the camera in his direction. Why was he so distracted? Thursday was the start of the NFL season and my husband is definitely a fan. It's funny to see him stretched out on the couch, inside a little bubble that can barely be penetrated, he's normally not very couch-potato like so I just had to snap a quick pic. I have to say that I really enjoyed live football games in high school, I even understand it mostly, but watching it on TV? Zzzzzzzzzzzz total snooze fest. However, one thing I've tried to accomplish in this marriage, is personal space. So I'm great with his love for the game, besides it gives me time to read. :)

love this man

Have I told you lately how much I love my husband? Well, I should say it more often because incase you hadn't heard, I'm totally crazy about the guy. Yesterday we celebrated Rich's 34th birthday! Well, we really celebrated it yesterday and today. On his birthday he got up with Ethan and let me sleep in, then he took my car and vacuumed it all out and filled my tires up with air (he knows I have a fear of blowing a tire on the freeway) and then he cleaned the kitchen! Who's birthday is it again? I did my fair share of Saturday chores, so did the kids, but I really appreciated all of his help. We went to Bajio for salad for me and a burrito for him, I love Bajio salad - yum and then later in the evening we went to Baskin Robbins for ice cream with the Merrill's. My mom is in Alaska this week so we skipped the usual Sunday family get together and invited the Merrill's over tonight instead. I meant to take pictures of the meal but of course I totally forgot. We had chicken lasagna, Eileen's homemade rolls, salad and Lauri brought the best watermelon from Pineae. Rich's favorite is yellow cake with chocolate frosting and I put Allie in charge of the decorating. I didn't realize it at the time but she put 34 candles on his cake and let me tell you I was a little worried about catching the house on fire. Unfortunately, this pic of Rich turned out lame-o
(maybe because he was so excited to be having his picture taken?) and he blew out the candles before my camera was ready, on purpose. Hmmm, can you say party pooper? Ok, well, besides the party pooper thing, I really do have the best husband, sure do love this man. Happy Birthday Hon!

rubber band boys

I had a feeling that once school started the blog entries would be fewer and further between. For one thing, with the kids gone, not quite as much is happening during the day. I could tell you about how Ethan has two big bruises on his forehead from falling down twice in two days but that's not very exciting. So, this week went by with the whirrrr, but that's how it always is during the school year, that's one of the things I hate about it actually. I have decided though that I am going to document some of my volunteer work, not because I want to brag but it's a huge part of what I do, and this is my blog/journal after all, it seems like an appropriate thing to do. But that's another blog story. One more thing I'm going to do is add a gratitude section at the end of all the blogs, or at least most of them, where I list five things I'm grateful for today. I thought about having it be an ever-changing list on the side that always stays on the home page but I decided against it because I would like to be able to look back and see what I felt on that particular day.

On with the blog...

Last night we participated in one of our favorite events of the whole year. We went to Thanksgiving Point to hear Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband play. It's an absolute beautiful setting at the Waterfall Amphitheater with, you guessed it, several gorgeous waterfalls off the redish cliffs behind the stage. Besides the scenery, the music was so fantastic, as it always is and we were lucky this time because they played all of our most favorite songs, Corndog tops the list for sure.

The history with us and RSRB is this, several years ago when they were still pretty small, Microsoft booked them for their Christmas party and Rich and I loved their funky music show so much we bought a couple of CDs. We talked them up to the kids and when we found out they were playing the Utah Arts Festival, we took the whole family. They played UAF for a few years in a row until they got too big and since then we have been going to their September concert at Thanksgiving Point. We ended up missing last year because Ethan was a little too little for music that loud. The last few years we have seen the "bowl" at the amphitheater grow considerably as they've signed a deal with Capitol Records and have been touring all over the country. It's has been fun to see them become so popular.

This year, I was still a little worried about taking Ethan, but he was a dream toddler, totally enthralled by the entertainment on stage and even did some Ethan style dancing, sweet.It was chilly enough that we all huddled together and sang along and enjoyed our silly little selves. We love this band. (yes Ethan is picking his nose in this picture, it was dark when I set it up ok?)

Five things I'm grateful for today (well, this is really yesterday's list) -

1. wonderful teachers

2. a picnic blanket big enough to sit AND cover up with (thanks Eileen)

3. perfect fall weather for an outdoor concert

4. awesome music that also happens to have kid-friendly lyrics

5. a perfectly behaved toddler for no less than three hours

labor day weekend

I wish I had something totally exciting to write about, like we were a cool family that actually travels during the busiest travelling weekend of the year, but we're not, so I don't. On Saturday morning we attended sweet Natalie's baptism which was very nice but we loved socializing with the extended families of Phil and Lauri. As we were getting ready to go Phil's mom was surprised because she thought we were family, I told her "we are family", and I really do feel this way. Of course I've blogged about this several times so no need to get into it again, but it was fun to spend the day with them for sure. Do you know that I had the camera in my car the whole time? Which explains why there's no photograph to accompany this paragraph.

Matt & Ann shared Bee's tickets with us, so my mom and dad and our family went to watch them play Saturday evening. It was a good game, we watched from the grass which was good for Ethan because he could run around, and he did. The Bee's won 11-7 and there was even a pitcher/umpire in-your-face you made a terrible call kind of argument that got the pitcher tossed! That was fun to watch, that guy was ticked! I should've taken better pictures, that's the story of my life.

Sunday my mom invited us to dinner with a catch, bring your camera she says. My Grandpa, her dad, isn't doing very well and she is leaving early Tuesday morning to go visit him in Alaska. She was hoping I would photograph the individual families and kids and such so she would have some current pics to take to Grandpa. I actually had a lot of fun, I bring my camera a lot but I don't do "portait" type pictures of the families very often and I learned, again, that I belong to a totally goofy family.

My handsome brother Brandon, he's single ladies... Jake and April and their kiddies... Jason & Leah and their kiddies... don't I have the cutest parents? :) These are the most recent additions to the family, Charlie, Ethan and Ashton...

Something totally momentus happened Sunday, something that's never happened before...You saw it here first ladies and gentlemen, a picture of my family. I'm totally embarassed to admit it, especially because it's what I do for a living, but this is the FIRST picture that contains all members of my family since Ethan was born 22 months ago! Maybe you think I mean portait, nope, I don't even have a plain old snap shot of the six of us. Don't ask me why, I'm not sure why we haven't done it before, I've tried a couple of times and failed, but here it finally is, a picture of all six of us. It's that same old complaint that I have had forever, that because I'm the photographer in the family, there are very few great pictures of me and that includes one with me and my family, so I know that we were just kind of thrown together and it's nothing fancy, but I'll take it. Thanks Dad for being the photographer for a minute.

Today, Monday, we went to the park with the Phil & Lauri's family with lunch and a big picnic blanket. We have a great park not too far from our house with lots of shade, it was so nice sitting and watching the kids play while the grown ups chatted and felt lazy under the shade of the huge oak trees there. Allie took charge of the camera so of course the only pictures available for viewing are of Ethan, her favorite subject. We ate my totally yummy quick lasagna recipe with spinach and tomato sauce for dinner and then Rich and I stayed up too late watching Premonition which was way better than I thought it would be. It was a good weekend, but I'm having a hard time gearing up for the week ahead, it's a busy one for sure.