Thanksgiving 2011

I was in charge of the buns, the pies and one turkey. It was my very first turkey I had ever cooked and it turned out great. Unfortunately I did not get a picture of my great turkey but trust me it turned out great. The weather was perfect for the traditional morning football game and we spent thanksgiving dinner at a friends house here in town with 2 other families. We hope you had a happy thanksgiving and I can say the we are so thankful for our friends and family. We are so blessed. Thank you!

A Cultural Experience

A few weeks ago for Steven's class he brought the whole class to our house to experience a real Hispanic meal. These two wonderful women from our ward came over and taught us all to make corn tortillas from scratch, make chicken with Latin seasoning, black beans, and queso fresco. It was great.
The students had to try and make there own tortillas and they were funny looking
The is Mercedes and she made it look so darn easy to make the tortillas. We were laughing pretty hard because after the students made theirs she was cooking them and she was flattening them and fixing them as they came to her.
The food was delicious and now I am going to have to try and make my own. The funniest part for me was buying all the ingredients for this meal. I went to Walmart and purchased the chicken, the Maseca (corn flour), Con Culantro Y Achiote (latin seasoning), queso fresco (fresh cheese), and the lady checking me out was Hispanic and she looked at me strange and just couldn't hold it back, she said "what are you making" I laughed and told her was I was doing and we laughed together about how it is not everyday you see a young white girl buying these kind of ingredients. It was funny.

The Music Man

I don't have any pictures yet from this but i must post about it.
One of the theater professors at Steven's work was helping direct the Jr High school play and needed and assistant director. Steven has interest in theater as well as a desire to have his students do short Spanish plays next year to get them out in the community more so needless ot say he volunteered.
The play was a time commitment but well worth the effort. The kids loved going to the practices when we were able to go. They loved watch the movie the music man. Jacob now walks around the house singing the songs and pretending he is in a marching band. (the kid can role his R's so well it amazes me) During this time was became all about acting in plays and singing songs.
For the performance I took the boys to the only matinee they were doing so that we weren't out to late with them and then Miranda went on a little date with daddy, out to eat then to the play for one of the other performance nights. The kids loved going behind stage and seeing and talking to the cast and when Jacob got to play the real drums and blow in the real trombone he was on cloud nine.
Like I said it was a large time commitment for Steven to help out but he loved it and it was well worth it for our kids to feel involved and see their daddy involved in the community. That is one of my favorite things about a small community, it is so easy to get involved. We have been more involved in the community in the 3 months we have lived here then we ever were in any other place we have lived. It is great!

Our Fire Place

We are ready for the winter. There is one thing we missed dearly in our house in Indiana and that was a fire place. In the house we are living in her in Iowa we have a fire place and we are so excited to use it. We now are stocked up on fire wood and intend to have fires often.
The kids love the fireplace and we have quickly taught them all the fire safety and the rules with the fire place. For some reason dad usually ends up making the fire because I am off doing something else and the other day Miranda asked if dad could make a fire when we got home. I told her that I could make the fire right then and she looked at me with shock that girls could make the fire as well. So needless to say I have been much more conscious about making the fire to show Miranda that girls can do it too. (because I must say I have built many fires in my lifetime with all the camping I did as a kid and I was always the one to build the fire)
We love having a fire place!

Steven's Birthday

I don't have many pictures but Steven turned 31 on Nov 18th. He had a great Birthday and instead of birthday cake we had birthday Pie, French Silk Pie. He and I got a babysitter the day after his birthday and went shopping just the two of us and out to a nice dinner. All in all i think it was a great day.
Happy Birthday Steven

Halloween 2011

We did 4 different celebrations for Halloween this year and by the time the actual day got here we were all Halloweened out(at least I was, the kids loved it) First we had a fall festival at our church and in the picture above Jacob is fishing at the fish pond. A few days after that we went to the trick or treating night and BVU, so we were escorted around the dorms by the BVU football team to go trick or treating, the kids loved this except for all the stairs they had to climb. On the Saturday before Halloween our town had a down town trick or treat with all the shops on the main street. It was great weather and we had so much fun at that. Halloween night we went around just to a few homes around our neighborhood so we had so much candy, so much fun, and we are done for a year!

My darling Jackson did not want to dress up for anything, he was not happy about the outfit and was not happy about the hat, but he was cute anyway.
Jacob was a great football player, he did have a helmet but ended up using it as his bag to put his candy in because it was not fun to walk with it on. And Miranda my darling princess, this year has been a little stressful and I was just so happy she agreed to be the same thing she was last year and she was darling being Cinderella.

Jacob Turns 3

On Oct 25th my sweet Jacob turned 3 years old. Some days he seems so much older then that because of how well he has learned to play with his sister, but like any kid his age he reminds us that he is just a little guy.
He loves cars and motorcycles so this year was all about those. I did a motorcycle cake and this is him opening is new road rug.
I did that cake in the shape of a three and then made it look like a motorcycle course. I am not the greatest cake decorator but Jacob loved it and that is all that mattered.
Happy Birthday sweet boy we are so happy to have you in our family.