Chicken Salad and Dressing....yummy

We love Cafe Rio, but can not afford it as often as we would like. The part I love the most is the dressing...uuummmm. My mom mentioned that she had received a Chicken Salad and dressing recipe from a neighbor that is like the Cafe Rio salads. There is a bit of prep time needed and we weren't sure if the payoff was going to be worth it. Well it was, it makes a lot but is so good. The dressing alone is worth the time. We usually make the full amount of dressing so we can have some left over for later. The chicken and rice are really good as well.

Just like my last cards these ones are ready to be saved and printed when you need them.

ENJOY!!!!

Christmas Music

Lately I have heard a lot of people who have mentioned and do not really like it when people play Christmas music "too early." Now I am not one who can listen to it before Halloween - mixing the two seems a bit odd to me but I will start listening to it in November.

Christmas is not about making a list to make sure you get exactly what you want or even about the presents. To me it is a feeling - I am happier and seem to have a smile on my face for two months straight, no matter what. People are better to each other and more forgiving. Except on those few day right before Christmas when all the last minute shopping is being done.

Listening to Christmas music is a way for me to make that feeling and cheer stretch. Ask my mission companions, since we don't get involved in Halloween it was all they could do to keep me from listening to Christmas carols in October. So to those who say it is too early, I do not think so.

I have changed my player on the blog to Christmas. Normally I don't have the player start automatically either. Having the music play while trying to read someones blog can be kind of hard. But in honor of the season and reason, the player will start automatically if you scroll down to it - just pause it yourself.

I Love......My Husband!!!!

With everything that has gone on this past week, Paul has been absolutely wonderful. Taking care of me, Bentley, school, dinners and the house he has truly been great. Today was a great day - I was able to get up and move around and no pain pills were needed. Since I am feeling better today and felt like I could handle more then just a bowl of Raisin Bran or Cream of Wheat, Paul decided to make me one of my favorite dishes. Growing up my mom would always make us our favorite meal on our birthday and I always wanted Apricot Chicken. Tonight it turned out just as good as my moms. There are two different recipes but they only very slightly. Just fix up the chicken and serve over rice.

Just click on the cards, to open them, then right click on them and 'save image as.'
Now you can save them where you want and print them off.

~Enjoy

Family Birthday Party

The last Sunday of every month my grandma holds a monthly birthday party. We are not able to make it every month so when we are in town on those Sundays we always try to make it. For the month of September it was my grandma and a son of one of my cousins. It is always a great time to catch up with the family. It wasn't warm enough to pull out the slip-n-slid but my grandpa made sure that the bikes were all working. My niece and nephew do not have bikes of their own and so they haven't mastered the skill of riding a bike without training wheels. I got on the little bike and showed my niece how easy it was. Since I was on the bike I was not able to get a picture to share with everyone.

Uncle Ryan tried to teach my nephew how to ride the bike and my mom tried to help my niece.

This is the little pink bike I was riding

Bike lessons

What a Weekend

This last weekend we had so much stuff going on. Paul did the lighting design for The Glass Menagerie and it was the opening weekend. On Thursday night we went to see it for a date night. We always hate leaving Bentley in the kennel when we head out. He hasn't had an accident in a really long time and since we were only going to be gone for a few hours we decided to leave him alone at home and not in the kennel. The show was interesting, not one of my fav's but it was fun to go and see Pauls lighting design. I thought it was great, one of his bests, he keeps getting better every show. He loves what he does and I think that is such a blessing. When the show was over we offered to give a friend a ride home. She was working the show and here husband was at home with their sleeping baby. By the time we got home we were both excited to find that the house was in order. Bentley was able to stay at home by himself and not make a mess.

On Friday we went to the Hale Center Theatre and saw The Scarlet Pimpernel. My friend was playing in it but we got the one with a different caste. Then we noticed that one of Pauls friends from school was in the show. I didn't know the story behind the show, which I think is better. The costumes and set were amazing, it is so fun to see all of them.

On Saturday Paul was going to the Hale to work on change-over and I went to the Relief Society Broadcast with my mom, aunt, Grandma and sister-in-law. It was such a good session and it was fun to be there with so much family. After that we went to Arctic Circle for ice cream and fries. We sat and visited for almost an hour. My mom, aunt and Grandma shared stories with us about when they were growing up. We started talking about the weather as well and how cold Wednesday was going to be, we all call it 'sweater weather.' Of course we are all excited about it and my aunt told us that she already had the sweater picked out that she was going to wear.

I really enjoy being able to spend time with my family when we get a chance.

A New Calling

This was actually two Sundays ago. We went to ward council and one the councilors in the Bishopric said he wanted to visit with us for a bit. As soon as we sat down I knew what it was about, we were getting a new calling. It was hard because we have only been in the calling we have now for a little less than a year and I did not want it to be over.

Paul is now the second councilor in the Sunday School and we are teachers for the kids that are 12-13. We were told that there were a number of names that was suggested to the Bishopric, then one of the councilors brought up our names and the Bishop said he wanted us back in the ward. He also told us that they wanted teachers for the class who could bare strong testimony as they taught and that is when they thought of us. Such a nice compliment.

We started teaching that Sunday because no substitute had been found yet to teach the class and the last teachers to be over that class just up and moved taking the manual with them. I was not to nervous about going into the class because we already know the kids in there. They are just a year older than the primary kids we used to teach, which means, soon our primary class will be our Sunday School class. I had no idea what we were going to do for a lesson and I did not want to spend the hour playing hangman. Paul, however, was right on top of it. He started out in Abraham 3:22-23 'the noble and great ones.' We then went on discussing who these noble and great ones where. One thing that Paul and I both came home from our missions with is an even greater love for the scriptures and a knowledge of how all the scriptures work together. Abr 3:26 was next, talking about our 'estate' and what glory we could have. We ended up taking about giving away our sins to know the Lord and those who are here on earth that want to follow in word but not deed. I added and bore testimony when I felt to. But the rest of the time I sat there smiling to myself to have such a wonderful husband. Someone so familiar with the scriptures to be able to teach at a moments notice, he can testify of the gospel and know its truth. He is a great husband and will be a great father.

I love you Paul.

Family Vacation

Last weekend my family went camping up at Marsh Lake. The whole family as able to make it except my sister, she stayed home sick. My youngest brothers girlfriend came up as well, it was fun to be able to spend time with her and get to know her. She went out on the canoe with me to take my niece and nephew. One morning when we were having breakfast we got talking about the our families last name and how she can never remember how to spell it. Then it was brought up that Paul and I are the only ones in the family with a different last name. Long story short, when Brittany found out Paul's full name she said that was her Grandpa's name as well. Turns out she is another cousin of Paul's, the same way that most everyone we have met here at school, they all go back to the same great-grandparents.

Thanks to everyone in the family that helped make it so we could come down. We had a GREAT TIME.

This is a video my brother put together so I thought I would just post it instead of making another one or adding tons of pictures.

Last Weekend Before School

This last weekend we decided to head down to see our families before Paul started back up with school. Our first stop was to Paul's parents house. They have a Nintendo WII, need I say more. I LOVE it. I have never really been a fan of video games. My thumb-eye coordination is off and I have seen a lot of people who have gotten stuck playing and never been able to pull them selves away since. There was even an article in the Ensign about young men who chose not to go on missions because they could not walk away. HOW SAD. Anyways, back to the point. I am one of those who leans with the video game because somewhere in the back of my mind I think if I can play it out in real life it will help me in the game. I like the WII because it has games, like Resort, where leaning really does help you play. I can get my whole body behind it and actually do pretty darn good. So we spent Friday night playing the WII with his family.

My grandma had the monthly family dinner on Saturday this weekend and we were told there was going to be a slip and slide. Of course Paul and I packed our suites and came prepared. my niece and nephew were sick so they did not come but my cousins and their kids came. Then my Aunt and Uncle got out there with us. It was a blast. I woke up the next couple of mornings so sore that I had to roll off the side of the bed because my abs hurt and I could not flex them to sit up. I joke with my mom that we do these crazy things to stay the favorite Aunt and Uncle. It is a lot of hard work and a bit painful at times, but oh so worth it.

Paul

Me

Now For Sale

I designed this for Paul's mom as a Christmas gift. Since I put it on my blog there have been a number of people that have wanted one. A friend of mine suggest that I set up an ETSY account to sell my stuff. Up until then I had not even heard of ETSY so I checked it out and decided that it would be a great place to sell my prints. Visit it again, I'm hoping to have more stuff up later.

Happy shopping.

Just For Fun

These are a couple of videos that have been sent to me, I thought I would share.

Happy Anniversary

Today was our third anniversary. It is hard to believe that we have been married for three years. In this time I have graduated with two Bachelors and Paul is almost done with his schooling here at USU. We were both able to help in the design of the 50th Robbins Awards.

This year instead of taking a trip we bought a dog. He is a full bread miniature Schnauzer. The name we went with is Bentley. He is three months old now and he has a brown streak of hair from his head to tail. It is crazy how much he has grown in the last couple of months. Bentley has so many fun personality traits. We LOVE the little guy.

This last weekend while my sister and her kids were here my nephew tried to ride Bentley like he rides my brothers Airedale. It did not really work the same way, we all looked over and Bentley was squished under him whimpering. It is great when my nephew gets with Bentley, they both wear each other down.

Bucket List

Over the past couple of years while I have been in school there was not a lot of time to keep up on some of the things I wanted to do for fun. There is a shelf full of books down stairs that I wanted to read but knew as soon as the cover was cracked my time would be taken up with projects to work on.

I have started a blog about the BUCKET LIST of BOOKS that I want to read or books that others suggested to me. Feel free to read along, or ahead as the case may be, and leave me your comments. I would love to hear from you.

Guilty Pleasure

I really am not one for reality TV shows. Especially The Bachelor and shows like that, I just do not see how people think they can fall in love with someone when they are living a fairytale. There is nothing about real life in these shows. Anyways I don't want to get to off topic.

Over the summer I have been watching America's Got Talent. As always there are some that are pretty bad but there are some that are just amazing. For instance there is the Chicken Catcher, just looking at him and listening to him talk you would never guess what he can do.

Some of these kids and the stuff that they can do is great. I'm not too interested in voting but I will watch because by the end of the show I have a smile on my face. I have found that the best way for me to watch is by using the DVR. I can come into the show 45 minutes late and then just fast forward through the commercials so I can just watch the performances. I LOVE the DVR.

Our First Balcony Garden

Since both of us stayed up in Logan this summer - no internships or anything like that - we decided to do a little garden. We have a balcony that we have hardly ever used because half of the year it's too cold out side and covered in snow or there is the constant threat of being hit by a way-word golf ball. Some neighbors of my parents gave us a couple of starter plants so we went out and got what we needed to plant them on the balcony. Now because we were not sure of what type everything was we could not know exactly what we needed. But honestly, I was not expecting to grow tomato plants that were as tall as I am. That one is huge.

Last weekend we pulled the first couple of tomatoes. It has been so much fun to watch and take care of the plants, and since it's a surprise about what we are going to actually get - that has made it even more fun.

Since I'm not going to help Paul eat any of the tomatoes or other vegetables that we are growing we got me a plant as well. The one with the purple flowers is one I got for a bridal shower and it is still going strong - that was three years ago. The one in the yellow pot has red flowers with a yellow center.

Create Something Every Day

I made these frames a while ago but never got around to posting about them. The idea came from a sister-in-law who has done similar things for gifts and to frames in her house. They were fun to make and a bit different from the other things I've done so far.

Enjoy.

Chic

Spring

Fun!!!!!!

Contest

Everyone knows I love to enter drawings. A friend of a friend is doing a book give away on her blog and if I mention it on my blog, then I get to be entered twice. The two books are and Gone With the Wind and To Kill a Mockingbird. I love the movie Gone With the Wind so I'm sure the book will be even better, as they always are. In Jr. High we read To Kill a Mockingbird and had to do a project about it. I do not remember what the other options were but a friend and I decided to take the option where we had to map out the town, how what we thought it looked from reading the book. It was a lot of work, needless to say we were the only ones who chose that option, but everyone, including the teacher, thought it was pretty neat.

Happy Reading.

More Birthdays - More Babys

We just could not help ourselves for the Fourth of July weekend, we ended up going down to visit with our families, celebrate the holiday and hopefully welcome another addition to the family.

This weekend started early. On Wednesday I took the light rail into SLC and had my sister pick me up. I was going over to spend some time with my brother-in-laws wife and their new baby. My nephew and my sister came in with me when they first dropped me off to see the new baby. When my nephew found out that there were little kittens there as well he spent the rest of his time trying to chase them down. That night, after my brother-in-law got home, we all went over to Grandma Yeates' for dinner. It was so much fun to be able to hang out with the new mom and baby. That night she only woke up once at about 4:30 then did not get back up until 9:00. Being that the baby was not even two weeks old she was still sleeping all the time but I noticed that for the time she was awake she was trying to look at everything around her and take it all in.

I forgot my phone that night so when we got back to their apt I noticed I missed a call from my mom. The next morning I called her back and she said that her, my dad, my sister and her two kids were all going to Vernal to visit with my grandparents. We have been trying to go and visit them for some time now but usually someone has been sick or the schedules just did not match up. Since the new baby was still just sleeping and eating there was not much I could do to help out so I had my dad come and get me. My grandpa and grandmas birthdays are in June so it was good to see them and visit. We also went to the dinosaur museum out there too. My niece and nephew loved it. All of the huge dinosaurs and the activities kept them really entertained.

The Fourth of July is such a wonderful Holiday to spend with family. It is also my dads birthday and my brothers birthday on the third. Every year we spend it together having a BBQ and playing games.

Another Weekend - More Birthday's

June 26th

This weekend was a birthday party for Paul's Grandpa, he turned 80 this year. It was a lot of fun to see everyone and celebrate with Paul (Grandpa). The theme was a Luau and Vonda and her brother and Sister went all out. Paul's uncle added onto his house to make the kitchen/living room area larger. Anytime there is something going on where a lot of space will be needed we do it there, it is a perfect space to have everyone over to.

The Birthday Boy

After a lot of the guest left we pulled out the limbo stick.

I don't want to forget my Sister, her birthday was on the 27th. We went to visit her and the kids but I did not remember to get any pictures.

Because it seems like we have spent every weekend in down with our parents, living out of our suitcases and sleeping where ever we could find a bed, we decided that we would go home on Saturday night so that we could be up for church on Sunday. It is just so nice to sleep in our own bed and be in our own place.

What a Weekend

Minnetonka Cave

We had a lot of plans for this last weekend but non of them worked out so on Friday night Paul suggested that we go up to the Minnetonka Caves up by Bear Lake. It was a lot of fun to take a day trip and get away. The good news about taking a leisurely day trip is that it didn't matter that the map quest directions that we printed off were wrong. We just backtracked and asked for some directions. When we got to the cave the next available tour was at 4 o'clock and it was only 2. Of course it was raining so we made ourselves a sandwich in the car and took a nap. It was a fun little tour and just nice to get out for a bit.

You guessed it, The Entrance

Paul said this one looked like a little monkey, sure enough
they call this the Monkey Skull

Kermit's Castle

The wedding room

Of course we can't go to Bear Lake without getting a Raspberry shake

When we finally made it down the mountain we kept waiting for our phones to get service so we could see if anyone had sent us any news about our sister-in-law and the baby, she was being induced at 11:30. Since we didn't have any messages Paul called his mom to see how things were going. As it turns out it was not until 11:30 p.m. not 11:30 a.m.

Just about ever weekend since school has been out we have been down in SLC for different things. This weekend we had decided that we were going to stay at home and be able to see the new baby and sister-in-law next weekend when we come down. I think Paul saw the excitement in my face when we realized that we had not missed anything. When put together with other things that were happening over the weekend we still ended up down there.

We got to the Hospital at about 2:00 a.m. Sunday morning and visited for a while. My parents house was pretty close so we decided to head over there after a bit and get some sleep. Since it was Fathers day on Sunday everyone came over, half of the family lives there and the others do not want to miss out on my mom's Sunday roast, so it does not usually take a special occasion to find everyone there on a Sunday. We were also celebrating our nephews birthday so he opened his presents before dinner. He was so excited that his mom got him a jersey outfit he practically jumped out of his clothes to get changed.

Swim Trunks from Grandma

Ball and bate from his Aunt and Uncle (not us, oops)

In his new Jersey from mom

Helping Grandpa open his Father's day present

Happy Fathers Day

My brother and his wife bought a 4wheeler, my nephew calls it the motorcycle,
he and his sister wanted a turn to go out on it.

Look Ma' no hands

Enjoying a wonderful Sunday afternoon ride

Another Uncle teaching him how to ride the dog

Right after dinner Paul got a text from his brother saying that the baby was born. I'm not one that likes to push my way in or hover over people so we left about a half hour later hoping that we would miss the crowd. By the time we got there most everyone had cleared out so Paul and I got to hold her for a long time. Then the nurses took the baby to bath her and so they could move the mom into another room. It was nice to be able to stay and visit for a bit, we did not get out of there until 10:00. Our wonderful Sister-in-law let us just hangout and visit with them even though I was sure she was so tired. I think it was really fun for Paul and his brother to be able to spend some time together too.

The Uncle

The Aunt

Paul is really excited. This is the first niece on his side.

As we were leaving there was a page for an LDS Elder, it was a little bit confusing trying to figure out what was going on but Paul was the only one who answered, they asked him to go back up to the Women's Center for a blessing.

Being so late by the time we got out of there we decided to spend the night at my parents again. I, of course, was fine with this because that meant we would pass by the hospital on our way home and we could stop and see the baby again and her mom and dad. I LOVE being an aunt. We couldn't help ourselves so we stopped at Wal-mart and got some balloons and a little stuffed animal, as well as a soda and some treats for the new parents. Pauls brother seemed especially excited about the Mt. Dew.

Look at all that dark hair.