Our visitor this morning and just about every morning...

See you tomorrow bunny!

*Okay so I tried to post yesterday (yes, I still would have been a day late), but my internet wouldn't allow me to upload pictures.

So we had a great time at home in WA visiting family and friends. McKenzie grated from HS and all but Austin from our family were able to attend. This is the best picture we got of the family with Joe smiling.
Us with the graduate

What was the first thing this graduate did after receiving his diploma?
Slide down the railing.


Michael really enjoyed Grandma's strawberries from her garden.

I mean REALLY enjoyed them!
I tried to feeding Michael some store bought strawberries and he refused to eat them. I guess no strawberries are like Grandma's strawberries.

Check out what I caught above Michael's head!

We really enjoyed the weather while we were there. The mornings were cool and it was so refreshing. The first morning Michael hadn't adjusted to the time yet and woke up at 5am. I decided we should go for a walk so he wouldn't wake anyone up. We visited the cows down the road and Michael thought that was pretty fun. Michael did adjust himself to the time soon after. He even adjusted back to our time pretty quickly once we got home.
We were the ones who had a hard time adjusting back. We stayed up too late there so it made it really hard for us. The humidity sure gave us a warm welcome back home. We stepped out of the airport and we felt like we were stepping into a sauna! I miss you already WA! This is one thing I do not look forward to in GA. I've only been there during the cooler months. We can't wait to see all of Joe's family though. Only a few more weeks!

*If you'd like to see more pictures I posted them on Facebook.

I'm back, tomorrow

We've been home for over a week now and I've yet to post about our trip. I promise I will try and post pictures tomorrow. We have had a hard time adjusting ourselves back to central time. Michael slept in yesterday until 10:30. I couldn't believe we all slept in that late. I should add Joe kept sleeping for at least another hour. Anyway I think we are back on schedule and I'll post tomorrow!

Happy 5th Anniversary Babe!
Love you

Camping

Friday we went camping at a state park near by with a large group of friends from church. We got there pretty late but just in time to set up camp before it got too dark. We forgot our camping chairs and lost some time there. I saw fireflies for the first time and was able to share that with Michael. We had fun eating s'mores and sitting around a campfire with friends telling stories. I ended up holding Michael on my lap in my chair until he fell asleep. We wandered back to our campsite around 1:30am. I didn't get any pictures from Friday but here are a couple from Saturday morning before we took off. Joe was hurting from sleeping on the ground. I felt like I slept an hour. Michael slept the best and only woke up a few times but went back to sleep quickly. We were happy to be back home early enough in the day for us to all take naps. We had a lot of fun the time we were there and hope to go again sometime. Michael absolutely loved being outside the whole time and didn't have any complaints! I think now that we've actually gone camping with Michael we know that we can do it. So hopefully we will! We just need a bigger tent.

What do you do on a rainy Sunday afternoon while Daddy is sleeping?


Help Mommy make cupcakes of course!

Being such a good helper.

I hand him a spoon and he instantly puts in in the bowl and knocks it over.
He was only supposed to play with the spoon but he thought otherwise.

What do you do with the worlds ugliest looking cupcakes?

Frost them of course!

Daddy woke up and shared the leftover frosting.

He couldn't stop saying mmm after every little bite of frosting.
Happy Memorial Day!

Our Living Room

Do you remember this post? I promised to post pictures of our updated living room. Well I'm finally getting around to it. One of the reasons why I waited so long was that we (Joe would say I) couldn't decide if we were going to repaint. So we haven't, but honestly we still could. Here are the pictures I promised... only problem is we need more color in them!!!

The organization of the toys! Too bad the wall this sits against is still blank! That needs to go on our to do list!

I love what curtains added to our room. Our circle iron piece is loved by both of us.

Our entertainment center that we waited an extra month to get because it was so popular.
Love it! It just needs to be decorated a little better.

I love our couches. Great quality, comfort & stylish!

Of course what post would be complete without Michael.
This is Michael's chair. We bought it for camping but it has a permanent place in our living room. He didn't want to sit in it and smile for me. You see when he is told to sit in his chair he gets to watch his favorite show, My Friends Tigger & Pooh. He was upset that the tv wasn't coming on. (the red blotches on his legs is his eczema flaring up).

He won, I won. TV on, smile for camera.


Did I mention he's really into flags right now? He points them out all the time. In the car it's all he says because there are so many to point out! Plus they're all huge! You know, everything's bigger here!

The Bachelorette & Dessert

I am a huge fan of The Bachelorette and The Bachelor. Despite the shock of Jason's actions I WILL be watching the Bachelorette this season. Jillian sure had a wide range of men to choose from last night. Don't you think? Actually I was quite surprised by the fact that so many of them were from Texas! Yee haw! Y'all!

I can't believe that she kept Brian who was calling her "hot hottub lady" or whatever it was that he said. I thought that was stupid of him and it seemed like he saw her as more of an object than a woman with feelings. He does not have my vote! Maybe I'm going a little to far with this?

It's hard to remember them all but the ones who would get my vote so far- in random order are... Juan, Kypton & Sasha. Cute, cute & cute. Oh of course I think they are sweet too.

Who gets your vote?

In honor of another season starting I had to make a yummy dessert.
Chocolate-Peanut Butter Dream Bars were the perfect choice!Picture via Betty Crocker
Be careful not to eat the whole pan yourself! Trust me you just might want to, until you read the calorie intake. The whole pan would be over 7000 calories! But they are oh so yummy!

Bekah's visit

(I'm warning you this is a long post. I don't blame you to just look at the pictures and call it good).
My good friend Bekah is traveling the states over the next two and a half months. She's already been on the road for two weeks. We were one of the first couple stops. She was able to stay with us Sunday afternoon through Wednesday morning. I had so much fun visiting with Bekah. We hadn't seen each other since before Joe and I were married. Which means over five years ago since our 5yr Anniversary is right around the corner. We had a lot of fun catching up and enjoying some girl time together. Joe took Monday and Tuesday off to run around with us but ended up choosing to stay home on Tuesday. He wasn't feeling so good but he willingly watched Michael for us so we could run around all day Tuesday.

Sunday Bekah showed up and I prepared a traditional Sunday dinner with grilled chicken, twice baked potatoes, green beans, rolls and jello with bananas. Joe and Bekah made fun of me for being a typical "Utah Mormon" (which I am NOT) for adding fruit into my jello.... and for the fact that I made jello. I swear I never do! What's wrong with making it anyway? It's yummy!

Monday late morning we did a little shopping with Michael. Lunch came soon and Michael would soon be ready for a nap so we went back and dropped Michael off with Joe. We ate lunch at home and went to get our nails done. I haven't had a manicure in quite some time so it was nice! We got back just in time to throw the boys in the car and head downtown to go inside the Alamo. We had a few minutes to look around inside and sign the guest book. I swear right after we signed it the guard closed the book because they were closing in 5 minutes so some guest didn't get to sign. I was surprised that he did it right when they were walking up. Rude! We took a few pics in front of the Alamo then headed over to the Riverwalk. It was nice to go during a weekday instead of the weekend. It's so much easier to walk without thinking at any minute you could get knocked in the canal. We decided to eat some yummy steak here and chose to eat inside since it was super hot & humid.

Michael got bored towards the end of our dinner and wanted out of the highchair. So Joe put him on his lap and he immedietly snatched Joe's straw turning it into a utensil. :) He proudly showed it to daddy and tried to eat his bread. No such luck, as you see in the last picture.











We walked around the Riverwalk a bit after dinner then headed home. On the way we stopped at DQ for a cool treat to cool us off.

Us waiting for our DQ. I thought I was being clever taking this picture and Joe made fun of me for doing it. BOO! :) Bekah hiding behind my seat...

there she is.

Tuesday we headed to the Zoo with Michael in tow. It was another HOT day! We kept hydrated by drinking water and tried to stay out of the sun but that was pretty much impossible! We enjoyed seeing the animals and Michael's reaction to them. He moslty just looked with a serious face and would say the ones he knew like: fish, duck, bird & bear. I can't think of any others he might have known. He knew what the lion, tiger and bear (oh my) said though... ROARRRRRR! He really like the elephant. We ended up getting there just at the end of a trainer talking about the elephant and having the elephant do tricks. We saw a few of the tricks and were really impressed. Michael didn't want to leave that exibit and blew a kiss bye bye per Bekah's request. I have to add that Michael was immedietly drawn to Bekah. Don't be offended family... she says she has this effect on all kids. :) Plus I think he's breaking out of his shell now. We also got to feed some birds a cup of nectar. One of the birds ended up taking it from Bekah and fed himself. It was so unexpected and pretty funny that it was snatched so quickly. After the Zoo we took Michael home for lunch and put him down for a nap.

We took off again and I had the pleasure of introducing Bekah to our favorite place for Texas BBQ. I think she liked it. Look at her happy face. :)

The "Sauce"
The goods: brisket, turkey, sausage link & sliced bread. Not pictured: potato salad. We shared this plus had left overs. There might have been a few pieces consumed at this point.

This is how you eat your brisket & turkey. A slice of moist bread filled with brisket or turkey or both with some of Rudy's BBQ Sauce to wet it. Mmm yummy!After lunch we decided we'd drive out here to do this. We changed our minds when we were going to have to wait almost an hour for the next boat. Thanks for the suggestion though Sally!


Instead we decided to go hit the two best outlets nearby! Bekah found a cute store that carrys super cute jeans. She was set after that so we headed home soon after. We got home in time for a late dinner including a quick trip to the grocery store. We caught up on Idol and then watched Fringe. :) We actually rented a movie but were too tired to start it at 10pm.

Thanks for making us one of your stops Bekah! We really enjoyed your visit and you're welcome to come back anytime!!!

Answers

#1. Nacho Libre from "Nacho Libre"

#2 The Joker from "The Dark Knight"
Okay so maybe this one was a little stretch of my imagination. My brother McKenzie guessed it, but this is who he was for Halloween last year.
























#3 Doug Heffernan from King of Queens
Although I really like NaDell's answer of the late Steve Irwin.


















































Thanks for playing along!