Best of....

There are things about people that I would call "best of's". It is that thing/s that when you see; you think of that person. Examples:

When I see J.Crew catalogs I think of my college roommate Janiece.
When I hear The Samples I think of my high school buddy Justin.
When we travel and see something purely authentic or local, I think of my husband (he always tries the local fare of any place we are visiting).
When I see Diet Coke I think of my sisters.
When I hear Olivia Newton John I think of my childhood friends Karen and Jenny.

It is those things that remind you of a specific person. Well, my daughter is full of "best of's". I am not sure how a child only 4 years old can have so many. But I love it... so many things remind me of her. Here are just a few:

lollipops
lemonade
avril lavinge (don't ask)
swings (and ella would be slides)
Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan or Cinderella
Pirate's Booty
Chicken Nuggest (but then again, what child doesn't this remind you of)
The Cheesecake Factory

She is so funny, my little girl. I love these things about her, they are what make her the BEST!

SLC Cont'd

The fun in SLC continued. Monday I got sick, but Chris and all boys (his dad, brothers and nephew) went to a SLC Buzz baseball game. And believe it or not, they were playing the Fresno Grizzlies.

The Tuesday we headed to Bountiful to swim at their rec center. It is awesome by the way. We went last summer. It is perfect for little kids because it is so shallow. Parents for the most part can be at ease that their children (that don't know how to swim) won't drown. I love that. I wish we had something like this here at home.

On Wednesday we went downtown to the Conference Center and took a tour. Chris' mom is a guide there, so she gave us the grand tour. It was really quite nice. The best part for me was the artwork they had all throughout the center... pretty amazing. The kids favorite part was being up on the roof and playing with the fountains.

More Bryce Canyon Photos

Here are just a few more photos from Bryce Canyon. Seriously, this place is so beautiful. I think I got a few good family photos that might be going up in our home.

Let's the Recap Begin

Our first day, we drove to Utah and stopped off in Bryce Canyon for a little hike. We met up with Uncle Brian and took the girls down the canyon and back up again. It was a great day of 70 degrees, a little cloud cover and family fun. It really is such a beautiful place. Hannah loved to walk through the rock tunnels. Ella almost got attacked by a hunger and fearless squirrel and mom and dad carried (and dragged) two girls up the canyon. The last 200 feet up was met with a small, but substantial rainfall. What a fantastic way to start our trip in Utah.

Let's build a community

I know many people that visit my blog come for my Young Women's lessons. Now that I am a counselor in the Young Women's I don't teach as much as I used to. Which is sad, because that really is what I love to do. The hard thing about my calling is coming up with 2-3 mutual activities a month. That is sooo hard!

This is where you come into play. I am looking to the community of YW leaders to help me out and to help each other out. Whether or not you are in charge of activities, many of you are involved in YW and mutual (if only by attending and supporting). I would love to have each of you share with me what your YW do each week in mutual.

I have been posting the activities my YW do each week hoping that it helps many of you out there. My thought is each week when I post my ideas, you share with me in the comments section, what your YW did that week. I will then take all the comments and make a separate post each week with all the ideas in one location so people can have a place to go to for ideas and activities.

I know this would help me out a ton. It is hard to come up with creative, interesting and fun activities each month, so let's help each other and share our ideas. What do you say?

Must visits in Utah

While I am waiting to go through my photos, I thought I would share "must sees' in utah according to Angela. This is the Best of Utah by Angela.

1) Cafe Rio - the best salads and burritos I have ever had. I get the grilled chicken salad with black beans, everything and the house dressing ever single time.

2) Gateway Mall - They have almost every stores you could think of (almost... no pottery barn or Crate and Barrel), but a lot of clothing stores and the scenery is so nice.

3) Ikea - This was my first time in Ikea. I don't love their furniture all that much, but their accessories and kitchen stuff is to die fore. I got these great mugs for $1.99 each. I thought they would be perfect for root beer floats.

4) Ben's Cookies - These cookies are so good. They are basically a stick of butter per cookie, but that is why they are so good. Eat sparingly, but we always get them when we are in town.

5) Island Flavor Shaved Ice Truck - I read about them being the best in Utah and they didn't not disappoint. This green truck literally is 1/2 mile from my in-laws house, so we finally had one. It was really so good. You have to order it with ice cream and cream, that is what was so good. But my daughter had a regular sno cone and it was almost as good. Try the Raspberry Colada. It is the best!

6) Tai Pan - Okay, I have heard about this place before as a must see and I almost didn't go. I am so glad I did. This place is home decorating heaven. I spend a couple of hours there and couple of $$ too. It was unbelievable.... definitely a must see and make sure you save up your money. Things are cheap, but you will want everything you see.

We're Back

We made it home last night around 11:00 pm. After a 14 hour car ride we are glad to be home. Sleeping in our own beds was quite a treat. Hannah woke up saying "I love my bed." Now we are up and getting ready for the first day of school. I have so much to write about our trip, but first I need to get caught up on laundry, unpacking, redecorating (thanks to my trip to Tai Pan) and just life back home. stay tuned for details about our trip.

The image comes from Apfrey Photography

Still Happily After

Today is our big day... anniversary day. Someone asked me how long we had been married and I said "5 years", but then later on I realized that I have actually been married 6 years. Shows you who the romantic one is.... not me. But even though I don't know how long I have been married (at least I dont' know how old I am either), I do know that I have loved these last six years. I am not going to get all mushy on the blog, but for journaling sack, I couldn't have asked for a better person to marry, a better father and a better life. I feel blessed to have what I have and can't wait for the more! I love you Chris!

Welcome Girls

This next month or so, we have 3 new girls joining us in beehives. So, I realized I need to do something for them. Along with introduce myself and the Young Women's program and Personal Progress. So, after visiting the Dollar Spot at Target, I picked up these cute silver pails, some Hershey's Hugs and Kisses and put together this simple, yummy treat for each girl. I also collect the following pamphlets and tied them together with a tag and string.

* For Strength of Youth (big book and mini pamphlets for their backpack
* Guidebook for Parents and Leaders of Youth.
* Personal Progress Book and Journal book

This is my new welcome for all incoming Beehives. That is until I come up with something new:-)

Halloween around the corner

I know, what am I thinking, but blame it on Joann's, Martha Stewart and the grocery store for putting it in my head. Stores are already getting ready for this holiday... months in advance. I guess we should be grateful it isn't Christmas stuff.

But Hannah and I have started to get her costume together. She of course wants to be Alice in Wonderland, ever since her Alice in Wonderland birthday. My friend let us keep the dress to use for Halloween. So, all we need is the following:

* black headband with a bow
* white tights
* black shoes
* and one Cheshire Cat

You might be wondering where am I going to get a Cheshire cat? Ebay of course. A nice stuffed Cheshire Cat for Hanna to carry around. This is probably the easiest and cheapest Halloween costume I will ever do. I am loving that!

Back to School Help

Now that we are doing preschool three times a week, I realized I need to come up with something for my daughter to help her out in the morning. She takes FOREVER to get ready each morning. Well over an hour. It take 30 mins to eat breakfast and another 20 on the pot. So, I decided that I would put together a fun activity each morning to help her get ready quicker and make things more fun.

We went to Michaels and she picked out some fake flower (on sale of course). Then I came home and found some clipart online to represent all the things she needs to do each morning. When she completes each "duty" she gets to put that flower back in the vase. When she is ready to go to school the flowers are all in the vase looking Be-U-tiful.

I think she likes it because we have already started using it.

Blog Banners are fun

I am creating a new blog for someone and created a few blog banner drafts for her to choose from. I thought I would share some of the ideas I came up with. This was so much fun to work on because her style is exactly what I like to create... simple and modern. If anyone wants a new blog banner, just give me a jinlge... I mean email :-)

Vintage Fun

I was on ebay the other day and came across these great vintage citrus crate labels from different parts of California. They are originals from the 1930's and 1940's. I fell in love immediately and won the auction. I thought these would make great wall hangings for our loft area. They are so fun yet old-fashioned and represent our wonderful state.. how perfect. I am not sure if I will frame them or paste them to canvas or some kind of foamboard, I will have to wait and see what they are like when I get them... but stayed tuned... I hope to have them up after we get back from our next vacation.

Mission Possible!

So, with only a month or two left of summer, I realized that I have yet to use our ice cream maker. How sad is that? I am not sure why I have neglected this modern day marvel.. I mean come on, how much easier can it be to make ice cream these days? So, the other day while visit Hello, my name is Heather, I came across a great ice cream recipe that I have to try before the summer is over. It requires a little more effort that just pouring five ingredients into the machine, but it looks worth the extra effort. So my mission before the summer is up is to make this recipe in my never used ice cream machine.

You can download the recipe here. and the photos and recipe are credited to Heather Bailey (see link above).

Also, here is a great roundup of ice cream and yogurt recipes... many of which I want to try.

And and one more must make. Man, ice cream recipes are all over the place. I better hurry up!

Service Scavenger Hunt Mutual Activity

We are having a combined YW mutual Activity tonight were we are having a Service Scavenger Hunt.

We broke the girls into about 4-5 girls per team/car. I came each team a brown grocery bag. In it had a list of services that each team needed to be accomplished. The brown bag is for them to put some proof items into the bag. Each bag also has a ziploc bag for the dirt they need to collect when they sweep someone's floor and a plastic grocery bag to put a dirty diaper into.
The scavenger hunt would be approx 30-45 mins. Tell the teams what time to be back by ... sharp. For every minute they are late, you will take away one completed service from their total.

The acts of service that require the girls go into someone's home should be church members or friends. We do not want the girls going into strangers homes. And of course while driving around, please do not speed, break driving laws or be careless. The winning team is the team that accomplishes the most acts of service. The winning team will each get $5 gift certificates to a local ice cream shop.

When the girls got back from the hunt they made ice cream in a bag. (Extra leaders stayed behind and prepare the ice cream activity). It is a pretty easy, fun activity. It takes less than 10 minutes, start to finish, and the only equipment you need are 2 ziplock bags. Here is the link to the instructions online and I included them here.

* 1 tablespoon Sugar
* 1/2 cup half & half
* 1/4 teaspoon Vanilla
* 6 tablespoons Rock salt
* 1 pint-size Ziploc plastic bag
* 1 gallon-size Ziploc plastic bag
* Ice cubes
* plastic spoons
* Optional - you can have chocolate syrup to make Chocolate Ice Cream.

1. Fill the large bag half full of ice and add the rock salt.
2. Put milk, vanilla, and sugar into the small bag, and seal it.
3. Place the small bag inside the large one and seal carefully.
4. Shake until mixture is ice cream, about 5 minutes.
5. Wipe off top of small bag, then open carefully and enjoy!

Great Gift Idea

I was contacted by a client to create a logo for a couple that is getting married. Her gift to this couple was their own logo that they could use at their wedding, on stationery, blog, etc. I thought that was a great idea. What a great gift and one that can be used in so many ways and thoughout their marriage. I love it!

So, here are just a few logos that I created for her to choose from. I will show you the final logo once the couple is married and living happily ever after.

Sharing a Keeper

A couple of people have asked for my banana bread recipe. I made it for some friends as thank you, so I thought I would share the goodness to you too. It isn't my own recipe, so I feel like I should share it with others. It comes from Taste of Ephraim, if you are wondering. Here you go!

1 3/4 cup flour
1 1/2 cup sugar (although I use 1 cup white sugar and 1/2 cup brown sugar)
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 eggs
2 med bananas, mashed
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup nuts, chopped

In a large bowl, stir together the dry ingredients. In another bowl, mix together all other ingredients (except nuts). Add to dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Fold in nuts. Pour into a lightly greased and flour or parchment line 9X5X3 loaf pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour and 20 mins. Cool on wire rack. NOTE: this recipe does not double well.

Vacay Time

We are off on another trip this summer. Back to SLC to enjoy the mountains, the climate, family (on both sides) and all this great state has to offer. We will be visiting Bryce National Park and spending a week up by Sundance. I can't wait to just hang out with family.. .enjoy things like IKEA (I might actually go to it for the first time), the Bountiful Rec Center (it is awesome), see my alma mater BYU and of course Temple Square and Gateway. Hope you have a great few last weeks of summer.

And yes, I will be posting periodically while I am gone!