Counting Down

I have never been one to count down to things.  To me counting down seems to make time pass slower.

When Ray left on his mission I remember a lot of girls with a missionary having countdown calendars where they would fill in a little dot for each day until the missionary returned.  That would have made me crazy to have to fill in 730 dots, so I didn't do it. 

I have also seen clever little blocks where you turn the blocks to the number showing how many weeks left.  Not a real fan of that either.  When you remind yourself it's 100+ weeks, that's just depressing.

With my sons though I am guilty of counting the Fast Sundays (there are only four left) and I have always counted how many general conferences (just one left)-I especially like that one because you can count it on one hand.

Awhile ago I saw an idea online that I really like.  That is to read the Doctrine & Covenants backwards as a countdown of sorts for a missionary coming home.  The other day I checked how long it is until Mitch returns and to my surprise found if I am going to do that I need to start NOW!

I can now say his mission has really gone by quickly.

And One More

As soon as I finished my last post I realized I had forgotten one of my truly favorite things I discovered last year. 

One day we were in Costco and they had a special display of sheets.  I had been wanting some new sheets, but hadn't gotten around to buying any.  I can't stand cheep sheets-I am kind of a sheet snob, so was a bit leery about buying sheets from Costco.  I'm super picky about sheets and bed making.  I want my sheets soft and snuggly and I like the bed perfectly made with hospital corners, so they have to be wide enough to tuck in the way I like it.  Anyway, I talked to the salesperson there and she convinced me I would LOVE these sheets and since they felt so nice to the touch I bought them.  I never thought I could love a set of sheets, but I do.  They are Jennifer Adams Eternal Collection sheets.  Holy smokes, I am not one known to sleep in, but I really do not want to get out of bed in the morning!

When Christmas rolled around and I was deciding what to get my kids (who now seem to have everything they need) I decided to buy them a set of my favorite sheets.  My friends who I told what my kids were getting no doubt thought I was no fun.  I was a little nervous that the kids would be disappointed when they opened their gift on Christmas, but knew once they slept on them they would think it was an awesome gift.

I knew it!

Now the coolest part about these sheets is that if you buy them anywhere but Costco they are ridiculously expensive, like almost $400, but when you can find them at Costco they are just under $100.  Still a little pricey, but oh so worth it.  

2013 Favorites

I do this every year.  Keep track of things that I discover that are new to me that I LOVE.  So for last year here are MY TOP 10 FAVORITE THINGS

MAYLEE-Hands down number one on this list.  There is nothing better than being a grandma.  We had a Relief Society lesson last Sunday and the teacher asked us to list some things that we love and someone said our children, and then joked that was sort of a love/hate relationship.  But then added, not with grandchildren..it's only love.

IPHONE- I held out for a really long time, but  last spring I decided it was time. I had no idea how much I would love it.  There are so many things on this phone that I thought I didn't need, that I now know I don't want to live without.  Some of them made this list.

FACETIME-Grandbaby living far away...being able to talk to her and see her smile wherever we are at...priceless.

ANGIE'S HOLLIDRIZZLE popcorn-This was a Christmas Costco find.  Yummy... and sorta healthy. After we started our healthy new year resolutions no more Hollidrizzle, so SkinnyPop is now our go to snack.

DILETTANTE CHOCOLATE COVERED MINT DROPS-Costco had these for a short while last summer.  These little mint green balls are to die for.  Nothing healthy here unless you count how small they are.

DIGITAL KITCHEN SCALE-In our quest to be healthy a food scale has helped us keep our portions in check.  It gets used several times a day and I feel a little OCD about that.    It comes in really handy when you want to know how much you can really eat without totally blowing your diet.  Apparently, 6,101 people on Amazon agree with me on this one.

MY FITNESS PAL APP- Speaking of love hate relationships, I have one with this.  Keeping a food journal is a pain, but using this app makes it a little less painful.  One thing I really like on it is the pie graph showing the carbs, proteins, and fats.  The goal is to make it look like close to this at the end of the day.

FOODUCATE-This app is just plain fun.  If you have nothing better to do, use it to scan items on the shelves at the grocery store.  It gives each food a letter grade.  Maybe the school teacher in me is why I love this so much.  Check it out and see why I won't ever be buying strawberry Pop-Tarts again.

GRANITE DEPOSIT SINK-Last summer we replaced our laminate countertops with granite.  I like the countertops a lot, but can't really say I love them.  But I do love the new sink that came with it.  I thought I was fine with doing stainless, but the salesperson convinced Ray we should pay a little more and get a granite composite sink.  Boy am I glad we did.  I love how this sink looks clean all of the time with no water spots or scratches.


SPICE STACK-Every time I open this cupboard it makes me happy.  My spices used to just be on a shelf in a cupboard.  I would have to remove about half of the jars each time I searched for whatever spice I was looking for.  This tray has changed my life.  It holds 30+ jars and I organized them alphabetically in the case.  The drawers pull out and down and I swear I can find a spice in one second flat.  Brilliant.  It has made me wonder how much time I have wasted the last 30 years looking for spices.


There are more things to love about the last year, but hey you have to stop somewhere.

CHRISTmas

Christmas came quickly this year.  It seemed like it was Thanksgiving one week and Christmas the next.  The tree has been up for more than a month, but I just don't have the heart to take it down yet. 

Last year at Christmas I blogged about a billboard saying Christmas is love, family, and Jesus Christ, so for the second year in a row I tried to take that to heart and do some things to simplify Christmas and focus more on those three things.

Early in the month I got busy putting together our annual Christmas letter/card and sent them off.  It seems like less and less people send cards anymore, but I love staying connected to our long distance friends and family this way.

Then I took simplifying Christmas one step further and did something different instead of neighbor gifts and extended family gifts.  Each year it has gotten more crazy as the neighborhood keeps growing and each year I wonder why we do neighbors gifts when there are so many better things we could be putting all that effort into. 

So this year instead running gifts around the neighborhood, we decided to have a neighborhood open house hot cocoa party.  So on one cold snowy day I delivered invitations to all of the 39 houses in our neighborhood inviting them all to our home the next Saturday night.

Delivering invitations in and of itself was a good thing as it gave me the opportunity to visit for a few minutes with lots of our neighbors and I was also able to introduce myself to a family that had moved into our neighborhood awhile ago that I hadn't met.

We felt like our open house was a success.  About half of our neighbors dropped by, had some cocoa, and visited with each other for an hour or so.  We even had a few neighbors we rarely see  and  a couple of the widows who don't get out much come.  Everyone seemed to have a good time and several people commented that we should do things like this more often.  So who knows, maybe we'll do it again next year. 


Another thing we did this year wasn't planned for, but just kind of evolved.   I had seen on the Daily Closer to Christ blog an idea to do 24 days of giving during the month of December.  The idea was to do something for someone else each day leading up to Christmas.

A couple of years before I had purchased this cute mitten advent garland for no specific reason, but when I saw this idea knew it was perfect.  So all month long we did little anonymous acts of service for others and then clipped what we had done to the back of each mitten.  It was a lot of fun...although it was a bit of a bummer when we paid for the person behind us in the drive up window and they had only ordered  fries and a diet coke.
 

We also cut way back on the presents we bought for each other and our children.  Each person only got a couple of gifts.  Shopping was kind of a non event for us, but we did a lot of other things together as a family.

All in all December was a lot less stressful and a ton of fun  I'm hoping we don't remember this as a Christmas of few presents, but as a Christmas of many more "gifts".

Tradition

I have noticed that after awhile most everyone who keeps a blog slows down on their blogging, so it's no surprise to me that I haven't gotten around to putting something on here for quite some time.  When that realization hits, or when someone who actually reads your blog comments wondering why you haven't posted, it's time for one of those catch up posts.  So here goes...

I have said before that Thanksgiving is my very favorite holiday.  It's my mom's fault because when we were growing up she always made it so special.  That is when relatives, who we hardly ever saw, would venture to Utah.  Mom loved to cook and this was her chance to do it all.  Our menu was the same every single year-turkey, stuffing, yams with marshmallows on top, potatoes and gravy, homemade rolls, cranberry sauce, Jello salad, stuffed celery, olives, and pumpkin pie with real whipped cream.  The table was always fancy with our china, and we dressed up for dinner.  Over the years we have tweaked things just a little, but for the most part have pretty much stuck to her menu.  But I am a little embarrassed to say our rolls have not always been homemade and I am guilty of using the Marie Callender pie crust, but other than that we've pretty much done it right.

After last Thanksgiving, when we totally broke tradition, I decided that this year we were going to do Thanksgiving the way you are supposed to.  No Rhodes rolls or grocery store pie crusts at our house.  I knew I could do this because Heather would be here to help and it's a lot of fun spending time with her in the kitchen. We made everything from scratch, even the cranberry sauce, which I'd never done before.

Can I just say traditional pumpkin pie has never been my favorite because the moist texture kind of freaks me out.  So over the years I have made chiffon pumpkin pie, pumpkin delight, or some other pumpkin concoction instead, but since I wanted to do Thanksgiving right knew this year it had to be a real homemade pumpkin pie. To build up our confidence for all this Heather and I went to a pie making demo at Sur La Table the Saturday before.  They taught us some tricks for making a perfect pie crust and a brilliant idea for making pumpkin pie on a quarter sheet pan.  Their recipe and cooking it on a quarter sheet made the texture so much better and the pieces able to be cut in smaller pieces, so we decided we'd give that a try. 

The one tradition we have incorporated that mom was never a part of is having pie the night before Thanksgiving.  We have done this the past few years and I think is the greatest idea ever.  Like most families you need many different pies besides pumpkin on the Thanksgiving menu, and the crunchy caramel apple pie I make is the favorite at our house.  So the night before Thanksgiving we gorged ourselves on apple pie and ice cream and saved the pumpkin for Thanksgiving when everyone is too full for pie, but eats it out of obligation. 

All in all is was a wonderful holiday.  Of course the best part was having our little family together.

I plan to blog soon about some other things we've been up to.

Conference Weekend

Last weekend it was conference, one of my favorite weekends of the year. 

How lucky we are to be able to stay at home and be instructed on how we can be happier, have more peace in our lives, and be a little better.  I always come away recharged but also feeling like I have so much to do...which is really not a bad thing.

 

The last several conference weekends we have spent in SLC, but this time we stayed at home and Heather, Nick, and Maylee were able to join us.  It made me realize how blessed we are and that no matter where we are, conference is wonderful...but it is even more wonderful when you spend it with family.  

 

Sometimes in the past we have a little trouble staying awake through all 8+ hours of talks.  Putting together a puzzle while we listened helped most of us stay alert.

 

Saturday morning we made some yummy cinnamon rolls and later we dipped caramel apples to have for a treat after the guys came home from priesthood. 

 

It really spoke to my heart when  Elder Hales reminded us that we gathered to hear the words of the Lord, now we are to return to our homes to live them.  That is what I intend to do.

Better Than Expected

After a seven year hiatus, we got around to planting a vegetable garden again.  We talked about doing it each year, then the spring would get away from us and before we knew it, it would be too late.  Not this year.

In early spring our neighbor brought us a load of sheep manure so we revved up our tiller and planted. 

And we are so glad that we did. 

Ray set up a drip system and we only had to weed the garden twice!

Our garden grew like crazy. 

We have eaten (and shared with our neighbors) lots and lots of tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant, cucumbers, melons, corn, carrots, and beans.

I found a recipe for ratatouille and made it with pretty much all of the ingredients coming from our garden!  It was yummy...although it didn't look so pretty.

Our garden is almost done producing and we 're pretty sad about it. Why can't summer/fall last just a little longer...