Cupcakes

My kids love cupcakes. My wonderful friend, Mandy, told me about this website. These are seriously the best cupcakes I have ever had. I used vanilla yogurt instead of the oil, but you can use applesauce too. And mine baked at 350 for 18 minutes before they were done. But that was just my oven I think. You have to try them......so dang good! We just frosted them with a can of frosting from the store, but someday I won't be lazy and try making frosting from scratch like this. It sounds good.

Summertime

Today marks the start of 100 + degrees. I hate this hot weather!!!! And today was also the last day of school......sad for me to have 2 bored kids all day.......fun for Zenock to have his buddy back all day.........and great for Gideon to not get naptime interuppted for a while to take/pickup Ammon from school.

Easter........way late :)

We drove to Brady's brother's house in Bullhead, AZ for Easter Sunday. The boys had a blast swimming with their cousins. I cooked my first ham.........and it was delicious!!!

And all the boys were so worn out they crashed in the car on the way home. Of course, I would too if I had swam all day and played my heart out.

Juli's Baptism

HELLO!!! I wanted to introduce you to my newly Mormon friend, Juliane Boxberger!!!! She got baptized today at 7pm. She's been looking forward to this day since she commited the date almost a month ago. Brady and I are so excited for her! She asked Brady to baptize her since it's mostly his fault she got interested seriously in the Church. They work together sometimes, and he recognized her accent from people he met on his mission when serving in the Southern area of Germany. He spoke to her in German, and she asked how he spoke the language so well.......and the rest is history. I guess I am partly to blame too because we became such good friends. She works the graveyard shift, so we often talk on facebook about her questions about the Book of Mormon and our religion in general. She is living proof that sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ through the internet works!!!!!!!!! And she is also proof to me that member referrals are more successful than cold contacts. Thank you, Juli, for strengthening my testimony of missionary service. You are SO AWESOME!!! And all of us at your baptism are so proud of you! Welcome to the rest of your life!!!!

The fabulous Sisters Hanney (from Shelley, Idaho :)) and Matthew (from Hawaii). They are serving in our ward, and we LOVE them!!!!!! They taught the first couple of lessons to Juli in my home, and I feel so privileged to be a part of this wonderful event!

In honor of our wonderful servicemen and women!

Camping

Brady took the boys to the Father and Son's campout at Redrock again this year. I had a great time with Gideon by myself, and I was able to recharge my Mom batteries while they were gone. Camping is fun, so fun in fact that you have to get up with the sun. And that makes one tired dude.

Zenock is very proud of the lizard he caught

They both loved playing with all thier friends from church

Swimming Lessons

New suit

I feel like I am always in the market for a new swim suit. The bottoms of all my suits seem to not last much more than one summer since I sit on the pool steps a lot with the kiddos. The last several years I have purchased tankini's. This year I think I'm going for a one piece, but man, are they hard to find! I love this one from Harpi. Too bad they don't have any coverups in lime green...I'm addicted to that color :)

Southwest Eggrolls

I made these Southwest eggrolls tonight for dinner. They are amazing. To make it even more simple, I just substituted the chopped red pepper, green chilis, and cayanne pepper flakes for medium salsa. The kids really liked it, and so did Brady and I. I made them just on my stovetop griddle. Knowing what I know now, we would not have gotten rid of that small George Foreman grill we got for a wedding present. Didn't have much use for it then, but we could sure use it now! Because I don't have a grill or pannini press, my rolls didn't look as pretty, but the flavor was excellent. We dipped them in sour cream and more salsa. And there's leftovers for tomorrow!!

Laugh for the day

I don't know about you, but after listening to my boys whine all day, I needed a good laugh, so I thought I would share a good one.

ZZism's

Zenock: "My sunburn makes me hurt, so in the middle of the night and I wake up, I need to watch movies to make it better." We laughed. We tried not to laugh at him, but we weren't completely successful.
Don't worry. He never got up...silly kid!!

Lose Weight for a GREAT Cause!

We have some wonderful friends who we met at BYU-Idaho way back in 2004. I have posted about their little 3 year old boy Austin before, but I'll tell you a little about him if you don't know.

Austin contracted an E. Coli strain last summer, and it caused him to loose 11 inches of his colon and his kidneys will never be the same. He does dialysis twice a week now until he can get a new kidney. You can read in detail about his story here. His parents are actively doing everything they can to raise money for his medical expenses, so I have decided to join in too.

I am an Independent Distributor with Herbalife. They have awesome health supplements, personal care products, and a wonderful, healthy weightloss program that actually works! My husband, who needs to lose about 60 lbs, started the month of April at 293 lbs. He is now at 279 lbs. I can't believe he has already lost 14 lbs!!!

So starting May 1st and running through May 31st I am donating 10 % of every weightloss program purchased through my website to COTA in Austin's name. And from June 1st through June 30th I am donating $1.00 for every pound you lose on the program during that month.

Please help Austin! Loose that gut, muffin top, flabby arms....whatever you have, and join me and my husband in helping someone else by becoming more healthy ourselves.

Please, please pass this on to everyone you know. The more the word gets spread, the more money we can give to Austin.