Valentine's 2012

Happy Valentine's Day! We had fun week celebrating love, 

hearts and all things pink and red!

Our much anticipated sugar cookie decorating contest was a huge success and Shane was awarded the gold medal for the 10th year in a row.  I gave myself a gold star for coming up with a new gluten free sugar cookie recipe that is hands down our favorite.  Shane isn't a huge fan of sugar cookies but he kept sneaking into the kitchen for more- Best compliment ever!!!

 He says the ideas for decorating just come to him when 

he looks at each cookie, but I think he spends all 

year thinking of new and creative ways win. 

 Molly is pretty good at spreading frosting on cookies and 

she's a pro at dumping as many sprinkles as possible onto each cookie.

Deciding which sprinkles to add to her masterpiece...

 She's also content to sit and eat frosting while we decorate the cookies!

(we go through a lot of knives!)

Thanksgiving 2011

We had such a fun Thanksgiving weekend with Grandma and Grandpa and lots of cousins to play with.  Molly was in heaven!  We had so much fun playing, shopping, eating deep fried turkey and spending time together.  Molly was so sad Sunday morning when she woke up and everyone was gone.

 Molly and Cha Cha.  It's so fun to have a cousin your age to play with.  We went and saw Arthur Christmas.  It was Molly's first time going to the movies and she loved it!

 The lights at the Mesa Temple

 Playing "chase"

 We love Grandma and Grandpa!

 Smile!

 Yum!  Watching the Krispy Kreme assembly line.  It smelled heavenly.

 The lights at the Mesa Temple.  See the wise men with their camels in the background.  So beautiful!

Grandma bought fun holiday p.j.'s for the kids

Happy Halloween!

Ready for some candy!  Molly was really excited for her 1st year of trick or treating.  She was thrilled to get candy but had just as much fun passing it out to the kids who came to our house.

Trick-or-Treat

Last night was our church's annual Fall Festival including trunk-or-treating for the kids.  Molly wasn't too keen on dressing up and she took off her witches hat as soon as I took the pictures, but boy did she love going from car to car filling her little pumpkin with candy!  After a few cars she was even saying "trick-or-treat" and "thank you" without any prompting.

trick-or-treat!

She was especially in love with the little packs of m&ms

We've been doing all things pumpkin lately: cookies, decorations, clothes; I love hearing Molly sing, "Good morning pumpkin!" first thing when she wakes up and see's the pumpkin in the window.

I've been teaching Molly all of the Halloween songs that I grew up singing: 5 Little pumpkins; Mr. jack-o-lantern; Witches flying through the sky; and Boo, Boo, boo, boo! I'm a ghost to scare you.

She loves to sing and follows along with the actions!

I hope you're enjoying this Bewitching Season!

Autumn...

 

It's October and suppose to hit 100 degree's today.  Fall is one of my favorite seasons, but despite my best efforts I'm having a hard time getting into it this year.  I'm homesick for sweaters and colored leaves!  As the weeks pass and the temperature dips below 100 I know that things will start looking up.  I'm counting down the days until we can spend all morning at the park or go on a walk without getting heat exhaustion!  Until then, I'm in need of some serious mental intervention ("I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and dog-gone-it it's fall!")  My plan is to do something Fall or Halloween inspired every day this month.  I'm not going to blog about everything we do, but if I come up with anything super cute or fun I'll definitely share.

I got this idea from the family fun website.  We taped a couple pieces of posterboard together, cut out a jack-o-lantern, covered the back with yellow tissue paper and put it in our window.  So cute!

(view from inside) 

(view from outside)

The pumpkin made Molly a little nervous, but by morning she 

was pretty excited to see her friend still sitting in the window!

Birthday Fun

 Our sweet baby girl turned 2.  Here's the play by play with pictures of Molly's birthday last week:

Wake up.  Ohh and Ahh over the birthday decorations for a millisecond before making a mad dash over to birthday gift - a Molly sized kitchen.

Mmmm breakfast.  Molly's choice: waffles, whip cream, raspberries, whip cream, chocolate milk and whip cream.  There might have been some bacon and eggs in there somewhere, but breakfast really was all about the whip cream!

Open some presents...

Get dressed, go to the car wash (one of her favorite activities), pick up birthday balloons, make cupcakes, talk to grandparents and cousins on the phone, skip nap because we're having too much fun today, and play more kitchen while watching the BYU game.

Molly chose pizza for dinner and then it was finally time for cake and ice cream.  Earlier in the week I showed Molly one of my cookbooks that has a picture for each of the cake and cupcake recipes.  I asked her to pick out the one she wanted for her birthday and she immediately pointing to the picture of strawberry cupcakes. "Happy Birthday!  Happy Birthday!" she sang with glee.  Those were the ones I was hoping she'd pick!

Yum!  They really were good cupcakes.  

(I'll post the recipe on glutenfreebetty.com soon).

 more presents...

Happy Day.   Happy Family.

Memorial Day Weekend 2011

I don't know what it is, but for some reason I feel let down if I don't get to go hiking or do something outdoorsy for Memorial Day.  To fulfill this need, we went to a park preserve that has a duck pond and a bunch of walking trails so that we could enjoy nature.  Then it was home for naps (Shane and Molly) before going to the Diamondbacks baseball game.  It really was a perfect day!

 

We had front row seats for duck watching!

 

One of Molly's new things- balancing on walls

 

My little helper!  Helping Mommy cut out donuts

Molly and Me

I love Mother's Day!  For a lot of years Mother's Day was a really hard day for me...a celebration of my greatest desire, my desire to be a mother.  Enter Molly and her sweet birth-mother Ana.  They have blessed me with the most precious gift and highest calling of all.  Motherhood.  I celebrate this every day when I look into the eyes of my beautiful baby.  I am a mother.

My little helper in the sewing room

 

Always ready with a smile

 Can you see the mischievous spark in her eyes?

 Mama's shoes

Easter 2011

I hope you had a wonderful Easter!  At church during Primary (Sunday school class for children ages 3-11) the most beautiful book was shared about a treasure hunt for the true meaning of Easter called Easter walk by Deborah Pace Rowley.  The pictures and message are beautiful.  It really touched me and is a book I want to share with my family not only on Easter, but throughout the year.

We had a quiet afternoon including naps and a silly photo shoot.  It's hard being away from family on holidays and being new to the area we haven't yet found "family" to spend our holidays with when we can't be with our relatives.  We were blessed to have that in Chicago and hope to find that in Arizona.

 Molly loved the Mrs. Potato Head she got for Easter!

 Cheese! Who's got the biggest grin?

 Seriously, those eyes just make me melt!

Happy President's Day!

We've had a fun filled week with Valentine's Day, decorating Molly's room and just spending time together as a family.  Here are some picture highlights:

 I've just about given up on headbands.  They look so cute but never last more than 5 minutes...

 Valentine's Dinner: homemade Heart Shaped gluten free pizza, red punch, red jello, purple salad dressing (raspberry vinaigrette), and for dessert...

gluten free sugar cookies (my recipe, of course!)

 We always have a little decorating contest, and yes, Shane always wins!  He's just so creative!!!

Yum!

Molly and I rearranged her room while Shane was out of town.  She loves having the books within reach of her rocking chair!

 Just hanging around

 Molly loves to find new places to sit

Mommy's girl!