Warm Sunny Day in January

The kids were out of school for Martin Luther King Day so we went and picked up Kyle and went to a park near his work to have lunch. It was such a nice day. Beautiful sunny weather and a warm 60 degree day in January. I'll take it. The park doesn't have parking nearby so you have to park on a side street and walk on a path to the park. Last time we went to this park it was really hot and the equipment was too hot to go on so they have been wanting to go back when they could actually play on it. Chelsea wasn't eating her lunch so we left it on the picnic table and sure enough a bird came down and took her sandwich away. haha. 

Vancouver Canada Day Trip

Marci texted me saying she wanted to go to Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada to use her new passport and get a stamp in it. At first, I said no, but then Kyle said go ahead. So we went! We just went for a day on Saturday January 24th. Marci drove up early to my house and we left around 8am. The weather was awful. Lots of rain and low visibility. We were hoping it was better up in Canada. Before we made it to the border, Marci suggested calling Verizon to see what charges we would incur for using our phones since we were leaving the country. I called since she was driving and ended up changing my phone plan for the day so we could use it to find directions. It was a blessing and a curse. I'll say why later. 

The peace arch at the US/Canada border crossing. We drove up to the stall and the man was immediately mad at Marci for not stopping where she was supposed to stop. We didn't know. Then he ripped her passport out of her new cute passport holder (I had an enhanced drivers license so he didn't need to rip my passport out of anything. ha). THEN he didn't even stamp it! Marci was all sad and asked if stamped it and he said they don't stamp them anymore. What?! That was one of the main reasons Marci wanted to go to Canada! hahaha. We died laughing as we pulled away. Not only was he rude (welcome to Canada), but she didn't even get a stamp! We laughed until we cried so our makeup came off. A good start to our day. 

We made it early to the Vancouver Temple where we had an 11:00am appointment for initiatories. Thank goodness for the Google map app on our phone to get us there! The Temple looks deceiving because it looks tiny from the outside, but when you go it there are 2 stories with a beautiful staircase like from Gone with the Wind. It was pretty with all the trim and molding and detail. We were in awe. There were ladies from a Spanish Branch and they would greet one another with air kisses on each side of the cheeks. It was fun to watch their mannerisms in a different country. 

On our way to find Harvey's (a fast food place that Marci's friend recommended), I checked my phone for the weather. This is what it said! Yeah right! 

This is what it was actually like! We were laughing and joking that it was the best season for traveling because of the awesome weather. Who chooses to go sight seeing in this weather?! haha. We laughed lots on this trip. We had to because lots went wrong. On our way to find Harvey's (we were in different cities or areas so we relied on our Google maps A LOT!), I had typed in Harvey's and found several options so we chose one along our route on our way from the Temple to the suspension bridge. They were 45 mins or so away from one another. Well, when we pulled into the location of Harvey's it was NOT a restaurant. It was an industrial area and the location of Harvey and Sons! So dumb!! hahaha! So we got back on the road and off to another Harvey's location. We joked that we were going to go visit all the people named Harvey in British Columbia. 

 This is the Harvey's we found near where we were going. It is the bright red awning next to the other restaurant. It was Take-Out only! This is hilarious because we couldn't even eat inside! hahaha! See why we laughed so much? No kids and we could eat anywhere and we eat outside under an awning in front of a coffee shop with a strange lady staring down at us. So funny.  

I tried Poutine fries. They are fries with brown gravy and cheese curds. The cheese melted. Marci said she's tried it before from a kid at school and hated it. I was nervous to try it. It wasn't too bad! I actually liked it. The burger was pretty good. Nothing spectacular. We were also hungry at this point so anything tasted good.  

We drove to the Capalino Suspension Bridge and right as we were parking I got a text from Verizon saying I had incurred $50 of roaming charges. I was annoyed. I thought I already took care of it before getting to Canada. So I called Verizon to sort things out and Marci went to the bridge place to see if it was even worth going with the weather being so bad. After 15 minutes on the phone with Verizon he helped me get things figured out. Marci came back saying the lady thought we should still go because we could still see things. We decided to do it. We were glad we did. 

Waayyy down there is the water! Yikes! It was nerve wracking at first, but by the time we left the main bridge was the easiest part of the whole thing! 

The bridge was shaking and moving as we walked across it. That made it more scary. I was proud of Marci because she is afraid of heights and she conquered it!

There were also a tree bridge walk where you walked across bridges from tree to tree. It was cool. 

Looking at the suspension bridge from underneath. 

This is the cliff walk. These walkways were attached to a granite cliff and this semi circular part was terrifying for both of us, but we did it! Originally, we thought it was just the main bridge we were going to walk across, but ended up being 3 different bridge walks so it made it more worth it. It was a fun experience. We were wet and our hair was wrecked by the end of this. Even with umbrellas and hoods. It was non stop raining. We both took extra time in the morning curling our hair and we should have just pulled it back into a pony tail. haha! We cried our make up off from laughing too much and looked like drowned rats from the adventurous bridge walks. :)

We drove around downtown Vancouver, Stanley Park and then out to Burnaby where there was a Target to go shopping. These pictures are from downtown Vancouver. Marci liked the saying, Time is Precious on that building. It was a cool area of downtown where they had brick roads/sidewalks and big clocks and lights on the sidewalks. My biggest mistake was that I didn't have my phone plugged in while using the map app and so it drained my battery. It was basically dead by the time we were done with the bridge and we still needed to get around! We made it to target and stood in Target by the ipads while my phone was plugged in to charge because Marci's car charger stopped working. That was a stressful part. Well and trying to decide what to eat for dinner. We couldn't make up our mind. We wanted to eat somewhere different. We ended up at Wok Box. It was okay. Again, it tasted better when we first started eating because we were hungry and then by the end we were like, that wasn't that great. haha. We went to Walmart too and Marci got a new car charging cord so after that we were able to make our way to the border crossing and go home. It was a fun trip. We had lots of good and fun memories. Even when things went bad we still were able to laugh about it. 

I brought home chips from Canada to taste test. The kids liked the Dill pickle ones best. Our neighbors liked the Ketchup ones. The dill pickle tastes similar to salt and vinegar. An update on the Verizon phone mess. I got charged over $100 worth of data fees so I had to call them when I got home. Come to find out I had to add a different package to my plan, but they didn't tell me that when I had called them. Nor did the guy tell me that when I called them while in Canada. So thankfully, I got them to adjust most of the fee. Traveling outside of the country is crazy! 

Relief Society Service Auction

My calling is to plan the monthly Relief Society activities. I have a great committee that helps me a lot. This month we did a Service Auction. I had heard about it in other wards and heard it was fun so I wanted to try it. We had a good response from people with signing up to do a service so it turned out to be really fun. I had sign-ups passed around 2 weeks prior to the event with a list of ideas they could donate. Or they could think of something on their own. Then the night of the auction the sisters came and filled out a questionnaire that I found online with a bunch of questions that gave them points based on their answers. They used these points to bid on items. 

I made bundt cakes for dessert, but had to document this epic failure. I wanted to try a knock off recipe of Nothing Bundt Cake's White Chocolate Raspberry Bundt cake. Yeah, I tried it twice. Both times the cake stuck in the pan and looked horribly dark like this. I threw away the recipe and want to go back to that website and adamantly claim how it doesn't turn out. I tried raspberry jam the first time then a raspberry filling the next time. I think both times there was too much filling in it and it made it too heavy so the cake collapsed. Plus, when I looked online at the real Nothing Bundt cake it hardly has any raspberry swirl in it so I think this recipe asks for too much raspberry filling. 

I ended up making a Carrot Bundt cake with cream cheese frosting, Chocolate Chocolate Chip Bundt cake with cream cheese frosting and Lemon Bundt cake with a lemon glaze/frosting. They turned out yummy and moist. The lemon and Chocolate were the most popular. 

I had asked Lance Kenyon to be our auctioneer. At first he was hesitant because he was nervous getting up in front of all us women, but he did a fantastic job. He had jokes and wore a wide short tie and funny glasses. It was awesome. He had us laughing a lot. He even had fun and didn't want to leave (he had to leave early for a basketball game, our auction went longer than expected). I made some paddles with numbers for them to bid with. We had a rubber mallet and wood for the gavel and I made the tassel garland to put in front for added decoration. It was a fun night and several people commented that we should do it again. 

Ice Skating to Playdoh

 Kate and Grace

Kate has been begging to do a double date with her & Kyle and Grace & Mark (our neighbors and friends). So when I saw a groupon for ice skating nearby I bought it and told Shannon about it. She bought it too and the girls got to go on their daddy/daughter double date. :) They had fun and then went to Chipotle for lunch afterwards. 

Kyle and I try to go on little one-on-one dates with the kids and this time he took Preston with him to the mall to go to the Lego store then to Menchies. Preston was in heaven.

Yes, that red liquid is blood. When I was in the shower Lindsey knocked on my door saying Chelsea was really hurt. I hurried and opened the door and saw Chelsea crying pretty bad covered in blood. Yikes! I grabbed her and rinsed off the blood on her hand to see where the cut was. Thank goodness it was two little cuts on her fingers that I didn't think needed stitches or anything. I was going to superglue them if needed, but ended up just using band-aids and they healed fine. She was trying to cut some apple for her and the knife was super sharp. I'm lucky it wasn't worse! There was a lot of blood for such a tiny cut. I was surprised. She had dribbled blood up the stairs on the carpet. Still working to get those spots out. 

We had some families over on a Sunday night and I made crepes with fruit and various toppings. It was fun to have people over and get to know more families in our new ward. One of my friends asked if crepes were a family thing because she knew I had made them before. I laughed and said that I didn't even really like them that much. They were just easy to make and fun for something different other than waffles. Plus, my kids like them. 

I had made a turkey and mashed potato dinner one night and Lindsey was plugging her nose while eating it. I hurried and took a picture. She's 4 years old! How does she already know to do that. I want to know who taught her that. hahaha

Chelsea taking her "boyfriend" Tate on a ride in her car. Hahaha! She put her arm around him and even kissed him on the cheek. It was hilarious. Shannon and I were dying laughing. (Shannon and Mark Wright are our neighbors. Like they live right next door. It's awesome. They are members and have 4 kids. Collin (11) Grace (10) Quinn (8, a girl) and Tate (2))

Meeting the new American Girl doll, Grace, at the AG store. You can buy her french bakery for $500! ouch.

This picture shows my love/hate relationship with playdoh. It keeps Chelsea's attention for quite a while, but man oh man the mess is horrible. It's easier to let it dry then sweep it up and easier to just chuck the gross stuff out instead of trying to save it. 

Memories and Splurges

 We cleaned out our garage and I went through some boxes that were stored at my Mom's house for several years since we didn't have room to store them. Well now that we have room I got them back. Going through them brought back a lot of memories. The first two pictures are dolls that my Mom made for me. You can tell the top doll was well loved. It has the dirtiest face ever! haha. The cabbage patch doll is classic with yarn hair. I used to pull the hair out and use the yarn to roll up and put under my nose and then suck my two middle fingers. I think I pulled Jeni's dolls' hair out. She wasn't happy with me. I wouldn't be either. The bunny dolls were made by my Grandma Joyce. I had a lavendar room with a high shelf around the room filled with bunnies. I wanted lavendar carpet but had to settle for my lavendar walls. 

Kate started basketball practices before Thanksgiving and the games just started at the beginning of January. She is on the purple Dragon team and is #6. She's learning the rules more each year. Her coach seems nice this year. We are going through a different place since we moved and the place where they have games and practices are close so that's nice. Last year we had to travel quite a bit for games and practices. 

Kyle gave me a massage gift card and Chipotle gift card for Christmas so when he was off from work I went and pampered myself. It was a fabulous afternoon. Of course, the massage therapist told me I should come in more often because my neck/shoulder/back are a mess. I already knew that, but who can go in for massages often?! 

I was at Costco and saw this dining room table with 8 chairs and for a good deal. When you see something at Costco it's now or never. We splurged and used some Christmas money to help pay for it. What's funny is when we were opening the table box up this opened cereal pouch was tucked into the box the legs came in. All the way from Vietnam. Some worker had fun tucking in this surprise. I've never had that happen to me before.

Trying out our new table! We were going to put it in the kitchen area, but I'm nervous having it in there with me still teaching co-op preschool and having young kids be rough with it. Maybe later. Or maybe we will keep it in the dining room. It was empty anyway. :)