Monday, August 29, 2011

Summer Vacations

Lest you think we didn't do anything fun this summer because of the wedding, here's a recap of our vacations. At the end of June the girls went down to Pocatello for "Grandma Camp" for 6 days. Luke and I went then followed them down there to spend a week with the family and celebrate the 4th of July. The girls absolutely loved grandma camp. They got to go swimming, visit great grandparents, visit the Idaho Falls Temple, visit the zoo, watch movies, go horseback riding, and have homemade ice cream by grandpa almost every night. Who wouldn't love that?!

Fireworks: the Bailey family pooled all their money together with grandpa Luke and we bought roughly $1400 of fireworks for, I believe, $550. Talk about a crazy show. We were able to light them off at Grandpa Luke's property and it was a BLAST... hahaha... blast. The above shows a little bit of what we did on the 4th of July. The Baileys have friends that have a "pond" in Idaho that made themselves. The pond has a water slide, slip and slide, rope swing, zipline, and lots of canoes. On top of that, they have a nice little kiddie train and a candy cannon. We spent most of the day there and then went to grandpa's for fireworks at night.

Next, we have a sister named Chris. We LOVE her. She joined the Bailey clan last Labor day weekend. Luke and I first met her in December. Anyway, after our week in Pocatello, we invited her to come back up to Washington with us to spend the rest of her summer here. So she did. Since we had a guest, we decided to do a little bit of traveling and vacationing. First up was Leavenworth. I sure do love that place. It was quite the last minute trip for us so we decided to camp just outside of the main street and then spent a whole day playing in town. We really loved the fun hat shop they had and so there's lots of pictures of that.

Lastly, we took a trip up to Vancouver, BC. Chris has never been to Canada so we really couldn't miss that opportunity. We stayed in New Westminster because it was another last minute trip, and because all of Vancouver was booked that weekend due to the international fireworks competition (which we couldn't go because it starts at 10pm and with kids in tow...). The first night we went to china town and the night market. That was a lot of fun. Night markets always have the best food and though this one doesn't compare to the actual thing in China and Taiwan, it was still fun and the food was great. The next day we spent all day at Stanley Park. We could've spent 3 days at Stanley Park if we wanted to, there was just so much to do! We went to the beach first, then the water spray park, and lastly the aquarium. We were able to catch the beluga whale show and the dolphin show. We didn't know we were sitting in the splash zone at the whale show until the show started. So the angry face Lily has on at the bottom left corner, that's when she got splashed by the whale. The next day we went hiking... can't remember where... but there was a suspension bridge and it's not the Capilano. We had originally wanted to go to Capilano but Luke did some research and found that it was too expensive and too touristy. So we went to another place that had some fun trails and a suspension bridge for free. :) We concluded our trip by visiting the Vancouver Temple.



Monday, August 15, 2011

Frosting Recipe

Since some of you have asked, here it is:

1 80z cream cheese
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup powdered sugar

1) Place 1 mixing bowl in the freezer for 10-15 min
2) Beat cream cheese with granulated sugar, vanilla extract and almond extract till smooth in a separate non-frozen bowl
3) Whip heavy cream and powdered sugar in the frozen bowl till stiff (I used my kitchen aid on high, you could use a hand mixer)
4) Pour the whipped cream mixture on top of the cream cheese mixture and beat on low till combined.

Hint - if you feel like the frosting gets runny or might just melt all over you, you can slowly add in a couple packages of gelatin while whipping up the heavy whipping cream in step 3. I have found that it's alright without doing that.

Friday, August 12, 2011

Wedding Day!

So, here's the overall picture of the wedding. We had orchids as center pieces for the tables along with photos of families scattered on the tables. The lovely flower arrangement on the arch and piano was done by Misty's mom - Penny. Misty and I were able to find fake ficus trees and nice sheer purple curtains for our decorations at value village and goodwill, etc. Let me tell ya, I'm a HUGE fan of value village and goodwill now. I bought my lovely purples dress from Goodwill for $12 and Misty got hers at value village for roughly the same price. We were able to borrow the columns and the picket fences from people in my mom's ward and it's amazing what you can do with some christmas lights and tulle. My sister-in-law, Blythe Bailey was willing to do all the wedding photos, Luke was my designated pianist for the wedding/reception, and he provided lovely music the entire time.

Here's a picture of the happy couple with all their children except 1 - Spencer Terry.
The petal dresses that the girls are wearing have been in 3 weddings now. It was first purchased in 2009 by Mom Bailey for our sister, Rachel's, wedding. I noticed that the dresses have a little pocket in the back that allows me to switch out the petals, so we've been able to use them for many occassions. All I have to do is switch the petals and buy matching ribbons for a sash and I swear it's a whole new dress. They are so pretty!

My mom wanted a musical performance instead of toasts, and bouquet tosses, etc. So we put together a 15-20 min musical program for them. All the grandchildren sang "I am a Child of God." Ethan and Mei-Ling Hsu performed on the piano, Zeke's whole family sang "Army of Helaman," I did a flute number and Luke sang a solo, and then all of the children of the bride and groom got together last minute and sang "Love at Home."
I set out a tip glass for Luke on the piano but he only made $1. It was kind-of funny. I'd like to say that the wedding is behind me, but now Blythe and I are working on editing the photos. I'm just glad that it'll probably be a year or two before I have to do another wedding. Luke still has 6 siblings that are unmarried and who knows, by the time we're done with siblings getting married I'm sure we'll be on to nieces and nephews. Maybe by the time my own children are getting married I'll be a pro.

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Wedding Prep - Cake and Cupcakes

Yes, I did the wedding cake and all 72 cupcakes. Call me crazy. I wanted to for various reasons and one of them was so that I could control how the cupcakes were done. The wedding cake was to save money and I wanted to see if I could do it. Looking back I probably should've given in and used fondant or marzipan so that the cake looked smooth, but let me tell ya, this frosting is DIVINE. It's a whipped cream/cream cheese frosting and it is so dang good.
Anyway, I had 3 types of cupcakes - white raspberry cake with raspberry filling, lemon cake with blueberry filling, and chocolate cake with cream filling.
For the wedding cake, my mom wanted lemon and then I filled the layers with strawberries, peaches and the delightful frosting mentioned above. I have to say, I was quite proud. Misty's mom helped me do the flowers on the cake. I did the top part and then wasn't quite sure how to make it trickle down, so then she was able to show me how to do that and had me finish up all the way around the cake. She is so fabulous!

Wedding Prep - Hair and Nails

Who needs a salon or a fancy nail place when you can just do your own hair with curling irons, bobby pins, some flowers, and buy 400 nail stickers at Rite Aid for $4?! Thank you Marren (Luke's sister) for teaching me the basics of how to do hair. :)



We all had a lot of fun playing around with the nail polish and the stickers.


Monday, August 8, 2011

Wedding Prep - Flowers

My mom got married last Saturday and I was her "Wedding Planner." Just putting it out there - being a wedding planner for your own mother while a mom of 3 young children (one still nursing) is NOT a good idea. I had half a brain the entire time. Thank goodness for Misty (Ron's wife) helping me out the entire week before the wedding.
Anyway, so to save some money we decided to do our own flowers except for her actual bouquet and Jerry's boutineer. This is the first time I've done flowers and I think they turned out quite well. Misty's mom is a pro and she taught Misty and I how to do them. So, the top picture is the little girls bouquet (which is now a little squished and battered because they were using it like a bat) and then I have an example of the men's boutineer and then a women's corsage and finally the last picture is a picture of hair accessories that Misty and I made.
I really enjoyed making it all and feel quite accomplished because of it. :)