The Bailey Family

Arya's Birthday

2012-01-24T10:44:00.000-08:00

Arya turned 4 on the 15th of this month. I know we all say this, but I really can't believe how fast time has flown by! It snowed four years ago when she was born; not a lot, but enough to make the world beautiful. This year, Heavenly Father gave her the gift of snow and LOTS of it!
Since her birthday landed on a Sunday, we divided the celebration in half . We went swimming on Saturday and took her to the dollar store to get her 5 things + birthday balloon (our birthday tradition), and had some Pizza that night. Church was cancelled on Sunday due to snow, so we ended up having lots of fun playing in it, followed by her favorite dinner - Chicken Penne Pesto, and cake. It was a fabulous birthday weekend.

Coming down our home-made sled run. More pictures to come!

Arya wanted a Cinderella Cake, so I tried. I wanted to play with Marzipan this time to see how that would work. It's a bit expensive, but it worked well! I could've rolled it better and done it better, but I was tired from playing in the snow and layering the cake (yes the cake was layered too with fruit & frosting), and making dinner, etc. But at least I know that I can do it and do it nice if I had the time/patience. Too bad the girls thought it tasted funny and didn't like it, but Luke and I enjoyed it!

Happy Birthday Arya!

Diaper Trike

2012-01-20T13:23:00.000-08:00

I saw the idea on Pinterest maybe a month or two ago and thought it was such a cute idea. A few weeks ago a friend had a baby shower for a boy so I just had to do this! The pin on pinterest just links you to amazon.com - not very helpful. However, this was not too difficult to make at all. I rolled up the diapers with a tube in the middle (ribbon holder, paper towel tubs, wrapping paper tubes, whatever handy), then used a rubber band to go around it all. I then used the ribbon to hide the rubber band. Next, I used receiving blankets and had the blanket go through the middle of the two back tires and looped it around some diapers in the front tire. I wrapped a hanger wire in a receiving blanket for the front tire/handles, looped it through the middle tube of the front tire; Stuck the bib and sippy cup on top, used a ribbon to secure the wires together and stuck the socks on the ends. Sorry, I'm not one to do tutorials and I just kind-of figured this out by looking at a picture. I'm sure there's a better explanation out there on how to do this. It was a hit! Very fun idea so thank you pinterest!

Michael's First Haircut

2012-01-09T13:27:00.000-08:00

As you can see from the Christmas photos, Michael was in need of a hair cut. I cut Luke's hair on a fairly regular basis, but I had no idea how to cut Michael's hair. Over the holidays, a friend of Luke's - Thomas, and his two boys stayed with us for 3 days. I actually met Thomas first at the Seattle Institute of Religion while Luke was on his mission. It was fun to be later introduced to Thomas by Luke as one of Luke's close friends growing up. Having 2 boys in his family, Thomas mentioned that he could cut Michael's hair and show me how to do it while he was at our house. I jumped at the offer. Turned out to be a fairly simple process with clippers and some Gerber Graduate Puffs. I think we used #8, 5, and 3 to give him a nice fade. I love his silly face in the first picture. We decided that maybe the clippers were tickling his head. He was so funny.

Luke gave it a try at the end and finished up. Following that, Luke cut his own hair. The first time he did that was in Utah and that didn't end well. However, this time he actually did a good job! I should've taken a picture of him, but by the time I was done bathing the kids he had finished. I'm also realizing that I never got a "finished" shot of Michael. Oh well, I'll be taking pictures soon when we celebrate Arya's birthday this weekend. I'll post pictures of Michael's new do then. :o)

Christmas Morning

2012-01-03T13:21:00.000-08:00

Luke's family has a Christmas Pajamas tradition. From the year I was engaged to Luke I received Christmas jammies from his parents. Can you imagine making 20+ jammies every year?! Three years ago Mom decided that those who are married needed to take care of their own Christmas jammies - smart lady. :o)

For Christmas 2011 the theme was Reindeer. Can I just say that I'm uber proud of myself? The pants are made out of fleece, and I will never go back to flannel. LOVE fleece! The shirts I did a combination of things: the Reindeer face was made out of felt; the names were done with fabric paint and the freezer paper stencil method. Method can be found at: http://www.makeit-loveit.com/. I was cursing myself while cutting these tiny curly letters out with an exacto knife, but they turned out SO WELL! We had Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen and Rudolph - and no, I'm not planning on having enough kids to have the other 4 reindeer.

Arya was really excited when they received a note from Santa next to the empty plate of cookies.

Candy canes from Santa in our stockings! This picture shows one of the reasons why I married this man - he's so entertaining!

Arya really liked the bracelet from Ama. :)

Michael got a fun little rider and the girls really enjoy pushing him around the house. Yes, I know, I agree, the snot on Michael's face is disgusting.

Santa knew that Michael really likes Gerber's Graduate Puffs. This kid downed a whole container within 4 hours of receiving it.

And look what Santa brought me!!! I saw these on Black Friday and LOVED them. However, Shopko only had 1 box left at the store (Dishes for only 4 ppl) and they were all sold out online. I then told myself that I didn't need them even though many of our inexpensive dinnerware are chipped and on their way out. I must've been a good girl this year! :o) These are OVEN SAFE!!!!!!! Merry Christmas to me!

PS. If anyone is curious, these are called Soho Dinnerware and they can be found at Walmart for cheaper than Shopko's Black Friday deal. :o)

Christmas Neighborhoods

2011-12-28T12:59:00.000-08:00

The weekend before Christmas, Luke and I attended a wedding reception over in Mountlake Terrace. On our way home, we noticed that there were a couple neighborhoods that had incredible light displays. One of the neighborhoods was trying to raise funds and canned foods for a charity, the other was just for fun. So, Monday before Christmas, Misty and the kids and my whole family took a drive. It was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed seeing all the lights.

Misty and I decided that instead of big blow-up things on the lawn that we will eventually do something like this display. It's just painted wood and we were really excited about the possibility of painting together someday. :o)

Garden d'Light

2011-12-18T14:39:00.000-08:00

We like to visit the Bellevue Botanical Gardens during the Holiday season. Every year from Thanksgiving till the end of December, the Garden puts up an impressive light display for the people to enjoy. It use to be a free event; however, due to funding they now charge on certain nights. Monday-Wednesdays during the first 2-3 weeks of December is always free. We took the opportunity to go this past Tuesday. It's one of the Hsu family traditions that I carried over into my own little family because these lights have magical holiday powers that make me happy and excited for Christmas. For the most part things stay the same every year, however, they do try and add new lights/new creations here and there. We took our family picture at the very end of the night this year which was NOT smart because Michael was extremely cranky by the end... and yes, that hat over half his face probably didn't help either.

I'm pretty sure I have about 10 pictures of this peacock and the swans from all the years that I've gone. I just can't help myself but snag a picture of these beautiful creations every year.

The Fishtank display is fairly new. I saw it for the first time last year. It's one of the girls' favorite displays.

The parrot is an oldie but goodie. They didn't have the squirrel or the slug this year. At least we didn't see them. The girls were pretty bummed about that, but they did have something else that was new!

This was my favorite! Brand new this year, this dragon had over six thousand lights on it! It was AMAZING!

Christmas Tree Decorating

2011-12-18T13:53:00.000-08:00

I am so behind on so many things but it's time to catch up! After we came home from Idaho it's been one thing after another; and then I was hit with a nasty cold! I had a fever for 2 days and was a walking zombie for 7. I'm finally up and about even though the cold is still lingering.

Anyway, we bought our Christmas tree from the Yakima Fruit Market on 12/3.That day was jammed pack with music rehearsals and ward Christmas parties, etc., but by golly I wanted a tree in the house! It's a nice 8-9ft douglas fir. We decorated the tree 3 days later on a Tuesday because that was the first time we had time together between rehearsals and performances. (Luke had 2 stake performances with specialty group numbers; 2 ward parties and a RS performance).

We blasted Christmas music that Tuesday night. The kids danced, played, and read while Luke put the lights on the tree. Michael was mostly interested in a ball that he was playing with but there were times when he decided that he wanted to help daddy with the christmas lights. :o) In the end we had LOTS of fun. The tree is not perfectly balanced, but when you look at it, you know it was decorated with love. I LOVE the holidays!

Michael balancing the ball he was playing with. He had so much fun with it! He was so adorable... but I pretty much think he's adorable all the time. :o)

The girls got to make some ornaments at one of the Christmas parties we attended. They were VERY excited to hang them on the tree.

Thanksgiving and the "Bubailey Plague"

2011-11-29T08:59:00.000-08:00

Friday Nov 18th - Drive down to Idaho; pull in at 5am MST due to closed and icy roads. We found out that 3 people have been throwing up all that night.

Saturday Nov 19th - Sick people under quarantine, we all visit and are very happy to be with the Baileys

Saturday Nov 19th night till morning - I had bad stomach pains all night, but seemed to be alright in the morning.

Sunday Nov 20th - We all went to church and things still seem to be alright

Sunday Nov 20th to Monday Nov 21st - I had pains all night again, got up in the morning, showered, and just couldn't shake the pains. Ended up in bed all day Monday feeling nauseated, thereafter had some interesting bathroom experiences at night.

Tuesday Nov 22nd - Feeling weak, but in general much better, went to the temple with the adults in the family and did sealings! Totally amazing experience. Thereafter ate at a Chinese Restaurant called "Happy's." However, Mom, Nick, Marren and I had to rush back to go to rehearsal/work; and Marren and I each had 1 kid throwing up while we were gone. We get back and it was the 2 moms against the world, as we had the two girls continue to throw-up on us and throw-up in 3 other places of the house that needed to be cleaned up.

When the rest of the party came back, 3 adults and Addie spent the most part of the night in and out of the bathroom or puking in a bowl next to them.

Wednesday Nov 23rd - Lily threw-up twice in the morning, and ended up in bed with her daddy all day, but everyone else seemed alright. We start prepping for the big Turkey Day.

Thursday Nov 24th - Thanksgiving was totally hectic in the morning with all of us cooking and getting things done. We were aiming to eat at 1pm because 1 of us had to go to work. We ended up eating at 1:30-ish without a Turkey but hey, we had 9 superbly yummy pies made by 5 married women! (In case you're curious, we had 1. The Mother of All Apple Pies; 2. strawberry rhubarb; 3. banana cream; 4. chocolate cream; 5. coconut cream; 6. classic pumpkin; 7. classic pecan; 8. french peach pie; 9. pumpkin eggnog pecan pie). We had lots of yummy sides and 2 tasty turkeys that were done a few hours later. Unfortunately another adult got sick after the meal.... Thursday night, I generally like to honor Turkey Day, but we ended up doing some shopping. 10pm @ Walmart was the most insane place to be in Pocatello, Id that night! Seriously crowded, seriously scary - we had people break out in fist fights over the Xbox 360 + Kinect bundle, people stealing other people's waffle irons, and a lot of chaos.

Friday Nov 25th 12am - Another bunch of us headed out to Shopko and everyone was much nicer, much more organzied and we all got what we wanted in 25 min!

Friday Nov 25th 4am - 4 of us crazy ladies got up again and went shopping starting with JCPenny's, then Fred Meyer, then Big Lots - all very successful. However, between 5am - 6am, we get a call and another one had bite the dust and fallen to this crazy stomach flu! And some of us were having relapses in a milder form of this crazy thing! I've decided it's more like a cleansing of your body because everything comes out in all directions. So, the healthy ones tried to shop for the unhealthy ones and we were shopping all day! I'm not joking! I had maybe 2 hours of sleep and was shopping from 10pm the night before till 5pm the next day.

Saturday Nov 26th - Another 2 came down with the sickness and was throwing up. But we tried to have fun and salvage the very last bit of our vacation.

Sunday Nov 27th - we drove home with 2 sick children in diapers. Yes, that says TWO children - it was a precautionary measure. All in all, only 2 escaped unscathed out of 25 this past week. Most of us are still experiencing left-over symptoms. We still loved every minute of being with the Baileys and we will talk about this for years to come I'm sure!

Michael's First Birthday

2011-11-16T16:23:00.000-08:00

November 10, 2011 was Michael's first birthday. Now, you can think that I am a terrible parent because I felt like I was a horrid parent, but I accidentally scheduled a long, overdue girls night with my *FFF gals from high school that night. Slight oversight. So, we pushed back celebrating Michaels' birthday till the 14th because there were many scheduling conflicts that entire weekend. We did it all on Monday, including his well-check appointment. Michael is now over 21lbs, making it my first baby to be over 20 lbs at 1 year of age. He is 75-90th % in height (making his daddy really proud who is trying to populate the world with tall Asians). He received 3 shots on Monday and he was quite brave.
I made him a cute little bear cake. It was suppose to be a nice brown bear but I couldn't get the frosting color quite right, (it kept reminding me of poop pardon my description). I started adding in red and green, but that made it even worse! Lily suggested that I add in blue. That made a really nice forest green color and we went with it. But I really need to remember to allow time for the colors to settle and seep because we ended up with a black bear after an hour. Brown, blue, green or black, it was still fun. That night we played games centered around Michael (passing the ball, etc.) and then had cake. He was a bit unsure about the cake and was poking at it till Luke got some frosting in his mouth. He LOVED it! Happy birthday my sweet, sweet boy!

Garlic Herb Roast Chicken

2011-11-09T08:46:00.000-08:00

I made my first roast chicken last night and it was AWESOME. It was moist and flavorful; much better than store-bought rotisseries. The best part was the mouth-watering aroma that filled my home while it was cooking. The original recipe was from Ina Garten - Perfect Roast Chicken, but I added quite a few of my own adaptations. So here's the EB version:

Ingredients

1 (5 to 6 pound) roasting chicken
salt
black pepper
1 large bunch fresh thyme
2-3 sprigs of fresh rosemary
1 lemon, quartered
1/2 orange, quartered (or smaller to fit it in)
1 head garlic, cut in half crosswise (no need to peel)
2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter, melted
4-5 Russet or Yukon Potatoes cut into large cubes
3 sweet potatoes cut into large cubes
4 carrots cut into 2-inch chunks
1 bulb of fennel, tops removed, and cut into wedges
Olive oil
garlic powder
Johnny's seasoning salt

Directions

1) Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

2) Remove the chicken giblets. Rinse the chicken inside and out. Remove any excess fat and leftover pin feathers and pat the outside dry with paper towel.
3) Liberally salt and pepper (roughly 1.5 TBLSP of salt and 1-2 tsp pepper) the inside of the chicken. 4) Stuff the cavity with the bunch of thyme, rosemary, lemon, orange, and all the garlic.
5) Brush the outside of the chicken with the butter and sprinkle again with salt and pepper.
6) Tie the legs together with kitchen string and tuck the wing tips under the body of the chicken.
7) Place the rest of the ingredients in a roasting pan. Toss with 2 TBLSP olive oil, 1 tsp of garlic powder and 1 tsp Johnny's seasoning salt.
8) Spread around the bottom of the roasting pan and place the chicken on top. (make sure your roasting pan isn't too big or else some of the veggies might burn)
9) Roast the chicken for 1 1/2 hours, or until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh. 10) Remove the chicken and vegetables to a platter and cover with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes. (this is essential to get the juices to go back into the chicken and make it moist!!) Slice the chicken onto a platter and serve it with the vegetables.

The veggies cooked in the chicken drippings were fantastic. The drippings from the chicken would make an amazing gravy... but I'm not the gravy maker in the family so I just made a pouch gravy. I ended up dipping my chicken in the juices and it was terrific. Luke mentioned that rice on the side would complete the meal and I totally agree. I was worried about roasting the chicken and veggies at 425 for 1.5 hours, but it really did come out perfect!

Lily's Haircut

2011-11-06T13:14:00.000-08:00

Here is Lily's new "do". I did it myself, though I really wish I'd known that she wanted it this short because I could have taken her to a nice, fancy salon for free and teach her about donating hair, etc. It's pretty even for the most part though I might go back in and give her a little bit of layering.

She really loves her new hair cut. Luke tells me that I need to be a better influence on her because he LOVED her long hair. I did too... I miss her beautiful hair, but, lucky for me, she inherited my super hair growing genes. I'm sure that her hair will be long again in no time.

Long or short, my Lily is adorable!

Caramel Apple Date

2011-11-04T09:41:00.000-07:00

Luke and I made these earlier this week for an "at home" date. We were suppose to do it last weekend for our date night but we were both too tired. We used the recipe for the caramel from one of my most favorite sites (you should know it by now) - http://www.ourbestbites.com/2011/10/gourmet-style-dipped-apples-with-homemade-caramel/ This caramel really is amazing! Luke and I were both really surprised at how easy it was to make and dip in, and it tasted incredible. We dipped the caramel apples in chocolate after and had an assortment of toppings - toffee bits, crushed walnuts, almond slices, crushed oreos and coconut flakes. Then we drizzled the white chocolate on top. My favorite toppings were the coconuts and the walnuts - definitely a must have although all of it together tasted really good too. We made 14 total and shared these with our Home-Teaching and Visiting-Teaching families.

The granny smiths are definitely the way to go. The red ones were the much more inferior gala apples. I wish we tried it with Honey Crisps because I think that would've been amazing!

I also wish we had some craisins because I think the red color would make it much more festive.

Halloween

2011-11-01T11:44:00.000-07:00

This Halloween Lily wanted to be Rapunzel. Her favorite princess is still Aurora, but Rapunzel is a close second. I think Rapunzel won the dress-up contest because her dress is purple (Lily's favorite color) and because she has long hair with flowers in it. Arya wanted to be Cinderella (her favorite princess) though she did go back and forth between Cinderella and Snow White for a good while. Luke and I decided that Michael should be Pooh because this kid is constantly eating!!! Never stops! We thought it'd be really cool if Luke can be tigger and I, Kanga, but... maybe next year... who knows.
We had our ward annual Trunk or Treat on Saturday along with a chili cook off and lots of fun activities. Seriously the largest ward activity I have ever been to!!! There were so many kids and so many activities - face painting, "gross touching," fish pond, cake walk, bean bag toss, doughnut eating, lollipop ghosts, and a few more rooms that we didn't even get to go to! Then we had our Trunk or Treat and man there was a lot of candy! The girls made a really good haul this year. They filled their buckets to the top and then some. But as usual, we let them pick out 10 pieces of candy and then confiscated the rest. We in general give out the rest of the candy as rewards for being good for the next few months... and Luke and I get to eat them too. :).
Monday night was business as usual, we had 2 kids come trick or treating this year (our next door neighbors) and that was it. Better than last year's ZERO. I actually expected this from our experience last year so I bought the good chocolate candy from Costco for our Trunk or Treat on Sat, so now that's what we have left over. :o)

I think I should do Lily's hair like this every Sunday.

I've decided that he's the cutest Pooh Bear in the world. Personal opinion.

Pumpkin Carving

2011-11-01T11:15:00.000-07:00

I honestly lost faith and didn't believe that we were going to carve pumpkins this year. Last weekend was the first weekend that Luke and I had time to spend together with the kids this month, and between going to Craven Farm, making cupcakes and corn bread for our ward's Trunk or Treat party, getting the kids in their costumes, etc., I didn't see it happening. But, to my great delight we did get to carve this year!!
Thanks to Luke, who found these awesome gourds at the farm that inspired us, he came up with a fun idea for a pumpkin. Since carving a face wasn't too difficult, we decided we would indeed carve pumpkins this year. I didn't get a pumpkin of my own because there really wasn't any time, but if I had, I would've done suns from "Tangled." We got mini pumpkins for the girls and they really are fun little things to carve. Lily wanted ladybugs and Arya wanted a kitty. I carved Lily's pumpkin and started Arya's but didn't have time so Luke did most of the kitty one.

I really like how the ladybugs turned out. I had my doubts till we put a candle in it.

Isn't this totally fabulous? It started out with the nose gourd and then we found the horns.

Kindergarten Halloween Party

2011-11-01T10:58:00.000-07:00

Lily's class had a Halloween party yesterday. Siblings were invited so Arya and Michael also got to attend. The parent who organized this was amazing! There were lots of healthy snacks along with sugar cookie decorating, paper sacks decorating, face painting, cake walk, bingo, lollipop ghost making, and paper activities. The kids had a GREAT time!

Pumpkin Patch

2011-10-31T16:15:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday we went to Craven Farm for our annual pumpkin patch trip. The weather was quite nice though the farm itself was extremely muddy from all the rain. As always, we had a fabulous time! We went on the hayride, played with the pumpkin sling shots, toured the farm, and then took a trip out to the patch. I have a confession... we bought 2 small pumpkins from the farm along with a few gords, but the large pumpkin in the picture were just props. Though it's extremely cool to pick out your own unique pumpkin from the patch, we have a hard time paying $15-$25 per pumpkin when you can get a large pumpkin at the store for $4.

They had a really cool pirate ship on the farm. All the kids loved it, including Michael.

Lily and I on the hayride

Arya was so entertaining at the Farm. She really is a character.

It's not a complete trip without a picture with the kids and pumpkins in a wheelbarrow.

My Budding Artist: Lily

2011-10-21T18:46:00.000-07:00

It appears that Lily really enjoys drawing! I think she did a fabulous job, don't you?

I have to give her props for this picture on the left. It's mixed media and I think it's AMAZING. The princesses were done with stamps, but their stamp pad dried out, so instead, Lily decided to use water color on the stamp. The result is quite beautiful. I love how each princesses' colors are all what they should be Belle - brown hair, yellow dress, Tiana - green, etc. Then she decided to draw a castle for the princesses to live in, color it in with crayon, then paint over it. Let me tell you, she did this ALL by herself, including the bird!! I had no idea what she was doing until I saw it the next morning. I think we have another artist in the family!!!

Baby Shower

2011-10-17T10:37:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday I hosted a baby shower for our friend at my house. It's technically the second party we've thrown at our house, but since the first was for Marren's friends, I don't really count that as "my party." So, this past Saturday I threw my first party at my house! :o) It's always fun to get together with a bunch of women, eat yummy treats/snacks and chat away. The above picture shows a candy/snack/dessert that I made following my friend's recipe from http://www.ourbestbites.com/2009/12/easy-pretzel-turtles/. It was a HUGE hit so thank you Sara! Seriously people, SUPER easy, tasty and fancy; GREAT for any party or gift!

For my friend's present I made her a diaper cake. It was so fun! I first saw the idea from www.ourbestbites.com, and LOVED it. You can google diaper cake and there are lots of different ones out there to get inspiration from. I decorated it with flower hair clips and some crochet hairbands. Talk about the perfect way to present it all!

I decided to give her 3 different types of hair clips. Girls have to accessorize for all different types of functions and seasons, right? I made some crochet flowers, some fabric flowers and then some silk flowers. I hope you enjoy them baby girl!

On a side note, I told Lily that she would be the oldest child at the party and that she needs to be a good big sister and a good example. We had 5 other kids here between the ages of 1-4. Half way through the party Michael finally left my side and decided to join the children. I looked in on them and Lily exclaimed: MOM! I'm taking care of all these babies! And she really did! She made sure they all got treats, water, toys, dress-up clothes, etc. and she took care of all of them! Way to go Lily!

Plum Creations #1 -- Plum Tatin

2011-10-03T13:44:00.000-07:00

When I work out at the gym, I normally watch the food network channel. It always seems somewhat counter-productive to me, but what can I say, I LOVE food! I'm normally there while "The Barefoot Contessa" is showing. Ina always seems to have recipes that are delicious and not too incredibly difficult to make.
A couple weeks ago, Ina demonstrated how to make a "Plum Tatin," which is basically a fancy plum upside-down cake. I had all the ingredients at home, including home-grown plums, so I just had to try it! It was a GREAT success! I was quite proud of myself and everyone enjoyed it :o).

Here's the link for the recipe if anyone is interested: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/plum-cake-tatin-recipe/index.html.
I did make a few changes after reading the reviews; Instead of 1 cup sugar in the sugar/water mix I only used 2/3 cup sugar in a little less than 1/3 cup water; in the cake itself I only used about 2/3 cup of sugar; I used roughly 1 tsp of lemon zest instead of 1/2 tsp... sorry, I don't measure exactly a lot of the times when I cook... just something I picked up when I first learned how to cook from my dad back when I was 11.

Plums, plums and MORE plums!

2011-09-29T13:25:00.000-07:00

We have a lovely plum tree in our backyard. The first year we lived here, we experienced some crazy weather that caused the tree to bloom at the end of Jan/beginning Feb. Consequently, it produced minimal fruit that summer. But, we still got to enjoy some and it was fun. This year, we had an amazing amount of plums! So the girls and Luke went out and picked them last week. We ended up with two GIANT pots (these are my canning pots people!) and an easter basket full. I've been making jelly, fruit leathers, dehydrating and canning them. I would give them away, but 1/50 when you cut them open I find a little white worm/maggot in it. So... what do we all think? Would people think it's gross if I gave them some plums and they find a maggot?

It was so cute watching them go up the ladder and have Luke helping them.

I LOVE Arya's face in this picture. It's so her!

When You Have 2 Older Sisters....

2011-09-22T07:41:00.000-07:00

In his defense, he did protest....

Canning

2011-09-16T11:36:00.000-07:00

I have never canned in my entire life. One of the first things I noticed about the Baileys when I first met them was the jars upon jars of home-canned goods ranging from fruits/jams to sauces/soups. I was quite impressed and always wanted to do it. When we first moved to our home almost 2 years ago, I was so excited about all the fruit trees and the possibility of canning... but then I got pregnant, then gestational diabetes, and decided if I couldn't eat my yummy canned goods while canning I wasn't going to do it.

A few months ago, our bishop pulled the entire ward out of the 3rd hour and talked about emergency prepardness and how he felt impressed for us to really get ourselves prepared. he wanted us to work on our food storage, etc., then he proceeded to cancel about 30 minutes of church and wanted us all to go home and work on our emergency prepardness. If that wasn't a wake up call I don't know what is.

So, this year Luke and I invested in some canning supplies, and when bountiful baskets had peaches for $0.73/lb and pears for $0.55/lb we took advantage and bought a couple 24-28lb boxes. I then proceeded to can them all in 2 nights.... yeah, not doing that again. I was just so excited and it was so much fun for the first 6 hours, but it definitely became work after that.

I also made some blackberry jam from the blackberries we picked on my birthday. So, all in all, I ended up with 11 quarts of peaches, 12 quarts of pears and 6 pints of blackberry jam. The apples on my tree are ALMOST ready so I'll be doing more canning still, but I am quite proud of myself and what I have been able to accomplish so far. :o)

For those who are curious, I followed the directions on this website http://www.pickyourown.org/. On the very bottom of the page there's a very small icon where you can find directions on how to freeze, can, preserve, and dehydrate just about anything.

Company Picnic

2011-09-12T15:40:00.000-07:00

Yay for company picnics! Luke's company likes to host their annual picnics at the zoo. It is great fun and admission is free for everyone in the company including their families. The picnic was from 11-2, but we took advantage and got to the Zoo at around 10:30 and visited before we joined the festivities. You never know what you're going to get at the zoo and unfortunately this time the red panda (my favorite) was sleeping when we went by his habitat. However, we did get to see the penguins diving in and out of the water chasing each other. The hippos were also going at it... so unfortunate the camera wasn't ready because MAN it was awesome seeing them open their mouths popping out of the water. There was a giraffe feeding when we stopped by so we got to see the giraffes up close too. Considering Lily's favorite at the zoo are hippos and Arya's favorite are the giraffes, I think we did well.

The company provided a lovely lunch, face painting, a magic show, tickets to both the dinosaur exhibit and the carousel, and fun bags for the kids. Needless to say we had a fabulous time. Thank you Cequint!

Arya was very excited to see the Giraffes up close.

Love Orangutans, they are so fun and clever.

Arya on the Carousel

Lily with Michael... such a good big sister.

Dinosaur Exhibit. It was quite fun... the girls were a little scared at first, but I think they enjoyed it.

My 31st

2011-09-09T12:21:00.000-07:00

Best day EVER! Luke took the day off work so that we could spend it together. We went to Home Depot first to get a few things - have to say, I was pretty happy/proud that home depot was one of my birthday stops. Next we went to the gym together and worked out. Luke then made lunch for all of us. After lunch him and the girls started making my birthday cake. Now, you might be scared or think it'll be funny or a disaster, but let me tell you, my man did GOOOOOD! In between making the cake and decorating it, we went to Michaels to get my present. We got some nice sketching/drawing pencils and charcoal. I cannot wait to dig into it! It's been so long and a few things have happened recently that has stirred my passion again. After Michaels we went blackberry picking! I am so excited to make some yummy blackberry jam or maybe pie or syrup; the possibilties are endless. We came home with a nice little basket and the girls had a lot of fun. Luke then finished making the cake, we went out to a mexican place for dinner, then came home for cake!

I am so thankful for such a sweet, loving husband that tried VERY hard to make my day special. It was seriously the best day ever! Thank you Luke!

Luke and the finished product, yes, Be AMAZED! Devils Food with the amazing whipped cream frosting and lots of yummy fruits!

Seriously impressive, RIGHT?! It was so dang good!

The inside was filled with cream frosting, strawberries and kiwi.

First Day of School

2011-09-01T10:37:00.001-07:00

The big day finally came and went. Lily was so excited for school. We got up in the morning, got dressed in the outfit we picked out the night before, I made her a nice little breakfast (egg with bacon and cheese on toast), did her hair, and then Luke and I took her to the bus stop right in front of our house. Even though the school is only 1/2 a mile away, Lily gets to ride the school bus because we live on such a busy street. I LOVE that the bus literally stops right in front of our house.

I had my moment of excitement and sadness, but it could only lasted for a second, because I then drove myself to her school to drop off baked goods for a PTA tea and help with safety patrol. I didn't just take Lily because the school district suggests that if your child will be riding the bus to let her do so the first day. I had signed up to help because the day before school started, the PTA sent out an urgent call for volunteers and I saw that no one was volunteering. It was also a way for me to transition into a student mom. It made me feel better being there, knowing that I was on campus with Lily even though she didn't know it. Everyone thanked me and thought it was so great that I am diving in and helping out already, but to be quite honest, I volunteered because it made me feel better and made me more comfortable, and it definitely curbed the crying. ;)

Lily has half day Kindergarten, so at 11:53 I went back out to the street to meet her because the buses won't drop Kindergartners off unless there's a parent waiting. Arya and I sat anxiously waiting for her to come. At about 12:10 I was worried and wondered if she got lost or if I missed her bus. The bus finally arrived at around 12:15 and she was beaming as she got off. I heard many little voices happily saying goodbye to her and I knew she had made friends already.

She told me all about her first day - about recess, songs she learned, snack time, how she made 3 friends - 1 boy and 2 girls. She calls her friend boy her boy friend so it was kind-of funny. She told me that she could not wait for tomorrow, and I call that a VERY successful first day! :)

Summer Vacations

2011-08-29T15:55:00.000-07:00

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.

Frosting Recipe

2011-08-15T08:13:00.000-07:00

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.

Wedding Day!

2011-08-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

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.

Wedding Prep - Cake and Cupcakes

2011-08-10T16:33:00.001-07:00

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

2011-08-10T16:26:00.001-07:00

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.

Wedding Prep - Flowers

2011-08-08T16:57:00.000-07:00

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. :)

Cake Decorating

2011-06-29T14:25:00.001-07:00

I've been wanting to take a cake decorating class for a while and last month when Michael's had a deal where tuition and student kits were 50% off I decided to go ahead and sign up for the Wilton's Basic's class. It's a 4 week course and it was a lot of fun!!! I'm so glad I did it and now I have yet another skill to play around with. :) I just can't help myself sometimes.

The first week we learned about frosting - how to make it, what consistency is good for what, how to fill a bag and pipe it, etc. Then we got to decorate some cookies.

The second week we brought an 8" cake and learned out to "torte" it which basically means cut it in half, fill the middle, and frost the entire cake. We also learned about coloring and dimensional decorating and that was pretty fun.

The third week we decorated cupcakes and learned about some basic flowers - rosettes, shaggy mums, drop flowers, leaves, etc.

And for the final class we did another 8" cake and learned how to do the basic Wilton rose, lettering and how to design a cake. I had SO SO SO MUCH fun doing this. The unfortunate thing so far that I've learned though is that good tasting frosting doesn't look as good as yucky tasting frosting. So, I'm still in the search for one that will do both. I'm also very curious as to how the asian whipped cream frostings will work so that will be my next experiment.

I'm just happy that I've already been able to put my new skills to use for Lily's birthday and I can't wait to decorate more cakes!

Lily Turns 5!!

2011-06-29T13:57:00.001-07:00

My baby turned 5 on 6.23.2011. On that actual date we didn't do too much but we did take her to the dollar store and she got to pick out a few things there. Luke and I have decided that the dollar store is a wonderful way to celebrate birthdays :). We celebrated her birthday on Saturday the 25th. Luke and I had family visiting - Stuart, Hope and Chris. Chris is our adopted sister and she came up to Washington to run in the Seattle Rock and Roll Marathon.

On the morning of the 25th we went down to see Chris finish her half marathon at Quest Field. It was really fun and exciting to be down there. After we came home from the marathon I started getting ready for Lily's big birthday dinner. Then we took a break and went swimming at the Y because that's what Lily really wanted to do for her birthday. Both girls did REALLY well swimming! I was so proud of them! Chris was the only one that came with me because Luke and Stu went to Boom City to get some fireworks... I'll post more about that later. :). But, Arya was able to swim by herself in a life jacket and Lily went under the water multiple times and put her feet at the bottom of the pool! Definitely time to start swimming lessons!

We came back at 5:30 and made dinner for a bunch of peeps. Zeke and Maggie's family over, my mom and all the rest of our guests were here to celebrate with her. We had some super yummy mondo burgers, then we had cake and opened presents!

Lily's been wanting a princess cake for FOREVER so I decided to make her one. Turned out pretty good. :) (I took a 4 week course in cake decorating this month and decided to put new skills to use.) We actually used white cake mix and colored it purple because that's her favorite color and put in a bit of raspberry extract. It was yummy! Then we made cupcakes for everyone too.

I was able to find a doll hotel at a consignment shop awhile back for $2 and she LOVED it. She also got wipe-away books, a necklace and a chinese outfit from my mom, and 2 dolls from Zeke and maggie - Tiana and tinker bell for her hotel. It was all SO SO FUN!

Grass Time

2011-06-29T13:19:00.000-07:00

About a week and a half ago, our lawn was completely ridiculous! The grass came all the way up to my knees!! I guess that's just what happens when life gets really busy. Anyway, the kids went out and were playing in it and I thought it was just so darn cute so I decided to snap a few shots of them playing. Frankly, I'm surprised I didn't lose Michael in it. :)

Lily's Ballet Production- "Seasons"

2011-06-20T13:48:00.001-07:00

Last weekend Lily's Ballet studio had their Spring Production - Seasons. It was really quite amazing and they had paid to have some Pacific Northwest Ballet principals come and participate. Lily was a snowflake in the Winter Season. There's been a lot of rehearsals and a lot of extra volunteer hours, etc. Last Friday I was at the Meydenbauer with ALL of my children from 3-9. Saturday was the show and Lily was there from noon till 7 and I was there from 3-7 with her and Michael. It's a pretty insane time commitment considering Lily is 4 and she's only on stage for roughly 2-3 minutes.

But, we had fun, she did well and she got to dance with her cousin Jeremy. Parents of children participating are suppose to donate 4 hours of volunteer time to get the production together, whether it's backstage help, costume change, or watching kids while they are in the green room. I fulfilled my hours by doing 100 rose bouquets. :) My mom purchased 2 of them for Lily and Jeremy so the flowers that you see Lily holding in the pictures, that's what I did.

Aren't they so adorable?!

Lets Go Fly A Kite!

2011-06-09T22:43:00.000-07:00

Last weekend Luke and I took the family on a very impromptu trip down to Beverly Beach, Oregon. One of Luke's best friends growing up, Bekah Green, called us and invited us to the beach Thursday night and we decided to be spontaneous. So, we drove 5.5 hours down on Saturday afternoon and returned on Sunday afternoon. Yes, I know, insane for such a short time, but we had a BLAST. It was the first time the girls and I flew a kite! We had a ton of fun at the beach even though it was still quite cold. And from these pictures you might be wondering, where is that cute little boy of mine? Well, it was quite windy and cold the entire time and since he still can't sit very well yet, we left him in the carseat... poor guy.

When Lily first got a hold of the kite she took off running like there was no tomorrow. It was AWESOME watching her go.

Family Photos

2011-06-01T11:46:00.001-07:00

My good friend Tami took these family photos for us. We LOVE them. Thank you Tami!

Atai

2011-05-14T16:22:00.000-07:00

My grandma, aka Atai, was here visiting us from Taiwan this last week. She's 88, healthy and happy. Although she's strong and amazing, this is probably her last time visiting us in the States. She was only here for one week, so every day I went over to my dad's house to be with her and visit with her.
When I was a kid, Atai loved hiking with us and would take us to many different places in Taiwan. She really enjoys nature and she especially loves flowers. Knowing this, I took her to the Bellevue Botanical Gardens this last week. I got some great shots of her and the girls. Michael was sleeping in the stroller the whole time we were there so he missed out on the mini photo shoot. I did learn that it's really hard to take cute candid shots when you're pushing a stroller, trying to keep up with the kids, but not loose Atai at the same time. :)
I'm so glad I got to be with her this last week. When we moved to the states we became further and further apart from her relationship wise, but in the last couple of years I have tried really hard to re-establish that relationship and it's been so worth it. She's such a fun lady and so fun to be around. She gave all of her great-grandchildren Taiwanese dollars this trip for them to use when they visit her in Taiwan. Hopefully we'll be able to do that soon!

Mother's Day

2011-05-10T18:06:00.001-07:00

Every year for Mother's Day I get the BEST present from Luke - a day where I don't have to take care of the kids or do dishes or any chores, etc.! Well, this year for Mother's day my mom came up to join us for the weekend. So, not only did I get my Mother's Day Sunday, Luke also suggested that I take my mother out for dinner just the two of us on Saturday night. So, my mom and I went out to this little Italian joint near my house and had a nice quiet dinner Saturday night. It was WONDERFUL.
Sunday, since my mom was here with me, I made a nice breakfast and dinner. I love waffles and so we had waffles for breakfast. They were so yummy! Luke has found a new way to eat waffles, and are you all ready for this? He tops his waffles with (in exact order): Nutella, peanut butter, vanilla yogurt, fresh strawberries, banana slices, syrup, and finally, whipped cream. It was amazing.
Sunday night I went all out and made a HUGE asian dinner. That's the picture above. I should've taken a picture of the waffles too... next time!

Ivar's!

2011-05-10T17:55:00.001-07:00

So, in case some of you didn't already know, Luke's sister, Blythe, is currently living with us. She's 18, number 7 in the family, she graduated early and decided to come up here to earn some money for college this Fall. We LOVE that she's here!

Anyway, Luke's youngest brother, Warren, visited us last week and we decided to go down to Ivar's for lunch one of the days he was here. I LOVE this picture of Blythe! I was trying to get good ones of Luke and the girls but I didn't have nearly the same success. The girls really enjoyed feeding the seagulls and Pike Place Market after. It was quite the fun day.

Easter

2011-05-10T17:44:00.001-07:00

So, I know it's a little late, but here's a little Easter fun. We had an egg hunt inside the house since it was raining Easter morning. The girls LOVE finding things especially when it's plastic eggs filled with candy!

LOVE Arya! She's my sweet tooth girl and she couldnt' wait to chow down!

The War Against Moles

2011-04-03T15:57:00.001-07:00

Pretty much as soon as we moved into our house the moles took over our yard. We researched, got advice from people, and thereafter bought some traps. For a year the traps we got didn't work and our yard turned into a mole village. So, with renewed determination, Luke got back on the internet, did more research and purchased new traps. Yesterday he went out to check and TA DA! One mole down in our war against moles! Here's hoping for more!

A New Phase In Life

2011-03-25T17:14:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday went like this:

1 am: feed michael
4am: feed michael
7am: feed michael (he's been having issues sleeping through the night lately)
8am: get up and made waffles with homemade berry sauce (delish!)
9am: dishes
9:30am: bathe girls and fold laundry at the same time
10:00am: bathe michael and feed him
10:30am: huh, the weather's nice, lets do some yard work
11:30am: time for lunch! Made lunch for everyone and then cleaned up
1:30pm: feed michael
2:00pm: made lemon cream cheese bars for primary talent show, and friend comes over to visit and help with yard work
2:45pm: back out doing yard work
4:00pm: feed michael and start dinner and Ama comes to visit for the talent show
5:30pm: eat dinner and get ready to go to talent show
6:00pm: feed michael
6:45pm: arrive at church
8:30pm: arrive at home and get kids in bed
9:00pm: Feed michael and put him down, breather and movie
11:00pm: bedtime!

And then I realized that this is just how life is almost every day, and my life has just gotten crazy! BUT, like my mother-in-law's song says - "I'm gonna do it all and ENJOY it to the end!"

Primary Talent Show

2011-03-20T09:53:00.000-07:00

Last night was our primary talent show. Some of you may remember that Lily sang a solo last year and did a fabulous job. This year she wanted to dance. :) I chose a song for Lily and choreographed about 40-48 counts and then told her to just dance until the music stopped.

Unfortunately we had some technical difficulties and didn't get the first part of her dance (the part that I choreographed...), but here's the last part. SO CUTE! One of our favorite parts is the way she ran off stage.

And in case any of you are wondering, Lily takes a ballet class once a week and she LOVES it! Oh and of course Luke was the one on the piano.

A Happy Melancholy State

2011-03-15T12:41:00.000-07:00

Seven years ago I met Luke's sister Marren. Marren and Jeff got married 1 week before us and we hardly knew eachother back then. Soon thereafter Luke and I moved to Utah in order for me to finish Law School and Marren and Jeff were also in Utah since Marren was going to BYU for her undergrad degree. I was nervous at first, thinking that Marren and I were somewhat different and I didn't really know how to be her friend/sister. But, that soon changed and after 2 years Luke and I call Marren and Jeff our "best framily" - a combination of best friends and family. I couldn't have been more grateful for such an amazing relationship.

For the last 12 days Marren and Jeff were here. We each have 3 children now and things are a bit more crazy because of it, but we still had so much fun. It's always so hard to say goodbye to them and we never seem to get enough of eachother regardless of how much time we spend together. I just saw them drive off 5 minutes ago and I miss them so much already that it's put me in a bit of a melancholy state. But since the melancholy state is caused by such love and happiness, I think it's quite worth it. Once again, I'm so grateful for such an amazing relationship. Thank you Marren and Jeff for coming up and playing with us for 12 days!!! We love you guys SO MUCH. Can't wait to see you again!

Bouncy House Fun

2011-03-10T14:20:00.001-08:00

Luke took this whole week off since Marren and Jeff are here. Today we decided to go to "Pump It Up" - a bouncy house place that's 7 min away from our house. We all had a ton of fun. I'm tempted to say that Luke had more fun than the kids, but Lily and Arya were having a blast. I had both my cameras with me today so I got to try different things and then I too ran around with everyone. I had Michael most of the time and he didn't really have any reactions going down the slides. He just kinda chilled. :)

I had to put this picture up since it's one of the only ones with Michael in it, but I really LOVE the expression on Luke's face! Love ya babe!

Happy 30th Luke!

2011-03-03T22:34:00.000-08:00

Today is Luke's 30th birthday! The celebration actually started yesterday when the girls and I decided to make him some birthday cookies. We got this awesome recipe off of www.ourbestbites.com which is simple, yet elegant and delicious. They are called chocolate toffee sugar cookies on Sara and Kate's website.

This morning Luke's sister Marren and her family surprised Luke by driving up from Utah. They got in around 6:45 am. That is love right there. He was so happy to see them. Marren and Jeff have been our bestfriends for the last 6.5 years and we just love them a lot. Luke had to go to work after but then we had a nice celebratory dinner with his favorite foods - Bruchetta, Spinach Artichoke Dip and Lasagna. Instead of cake this year he really wanted Apple Dumplings from the same website mentioned above, which are super easy and heavenly!

Happy Birthday Babe!

Can We Say "AW YEAH!"

2011-02-28T16:25:00.000-08:00

I GOT MY NEW CAMERA!

Canon Rebel T2i

Valentine/February Decorations

2011-02-11T11:45:00.000-08:00

I got the crazy craft itch again this month, so the girls and I decorated the house a bit. The first decoration was inspired by my friend Max - she made 2-3 of these for the lunar new year and I thought they were so neat that I decided to make one with the girls. It only took her 40-45 min... but it took me 2 hours. :) Amazing what you can do with some sticks, tissue paper and hot glue!This is my favorite! It was inspired by Lily who had been wanting to make lady bugs. Don't know where she got that desire from, but she was asking me about it, and then she said, "hey mom, instead of black dots on the wings we should do hearts!" Clever girl! So I came up with this for our window. It makes me happy everytime I look at it.

Heart snowflakes cuz I'm still hoping for some snow.... One can dream. :)

Heart garland.

Paper heart wreaths that that the girls wanted to make.

Curling Hair Without Heat

2011-02-08T12:58:00.001-08:00

A few weeks ago a friend had posted on FB a link to Youtube of how to curl hair with a sock bun. The amazing sock bun curled hair beautifully on the Youtube girl and makes one wish that one had long hair. Well, I tried the sock bun on Lily... and yes, it made pretty curls but a lot of the hair had fallen out of the sock bun and didn't work as well for her. So, I ragged her hair and it made these gorgeous curls on her and it was so easy! It takes me all of 5 min at night, then she sleeps in the rags, and next morning - poof! Beautiful curls!

Now... having had success with Lily's hair, I decided to try it out on myself. Sorry, NO pictures because it turned out CRAZY on me! Most of you know I have incredibly thick, coarse hair and LOTS of it. I have to admit, some of the curls were really pretty and if my hair was longer, maybe, but I had quite the fro going. So, not so much for me, but I sure LOVE it on Lily!
So, all you do is take some rags - cut up a shirt or fabric of some sort in strips - better if it's a little stretchy. Then take a portion of damp hair (NOT wet, just sprayed damp, needs to dry over night), roll it in the rag and tie it when you've rolled it up. Google "how to curl hair with rags" and you'll get the proper Youtube vids.

Seattle Chinese New Year

2011-01-31T15:52:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday Seattle's International District put on a Chinese New Year Celebration. Chinese New Year is officially 2.3.2011 this year. The celebration was held at Hing Hay Park from 11am-4pm. Having never done this before, I had HIGH expectations and was really excited. Looking back, sure, I'm glad we at least checked it out, but let me say this: It was INSANE. They had a few booths that were intended for kids, but it was WAY too crowded to really enjoy it all as parents. The girls on the other hand had a lot of fun.
The part that I had REALLY wanted to do was the food walk. The concept of getting stamps while eating authentic chinese food for $2 and entering a contest sounded really fun. Unfortunately these really authentic restaurants were the fun holes in the wall that I would love to explore on my own, but not children and 50 other people trying to do the same. So, we ended up getting one thing - egg puffed waffles. I haven't had these babies since I was 7 in Taiwan and really wanted some. I stood in line for 30 min for 2 waffles but to me it was worth it and worth it to have the kids try it. We ended up eating at a chinese restaurant that was not participating in the food walk, but the food was still good.
Overall, I'm glad they did an event and that we decided to go... but we probably won't do this again with young children. :)

They had a fire truck there for kids to explore and climb on.

Then came the lion and dragon dance, which is always neat and fun to see.

Free face painting for children.

Craft table for kids to make things.

And the dressed up guy in the first picture was handing out red envelopes... unfortunately they only held candy and no money. :)

Michael's 2 Months Stats

2011-01-24T16:03:00.001-08:00

I took Michael in for his check up last week and here were his stats:

12 lbs 5 oz (50-75%)
26" (100%+ off the charts!)
15 3/4" head circumference (50%)

Luke's reaction to this was that he's trying to populate the world with tall asians. :) I now have had a child that's 3 months behind in clothing size (Lily), a child that's right on in size (Arya) and a child that is 3 months ahead (Michael)!!

Arya Turns 3

2011-01-19T15:35:00.000-08:00

My little Arya turned 3 on 1.15.2011. I can't believe how fast these little kids grow! On her birthday we had birthday pancakes (chocolate chip pancakes). That afternoon she wanted to go swimming so we all went to the YMCA for a little swim. Afterwards we went to the dollar store and she got to pick 5 things from the dollar store. I have to say, I LOVE our dollar store up here!! They have some really fun stuff for kids for $1!! We then went to a little Italian joint - Romios since Arya's favorite food is penne pesto with chicken. We ended her birthday right here at home with some fun present opening.
Arya is now 29 lbs (10-25%) and 37.5 inches (50-75%)
Thanks for all the pictures Ama!

Michael's Blessing

2011-01-06T11:29:00.000-08:00

Michael Widdison Bailey was blessed on 12.29.2010 at the Bailey Home. It was such a wonderful and spiritual experience for all of us. We had a double blessing that day with Luke's sister's baby -Kamille. His blessing outfit was made by my uber talented mother. Thanks Mama Hsu!

All the men. Back row - Stuart Bailey, Uncle Matt Belliston, Grandpa Luke, Dad Bailey, Warren Bailey, Nick Bailey, Front row - Luke Bailey and Jeffrey Copeland.

The two daddys :)

This is what happens when you have christmas with 26 people....

2011-01-06T11:28:00.001-08:00

The presents go all the way around the tree and then some....

Garden d' Lights

2010-12-14T15:38:00.001-08:00

Bellevue Botanical Garden always puts on an amazing display of lights each year during the holidays. I have gone many times and it just gets better every year! We went last night for family home evening and had a blast. Afterwards we had some nice hot cocoa for dessert. I LOVE the holidays!

Writing to Santa

2010-12-10T13:52:00.001-08:00

While I was running errands with the kids yesterday, we stopped by a Santa booth for a quick chat. When Santa asked the girls what they wanted for Christmas they didn't know what to say. I found that interesting since about every other day Lily asks for Disney Princess things for Christmas. I then stupidly asked her why she didn't ask Santa for princess things and what followed was an instant meltdown and complete determination for me to take her back to Santa, NOW! Well, since I had already been all over town for 2.5 hours, Michael was getting hungry and cranky and the fact that I already strapped everyone in the van, I told her we'd write Santa. I had wanted to do that as an activity with the girls anyway.

So, we wrote to Santa today! Lily is doing really well learning her letters and writing them that she wrote her letter and envelope by herself. I just had to spell out each word for her and tell her what letter to write. :)

I had to help Arya a bit more - holding her hand while we wrote together, but she was really excited too. She asked for books and coloring books. :)

Things That a 2 Year Old Comes Up With!

2010-12-01T11:52:00.001-08:00

At lunch today the girls were looking at our backyard and noticing all the animal life - robins, squirrels, blue jays, crows, etc. Lily saw a blue jay and excitedly told me about it. Ten seconds later, Arya sees the blue jay and said:

Mama! I see a blue... a blue... a blue... A BLUE COCKADOODLE DOO!

Gotta love that!

Thanksgiving 2010

2010-11-27T14:30:00.000-08:00

For Thanksgiving this year my mom thought we'd have the celebration at my house since I just had Michael 2 weeks ago. Well, between my mom being jetlegged from her stay in Taiwan and my determination and interest in helping out, I ended up doing quite a bit this year for Thanksgiving. I am proud to say that I made that beautiful bird in the picture - stuffing and all! This was my first Turkey all by myself and I was pretty dang happy with it. I brined it on Wed night and it was SO worth it!! The Turkey was juicy and tasty! Our friends that we invited over made little turkey booties for me so that my Turkey could look extra schnazy in this picture.

So, I ended up making rolls, green bean casserole, corn, broccoli salad, jello salad, wassel and 3 pies - apple, strawberry custard and chocolate cream. I didn't go all out and make the pie crusts, it was just a bit much and we bought a frozen pumpkin pie so I didn't make the pumpkin. Our friends made the mashed potatoes and brought the eggnog, and my mom made the candied yams and cranberry sauce.

Most of you know that we had snow over Thanksgiving week/weekend and this was the girls' first experience playing in the snow. Lily was pretty cute when she asked me what the snow crunching sound was when they were walking on the snow. She was however quite disappointed at the powdery consistency of the snow this storm since she couldn't form a snow ball very well. Next time!

Halloween

2010-10-31T18:44:00.001-07:00

Since I wasn't sure that I was going to make it to Halloween this year, Luke and I did not dress up with the girls. I was a little sad, but the girls didn't really want to do a family theme anyway. Lily wanted to be Belle, Arya wanted to be Tinker Bell. I have to say though, I LOVED dressing them up all cute and they had a GREAT time at our ward Trunk or Treat.

So, I was really proud of Lily's hair, and jut had to take a picture.

Pumpkin Carving this year got a little crazy. I was more into quantity since the girls wanted their own pumpkins this year, and Luke was definitely into quality. So, Luke did the CTR and I did the other 3. It was a lot of fun!

Summer Painting Projects

2010-10-20T12:33:00.001-07:00

This Summer I painted a couple rooms in my house. I liked the colors that the previous owner had, but I wanted to make this house mine. So, as soon as I found out what we were having, I started in on the baby room. I took a before picture of the baby room but for the life of me can't find it anywhere on my computer or my camera. So, just a brief discription - the room had nothing but the changing table and the crib when I first started and the room was painted completely green - the color of the bottom of the room. I kept the green cuz I thought it'd work well. Here's the finish product. So Pretty much I added the white strip in the middle and painted the top part blue.

We then added the rocking chair and instead of a dresser, I used our old book case and some storage baskets that the previous owners left in the bathroom to put all the baby clothes in.

I still plan on putting up stars and pooh bear stuff on the walls... but still haven't gotten around to that just yet....

Here's the girls' room. The room was pretty plain - just the basic khaki color and I didn't have anything up on the walls.

Here's the finish product. I did a pink/brown theme with the castle mural.

Pumpkin Patch Time

2010-10-18T09:56:00.000-07:00

I adore Fall in all it's glory every year, especially on days like this last Sat when we had perfect Fall weather. So what to do on a gorgeous Fall Saturday? Pumpkin Patch of course! Last year Luke and I had so much fun at the pumpkin patch that this year we decided to invite my parents along. We went to a farm much closer to where we live now - Craven Farms and had lots of fun in the sun.

Tractor Hay Ride

Picking pumpkins with the grandparents - we did decide that it was fun and worth it to pick small pumpkins at the Farm but the larger pumpkins should be bought at a store considering it's a $25 difference. But... I have to admit, it's MUCH more fun to pick out your own giant pumpkin from the fields.

They had some really cool pumpkin people displays all throughout the farm. The girls liked this one a lot.

And Christy, this one is just for you! :)

Mini Autumn Get-Away

2010-10-11T11:17:00.001-07:00

For the last month Luke has been working a lot of over-time due to the sale of his company. His boss was really nice in recognizing that factor and decided to give him 2 days off of work for him to rest, etc. Well, I couldn't pass up a 4 day weekend! I've been feeling rather antsy lately - wanting to take off and go before our little baby joins us and turns our lives upside down.

So, we decided to take a spare-of-the-moment mini-vacation to Leavenworth!! We went last Thursday morning, spent 1 night, and came back Friday. We had a FABULOUS time! The girls LOVED our little vacation and kept telling Luke and I "thank you" and how much they loved us. It was sweet.

The place we stayed at had the BEST heated outdoor pool (86 degrees!) I have ever been to. It was warmer to be in the water than to stand outside before we got in. We also watched a movie with the girls, ate lots of German/Bavarian food, took the trolley, rode on the carriage, shopped a bit, played mini-golf, visited the arcade and got so many tickets that the girls each got brown bags loaded with fun princess things - bracelets, crowns, candy, hair things, etc. It was definitely a fun-filled time! I can't wait to do something like this again. :)

Lily enjoying swimming by herself with a life-vest.

Arya riding on Luke's back. She did really well hanging on and had lots of fun!

Outside our Inn/Resort.

The Kris Kringle store.

Mini-golf at our resort.

Arcade place - we scored a great deal on tokens and mini-golf combined so we got to enjoy a lot of what the resort had to offer.

HARVEST!!!

2010-09-26T16:08:00.001-07:00

Well, after replanting my garden so late in the season, and then the pregnancy making it difficult for me to do yard work, I had all but given up on my garden this year. However, it wasn't a total lost! I was able to harvest some stuff today to my great delight! I hadn't checked on my zucchini in a few weeks with all the rain, etc. but when I went out there today I found this GIANT zucchini growing in my garden, all my carrots ready to harvest and tons of ripened apples on my apple tree. :) I still have more zucchini and apples to harvest later, but I was so excited!!! And like everyone else in Seattle this year, I have tons of green tomatoes that I'll have to figure out what to do with. BUT, this definitely makes me want to do more gardening next year. :)

Turning 30 and Feeling Fabulous

2010-09-15T17:51:00.001-07:00

Turning 30 in the Chinese culture signifies Independence. This is when parents truly feel that a child is able to stand on their own - it's a big mile marker. I have to admit, I wasn't all that excited about leaving my 20's and turning 30. But, now that it's come and gone, I'm feeling pretty good. :) We celebrated the beginning of my 30's in style and had some great fun. On my actual birthday Luke came home with this lovely bouquet of flowers from Pike Place Market. I LOVE that place and the flowers there are amazing. Since my birthday was in the middle of the week, we decided to wait till the weekend to celebrate.

Friday night our good friends Marty and Leyah surprised me by taking us all out to Buca di Beppos. For those of you who don't know, this place is a family style Italian restaurant. We had lots of fun at the restaurant and playing games after.

Luke got me a snazzy red weather-proof coat from costco Sat morning.

He then surprised me with these beauties! Diamond earings from Zales - I was speechless.

Sat night Luke and I went to Wild Ginger with my parents. Wild Ginger is my absolute favorite restaurants in Seattle. They serve the most wonderful pan-asian food. My parents have never been and I wanted to take them there... or rather let them take me there. In my sis-in-law Misty's words, I was "being spoiled by my 3 best spoilers." My parents combined gave me some money to buy a SLR camera. I'll be waiting for some good holiday sales to partake in that present- I'm SO EXCITED!!!

Lots happened in my 20's - I graduated from UW, made amazing, eternal friends, married Luke, graduated from law school, had 2 kids and bought my first house!! I'm excited to see what the 30's will bring. Thank you to all those who love and support me always.

Craft Project #3-5

2010-09-10T13:14:00.001-07:00

I've always wanted a Pooh-themed nursery. I know, generic and totally non-original, but I like Pooh Bear and the Hundred Acre Wood!
However, I was NOT about to spend oodles of money on a crib set to fulfill my desire, so I decided to make a basic set for myself. This past week I made 3 things - pillow case, sheet and blanket. So what if they aren't all made of the same fabric, I made it and it works for me! :)

I found this SUPER EASY tutorial on how to make cute pillow cases online. Anyone can do this - you just have to sew 3 straight lines! Here's the link: http://vimeo.com/9035171

I made the cuff on the sheet the same way as the pillow case cuff.

The baby blanket wasn't a total success - a few things here and there aren't exactly lined right and didn't work out the way I had hoped because I tried to take a short cut instead of doing it like a quilt. Oh well, it's still cute and soft. The corners of the blanket has the same fabric as the sun/moon trim on the pillow case so it does kind-of all tie together.

All together - Viola!

Camping Trip #1 - Deception Pass

2010-08-22T22:07:00.001-07:00

Earlier this year I decided that by-golly we are going to be a camping family! Luke and I both really enjoy camping and did it every summer before we had kids. So, this year I decided that we'd go on at least 2-3 camping trips. But, since we were dealing with varying schedules, pregnancies/births, etc. it all ended up being planned for the end of August. So starting this last weekend we will be camping 3 weekends in a row. :)

Our first is at Deception Pass. After stopping by during the Tulips Festival we decided that we HAD to go back. We got together with 2 other couples from church and did a Friday-Saturday thing. It was a bit chilly but no mosquitoes!

Now, back when I planned all this I didn't really think about being 6.5-7 months pregnant and sleeping on the ground with little foam pads. Let me tell ya, I don't recommend! This next weekend, I will definitely have air mattresses, even if it does have a small leak!

Luke, Lily and our friend Marty.

Our cute girls waiting for breakfast.

Arya wanted me to take a picture of her on the rock. :) We also had a croquet set and a few other lawn games that the others brought. It was quite fun for our girls and the adults.

Luke and the other boys had wet suits and took a dip in the really really cold ocean.

Boys being silly and jumping off rocks.

Girls picking up rocks and throwing them in the water.

Cranberry Lake - they have this really nice lake area for swimming. I thought it'd be way too cold to swim so didn't prepare for the girls. Live and learn! they got in the water carefully at first, but then eventually just got all wet in their clothes and played and built sand castles. Next year I will definitely have to bring all the swimming gear. This place is definitely going to be on the annual calendar! It was so pretty and so much fun!

Craft Project #2

2010-08-16T16:07:00.001-07:00

When I was pregnant with Arya I got the "nesting instinct." I was super clean and prepared for her arrival about a month and a half before she was born - I mean 2 months worth of diapers stocked, everything laid out, etc. Well, I think the "nesting instinct" has kicked in again, except instead of just cleanliness/readiness, I got this whole art/craft thing going. I've been painting the babyroom and the girls' room AND decided I was going to make most of the decorations in those rooms too. Call me crazy.

So here is project #2. I've seen things like this at Deseret Book for a price tag that seemed too high for something so simple. So, I went and got some scrapbook paper, ribbon, and a frame and viola! I was able to print the lettering off of our own printer and it was a couple hours of pure fun for me. I'll be posting more projects as I finish them!

A Moment of TOTAL and COMPLETE Immaturity

2010-08-15T15:28:00.001-07:00

Our stake had stake conference today. The church building was packed and the meeting was spiritual and wonderful. Our children were amazingly good and did very well during the whole session.
Since we were sitting in the gym we had our hymns printed on paper for us. One of the rest hymns that we sang was #89 "The Lord is My Light." There was a typo on the paper in one of the verses and it read "The Lord is my light, the Lord is 'mu' strength." Luke and I both made the concious decision to sing what was typed. Haha, we thought it was funny and hilarious that we made the same decision.
What followed after, was complete hysteria on my part where I could not control myself for the life of me. Luke recovered just fine and was able to sing perfectly after his momentary chuckle, but me, no, I could not control myself! I kept thinking about the phrase, "the Lord is MU strength." MU STRENGTH! I was so bad that I could not sing anymore for the life of me and tears flowed as I tried to bring my laughter under control.
I chuck this whole thing up to a moment of total and complete immaturity, insanity and hysteria on my part. But, it really was kinda funny. :)

Copy Cat

2010-08-09T08:51:00.000-07:00

After seeing my sis-in-law's finished product in action, I just had to copy her. These carseat canopies are cute and easy to make. What can I say, it called out to my creative genes. I have to admit though, this took a LOT longer for me than for Mags - probably a good 4 hours on my end but that's partly because I had to remember how to use my sewing machine again. :)

It was really hard to find uber cute boy fabric! This was the best I could do at Joann's, though I really wish they had a better selection for boys!!!

One a side note, my girls LOVE this thing and have been putting dolls and stuffed animals in the carseat and rocking it and singing to it. Fun all around!

Hsu Family Vacation!

2010-07-19T17:05:00.001-07:00

For my dad's 60th Birthday, we gave him a Hsu Family Vacation. In the Chinese culture, turning 60 is a HUGE deal. It signifies a level of enlightenment and if you make it to 60 you should be honored because you have lived 5 rounds of the 12 zodiacs. Well, since we haven't had a Hsu Family Vacation since 2001 I thought it'd be neat. It was really crazy with 10 kids 6 and under, but it sure was fun. We got a rental house that fit all of us up in Sequim and had a blast from Fri-Mon. My FB will have a TON of pics if people want to see it.

The vacation started with seafood night. I never thought I'd get sick of crab, but apparently it's possible. We had 15 huge crabs with oysters and clams! Then Sat we had a really yummy breakfast at Oak Table Cafe before heading to the Olympic National Park. With the amount of kids we had, Mags just given birth to Carly, and me 5.5 months pregnant we chose hikes that were both fun and easy. We hiked roughly 4 miles to Sol Duc Falls and Marymere Falls. Then we went home and had the biggest chinese BBQ EVER! Sun we went to church, then (don't judge me, it was the only way I could plan it) we went to the Olympic Game Farm. You Drive through the zoo and feed wild animals! Then we went to the tidalpools at Salt Creek Park. Ron's family, my dad, and Luke had to leave us on Sun night. My mom and girls and Zeke's family stayed so we got to go to the Dungeness Spit on Mon. It was relaxing and beautiful.

Overall it was a FABULOUS vacation. I haven't decided whether I'm more crazy for planning this and hiking at 5.5 months pregnant or Mags for doing all of this with a 3 week old infant. I think Mag's is crazier. :) But, everyone had a great time and decided that we should make this a regular thing. "Eggs Benny" at the Oak Table Cafe. It's a mix of Eggs Benedict and Biscuits and Gravy. Makes my mouth water just looking at it!

Oak Table Cafe's famous Apple Custard Pancake. This is amazing and so huge and delicious!

Sol Duc Falls - 1.6 miles total hike

Sol Duc Falls.

Marymere Falls at Lake Cresent - 2 miles total hike.

Olympic Game Farm. Ron got to feed a Zebra!

Luke feeding a huge buffalo. It nudged him for more food after that one piece. :)

Luke brought his wetsuit and he swam out to the rocks and found this giant sea star at Salt Creek Park.

Salt Creek County Park.

Lily found a crab. These tidalpools were SO COOL. All the kids enjoyed finding marine life.

Dungeness Spit.

Discovery Park

2010-07-11T09:07:00.000-07:00

Though we were all a little sick still from the 4th, it was NOT going to stop me from going out on the first really nice weekend in Seattle this summer. When I was single and living in the U-District, Discovery Park was one of my most favorite places to go with my friends. When the tide is out you can walk out forever on the beach and find cool things in the tidepools. This is the first time I've been since those single days and it sure brought back memories! The girls had a lot of fun playing on the beach finding little fish, hermit crabs, shells, dead crabs, sea snails, and of course, poking at the anemones. The jaunt down to the beach was longer than I remembered it being but it sure was worth it.

July 4th Weekend

2010-07-11T08:56:00.000-07:00

Since the 4th fell on a Sunday this year, we did most of our celebrating on the 3rd. Luke went and got quite a bit of fireworks like he always does and we headed out to a friend of ours in Issaquah and lit off fireworks for 3 hours! The girls had a TON of fun and are more and more into setting things on fire and watching it go boom. Luke couldn't have been a prouder daddy for that. :) As you can see the girls were wearing their winter jackets and that's because it was FREEZING cold that night after which we all promptly got sick. I ended up being an "old" person and went to bed on the 4th at 8:30pm. Oh well, such is life and it was worth it.

Lily helping Luke light off a fountain.

Arya holding a party popper in the shape of a gun.

Luke got this really cool lantern/hot air ballooon thing and it just goes until you can't see it anymore. He ended up with two of them and one of them actually came down pretty close to where we originally set it off.

Lily's 4th Birthday Bash

2010-06-28T13:07:00.001-07:00

Lily had her 4th birthday on the 23rd and we threw her a small party on Sunday. We had Luke's oldest brother, Nick and his wife and youngest son, Zeke and his two oldest boys since Maggie was at home resting, my parents, and a family that Luke and I really like in the ward come over.

Lily had a GREAT time. We had a BBQ with LOTS and LOTS of food - bruchetta, stuffed mushrooms, spinach artichoke dip, oysters, fruits coming out of our ears and a home-made cake that actually turned out pretty darn good. :) I spent 4 hours cooking right before we BBQ'd and my feet, ankles and calves were super swollen by the end of the night, but it sure was fun!!

I can't believe my little girl is already 4! We sure love and appreciate the sweet, thoughtful girl she is. She's SUPER into princesses and her favorite is Sleeping Beauty. She made quite the haul and has been playing with all her presents in turn ever since she got them. Thanks to everyone that made the party so fun and special for my darling girl!

Wearing the fun fairy skirts and shoes that aunt Maggie made and bought her.
Super excited about a princess book with little figures and a map to play on from my mom. She actually got some really fun polly pocket princess things from Luke's mom while we were down in ID and she had the exact same facial expression for that present as well.

Excited to finally get her Sleeping Beauty movie that she's wanted since February. :)

New Toy!

2010-06-19T09:22:00.001-07:00

Luke grew up with a trampoline and really loved it. When we were looking for a house one of his requirements was whether the yard was big enough for a large trampoline. Well, a trampoline wasn't exactly in the budget this year, but I found a fabulous deal on craigslist that we just couldn't pass up!! Craigslist can be so great sometimes. The girls absolutely love it!

Who Would Have Thought - I Found a Purpose for Beer!

2010-06-14T11:18:00.001-07:00

So, throughout HS and College I've had friends who drank beer. I've asked them what it tastes like and why they drink it and most often than not they say it's an acquired taste and they enjoy it for the affects. Apparently some beer tastes better than others - cheap beer tastes like urine and others not so much, but all far from a Jamba Juice Smoothy. To me, it's a big fat waste of money and brain cells... until now!!!

So, when I returned home to my completely eaten garden, I got the advice that beer attracts and drowns slugs. So, on Sat my mom and I went to the store and bought a six pack of beer. I felt extremely self-conscious but was excited to try it out.

We went out to my garden and replanted EVERYTHING that night. I still had some starter melons, peppers and tomatoes in pods so those were transplanted and I started a bunch of new seeds. I then proceeded to set up 4 beer traps in plastic containers set into the ground around my garden. After 2 days I have successfully killed 7 slugs and nothing has been eaten in my garden!!!

Conclusion - I LOVE BEER! It's the most effective slug killer I've seen! So, for those of you having slug trouble in your garden, I highly recommend going out and buying some beer. :)

Gardening and the Gospel

2010-06-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

Last year my sis-in-law Marren and I were talking and she mentioned that one gains a new appreciation and understanding of Alma 32 in the Book of Mormon on the analogy of faith and planting seeds when she started gardening. I completely agree!

I've already spent roughly 20 hours total in my garden - I tilled it, dunged it, nourished it, tried hard to keep bugs, slugs, and deer away. I've recently returned from a 10-day trip in Idaho and my entire yard/garden has been destroyed. it's surprising how much damage can be done in 10 days, but it made me reflect on what happens to our spiritual lives when we neglect our daily spiritual nourishment for 10 days.

So now, instead of giving up, which a part of me really wants to, I'm going to start over again and make my garden stronger and better than the first time. I compare this to the whole repentance process, and renewing my faith in the gospel. I've made mistakes in my time and have become stronger and better for it. I know better now how to take care of my garden. I understand the whole process better and am determined to have a plentiful harvest in the next few months. I have also renewed my determination to nourish my spiritual life more each day so that "slugs, bugs, weather, deer, etc." won't destroy me when they come attacking.

Deer in the Yard!

2010-05-21T16:41:00.001-07:00

So when we purchased our lovely home with my lovely yard we were told that sometimes deer come through. Back in March I suspected something like deer ate my tulips, but didn't think much of it. Well, today when I went out to my car at 4:30pm to pick up a few things from the trunk I looked out to my side/back yard and lo and behold 3 deer! Lily was with me and she was SO EXCITED! The deer stared at us for a little bit and us them and when they started walking towards us we went in the house and to the back to get these lovely pictures. They ate stuff from my fruit trees to my slight distress, but luckily left my ground garden in tact! Fun end to my very busy, stressful Friday!

Lily's First Talent Show!

2010-04-25T14:01:00.000-07:00

Lily had her primary talent show on Sat. I am one VERY PROUD mom!!!! She was so brave and so cute and did such a WONDERFUL job. The gym was packed full of people from the ward. It was a great experience for all of us!

Deception Pass

2010-04-11T14:16:00.001-07:00

We had the opportunity to stop by Deception Pass yesterday! Luke was telling me that we should take my mom to Anacortes and see the "big bridge where the water is" since we were at the Tulips Festival in Mount Vernon. I had NO idea what he was talking about at the time since I had only been to Deception Pass once before with the Institute Choir. But, I figured, why not -water, big bridge, sounds like fun for the girls. So after the Tulips Festival we headed out to Anacortes and we saw the big brown signs pointing to Deception Pass. I was DELIGHTED to find out that we were going there and showing my mom a beautiful state park! Too bad my dad had to leave to go to work after we left the Tulips Festival. We had fun and the girls did GREAT hiking down these narrow steep paths. We will definitely be coming back here to do some family camping next year! More pictures on my FB.

Luke being Luke.

He hiked down this really steep trail hanging on a tree to get out on the rock where he found some mini tide pools

Tulips Festival

2010-04-11T14:08:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we were able to go to the Tulips Festival with my parents. The girls had a lot of fun and we got some nice pictures. This was the second time I've ever been and it was GREAT! The first time I went was when I was 11-12 or something like that. Brought back some fun memories and created some wonderful new ones! There are more pictures on my FB account.

We really enjoyed finding the odd ball tulips. There were quite a few here and there and this was one of our favorites.

I REALLY liked the pink tulips. They were my favorites with white on the bottom. SO PRETTY!

I Just Want You

2010-03-12T08:52:00.000-08:00

The one advice that all mom's with grown children have given me these last 3.5 years has been to enjoy this time I have with my young children. Though it's a hectic time and some days are better than others, they all said that this was their favorite time and the time that they missed the most. I often reflect on this advice on days that I just want to tear my hair out and also on days when life just couldn't get any better. This week has been rough on us. We've all been sick, especially Lily. Lily's been terribly ill with fevers, puking and general miserableness. Every day all she wants is for me to hold her. Everytime I ask her if I could get her anything, all she asks for is me. My heart goes out to my little sick girl, and I feel so awful for her, yet I can't help but cherish these momments - when all my baby wants is me.

My Little Ballerina

2010-02-07T10:22:00.000-08:00

I enrolled Lily in ballet last week and she just LOVED it. I should've prepped her that I only enrolled her in one class and she'd have to leave after the class ended... but I didn't. So, out of 18 kids that were in the class, mine was the one that had a total meltdown when we had to leave. Live and learn!

Arya Turns Two!

2010-01-23T10:29:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe my babygirl has turned two! Arya's birthday was on the 15th. Maggie and the boys came over to celebrate with us. Zeke couldn't come because their youngest - Brandon was sick. Arya loved her birthday and all her presents. Here are some pictures!

The dress is from Zeke and Maggie. It's SO beautiful. Thanks guys!

Post-Zoo Fun

2010-01-23T10:20:00.000-08:00

As mentioned before, Luke's parents got us Zoo passes for Christmas and one of my goals this year is to take them to the zoo at least once a month. I took the girls yesterday and we had a TON of fun. And apparently the girls learned a little something from the Orangutan's.

They were just pretending, but it was so cute!

Got Juice?

2010-01-23T10:19:00.001-08:00

Lily LOVES vitamix drinks. Here's a typical Lily face after she finishes her juice. We love the Vitamix!

Fireworks with the Girls

2010-01-23T10:08:00.000-08:00

We had some sparklers left over from the 4th and so we thought we bust them out on New Years. The girls LOVED it! Arya kept asking for more and she always wanted 2 at a time. It was GREAT!

New Year Resolutions

2010-01-10T15:20:00.000-08:00

Last year I made just one new year resolution. I've made lots of resolutions in the past with it all fizzing out by the end of January so last year I decided to take just one baby step. I'm proud to report that in 2009 I accomplished my resolution roughly 90% of the time and have now formed a new habit - I now make my bed almost 95% of the time!

So, this year is a little different. I wanted originally to just do one resolution again something that I know I can accomplish, but with a new house and kids getting older I am forcing myself to do more and here's my new list.

1. Make the girls beds everyday
2. Keep my house clean one day at a time (we've worked out a system and it's working so far)
3. Enroll Lily in a ballet class
4. Go to the zoo at least once a month (Luke's parents got us annual zoo passes for the family for Christmas)
5. Do something preschool-ish with Lily at least 45 minutes a day during the week
6. Exercise twice a week (And hey, working in my yard counts!)
7. Attend the temple once a month
8. Go on a date with my husband once a month besides the temple trip
9. Pick up my flute once a month (I was going to say once a week, but lets face it, not going to happen)
10. And... I can't quite make it to 10 so that's that! (Sorry, becoming a better blogger isn't going to make the list )

I've often found that when you tell people you're going to do something there's more motivation to do it. So here I go and wish me luck! I wish all of you a wonderful 2010 year!

Our New Home

2009-11-22T09:29:00.001-08:00

Luke and I found this house in the middle of October. When we went to look at it the first time, the seller was at home and he came out and in a very strong Russian accent said, "What do you want?!" Our Realtor looked slightly taken aback, but introduced himself and us and asked him if we could see the house. The seller then said, "You want to see the house? Fine, come in." So, a little awkward, and in we went. Luke recognized the accent and immediately asked the man if he spoke Russian in Russian. And off they went. The man's cold, hard voice melted and he gave Luke a personal full tour of the house. It took an hour and a half.
There's a lot more to it than meets the eye. Of course the Yard is huge and fantastic, but the seller has 4 fruit trees lining one side of the house, a strawberry patch, blue berry bushes, raspberry bushes, grapes, and another berry bush that Luke didn't know the translation to. There are HUGE garden areas that I'm so excited about! The house itself has 4 beds and 2.5 bath. We closed on Friday Nov 22 and went and took a look at what was left in the house since the man had told us they'd be leaving things. They left us their formal dining set, a really nice coffee table, some curtains, some paintings, fully decorated bathrooms with baskets, etc., 2 extra party fridges in the garage, seeds that they plant in the yard, ALL their yard tools - lawn mower, weed eater, planters, rakes, axes, saws, everything you can possiblythink of to upkeep the yard. They left us a computer that's not half bad, etc. etc. etc. The list goes on and on.
The sellers were some of the sweetest, nicest people I have ever met. They were also extremely clean and meticulous about everything so the house is in fantastic condition. They were older - grandparents age and they even left little stuffed animals for our girls that they absolutely adored (which really helped in the whole buying/negotiations process.)
So here it is! Our new home for years to come. There's a LOT of parking so we'll be having a house warming party sometime in the near future! In all our haste we didn't get a picture of our incredible guest bathroom, so you will just have to come see it. Lets just say that there's a $5K bath/spa/sauna chamber in there that has neon blue lights, built in MP3 player, and you can even patch your phone into it. Thanks to all who helped and supported in making this happen for us. We feel incredibly blessed and are very humbled and grateful for this new WONDERFUL blessing.

A Child's Prayer

2009-11-14T08:48:00.000-08:00

We've been teaching Lily how to say prayer for almost a year now. Mostly she says the prayers over the meals and they are very simple and always the same. Lately something has clicked and she has started praying for different things during our meal prayers. It started when we all had the flu and she started praying for us to feel better. Then she started praying that Lily and Arya will have good sleep. :) (Can you tell what Luke and I pray for all the time?) This morning's went like this:

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank thee for the food, please bless the food, please bless that Santa will bring Lily presents, bless that Santa will bring Arya presents, bless that Santa will bring Mommy presents, and bless that Santa will bring daddy presents, in the name of Jesus Christ Amen.

It's amazing how children connect things sometimes! It brought a smile to my face as I said AMEN!

Fall City Farms - Pumpkin Time!

2009-10-11T07:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was one of the BEST days ever! Luke and I took the girls to Fall City Farms and had a superb time. They have hay rides, hay mazes, farm animals, fresh pressed apple juice, fresh made donuts, and of course, a pumpkin patch. It was the first time we took the girls to do something like this and they absolutely loved it. Lily use to be afraid of animals a year ago but this year she was in heaven. She wanted to pet everything! Arya, our fearless baby, had no problems either and also wanted to pet everything.

Luke and I both grabbed pretty big pumpkins and we have pretty big plans for them. Hopefully it'll pan out. We'll just have to see in a couple of weeks. I LOVE FALL! It's so beautiful and cozy. And now, it will forever be the time that we bought our FIRST HOUSE! More of that to come... :o).

Locks of Love

2009-07-14T15:24:00.000-07:00

As some of you know, my hair grows like weeds. I have estimated that it grows approximately 8-10 inches a year. This makes it financially difficult to keep cute short hairstyles. A couple years ago I decided that I'll just grow my hair out and donate it to a company called "Locks of Love" that makes wigs for children who have lost all of their hair due to health reasons. This is the second time that I have done this over the last 3 years and it feels great! It also helps that a really fancy schmancy salon in downtown Bellevue called "7 Salon" cuts your hair for free when you donate to "Locks of Love."

Now, I have liked all the short hair cuts that I have ever gotten thus far (with the exception of when I was 3-4 and got a boy cut). It's always a shock and for some odd reason all the stylists I have ever had except for one have insisted on fluffing my hair up as much as possible and then have the hair curl under so that I look like a freakin' mushroom. Last night was no exception and all I could think of was, "wow, I look like the mushroom monster on Mario Brothers." This syndrome will pass as soon as I wash my hair and style it myself. But, I couldn't resist snapping a picture of it last night.

I Am a Child of God

2009-07-09T19:14:00.000-07:00

Lily is really good at singing... at least we think so. :) She has been singing "I am a Child of God" from start to finish for a couple months now. Sometimes she sings it while she's playing with the piano and other times she likes to put on a performance. Arya pretty much enjoys doing whatever Lily is doing and has also picked up on a few songs from nursery and can follow along here and there. Today they put on a performance for Luke and I. It was so cute that we had to get a video of it!

Lily's Third Birthday

2009-07-09T19:01:00.001-07:00

Lily's 3rd birthday was on June 23rd. She ended up having 3 different celebrations - once on her actual birthday with just eveyone in the household. She got her trike and a fish that day. Then we celebrated it again with Zeke's family when she actually got her birthday cake and a beautiful pink dress (that she couldn't stop twirling in) from them. Then again with Luke's brother's family when we had ice cream and she got a HUGE Disney Princess coloring book and some cute PJ's. Quite the birthday week. Hopefully the number of parties for her will not match how old she is every year. :)

We tried to get her to name her fish, but I don't think she understands the concept just yet. She named her fish - Fishy. :)

Camping Trip

2009-06-15T16:47:00.001-07:00

Well, we had our very first family camping trip! It was actually Zeke and Maggie's first too. Zeke is not exactly a fan of camping, but with 3 boys, Maggie wanted him acclimated. So, she invited us along! The girls did better than I expected and since Luke and I really enjoy camping, there will definitely be more to come! We were at Ensign Ranch and everything was wonderful except for the hundreds and hundreds of mosquitos that were there. The girls got away without any bites... might have something to do with the fact that I was spraying them about every 45 minutes. Luke and I were not so lucky, but it wasn't too bad.

Here are some pictures - Enjoy!
They had a really nice FREE slip and slide and so we all went and had a GREAT time. Lily went down about 5-6 times. But after she got splashed in the face 3 times in a row she was done. Arya did about 3-4 but she screamed and cried every time. We're such nice parents. :)

From the Mouth of my soon-to-be 3 year old

2009-06-02T09:15:00.001-07:00

Lily has become more and more aware of herself lately. She's always been a clean/neat freak about her appearance and her body in general but lately she's more into her clothing and picking out what she likes, etc. This morning when I handed her some clothes to put on, she picked up her shirt, examined it and said:

Lily: "Oh no!"
Me: "It's ok, it's just wrinkled, put it on."
Lily: "Wrinkled? Like you?"

I didn't think I was getting wrinkles yet!!!! After she got her clothes on, she then proceeded to say, "I'm going to go look at myself in the mirror." Oh boy! I didn't think that they start that young! I know that kids pick up on what we do and say, but I didn't think that I checked myself out in the mirror that often! Things you learn!

Family Time

2009-05-31T17:22:00.001-07:00

Luke's little brother and sister came and visited Seattle over Memorial Day weekend and the weather was so nice that we went to the beach and had a bbq. She took some cute pictures of the girls and we had a lot of fun.

Here's Lily lookin' stylin' in Blythe's sunglasses. Sorry the pictures are small because I stole them off of her facebook.I love these pictures of Arya. She is literally always eating and we call her our little chunky monkey.

Beach Day

2009-04-21T09:56:00.000-07:00

Well, it finally warmed up and yesterday it was about 70-72 degrees so Luke and I took the girls to Coulon Park with Zeke and Maggie's family. The girls were a little hesitant about the sand at first, but they had fun in the end. It was really nice since Coulon also has this really large playground so after some beach fun we went over to the playground for some extra fun.

Arya really wasn't so sure about the whole sand thing.

Zeke's little boy didn't have any problems with the sand. :)

Lily helping build a mote around Luke's castle.

The girls at the playground. I think that's the first time I've really seen Arya enjoy the swing, but who can resist daddy making funny faces at the same time.

Random Pictures

2009-04-21T09:47:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to post a few pictures of our happenings:
This is Arya climbing from the little chair to the little table. She's quite the climber. I would've snapped a picture of her climbing on top of the toilet tank trying to get into the pedestal sink, but I didn't trust that I had enough time to grab my camera before she plummeted to the tile floor. She is definitely Luke's child. :)

Here's Arya smooching Aiden - Ron's youngest. Ron and Misty came up to see The Music Man and Aiden and Arya just smooched left and right. They were very, very cute.

Luke's Sister Marren who is a professsional hair and make-up artist was up visiting and helping with the remodeling of my mom's house. She did Lily's hair for church. I'd like to say it was for Easter, but it was just a regular Sunday and Marren had a lot of fun. She did such a GREAT job thta I just had to snap some pictures of it.

The Music Man

2009-03-22T10:59:00.001-07:00

YAY! Well, the show was a success and there were so many people there this weekend that it was insane. On opening night about 15 minutes before theshow started, we had a packed gym and into the overflow. Then about 5 minutes after that the crew had to open up the chapel put seats in between the pews and people were sitting in the choir seats up on the pulpit! We had an estimated 550 on opening night, about 300 for the matinee and then about another 450-500 for the closing show!! It was SUCH a great time! My mom was so great at babysitting for Luke and I this week that I really didn't have to worry about my children at all and was just able to enjoy being in the orchestra. Here are pictures of the show. We do have video clips... but copy right laws are screaming in my head saying "DON'T POST ANYTHING!!" So, you all just have to come visit and watch it some time!