Easter

Well, the Easter bunny came again! We were pretty excited when we woke up and to our great awe and surprise there were baskets filled with treats...our Easter bunny even had leopard print eggs...how did he know that's what kind of people we are?

Marilyn was delighted that her basket had eggs that she could open and shut...and I think the candy inside was a surprise...last year she had yogurt melts (sorta boring)

The Easter bunny must have communicated with my subconscious because he brought me plastic lids to use for my jars in the fridge which I have wanted FOREVER...might sound boring but it's really amazing!

Linny loved her basket so much she carried it around as her purse for the rest of the morning...until we HAD to leave it at home for church (I know, I'm evil right?!)

Marilyn's "cute chick" jammies...so cute!

I made THIS Easter dress this year...with my new serger! It turned out pretty cute! Marilyn seemed to like it, and she was adorable in it at church...which is really all that matters, right?

We are grateful to be able to celebrate Easter and are grateful that we know the real reason behind this seemingly silly holiday.  I loved going to primary on Easter Sunday and hearing the sharing time about the resurrection and how we can remember it in our lives every day.  Even though Easter has lots of candy and treats, the real reason for the season is our Savior and his great sacrifice and resurrection for us. 

Uncle Jeff

For those of you that don't know, my brother Jeff is on his mission in Boise, Idaho! Well, he is almost done...we have missed him like crazy and cannot wait for him to come home! This is a shout out to him!

Dear Uncle Jeff-

I know you are online today, we made this greeting for you.  Hope you love it! We absolutely cannot wait to see you in 5 weeks.  Marilyn can't wait to meet her Uncle Beff!!

Love,
Tom, Sara and Marilyn

Logan

We love Logan (more specifically North Logan), UT.  We always feel lucky that Tom's family lives there and we get to visit often.  We cherish the memories we make on our visits and love to remember the time that we spent there.  Last weekend, we had the opportunity to visit because our beloved Grandma J passed away.  We were lucky that the funeral fell on a Friday and that we were able to spend the weekend with Tom's entire family and have a lot of cousin time.  I literally took 200 pictures just this weekend alone.  We crammed a million things into the weekend (like always) and had such a great time reconnecting with family during this time. Here are some of our favorite things we did. 

We cleaned the sink at Angies.  Which is when they give you a ridiculously enormous amount of ice cream in a "kitchen sink" and you aren't supposed to be able to finish it. There were 22 of us and we polished off 2 of these bad boys! Everyone loved it so much, especially Marilyn.  

 

it was so so so delicious!

this is when Marilyn was bringing out Uncle Troys inner little girl...haha he is surrounded his boys so we think it's good for him!

we even earned this sticker!

cutest thing ever?

this is Marilyn's little cousin Amelia...she is to die for cute!

This is Marilyn and Grandpa having some seriously much needed bonding time watching Elmo's World...Grandpa had surgery on his knee so his movement is limited.  Marilyn took full advantage of this and loved cuddling with him!

This is the amazingly adorable rain coat Grandma J got for the 4 little little girls...seriously? is it literally the cutest rain coat on earth?

Marilyn and her cousin just older than her played like crazy the whole time.  They read books and played purses and barn.  Marilyn even showed her how to use the big girl potty!

This is so adorable because Marilyn fell in LOVE with this purse, it went everywhere with us, even to Jakes rainy soccer game.  I got this purse with my wedding dress, it is made from the same fabric and it makes my heart melt that Linny-Loo loves it so so much!

we ate way too many wegies and all the kids loved it!

Marilyn got a new tea set (for filling her second potty chart) and she loved having little tea parties with everyone

Basically, we love love love our Logan visits and we always feel a little lonesome when we get home...but it helps us look forward to our next visit!

I Will Be A Master!

Kristin (my bff) and I are taking a Master Preserver class.  We are pretty stoked about it! At the end of 6 short weeks, we will take a test and be nationally certified master preserver.  We learn water bath canning, pressure canning, jams and jellies, dehydrating, pickling and freezing.  It is pretty much the greatest thing ever.  Please excuse Kristin and I in these pictures, we are wearing the same shirt...on accident I swear. 

Last week we water bath canned fruit.  This is pineapple.  It was so delicious! We also canned applesauce, peaches, pears, oranges, grapefruit and a bunch of pie fillings. 

This is me, holding the blueberry filling I made...isn't it pretty?

Here we are...holding things that have to do with canning...I don't know what we are doing, but cute right?

This is the peach apple salsa we made.  It was so delicious...I really would have never tried it unless I made it at master preserver class...if  you know me I am not the most adventurous eater in the world.  But I tried it and love love loved it! I even got to use a muslin spice bag! See it? Wow... blah blah blah...I love this class!

Marilyn is getting big...

Freak me right out...Marilyn is down right big now.  She is basically a kid...when did this happen without my knowledge or approval! Here are some really cute things she has done lately...

We were making dinner and turned around to see this...seriously...and since she doesn't eat ANYTHING EVER, I let her continue until I snapped a picture!

This is how Marilyn stands these days...hand on hip ready to take on the world!

She set up this scene in the kitchen while I was cleaning up.  She brought the whole thing in piece by piece...so so so cute!

Aunt Cari Came to Visit

We are lucky that the Johnsons have a place down here that they visit frequently, and therefore visit us frequently.  We love having them here! Me and Marilyn get spoiled with cousin play during the day and I feel more connected to what is happening in Tom's family.  I also love it when the Johnsons come because I can see that working really hard while Marilyn is young actually can turn out with normal, well adjusted, polite kids when they get older.  I am sure they have other things they are dealing with now, but it just gives me hope that life moves on from potty training and hysterical crying fits.  I love talking with Cari while she is here because she always seems to have some creative idea on how to teach something to Marilyn, or some other solution to a problem I have been thinking about.  One night while they were here I had a pack meeting (the pre-pinewood derby pack meeting) so Tom and Marilyn had a pizza party with the Cari and Troy and their boys (who are almost men now, so weird).  In this house full of 6 boys and only 2 girls I came home to find Tangled on and this scene...

Marilyn has a lot of really GREAT aunts we feel super lucky when

we get lucky enough to have them to play with (especially dress up!)!

Happy Kreg Kolb Day!

On Saturday our ward had a crazy huge fundraiser for a man in our ward named Kreg Kolb.  He was diagnosed with ALS and our ward really rallied together to do a we love you Kreg Kolb celebration of life day.  So many people came out and it was a really cool event.  The young women were in charge of a bake sale and since me and Kristin have a small obsession with cupcakes these days we told them we would make TONS.  Literally, thats what we signed up for, to make tons of cupcakes.  We made 7 batches, oreo, sour cream blueberry, strawberry shortcake, doughnut cupcakes, pink lemonade, double chocolate fudge mania and churro.  It was super fun to make and decorate that many cupcakes, I sorta loved it so much I had thoughts of trying every cupcake recipe I have ever seen, but I stopped before it completely took over my house.  Here are the cupcakes! (and we love you Kreg!)

This is a double chocolate fudge cake with chocolate buttercream and sprinkles 

This was my favorite cupcake I made all day...I ate it...

Here they all are, well all the ones I made, churro in front, then doughnut then pink lemonade then the chocolate

These are the pink lemonade, a lemon cake with pink lemonade in the batter with whipped cream on top!

We Did It!!

Well, we did it! The potty chart is full!! I say "we" because even though Marilyn did the deeds I feel like I did the work.  We work as a team and a pretty darn good one! Here is Marilyn with her filled potty chart! She didn't quite get it...but she is still cute!    

The moment she put the last sticker on the chart we got our buns dressed and in the car.  I told her that we were going to the toy store to pick out a toy for filling her chart.  She carried her chart the whole way.  We made it to Wal Mart and Marilyn showed the welcomer (who was a darling grandma) her chart, she was so proud.  We walked together to the back of the store to the girly toy isle.  Marilyn's eyes widened when she realized what was going on.  It came down to 2 toys a Barbi Belle that came with her horse Phillipe and a Baby Belle Doll.  I held them both up and she picked...drum roll please....the Baby Belle Doll!! I told her that because she filled her chart she got this fabulous dolly! Now the wait began we had to drive all the way home before we could open it.  But Marilyn started talking to "Baby Belle" before we even got there.  She said "Baby Belle Home". 

The minute she got Baby Belle out of the box she began taking her around the house showing her everything we own.  She said things like "Baby Belle Gi Gi" pointing to our dog Maggie, then "Baby Belle GiGi NiNi" pointing to Maggie's bed.  Then she got hold of my phone and said "Baby Belle phone FarFar and Mamie" her way of telling our new little friend this is how we talk to our family.  It was sweet to hear her explain in her own little language how our world works.  It is getting fun to hear her talk and play.  I am excited to see her imagination growing and her brain working!

Quickly, Baby Belle became the most important thing in our world. 

She went everywhere...even on the potty!

This is Marilyn and Baby Belle watching Beauty and the Beast...seriously? Can life get cuter?

My Potty Training Adventure...

Marilyn is 21 months old.  I have been tracking her development (with relation to potty training) since she was 15 months when she started crying when I wouldn't let her flush the toilet for me.  She has hit all the markers.  So we decided to try it, even though she is still pretty young.  I got her a little potty a while ago and she has played with it for months.  I read the book "How To Potty Train You Child In Just One Day".  I liked the principles in the book, I liked the idea that by teaching you learn.  So we got little Marilynny-Loo-Hoo a potty doll, who she named "Baby Nana".  The day started out by Marilyn taking Baby Nana to the potty, "teaching" her how to tell she needed to go and taking her to her little potty. 

Clearly, she took everything VERY seriously and carried Baby NaNa around all day (and everyday since). 

Here is our setup...it started in the bathroom but was quickly moved to the family room cause we couldn't ever make it all the way to the bathroom. 

Here is the living room setup...potty chart and all!

The key for the first few days is to fill Marilyn's body with drinks, so she has to pee ALL the time...then we have a lot of opportunities to teach!

Here they are...

The first day was disastrous, I was covered in pee, frustrated and exhausted.  But we slept good and started again the next day.  Slowly but surely Marilyn got it! The first ragingly successful moment didn't come until day 3.  I almost died waiting for it, but it came! I can't believe that this really is working and Linny is big enough to be working on this...but working we are! Hopefully we can keep our patience and keep working on it, one day at a time!

My Serger

For my birthday, I got a serger.  I love sewing, especially clothes for Marilyn, and I have made a quite a few things now and really enjoy it.  I have figured out all little intrecisies of my machine and know how to fix every little problem that comes up.  I am a killer button-holer, a rock star hemmer and I have even put in a zipper or two.  The next step is to move to the serger (which makes the seams on the inside look professional and can also hem the way your t-shirts are hemmed, amoung other things).  I have never seen a serger in real life, let alone used one.  So needless to say, I was a little intimated.  I did a bunch of research online and found the one I wanted.  I got a Brother serger.  I waited for a few days and then it showed up on my porch.  I ran to it and realized how little I really knew about it.  I brought it inside and put it on the table.  There it stayed for 4 days.  Everyday I looked at it and got more and more freaked out.  Tom finally asked me when I was going to open this birthday present I have been talking about FOREVER AND EVER.  I knew he was right so I went for it.  I have a long way to go (alot of dresses for Marilyn) before I know it like I know my sewing machine but I am hopeful I can stick to it! Here is a picture of my first stitch.  I was a little freaked out...but it worked!! I am on my way!!

Tangled Viewing Party

Well, the day we have been waiting for FOREVER finally came! Tangled was released on Blu Ray on March 29th! Me and Marilyn got our buns ready early that morning so we could be one of the first to have the movie.  (This was particularly fabulous because this also happened to be the first week of potty training so it was a nice break from Beauty and the Beast and Elmo).  I thought maybe we should make it a special viewing party so me and Marilyn went to her room and got ALL of her stuffed animals and brought them to the living room.  We lined them up on a blanket and got settled in to watch Tangled for the first time! It is a super cute movie with a great message.  We all have power inside of us, it is up to us when and how to use it.  If you haven't seen it...go, now.