Ward Activity

This last Saturday our ward had an activity centered around presidents day. The plan for food was to have a chili cook off/cornbread cook off. The primary presidency was in charge of organizing the food. I am part of the presidency so I helped plan. I'm a stresser, and I was just wanting the activity to come and go. So Saturday comes and we thought we were all organized and ready to go. Nope, there were so many things that we didn't even think about. Luckily we got it all fixed in the nick of time of eating.

The primary was also in charge of a coloring activity for the kiddos. I got together some coloring pages of the flag, George Washington, and Abraham Lincoln. I also found some crossword puzzles, and word searches for them to do. They really enjoyed doing them! Another activity they had was to put every president in the right order from the very first to the very last. I didn't even get a chance to try. Not that I would have done very well! They also had another activity. One of the councilors in the Bishop brick had made a background of Mt. Rushmore. He made it so you could remove the faces and put your own face in. They took pictures of each family or kid. Here is ours: I thought they turned out really cute!!! =)

I made white chili to compete in the chili cook off. I love it, it's so good! It's my sister's recipe. I didn't win the chili cook off, I didn't even place in the top 3. Something must have been wrong with peoples taste buds! Oh well not too big of an issue. LOL . I won first place in the cornbread cook off!!! I won a 100 grand see:

Oh nuts, I really wish it was money! My kids appreciated it! =) So here are the recipes for my chili, and cornbread. Try them.... you will love them. If your not a cornbread lover please try it, it's like cake. Enjoy and let me know what you think! =)

Cornbread

Mix together:

1 ¼ cup cornmeal
1 cup flour
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 white sugar
1 Tsp Baking soda
½ Tsp Salt

Mix together:

1 egg
1 cup milk
¾ cup vegetable oil
Stir and combine all ingredients. Grease 9 x 13 pan. Bake at 400 degrees for 15 min. When done spread honey on top and bake another 2-3 minutes.

White Chili

Sauté until brown:

1 lb. Boneless skinless chicken breasts cut into ½ inch cubes
1medium onion chopped
1 Tbsp. Vegetable oil
1 ½ Tsp. Garlic powder

Add: 2 cans (15 ½ oz.) great white northern beans rinsed & drained
1 can (14 ½ oz.) chicken broth
2 cans (4 oz.) chopped green chilies
1 tsp. Salt
1 tsp. Dried oregano
¼ tsp. Cayenne pepper
1 tsp. Ground cumin
½ tsp. Pepper

Bring to a boil, reduce heat; simmer uncovered for 30 min. Remove from heat; stir in:
½ cup whipping cream
1 cup (8 oz.) sour cream

Yield 7 servings

Medical Appointment

Wednesday was a big day. McKenzie had her kindergarten appointment. I can't believe that she is going to be in Kindergarten this year. It's so crazy! She was excited to go to the Dr. I have no idea why. I never was excited to go to the Dr! So anyways I didn't know how involved this appointment was. We were there for a long time. She has great hearing. She is not color blind, good thing too because Matt is. She is blind though, she is definitely going to need glasses. That was the hardest part of the whole appointment. She has never done a vision test before. We did it twice to make sure it wasn't a shyness thing. The first time they did the letter one, and the 2nd one they did the E one. They got the same results. Her results were 20/30 in her Right eye, and 20/50 in her Left eye. Man I was really hoping that we would not have to do the whole glasses thing with our children. Kind of hard though seeing as both Matt and I wear glasses. I guess we better take her to an eye doc and see what they have to say.

Next I didn't know that you had to do a urine sample too. If I would have known that I wouldn't have had her pee before we left the house. She really didn't get much in the cup. McKenzie thought that the whole cup thing was pretty cool. I didn't seeing as though I was the one holding the cup! I'm glad she didn't pee on my hand! While waiting for the Doc, the nurse assistant comes in and asks me if McKenzie ever complains that it hurts when she pees. I was like no, Why? She tells me that their is a whole lot of blood in her urine, and other things as well. I can't remember the words. She says that it's possible that she might have UTI. Nice. I was also worried about the blood in the Urine because Matt has blood in his urine, and it's an indicator for lupus. Matt doesn't have it, but his Mom does. Anyways I haven't heard back from the Dr. so she doesn't have a UTI. That's good, but that doesn't explain the blood in the Urine. I'm going to have to talk to Matt's mom about it. Lupus is not something you want to have. She probably doesn't have it, but it's something I've always worried about when Matt and I decided to have children. I'm not going to stress about it.

Finally the Dr. made it into our room. He was happy with how McKenzie acted, and looked. McKenzie was very shy at first, but warmed up after about 5 min. The next best part of the whole appointment was she didn't have to get any shots because I did them last year. Wahoo!!!! I was so happy with how well behaved McKenzie was, she did such a wonderful job! I told her I would take her to the $ spot at target and let her choose a treat for doing so good. She was excited, and was just beaming about it! I'm so glad this appointment is over and done with. Registration is March 11th and 12th. It's coming way too fast! So lastly here is a picture of the happy girl with her treat that she chose:

I Love??????

So what did you think I was going to say? I Love you? Yes I do!!! I love my husband too, and I love his homemade gifts to me, and our children. I think he is full of talent! So for Christmas he made me this key holder:I thought he did an awesome job! I think it's pretty cool looking as well. I wish that he would get out in our garage more often and put his skills to use and make some more wood projects for me! =)

He also helped the kids make this cute gift for me:
How thoughtful huh? I just smiled and laughed when I opened this gift! It melts my heart whenever I look at it. I have it in my kitchen bye the phone, so I see it all the time!

When Someone you love becomes a memory...

When someone
you love becomes
a memory... that
memory becomes a
treasure

That somebody I love is my Dad. I can't believe that today the 31st will be the 2 year mark of when he died. 2 years? It feels like an eternity. I love my daddy so much, and miss him so much. It's getting easier not having him around, but it is still super duper hard. I'm finally to the point where I don't dwell on it, and let it consume me. Yes I still think about him, and that's why I love this saying so much. He is a memory that I will always treasure. For Christmas my Mom gave each of us that saying. She made it for a relief society Super Saturday project. This is what it looks like:

I'm going to use my sister Kate's idea and put a bunch of pictures of my dad under this saying. I happen to have the perfect frame for it! Here are some of the pictures I'm using, or would like to use. This one is a very special, and very sentimental. My Dad used to give all of us kids wheel barrel rides around the block. We still have the wheel barrel!
We had a barn growing up, and a big pasture. We had Lot's of goats! I have Lot's of good memories of my Dad and the goats.
Me on my Baptism day. I'm so glad my Dad was able to be the one to baptise me!
My Dad and I at a Merry Miss Daddy Daughter activity. We had a fun time!My Dad was famous for trying to blow out other peoples birthday candles. He was a big tease! So here I am on my birthday(I think I was 14) covering my Dad's mouth so he can't blow out MY CANDLES! LOL =)My Dad loved to try new things. He decided that we were going to breed beagles. Here he is holding one of the beagle pups. I think it's really sweet!My Dad and McKenzie when she was about 9 months. He was really good with her, and she loved her Papa Kotter! She still does.I love this picture of my Mom and Dad, and Kenzie. We had gone on a hike together up to Donut falls. Fun times!!!

Dad I miss you, but I know that we will be together again. Love you with all my heart.

Can you say Holy Sugar?!?

Today we(the girls and I) went on a field trip with McKenzie's preschool to the Sweets Candy Factory. They have been looking forward to go going for the whole week. So here are some pictures before we left:

Madisynn couldn't or wouldn't keep her eyes open so I took multiple shots. I love McKenzie's face in all of them. She is the warden and is making sure Madisynn keeps her eyes open! So here they are:

But finally the only way to get her eyes to stay open was our favorite pic to do together is sticking our tongues out:So finally after that shot we were able to get into the car and go. We were already running late, and I wasn't exactly sure where the factory was. We made it just in time though! We had to hang our coats up, check in our purses, cameras, cell phones, jewelry, and we had to wear hair nets. The kids were all so excited to wear them! They looked like a bunch of Umpa Lumpas! We got to see some interesting things. A couple of them were: how to make salt water taffy, and chocolate covered raspberry sticks. Something else that was interesting was they have chocolate flowing through pipes all throughout the building. Someone asked the question what do they do with the chocolate in the pipes when they were done. The tour guide said they never shut down because the factory runs 24/7. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to break open one of those pipes and drink the chocolate? Yum!

I think the best part of the tour were the samples. The kids devoured them! Madisynn shoved a whole piece of chocolate in her mouth, followed by a chocolate raspberry stick. She had chocolate all over her mouth. She enjoyed it immensely!!! Kenzie says her favorite parts of the tour were seeing the taffy, and of course getting candy! I wish I could say the best part of the tour was getting the samples, but I didn't try any. I've decided to go without candy this year. It was so hard, but I said no. It smelled wonderful though! My favorite part was watching how they stretched the taffy. At the end of the tour, McKenzie's teacher had ordered little packets of Salt water taffy for all of the kids. So I took home 2 sugar crazed kiddos!

Here are some pictures of the Umpa Lumpas:

McKenzie had a little bit of chocolate left on her face from her samples:Madisynn well she had a lot of chocolate left over from her samples!:And lastly one last picture of the 3 Umpa Lumpas:I so wish Matt was able to come. He missed out on all of the action! I told him we would have to go again with just our family. He was totally all for that! The best part it's free!!! =)

Our little girl is...................

doing so awesome in her preschool! She absolutely loves it! She gets along with all of the kids, and she can't wait till the next time she goes! It is definitely worth every penny for McKenzie to go to preschool, it has helped her tremendously. She amazes me! This month in Preschool they focused a lot on snowmen. Last week she came home with this picture and craft both of snowmen. Here they are:

Aren't they both so cute! She did an awesome job. When she was explaining to me what she drew in the picture I started to laugh and gave her a hug because it was so cute. She was so Happy! So anyways on the right of the picture is her snowman, her very tall snowman. On the left of the snowman it looks like a tornado, but she says it is an earthquake. Hilarious huh? Kids imaginations are great! I love her little snowman craft too. She helped glue the nose and scarf on, and of course she drew the eyes and the mouth. I also work with her on her writing and numbers and Alphabet. Today she actually spelled her name right. She usually spells it McKneize and today she did this:

She is getting smarter and smarter each day, and is growing up so fast. She is so ready for Kindergarten. She asks all of the time if she is going to the big school soon. I love that she is so excited!

A Beautiful start to the day....NOT

So this morning I was pulled out of a deep peaceful sleep by the ringing of the phone. I instantly knew that it was Matt by looking at the time on the alarm clock, which said 7 A.M. As I answered I was hoping for good news, but no my hopes were shattered by him telling me the car wouldn't start. Lovely.... I didn't get mad, I was actually pretty calm. It wasn't Matt's fault the car wouldn't start. It was a dead battery. We should have taken the car in a couple of weeks ago because it was having a hard time starting up. We both thought it was the cold that was making the car not want to start up, but actually I think I was the one in denial otherwise I would have brought it up to Matt. I just didn't want to face anymore car problems.
Anyways Matt was able to find someone at work to help him jump start the car. Thank goodness it started up. Matt drove to the Auto zone that is just a couple of blocks away from us and saw that they were about to open. He turned the car off, and tried turning it on again, but it wouldn't start. So he waited for about a half hr. and they changed the battery. I can't believe how expensive car batteries are! It cost us $97.75 total out the door. I'm grateful that it didn't cost anymore than that. I'm also thankful that we got payed today, so that we didn't have to pull from our savings. The car starts up wonderfully now, and I'm grateful for that! I'm grateful that Matt wasn't hurt, and he is so wonderful to take it to be fixed so I wouldn't have too. Yeah so our day didn't start out so swell, but we will have a good rest of the day, as I hope you do as well. =) Think positive!