All work and no play...

makes Anthony a dull boy.
Ok, Ok, he's really not dull. he found his grandpa's broom and scooper/dustpan thing and apparently was going to town. I unfortunately was not there to enjoy watching the slave labor, but rest assured that I crack the whip when he's at home.

Blood, Guts and Cakepops?

Yep, that's right, blood, guts and cakepops. A few weeks ago, Bug Man and I decided to get the UFC fight and invited my favorite bikini-clad baking assistant, Pamela, and her boyfriend, Marc over to watch. The girls decided we needed something girly to make us feel more, uh, um, girly? Anyway...my blog addiction led me to Bakerella, who stands for all that is good and right in the world of baking. She has these cakepops on her website that are so a-darn-dorable that I couldn't resist making them, even if it was for no special occasion, other than celebrating the blood and guts that is UFC. They were so fun, and pretty easy. Here they are, only partially complete.And the pink "muffin top" candy coating. Never thought of the underlying meaning of the muffin topping causing greif to my actual "muffin top." Hmmm. And, the lovely bikini-clad baking assistant, Pamela. Everyone should have a bikini-clad assistant, weather for baking or not. Actually, Puh-mella (pronounced the way that Borat talks about Pamela Anderson) and Marc had just come from the lake, hence the beach attire. We thought we had this one down pretty good. Make cake ball, shape ball into cookie cutter to form scalloped, cupcake-like bottom, dip in chocolate, stick in bottom of cupcake, in fridge to set, pull out, dip top part in pink candy-coating, sprinkles & m&m on top, and, and, and, crap, where the heck to put 'em now to let the top part set... We got creative-fast. Collander, we'll put them in the holes of that. Nope, the sidesways leaning caused chocolate to run to the side. Bakerelle recommends a block of styrofoam, but I missed that little detail while at Michael's (and I loathe Michael's, so I wasn't about to make a run). SO, I grabbed a Gymboree box, poked holes in it and thought that was the PERFECT solution, but since the inside was hollow, they tipped so easily, and ran into each other and smudged and the world almost came to a screeching halt. THEN...The genius bikini-clad baking assistant said, "What about a baking rack?" So we placed a baking rack on two Cherrios boxes and now we're gonna patent it and make millions. Not really, but it was the perfect solution to our problem and the cake pops were more delicious because of it! Hello my pretties...

I have had this inherent need to bake lately. In addition to Bakerella's cakepops, I've been baking any and all recipes I come across that look sugary, chocolatey, and delicious. It's a problem. Mainly for my waistline. I blame (in no particular order:) Pioneer Woman (LOVE HER) for all her delicious looking foods AND for the whole Tasty Kitchen thing, Bakerella for having not only delicious treats, but adorable treats. You can't resist cute food, you just can't. Also, Joy the Baker for the whole S'mores cookies incident (the incident being that I made them and ate them), and Neiman Marcus for having the urban cookie legend, in which a woman charged a cookie recipe to her account, wound up with a rather sizable bill, decided to share the cookie recipe with the world via email to get back at Neiman's for the cost of the recipe. They are REALLY good. And, my sister Susan, who let me flip through her recipe files, only to find a recipe titled "Rolo Cookies." Need I say more about that? I really do take responsibility for my baking/eating problems, but sometimes it just feels good to blame my love of baked goods on others. All of the aforementioned recipes may make a debut on this here blog. Which may mean that I have to bake them all to take photos and then I'll eat them and blame the blog. Darn blog.

Lenny

These two antagonize each other, just like siblings. If Scout was a tiny dog, she'd have NO shot. But since she's got Anthony by about 75 lbs, she's gonna be just fine. This is mild on the torture scale, he's usually chasing her around with a bat, flashlight, toilet plunger, chain saw, anything that he can get his little grubbies on. Not really on the chain saw. I walked into the bedroom to see this, and hollered at them. "CHILDREN!"They both stopped and looked at me, and although neither one can actually say "what?" I will maintain that I did hear that word from this look. And then I crawled down on the floor and squeezed both of them. Wonder baby loves Sesame Street. It's the only thing he actually ever watches. I try to not keep the TV on much but when I need a few minutes (or hours) to clean...Sesame works great. This is usually how I find him. I took this photo, then crawled onto the floor to squeeze him. Then he pushed me away. His show was on. I know he loves me. Just not more than Texas Telly.

Up the creek without a paddle...

On our recent trip to Utah for the 4th of July, we got up every morning and played in the backyard and the creek. The weather was perfect and the creek was fuh-reezing! But it is water and where there is water, there is a certain one year old that must be splashing in it. So, here we are (unbeknownst to me and my pajama/ponytail combo) splashing in the creek, having a grand ol' time. Does Utah get prettier and prettier or is it just me? It was (and probably still is, even though I can't see it right now) so green and pretty. No other way to put it. Anthony caught wind of the paparazzi and flashed his toothy little grin. Chris and Megs brought Addie (or Ads as I like to call her...something about the Hart family that beckons an "S" at the end of every name, don't know what it is?!?) over to play with wonder baby and they were too funny together. They sat down with some toys and Anthony picked up two of the same toy and held one out for Addie, she took it (oh-so-daintily) and then reached for the one in his other had. He was having NO part of that, and told her rightly so. She seemed perhaps a little concerned about this situation as you can see from her face here.They got over it all pretty darn quick when Ads took Anthony over to show his the ropes on the trampoline. I can't lie my first reaction to putting a one year old on a trampoline was "ABSOLUTELY NOT" which really is not like me. I'm all about letting the kids explore and have a good time, but sustaining trampoline injuries myself, that were in all likelihood really minor, but I of course thought they were life-threatening, I was a little leery. Then Chris talked some sense into me, explaining that the one year olds were not auditioning for Cirque du Soleil. Good call Chris, good call. They had so much fun. They're a crack up together because half the time they were swiping toys from each other and the other half the time they were totally oblivious of each other. I couldn't help but think of the many sleep overs we had at the Melville's house on this very trampoline and how we'd wake up at the crack of dawn with the sun beating down on up, huddled into a big ball of sleeping bags, pillows, blankets and people in the middle of the tramp. We had some good times! Now it's their turn, I'm passing the torch. Thanks for the trampoline fun guys, we'll be back in a few weeks to do it again!

4th of July!

First, we'll start with the food. I mean I have priorities in life. Since this was not actually my party, it was my seester, Angie's, she had to get the photos of the food, and since I am such a great guest at said party, I had to get a photo of Ang getting a photo of her delicious food. With me? Doesn't matter, what does matter is that you get a good look of this oh-so-great meal. We had gourmet hot dogs. Which were really just regular ol' hot dogs but with a gourmet twist. Bacon, Gruyere, some-kinda-fancy-sauce (Ang...name of sauce?), avocado, corn relish, and for you plain jane's... ketchup and mustard. My sister Susan made this delicious and surprisingly calorie free grape salad. Right Sue...calorie free? I'm pretty sure that's what you said. My contribution was this spinach summer salad.Hot dog creation by my Brother-in-law, Randy. Great photo Randy, sorry it's the only one of you. I'll try harder next time. The I-just-had-so-much-sugar-I'm-pretty-sure-I'll-be-in-a-coma-soon beverage. Lime Ricky. It has some sugar in it, which is one of the food groups I need to function, so it was OK by me!Next, comes family. Awwww, family. I love my family. I regretfully didn't get photos of all my family members, sorry y'all. Actually after seeing these you may be thankful.Here's Parker, He's Susan's oldest boy. You can't see from this photo, but he had just come home from Scout Camp and had approximately 8,595, 348 bug bites all over him. Looks pretty happy for having all those bites, I'd say.This is Max. He's my brother Eric's middle kid. He's so darn cute, I have to really try not to rub my hand all over his noggin every time I see him. Although, I don't try THAT hard, because I DO in fact rub my hand all over his noggin every time I see him.This is The Bug Man (and a good attempt with the Steve-o face, but not the best effort I've seen from him). Pretty Sexy, eh? Oh, and wonder baby extraordinaire. Wonder baby may or may not have a nose picking fetish. This is my brother Eric. It's so great to see my brother smile. He's been through a lot, so seeing him smile makes me smile.This is Eliza. We'll check up on her a little later in this post.Coleman and Max, two of Eric's three boys. Where in the heck was Andrew all day? Not one picture of Mubby Jubby. What gives? "Boy's... DO NOT SMILE. What ever you do, don't smile."Never worked on me either. I always end up smiling. Enter Ben, who is Angie's oldest and Preston, Susan's youngest. Preston, on the far right is the youngest of all these boys, yet the tallest. Must have some Andersen in him.Ben's pretty cute. And dangdarn smart too. Plays the guitar and just cut about 43 pounds of hair off his melon.Here's Maddy, she too just lost about 43 lbs. of hair.


Which brings me to FUN. Here's my husband on the trampoline thinking he's 16 again. Weeeee, this is funnnnnn...I can go back, I can go forward, I can...Ooooo...wait...a...second...gotta...catch...breath.... (He may be realizing now that he in fact is not 16 anymore.)Wonder baby got lots of attention. Here he is on a wagon ride, compliments of Emily. She even gave him his very own steering wheel. He was in HEAVEN.He played with Nana, outside.He melted hearts. Mine especially.Remember that little darling, Eliza that I introduced you to earlier? Well, to say she has personality would be a huge understatement. She's Angie's youngest. "Lizey...smile for a picture." This is what you get...and this...and this...Ang, remind you of anyone? Ahhh(you)Choo. 'Scuse me, allergies.How did this get in there? I didn't allow anyone else to handle my precious Canon. "What's that? Smile? Ok, I'll smile, but only for one.""I'm sorry, what? Turn a little? Ok.""Huh? You still didn't get it? Does this help?" GOSH, I'm sorry about those. Don't know how that happened.





AND...work. Wait a minute. (Counting on fingers) Food, family, fun...work? How did that happen on a holiday, at a family party? Hmmm... Jack must have been there. Yup, that's Jack. There's not a whole lot of sitting around with him, as evident from my father's day post. He's a worker. A hard worker. Angie got some new furniture that needed assembling, so who better than to do the job? That's right, Jack and his project sidekick, Eric.


While we're on the subject of work...here's Emily. She's Angie's middle child. She worked her little hiney off. And believe me, I am thankful for that. I actually got to eat (with both hands), play (chit-chat), and snap a million-plus pictures. She watched Anthony the entire time. She's the best. Thanks Em, I owe ya!They did this...and this...and this...and this...and some of this...and lots of this...and LOTS of this... then they shared a moment doing this.Whew, I'm exhausted! And I wasn't even the one doing all the work. Thanks Emily. Your favorite cousin had so much fun with you :)!

After all the Food, Family and Fun, we walked about a mile or two to Sugarhouse Park to watch the Fireworks. Awesome, awesome, awesome. I loved it and I'm so thankful we got to see them. Sugarhouse has done fireworks for as long as I can remember. Because of the recent downturn in the economy, they won't be doing their fireworks for the 4th anymore. Hopefully once things get a little better, that will change. Understandable, but still a bummer.

And, this last part has not one darnit thing to do with the 4th of July, but I had to take a few photos of Angie's flowers in her yard, because they sure are purty.
Flowers make me smile. And me taking a SUPERCLOSEUPPHOTO of Ben makes him smile! The End.