Saturday, July 31, 2010

Day At The Zoo

Last night we were trying to think of something to do to get us out of this house.  It seems like we haven't really done much lately and the summer is quickly coming to a close.  However, we wanted to keep it cheap and local.  And yes, California is filled with many attractions, however most of them seem to require quite a bit of money.  Something that doesn't grow on trees for us here.  We live really close to Mission San Juan Capistrano and i have been wanting to go see it but I know it would come with many moans and groans and cries of boredom for my children so that was out.  And needless to say, all the other museums I would love to go to were out as well.  I don't feel like being banned from these places.  So, the zoo it was.  And it had to be a cheaper zoo.  The San Diego Zoo was calling my name but if I am going to pay the admission there, I might as well go to Disneyland.  So, to the Santa Ana Zoo it was.  We had a good time, it was not huge or filled with tons to see, but it is also in the middle of the city, you can see the freeway which runs down one side of the zoo.  Wow, I really know how to make something sound appealing don't I?  Maybe this will be a good time to show you my sweet girls with faces filled with excitement.....


See?  Who needs a huge zoo?  All you need is a gigantic fake frog and all is right with the world once again.  I feel it right to also mention that this was the first zoo trip for my littlest one.  She had no clue what a zoo was and why her older sisters were giddy at the mere mention of the word.  Now?  Oh, now I think she gets it, the girl had a blast!!!!  She got to pet a goat (and pet may mean grabbing it by the ears and tugging it around), look at pigs, listen to geese squawk in her face and even take a ride in a mini train around the whole zoo.  Oh, and then there was this moment, my absolute defining moment of the day....



Oh, of only I had taken a video of this or even just recorded the sound.  At this point we had gone down what they call "Monkey Row".  She was super excited to see the monkeys but some of them were tiny and were hidden from plain sight.  I think by the time we got to the 10th cage of monkeys, she was done.  At the end of the monkeys was a camel.  We tried to get her attention but for a good solid minute so just wanted to check out what other kids were doing.  Then, she turned and saw him.  It was followed by the sweet face you see above and big "ooooooohhhhhhh".  She did the "ooooohhhh" and adorable face about 5 or 6 times and it was the cutest thing I had ever seen.  She was so fascinated!!!  The "oooohhhhh" quickly turned into a hands outreached and trying to free herself so she could go and be one with the camel which was followed by a little breakdown when told no.  Later, her older sister got to ride the camel with daddy.



I think that was when her love affair with the camel ended.  As soon as the camel took off with her dad and sister on board, she lost it.  She screamed and looked mortified and reached for them.  She tried to break free of her belt in her stroller and wasn't happy until dad and sister were safe and back on land, ha.  All in all, we had a fantastic day.  It even felt like summer!!!!  And what day couldn't be fantastic when it is ended with this marvelous creation?



The girl is in love!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Friday, July 30, 2010

A Work Of Art

I love my kids and I love when they make art.  However, I am also not the mom who saves every piece and cherishes it for forever.  I keep some that I find amusing and cant wait for them to see as adults and the ones that truly melt my heart.  The others get a brief stint on the fridge and then to the trash bin they go.  Is that bad?  Anyways, Cass has been the only one so far who creates special works of art but Kendall is slowly catching up and figuring out how much she loves to draw.  Her pictures crack me up and I love them.  Last night, on my way to bed, I did my normal tuck in and in her bed I found this.....


They both have their tongues sticking out and they remind me of thing 1 and thing 2 from Dr.Seuss.  I absolutely love them.  They made me giggle and she almost woke up.  I figured I needed a picture to document the rise of her art ability so I snuck it into the hallway and captured it to keep for forever.  And first thing this morning, our little tongue people had been erased and replaced, I wonder what she will come up with next.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

I Should Go To Culinary School

If for no other reason than tonight's dinner.  How does pea soup turn brown?  I have never seen little maggot shaped things pop out of peas.  I made sure they were indeed not maggots or living and I think it was a part of the inside of the pea, I found a raw one I had only soaked but not cooked and split it open and say the thing in there, maybe more like a stem and not a maggot but if I say maggot, you will get the throw up in your mouth feeling I have.  I could not bring myself to eat it, my family did though and they loved it.  Will called me a hypochondriac however when asked if he knew I didn't make it and saw it in a restaurant if he would order it....when that came with a no and he wanted to spit out his food when I pretended to make puke noises, I knew it wasn't as great as they all swore it was.  Cass did have 2 bowls though.......should I worry, ha.  I made everyone smoothies after to make up for it but even that failed.  We had one popsicle left so I decided smoothies for the big kids, popsicle for the baby.  She loved it, until she took a bite out of it, chewed for a good 5 seconds and started screaming in pain from the cold.  I wonder what else I can turn my kids off of?  Maybe I can make dessert super nasty and they will crave nothing but broccoli and brussel sprouts from now on :)

Friday, July 23, 2010

The Real Purpose Of A High Chair

Many of you may think that high chairs are for the purpose of feeding a small child.  To spoon feed your young one before they are able to sit at the big table with everyone else.  But we here in the Hall household have found 2 main purposes for our high chair.  The first?


Learning all about bacon!  Our sweet angel still only has 4 teeth which we lovingly refer to as her beavers.  She has her front two on top and bottom.  Therefore, we still try to feed her somewhat mashable food, food she can chew in her gums or gnaw with her beaver teeth.  So when we had bacon, we decided to let her try.  Man did she love herself some bacon!!!  I think she would have sprouted teeth and gnawed like a beaver as soon as she was born if we wafted a piece of bacon in front of her.  She went to town on that sucker, the poor little piggy never had a chance!  So, whats the second reason?



Why naps of course.  Who can resist a nap after eating things like bacon in that comfy thing?  The real reason she is asleep is because we have completely screwed her and any chance of a schedule these days.  4 weeks of summer school for Cass and having to run her back and forth have screwed my little one out of her routine.  She was such a sport but it eventually caught up with her.  I still think that if someone sat me in a comfy chair that reclined a bit and gave me bacon, I would totally nap any chance I got.  And I would love someone to carry me in a snuggly sometimes as well, is that wrong?

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Engagement Celebration

Over the weekend I got to celebrate the engagement of one of my very best friends.  Her name is Bre and I have known her since high school.


She recently got engaged to her amazing (now fiance) Chuck.  He gave her an amazingly gorgeous ring and makes her happier than anything money can buy.  The party was a luau and was filled with great people, food, drinks and dancing!!!!  I got to see her parents that I haven't seen in a while.



This is Bre, her sister Allie and her dad.



This is Bre with her mom and sister, plus her new fiance.  I love how she would look at him!



And this is me with the gorgeous bride to be.  I love and don't love this picture.  I love that I am back in California and can see my friend and celebrate with her.  I love my dress I picked up the day before for only $10!!!  Seriously, $10!!  So excited.  What I don't love is how I look.  I swear I always say I will have my pre-baby body back by the following summer.  So, last summer I vowed and his summer, I think I am 4 pounds lighter, which could be because I don't eat a meal.  4 pounds is nothing.  I felt so jiggly.  Mostly just in my crazy flabby arms that have no tone whatsoever in them.  And it doesn't help that I am vampire pasty, I seriously would fit in with the Twilight crowd.  The rest of me was sucked in by spanks and thank the Lord for those!!!  But I am waiting for someone to make invisible arm spanks.  Or some device that would make my arms looked toned and tan.  I know, the device exists and it is called a push up every now and again but I don't like them and don't want to do them :)  But I swear, by next summer I will be back to my pre-baby body...........I wont laugh until next summer when I see that I am down another 4 pounds.  But if I lose 4 pounds every year, by the time my kids are in college, I might be back to my pre-baby weight, woo hoo!!!!

Monday, July 19, 2010

Crazy Weather

A couple of days ago we got some pretty weird weather here in California.  I actually saw my friend Ashley post on Facebook that the storm was crazy and her power was out.  I looked out my window to blue skies and no clouds.  I basically told her she was nuts because it was a beautiful day outside.  Around an hour later I smelled rain.  The smell you get when you have had a huge storm and you walk outside after and it smells like fresh rain and concrete.  I first thought that maybe someone had hosed off their patio or driveway and that's why I was smelling it.  Then I decided just to go look outside.  To the north was beautiful blue skies, to the south were jet black ominous skies.  Yep, there was the storm.  I was able to watch it actually move over our house.  And since we have lived in the midwest for years it was normal for me to see it, and I had been missing parts of the midwest so I guess it was God giving me a little bit of back east.  However, all the California natives?  They went crazy!!!!  a guy on the news had a video of the storm and screaming that it was the end of the world and if anyone found the tape, he was alive and to find him.  And I thought I was nutty!!!!  I don't remember the Bible saying God will come back via thunder storm and rain.  People, it is a storm, a summer storm that makes the weather hot and sticky.  Granted, it normally happens far east of here but it is still a normal thing.  And what did we get in the end?  A beautiful rainbow that I saw go from the beach to the hill behind my house.

And after the first rainbow, I saw a faint second rainbow form right on top of the other.  A double rainbow!!!



I know it is hard to see but if you look a little above the first one, you will see a faint line of the second.  It was so faint it was hard to capture on film, but it was super pretty and I for one loved the storm!!!!!!

Sunday, July 18, 2010

The Best Chocolate Sheet Cake?

(please disregard the horrid picture, I am also not a professional photo taker)

As with most bloggers out there, I love going to Pioneer Woman's site everyday, sometimes more than once.  She is witty and hilarious and the girl can cook.  Awhile ago I printed out the recipe for the Best Chocolate Sheet Cake.  I finally made it this past week and I don't know what to think.  I read so many comments on how amazing it was and people ate 2 pans at once because they couldn't get enough so I think I was expecting this out of this world kind of flavor and that I would die a happy woman because of this cake.  I don't know what to think of it being called the best.  It is good, don't get me wrong and super simple to make.  And the first night I tried it, my stomach was aching before I even ate any so that could be why it wasn't so tasty.  The following night I nuked it to get it hot and gooey and put some ice cream on top and it was super yummy.  So, I don't know what to think.  It is super good and I recommend trying it but I don't know about it being the best.  I hope I don't sound cynical or trying to come off as a professional food critic, I am in no way a professional, this is just my opinion.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Standing Tall

The other day, without anyone prompting her, Hayley decided that she wanted to stand on her own in the middle of the room.  I was sitting next to her and she just stood right up, looked at me and giggled.  She does it a lot now and looks at you and giggles, she is so proud of herself.  So, today I finally was able to capture it.
My little frog, getting ready to stand.........


Getting her legs steady.......


Almost all the way up....(wish I had it set on a different mode so it isn't blurry)


My little princess standing up all on her own!!!!!!

Did you notice in the last one how elegant she looks?  Her onesie has the dress part on the front and I swear she stood like that, in curtsy mode, for a good minute before plopping back down.  She is growing up way too fast!!!!!

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Weekend

Over the weekend, the girls and I packed our bags and spent the weekend at my Aunts house.  It is always good times at her house and we were planning on having a BBQ at my sister-in-law's house that weekend as well so we just stayed for 3 days.  Hayley hates her pack-n-play with a passion so she didn't sleep at all the first night.  Kendall slept with me and with only that being said you should already assume I didn't get much since I had feet in my face constantly and she refuses to sleep anywhere except right up next to me.  The next night she was trying to be nice and sleep in her side but kept falling off the bed and hitting her head, which I would need to wake up and get her back in bed anyway so I just let her sleep right up on me.  I was so tired I was fine sleeping that way!  Saturday was fun, that's the day we had the BBQ at my sister-in-laws house.  We spent some time swimming, and I actually wore a suit, thank God I was the one with the camera so no one was able to capture that nonsense.  Cass made no progress on her swimming.  She freaked anytime she had to get off the top step.  I swear she could have been strapped to me with rope and still wouldn't trust us not dropping her in the water.  I guess it is a blessing since she isn't supposed t be swimming anyway.  Kendall had fun and swam on her own for a bit with floaties and Hayley completely enjoyed the raft.  She was almost asleep just floating around the pool.  After we got out it was time to BBQ and for the kids to play.  And what else is there for girls to do but dress up?


Since Cass was bigger than the other girls, she got to dress up in Auntie Brandi's clothes, she felt very special. 


I went inside to change Hayley and caught Kendall playing golf in her outfit.  I just thought it was so cute to see my little fairy playing golf.  I guess that encompasses so much of her personality.  A little bit girl with a love for guy stuff and sports.


Then it was time to push baby cousin Hayley around the pool.  Hayley loved it and so did my niece and of course Kendall got involved.  When they were done my Aunt took over for a little bit and I kept trying to get the face she was making.  she had her tongue stuck out with a little smirk, it was super cute.  She kept pulling her back and rushing at me so I might be able to get it, which I didn't but I did get this super happy face.


Overall it was a fantastic, relaxing (somewhat) weekend.  I love spending time with family!!!!

Friday, July 9, 2010

Fan Love

Since it is warm upstairs in our house, even though it is gloomy and chilly outside in JULY, hello weather, we live in California and we would love our sun back.  Nevertheless, it stays warm upstairs in the rooms and so I have the ceiling fans going in every room.  I turn Hayley's on at night because well, she is a baby and babies don't know how to put covers back on when they get cold and it get chilly at night and I don't want her uncomfortable.  So, I turn it off, yet every afternoon when she takes her nap, i turn it on so her room doesn't get stuffy.  We walk in her room and her eyes automatically go towards her fan.  I ask if she wants me to turn it on to which she shakes her head yes.  So, I turn it on and her eyes just watch it go from slower to fast to faster.  She looks at it like she looks at me when she is in total amazement.  her eyes light up and she has a slight smirk of a smile on her pretty little face.  I just love to watch her.  I always tell her she is my little fan of her fan, give her sweet cheeks kisses and tuck her in with her favorite puppy pillow, a snugly blanket and a million other blankets she has to have, you know, just in case she needs to switch it up.  I love watching her grow!!!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Sloppy Joe's

Ok, this seems like I am constantly blogging about food.  I guess it is because I am trying all sorts of new recipes lately.  So, here is another one.  The other day around 2, we realized we had no clue what we would be doing for dinner.  Leftovers didn't sound good and it was too late to take anything out of the freezer.  So, I went to my go to website for food these days, none other than the cooking goddess Ree Drummond, otherwise known as the Pioneer Woman.  I have been wanting to make her summer salad but it is not something the girls would probably eat unless it is a little on the side of something so that was out.  I ended up looking in her cowboy food section (she also has a cowgirl food section to).  One of the first things I saw was her sloppy joe's.  When we lived in Illinois and Will had surgery, our church brought us some meals over.  One of the ladies brought sloppy joe's.  To be honest I was not that excited to be eating sloppy joe's.  The only kind I had ever had was Manwich out of the can.  Don't get me wrong, it is cheap and easy and not bad but then I tasted the super yummy sloppy joes this lady had made and knew it was so not out of the can.  I asked her what was in it and all I got was "Oh, it is so easy".  Needless to say I didn't get the recipe and I don't think we have made sloppy joe's, until this last weekend.  Oh my goodness these are super yummy.  They are super easy to make and your house smells divine, kind of like you have actually been cooking, haha.  And I totally recommend her idea of buttering and putting your buns on the griddle.  Our buns were a little buttery and crunchy and so were the ones for our sloppy joe's too :)  Here is what the end result looked like while it was still in the pan (minus some because my kiddos were starving of course and couldn't wait for mommy to be annoying and take a picture of the food).

And then here it is on the bun with our super healthy side of tater tots.  Which by the way, there has to be a way to make homemade tater tots and I want to know how!!!!  Minus deep frying them so they are healthy.....anyone?


Ok, so I totally mushed my bun down.  I have a habit of doing that anytime I have something on a bun.  Maybe to fit it in my mouth, maybe to make it look like I am eating less?  Maybe because I am just weird and sometimes have weird habits.  Either way, please don't mind the smooshed bun, the food is delicious and I want to spend a weekend at The Lodge and watch Ree make me food, or maybe Marlboro Man and then just eat until I cannot move.  Which would be perfect if I could sit on the porch and relax.  Have I mentioned I want to move to Oklahoma on a ranch now and have nothing but land and wild horses and streams surrounding me?

Monday, July 5, 2010

Oh Holy Cookie!!!!

There are quite a few blogs I read everyday and one happens to be Bakerella.  I found this woman pretty amazing in the first place and think you should definitely check out her site, but did you also know that she franchises with Disney now?  Her fun cake pops that she does as Disney characters are featured on Disney websites, how cool!!!  The other day she made a recipe called pillow cookies.  OMG, they looked amazing.  They consist of a brownie surrounded by a chocolate chip cookie.  They reminded me of a cookie I made by Paula Deen around Christmas where you take any miniature chocolate or peanut butter cup, whatever warms your sweet heart and surround it by a sugar cookie and bake.  Super yummy but I must tell you, they turned out gigantic.  and on this I am not exaggerating.  My Aunt went to check the cookies and all we heard was "Oh my gosh, you need to come see this".  My 6 cookies I put on the pan were the size of the whole pan!!!!!  This new recipe by Bakerella said the cookies are huge as well.  I gotta admit, that kind of freaked me out!!!!  I was thinking of ways to make them smaller.  I was also not able to place the brownie in the middle as she told you to do.  I ended up putting my brownie on a cookie sheet and then putting my cookie dough on top, covering the whole brownie.  To make the cookie look better and have it look like there isn't anything inside, you should push down the brownie a bit so it isn't in a huge lump, but not so smooshed where it is flat.  Ok, so on to the cookies.  Here mine are when they came out of the oven.

Looks like a normal chocolate chip cookie right?  Now, all you need to do is split it in half and you get this.


Do I need to even say YUUMMMMYYYY!!!  Do you see the chocolate chips all gooey?  This cookie is amazing and if I was a secret eater, I would have stolen the whole batch while my family slept.  Not all of my cookies came out so perfect.  Ask my friends.  With some you could totally tell that there was a huge ball of brownie in the middle.  That was before I figured I should smoosh it down a little.  Either way though, they are to die for and I recommend making them asap!!!!

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Happy Fourth



234 years later and we are having ourselves a celebration.  And no, I did not know the anniversary right off the top of my head, I had to subtract 2010 minus 1776, world, please be happy knowing I am not homeschooling my children :)  Last year we celebrated by watching my amazing friend Erin marry the love of her life.  This year we are staying home, having a BBQ with the neighbors and heading up the hill later to watch the fireworks they shoot off over the pier.  Wherever you are, I hope you are having a great day filled with love, family friends and good food of course.  Happy 4th America!!!!!!!!!

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Lamp Overhaul

I think it was when I became a Girl Scout leader that they put me on a mailing list for a church who gives things away to military families.  I guess instead of people selling their household goods, they give it to the church and the church sends out an e-mail to everyone on their list.  Sometimes there is nothing I need or anything that interests me but I have found some treasures.  Of course, people are getting rid of these things so they aren't store bought perfect but sometimes they turn into nice additions to my house.  Such as this lamp.
The ladies house I got it from was huge.  It was in a mansion-like area up in the hills of Carlsbad.  It was super nice so I was a little excited to see what this lamp was going to look like.  She described it as a free standing black wrought iron lamp with a suede like lamp shade that had vines twisting around the stand and leaves coming out of the side.  I envisioned it to be beautiful.  When I went in her house, it was gorgeous.   She either had impeccable design skills or an amazing interior decorator.  And standing right in the entryway was this lamp.  I smiled and told her how gorgeous it was and I was so thankful.  Don't get me wrong, it was a free lamp and I was and still am very grateful but the thing is ugly.  Need a closer look at the decorating she did on it?

Who does that?!  I don't know what to call it.  It is not shabby chic or cute country or anything.  It looks like she had a white lamp and decided she wanted it to be green so she quickly brushed it with a green paintbrush.  I took it home however and it has been sitting in my garage waiting for me to refurbish it.  The thing has good bones.  And the lampshade is super nice, I can tell she paid good money for it.  So, this was the week.  we made a quick trip to Lowe's after one of my doctors appointments (which may or may not be blogged about, I don't know how I feel about things quite yet).  We talked to one of the experts about my vision and she gave us all we needed.  And more, I think that woman is good at what she does.  So, we came home and like always, I wanted to do it now.  Will asked if we could wait until the weekend but I wanted it now....now, now now :)  It wasn't so bad, we took the kiddos outside to play and prepped our area and it seriously only took us 10 minutes.  Within that 10 minutes Hayley decided to be a daredevil and run across the street in her walker.  The thrill of speeding down the slope of the driveway was too much for her, she couldn't stop herself.  And I am sure someone was looking out their window at that very moment wondering who the idiots were who would let their 1 year old baby run across the street in her walker for the thrill of speed.  She tried numerous times to do it again, with her evil little giggle but thankfully we were done with our project.  We let it dry overnight and last night I was able to put it in our living room.  Granted it is taken at night so you don't get quite as good a picture as I had hoped and it is kind of behind our couched so you don't get the full top to bottom shot but you will see how lovely my lamp is now.

Imagine that, black wrought iron.  What the lamp was supposed to be in the first place.  Our home feels so much homeier with that light at night.  It sure beats the overheard fan light the military housing usually has.  Granted, it does have a dimmer which is more than any other house we have had but it still was very institutional feeling.  I am kind of excited to see what else people are getting rid of :)

Friday, July 2, 2010

Lazy Days

Since I have been medicated and not doing much lately, our days around here have been more lazy than usual.  I did however enroll our girls in the summer reading program here on base so we are trying to read as much as possible.  When they read 12 books, or have me read a book to them, they get to turn in their list and get a free book to keep!!  Kendall has already gone once for her free book.  Even Hayley is enrolled which may seem odd but do you see how interested all of them are?
Please don't mind the messy house.  If you have not been to our home, this is the back room where our tv is, along with the toy box so it is guaranteed to be a train wreck for most of the day.  After some reading, Kendall became very interested in doing some yoga on the wii.  Really?  You know we have other fun games, even sports games you can run and jump with.  Nope, she wanted to do yoga.

She was really making sure to listen to the instructions.  She even kept telling Hayley and myself to shush.

Then came some sit-ups.  Poor thing tried so hard but it gave her a score of zero and called her a couch potato.  I guess you are supposed to keep your feet on the wii board the whole time.  Which by the way was not registering her much at all anyway since she is light as a feather.

Then of course her sister came to ruin her fun.  It was followed by a lot of screaming, yelling and crying that she was ruining her good time.  Hey, if baby wants to do yoga, babies gonna do yoga.  She is starting to be a hard headed little thing.  Thank the Lord she is cute :)  Have I mentioned how much I love lazy days?

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Last Minute Yumminess

Yesterday was another grocery shopping day.  Only I had help this time.  Will came along, mainly to make sure I don't pass out since all my craziness going on, but I know secretly because he likes to add things to the cart.....unneeded things I might add.  And for the most part, I normally get home from the commissary and wonder what on earth I bought and if I can even make meals with this stuff.  Yesterday though, yesterday was brilliant and yummy.  First, we picked up some hot sauce and wings and had this for lunch...
These are just the first little bit that came off of the grill and were being coated in yummy sauce.  The kids of course insisted on trying what mommy and daddy were eating, which was quickly followed by running to the fridge for something ice cold to wash it down with.  Surprisingly they came back saying "that was really good", ha.  Then hours later came dinner and I made 2 of these bad boys.....

Homemade pizza dough, okay maybe I didn't get all fancy and make it homemade, it was store bought.  I normally use Trader Joe's whole wheat pizza dough which is crazy good, but this was commissary bought.  Brush the crust with a bit of olive oil, add some pesto for sauce topped with sliced tomatoes and bake for 7 to 10 minutes.  When it comes out, add your sliced avocados and enjoy.  Sooooo yummy!!!  I actually just had some cold for lunch and it is still just as good.  And I think I may want it for dinner tonight, who knows, ha.
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