Fun friends are fun! When is Breaking Dawn coming out?.... just looked it up and the release date isn't until November 18th, 2011!! A year and a half away?!! sigh.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Eclipse Craziness!
Might have been up till almost 3 am last night (err.. this morning). But feeling alright! :) And once again, Amanda put together an AMAZING party, so it was totally worth the late night! Amanda puts all other parties to shame....
I love how Edward is creepily hanging out in the background of these pictures
I was acting out one of the vampires from the books... can you guess who?! of course you can't... because I'm a horrible actress... BUT my team (Team Victoria!) was amazingly talented and totally knew who I was pretending to be. :)
Who invited THAT guy??!
Fun friends are fun! When is Breaking Dawn coming out?.... just looked it up and the release date isn't until November 18th, 2011!! A year and a half away?!! sigh.
Fun friends are fun! When is Breaking Dawn coming out?.... just looked it up and the release date isn't until November 18th, 2011!! A year and a half away?!! sigh.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
The last of our vacation...
So, Ben is officially done with his vacation time and back at work today (too bad it's a Sunday!). He's had the last 8 days off, most of which we spent on our cabin trip, but these last few days we managed to find some fun things to do as well. I took the girls to see Toy Story on Friday morning, which I thought was seriously hilarious! Ben was nice and offered to be the one to stay home with Jake - he got to take the girls to the last kids movie (The Princess and the Frog), so he figured it was my turn. We even used a couple of our free movie tickets (which Ben seems to routinely win at work), so it was a $5 outing. Nice! I laughed so hard in this movie... and then, for some reason, I cried like a baby at the end. What is wrong with me?!! I never would have thought that Toy Story would be emotional for me. ;) Emma cried too, but for different reasons... she got really frightened during a couple parts - that poor girl gets so scared of stuff sometimes. She's been having lots of nightmares lately too - everything is just so REAL to her right now and sometimes has a hard time separating reality from pretend. So, I had both girls on my lap towards the end of the movie (Becca because she couldn't see and I neglected to get a booster for her and Emma because she was frightened)... from this experience I learned that they have very boney little bums. ;)
On Friday night we made a delicious dinner! We had teriyaki kebabs (using the same recipe my cute sister used when she cooked for us last time she was visiting) with rice. Emma had picked out a fun drink from her Princess Cookbook that we made to go with it - Homemade Vanilla Cherry Cream Soda. Mmmmm. Then for dessert, I had dived back into some old Everyday Food mags and made these yummy ice cream sandwiches. Summer food is really the BEST.
On Saturday we drove across town to Ben's parents home and Grandma Dangerfield took Emma and Becca to see The Wizard of Oz play at the Queen Creek Performing Arts Center. They loved it! And it looks like the plan is to all be Wizard of Oz characters for Halloween this year. Emma wants to be Dorothy and Becca wants to be a Flying Monkey ("because I like monkeys!" says Becca). While they were out at the play, Grandpa stayed home with Jake while he napped and Ben and I got to go out on a little outing... always such a luxury to go out without the kids! We went to The Dump in Tempe... an oddly named furniture store, but we found lots of things we would have loved to purchase if only we had more money. ;) Afterwards we went to Sonic because I wanted ice cream. Ben insisted that I try the Limeade Chiller... we got the strawberry kind and it's now my new FAVORITE ice cream treat!
Apparently the girls also entertained themselves this weekend by using my camera to take pics of each other. When I went to upload them to my camera recently, I found all these shots of Becca, which Emma must have taken of her. She's such a card!
On Friday night we made a delicious dinner! We had teriyaki kebabs (using the same recipe my cute sister used when she cooked for us last time she was visiting) with rice. Emma had picked out a fun drink from her Princess Cookbook that we made to go with it - Homemade Vanilla Cherry Cream Soda. Mmmmm. Then for dessert, I had dived back into some old Everyday Food mags and made these yummy ice cream sandwiches. Summer food is really the BEST.
On Saturday we drove across town to Ben's parents home and Grandma Dangerfield took Emma and Becca to see The Wizard of Oz play at the Queen Creek Performing Arts Center. They loved it! And it looks like the plan is to all be Wizard of Oz characters for Halloween this year. Emma wants to be Dorothy and Becca wants to be a Flying Monkey ("because I like monkeys!" says Becca). While they were out at the play, Grandpa stayed home with Jake while he napped and Ben and I got to go out on a little outing... always such a luxury to go out without the kids! We went to The Dump in Tempe... an oddly named furniture store, but we found lots of things we would have loved to purchase if only we had more money. ;) Afterwards we went to Sonic because I wanted ice cream. Ben insisted that I try the Limeade Chiller... we got the strawberry kind and it's now my new FAVORITE ice cream treat!
Apparently the girls also entertained themselves this weekend by using my camera to take pics of each other. When I went to upload them to my camera recently, I found all these shots of Becca, which Emma must have taken of her. She's such a card!
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Our big cabin adventure!
Ben is OFFICIALLY done with his Intern year and is now a 2nd year Resident! We celebrated the occasion with a little vacation time and have spent the last 5 days in Pine, AZ (about 2 hours northeast) relaxing and exploring. We stayed at a nice cabin there with Ben's parents and had such a memorable time! We also got a much needed break from the sweltering Phoenix heat. We played games (mostly lots and lots of Qwirkle), ate an abundance of food, read books, relaxed in the hot tub, rode horses, explored Fossil Creek, watched the stars, went fishing, took a little night hike with the girls, antique shopped, and became a bit more familiar with the cute little town of Pine. What a wonderful week! (oh, and the week was so great that I almost forgot about our little mishap when we tried to leave our house to head out of town... we had our van loaded up and ready around noon with kids buckled in and lots of groceries packed in coolers... we went to start our car to pull out of the garage and the car wouldn't start! We assumed it was the battery and that maybe the kids left a light on in the car overnight or something, so we tried to jumpstart the car using our Cavalier, but as soon as we tried to do that the engine completely shut down trying to start because the alarm on the van started going off... we don't have a "clicker", as I call it, to shut off the alarm.... so in the end, we had to get a AAA guy out to the house to replace our battery, which ended up being completely fried, and then had to haggle with several people at the Nissan dealership to figure out how to manually shut off the alarm, so that our car would let the engine start... we ended up leaving a couple hours after our first attempt and Jake got an impromptu afternoon nap).
We started out our Pine adventures with a night out to eat at The Randall House. Ben had noticed that it was listed in the Top 25 Arizona Restaurants of 2010 in the Arizona Highways magazine a couple months back... and so we had to give it a try! It was delicious and very quaint and unique. While we waited for our food to come I took the kids to behind the restaurant where they had a little playhouse with kids books... small towns are so fun!
Sunday was Father's Day - we had a Father's Day breakfast of French toast with whipped cream and strawberries and then Ben and his dad opened up some cards and gifts. The cards I gave out this year (to Ben, his dad, and my dad) was a version of this cute idea I found online. Dad's are the best. I've always thought so, since my dad has always been so awesome... and my fondness for dad's has only been reinforced every day as I see Ben be such an amazing dad to Emma, Becca, and Jake.
We also got dressed up and headed to church that morning in the Pine Ward. Afterwards we took some pics...
A lot of our cabin time was spent playing games...
And playing with the camera... Becca wanted me to take a picture of her and then she wanted to take one of me. :)
And the kids spent LOTS of time outside... mostly hanging out in the little sandbox - who would have thought that such a tiny little square of sand would be so entertaining...
On Midsummer's Night Eve we floated a cake... in the hot tub. hahaha! We've been doing this tradition with Ben's family for as long as I've been married to him, and it's definitely becoming memorable - There's something about floating a cake now that elicits lovely summertime feelings. :) We took turns reciting poems and watching our flickering cake float around... then we ate it.
One of the most entertaining things we did this week was venture down to Fossil Creek to swim, picnic, and explore. The drive there was CRAZY. Once you get to the top of the canyon there, it's all dirt road to the bottom.... so we drove in our VAN on a very windy, slender, dirt road... and it drops about 1,300 feet in elevation in about 2.5 miles. I basically closed my eyes the entire way down (and back up). (It was at this point that I really noticed the blessing that it was to have had our battery die out on us at the beginning of the trip... can you imagine what an ordeal it would have been if our battery died at the bottom of the canyon?!) I breathed a sigh of relief when we got to the creek... and it was beautiful!! The water was completely clear, with fish swimming everywhere. Ben had brought his fishing supplies, only to find that they are trying to rebuild the fish population so they are currently not allowing fishing. But, despite that, we had a great time. We borrowed some snorkeling equipment from the Lee's, and we all took turns enjoying the close up view of the travertine river bed and big trout. There was also a rope swing hanging from a tree at the edge of the creek and Ben, Carol, and I all gave it a try. You'll see in the video below that my attempt was weak as I didn't really swing out on the rope like I intended... I kind of wussed out last second and just jumped off from the side. :) There was a small waterfall up the creek from where we were at that we all swam up to and then let the current push us back down... it was so fun! The girls enjoyed our time there, but were both nervous about the fish... Emma kept climbing on top of daddy so the fish wouldn't touch her. I think one of the best parts about our time at Fossil Creek was the privacy... we were the ONLY ones in the section that we were at. It was awesome!
Ben's dad swimming down the creek
Jake has recently entered a new phase... he's communicating like crazy with lots of new words, noises, and body language... and also lots of whining. In this video you can get a little taste of his new found personality and also see that this kid likes anything to do with eating...
We felt so lucky to get to visit some friends of Ben's parents that live about 20 minutes south of Pine in the town of Payson. They were so kind and let the girls each take a turn riding their horses! This was definitely a highlight of the trip... especially for Emma. Now she claims to be a cowgirl. After horse riding and getting a tour of their lovely home, we went out to dinner with them at a fun restaurant there in town.
Since fishing didn't work out at Fossil Creek, we decided to give it a try at a stocked pond in Payson the next morning. We had never fished before, so this was a learning experience. We did NOT catch a fish, but we did have fun, and Emma got VERY good at casting her line out quite far. I was impressed. When I tried I got my line caught in a tree. Grandma Dangerfield helped the girls put bait on their hooks. (Sadly, Grandpa had to head back home just before our fishing outing for work meetings).
After our time at the cabin, I've decided that I want a hot tub on my back porch. I've also decided that I have the cutest girls. :)
On our last night, Ben and I took the girls on a little night hike with our flashlights. It was nice to be outside on a cool summer evening. We played many rounds of "I Spy" while on our walk... Every time it was Becca's turn, the answer was always a tree or the road.
The last morning before heading back home, we hit some unique antique shops, a little honey stand, and out for ice cream.
I definitely love summer adventures, and this was a great one. We love hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa Dangerfield and it was wonderful to get to share this vacation with them. Now I've got one more week till our next big summer trip... to Utah! I'm counting down the days till I see my family! :)
We started out our Pine adventures with a night out to eat at The Randall House. Ben had noticed that it was listed in the Top 25 Arizona Restaurants of 2010 in the Arizona Highways magazine a couple months back... and so we had to give it a try! It was delicious and very quaint and unique. While we waited for our food to come I took the kids to behind the restaurant where they had a little playhouse with kids books... small towns are so fun!
Sunday was Father's Day - we had a Father's Day breakfast of French toast with whipped cream and strawberries and then Ben and his dad opened up some cards and gifts. The cards I gave out this year (to Ben, his dad, and my dad) was a version of this cute idea I found online. Dad's are the best. I've always thought so, since my dad has always been so awesome... and my fondness for dad's has only been reinforced every day as I see Ben be such an amazing dad to Emma, Becca, and Jake.
We also got dressed up and headed to church that morning in the Pine Ward. Afterwards we took some pics...
A lot of our cabin time was spent playing games...
And playing with the camera... Becca wanted me to take a picture of her and then she wanted to take one of me. :)
And the kids spent LOTS of time outside... mostly hanging out in the little sandbox - who would have thought that such a tiny little square of sand would be so entertaining...
On Midsummer's Night Eve we floated a cake... in the hot tub. hahaha! We've been doing this tradition with Ben's family for as long as I've been married to him, and it's definitely becoming memorable - There's something about floating a cake now that elicits lovely summertime feelings. :) We took turns reciting poems and watching our flickering cake float around... then we ate it.
One of the most entertaining things we did this week was venture down to Fossil Creek to swim, picnic, and explore. The drive there was CRAZY. Once you get to the top of the canyon there, it's all dirt road to the bottom.... so we drove in our VAN on a very windy, slender, dirt road... and it drops about 1,300 feet in elevation in about 2.5 miles. I basically closed my eyes the entire way down (and back up). (It was at this point that I really noticed the blessing that it was to have had our battery die out on us at the beginning of the trip... can you imagine what an ordeal it would have been if our battery died at the bottom of the canyon?!) I breathed a sigh of relief when we got to the creek... and it was beautiful!! The water was completely clear, with fish swimming everywhere. Ben had brought his fishing supplies, only to find that they are trying to rebuild the fish population so they are currently not allowing fishing. But, despite that, we had a great time. We borrowed some snorkeling equipment from the Lee's, and we all took turns enjoying the close up view of the travertine river bed and big trout. There was also a rope swing hanging from a tree at the edge of the creek and Ben, Carol, and I all gave it a try. You'll see in the video below that my attempt was weak as I didn't really swing out on the rope like I intended... I kind of wussed out last second and just jumped off from the side. :) There was a small waterfall up the creek from where we were at that we all swam up to and then let the current push us back down... it was so fun! The girls enjoyed our time there, but were both nervous about the fish... Emma kept climbing on top of daddy so the fish wouldn't touch her. I think one of the best parts about our time at Fossil Creek was the privacy... we were the ONLY ones in the section that we were at. It was awesome!
Jake has recently entered a new phase... he's communicating like crazy with lots of new words, noises, and body language... and also lots of whining. In this video you can get a little taste of his new found personality and also see that this kid likes anything to do with eating...
We felt so lucky to get to visit some friends of Ben's parents that live about 20 minutes south of Pine in the town of Payson. They were so kind and let the girls each take a turn riding their horses! This was definitely a highlight of the trip... especially for Emma. Now she claims to be a cowgirl. After horse riding and getting a tour of their lovely home, we went out to dinner with them at a fun restaurant there in town.
Since fishing didn't work out at Fossil Creek, we decided to give it a try at a stocked pond in Payson the next morning. We had never fished before, so this was a learning experience. We did NOT catch a fish, but we did have fun, and Emma got VERY good at casting her line out quite far. I was impressed. When I tried I got my line caught in a tree. Grandma Dangerfield helped the girls put bait on their hooks. (Sadly, Grandpa had to head back home just before our fishing outing for work meetings).
After our time at the cabin, I've decided that I want a hot tub on my back porch. I've also decided that I have the cutest girls. :)
On our last night, Ben and I took the girls on a little night hike with our flashlights. It was nice to be outside on a cool summer evening. We played many rounds of "I Spy" while on our walk... Every time it was Becca's turn, the answer was always a tree or the road.
The last morning before heading back home, we hit some unique antique shops, a little honey stand, and out for ice cream.
I definitely love summer adventures, and this was a great one. We love hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa Dangerfield and it was wonderful to get to share this vacation with them. Now I've got one more week till our next big summer trip... to Utah! I'm counting down the days till I see my family! :)
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