sleeping beauty

it's finally naptime for hazel today. she fights me as long as she can but once again, i win:

p.s. she gets it from her daddy.....and her nanny.....and granddad.....pretty much anyone but me.

monday night flashback is back (#25)

for how long? who knows. it's been a while since the last one and i wasn't having any brilliant ideas. but then this last week, we purchased got a printer/scanner. can you believe that we didn't get digital copies of our wedding pictures? sad but true. first thing i did after setting up the printer, was dig out our wedding album that my sweet sister rachel put together. unfortunately, i couldn't remove many of the pictures without damaging either them or the page they were on. hence the full scrapbook page:

isn't that page stunning? rachel layered and cut for who knows how long to make this stained-glass effect. the flower girls are pretty darn cute too (my neices, avery and mckenna (left and right in bottom picture); and my baby sister, mary alice (middle in bottom picture)).

i always kind of giggle at this page: we look like a wedding cake topper in the bottom right pic. don't you think? it also reminds me how bright and sunny it was that day, not to mention hot. but i guess that's what you typically get in august in utah.

this is one of two 'bridal' pictures. i didn't like standing there by myself.

that's better.

it was nice taking pictures in the shade, i didn't have to squint and my eyes weren't watering.

regardless of the squinting, i think this is my favorite. it's also hanging on our wall. next are a couple from the never-ending reception (seriously, we never got to cut the cake or sit down the entire time [we did have some kind friends who had gotten married the week before, bring us drinks], plus it went a half hour or more overtime. i guess that's what happens when everyone you invite knows both of you. our parents had to coordinate who they were each inviting to avoid double invitations.) back to the pictures:

a wedding toast......with milk and apple juice (for me of course. milk = ewww!) in cartons.

we're so awesome.

there you have it. you've seen our courtship and now our wedding. aren't you special?

"have you been peckish during the night?"

well? have you? i haven't. can you name the movie that quote is from? i'll give you to the end of the post to have your apostraphe (if anyone answered in their minds "i think you mean an epiphany, smee." i love you and we should be friends. and no, i was never that annoying person that responded to everything with a movie quote...). i'm just putting up some pictures i never blogged about from the past month and some from 5 months ago:

i'm not sure why i never posted this pic. i mean, look! it's not bad for a self-taken portrait: no double chin and we match! maybe the reason i neglected to post this was because i was still reeling from turning 27 (did i detect some fine lines around the eyes?)? or because lucy's pulling away? perhaps it was because she, at 15 months old, was already tanner than i've ever been in my life? hmmm, well anyway, it's up now. i stumbled across it when i was looking for this picture:

and this one:

i have already blogged about these pictures. they are from our last visit to utah back in august. i wanted to post them again because a couple weeks ago hazel received a letter from her dear auntie mary alice (yes, i have a seven year old sister):

she was so happy. she loves mary alice to pieces and every few days will tell me "we're going to see mary awice tonight!" i feel bad popping that bubble. my mom and i decided that hazel and mary alice should become penpals. hazel dictated a letter and drew a picture to send back. the ball's in your court, malice.

next up, we have some pictures from kandice's birthday. she was kind enough to let me make her dinner and and a cake. i ended up making chocolate cupcakes with mint buttercream frosting and a ganache topping (recipe here. i halved it, added a little more mint to the frosting and used regular vanilla.). i made kandice a mini cake for her very own. the cupcakes were tasty:

so tasty in fact, lucy didn't even bother with the middle man, i.e. hands:

lucy has another highchair related trick:

when she's done, she's outta there:

yeah, we need to use those straps. thankfully, she's not always climbing:

such a sweet little thing:

oh and the movie quote? i'll give you a little more: "have you been peckish during the night? only someone's been at me cheese." Figured it out yet? we picked it up at target for $5. grant was even the one to spot it and suggest we buy it. i know!! i was shocked but played it cool so he wouldn't realize how out of character he was and change his mind. luckily we were out of the store before grant said, "i can't believe i just let us buy a movie." i burned the receipt.

on another note: i've started running. i'm actually training for my first 5k, this one. my goal is to run the whole 3.2 miles. i added a widget to the side bar so that i can keep track of how i'm doing. i'm pretty excited and optimistic. i tried getting into running last year and it didn't work out  at all so well. but now that i've actually paid money to do this "fun run" i'm training pretty hard and making progress. i've been [kind of] following this training program. i'll be finishing week 3 tonight. 

a day late or right on time

i had planned to make a special treat for grant on valentine's day but it didn't happen because i took a much needed nap. i decided to do it monday and luckily monday was a holiday so everything worked out. well, almost everything. you see the treat i planned on making seemed so simple to put together, i didn't look at the recipe more than once before i bought the supplies. bad idea. my pretzels were too big and i got hershey kisses instead of rollos. all was not lost, hazel still had lots of fun putting them together:

kandice, who stopped by, and i put the kids to work unwrapping the kisses. lucy was fired after eating 2 out of the 3 she unwrapped:

and then spent the rest of the time undoing hazel's work:

hazel laid out the pretzels:

and then topped them each with a chocolate kiss:

[see, pretzels too big for the kiss] then i popped them into the oven for a couple minutes to melt then hazel added a peanut m&m to each:

sorry about the odd angle. it was fun for hazel and the treats did have a nice salty-sweetness to them even if they weren't as pretty as the original.

to all y'all:

@ the drop of a hat

lucy the prospector:

hazel - macgyver style:

lucy as goofy:

hazel the sushi chef:

and lucy the 1920's fashionista:

we {heart} parties

yesterday was a playgroup valentine's party. i had some reservations about going since it was to be held in the same gym as the halloween party. remember that post? i do and i still have nightmares. between those flashbacks and several blogs i've read lately, i'm getting pretty paranoid (even more so than i was already). but since it was an activity that i knew hazel and lucy would both love, i bit the bullet and we went. tuesday night grant cut out many paper hearts while i decorated lucy's box and helped with hazel's:

hazel was very proud of her's and has barely let it out of her sight. lucy just wanted to unwrap her's:

decked out in their valentine's t-shirts (thank you, grandma), we headed to the party. hazel spent the first little while observing the goings on from her perch on top of the stage:

lucy quickly found a friend and some food:

one of the mom's brought cookies to decorate. as you can see lucy wasn't interested in decorating (later, someone kindly frosted it for her). hazel meticulously frosted a thin layer of  icing:

and then preceded to spoon heaps of sprinkles on top:

about this time, lucy was pretty much done eating her's:

finally hazel was ready to dig in:

that's quite the sprinkle job. we then had lunch or tried to. lucy ran wild again, stopping now and then to take a sip of someone's water or a bit of food from anyone's plate. hazel was great about sitting at the table but kept her lunch simple: cheetos. once lunch was over, we passed out our valentines:

i didn't get pictures of hazel passing her's out because if i didn't watch her, she'd just keep putting treats into the same box over and over again. i'm pretty sure that star wars box got 3 or 4 before i stopped her. but that's ok because hazel really likes isaac (the box owner). the kids all burned off some of the sugar:

then it was time to clean up and the kids were all really 'helpful' at first:

but then some of them realized it was funner to play or stand in front of the sweeper:

lucy helped to the last. hazel just kept asking to open her box and see her treats. once we got home i let her:

 and she was happy.

twinkle, twinkle widdo stars

star #1:

hazel participated in our church's primary talent show on saturday. all week she talked about singing twinkle, twinkle little star and dancing like a princess on top of the stage. i had my doubts...but saturday came and she asked for a dress to twirl in and her princess shirt. i added a princess flower and she was ready to go. once we got to the church building, i figured she'd chicken out, but she happily watched all of the other acts while chomping on her popcorn and candy. finally, it was time. i took her into the hallway and had her practice singing. she sounded lovely. then her name was announced and we trotted out onto the stage:

she mumbled a few words into the microphone and stood frozen. i tried to urge her on by singing with her but she started to hand me the mic:

since i didn't want to steal the show with my mad singing skills, i told her to take a bow. she did and the audience went wild. you see, hazel has mastered the art of bowing. observe:

exquisite form. thank you, princess presto, for teaching hazel this important life lesson. her reaction to the applause:

"oh! they love me, they really love me!" i'm sure you noticed that all of the stage pictures were pretty blurry. this would be why:

grant, a man of many talents, took them while holding lucy on his shoulders. not an easy feat. speaking of grant being a man of many talents....

star #2:

what book is this on my nightstand?

intrigued? here's a peek inside:

are you totally 'wow-ed'? you should be. i'm so proud of him.