What do you think?

So we found one that we like. My mom, Nanna and I went "house shopping" on Thurs. this week and we looked at quite a few houses. We were able to narrow it down to 2 or 3. Jon was out of town (no surprise there) so when he got back in town that night I told our discoveries of the day. We took him out the next day to see 2 of them and only needed to see this one. Besides that fact that I forgot that the 2nd one wasn't vacant and needed an appt. to get in. ooops my bad! This one is vacant so we just needed the realtor key. He liked it, I guess because we got back and said let's make an offer. So I'm calling in the morning to set up the appt. We are putting an offer down on it tomorrow. This is the picture of it. I'm not sure why but house is actually kind of a peach color, not a bad one though, instead of gray and the white trim parts are a kinda brown color. It's still really cute and nice and clean on the inside. Here's the stats: vacant-ready for us to move in!, 2030sq. ft., 4 beds, 2.5 baths, good size utility, double garage, cute kitchen, basement with fam. room and funny little extra room I could use for my craft room, big storage room, fenced back yard, cute little cul-de-sac, lovely mature yard-hopefully I don't kill it :), ummm....that pretty much sums it up. We'll keep ya posted on how it all turns out. Wish us luck!

(hopefully it was ok that I used this picture from the listing, sorry to those who may be concerned- naive blogger here. )

Pictures for Melissa

The Makeup:
body: 2 round cakes -i did white cakes with raspberry filling between them
spots: york peppemint patties
Red wings: red icing spread over whole cake
Black body: black icing tipped on the red
green grass: green icing pulled up the at the bottom and coconut w/ a little green die
flowers and eyes: gum drops with toothpicks in them and stuck into the cake
antenas: silver pipe cleaners

the icing took a little of time to do especially the tipping but it wasn't too bad at all. like I said, I ended up making it twice cuz I liked it so much and we had more than one party. Call me if you have any questions. I actually got the idea from a mag. at michaels a few years ago when we lived in Layton still, but I have a great friend who helped me and made it even better. It's easy.

Dentist Update 2

We went to the dentist again this morning with much more success. She was still scared and nervous but we got much better results. Good thing the Dr. is patient with grandkids of his own her same age. She let Dr. Garn polish her teeth and fluoride her teeth today. She was braver and got to feel the "tickle brush" on her finger this time but when he went to put it in her mouth she totally froze and started crying. *I wanted to jump straight out of my chair and just hold her, my heart just dropped.* But he was patient and he slowing coaxed her into letting him polish her teeth, then put the fluoride on. She was scared of Mr. Sucky too though. She doesn't like the sound of the drain when the tub is draining and that is what the sucker sounded like, so she kind of freaked out again but not as bad. Again he was patient and got the job done. After we were all done she got to go to the prize basket again and pick out a toy.....she picked a glittery pink hand mirror. Dr. Garn even gave her a great big Grandpa like hug when they were all done too. So he got her teeth polished and fluorided, but he said he didn't think that she would let him do any fillings on her teeth so he recommended us to the pediatric dentist in Twin Falls. So we are on our way to Twin to meet Dr. Young at 4:00 today. He will do an exam (just count her teeth), review the x-rays from Dr. Garn and observe her personality. They have to do the exam before they can even schedule the appt. for work to be done. The exam allows them to see a little how she will react and what kind of set up they might need to keep her calm to do the work. *I think I might need some of the gas too when he does her fillings so keep me calm. I'm such a Nervous Nelly.* He is the only one in our area that is specialized in infants, children, and teens. He is equipped with the capabilities to just do the normal stuff with the laughing gas in office, or he can sedate in office if they are a little more nervous. He even goes to the hospital and can do work there for oral surgery with anesthesia. They have a totally kid friendly office I have been told and he is super nice. We'll have to see. We'll keep you all updated.

Family Fun Mag Craft

In the April issue of Family Fun Magazine there was a really fun craft idea for bathtub floaties. They are called Buoyant Buddies and are totally cute and super easy to make. I thought since Nanna still likes to play in her baths and could stand some new tub toys that it might be kind of a fun thing to do together. Thus began our quest for the supplies: corks-the real ones not rubber because they have to float, craft foam, googly eyes, hot glue. The last three were easy to find, the corks on the other hand, were more of an issue than I expected. First I thought for sure that I would be able to find them at good old Wally World, and I knew that they had craft foam there too and googly eyes, so one stop shop..........wrong. No corks to be found and the craft foam only had a selection of red, black and white; we wanted green, blue, yellow, purple, you know the fun colors. So then I thought to try one of the hardware stores.........no luck there either; they used to carry them but have since discontinued them to carry only the rubber ones. The next stop was reliable Kings.......nope, no corks there either, oddly enough. They usually have what you can't find anywhere else. That ended the search for the first day. The next day I had to work at the salon for a couple of hours and I was telling one of my clients our dilema. She suggested all the same places that I tried, then she had the brilliant idea that she could just bring me some of hers. She said she usually saves the corks from their wine bottles because she is going to make a cork serving tray, but she thought she could probably spare a few. She brought them by the shop the next day and left them on my table in a ziplock. They didn't even smell like wine as I anticipated that they would. So after work that day I went back to Kings because I noticed they had a lot more colors of craft foam to choose from and Nanna picked out four colors that she wanted. *The project actually has five patterns that you can do but I was forgetting the fifth.* We also picked up the googly eyes, she picked the med. sized ones. When we got home I got online to the website to print off the templates/patterns; they didn't put the patterns in the mag. you do have to go online to get those, but the instructions are in the mag. or you can get them online too. After dinner I promised her that we could put them together, her patience was wearing thin by that point, she really wanted them for her bath that night.......they weren't done in time. We dug out mom's glue gun and went to work. The patterns were a little smaller than I thought they would be when I printed them, so you might want to enlarge them a little. I could have used my mom's copier but I thought it would be just as easy to to trace around them a little larger. In retrospect, I should have blown them up on the copier because then Nanna could have helped a little more by tracing the patterns herself. She is really good at tracing and cutting. But she helped by choosing which ones were which colors. In the end, once you go on a trek for corks, it was a fun and easy project with cute results. I would suggest that if you have little ones that still like to play in the tub that this would be a fun and inexpensive thing to make. Just track down the corks before you buy the rest of the supplies. Here is the link: http://jas.familyfun.go.com/crafts?page=CraftDisplay&craftid=11960 I hope that works, let me know if it doesn't. Here is a picture of the finished product, waiting for the next bath.

Just in case you can't tell: yellow-dolphin, blue-frog, pink-crab, purple-octopus, and the one that I was forgetting is a starfish.

Have fun!!

Busy Day Cookies (Choco. Banana Cookies)

So after lunch today Grandma asked for cookies and since she cooked lunch Nanna and I told her that we would make cookies. Mom picked out the recipe, she said it was really easy and she hadn't had them in a while, so we wanted to try them. Nanna was a very good helper. She loves to put on her "baking" apron and help mom cook. We don't do stuff like that very often. Those that know me know that I don't get along with the kitchen very well. I'd say we are more like associates than best friends. :)

mashing the banana

Nanna dumping in the chocolate cake mix

we separated it into 3 parts:

one with peppermint choco. chips and walnuts

one with just choco. chips and walnuts

one little one for Nanna with just choco. chips

the finished product coming out of the oven

Mom was right, they are really easy to make. If I can do it, then anyone can. The peppermint ones are ok, but the reg. chocolate chip ones are pretty good. Here is the recipe:

2 ripe bananas

1 egg

2 TBS. water

1 pkg. choc. cake mix

1 cup choc. chips (opt.)

1/2 TSP. peppermint flavoring (opt.) *we used 1 cup Andes baking mint chips*

1 cup chopped nuts (opt.)

Mash banana; add egg, water, cake mix and mix. Add remaining ingredients. Bake on greased cookie sheet 10 min. - 350 degrees.

makes about 3 1/2 doz.

Hope you like them.

Dentist Update

Well we went on Thurs morning to the dentist and we were only there about 20 min. Her appt. was at 10 and we were outta there by 10:30. It was short and quick because she wouldn't let them work on her very much. So now we are going back on Mon. morn for another try. She has 4 or 5 cavities and a couple of teeth that are decaying. Two of the cavities hurt to chew with and unfortunately they are not on the same side of her mouth, so we have been doing a lot of soft foods since Thurs. She was very brave though and let them count her teeth and do the x-rays (she liked those cuz they were like pictures for her teeth and she could see them on the screen right after they were taken. Upgraded technology is cool.). However, as soon as they got out the brush to polish her teeth it was over. She didn't start crying or anything but she totally froze. They told her it would tickle and even tried to get her to feel it with her finger to see that it would tickle but her answers were "uh uh" through lips locked shut and her body was stiff as a board. Poor little thing. Since she wouldn't let them do any work on her cavities we had to schedule another appt. to try again. If she doesn't let them work this time they will refer her to a pediatric dentist in either Twin Falls (45min. drive) or Pocatello (1hr 15min drive). She did really good until the sound of the brush I think, but I'm not sure how Mon. is going to go because she is saying that she doesn't want to go back. We are trying to reason with her that if she doesn't go her owie teeth won't go away, but if we do Dr. Garn can fix them so they don't hurt anymore and she can eat what she wants again. So wish us luck, I was excited that Jon was going to take her on Mon. but then he got a call for another install trip to Coeurd'lene, he left this morning at 8. So guess who gets to take her again......yeah I'm really working on my poker face. oh geez. Hopefully this one will go better because we have already done it once now and she knows that there is a prize basket she can pick from when we are done. Cross your fingers.

THE DENTIST!!

Nanna gets to go to the dentist in the morning for the very first time. I'm not sure who is more nervous about it, me or her? This is just the "Happy Visit" so I should be able to put on a fairly decent poker face so she doesn't get scared, *I am terrified of the dentist myself* but what I'm worried about is that she has quite a few cavities and she complains that one of her teeth hurt when she chews with it. Poor Baby!! I feel so bad for her. I'm blaming the cavities on genetics. Jon's side of the family has the genes for some teeth squishing other troubles-sorry Grammy Jan, we still love you and your genes. Anyway, I say it's genetics because I think that I do pretty darn good with monitoring her sugar intake, and I don't let her eat hardly any junk food. We ditched fruit snacks months ago when I first started noticing little cavities cuz I've been told that those are a sure fire way for trouble. She rarely gets straight up juice, it's always diluted at least by half with water. However, it is a struggle almost everyday with her when it's time to brush her teeth, she hardly ever does it herself, so either Jon or I do it. When it's me, I have come to notice I have a very short fuse for whining about. So I guess we will just have to see how it all goes tomorrow. If she won't let the dentist work on her teeth then he will refer her to a pediatric specialist who comes in from Poky once a week as I understand. With out having insurance, let's hope she is a willing and compliant patient. This is going to be just as much a test for me as it is for her. I have put it off and put it off trying to get Jon to take her so I wouldn't have to go the dentist and worry about her feeding off of my nervous energy, but no such luck. He is in Texas this week and she has already been complaining about her tooth hurting for a week. I feel like such a bad mom, making her suffer through the pain just because of my insecurity. So we are going to step up to the plate and get it done. Wish me, us luck.

More Easter Pics

Easter Fun

So I'm just a little late getting these posted, but here they are. This was the first year, I think, that Savannah really got what was going on with the Easter thing. She got to dye eggs this year for the first time. She and her Daddy had fun with the colors. Savannah thought it was really cool how you can put a white egg in one of the colors and when you take it out it is a different color. We also showed her a "magic trick" with the eggs by coloring on them with crayons. She thought that was pretty cool too how the crayon would magically show through the color. She actually got to go on two egg hunts this year, that's why she is wearing different clothes in the hunting pics. The first one was on Sat. as a bribe/reward for taking her nap that day. There was too much going on that she didn't want to miss, especially with Jacki and Robb in town for Easter. The second one was on Sunday after we got home from church. We decided that we would have lunch before we did any egg hunting to give the Easter Bunny time to get everywhere he needed to be. Daddy even got her to take a nap with him again so the Easter Bunny could hide the eggs. We only hid the eggs in the back yard for the first hunt, but for the second hunt the Easter Bunny went all around the house and down the lane, and this hunt also included the eggs that she had colored. She was totally surprised when she woke up from her nap again to find "Bunny Tracks" in the yard again and to have another egg hunt. Grandma Easter Bunny was very generous this year. We talked about what to put in the eggs because we didn't want to giver her tons of candy, so we decided to put little toys and things in them. Well, Grandma went a little beyond that and gave her money in them on the condition that we add it to her Good Behavior Marble Jar and do tithing and savings with it. What a lucky little girl. After the Little Kid Hunt Mom and Dad went out and hid eggs again for the Big Kid Hunt. Jon and Robb had fun racing around the yard finding eggs that were hidden a lot higher this time. I missed a couple cuz they were over my head and out of my level of view. It was a beautiful weekend. The weather was wonderful, the Spirit was strong, and having family around was just as it should be.

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