Disney Princess Half Marathon or bust

Elisha and I at my wedding

Six years ago a friend mentioned that she had a friend that I should met. I have thanked Angela many times for that introduction, she introduced me to Elisha, and Elisha and I very soon became close friends and would travel the country to see one another. 

Elisha and set a goal many years ago that we were going to one day run the Disney Princess Half Marathon, see we are both huge Disney fans and there would be nothing better than running together in at Disney World then enjoying a day or two in the Magic Kingdom. 

This remained a pipe dream for many years. There were changes in relationships, we both had children, we both changed jobs, and even though we haven't seen each other in two and a half years we still remain close. Yesterday during a text exchange E brought up the half marathon and after careful deliberation...all of thirty seconds...we decided we are going to shot for the  February 2015 half marathon. I know that is a while away but we have to schedule around family and budgets and readiness. 

So to kick off today I started the couch potato to 5K. It actually went well. Though I have never been a runner I am actually in the best shape of my life (I know, nothing to brag about there). The six days of cardio I have been pulling for the last six months are paying off and I was able to do the run for sixty seconds walk for ninety seconds for 25 minutes with no problem. I know that it will get harder as I progress but right now I feel good. I feel ready to take on this challenge and ready to go down this road with my friend. So her it starts. Weekly updates, stories, failures, and triumphs are around the corner. 

Until then it is scheduling in my runs and looking forward to the day when I will cross the finish line and be crowned a Disney princess with my friend. 

Crafts- U of U quilt

About a year ago I made a quilt for my cousin's son, it was a U of U quilt and I wanted to keep it. Not only did I want to keep it but Christian wanted one for himself. Thus started my quest to make sure by his next birthday he had a U quilt.  

I found the fabric on sale!!! a bonus if there ever was one and then found a black and red skein of yarn. 

The hard part about this quilt was keeping it a secret from my husband. I love having my husband home all day, it is a lot of fun and very helpful when the baby is napping and I have to run errands, or if I have to take James to school.  The only time it is a problem is when I want to try and do a project for him.  

With the help of a good friend I was able to tie the quilt in an afternoon then spend the rest of the week finishing it in the basement while Christian worked upstairs, there was only one time when I had to tell him not to come in the room when he finished worked early. 

It ended up working out though and he was surprised. 

I was quite pleased on how it turned out myself! And for the first time ever in sewing a quilt I actually got the binding down the first time!

Go Utes!

Craft- Celebration board

I am starting to find my weekly craft time to be an escape. I like doing simple easy projects and it gives me a few minutes to just escape. So far I had avoided painting, I have never been great at details. I have stuck with knitting, or things I can work with on photoshop, or print out. But I launched out this time and did a very simple and easy painting project.

This celebration board is a simple concept I found on pintrest. It is a chalk board that sits somewhere in your home and you change daily what your family can celebrate. We have celebrated homemade jam, first days of school, lost teeth, and family baptisms. It is to celebrate big and small. 

First thing I did was went to Home Depot and got some project board. Cooper, the very nice Home Depot employee, cut the board for me till I had six 12x15 pieces. 

Then my husband showed me how to use his drill and drilled two holes in the very top.

Then I started painting. It took three coats of paint but I was surprised how quick it was. It took me twenty minutes to paint the front and sides, then I waited an hour or so for it to dry and painted the back. Not too long at all.

I had someone cut the vinyl for me and I ended up using a vinyl chalk board as well.

Then it was time to add the ribbon, not sure if I like this one but it is what we have for now.

The kids love this and every morning they wait to see what will be written on our celebrate board.

Cookies!

It has been baking central here the past few days and cookies have been on the plate. This time I wanted to try something different and stumbled across a cookie site that I am excited about- Sally's Baking Addiction. I feel that Sally and I could be kindred spirits, she has so many great ideas and her cookies sound delicious. 

The first thing I tried was the Golden Oreo Truffles. 

This was a very simple recipe:
1 8 oz package of cream cheese, softened
1 package of Golden Oreos, crushed
White chocolate for dipping (I just used white chocolate buttons)
Sprinkles

After crushing the Oreos ( I did mine with our mini food processor) combine them with the cream cheese and mix until you have a batter.  Then roll into one inch balls, you should get about 48. Then put them in the freezer for at least a half an hour. This was one of the moments I wish I had a bigger freezer than I do...and I have two freezers. However I made it work and the got nice a frozen.

While they are freezing follow the directions to melt the chocolate. Usually it is melt it in the microwave for a minute. Stir, microwave for 30 seconds, stir, repeat until the chocolate is melted.

Then take the balls out of the freezer and dip, I struggled with dipping it and couldn't find the right way to actually do it, but hey it worked. When you are finished put them back in the fridge for at least 20 minutes.

These things were so rich and so good. The recipe is also rather versatile and has me thinking of other ideas. Like oreos with mint chocolate or mint oreos with just chocolate or strawberry oreos with chocolate...oh the possibilities are endless.

Now growing up my favorite ice cream was Rocky Road, the problem was my dad is allergic to tree nuts and my mom is allergic to chocolate. With those two allergies it wasn't that often that I got rocky road ice cream and I changed my preference to strawberry instead.  When I stumbled across the recipe for rocky road cookies, I had to try them.

Again a very simple recipe-

3 cup powdered sugar
2/3 cup cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 extra large egg whites
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups chocolate chips
2.5 ounces of slivered almonds (you can toast them if you want but I didn't)
1 cup mini marshmallows

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Combine powdered sugar, cocoa powder, and salt. Add egg whites and vanilla and mix until batter is smooth.  Stir in chocolate chips and almonds. Using a medium cookie scoop place 12 cookies on the sheet and place 4-5 marshmallows on each cookie. Then place the cookie tray in the fridge for 10-15 minutes.   After bake them 12-13 minutes .

They are super chocolaty and oh so good.

Craft- Conference Board

With LDS General Conference coming up I am always looking for ways to keep the kids entertained.  While looking for other things on Pintrest I ran across this idea from a site that seems to have been hijacked for a moment. I will get back to you with the site. But this woman was awesome! She had so many different ideas and one of them was creating a Conference Center. The idea behind it is the kids can find out who is speaking and place their picture at the podium. Then they can pick the topics they hear about and put it in the speech bubble.  I am seeing 

The idea behind it is the kids can find out who is speaking and place their picture at the podium. Then they can pick the topics they hear about and put it in the speech bubble.  When the speaker is finished you can put them in their seat for the remaining time period. 

 There are also places to put who is conducting the music and who is playing the organ.

This lady baby caused me a lot of grief and a ton of time but I got it finished in time for October conference. Now I just can't wait to use it.

Craft- Picture Quiet Books

Recently I joined Pintrest. I really didn't want to, in fact I had avoided it. But then I got called to the Relief Society Additional Activities Committee, formally known as the Enrichment Committee, formally known as the Personal, Home, and Family Enrichment Committee, formally known as the Homemaking Committee.  All of a sudden I was in charge of coming up with craft ideas for our ever popular Super Saturday craft day.  

I browsed Pintrest with no intention of joining but pretty soon I realized that I needed to take the plunge, if only to keep straight the craft ideas I was coming up with for our Relief Society event.  I had also been thinking of creating a quiet book for Matty so this helped too. While I was looking around I realized two things: 1-Matty is still six months away from using quiet books 2- I was at least a year away of having the talent to make a quiet book. 

Then I stumbled across the picture quiet book. Perfect not for Matty but to keep James entertained. The premise was simple. Simply Fresh Designs had already created the templates I just had to add pictures. Perfect. They had books on beliefs, Old Testament stories, Teaching of Jesus, Life of Jesus, Book of Mormon stories, Articles of Faith, Gospel ABCs, and Life of Prophets and Apostles. 

I used the LDS Gospel Art book to put in the pictures with my paintshop pro. Then I sent the pictures to Walgreens and picked them up a few days later. I found some 24 photo photo books at Target and Walmart and then put them together. 

Simple and easy, my kind of project.   Now I will have to launch into the other quiet book...maybe next week.

Craft- Back to school and welcome home banners

Back to school, the time of year most kids dread and most moms look forward to with gleeful anticipation. As I child I loved going back to school, I loved pouring over back to school ads and deciding what school supplies I wanted buy, what Trapper Keeper was going to go best with my new folders and pencils.  I would drag my parents to five or six different stores to make sure I got the best deals my babysitting money could buy.   Yeah, I was unlike most kids. 

My kids however cringe whenever I mention how many days are left till the school bell rings. They are even now holing up in the rooms hoping beyond hope that August 27th will never come. 

Recently I was reading the Disney Family Fun magazine and I ran across a craft that was so simple and easy that even I could do, and would solve the kids back to school blues. 

The idea was simple enough. Celebrate summer's end by picking a few activities that we hadn't done yet and pack them into the last few weeks. I just had to make a banner.

Now I like to be crafty, but I am not very good at it. So this was a low key craft for me. 

I made a template first off to have something for my banner.

 And then I got my letters and paper ready

 Look how nice all this looks, really I should be barred from Hobby Lobby, I am just grateful the closest one is about a half hour away.

After the letters were put on I went and got them laminated.  

I had to think about this one for a minute. How do I keep the fun activities on...turns out all those envelopes that I had lying around finally came into good use.

Then I strung and hung the banner. It looked pretty good if I do say so myself.

It worked so well I made a Welcome Home banner too to celebrate the kids arrival from their super long trip.  

This turned out to be one the best crafts  I had ever done and one that I am thinking of repeating for several other holidays.