Mainland Trip - Welcome to Ashton, Idaho

We spent a whole week in Ashton, Idaho with Christian's family, and it was lovely.  We arrived at the beautiful cabin (picture stolen from the web), and were greeted by these fine folks, waiting on the back porch.  The cabin and the view were unbelievable.  So peaceful.    

On Sunday morning we decided to explore our surroundings and took a short walk down by the river.  Tristan, being obsessed with his older cousins, decided to follow them on the shortcut path back to the cabin and cried for my help getting him up there, therefore my walk was cut short.  It was fine.  It's cute how much he looks up to those boys and tries to be like them.

Later that day we went to check out the Mesa Falls.  It was fun how close we got to the upper falls drop off.  The kids were impressed too.  

And there were some water balloons!

 

We have SO many pictures from this trip.  I'm having a hard time narrowing them down!  A ton more to come.    

Mainland trip - CA and UT

We just came home from a 2 & 1/2 week trip to the mainland.  On our way over to Ashton, Idaho for the Hastings family reunion, the kids and I made a pit stop in Orange County and Salt Lake City to visit with family and friends.  I pretty much tucked my camera away for most of the week, so I hardly have any pictures.  Bummas.

This was a very organized trip to CA.  Before I got there, my mom and I planned out everyday we were there, to make sure we used our time wisely.  I was fortunate enough to be in town for Adrienne's bridal shower, my best friend from 4th grade and up.  She's getting married in October!  It's always fun seeing some of my old high school friends.  On Sunday we got to witness the baby blessing of Liam King DeVilliers, the new baby boy of our friends, Kelly and Jason.  Of course my sister Chelcie got to mess with my hair, color and cut.  And she also did a Brazillian blowout too!  (While being 9 months pregnant!) She's wonderful.  

We made a trip to Knott's Berry Farm, which was so awesome.  The adults took turns going on some of the big rides, while the little one's played around in Snoopy Town.  So fun.  Alisa (Sista in-law) and I went up to LA one day and visited the Fashion District.  We scored on fabric and spent one night sewing up some skirts.  I can't wait to get back there again.    We had a beach day at Huntington Beach 9th St.  BBQ's and smores in the backyard.  LOTS of swimming in the pool.  

Christian flew in at the end of the week so we could celebrate our 10 year anniversary together.  We went out shopping together in the morning, (without kids!), met up with friends Kelly & Jason to eat some grinds from Beach Pit BBQ.  The food there is phenomenal.  It was exactly what we wanted to eat on our anniversary.  Then we came back to the pool to swim and hang out for a while together.  We had big plans to go bowling or to a movie that night, but the kids got super clingy and we needed to pack for our flight to SLC the next morning.  Sad but that's life.          

Off to Salt Lake City we went for the night, before we drove up to Idaho.  We stopped in to have dinner with Nana and Papa at their new place.  Aunt Lina Bean and cousin Lisa joined us.  It was SO good to see them.  Special thanks to Christian for entertaining the kids so I could visit with everyone.    

The kids enjoyed their special rides back to the room.  

I love these guys.  They are so special.

Off to Idaho next, with plenty of pictures to come!  

Homemade Dinner Rolls in the Kitchen Aid

I'm sharing these two dinner roll recipes on my blog because they have changed my life.  You have no idea how far I've come with making dinner rolls.  I had no clue about yeast, and letting dough rise, and kneading the dough, etc.  I wanted so badly to make yummy bread but it was always a disaster.  Christian used to call my dinner rolls baseballs.  They were so hard and heavy, you could throw them across the room and break a window.

Another thing that has saved my life is my kitchen-aid!  I use it almost daily.  I really don't know what I would do without it.  In fact, it's ready to get serviced because a screw is loose inside, and I think I'm going to take it in right before my trip so that they can fix it while I'm gone and I won't miss it!  

The thing that I love about these recipes is that they only take 1 hour to make.  That's usually when I start thinking about what to do for dinner, an hour before.  The other thing is that the kitchen aid does most of the work.  Anyways, without further ado, my 2 most favorite go-to kitchen aid dinner roll recipes;    

Alyse's Dinner Rolls

I learned about this one from my friend Alyse.  She said that this is a recipe from when she was a little girl.  Before the kitchen aid, her mom and all of her sisters would knead the dough for 10 - 20 minutes by hand. 

2 cups Water

2 Tbs. Yeast

1/2 cup Sugar

Place in kitchen aid bowl and let rise for 10 minutes.  Then add and mix the rest of the ingredients below;

2 tsp. Salt

4 3/4 cups Flour

1 Egg

1/4 cup Oil

Let kitchen aid knead on med/high for 10 minutes.  Let rise in bowl for 10 minutes.  Roll them into balls.  I use a combination of flour and oil for my hands and counter space.  Let rolls rise for 10 minutes.  Bake for 10-15 minutes at 375 degrees.  

Pinterest Rolls

This one I learned about from pinterest.  It makes a smaller batch, about 10 rolls.  It's SO easy and so tasty. 

In a kitchen aid mixer bowl, mix the following and let stand for 15 minutes; 

1 cup Warm Water

1/4 cup Sugar

1/3 cup Oil

2 Tbs. Yeast

Add:

1 tsp. salt

1 egg, beaten

Gradually add 3 1/3 cups flour.  Dough will be kind of sticky.  Let stand for 10 minutes.  Spray hands with non-stick cooking spray (or flour/oil) and form into balls.  Place balls so they don't touch on a cookie sheet.  Let rise for 20 minutes.  Back at 375 for 10 minutes.

The recipes are very similar.  Please try these.  I hope they will change your life like they have changed mine!

Sidewalk Painting

Again, thank you Pinterest for these easy and fun outdoor activity ideas.  

So simple.

2 T. Corn Starch

4 T. Water

6-8 Drops of Food Coloring

My busy bees at work;

We may have two lefties? (ignore the last picture).

This week

This is what I get to see when I tuck her into naps each day.  She LOVES nap time and loves to snuggle with her "baby".  And usually when I walk away I'm thinking, "aww man, if only..."  I wish I could trade places with her sometimes.  She looks so dang cozy and I get super jealous on those sleep deprived days.  :)   

 My cute (and not annoying at all) little helpers insist on sitting on the counter while we 'all' make dinner rolls.  My counter space is already limited but we make it work.  They actually turned out really good!

And a fresh picked rose from my little man.  

4th of July

Explaining to Tristan why we celebrate the 4th of July and what we do to celebrate the special day:

Mom "...and we eat watermelon..."

Dad "...and pumpkin pie!"

Tristan "...No, apple pie dad!"

He's already correcting us!  Pumpkin pie is for fall festivities, right?  Anyways, I don't know how he knew that.  This year we actually got to watch a firework show!  We had a lot of fun.  We spent the day out on the north shore at Vland with the Thomson family, then headed over to Turtle Bay to jump in bounce houses, listen to live music, eat yummy pulled pork sandwiches, watermelon, fried rice, hot dogs and cup cakes (no apple pie), and watched a firework show.  It was a long and fun day, and unfortunately we had to end the last 2 hours of it sitting in the car.  The first hour, waiting to get out of Turtle Bay, and then the next hour was on the road to drive home.  With hundreds of cars trying to leave the resort at the same exact time...it took us an hour to get onto Kam Hwy.  I guess next year we will have to take off during the grand finale of the show.  

 The kids and I ate breakfast, while Christian went for a morning surf in town.  

 Betsy, the patriot, checks out her freshly painted toe nails.  

  Purple lips and shivering.  This boy needs to get some meat on him!

 Like this little girl.  She can last a really long time in the water.  This particular day we swam for almost an hour straight before getting out.  And it was only because a rain cloud was coming.  She wanted to stay in.  

 This is her new thing, cheesy smiles for the camera.  

 Dad spent some time pushing Tristan into waves.  He loved it!

Turtle Bay.

 Family pic.  I'm not sure why both of them have crazy eyes.

While waiting for the firework show to start, we got hit by some rain.  Christian ran to the car to grab our beach umbrellas for cover.  As soon as the rain stopped, (at 7:59), everyone started counting down for the 8:00 show.  The timing was perfect.  

On the move

Whenever our screen door opens, there goes Betsy out the door to play and explore.  This little girl loves getting dirty!