It has been 8 years since I blogged. Life got busy. I didnt know my password and so. Was reading thru my old blogs and just wondered if I could even get on here. I did, so I'm gonna try and post something just for fun. All my kids have grown up so much. I'm not going to write a lot because I'm not sure it will work so I won't waste to much time. I'll attach a picture for fun do you can all see how much the kids have grown.
It has been one year and 2 months since I last blogged. I have no idea how life and living got away with me but I am back and decided that would jump on here because my sister wanted to see pictures of everything I have been telling her about for the last year. So I am going to do that today.
We just got back from Victoria Island in British Columbia Canada where we stayed a week for Spring Break at the Stunning Pacific Shores Resort and Spa.
We had to take a ferry from the US to the Island, here is a picture of the whole family on the boat over.
Our resort was an amazing place and even had free Kayaking that we took full advantage of as well as swimming daily in the wonderful pool. We even got to watch them feed the fish in their enormous fish tank.
We also got to go to Miniature world in Victoria which is super cool Here is some video and Pictures from that adventure.
We also went to a bug Zoo and all the kids got to hold many different kinds of bugs here are just a few of the 65 videos we took.
We hit most of the Tourist attractions all over the island but my favorite turned out to be playing with all the baby goats at Beacon Hill Park and Petting Zoo.
Later in the week we went to Tiger Lilly Farms and We got to milk goats then bottle feed baby goats. We hung out with baby cows, and Jerika fell in love with the baby chickens and spent much of her time inside their cage playing with them. The kids also got to go on Pony rides at Tiger Lilly Farm.
We also visited Parliament and the amazing Empress Hotel as well.
We hit the farmers market "goats on the roof" which has goats eating the eco roofs and took tons of pictures at the statues there.
We took over 600 pictures but I gave you a little taste of this really fun filled vacation. I hope you liked it and I also hope it takes me less than a year to get back in and write on my blog.
February is now over and we get to shop again. I'm heading out soon, as I have lots of things to buy.
It was an adventure not spending money. I still am amazed that we did not prepare for it at all and all we spent was 12 dollars for eggs and butter the whole month. We saved so much money by baking and using food that probably would have been ignored and gone bad. So we are thrilled with our adventures in frugalness. But now I am just dying to shop again.
Also, I am glad that we accidentally picked the shortest month of the year to do this. How lucky.
It snowed yesterday and I was thrilled. I have been dying for it to snow this year. School was canceled and Joe stayed home to work. We played on sleds, drank Hot cocoa, made snowmen, and then cuddled up in blankets afterwards.
The kids and I headed out at around 9am to play, which turned out good since it was all melted by noon. I didn't even get pictures of the snowmen the kids made before they melted. Oh well at least we had one morning of snow. Here is a short video of the kids sledding down our front lawn.
Feb 16th- Joseph has been sick this week and so he stayed home a couple of days, luckily he is able to work from home, he sat on that couch all day but lunchtime, working his little heart out, my poor sick guy-
Feb 17th-Joe's dad, has two toy poodles that he recently bread. Here are their puppies. They are all sold and gone now but before they left we went over to play with them. They are so cute and bark a lot. Trenton and Jennedy would not hold them but the rest of us enjoyed their cuteness.
Feb 18th-Little tiny body parts amaze me. Maybe it is weird, but I love Trenton's tiny wrists, they seem so fragile to me and remind me how small my children really are. I decided to take a picture, because it is something I think about a lot when I cuddle with him. I think about how small he used to be and how he gets bigger every day. I love those tiny wrists and know that they will get bigger and he will get stronger and he someday he wont be my little boy anymore. I will miss these tiny wrists. Boo Hoo.
Feb 19th-Some french bread I made. It was amazingly yummy.
Feb 20th-Jennedy and Trenton found some chapstick, put a ton on, then kissed the mirror a bunch. I laughed so hard when I saw it. Funny kids. 
Feb 21-Trenton's disasters are legendary. Here is a small one, where he put books all down the halls. See below for his explanation of why he did it.
Feb 22- I did not take a picture this day so instead I will give you a video of Trenton's explanation of the picture above.
Feb 23-Trenton likes to hide his food when he is done with it, I think he worries I will make him eat it or something. I find food hidden under sinks, behind the furnace and under beds. This day I said "when everyone eats their lunch we can have hot cocoa." I should have waited with that bit of info until later because Trenton snuck out of the room and later came in saying, "I ate all my food, can I have cocoa." I'm not dumb, so I had him show me where he hid his food, Here he is after showing me his macaroni and cheese he hid under the pac and play. Look at those sad eyes.
You may be wondering how we are doing in our NON-SPENDING MONTH of February. Well it is hard, dang hard, but really cool in many ways too. Like how we stay at home with each other more, playing games and enjoying just being together. We cook more together too. Also my picky eater, Trenton is actually trying new foods.
We have had a few problems though.
We ran out of butter the first day I made bread and that was a bummer, you can't eat yummy bread right out of the oven without butter. We were so sad. So Joe and I decided that we had to have butter, so we made an exception. We spent six dollars.
Then we ran out of Ketchup, that was weird. We usually have several bottles always in food storage. Guess we didn't stock up well enough. After discussing the situation Joe and I decided that we could do without Ketchup for a month and we were not gonna buy it.
Then I decided to make my own ketchup and that was awesome.
Then on the 14th we ran out of eggs. Everything you bake uses eggs and we don't have any powdered eggs or anything in our food storage, so after some discussion, Joe and I decided that we would get eggs, we spent 6 dollars and bought a ton to get us through the month.
That is it. We have done so well. We have spent 12 dollars for half a month and feel like we can get through the rest of the month. I will keep you posted.
Feb 13- I made Ketchup. It turned out so yummy too. So today you get 3 pictures of this experiment.
Feb 14th-Valentines was fun, the kids made us crafty valentines that were so cute. Joe brought me breakfast in bed, and I decided to make a heart cake for each of my little, and one big Valentine.
Then I made a yummy dinner with Tri-tip beef, rolls, green beans, and stuffing.
You get two pictures today too.
Feb 15th-I decided I wanted Krispy Kreme doughnuts. So I looked up the recipe online and we made them. Our shaping of them was far from the perfection you get at Krispy Kreme after all I let the kids cut them out too. But the taste was perfection.
Feb 7th-I did not take a picture for this day so I am going to show you a video of the kids showing me their robot persona's instead.
Feb 8th-I have been baking up a storm, here is Jennedy eating scones I made for snacks this day. Since we are not purchasing items we no longer have fruit snacks, fish crackers, graham crackers, chips, or any of that snack food we all take for granted. So we are having fun seeing what I can make to have for after school snacks. The scones were a big hit for the kids. 
Feb 9th- I have been sprouting wheat to increase the nutritional value even more in my wheat bread. We soak it for 12 hours, let it sprout, then dry it, then grind it. And there you have it, super healthy, full of nutrients bread, and its Yummy too. 
Feb 10th- There is always some type of bread rising in my kitchen each day. Here are some delicious wheat rolls just rising, waiting to hit the oven. My friend brought her kids over this day and we had rolls for snack time. They loved them, in fact they ate them all and wanted the bread I had cooked too. It made me feel really great that everyone loves my "snacks" so much.
Feb 11th-Here is Trenton painting, isn't painting fun? I joined in the painting this day and did some adorable pictures of Dora. Having young Children really keep me feeling like a kid at heart. 
Feb 12th- Here is another day and batch of delicious wheat rolls cooked and ready for dinner.
Feb 2-
I have been doing preschool for my little ones at home. They love it and so do I. I got them these chalk boards at the dollar store to practice writing our letters on and they love them. They make the cutest pictures Here is one of Jennedy and her drawing of a happy sun. Notice it is wearing a coconut top and a grass skirt. You will see Trenton's below.
Feb 3- Trenton's picture of a sun. 
Feb 4-
I have started baking a lot now that we are not spending money this month. These are the homemade hamburger buns I made for our veggies burgers. Oh my were they tasty. Why bother buying buns when making them is so easy and way yummier. 
Feb 5-I caught the kids playing robots, here is their creative robot costumes. They used a letter puzzle we have to make them. It was so funny to hear them talk like robots. I love that I get to laugh so much being a mom. 
Feb 6-I borrowed my friends wheat grinder so that I could grind my food storage wheat to use in bread making. Here is Joe helping to grind the wheat. Not spending money has really made me bake so much more just so we have food to eat and it has actually been so much fun. I feel like Holly Homemaker. We decided that we need to buy a grinder when we get to spend money again, so I can continue to bake yummy wheat breads. 
Feb 7- For the treat for Family Home evening Jennedy wanted to roast marshmallows. We have tons of the caramel flavored ones so we roasted them over our stove on skewers. Fun stuff.
Feb 1st
Here is Jennedy playing the Kids guitar. We love music in our family. I kinda play the guitar, and the kids love for me to entertain them on my guitar, so we got them this one. Actually it was a gift from Emma, my sister Tammy's, daughter.
Jan 30th-
We love when Daddy makes Chocolate Chip pancakes. I think we even had the missionaries over this day to eat them with us. Thanks daddy you are the best. 
So my husband and I had a discussion last night about money. Money, we really like it, we collect it and guess what?!?! We also like to spend it. Im sure you get that.
Well in our discussion we decided it might be fun, and helpful to our bank account, if we did not spend money.
How does one live without spending money? I'm thinking that they don't, they die of hunger, or exposure to the elements or something.
Well we don't want to die, but we wondered if we could do it...Not buy anything for the whole month of February. Could you do it?
We have to pay bills, so that is spending, but we decided bills do not count, so we are gonna pay those, we don't wanna lose our house, or be without electricity or gas.
But we set a goal to not do any shopping and spend any money in February.
I am sure you may be worried that we might just starve. Do not worry because we are collectors of food, not only do we have lots of food storage in our garage, but we have tons of food crammed in our cabinets, pantry, fridge, freezer, and our outside freezer. Sometimes we find things at the bottom of our freezer we should have eaten years earlier.
So on the food front, we are gonna be creative and try to use up most if not all of the food we have had hanging around for way too long. We are actually thinking this might be fun. Creative meals are always fun, dont you think.
So now that we have this new goal, all I think about is shopping. I wanna buy, buy, buy.
In fact I just thought...What about Valentines? I have to get my kids and husband valentines...My kids need the ones to bring to school too. I guess we are gonna have to do hand made, home made things. Sounds like a lot of work. Hmmm. Wish me luck.
Jan 13th- Here we have a picture of the home made bread bowls I made this night and melted brie in. Oh my goodness were they delicious!!!
Jan 14th- Here is our van door. The handle has been snapped off by me. boo hoo
Jan 15th- This Saturday, Joe and I set out to replace our handle on our car. Joe broke it with his amazing muscles last summer. We have lived with it for awhile, since we could still open the door. Finally the week before this I snapped the whole thing off. So we ordered a new one and researched online how to put it in, and that is what we did on Saturday. It took us about 4 hours, but we had a great time. We love doing projects together and we laughed a lot as we sat in our van and fogged up the windows, while putting in our new handle.
Jan 16th- Here is a picture of Trenton at bedtime, he is sporting a crown that his big sister Jerika made for him. He is really our little prince. 
Jan 17th- We have a great friendship with our Girls Birth mom and visit with her frequently. I love this so much because I get to see Jonathan our foster Son who was in care with us for the first 11 months of his life. It is great to see him. On this day we picked Jonathan and the Birth mother up and took them to McDonalds to eat and play. I took some pictures, in this one I am amazed at how much Jennedy looks like her brother.
Jan 18th- Laundry day. With a family of six we have a lot of laundry, I do it all one day a week. My kids help a lot, each child has a basket and we fold their laundry and put it in each basket. We also have a sock basket, and two pajama baskets for each room. Here is what the house looks like on this laundry day.
Jan 19th- I like to take Trenton and Jennedy to the Mall, they have a fun indoor play area and when it gets stormy, which is very often in Portland, we have to have some place great to go.
Jan 20th- My husband turned 33 this day. I made him brownies and put a recess peanut butter cup recipe filling I had on file, on the top of the brownies, I also dropped chocolate chips on top, Lets just say it was an amazing melt in your mouth taste explosion of yumminess. 
Jan 21th- Grandma Darling and Pop Pop (what my kids call my parents) sent books to my children. It was such a wonderful surprise. The kids loved the books. They are avid readers.
Don't you love how Trenton is dressed up like a princess, you can tell he is growing up in house full of girly girls.
Jan 22-We went out with our friends for Joes birthday doing our traditional restaurant hopping/ Progressive dinner. We did breakfast and lunch and went to places from the show on food network called "Diners, drive in's and Dives." We watch that show and our mouths water, so we looked for all the ones in Portland and hit them for the signature dish we saw on the show. Here we are at the Arleta Library Cafe and Bakery. Wow, we had their Biscuits and Gravy and it was so so amazing. We are going there again for sure. You can see Joe as a shadow in the picture.
Jan 23-Joseph and Jerika doing her homework. She brings home weekly math homework that requires an adult playing some type of math game with her. Joe enjoys playing these with her and she loves the daddy daughter time. 
Jan 24- My girls now all have Nintendo DS's and here they are on the couch playing them. Trenton has my new smart phone, the Droid X, which I love BTW. He likes to play all the games. They are truly the electronic generation.
Jan 25- Since I did not take a picture for this day, Yes I got busy. I'm trying ok. So I will put in a picture from this week, one from McDonalds with Jonathan and his sisters.
Jan 26-Here is Trenton again, this time sporting the Barbie sun glasses.
Jan 27- Oh my, Jennedy can open her mouth so big. When she asks me to feed her something she opens her mouth wide. I crack up every time. So I decided to capture her amazing mouth. Here it is. 
Jan 28- I didn't take a picture for this day. So here is the one from our Progressive dinner for Joes birthday. Me and one of my very best friends, Dawn.
Jan 29-I didn't take a picture for this day. So here is another one from our Progressive dinner for Joes birthday. It is of my hot husband and his best friend Micheal.
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