Catch-Up

We are finally back up and running after being gone for Thanksgiving and coming back to no internet. So, to catch up on all that has been happening around here....

We had a blast with the Potters and Candace and April the weekend before Thanksgiving. Then, we were able to head down to Utah for some Thanksgiving vacationing with great food and family. We went Black Friday shopping thanks to Mom and Dad being willing to keep an eye on Sam while he slept. We scored some great deals on Blu-rays, a shop vac, a fancy grill and some various other items. We had a great time going shooting as is tradition in the Whatcott clan and Robert was thrilled to get his new gun's scope in prime setting for the few days he had left to go elk hunting. Then we enjoyed a night out with Candace and April and dates seeing the lights at Temple Square and trying some yummy Mexican food.

These first two pictures are to show how blustery the weather was here before we left for Thanskgiving. The wind was terrible and while we were gone our front door blew open again! I took the top one to show how unprotecting our garage can be against the wind! :) When we arrived home Sunday evening, Robert couldn't wait to open up and start putting together his new grill.

Here are a couple of shots of Sammy helping Daddy put the grill together (he loves to squint his eyes for pictures now) while Mommy enjoyed watching "The Blind Side" on Blu-ray. Robert was especially excited to buy this grill because you can grill either using propane or brickettes(?), which will be nice to use with all the steaks we get each year from our company-provided cow.

Some exciting news at our house: I got my Christmas gift early - an iPod touch AND, Robert was unable to go hunting yesterday and was quite dejected that he only had one day left to use his new gun and to score an elk (he didn't get one last year or a deer either year), but this morning he and his boss headed out early on the snowmobiles and he called me around 11 saying he had his prize! It wasn't entirely big, but the point is he got one and that we will have two kinds of meat to enjoy this year!

Last night we went and bought our tree - a real one again! We thought about buying an artificial tree during Black Friday, but both of us grew up with fake trees and we want to hold out a bit longer, so we have the fantastic piney smell filling our house and I can't wait to put up the lights on the house and the decorations on the tree (we bought it bundled up, so we had to let it open)

This last picture is just a heartwarmer for me not only because my little guy is growing up so much and getting cuter every day, but because he is getting to be such a big boy. We are working on letting him be more independent, so I told him to go to his bed to take a nap instead of taking him myself and tucking him in and giving him the talk about going to sleep and no playing. Not five minutes later, I opened his door a crack check on him and he is fast asleep! Also, more and more often I find him sleeping with his arms behind his head, like he is relaxing in a recliner - too cute!

Grateful for my Husband

My post today is dedicated to my wonderful husband, Robert. This weekend we were able to have my older sister and her family come visit briefly, along with two of my other sisters from Utah. It was wonderful to get to see all of them again, but it was a little stressful going from three people (four if you count Jake) to thirteen. On top of that, I agreed to substitute in Primary without realizing what else was happening this weekend. I've never taught Primary. In fact, I've never taught any class and thus was a little nervous. Robert, however, is the greatest teacher and he gets lots of practice being one of the teachers for the 11 and 12 year olds. He was such a huge help this weekend with everyone being here making meals, getting Saturday off of work, letting me and my sisters go shopping and out to dinner Saturday night and then helping me with my Primary lesson on Sunday (it helped that he had taught the same lesson the week before). I am so blessed to have such an amazing husband who will step in and help when I need him, in whatever capacity. I'm grateful for him and his willingness to serve those around him, no matter how busy or tired he is. We are greatly looking forward to traveling down to Utah to spend Thanksgiving week with my parents and a few of the siblings, if this snow will ever let up! :) We hope you all enjoy your Thanksgiving week with whomever ends up at your table!

Odds and Ends

First off, I thought I might share this cute picture we had taken of Sam in his Halloween costume. Our local studio offered a free Halloween 4x5 to those who donated a canned item and we finally got the picture back. This was after the kids Halloween party and Sam was a little grumpy and refused to smile for the camera, but I still think he looks so adorable as a ninja!

Our local weatherman (Daddy) said today was supposed to be extremely windy and cold. I guess he forgot about the snow that was to come as well because we got this much snow in less than two hours. But of course it has all melted by now. We had a fun experience this morning of waking up to our front door open, but with the handle still locked and the chain still on. The bad wind last night must have forced the door open despite the handle being locked, so I guess it is time to get a real, working dead bolt.

Things lately have been pretty laid back. We spent the morning in our jammies warming up next to the fire and playing cars and trucks. Don't you just love Sam's knee socks? My latest funny story from Sam is from Sunday after church. He had colored a picture in nursery and was very excited about it, so Daddy told him to go put it on the fridge. Later in the day, I discovered that he had not put it on the fridge, but IN it! There it was, sitting atop the eggs, waiting to be admired by anyone scavenging for food. We both had a great laugh and I took the picture out. Later, when Sam had woken up and found his picture out of the fridge, he took it and put it again IN the fridge. Who knows the workings of the two-year-old mind? :) We have enjoyed having Uncle Jake with us for the last few weeks and will be sad to see him leave this Friday. But we won't be alone for long when Uncle Ben, Aunt Corinne and the gang come to stay with us for one night on their way to a reunion and Aunt Candace and Aunt April come up to join in the family fun, so it should be a great weekend!!

Entertaining

This last Sunday we had the great opportunity to have our good friends, the Southwicks, over for dinner and Robert's little brother and his girlfriend. When we were first married, we loved to entertain people at our home. We would usually invite another couple over for dinner and games and we would go all out for dinner. But since moving to Rigby, we have had many things that have put entertaining by the wayside and I forgot how much I have missed cooking for other people and just plain enjoying other people's company for an evening. We are starting to get low on our meat supply and I only had two roasts to choose from for dinner, both being on the slim side for 6 adults, so I thought I would try making Hutspot to help make up the difference. Hudspot is a traditional Dutch dish my mother's father told us about and that I grew up having once or twice a year. It is basically potatoes, carrots and onions all peeled, cut and cooked until mushy and mashed together with gravy on top. It was a big hit and I am so grateful to have such a strong husband to help with all the mashing! The other big hit of the night was the dessert. The Southwicks have been in Boise for the last year or so and have not had the privilege to try my cake creations and requested that I make something special. (ok, they didn't say that exactly, but it was explicitly implied) I am making a cake next week for my sister's baby blessing and then two weeks later we are making a dozen pies for Thanksgiving, so I decided to go a little lighter and try filled cupcakes. I think most have picked up that my favorite combo is the cream cheese frosting with strawberries with either white or strawberry cake, so I made white cupcakes and filled them with a variety of fruit fillings (including strawberry) and iced them generously with cream cheese icing. I should have taken a picture, but by the time I thought of it, all 24 cupcakes were gone - and yes, they were that good! I really liked the idea to fill the cupcakes, although I need to work on sensing how much filling I have squirted in. So another success is added to my belt of yummy desserts. Thanks so much to the Southwicks for driving out to our place and bringing Ticket to Ride - it was great to enjoy the old times of entertaining friends with good food and fun!!

Halloween Preparations

Here's Sam in his Halloween costume for this year - a ninja! He loves wearing the headband, but it is on the tight side, so it can't be worn for too long! Sam loved getting to wear his costume to storytime on Wednesday and getting to see his buddies Josh and Lilly in their awesome homemade costumes. I'm just realived that this year it isn't a fight to get him to dress up!

And on Tuesday we had William and his Mommy come over to help us decorate some spooky Halloween cupcakes I saw on Make It & Love It and wanted to try. Sam was obsessed with the eyeball cupcakes and enjoyed eating them immensely!

And here are the mummy and ghost cupcakes. These were so much fun to put together, I think it would be great to do these for the "Boo"ing thing that goes around the neighborhoods next year because they really get you in the spirit of Halloween!

All of the finished cupcakes. Thanks William & Co. for coming over to help us make these yummy treats!

Annual Pumpkin Carving

It's time again for our annual FHE pumpkin carving. This year was made extra fun by the fact that we grew our own pumpkins and Uncle Jake was here to join in the fun! Jake's is on the left, then Robert's in the middle and mine on the end. Mine was a Frankenstein, but is hard to see because the features were so small. And probably that I'm not an expert at carving pumpkins, but we all had fun anyways!

Focusing really hard on getting it just right :) We have found a great way to get a cool picture on your pumpkin is to print out a stencil or shadow and using a nail or some other small object, poke holes all around the outline and then use the knife to carve the picture following the holes. Works every time!

Crazy Week

Sorry I haven't posted all week. My good friend had her baby and we have been doing our best to help them out in any way we can. We have also been adjusting to having Uncle Jake here with us as well, but it has been a good adjustment. Daddy has been going out every night after work trying to put his new gun to good use, but no luck as of yet. We are hopefully headed out soon for Utah to visit with my family and my grandpa who is here visiting from Virginia, so hopefully some fun pictures are to come soon! Have a great weekend everyone!

Can't Believe It

I can't believe it! We are FINALLY done with harvest for this year!! This year felt so very, very long for me and Sam and I can imagine it felt the same for Robert, too. What I also can't believe is how we have acquired yet another firearm!! Yep, somehow I was convinced to let Robert buy yet another gun. This will be gun #4 for him now. Our new addition is a Ruger 300 Winchester Mag. Robert has had hunting fever ever since he went elk hunting with my dad that first year and begged and pleaded with me that he needed his own gun and that the three other ones he owned just weren't right for the job. Don't get me wrong, I am glad to see my husband so happy with his new toy, I just can't believe how many guns we have acquired in not so many years! We each have a shotgun and Robert has a pistol and his Mini 14 and now the Winchester Mag.
In other news, Robert's brother is staying with us for a few weeks and so far it's going well. Sam loves wrestling and demanding Uncle Jakey to play with him and Robert likes having another guy to talk tractors, farming and guns with. As for me, I've pretty much finished up my canning for the year. We ended up with peaches, pears, peach jam, green beans and apple pie filling. I will probably can potatoes, but that can be put on hold for a while. Hope you all have a great weekend!

Trip to Logan

Last week Sam and I were able to take a quick trip down to Logan to spend some time with my baby sister and her husband and their new little guy, Thomas.

Even though this picture doesn't show it, Thomas is a very good-natured baby and it was such a blast to get to hold him and not compete with anyone but Mommy for snuggle time!

Sam really enjoyed getting to play with Uncle John while we visited - he misses his Daddy so much!

While there we were able to do a few things like sew some Pee Pee Tee Pee's to help with the whizzing little boys tend to do when you change their diapers! We also made a few meals, got Mommy a boppy to help with breastfeeding and starting working on some cutesy-fied burp clothes and getting the supplies to make a nursing cover as well. (that IS coming sometime soon, April, sorry!)

And last, but not least, one of the conditions of us coming to visit was that I had to make a cake for the Kimballs. We settled on fruity yumminess of a strawberry cake with strawberry filling and topping and cream cheese icing. It was very good! It was a great trip and we were so happy to be able to come down and enjoy some time with the Kimballs all to ourselves - thanks for having us guys!

A Good One

Yesterday was my birthday and it turned out to be a pretty good one. It was General Conference and my friend invited Sam and me over to help do some canning and play. We accomplished alot by finishing all 44 quarts of our potato/carrot/onion mix and processing two batches of 14 by the end of the day (they had to be pressure cooked, which takes FOREVER) During the priesthood session, we loaded the kiddies in the car and drove to Coldstone to pick out an ice cream cake and settled on the strawberry cheesecake variety - so yummy!!! Robert insisted that I couldn't make my own birthday cake (although I did last year and this year I actually WANTED to make my own birthday cake) and said we should try an ice cream cake again (we've tried the ones from Dairy Queen before) and I had a coupon for $3 off at Coldstone, so it all worked out great! I really like these cakes because instead of all ice cream, they are layers of both cake and ice cream, as you can see in the pic :)

And my sisters know how much I love flowers and sent this gorgeous arrangement of purple and peach flowers in a cool vase! Thanks sis's!! So even though Robert was gone, we were able to stay happy and busy and make the most of the day! Thanks to everyone for their birthday wishes yesterday!!