How do you fair?

Catalog Living

You HAVE to visit Catalog Living over at Tumblr. It is a riot! Basically, the creator/author (a LA-based actress, writer, and comedian) takes pictures from catalogs and puts a running, comical story to them featuring a couple named Gary and Elaine. I've never laughed so hard in my life! Okay, maybe that's a *slight* hyperbole, but I did laugh pretty hard. Definitely my kind of snarky humor.

Click the picture to visit.

Cuter by the Day

Drew - Twin Falls, Idaho - 2010, originally uploaded by The Shutterbugette.

Robby's 2nd Birthday

Even though Robby's birthday was today, we decided to celebrate it yesterday instead. It was a fun day, full of presents and sugar!

 First, we surprised Rob with a pillow pal Buzz Lightyear and a ton of Hot Wheels. He played with his cars all morning!

 While the boys were napping, I started making Rob's birthday cupcakes - Toy Story theme, of course. I used a special recipe lent to me by a friend, who was nice enough to share her secret cupcakes with me.

After the boys got done napping, we headed to Cher's, where there was a filled swimming pool waiting for him to splash around in.

Despite Drew's grumpy face, fun was had by all. I love this picture.

Nana (Cher) lighting his candle. He actually blew it out!

Frosting's best when it's blue.

We topped off the evening o' fun with a bubble gun and new Buzz Lightyear jammies (this was taken pre-jammies because he decided to jump back into the pool with his street clothes on). Also another favorite picture of mine.

This one's just for Grams. He loves the little vehicles you guys got him - especially the combine Gramps picked out for him! See how it's leading the convoy?

I really can't believe I have a two-year-old. It's sad and wonderful all at the same time. We are so blessed to have known this sweet little guy for two whole years now!

Happy Birthday Chronicles!

HAPPY 2ND BIRTHDAY CHRONICLES!!!

This mama's been bloggin' for two whole years, now! Trials, joys, hardships, births, sarcasm - this blog has seen it all! Here's to another great year of blogging!

Just for fun, go read my very first post.

Brownie Silk Pie Recipe

This is my new creation that I came up with. Basically, you take the crust and brownie part of the strawberry fudge pie recipe, but instead of cheesecake, you put chocolate pudding on top. Matt's not a big fan of cheesecake, so I was happy to make him this extra chocolately version. It really needed whipped cream, but we didn't have any, nor the funds to buy any (sad, no?), so we topped it with nuts intead. Yum.

A Hat-Lovin' Family

Well, except for me, I guess. I've never been able to find a hat I don't look dorky in, but my boys sure love them. I really don't think Drew has a choice in the matter, so I'm just going to group him into the bunch.

Rob decided that Drew needed to wear Daddy's hat yesterday. I don't know how Drew felt about that, but Rob and I had a good laugh.

Hats, Day 2. Today Rob was nice enough to share his own hat.

There's a new gang in town - the Bucket Hat Boys.

I managed to dig out this cute little hat that was once Rob's.

Ranch Chicken-Bacon Pizza Recipe

Before we get to the recipe...

If you're not drooling, there's something wrong with you. This pizza is SOOO good, I stuffed myself silly and regretted it later.

Ranch Chicken-Bacon Pizza

Crust:

1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
1 teaspoon white sugar
1 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
2 1/2 cups bread flour
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon salt

Toppings:

1-2 chicken breast, cooked and cubed
4-5 strips of bacon, cooked and cubed
1 6 oz. jar of marinated artichoke hearts (optional - I used these on another pizza a few nights before - YUM)

Sauce:

1 16 oz. container Dean's Ranch Dip
Hidden Valley Ranch, to taste and to thin a bit
garlic powder, to taste

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. In a medium bowl, dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.

2. Stir in flour, salt, and oil. Beat until smooth. Let rest for 5 minutes.

3. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and pat or roll into a round. Transfer crust to a lightly greased pizza pan or baker's peel dusted with cornmeal. Mix together sauce ingredients and spread about half of the container (or to your liking) on to dough. Spread with desired toppings and bake in preheated oven for 10-15 minutes, or until golden brown. Let baked pizza cool for 5 minutes before serving.

Pepsi Night at the Speedway

Sorry I have not updated in awhile and that this post is over a week late, but as usual, things have been crazy.

Last weekend was not only a holiday weekend, but I also had a wedding to shoot, a evening with two of my boys at the speedway, and a 4th of July BBQ to attend. We were kind of pooped by the time Monday rolled around. Thankfully, Matt had Monday off, so we all rested up in preparation for the week ahead of us. Before getting to the point of this post, I would like to say that the wedding went swimmingly. It was small and simple, so it made shooting it a breeze. If you would like to see some of the shots I took, you can skip over to my photoblog post by going here. I didn't shoot any of the fireworks this year. Frankly, after a whole afternoon of shooting the wedding, I was kind of tired of taking pictures. I know - it's a sin for a photographer to say that. It was nice just to sit with my little family and church family watching the spectacular fireworks that almost didn't happen (a big hub-bub over the 4th falling on a Sunday this year). It was a blessed time.

So - on to Pepsi Night. Since Pepsi is a big sponsor of the Magic Valley Speedway, one night in the summer all the employees and customers get treated to tickets and dinner. It's a major highlight for us, who are closet racing fans and hey - it's free stuff! It's always a lot of fun, but this year we decided to take Robby with us since he's finally old enough to appreciate it. And appreciate it he did! This kid goes coo-coo for all things vehicular - especially race cars. He didn't know what to do with himself when he figured out where we were.

This is the expression he wore for about the first hour. He would whisper "wow" everytime a car roared by.

My boys looking handsome in their hats.

Up close and personal with the cars. The driver in the truck right in front of them was nice enough to wave at Robby. Rob thought that was funny.

Up close and personal with Rob. We started to lose his attention at this point, but he stuck it out til the end.

See? Ear protection. We're good parents. Sometimes. I said "good". Not "perfect".

I love it when he wears his hat backwards. He only does it because Daddy does.

Nevermind the cars! Look! An ant!

If all else fails, buy the kid some cotton candy and then put the bucket on his head. That will entertain him. Or just you.

Here's an insane video of them blowing up an anvil. Next to the trailer races at the end, this was the craziest and scariest thing I've ever seen. 55 lb. anvil + 1 lb. black powder = 200 ft. of terror. This was the second time they blew it up, but the first time they used less powder, so it was *only* 100 ft. The anvil buried itself so deep the second time, they had to use a truck to pull it out. Crazy rednecks. We giggled.

Overall, fun was had by all and we stayed up way too late and ate way too much junk. It was a lot of fun having a Mama/Daddy evening with Rob - and he seemed to like it, too! A big thanks to Cher for staying late and watching the baby so we could go out!