A princess to marry her King

Last night my little sister, Melissa, got engaged to her boyfriend. Congratulations Melissa and Taylor!
Ironically, she was always the little princess of the family and now she is marrying Taylor KING. I always wondered if she really would find a way to marry into royalty :)

Scripture Cake Recipe

A lot of people have been asking for this recipe so here it is:

It is from the Essential Mormon Cookbook by Julie Badger Jensen ( my very favorite cookbook!)

Some of the scriptures are a little bit of a stretch, but most of them contain the exact ingredient. So we put out all the ingredients ob the table and had the kids listen to each scripture and decide which ingredient came next.

1 cup Judges 5:25 (butter)
1/2 cup Exodus 27:20 (olive oil)
2 cups Proverbs 16:24 (Sugar)
2 tablespoons 1 Samuel 14:25 (honey)
3 Isaiah 10:14 (eggs)
1/4 cup Joshua 5:6 (milk)
2 cups 1 Kings 4:22 (white Flour)
1 cup D&C 89:14 (whole wheat flour)
1 teaspoon Leviticus 2:13 (salt)
1 teaspoon Amos 4:5 (baking soda)
2 teaspoons Exodus 30:23 (cinnamon)
3 cups Proverbs 25:11 (apples, peeled and grated)
1 cup Genesis 43:11 (chopped pecans or walnuts)

Cream butter, oil and sugar. Add eggs and milk, beat until creamy. Mix dry ingredients together. Combine wet with dry and bake in a 9x13 at 350 degrees for 50 minutes.

Scripture Power! Cake!

Tonight we made cake based on a bunch of ingredients listed in different verses from the scriptures. It was pretty much just plain delicious, and the kids listened better than I ever thought they would. They're great kids!

More flags! More Fun!

So this past Saturday my work rented out the whole Six Flags Fiesta Texas amusement park, and it was AWESOME! The kids rode roller coasters (little ones), log rides, airplanes, Scooby Doo rides (like Buzz Light Year at Disneyland), a wave runner ride and best of all bumper cars... and a train too. Towards the end of the day, we were able to find some friends to swap baby sitting with and Amy and I hit 4 rides in an hour! It was so much fun! Here are some pics from our day:

Fashion consultant for hire

As I have grown up, my mom has always given me great fashion advice. (Anyone who knows my mom knows exactly what I am talking about! Love you mom.)I was excited to have my own little girl and help her learn what is cute on her. Well today I learned that being fashionable may have just skipped a generation because now my daughter is telling me what is cute and she is right!

This morning I was getting Abby ready for preschool. I thought she looked pretty cute in a pink long sleeved top and a denim skirt. As I went to do her hair she insisted on wearing a yellow headband with the pink ponytail holder I was putting in her hair. I thought "Oh, no, my little girl wants some weird 80's hair style, all kinds of crazy mismatched things in her hair." But she convinced me to try it. It was adorable! I didn't get a picture because I didn't think to take one until after preschool and by then it wasn't really done anymore. But take my word for it, she looked like she was in a gapkids ad!

So as it turns out it doesn't look good for me ever really knowing what is cute all on my own. But between my mom and Abby, I might be saved from ever wearing socks with sandals or any other major faux pas.

Baby food!

Amy picked up a high chair today after Evan's doctor's appointment, and so begins the introduction of baby food. He didn't take too well to the stuff on his first taste this afternoon, but for dinner he was doing so much better we decided to give Abby and Collin a shot at feeding him. Check out the pictures below!

First day of school!

Yesterday morning was Abby and Collin's first day of preschool - they were both really excited and both had a great first day. Abby learned that spiders have exoskeletons ("bones on the outside") and people have endoskeletons ("bones on the inside"). Collin learned his teachers name and that blowing in and out on your juice box can have negative effects, like, oh, throwing up all over yourself. :) Turns out Collin's already the class clown because he reportedly had the whole class laughing before he let his lunch go. Criminitly, trigger.

Anyhow, here are some pictures of them on their first day:

My first 10k

So this past weekend I ran/walked my first 10k as part of the Nike+ human race. I've been running more and more since Evan was born and have loved tracking my progress with the Nike+ tools. It's also been pretty inspiring to see what Dan and Amy's parents have been able to accomplish over the last couple of years. But more than anything, I had a bit of scare a few months ago when I went to donate blood and got turned away because my blood pressure was too high. I sat there, eating the Nutter Butter and drinking the caffeine-free Dr. Pepper the blood donation people let me eat and thought, "You've got to be kidding me - I'm not even 30 yet." It was quite a rude awakening. I've been regularly running and walking with the family and am about 2 miles shy of 100 miles run and walked over the last 4 months, and the BP is looking much better.

Nike+ tools record my pace for each run or walk and here's what my 10k looks like:


So I'm not the fastest guy out there, but if I've looked at totals correctly, I'm in the top half of people that ran the race. Ta-dow - not bad for guy who played offensive line in high school.