14 years

14 years ago today, a charming man came into my life and he's here to stay. for this i am thankful, he has given me  amazing kids to love and adore. wonderful memories, a sense of peace when waters are rough, arms to fall into, good examples of hard work & persistence. he pushes me out of my bubble when i need it most, encourages me to strive for my goals, pushes us to be better, listens to me with his heart..

thank you 

i love you boo

Surprise!!

 Meet Rex!  

Our new English lab. And we are in love!
he is 7 weeks old.

 This is my old man, Jag. And I love him more than anything. {well except my kids}

Jag is 9.5 years old, and he is getting tired, so he needed a rambunctious puppy to keep him going. 

 So here we are in a place called Orting, I've never heard of...

 trying to pick a Lab,

 7 to choose from, how to choose just one?

 First we decided it needed to be a male, then he had to be sweet, and lastly, he had to have the characteristics of the English lab, not the American lab. The mama dog was an American black lab, and the daddy was an English lab. So some took after their mom and some their dad.

This is the puppy I wanted!

But John is the chooser of pets and their names in our house so he picked Rex. And really~ I don't think you can go wrong with a lab..if you can get through the chewing phase. :)

I feel a surprise brewing...

Braces

 The before.

 The during.

 The after.

two very expensive beautiful smiles :)

Spring Break 2012

 We kicked off spring break heading to my new FAVORITE place on earth to eat.

Pinkeys

REMEMBER THE NAME, YOUR GONNA WANT TO TRY IT!

They have the best macaroni and cheese, and their pulled pork is to die for! The sliders, which is all we ever get because even one can fill up a grown man or a  pre teenage boy and is made on  homemade rolls. {you can see the flour still on them!} So you have to sit in a tent, but every last freezing cold moment of it is worth it I tell ya.  Go. Try it. You won't regret it.

 So Seattle can be beautiful, if you have the patience to wait out all the rain, you will be rewarded with an occasional gorgeous day.  Truth be told, April started off this way and has pretty  much held steady so far. Keep our fingers crossed it's a sign of a beautiful summer to come.

True found a lady bug first thing, he and I love those little red bugs.

 Made the kids pose..and that they did.

 Shilo, True and I had an afternoon of cookie making.

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2012/02/chocolate-cookies-with-toppings/

shocked it was a pioneer woman recipe?

While Chastin spent 3 days at a Shoreline camp, enjoying hiking, mountain biking, swimming, and his all time favorite~ paint balling. {lucky kid}

 He then spent a weekend camping with his boy scout troop.

Top picture is him leaving, all smiles, clean, energetic.

This is him coming home.

Tired, hungry, a wee bit grumpy and very, very dirty.

And just a note: Jordan didn't enjoy any of our Spring Break 2012 festivities because she... drum roll please.

WENT TO FRANCE!!!!

The Pioneer Woman

I had the privilege of going to Third Place books with some good friends and hearing the Pioneer Woman speak about just that~being a pioneer woman, on a farm, how she grew to love the art of photography and some really funny stories along the way.
Did you know that she once was a balarina and her toe nails had seperated from thier beds, and one day in high school she was sitting next to a boy she had a crush on and  she removed her shoe and sock and sticks a paper clip under her toenail, then proceeds to hag her foot out the side of her desk and show said boy her neat trick! Ree says she had no reasoning behind it, just thought it would be a neat thing to do. She was cracking me up!

When she was  alittle girl about 4 years old she had a 'fun little habbit' of putting various items up her nose, one of those things being fruit stripe gum wrappers. Her mother found Ree to smell quite a bit and kept bathing her, powdering her and scrubbing her down, finally out of desperation to figure out why she had such an oder, she took her 4 year old daughter to the doctor to find out that she had shuved quite a few fruit strip gum wrappers up her nose and had forgotten to pull them out.. She said she really liked the tickle of the paper unwinding in her sinus...cracks me up just replaying her story telling in my head. She was Hilarious! And just what I needed at the end of a hard day of work and doing the single parent gig. So glad Chastin is old enough to stay with the kids to give me a quick break.

Ree was so fun to see! Just like on her show and in her book, "Black heals to tractor wheels" she really has a great sense of humor. At one point she sang about her basset hound charlie, that he was her one love, her first love..in different voices, quite funny. Shannon was cracking up big time, tears rolling down her face...I was busting up, in that feels so good, your sides hurt and your face starts to cramp kinda way. {You've all been there right?} Thanks to Wendy for pushing me to go and to Shannon for sitting with a bunch of crazy excited fans in the fourth row, holding our seats {for someone she had never heard of..}

Bountiful Baskets

{sorry for the picture, not the best}

SO at dinner group a week or so ago, some of the girls were sitting around talking about "Bountiful Baskets"..
This whole concept was new to me. They explained that b.b was a co-op. For a $15 contribution, you receive a whole basket full of fresh produce!{ I have to say I was skeptical.}And for $10 more you can make your produce all organic.
 But after picking up my basket I have to say "where have I been hiding all this time??"
This last Saturday John and the kids and I headed up to a parking lot in Lynnwood where we picked up our very first basket. I was impressed, very organized, all volunteer based, quick, friendly and good quality. The only draw back that I can see that some might not like is that you have no say as to what comes in your basket. But my friend Sarah said if something like mushrooms { that her family doesn't care for}ends up in the basket for the week, she just gives them to someone else.. No biggie. She's only out a buck or less, for a whole carton of mushrooms!
Some of the shipment is what restaurants order and our order is just tacked on to theirs.
There are {roughly} 6 kinds of vegetables and 6 kinds of fruit in every basket, roughly $50-$60 worth of produce they say. I haven't added it up, but I would venture to guess it to be a pretty close guess. Bountiful Baskets is just cutting out the middle man, no stand or grocery store.
The produce was supper fresh! I picked up the largest lemons I had ever seen and the romas were HUGE!
So I didn't categorize all of the goods received. but it certainly  was enough for me to order again this week.
Rough counting, i got:
4 green bell peppers
4 yellow onions
4 zucchini
4 yellow squash
head of bib lettuce
bag of brussels sprouts
7 roma tomatoes
a beautiful bunch of bananas
6 kiwis
3 GIANT lemons
5 purple pears
8 or 9 pink lady apples {so yummy}
5 oranges/ tangelo kinda things
5 navel oranges
So if you are interested, check it out and see if there is a location in your neck of the woods!
http://www.bountifulbaskets.org/

I would love to hear if you give it a shot! Happy eating!