Famous People with Curly Locks

First Day of School

  

 

Today was the first day of school for Logan AND Carli!!! Logan started the 3rd grade and Carli started Kindergarten. Logan came home really happy. He is glad to be reunited with some of his friends from 2nd grade. We're just hoping they've all matured a little bit over the summer! Are all 8 year olds so silly? He has an hours worth of homework everyday, but if we start with good habits early on, I think it won't be too hard to do. I drilled him on the times tables the day before yesterday and he did pretty well! Thanks to my cousin Shelley who turned me on to Usborne books, I bought him a multiplication practice book that helped us get through the facts very quickly and successfully.

Carli was so shy...no surprise there, but she tried very, very hard to participate. She did move...a little, when the kids were supposed to make letters in the air with their fingers. Parents stayed for an 1 1/2 today to learn about the classroom routine and to help encourage their kids on the first day. Carli's teacher is cute and young and due with a baby in October! I'm a little worried about that since most kids get attached to their teacher right away, especially in the younger grades. But I think she'll be okay. Her teacher even said that she knows sign language and wanted to teach the kids. Carli took the opportunity to tell her teacher that she knew some sign language too!
It was a good day!

Utah State- Hey!...Aggies all the Way! Go Aggies, Go Aggies, Hey-Hey-Hey!

We had a Utah State Freshman year friend party. It was so fun! Mark and Amy Andreasen were able to come, with their kids Xander, Ezra, Emma, Romney, Linda and Baby Adam. Heather Jo Smith also came. As well as the Whitakers, Aaron and Heidi with their kids, Savannah, Justin and Baby Brigham.
We try to get together, usually at Christmas time, but this time we were actually able to get a number of us together during the summer. The Whitakers live in SLC, Heather lives in North Ogden and The Andreasen's live in Powell, Wyoming.
Chad has so many funny stories about all these friends. He loves getting together with them. And I can't believe that after all these years they are all still friends!

We went camping for 3 days up at Black Smith Fork Canyon in Hyrum. It's about 20 minutes away from our house. We had such a fun time.

Ryan, Emmali, Linda and I went home at night to sleep and came back in the morning. Everyone else stayed in tents.

We took the opportunity to try canoeing. You can rent canoes from campus at the ORC. It was pretty cheap and the canoe was sea worthy. It only tipped once! Thank goodness it was only Joy and Chad who got all wet.

You can check out Joy's blog for more pics. There's a story on there about them running into a number of moose when they went out with Chad, Joy and Logan only. They had quite an adventure.

The bathrooms were latrine style. Linda was not a fan. In fact, every time Dick and Linda used them they would carry a bug fogger in one hand and an air freshener in the other! Linda would start gagging as soon as she thought about going.

Poor Joy got a number of bug bites. Mostly on her face. One was close to her eye and when she woke up in the morning her eye was swollen nearly shut.

Emmali loved the dirt! We had to bring lots of extra clothes for her.

Carli loved sleeping in the tent. I even asked her is she'd come home with us to sleep because it might be rainy one night, but she didn't come. She wanted to stay.

Logan was the keeper of the fire. He'd let us know if the fire needed more wood and was always excited to see it get started. He loved that he could pee outside in the woods too. He choose a special leaf that he used every time he had to go. For some reason he thought it would be good for the plant. I asked him about it and he said, "well poop is good for plants, so isn't pee?"

I had fun because I had help holding baby Ryan. He loved being carried in the Baby Bjorn. Linda's pretty good at getting him and out of it and it's hard to do!

We had some pretty yummy dinners up there too. I made us fajitas and Dick and Linda made BBQ dutch oven chicken.

Chad brought his fly fishing rods and we all tried fishing but only Chad got any fish! Chad is so cute with all his gear. He also would get up at sunrise and head down the river and fish all by himself.

I think I'd like to go again.

Bonnie and Ryan

My baby niece Bonnie will be 1 year old in September. When I first met her back in November, she took to me right away and me to her. She is so sweet. I just recently saw a picture of her and I couldn't believe how super cute and similar she looked to Ryan, my baby. Ryan is 5 mos. old and also a sweet and smiley baby. We are sure lucky. 

For those of you who know all the ethnicities that fill our children and their cousins, you wouldn't be surprised that none of the cousins look a like. This is why we've been shocked that they resemble one another not only as cousins, but more like brother and sister. 

This is what Bonnie is: 1/4 caucasian and 3/4 hispanic (Venezuela, Ecuador) and Ryan is 1/2 Japanese, 1/4 hispanic (Venezuela) and 1/4 caucasian. Here are the cousins!

#9-20 Everything from Party Mix to Key Lime Ice!

These wonderful recipes are all from my best friend Emily. Emily and I know each other from way back in the day when both our husbands were up at USU getting degrees! So we've been friends for quite a while. We both lived at Aggie Village.

Emily is a very conscientious cook. She graduated college in Nutrition. Emily is very healthy and is careful about all the food she chooses to eat and make. I am sure that these will be amazing! I've linked you up to her web site so you can see these recipes for yourself. There are many others on there too! I added the direct link to some of these but all of them are on the site anyway.

1. Party Mix
2. Artichoke Spinach Dip
3. Best Ever Turkey Burgers
4. Cornflake Chicken
5. Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese
6. Pumpkin Chili
7. Potato Soup
8. Salmon Teriyaki
9. Stuffed Salmon
10. Lentil-Rice Salad
11. Easy Pumpkin Bread or Cookie
12. Key Lime Ice
    

# 8 Spinach Recipes

My sister Becky is a very good cook. She dumps and tastes and comes up with really amazing recipes! She loves these so I'm sharing them with you.

Turkey/Spinach/Rice/Seasoned Tomatoes

Chop 2 tomatoes and season with salt, pepper, EVOO, and italian seasoning

Grill Turkey sausage

1/2 cup frozen spinach, cooked and drained

2 cups of cooked rice

Mix all together and enjoy

Chicken/Spinach Souffle

Mix 1 beaten egg with

1/2 cup Bisquick or whichever pancake baking mix

1/2 cup frozen spinach, cooked and drained

1 can of cream of chicken soup

Italian seasoning, adobo, and pepper to taste

Put in a fork-pricked defrosted pie crust

Bake 400 degrees for 1 hour

By: Becky Powell