Oh BABY

Someone in my family is FINALLY having a baby!!!!




Whohoooo!!!!





Believe me, this is BIG news.







To reward them, I made them this for their sweet little girl to come....

 Lucky.










...and now I'm going to make a huge pan of decadent orange sweet rolls just for ME. After all, I've had three babies, and I deserve something too. Don't ya think?

Best Bread Ever!!!

I thought you guys deserved a treat. No knead bread!

As many of you know, I am a bread lover.

This easy recipe(they say a 4 year-old can do it) happens to be the best bread I have ever made. It is more of an artisan bread, really crusty and chewy. (Like they have at the Macaroni Grill) So if you don't like that, you won't like this.

 OH and there is only 3 ingredients, what could be better??

Okay, now please don't get downhearted, it is an overnight thing ..but well worth the wait..

The Recipe
3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
(White flour is by far the best, you can use 1 cup wheat if you really want)
¼ teaspoon instant yeast
1¼ teaspoons salt
Cornmeal or wheat bran as needed.

1. In a large bowl combine flour, yeast and salt. Add 1 5/8 cups water, and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest at least 12 hours, preferably about 18, at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.
(I just mix up a batch before I go to bed.)

2. Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it; sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest about 15 minutes.
(Mmm never done this step, probably would make it even better)

3. Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour, wheat bran or cornmeal; put dough seam side down on towel and dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours. When it is ready, dough will be more than double in size and will not
 readily spring back when poked with a finger.
(So when I get up in the morning, I do this step, it does need to rise for about another 2 hours, but it's worth it.)

4. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 6- to 8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic, dutch oven) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under towel and turn dough over into pot, seam side up; it may look like a mess, but that is O.K. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.
(We use a small aluminum dutch over, works like a charm, and I only cook it another 10 minutes with the lid off)

(Rachel** this recipe is perfect for you, I hear your husband likes to cook with a dutch oven on the stove ...just have him put it in the oven instead, and you're all set!)

 Num, num, num!

Yield: One 1½-pound loaf.

The Post You've Been Waiting For.....

Due to the sudden influx of blog readership.... I feel I should use this post to make an important announcement.


..... to dispel any rumors that have been fluttering about ...well actually running rampant.

  yes, I cropped my bum out of the picture, it was just too ugly for words.
 (that's not part of the rumor ... I hope)


Okay, here you go:
 1. There is my tummy. Yes, I have had 3 kids and it certainly doesn't lie flat like it used to.
2.  Come September, October every year, I put on my annual extra winter weight of 5 pounds. It's extra "insulation" people. Keeps me warmer.
3. I get down-right cranky when the weather turns cold, and it's dark when I have to get up.

Note on #2. I have gotten a bit carried away this year.(um 7 lbs) I have been eating enormous amounts of pumpkin cookies, fried cheese on bread, rotisserie chickens, apple pies, chocolate chips straight out of the bag, etc. ...you know, the typical comfort foods ....to mourn the loss of summer.

Anyway...I think the result of that, in combination with #3 is probably the reason for the rumors.





 Alrighty?







 Okay I'm still sensing some doubt out there.  :(









Sooo just to make doubly doubly sure, nothing was going on.(Hey, these rumors have been getting to me too)
I went in for an ULTRASOUND  of my tummy..... (I know, I know, there just isn't anything I wouldn't do for my blog readers)




AND

....just as I suspected, it's ALWAYS better to chew the rotisserie chicken before you swallow it. I won't be making that mistake again. :)


 ..Whoa. This explains soo much..






Anyway. Sorry ladies, better guessing next time.









Disclaimers:
No, I have no idea of what that ultrasound is really a picture of, ...yes it could be a baby, and no it's not mine.
Yes, babies are carried in the uterus not the tummy, this I KNOW.

Goings On

 On Thursday, I went to my first parent teacher conference for Ellie's in FIRST grade.

Guess what???

She is super smart!!! Go figure huh? They are going to pull her out of class for "intervention." I guess, so she doesn't get too bored. She gets to read books and write essays on them for about 45 each day.

Highlights: Her teacher said she has beautiful penmanship, and Ellie really does. We worked hard on it before she went to kindergarten and our hard work really paid off.

On some of Ellie's school testing, she scored higher than any first grader or second grader that her teacher has EVER taught.

A few weeks back, Ellie's teacher's grandma died. She was really sad. Ellie came home and spent hours drawing pictures and putting together a book for her teacher to help her feel better. It meant a lot to her teacher.

Ellie came home with a dollar in her pocket, I asked her how she got it. She said a high-school boy on the bus gave it to her. (huh?!?) I asked her why, and she said, the older kids made a rule on the bus, that they can't use bad words around Ellie, and if they do, they have to give her something. Apparently, one of the kids said a bad word, and his friend made him "pay up". She is pretty happy about the dollar, and is looking forward to getting wealthy from the potty-mouths.

We celebrated Ellie's achievements with greasy chicken(rotisserie chicken) corn bread and baked potatoes. The next day Ellie had off of school, so we played ALL day. First she made strange pillow people.(pictured above) Notice her brandbe-new school shirt. (She bought that with some of her birthday money Grandma.) She is so excited to wear it on school spirit day.YEAH!
Next, Ellie and James found some string on the stairs and decided to make kites,(wouldn't you?) they colored, cut out and constructed for hours. I warned them several times in the process that you have to have WIND to fly a kite, and we were having a strangely calm day. They had no doubts.

WANTED!! THIS BROWN EYED RUFFIAN. REWARD OFFERED!


Our winter supply of wood, gathered in one day! Barry lifted those logs on the trailer. ...and he wonders why his back hurts.

 As soon as we went outside, a little wind started right up for my munchkins. They had no trouble flying their kites. They quickly gave up on the homemade ones, and resorted to the ones Grandma and Grandpa gave them.
Lauren's favorite thing to do was get the kite going real high and then let go off the string, laughing her head off as her foolish mommy scrambled across the yard after it. It only took me three times to realize the RAT was letting go on purpose!

 Barry and I went on a first-ever-trip-without-kids to Park City. These are the mugshots my parents took of the kids while we were gone. We certainly missed the kiddos. We hiked around, got a bit lost looking for the Huber Homestead. we drove through the beautiful Guardsman pass. We went to a fun restaurant and visited the outlet malls, where I was able to find an awesome deal on a down coat. We stayed in  a nice studio suit, and got a chance to listen to conference uninterrupted. Overall we made some great memories and it was nice to spend some one on one time with my hubby of almost 9 years! Whoa ho!

I think the brown-eyed ruffian needs a nap, but is still very cute, and strangely loves wearing other people's hats.

Brigham City Temple

We took the Ellie down to the Brigham City temple open house for her 7th birthday. September 7, 2012.

The temple was absolutely beautiful, it was perfect in every way. I feel like it is MY temple, because I always dreamed of having a temple in Brigham, but I never thought in a million years that it would happen.

I am so excited to go back. I hope it was a day Ellie will never forgot! 

Some kind residents of Brigham City(Grandma and Grandpa Stuart) came with us to make the day even more special.

I have a lot better pictures of the whole family and stuff, that I took with my dad's camera. Unfortunately, he emailed them to me, and somehow I must have deleted the email. For the record though, Barry and I were there as well. It was a very special day at a very special place.

City of Rocks

 Sorry these are in no particular order. We took the family camping to City of Rocks this summer. It is one of my favorite places. I love rocks, so that helps a lot. We had soo much fun camping, we invited Barry's brother's family to come camping with us there the next weekend. So instead of going to the fair for Ellie's birthday this year, she got to go camping with her favorite cousins. We got poured on the first night. Sleeping in the car with 3 kids was quite an adventure as well. Alas, the kids had a lot of fun and want to go back. Oh and my sister in law brought all this tasty food for me(everyone) to eat, so that was great too. YUM and FUN.

 The views are incredible, I can't helping thinking about the mythical greek gods and how well they would fit in at this amazing place.

 Just so you know, my kids aren't the only ones that make awkward faces for photographs.