sharing her party with him

This morning was Layla's Easter egg hunt at preschool.

On Monday her teachers invited the younger siblings to join in on the fun. I wasn't sure how Layla would react to that. I asked her if she wanted Hayden to hunt Easter eggs with her at school. She said "I love my brother, and I'd love to help him look for eggs." Yeay!

Hayden did great...he only knocked his basket over once.

Layla found her eggs quickly.

Thank goodness...her basket kept breaking.

Her construction paper bunny ears were cracking me up!

They were flopping around like crazy.

Hayden got a bit side tracked at times, but mostly hunted his eggs and seemed to have fun.

I love this picture of Layla...she is very serious!

Fun times!

okios

I am in love with this stuff!

It is my sour cream.

It is only 3 points per cup...if you are counting points on Weight Watchers.

I never use a whole cup at one time.

Usually, I put a tablespoon of this Greek yogurt (0.5 pts) in with a 100 calorie

Wholly Guacamole (2 pts) packet.

It tastes so stinking good...creamy guac :)

I team that up with 6 baked tortilla chips (1 pt) and I have a 3.5 point snack.

I have also used it as a dressing on my salads.

The kids love smoothies, so I throw about 1/2 a cup of Greek yogurt into a blender.

I add a few strawberries, a banana, 1/4 cup of milk, and some ice cubes. I blend it up and serve it right up! Smoothies are a huge hit in our house.

The simplest way to eat it is with granola!

Have you tried Greek Yogurt?

icky dream

Have you ever had one of those dreams that wakes you up with a "whew"!?

You wake up and immediately think Whoo Hoo...thank the Lord that wasn't real.

That happened to me this morning, but I just can't seem to get past it. It has been bugging me all day long. I am wondering how I could dream something so weird and scary.

I dreamt that I was floating the Guadalupe river with Layla. That in itself to me is weird. Who floats in an inner tube with their four year old? Not me. The river isn't a place I plan to take my children. We were floating on ice chest lids. Not on the inner tubes normally used. Yep...strange.

The river was really low, and we had to get up and walk for a bit. Layla started running, and fell off the pathway down into a pool of river water surrounded by rocks. I was freaking out!!! She came up from going under water and was crying and had the look of pain in her eyes! That is my girl...I had to jump in to save her. BUT the water wasn't very deep. What if I jumped and broke my legs? Ughhh!

So, I jumped and that is when I woke up.

I am messed up today thinking about this crazy dream.

Ughhh...I have to get this out of my head.

Why do we have to have dreams that scare us? Why can't they all be good?

I want to take a nap, but then will I dream the same thing? Yuck!

Oh, but I can't take a nap because a little boy I know won't stay in his bed.

I know he is very sleepy and needs a nap. But no...he wants me to go nuts.

At least I won't have bad dreams if I don't sleep!

fun time had by all

We took the kids camping this weekend. It was so much fun.

I have to say I was a bit worried at first, but everyone did great!

Layla and Hayden slept together in the same bed...that is a first for those two.

They were wrestling and giggling, but finally got some good sleep both nights.

Saturday morning we got up, made the bed and had bananas and

powdered donuts for breakfast. Yum!

Then we were off for a full day of fun!

Hayden gathered a million rocks in his bucket and then threw them into the lake.

Layla and Daddy fished.

I took a ton of pictures, as usual.

~~~~~

We had so much fun, just the four of us.

We are definitely going camping again soon!!

Now I must go catch up on laundry and get some rest.

We have a busy week, and I just looked at the calendar and realized all of our weekend in April are packed full of activities!

Gotta love Springtime!!

it is safe to say...

i love taking pictures of fences.

not only that, but i love fences.

i love that they keep things in and/or out.

my blog header is proof of my fence fixation.

it has been around for while, the header and the fixation :o)

what do you like to photograph?

have a great Saturday!

Oh My Cuteness...Look at this little face

Her name is Ponijao.

She is a movie star of sorts!

Ponijao, who lives in Namibia with her family, is one of four babies followed from birth to first steps in Thomas Balmes' BABIES, a Focus Features release.

The film Babies is so interesting to me.

We get to see the lives of four babies and the ways they grow and

develop in different areas of the world.

I am so excited to see it!!

The timing is awesome...Mother's Day weekend!

It chronicles the lives of four babies from birth to one year.

The babies live in different parts of the world, Mongolia, San Fransisco, Tokyo and of course little Ponijao from Namibia {South Africa}.

I can't wait to share the other three little faces staring in this film.

I am so excited to be part of promoting this movie!

As a Buzz Agent I will have insider info and share pictures and clips with you guys!

Take a sneak peek at the film:

Our new favorite salsa

This salsa is fabulous and super fresh.

There is nothing like fresh yummy salsa and warm crispy tortilla chips.

~~~

Gary & I sort of 'rate' restaurants as to how good their salsa is.

We have always done this...we are Mexican food junkies :)

I would totally frequent this place once or twice a week,

but it is in Santa Cruz...so I can't. Booo!

~~~

I am going to try my hardest to copy the taste of their salsa...I don't know if I can.

But I will try to conquer the SALSA!

I was able to make the Mango Salsa seen above on Gary's Mahi Mahi fish tacos.

I have seen recipes for mango salsa, but never really cared to make it.

Until I ate it.

OMG...it is like the mangoes are doing a little dance in your mouth...yum!

I couldn't wait to get home to try to make some!

We ate it on grilled tuna steaks, but my favorite was with grilled salmon.

It makes a great dip too, for chips or crackers.

Just chop all these things up.

1 mango

1/2 a cucumber

1/2 onion

1 jalapeno

Add a splash or two of lime juice.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

You could add cilantro...I just didn't have it on hand.

Place in the 'fridge to let the flavors mesh together!

~~~

Have a great Thursday!

The amazing views in Santa Cruz

Our Monday fun day!

We have waited so long...

to swing in the sun!

See that thing up there?

Hayden is pointing at the sun! I am sure of it!

We are all happy to see the bright shiny sun!

We spent all of Monday afternoon outside...sliding, swinging,

riding in the jeep and playing in the sandbox.

And having a Popsicle!

It was a wonderful day and I am so thankful for springtime :)

I have read several other bloggers comments on the weather in

Texas...It is like a box of chocolates.

I agree, but am hoping for more spring weather.

First Day of Spring

These really aren't the pictures I planned on posting to show you

how much fun we had on the 1st day of Spring.

I was hoping for some pictures of the kids swinging on the swing set and running around the backyard kicking the soccer ball.

Here is the swing set...covered in snow.

The first day of Spring here in Texas produced another inch of snow in our neighborhood.

Oh well...at least the snow covered the weeds.

I got a prize and I like it!!

I won an amazing giveaway from a sweet blog friend!

Look at all the fun things I received...

A book titled: The Creative Counterpart, a purple bookmark, matching purple journal,

purple nail polish and yummy candy.

{Ilovejournals&Ilovepurple}

Seriously, it is like she jumped into my brain and read my mind.

She picked all the things I love!

She even included purple raffia...I simply opened the package and put it in this glass bowl.

Easy as pie, and such a pretty way to display the candy that lasted about 2.5 seconds in this house.

Erin is an amazing person...if you don't already read her blog go visit her.

Home's Where My Heart Is

Two reasons I blog...

1.) To have a journal for my family and to document our lives.

2.) To continue to make great friends.

Thanks for all the goodies Erin :)

I can't wait to dive into the new book.

I read the first few pages and can't wait to read the rest!

Touching down in San Fransisco

Of course...we endured airport drama...our flight was delayed about 2 hours.

We sat in DFW airport and had breakfast and chatted with Jarred and Shelby.

I was a bit nervous about the flight. I clearly need to get out and about a bit more than I do. I'm not a fan of the taking off. The landing I can deal with. The flight was so long...four hours. I was going nuts. I am used to chasing kids.

It was sort of nice though, to sit and not have someone tugging on my arm...Mommy do this, Mommy let's play! HA! Gary and I weren't used to having an uninterrupted conversation.

The landing made me a bit nervous because it was raining AND we couldn't see anything.

Finally, we could see through the clouds, and I thought we were about to

land in the water. If you have ever flown into San Fran it is right on the bay. I made it past without hyperventilating and we jumped off the plane and headed to rent a car.

Our plans changed with the weather.

We planned to go sight seeing when we arrived.

We were gonna head on into San Fran, but not in the rain. It was raining like mad! I was a bit upset...hoping it wouldn't rain the whole time! It didn't...yay!

We ended up in San Jose at a yummy restaurant.

We all ordered something different and shared food. The food was to die for :)

The guys talked me into trying raw oysters. Wow, that was a sight to see.

I am not a fan! I wish I could tell you how funny that was.

I am so embarrassed!

We sat in this fun private booth. It had a curtain, but we didn't close it.

We were really the only people in the place. Gary is sitting there checking out the menu.

You can see they have their St. Patrick's Day decor going on.

Love these people. I am so thankful for great friends!

Here is my happy, glad to be off the airplane, I am starving face :)

After our super yummy meal we headed to the hotel/resort.

It was so pretty! I was in love.

I'll post more soon!

My lettuce ritual

I really don't care for pre-washed-bagged lettuce.

One time I was eating my salad and there was a moth in it. GAG!!

Ever since then {unless I am in a huge hurry} I wash, rinse, dry, cut and spin our lettuce.

I start with 2 heads of green leaf lettuce. I wash it and rinse it with water.

Then I lay it on towels. I stack lettuce, towel, lettuce, towel. I roll them up like burritos.

Then I let them sit for a couple of hours.

After I unroll the leaves I lay the separated pieces in

a large bowl and cut then into small pieces with scissors.

After that I spin the pieces in the salad spinner.

It seems like it should be dry because of the several hours of towel soaking,

but after I cut it, it is usually still a bit damp.

I store it in an huge airtight Tupperware with a few paper towels to soak up more moisture. It usually lasts us a little over a week.

It is a ton of work, but so worth it every time we eat a salad. Lately we have been eating a ton of salad. I'm sure we will eat it even more with spring and summer approaching.

~~~

I was so excited about our spring weather, but tomorrow is going to be cold again.

Will it ever end???

Ugghhhh!

This summer I'm gonna try to bite my tongue when I want to complain about how hot it is!

I'll try to think back to our ridiculously cold winter.

Happy Friday Y'all!!

♣ Our green day ♣

I just love St. Patrick's Day.

Before we had kids Gary and I always did something fun to celebrate every year.

We usually had a party at our house for all our buddies. Now that we have the munchkins it is even more fun for me! I love doing fun stuff and celebrating.

I made the kids a snack plate of green marshmallows, kiwi, green goldfish, and green apples.

We had guacamole for lunch. We need an avocado tree in our backyard.

Layla and Hayden had green tea for the first time...and loved it!

Layla and I made a lime Jello pie. It is so EASY to make and low-fat!

I boiled water and added sugar free lime Jello. Then I added lite whipped cream.

After stirring it up real well, I poured it into a store bought graham cracker crust.

I refrigerated it for 4 hours~~~ Done!

We ended the day with spinach and shrimp quesadillas.

Layla thought it was so fun to eat as many things 'green' as possible.

I had high hopes of doing a fun craft, but we didn't get around to it.

I also realize that I didn't get any pictures of the kids in green. Duhhhh!

I am such a slacker!

I was really busy catching up on laundry and planning green meals, I forgot.

I did manage to catch up on laundry and get the house pretty much back in order from our trip. I also made a huge batch of 'salad'. That chore takes a whole stinkin' afternoon.

What did you do special for St. Patrick's Day yesterday?