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To keep updated with crafts and recipes I making go to www.notacheese.blogspot.com.

This blog will be toasted once I figure out how to make it a book.

Valentines Day.

Happy Happy Valentines day! Here is what happened at our house. The girls woke up and opened their mailboxes to find love notes from mom a dad and a small toy. They were little strawberry shortcake figures if you were curious. After we enjoyed some pancakes in the style of http://www.jimspancakes.com/ I think they turned out nicely.

Butterfly
Flowers

Hearts

We were so sticky that we had to have a bath.
I am including this awesome picture of Vera in her church clothes the previous day.

For family night we decorated small heart cakes that we baked from a heart tin my mom got me.Ben's says happy heart day.

Ginny's all decorated by herself.

ViVi's says love one another. Which is what she told me to write because that is what we learned about for family night.

These are the cards I made the girls.

And this is the card I made Ben.

Hope you all had a Happy Hearts Day!

Valentines!

If you do not already know Valentines Day is my favorite holiday. What a better time to put hearts everywhere and say "I love you" all the time. Here are some pictures of what we've been up to with decor and goodies.
Above we have the girls getting ready to make heart shaped spritz. Below is what we ended up with. Dipped in candy melt and sprinkled. I would have more pictures of the girls making them but the camera died.

This is something my mom made in her wards super saturday. Its a saint candle in a jar on a candle stick. Its all E600 together and after dried you can fill it with different decor. We chose sweethearts cause they were so cheap at the store and they look amazing.

This is a heart garland I learned how to make from the blog: eighteen25.blogspot.com. Super cute. Its just 81/2 by 11 paper cut in 3/4" strips. Poke holes near the top and less than halfway down and glue them together and string them.

I had a cute Valentines basket that was given to me by my buddies in the Miner family. I still have their Valentine on my fridge. So cute. Anyway I filled it up with stuffed hearts I made from scraps of fabric I had. One is a bandana. On is from a dress I made Ginny one is from Ginny's apron, another from her octopus costume. An institute masquarde fabric... and on and on. Good memories now hearts.

This is all over the web right now. These mailboxes are from Target's one-spot. Violet and I put the stickers on and suprised the girls after school and nap. The girls will be sending love notes to eachother this month and putting the flag up when they leave a note.

Here is a close up on Vera's

This wreath is also from the blog eighteen25 as well as the subway art below.
My buddy Marin came over and we cut many circles (this one has 115) from felt and straight pinned them to a styrafoam heart. I'm thinking I need 25 more circles. Anyone else? Oh the circles are just the same size as one of my drinking glasses. They are folded in half and then in quarters and pinned on. I think it turned out nice.

And for family tradition our down stairs is covered in conversation hearts we've put up since we got married. They say thinks like "xoxo" "just friends" "U R Hot" etc... "sexy" has been discontinued, and "wanna make out" is hidden well, it may too be discontinued for propriety. Ahh how things change when you get older and wiser.

Lastly Ben has yet to cut new hearts for our front door. Here is last years door:

Well I hope you are enjoying the love that is in the air. I know I am. Happy Valentines Month!

I Met Bakerella!

Today at Williams Sonoma in Bell-Square I met Bakerella. Yes, Angie Dudley of http://www.bakerella.com/ the queen of the Cake Pop! Above we have Me and Vi and Vera with her while she is signing my book. I even wore my Bakerella T-shirt. She was suprise and glad I did. What book you ask? Oh! The cake pop book. Amazing ideas and tips on how to make awesome and delicious cake pops. I have already looked throught it and you should go get one too.

Here is her signature!

I am so excited to start using it. Hooray! Thanks Angie for coming to my neck of the woods.

From Bakerella's Camera:

Virginia Wilson - Preschool, Religion and Swimming lessons

PRESCHOOL

My very big girl Virginia Ines has started preschool. Above is a picture of her on her first day, after school was over. She has been excited for months to go to school and loves every day. I asked Ginny what her favorite parts of school were, "I like how fun it is and I like the sandbox." I asked her what was fun about school and she said, "play dough and painting, and there is one more thing... oh actually its about the park. I already told you though." This is a picture of her take home bag she decorated at preschool orientation. She did it herself. I helped her with the gingerbread but the concept was hers. She also wanted a rainbow out of pipe cleaners so we braided them and she added glow in the dark beads to the top and now it kind of is a rainbow tree. This is Ginny posing in her first day of school dress.

And this is her first painting of the year. I asked her to tell me about it and she said, "It is an orange Robin because the color of the tummy tells you what kind of Robin it is."

RELIGION

Often I find Virginia somewhere in the house doing this: marking her Book of Mormon OR

Doing this: Reading the children's scripture book or the gospel art book (under the piano bench).Now I am not the most diligent personal scripture reader myself but we do well as a family or a couple. Ginny continually amazes me with her spongy brain. She will sit and tell Violet what is what in the gospel art book or "read" aloud the children's scripture book (she watches the videos and memorizes the words) its kind of crazy. I will find her with the video on just watching happily. Thanks to her amazing primary teacher for all the church items she has given Virginia.

Now for some examples of spongy-ness:

*We are leaving our old building in Seattle (we went to a baby blessing) and Ginny sees another church nearby and says, "Mom, you see that church over there." "Yes," I said. "They don't teach God's plan," she explains. "How do you know that Ginny?" I ask. She says in a mysterious hushed tone, "I just know." Totally cracked me up.

*Ben was showing her a picture of Joseph Smith reading the Bible, you know the one before he goes to the grove to pray. Ben says, "Whats this a picture of Ginny?" And she says, "Joesph Smith." And he says, "What is he doing?" She replies, "Reading James 1:5 in the Bible." Ben looked at me with amazement.

*I finished reading a series of books and started crying on the couch because that's what I do when I finish books (well sad ones anyway, okay and really happy ones). So Ginny and Vi came up to me and put their little hands on my face and ask me what was wrong. I say, "I just finished my book and a lot of good people died." And without any pause Ginny says in a sweet reassuring voice, "Its okay mom we will see them in the Resurrection." That sure made me smile and I gave them hugs.

Those are just some of the best ones from the past few months. I am sure we will continue to get a bunch more.

SWIMMING

I will leave this post with two photos of Ginny at swimming lessons this summer. The top is of her first day and the bottom her last. She loved her teacher Katie and did level one with her twice. We hope to start again soon. I really recommend Gold's Gym for lessons, you don't have to be a member, and you can use their showers.

Vera's Nursery

So our little Vera will be 8 months on Tuesday and I finally finished her nursery. This is the only nursery I have been able to all out decorate because you can't paint in apartments. So this is still the same bedding and mobile the older girls used and we went off of that theme. Ben did the painting. Nice work honey!I think you can tell from this first photo that Vera really likes her new room! A special thanks to Auntie Cyddie for her favorite blanket, which matches the room very nicely. And to Ashley B. for the bear Vera loves to grab at night. I hemmed some cream curtains for the window and found a cream rug to match the bedding. Then I painted the three paintings to match the bedding and used white to tie in the baseboard trims.

I finally framed some cute artwork of animals I found at Ikea. Then I set up Vera's dresser with blankets and burpies and a basket of books for bedtime. With Muffy Vanderbear living on the top shelves, as well as Gunny Bunny (a bunny Gunnar bought me that looks like him, glasses and all). And I keep the quilt on the rocker for my back and because it looks nice. The wall above will have the girls baby annoucements framed when Grandma is finished cross-stiching them. Love you Gram.

Camping trip #3

So this third camping trip we won at Ginny's preschool aution. We were going to go with another family who would bring all the food and cook it for us. Turns out that family had a serious emergency and couldnt come with us. We hope they are doing well and our prayers are with them. So instead of that senario we were able to invite Meaghan's family, Ben's sister, to join us and bring our own food. We camped at Gold Basin near Granite Falls, Washington.

We went on a hike at the Ice Caves. It was beautiful and an easy hike for our girls. It was a little scary for me considering and 11 year old girl passed away there the week prior due to ice collapsing. Our hearts are with that family aswell. We didn't venture close to the ice.

Where we stopped for lunch Anika found a napping rock. We thought that was pretty cool.Bridget also napped in the pack on the way back to the car.
Due to rain for most of the second half of the trip we spent some wild time in the tent.

And under blue tarps Garrick lashed to the trees.We had lots of fun catching up with eachother and riding bikes and enjoying good food, thanks to Garrick's awesomely constructed box oven. I plan to make one soon. Hooray for camping! Next summer we won't do it on consecutive weeks.