Service!

With all the issues surrounding the global pandemic, all the foreign serving missionaries for our church are being sent home on a moments notice; some are having trouble getting home at all. Luckily, the elder from our ward who was serving in Liberia made it home last week and is self quarantining in his home while trying to perform some missionary service online. Our hearts go out to these young men and women who are trying to serve the Lord in the wake of the current events. We made this candy bar poster in hopes of brightening his day!!

I Love Covid 19!

This guy is thoroughly enjoying having everyone home all day everyday thanks to school being online now. I take him on long walks everyday and Ava has been using her birthday dog training book each afternoon.  Ulli has been getting so much attention, he seems very happy to have experienced the pandemic!!

Iron Golem Series

Ben created all 19 of these 8 page Iron Golem graphic novels by himself. He thought of each of the stories and did all the illustrations; the books are a joy to read and the fact that Ben made them makes them even more amazing!!

Happy Girl!!

Ava was showered with gifts and texts all day from sweet family members and friends. After breakfast we finished the first Lord of the Rings movie and then she went to her friend’s house and made some monster pancakes with a peanut butter topping!  When she got back we played video games and enjoyed a smoked pulled pork dinner with all her favorite sides.  After dinner we headed to the church for some driving lessons!!

For dessert I made a devil’s food cake with a Carmel and evaporated milk filling topped with crushed heath bars, cool whip, caramel and more crushed heath bars!  It was so delicious!!  After the little guys went to bed, we granted Ava one more birthday wish and watched Mrs. Doubtfire; love Robin Williams. It was a great day indoor of not being able to go out in public!!

Gluckwunsch

We dug up a German birthday banner from one of our many European birthdays and hung it up last night. I love that it says happy birthday in another language!!  I also love it when Kyle sings Happy Birthday while carrying delicious cakes!!

Peace In Christ

Norah and her BFF were planning to sing a song accompanied by her BFF’s mom in our Sacrament meeting the first Sunday of lockdown. They never got the chance so we got together today and recorded it to share with the ward. It turned out beautifully-so glad both girls love music and were willing to share their talent.

Birthday Breakfast

We spent some time a few days ago planning out all of Ava’s birthday meals in hopes of being able to find all the ingredients.  The chocolate raspberry croissant breakfast she picked seemed simple enough with the use of puff pastry dough, but it still proved complicated and turned out delicious with the Nutella and jam filling!!

The white out snow storm that dumped inches on us all night was one of Ava’s favorite birthday gifts!!

15!

Our sweet Ava has turned 15!  She is a special girl and a great oldest child. Today we will celebrate her and to start things off we had a late birthday parade for sleeping in purposes with Kyle on a phone call. She got some cute clothes, knee pads, a phone case, a crochet book and a dog training book; Nana and Papa gave her a gift card to hobby lobby while Grandpa and Grandma Barb gave her  some money!  She looks pretty pleased with her plunder!

Cooking Show

Our meals these last two weeks have all been cooking show quality!  The extra time we’ve had together has been mostly spent in the kitchen. From planning to prepping and eating together-this family can cook!!  Tonight’s chicken Alfredo pizza homemade Alfredo sauce, brined chicken chunks and a whole wheat crust made from crust!  YUM!!

4,000!!!

It’s been a long week of social distancing, lots of fighting, teasing, baking, cooking, cleaning, coloring, working on schoolwork and through it all these guys have completed 4-1,000 piece puzzles, this new Star Wars puzzle was the most interesting and actually had all its pieces.

I Spy!!

Ulli and I were on a walk around the neighborhood in the middle of the day and were surprised to find this guy hanging on the side of the road. He didn’t seem especially angry that we were near him, but he wasn’t running away either. Kyle thinks he was injured and was probably on his last leg. Either way, Ulli didn’t even notice him and I could stop taking pictures or staring at him; it was a fun surprise regardless.

Try Try, Again!

The last round of bread was a total fail, but made delicious French toast!  I wasn’t about to give up on the real stuff though, especially with a bread shortage at the stores. The girls pitched in with the ingredient pouring, the Bosch kneaded the dough expertly and I made sure we added enough flour to make the dough “tacky but not sticky”. The end result after it rose out of the oven was beautiful to the eye and delicious to eat!!  Success!!  So glad we figured it out for the first time in UT!!

Pi Day!!

Inspite is the intense chaos surrounding the Coronavirus since Wednesday, Kyle managed to plan and I was able to secure the ingredients for this delicious French a Silk pie with a pretzel crust and whipped cream topping. I wasn’t sure all that was needed to create this dessert would be available, but thankfully our little Valley Market has everything!  We enjoyed the pie after watching the movie The Kid as a family. It was a slow day of cleaning and everyone felt the lack of activities, we will see what the next few weeks of “home school” will bring; hopefully more tantalizing desserts like this one!

Bread Fail

Today’s attempt at making whole wheat bread using the recipe I perfected back in TX turned out similar to the rolls-BAD!!  I am so discouraged, because the only thing I struggled with today was proofing the bread in the oven again, I think I will let it Rise the old fashioned way next time!

When your bread fails, you cut off the weird tops and whip up some brown sugar and cinnamon batter to dip the toasted slices in!!  This stuff actually tastes good and I am pleased to say I have made something the kids can actually eat!!

Holy Moly!!

A few weeks back, Kyle and I sat down and figured out some meals we could store and decided to go on a day date the next day and buy the items we had figured out as well as some other snack and baking items. 

We basically grabbed two of everything on our list and ended up with an insanely filled cart. When we went to the checkout we noticed most of the carts were super full like ours.

Fast forward to today and it seems like we were prompted to prepare for what was coming our way. The global pandemic has sent the country into a panic and the store shelves are proof that there’s something wrong!  We have some food and supplies stored, now, hope they will last until the shelve will fill up again!!

Seek and Find

At Art today, the students were instructed on how to create a seek and find picture. I was instructing Norah’s class about the photographic illustrator, John Wick and was there to see all the students’ creations. No one’s even came close to Norah’s. Most of the kids didn’t even finish their project, let alone have it turn out so beautifully detailed. It was fun to see her cut her paper and reduce the size of the picture, nobody did that either-what a creative girl!!

Cookie Rolls

I got some momentum today and picked up some whole wheat flour after the gym to make some rolls!  The recipe looked good, the dough looked good, but between refrigerating the dough, allowing it to proof in the oven and leaving Ava to bake them something went wrong.  The texture didn’t make them taste any better either.

Sick or Stressed?

I was making the guest bed today and found Ulli snuggled up with the lumbar pillow I sewing so many years ago. He’s been acting a little funny the past few days, throwing up and not having much of an appetite as well not loving his walks. He doesn’t love men, and since Matt had been staying with us I’m hoping he is just stressed out and will calm back down since Matt’s departure. Poor puppy, wish he wasn’t so sensitive.