Symphony

Our Saturday consisted of cleaning the church building at 7am, having lunch with Steve, Angela and Audrey's friend Hayley, and then going to the Symphony with mom in the evening. The performance was "Cirque de la Symphonie" that included a mime, juggling act, aerial performers, strength and hand-balancing acts and hoop performers. The evening was a combination of acrobatics, gymnastics, dance/ballet and circus-type acts. These people were pretzels!!

Administrative Assistant Day

Having 2 bosses as well as 30 stores makes for a fun Administrative Assistant Day. I was spoiled and loved every minute of it.

Busy Sunday & YW Recognition

Today was an incredibly busy day for the Carter's:

* Audrey spoke in Sacrament

* Audrey received her YW Recognition Award

* Audrey co-taught the YW Lesson to the Laurels

* Sam accompanied 2 musical numbers during Sacrament

* Sam played the organ

* Sam taught the YW Lesson to the Beehives

* Family went to Cameron's BD party right after church (yummy food)

* John & Sam set up technical items for fireside

* John & Sam attended fireside, Sam played piano

Good day - busy day! But our favorite part was listening to Audrey speak in Sacrament and seeing her earn her YW Recognition Award. She actually finished it on January 1st, but they present to all the girls at one time, right before the Stake YW Recognition event. So she worked very hard to get this accomplished while she was only 15. We are proud of her!!

Beehive Cake

Even though I was released from Beehive Advisor a few weeks ago, I had been asked to continue with the April assignments (lesson & activities) already outlined. So today was actually the last time I gave a lesson to the Beehives. Once my lesson was prepared, I had quite the Bee-theme going because the lesson included a story "The Parable of the Bee", I used a photograph of a bee with flower, and then I made this Beehive Cake. Lesson went very well and the cake was a hit! In fact, one of the Beehives asked me later if I would return to their class and make them another cake : )

You have to love Princess Bride...

What a classic! We love this movie in our house. Today I felt like we had taken a page out of the book. John and Audrey were sharing a Sobe. Our rule is the person who divides the treat allows the other person to choose. So the person doing the dividing usually tries to make it pretty fair. It seemed that Audrey was in the science lab doing an experiment or something...she had two glasses and was literally putting a drop in one and a drop in the other one to make sure they were as even as possible. And taking a long time. Once she finished, John did not even spend any time thinking about it, but just grabbed the glass in front of him. So I said - "Clearly you could only choose the drink in front of you". At which time my husband started quoting the lines from the Princess Bride and doing quite a good rendition of Vizzini! For those needing a chance to review, here is a snippet from the movie:

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Man in Black: All right. Where is the poison? The battle of wits has begun. It ends when you decide and we both drink, and find out who is right... and who is dead.
Vizzini: But it's so simple. All I have to do is divine from what I know of you: are you the sort of man who would put the poison into his own goblet or his enemy's? Now, a clever man would put the poison into his own goblet, because he would know that only a great fool would reach for what he was given. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But you must have known I was not a great fool, you would have counted on it, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.
Man in Black: You've made your decision then?
Vizzini: Not remotely. Because iocane comes from Australia, as everyone knows, and Australia is entirely peopled with criminals, and criminals are used to having people not trust them, as you are not trusted by me, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you.
Man in Black: Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.
Vizzini: Wait til I get going! Now, where was I?
Man in Black: Australia.
Vizzini: Yes, Australia. And you must have suspected I would have known the powder's origin, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.
Man in Black: You're just stalling now.
Vizzini: You'd like to think that, wouldn't you? You've beaten my giant, which means you're exceptionally strong, so you could've put the poison in your own goblet, trusting on your strength to save you, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But, you've also bested my Spaniard, which means you must have studied, and in studying you must have learned that man is mortal, so you would have put the poison as far from yourself as possible, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.

Popcorn Scramble & YW Changes

I was released as the Beehive Advisor and called as the Young Women's Secretary & YW Ward Camp Director. (Can you believe I've never had a Secretary calling in the church?) The great thing is that I get to stay in YW - what a neat bunch of girls and leaders to play with. I'm up to FIVE callings now (not including VT)! So today was the last activity with the Beehives I was co-running. Since Patty was out of town, I had agreed to assist Mollie and so we had a game night with the girls. We had two game tables set up. The girls were also getting their Personal Progress interviews, so as one girl left, the one returning would take her place at the table. This mixed up the players between the two tables and all the girls got to interact with different girls throughout the evening. I think they had a good time. For treats I made this recipe - it is kind of addicting.

POPCORN SCRAMBLE
Mix together the following ingredients:

3 cups corn or rice Chex
6 cups popped popcorn
8 oz jar dry roasted peanuts
3 cups small shaped pretzels
1 & 1/2 cups coconut
Set aside

In deep saucepan combine:
2 cups brown sugar
1 cup butter
1/2 cup light Karo syrup
Heat until boiling. Boil for 5 minutes.
Add 2 tsp. vanilla and 1/2 tsp. baking soda.

Pour syrup over popcorn mix and stir well. Spread on a large baking sheet and bake at 200 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes. Remove from oven and cool. Separate into chunks as soon as it's not sticky and store in airtight container.

Boy in the Striped Pajamas

We rented movies the other day and Audrey really wanted to see this movie. It was good. It made you think, and not just at the end of the movie, but every day throughout the week. I've got the library book on reserve, but am on the waiting list so have not had a chance to read the book yet. But I will. You should see this movie.

Easter

The day before Easter the choir had an early morning practice and Becki (our director) fed us biscuits & gravy with fruit & juice to tempt us, get us there, bribe us... it worked! Lots showed up for practice and if I do say so myself, our choir sounded wonderful on Easter morning. I'm the accompanist and had some fun arrangements to play. We sang "In Him We Live" by Sally DeFord and "Consider the Lilies" by Roger Hoffman (arr by A.L.Lyon). We had a nice lesson in Young Women and then headed home to a quiet meal & family time, just the three of us. I bought a small ham and then we had Church potatoes, Ambrosia salad, hot cross buns & chocolate egg-cakes for dessert. It was a very nice day.

Ambrosia Salad

Also on our Easter menu is this spring jello salad. My daughter would prefer eating jello "without making it a salad, mom". Then there is John, who says marshmallows are "fish-bait" so should not be included in jello salad. So I would say, I probably made this specifically for myself! I did make a separate dish for John with no marshmallows, 'cause I'm just that nice.
AMBROSIA SALAD
1 can (8oz) crushed pineapple in juice, undrained
2 cups boiling water
1 can (11oz) mandarin orange segments, drained
1 & 3/4 cups thawed Cool Whip
1 package (8 serving size) orange flavor gelatin
1 & 1/2 cups miniature marshmallows
1/2 cup coconut

Drain pineapple, reserving juice. Add cold water to juice to measure 1 cup. Stir boiling water into gelatin in large bowl 2 minutes or until completely dissolved. Stir in measured liquid. Refrigerate 1 & 1/2 hours or until slightly thickened (consistency of unbeaten egg whites). Then stir in remaining ingredients (whipped topping, pineapple, oranges, marshmallows & coconut). Refrigerate about 3 hours before serving.

Church Potatoes

We love to have this dish at Eastertime. Very yummy with ham. I know sometimes these are called Church Potatoes or Funeral Potatoes, but on Easter at our house, we call them Resurrection Potatoes. I was too hungry to stop and take a picture, so here it is - giving you a lovely side view!!
CHURCH POTATOES
2 can (10 3/4 oz) Cream of Chicken soup
2 cups sour cream
1/2 c. melted butte
1/2 c. grated onion
1 package (32oz) frozen Southern-style hash brown potatoes (THAWED)
2 cups grated cheddar cheese
2 cups crushed cornflakes
Additional melted butter - about 4 tablespoons

In a large bowl, combine soup, sour cream, 1/2 cup butter and the onion. Stir in potatoes and cheese. Transfer to a greased 12x9 inch baking dish. Toss cornflakes with about 4 tablespoons melted butter; sprinkle over potatoes. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes.

Thanks Michelle!!

At Christmas we had a gift exchange and Michelle (with school & work) did not quite finish John's gift, but she dropped it off the other day. Isn't it awesome!! She certainly spent more time on her gift to John than we spent on our gifts to others : ) We really appreciate it and John has enjoyed curling up to watch movies while wrapped in this blanket. Often he has to move the cat off the blanket as she likes it too.

Who had my camera?

Any guesses??

Puzzles

I like a good puzzle, so when we were on vacation and saw this one - I had to get it. Mind you, you could not work on it with a full stomach as the food combinations were a bit scary... cheetos, french fries, pizza - hmmm. We had a good time putting this together. It was hard as the pieces were not traditionally shaped, but we enjoyed the challenge! Even when we ended up with 1 extra piece at the end!!

Movies

One of the things we do a lot in our family is rent movies and snuggle up on the couch to watch. This weekend was not an exception. We rented:

MARLEY & ME: Good movie, bring the big box of Kleenex! Thumbs up.TWILIGHT: Sorry, I still don't know what everyone sees in either the movie or the books. Thumbs down. SEVEN POUNDS: Wow, a real thinker, tear-jerker at the end. Kept us really interested throughout the movie. Thumbs up.

Fabulous Friday!!

We had a grand time today! Started out by having delicious breakfast at Old European Breakfast House. If you have not tried this place, you must. Audrey & I had our favorite - Swedish Crepes with strawberries and this absolutely yummy sweet cream cheese filling. Swedish crepes are a little thicker and softer than the traditional French crepes (which we also love) and are made with fresh orange juice. After breakfast we headed over to Marcie's to help her pack, but alas, she was not home at the time. So we went home and then received a dinner invite from my sister. She lives about an hour north, so we left in the late afternoon for their place. They served us chicken pot pie, salad and fresh fruit for dinner. Then we all went to The Roxy to see Monsters vs. Aliens. What fun! Afterwards we headed back to their place for Italian sodas and some sampling of the Wii-Fit system. Evidently I was pretty funny to watch trying to do the hula hoop segment. Oh well. What a fun day we had!!

And then it snowed...

It's April people!!!

Spring Break

We all had the week off for Spring Break so decided to take a small road trip as we had some commitments in town later in the week. We headed to the Tri-Cities, but stopped periodically in the towns along the way (and the way home). We had a fun time exploring antique stores, speciality stores and small towns on our way. After we were settled in our hotel room we visited Aunt Susan and Uncle Larry. The next day we were sure to check out the local shopping and fun eats. When we travel we try to find places to eat that we do not have back home and stumbled upon a fantastic barbecue place! The manager even came over during our meal and gave us a free bottle of BBQ sauce since he had heard we had never been to Famous Dave's BBQ before. Fabulous food - yum, yum. We spent time doing traditional road trip things like stopping to get treats for the drive down & the drive home. We had homemade ice cream and then bought some homemade chocolates for the trip home. What a great time AND the weather was nice & sunny! Bonus!!