Happy Bday Tay!

Happy Birthday Taylor! We had a great time celebrating Taylor's birthday as a family last night at Chuck E. Cheese, she's been wanting to go there for a year now. It was lousy pizza, but a lot of fun. She's so big now. I asked if she felt different when she woke up this morning since she was 5 now, and she said, "Yes, my legs grew, my elbows grew, and I think now I'll need new clothes!" Yes, she's a little too clever sometimes:)

New York!

Jon and I got to go to New York City last week. We had a great time. It is one of my dream vacations and it was an experience. We saw West Side Story on Broadway, ate great food in tiny places, and saw some interesting people, lots of people! It was a great vacation, but after all that noise, dirt, and people, I was really glad to get back to my mountain air and green grass, and to my babies of course!
Times Square, I couldn't believe how bright and busy it was, it was like noon at 10 pm!


I had a lot of fun at "The Met" . They had on special display; Vermeer's "A Milkmaid", so that was neat to see the real thing. It's an amazing museum!
On our way to central park we found the LDS Temple, it's funny how it just rises up in the middle of the city.

We enjoyed seeing the statue of liberty and Ellis Island. We spent over 4 hours just inside the Ellis Island museum. It was amazing to hear about the stories of the immigrants that came through there.
We went to Junior's for some real New York Cheesecake. I ordered some onion rings and they came out like donuts, they were huge. They tasted ok, but the cheesecake was great!
There wasn't much to see at Ground Zero, but a big hole, amazing how big of a hole is there.

We ventured to Chinatown one morning and had Dim Sum. Pretty sure we were the only ones speaking English there. I THINK we had seafood and shrimp dumplings, and Pork potstickers. I also explored the stores and negotiated for a couple Coach purses (I'm sure they are real, right?:)
Central park was bigger and prettier than I had imagined.
After several delays on the plane trip over, and a thoroughly invigorating taxi ride to our hotel, I was just glad to be on something that wasn't moving!

Fall Hike

We went hiking this last weekend up in the mountains. It's been 80 here (until today, brrrr!) and we've really enjoyed having such a great Fall so far. The mountains were beautiful, the leaves were golden, we roasted hot dogs and smores, and I took pictures of course! It was a lot of fun!
Taylor said, " I'm Queen of the mountain!"
Baily in the sun set, love the light and lens flare in this one!
Pretty much the only shot I can get of this girl, walking away!
Mandy and Emma
The kids and I.

I made this last night and remembered how great it is, if you don't have this recipe, you should try it, it's delicious! (I always use unseasoned rice wine vinegar for the dressing) (Click on recipe to enlarge)

Peaches

The best thing about this time of the year to me has got to be fresh peaches, from our nearby orchard, or from the neighbor's tree that hangs over our fence. Baily loves to grab one and dig in. If you have a lot you HAVE to try this desert: peel and half a fresh peach. Put a scoop of vanilla ice cream in the middle, drizzle with caramel, and top with toasted almonds, DELICIOUS!

Taylor Back To School

Taylor FINALLY started her preschool, she's been dying to go since Trevor started a couple weeks ago. She loves school, Trevor endures school. We made a cute bag for her to take, she picked out the decorations herself!

Pettiskirts

I loved the boutique pettiskirts that are around now, but I didn't love the $80 price tag, so at the beginning of the summer I set out to make my girls each one, and it pretty much took all summer, but I think they turned out really cute. If you want to be ambitious and try here are the directions I found most helpful from sewingmamas.com. Warning: may cause you to really HATE tulle!