Date night!

We had a spectacular date night the other night. It was the first in a while because this semester has just about killed us. We made dinner at home, and then took the girls out for an Ironport float. (Iron port is Iron county's world fair version of root beer. It's a lot different than root beer, though, you need to try it.)

Then we dropped the girlies off at Grammies, and went to a movie. We saw the Bounty Hunter. It was pretty funny. We have been laughing about it all week. It was so much fun to hang out together and hold hands with my sweetie. (The outing was free except for the floats because my work gives out free movie tickets for employee birthdays! Yay for Freedom!)

Sunshine, check it out!

My sister, Sunni, is an avid seamstress. She has been working on charming me into tapping into my sewing well. (Mine is a bit shallow) But last month I started working on this skirt and I finally finished it. What do you think?

Spring Spa Day!

We had another girls night out (in) last night. This time we did a spring spa day. We had such a fun time. I think we might be making some headway in chasing winter away.
We started out by making some spaggetti and garlic bread for dinner. Then we deep conditioned our hair. (by putting some really strong conditioner in our while it was dry and then putting our hair in a ponytail for a while.) Awhile back I bought a book about how to make "at home spa treatments," this book suggested putting a mushed up avocado into your hair for a deep conditioning treatment. We didn't try it because we didn't have an avocado. Maybe next time. I try to include both of my girls and David in Girls night out. So David and Dolce both had Olive oil put in their hair for some deep conditioning.
Then it was on to facials. Try this recipe for a good exfoliating facial mask.

Honey Oatmeal Facial Scrub

2 tsp honey
1 Tablespoon Oatmeal

Mix honey and oatmeal together in a bowl until blended. After giving yourself a steam facial treatment by putting a washcloth soaked in hot water over your face apply the facial scrub to your skin and leave on for ten minutes. Scrub gently before removing with warm water and a washcloth. Follow up with your favorite moisturizer.


We did this and little Mckinley seriously thought her mommy was off her rocker when we were putting breakfast on our faces. She specifically requested cucumbers for our eyes though.

Next, we did pedicures and painted our toes beautiful spring colors! Dolce even got her toes painted.
Lastly, we made Daddy give us hand massages while we watched The Barbie 3 Musketeers, followed by chocolate brownies with strawberry ice cream on top.
We feel so revitalized now!

Crawling lessons

At five months to the day, Dolce started trying to crawl. She had been so fussy for several weeks when her big sister played with her. She has been so frustrated that she can't keep up with everything Mckinley does. Mckinley is definitely her favorite person and she wants to do everything she does. I love watching them interact and Mckinley is very good at playing with her. Sisters have a very unique bond don't they? On this day, Dolce was trying so hard to play with Mckinley, and Mckinley stopped what she was doing to give her baby sister some tips. I love these pictures because I don't know who is more frustrated, Dolce or Mckinley. Mckinley is really sharing in the emotion of learning how to crawl.

Hoppy Easter!!!!

We had such a fun Easter this past Sunday. It seemed like a very busy weekend because of 2 birthday parties, also Happy Birthday to my one and only sister Sunni! and General Conference. Both David and I were scheduled to work Friday and it was such a nice surprise when we both went to work and ended up getting off early enough to color eggs with Mckinley and my brother Johnny and hang out together for the rest of the evening. Saturday, Mckinley jumped up to go to one of her favorite cousins birthday parties. Happy Birthday Kenzie Lynn! (by the way, I think all of her cousins are her favorite cousins!) Right after Kenzie's birthday party, we got an urgent phone call saying that the Easter Bunny had made an early stop at Grandma and Grandpa Jacksons, so Mckinley rushed over to hunt for some fabulous surprises. The Easter Bunny had even brought some jars of baby food for Dolce to find. (my camera was not charged and so we didn't get any pictures of the egg hunt:( )

Easter morning we woke up to some very fun surprises. We thought it was so cute that when Mckinley saw her Easter dress she put it on right away so she could be pretty while hunting for her treats. I am fast becoming the kind of mother who can't contain how proud she is of her kids. Our fridge is always covered with all of the creations Mckinley makes at school, (we are running out of space.) I especially love some bunny rabbits Mckinley drew for Easter. They are her version of stick people but with big bunny ears on top. I am keeping them forever.

For my Easter surprise, I wanted this tea caddy that you can hang cups on and stack plates on. Thanks Grandma for my genetic (and psychotic) love of dishes. (It's a sickness.)

David was very surprised when he saw that he had gotten a new cookbook from the Easter Bunny! This must be because the Easter Bunny would like him to make dinner more often because he is such a wonderful cook! In this picture he is making the same face as the guy on the Wheaties box. By the way, try this cereal if you haven't. It is really good, and is supposed to give you energy with extra vitamin B.

Dolce was not so concerned about what the Easter Bunny brought for her, but she got a new dress with an Easter bonnet. (When I was a little girl, my sister and I always got a new Easter dress with gloves and a hat.)

I also made these little Easter candy jars for my girls this year.
At our house you can't have Easter without having chocolate dipped peeps rolled in green coconut grass. (I don't actually like peeps at all unless they are like this. haha, but I would eat rocks if they were rolled in chocolate.)
HAPPY EASTER!!!!

Spring Break!

David was on spring break last week. He has been working so hard with everything, and I was so happy to see him finally get a little break. The weather couldn't have been more perfect for the week. It was a great reminder that Spring is just around the corner. (I think every time I had a spring break when I was in college, it always ended up being the storm of the century. Working at a ski resort, though, I guess that made it ok.)
Because it was nice and warm, we wanted to get out and do something fun. We decided to go to Zion. This was David's first time. It's such a fun place to go and there is really so much to see. We went with my Mom and my brother Johnny.
One thing you should always do when going to Zion is drive the scenic route through the tunnels. There is one tunnel that is a mile long, blasted through rock during the early part of the century. The first thing we did when we got to the park was drive through the tunnels. (Remember to honk your horn and blink your headlights as you drive through!) There is a very interesting part of the park above the second tunnel that I love because everything looks like it has been painted with a huge paintbrush. You can see the brush strokes, it's so interesting.

We were all starving after the drive and so we decided to stop at the lodge and have a picnic on the lawn. We sat under this big tree, that is a part of just about every Zion memory I have. My Mom has old memories under this tree too from when she was a little girl. She said they used to come to Zion all the time during the summers (sometimes with my Aunt Elaine who just passed away.) and she always wanted to get some of the ice cream that they sell. They never could afford to get any except for this ONE TIME. That time she was in heaven. And they sat under this tree and ate it. I think the picnic was Mckinley's favorite part of the trip. She loved setting things out on the blanket and pouring the drinks into cups and passing out plates. My Mom believes that every picnic should have at least a little bit of "home made" goodness. Haha! We didn't have much time to prepare on the day we were going, and so she made some brownies from a box. They tasted really good, but my Mom laughed that they weren't exactly home made.

After the picnic, we went across the river to hike the Emerald Pools hike. It's a very pretty walk. Once we had made it to the lower pool, David and Mckinley didn't want the to stop. So we left Dolce with my Mom and Johnny at the lower pool and continued to make our way up. I went to the middle pool with them and then turned back to feed the baby. I love having such an adventurous little girl and husband. They hiked up to the top pool, and then David gave Mckinley a piggy back ride back down. It was such a fun day of exploring and hanging out. Can't wait to go again!

Oh yeah, the Ostriches were on the side of the road on the way to Zion. We stopped to feed them. Mckinley couldn't believe such crazy things.

Makin it through.

I think it's safe to say that we are all feeling good for now. In the middle of February, Dolce came down with RSV. It was a mild case, but they still wanted to treat it aggressively with breathing treatments and nasal washing because she was only 3 months old. Fortunately, she has recuperated nicely and is back to her usual happy self. Yay! We are having so much fun with her and love watching her grow. She is also getting big enough to handle more of her big sisters tough love. Haha.(Mckinley tried to feed her an ice cream cone yesterday! And the picture above with Dolce wearing the bunny ears was Mckinleys idea too.) Cute torture.