Day #2 - Pre-Wedding.

Lots 'o Pictures:











(cheese cutters :) HA!)

Tomorrow...the actual wedding. And then I think I'm done. Maybe.

Day #1 - Part II

When we arrived to Denver, Hallie RAN into her Uncle Kurt's arms. It was super cute, and you can tell Kurt was melting :)

We had times for naps, changing, and then we were off to the mountains for Kurt and Beth's rehearsal dinner. It was a great night!!



Beth cries a lot (that's a good thing):


The happy couple:


Money grubbers:


Tomorrow...brunch.

So Many Pictures

So little motivation.

I'm tired. So tired. More on that later.

Big Brother Kurt James got married to now Big Sister Beth (middle name???). But that's not until Day #2 pictures.

Day #1 is all about the traveling. If you know Hal, you know that she LOVES airplanes. She can pick a tiny speck of a plane from the sky that I have to squint to see. She waves and hollars at them. In short, she loves them.

So you can imagine how excited she was for her first airplane ride. Ridiculously excited.

Down the walkway:


Chewing her gum (no clogged ears here!):



Here we go:


Good ole Daddy:



Good ole DVD player:




Tomorrow...The rest of Day #1. Stay tuned :)

Channeling James Taylor

(walking on a country road)



lalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalala country roooooad, road, yeah.

Turkey in the Straw

Name that tune.

Last week we went to the rockin' Cass County Fair. And despite the total lack of rides, we had a BLAST!

This fair had animals!

An obstacle course!

Children conquering piggies!

A cow pooping before your very eyes!

And of course...friends!

Fail.

Those who knows me know that I love to cook. And I love to bake. I do. It's so much fun to put on an apron and play Betty Crocker.

Anyway.

I cannot bake bread. I have tried. And tried. And tried. And last night, I tried again.

This was my easy, breezy recipe:

Virginia Light Rolls
Makes 16 dinner rolls
For 1 1/2- or 2- pound-loaf machines
1 cup plus 1 tablespoon milk
3 tablespoons honey
2 large eggs
6 tablespoons butter or margarine, cut into pieces
4 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons SAF yeast or 2 1/2 teaspoons bread machine yeast
4 tablespoons melted butter or margarine, for brushing

Place all the ingredients in the pan according to the order in the manufacturer’s instructions. Program for the Dough cycle; press Start. The dough ball will be soft, but add no more than 2 to 3 extra tablespoons of flour, as needed, if you think it necessary.

Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. When the machine beeps at the end of the cycle, press Stop and unplug the machine. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough in half, then roll each half into a 2- to 3- inch cylinder. With a metal dough scraper or a chef’s knife, cut the cylinder into 8 equal portions. Repeat with the second cylinder, making a total of 16 equal portions.

Shape each portion like a miniature loaf by patting it into an oval, then rolling up from a short side to make a small compact cylinder about 4 inches long. Place the rolls in two rows of 8 with their long side touching. Brush some melted butter on tops of the rolls.

Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature until doubled in bulk, about 45 minutes.

Twenty minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 375°F.
Place the baking sheet in the center of the oven and bake for 25 to 28 minutes, until golden brown. Remove the rolls from the pan and cool on a rack. Serve warm or cool to room temperature and reheat.

I was even using the bread machine to make the dough!

See?


And I let them rise or whatever for as long as the recipe said to. And they sort of enlarged, but they never REALLY doubled in size.

So the oven was still warm from the Oatmeal Scotchies (YUM) I made an hour before:


So I thought they extra warmth might help them rise. Nah, they just sort of cracked and looked slightly larger. And it had been double the described time, so I just baked them.

And they looked like this:


And I wanted to cry.

The taste was okay, tasted like bread. But the consistency was NOT what I had in mind.

So.

FAIL.

So.

Someone else needs to try them. I really think I might have old yeast or something. Try the recipe, please? And report back.

Just make sure your yeast is not old.

It's 9:10am

Do you know where your blueberries are?

How to Make a Rainbow Cake.

I'm a poet and I didn't know it.

Anyway.

Hallie said she wanted a rainbow cake. And since I didn't get her "pink stripes" for her birthday (pink striped what, you're asking?), I figured I should do at least ONE thing she asked. Three is an important birthday!

So here's what I did.

I made two boxes of white cake mix. (Yes, I was too lazy to do it from scratch). Then, I poured some into six bowls and mixed in gel-food coloring.

It looked like this:


I used two 8-inch round cake pans (next time I will use 9 inch). In one cake pan, I dumped some red in the middle, and then orange in the middle of the red and then yellow in the middle of the orange. So it looked like this:



And then in the other I poured purple, then blue, then green. And I didn't take a picture.

And then my dishes looked like this:


And the cake looked like this:

And this:

Par-TAY!

Hallie officially turned the big 0-3 on Sunday, and we had quite a bash to celebrate her birthday.

She is so stinkin' cute:



Breakfast of Champions (Watermelon & Sprite):


Babies EVERYWHERE!!!!
(Maggie)

(Isaac):

(Will):


A rainbow birthday cake:




Taking pictures of willing family members:











Wonderful gifts:



And of course, the trampoline: