This makes me happy

I stepped out the front door the other day to say goodbye to the kids & Rick as they left for swimming lessons & this is what I saw:

It makes me so happy. In that moment I realized, "I'm one of those homes that you drive by with the bike left in the yard where you can tell simply by looking that children live there."
I've always wanted to have that.

Happy Father's Day! (with food)

Rick had to work Saturday night, which means he slept until we got home from church.
Then we all headed over to his parent's house for the 1st annual Father's Day BBQ rib "throw-down". Us ladies provided the side-dishes & had the daunting task of judging the ribs. Mmmmm.... yummy.

Since we weren't able to do Father's Day breakfast properly I made french toast this morning & tried out a new ooey-gooey pecan caramel cinnamon roll recipe in honor of Rick today.
We love you honey, thanks for being such an awesome Dad.

Check out the results:

click here for the recipe (awesome site)

Learning to write their names:

Trevor & Olivia have been working on learning to write their full names, Trev has his memorized but Olivia keeps getting thrown off on how to write the letter "a".
Here they are practicing:

and the rain just keeps coming....

Silly me.
I thought it was the middle of June.
Apparently over here in the Boise area we're still stuck in April.
I love the rain, it's good for my flowers & garden.
Except they need the sun too.

Here's a pic out my back door after one of the showers... love it.

We're all good around here

Just some random pictures from the past week or so.

Rick finally got some time off from work & we've been having fun spending time together as a family.
Trevor & Olivia started swimming lessons again yesterday & of course, are loving it.

We had our first date (thanks for the babysitting Dennis & Evlyn) since our 10th Anniversary (9 months ago). Let me just say that it was LONG overdue. We went to go see Wolverine & loved it.

Oh yeah, I know this is an older picture but I just have to point something out:
Aiden has RED hair.... not blonde (nice try Rick)

Aha! My genes have finally broken through & shown up in our children. It makes me so very happy.

(ok, so he doesn't have much hair but it's red... click on the pic to see it bigger)

Barbie's defense:

I played with Barbies... my brothers played with Barbies with me (sorry guys, you know it's true)...my daughter plays with Barbies & I think it's great.

My current personal favorite: Scotland Barbie

(way to go lass!)

So, I'm completely stealing (as in literal cut & paste) from one of my best friend in the entire world's blog.

Thank you Kristen, no way could I have said it better than this:

The Case for Barbie

(image found here)

Recently in the news and magazines, articles have been popping up about Barbie's 50th birthday; which is being celebrated this year by Mattel and by collectors everywhere. However, her birthday does not come without it's share of opposition. For years now people have railed against Barbie as an unhealthy and unrealistic role model for our daughters.

Mothers and psychiatrists alike came out against the impossibly-curvy-while-being-impossibly-slim (according to sources, her real life measurements would be 39-21-33) doll, stating that she was largely to blame for the rise in eating disorders and heightened sexual awareness in young children.

(Image)

I have to disagree. My mother, single until I was 8 years old, allowed me to play with Barbies. My mom is not a girly girl. Sure she likes herself some fancy heels and she curls her hair before she goes out, but she's more likely to be seen in cotton and flannel in her free time and I could probably count on my fingers the number of times she has allowed makeup to touch her face. She has caught her own fish, killed her own deer, changed her own tires and helped build her new house after she got married.

I am a girly girl. I love makeup and fashion and the one time my dad took me hunting I humiliated him beyond description. I had several Barbies and boxes full of clothes and a Ken doll for all of them to fight over. My 3 younger sisters also played with Barbies. They range from "almost as girly as me" to "touch me with that curling iron and you die".

(image)

Last Christmas my friend, who had previously been opposed to letting her daughter play with Barbies, allowed us to buy her one as a present. Her husband had decided it was high time his little girl get some fashion sense. (heh) My sons picked out "Barbie for President" Barbie. Score one for females around the world, I say. Barbie now has had so many uniforms and held so many positions, a young girl can hold this doll and see before herself a world full of possibilities.

And about those eating disorders: What has happened to women, teens, and young girls since Barbie began to be ostracized a couple of decades ago? We have gotten fat. The term "muffin top" has been coined and it does not refer to anything so warm and delicious as a freshly baked blueberry breakfast food.

The last time I saw a Barbie with workout clothes on, it was 1984. Is it possible that having an impossibly beautiful and curvaceous icon to look up to (down upon?) helps us to see the possibilities in ourselves? Helps us to make goals of beauty and health that have been tossed aside in favor of a milkshake and french fries?

Happy Birthday, Barbie. May your youth, beauty, and impossible curves last another 50 years!

New Moon: holy fetch!

Just watched the trailer for New Moon... set to be released 11/20/09.
I'd had my doubts about Taylor Lautner playing Jacob.... all I can say now is:

Oh. My. Dang.

(click here to watch the trailer in HD)