Issy had a sleep over.....

Elizabeth and her mom brought her big sister over to have sleep over. Elizabeth is at the greatest stage. She just stares at you and watches you. Eve3n if she is eating she has to stop pop her head up and look at whom ever is talking. She stares right through to your very soul:-) One of Issy's favorite things to do at Gamma's is to go out to the garden. So we headed out. I had some lettuce go to seed. But I thought it was fascinating that the lettuce had dandelion like puffy
flower. But when I blew it, thinking cool lettuce just sprouting up all over, it didn't blow away. They are just stuck on the pod.

And I do have have pumpkins growing but mine are pretty far behind. Most everybody else has orange pumpkins.

She had a bath that night. She loves to take a bath.

The next morning papa said that he had to mow the lawn. She insisted that she needed to go mow too. So papa let her steer the mower and she loved it.

Then she helped gamma in the garden, we pulled out a carrot!

She was so tired that she came in and took a nap on Uncle Steven. He just sat and rocked her for at least 40 minutes.

Her dad came over so when she got up she went and loved on him.

Gamma took her to the store to find a fun toy. We found this fun Barbie and kitchen set. She really didn't care about the "Bobbie." But loves the kitchen stuff. Her mother complained to me today about what a "hooch" the barbie looks like. She said, "Really this is what a barbie who comes with a kitchen is dressed like?" But like I said, Issy loved the kitchen part not the barbie part!

So this summer a cooking movie came out. The food in it looked good but nothing I couldn't live without. Expect for a tomato thing she made. She fried some sliced bread in oil or butter and browns the slices up. Then she had a bunch of chopped tomatoes, yellow and red. And she served it on top of the bread slices. That was the one food from that movie that stayed with me. So I finally looked up some fresh tomato recipes. I found one and made it and I am truly sad I never had it before! I fried up small slices of a bagget in olive oil, so they were crusty and hard. Then I diced tomatoes, and I threw in some sweet onion and 2 cloves of garlic chopped very fine, a big glug of balsamic vinegar, and a couple of glugs of olive oil. Plus parmigiana cheese or any kind of cheese, and salt and pepper. You let it come up to room tepmature then you spoon the tomato mix into the bread. The juices soften it up a little and it is sooooo good. Even a few of my boys liked it. I'm sure what ever she made in the movie was better. But this stuff made me happy!

(OK I found out that this is what bruschetta is, I always thought bruschetta was broiled after you put the tomato mixture on, so now I know what I was missing out on!)

Going backwards.....

So I loaded these all crazy and out of order. So I shall go backwards as I show you our Labor Day weekend.


Erin and her family came over in the afternoon and spent the rest of Labor Day with us. But before that we met them at their favorite pizza place for a late lunch. Elizabeth helped Papa drive a little.

This was our pizza it was very yummy.

This was the kids pizza and it was very yummy.

The princess got to pick what she wanted for lunch. She wanted pizza. She wouldn't let us help her, she wanted to cut it and eat it all by herself.

I think I might start calling Elizabeth "Little Miss Smiley Pants."

She loves papa but sometimes she has to brace herself for his kisses!

Miss Smiley Pants and her mom.

The little princess happy to greet gamma and papa.

She loves her papa.

The girls are so fun and I have a stray strand of hair on my face.

OK before we met the kids for lunch we stopped by and visited Stacy and Aunt Brenda. I didn't take any pictures, but Aunt Brenda looks great, and seems to be doing very well. We did however take a picture of this cool mailbox in Stacy's neighborhood.

Alright now to go farther back. Mike and I spent a quick night in Park City. We drove up to Park City the actual little town, and it was all blocked off for Swiss Days. But on the way up we saw some crazy trees covered in shoes. Hundreds of pairs of shoes were hung on a few trees. I have no idea why, but would love to know if any of you know. Click on the picture to blow it up this is just one section.

It was so pretty, up in Park City the weather was prefect. Cool and breezy......nice!

This is a picture of me. notice how I'm looking up and my bangs are covering half my face, that is very flattering to me, hide everything behind the hair!

The place were we stayed had only been open for 6 weeks. They had a super cool entry system. They told us they were the only hotel in the U.S. or was it the world to have this system. That won't last for long. But you just put your room key in front of the door and it opened up. No more sliding it in and out and waiting for the green light.

It was a resort, so they had a little tea packet along with the coffee stuff. I opened it up and made myself some herbal tea. And when I opened it up I found a cloth tea bag that had been sewn together. Wow talk about sheeshy! (This was the black tea I wanted a little picture of the tea bags)

This was our room. We had a little kitchen in the room. A small fridge, a microwave, and a 2 burner stove top. Everything was under lit under the cabinets and at the bottom above the base boards. I decided I should light my kitchen up like that. It really looked nice.

We stayed at a collection place. It just kind of made me laugh, on this sign they tell you it is a Waldorf Astoria Collection. That sounded a little funny to me.

This is a picture from down the road. But up close every part of it was very nice, the weed covered field in the foreground takes away from the feel of it. I actually kept being messed up. Park City reminds me of northern Arizona. So I kept thinking I was in Arizona, Sedona or Flagstaff. So I suppose I feel like I really got away!

This is the lobby, it was so nice. They had a big fire going in the fireplace. We had to wait there for a bit while the did "the finishing touches to our room." We of course knew that was code for your room isn't clean yet. So we ended up taking a smaller room so we could quit waiting in the lobby!

This was a huge fire pit outside on the grounds and at night it was beautiful. It's a gas fire pit and they had the flames set very high. I loved it!

This was the bathroom. The toilet flushes by pulling up the handle on the top of the toilet. There was also a TV on the opposite wall. And a fat jetted tub.

There was a huge TV in the room. It also had lights on the side of it. It was on an arm and swung out for perfect viewing anywhere in the room. There was also I gas fireplace it was so pretty at night and it's cool enough up there, especially with the air conditioner on, that we could run it for a while.

We didn't bring any food with us so we had to order room service. All of the fee's they add on the the room service kill. But what I got blew my mind:-) I got a Waldorf salad, I had never had one before but it sounded so good. the problem was it was a lunch item and I was ordering at dinner time. But they went ahead and made it for me. I took a picture let me describe it for you:-) They lettuce was so tender and mild, it had blue cheese chunks, lightly pickled grapes, candied walnuts, paper thin sliced apples, and scallions. Topped with some really nice mild vinaigrette dressing. The chicken breast was so tender it practically melted in your mouth, and it had great flavor. I told Mike it might have been the most expensive salad you ever bought me but it was the most delicious one I've every had!

They had his and hers slippers and robes. They have the WA on them for Waldorf Astoria, they were soft and comfy.

I took a walk in the morning and saw a few pretty little wild flowers.

I kept giving Mike a hard time about not going to Amsterdam this year. He had to be someplace else.

We would have left on Labor Day. So I kept saying "because I'm not going to Amsterdam!"

If I would have gone to Amsterdam I would have gone down the "Bloomin Market" where they have tons of great flowers. So I walked on the side of the road in Park City and found my own flowers!

A couple of days with the girls.....

First off I had to show you how well the couches match Bea. She appreciates being able to blend in. I got to spend 2 days with the girls this week.


Issy has been working on her smile and I think she is getting the hang of it. Elizabeth has the smile thing down pat.

Don't you just want to eat em' up!

Elizabeth is starting to really be social. She gets so excited about little things. Pumping her arms and legs. This day I was holding her and I squeezed her little foot. That made her look down and see her foot. Then she stared at it for a while while it was wiggling around, to funny!

Then I went over the next day and hung out with them they all 3 weren't feeling so hot. Maybe little colds or allergies, their mother has it too. I'm hoping I didn't get it from them. But if I did it would be worth it, because I love to be with them!

This is Issy all set up to rest and recuperate.

And this is the sweet little smiling girl! Love them!!!!

A farewell.......

Last week I had a fun "family" girls night out. I got to go out with my cousins before they all started to leave. It was a very sweet thing. When their dad was diagnosed with cancer they all rallied around and spent the summer with him. Alli was in the middle of a move from England to France, but put it on hold. I felt bad for her because we were super wild and stayed out very late, and she had to fly out very early the next morning. she had to fly to France so she traveled for quite a long time that day. Bridgette left for Alabama and her family 3 days later.We all had a great time. We had Aunt Brenda and all of her girls, Uncle Jimmy's sister, and one of Allison's very close friends. It was a really great and fun night. Stacy got left out of this picture, but it shows a few of us.

Then this picture has everybody in it. Aunt Brenda seems to be doing well now. She has had such drastic changes to her life in the last 4 months. She sold her home and moved from her friends and ladies clubs, came to Utah and lost her husband. The little routines that she has done for years and years are going to have to be different now. Her situation has really made me think about getting older and the things we will have to deal with. I have just decided when I go to "my great reward" I'm just going to take my entire family with me. Nobody left behind to be sad or to worry about!

The kids were over this weekend this is Issy making a sad face for Gamma, staged so really cute.

This is Issy with a snack out of Gamma's garden. She picked lot's of things and was so excited.

This is Elizabeth having her first taste of red velvet cake.

Despite the face she made in the picture, she really liked it.

After Issy had her cake she posed for a few pictures, I loved this little kissy face!

Oh and Mike bought me new couches. We were in desperate need. Our old couches were 10 years old and super worn out. They were leather so they still looked great. But when you sat on them you sunk down to the ground. (Plus the leather was cold to sit on in the winter!)