About us – Page 66 – Gracious Rain

April 21, 2009July 6, 2020

An Apple a Day…

Update–

New Year’s Goal #7

“To eat more healthily and cut wayyyy back on sugar–so that I can be here to play with my babies for a long, long time.”

Who wouldn’t want that?

Too bad, all I can say here is a great, big, “Yikes!”

Actually, believe it or not, I was doing great for about 5 weeks. Sugar and I were barely speaking…

Oh, I wasn’t doing too much label reading or anything–it was more like just not eating the cookie, or donut, or ice cream. Now and then I’d make a treat or something and taste it, but honestly, skipping it wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be.

For me, the secret was to tell myself that I could have whatever I wanted–if I REALLY wanted it. However, I needed to drink water first–which magically made an apple sound and taste better.

Anyway, it worked. The weight was coming off. Wahooo!

Until, that is, the evil Easter candy came along. It was bad, as you may remember.

There’s more. What you didn’t know–unless you’ve been to my house in the last week–is that one quick trip to a town called Logan and you can really end up with a kink in your cart. Logan is a two hour drive from my place and so whenever we go there, we always stop at the Gossner’s Cheese Outlet. Sounds harmless enough.

We buy Provalone, Swiss, Mozzarella, Smokey Gouda…

…squeeky Cheddar.

…and root beer milk. Incredible.

These things are pretty much good for you, right?— so I’m not worried. Also, when it’s as fresh as you can possibly get it–yeah, the cows are right outside the back door– I can’t feel really bad about this place.

Sadly, now we come to the truly evil part of the story.

Down the road a spell from Logan, there is a great, huge, magical factory that no doubt employs hundreds and thousands of people, thus raising the standard of living in the Logan area to a…um…well, a higher standard.

That’s a plus–right? Of course, right.

The frightening news is that this factory is…a…dare I say it?

I dare…

a…cookie factory. You should be screaming right about now.

Here is how we handled the Pepperidge Farm Cookie Outlet.

There are no words to describe it. In fact, this whole experience may require some intense group therapy…

we can meet at my house…I have cookies! HA!

Ok, ok…seriously. I’m ready to behave again. Truly, I am.

And to prove my determination–

First: I put all my Easter candy in the bald kid room. Trust me, it now has the life expectancy of a sycamore moth.

Some clapping here–please.

Second: I put new twist ties on the cookie bags and ate a banana instead of ripping a big hole in the Milano bag–as previously planned.

A bit of cheering is in order now.

Thirdly: Later in the day, instead of downing 47 Brussels and 22 Piroettes, I opted for a handful of the babys’ animal cookies…and they weren’t even good.

Ovations…anyone?

I intend to be thin and gorgeous really soon so I can play with my babies forever. Or at least to fit better in an squishy, ridiculous airplane seat. I’ll do it–you’ll see.

In the meantime…I have a hot date with a treadmill.

Toss me an apple, would ya?

April 10, 2009January 1, 2022

Egg Toast Cups

In case you’re feeling a bit of a sugar buzz–here is some nice, soothing, protein to balance things out a bit.

Egg Toast Cups

Ingredients:

Bread

Eggs

Cheese

Ham or sausage or bacon or NOT

Whatever else you put in scrambled eggs

Butter

Lightly butter each slice of bread and cut off the crusts.

Hold the bread–as shown–over a muffing tin.

Pinch slightly and press the bread down into the muffing cup.

Toast in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes–until browned.

Fill with a scoop of scrambled eggs mixed with diced ham and a bit of cheese. The cheese is important because it holds the eggs together so that they don’t spill whenever you take a bite.

Have a good weekend and I promise—no more food for a while. We’re about to burst over here!

Week 4 Food Storage Prompt

100 count Multiple Vitamins

Egg Toast Cups

: Launi

Ingredients

Bread
Eggs
Cheese
Ham or sausage or bacon or NOT
Whatever else you put in scrambled eggs
Butter

Instructions

Lightly butter each slice of bread and cut off the crusts.
Hold the bread--as shown--over a muffing tin.
Pinch slightly and press the bread down into the muffing cup.
Toast in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes--until browned.
Fill with a scoop of scrambled eggs mixed with diced ham and a bit of cheese. The cheese is important because it holds the eggs together so that they don't spill whenever you take a bite.

April 2, 2009July 19, 2020

Baby Feet

New Year’s Goal #6– I will pay attention to the tiny feet that may be stepping in my footprints.

Preparing this week for General Conference is an easy way to set a good, happy example for the babies.

Years ago, when the bald kid was about 7, he was in the kitchen looking at the huge wall calendar that we had on the corkboard. He walked his fingers over the holidays, birthdays, sport events and parties that were scattered throughout the month of October. Because it’s such a busy month he kept saying, “cool…cool…cool.”

Then as he got closer to the top of the calendar—he was short back then and had started at the bottom of the page—he shouted, “Yes-yes-YES!! CONFERENCE!” Everybody in the room just busted up laughing. I figured something must be working right.

Over the years, in our quest to help the kids enjoy Conference we would buy inexpensive notebooks–you know the kind you can get at Target for 25 cents at “Back To School” sales–and a new pen of some kind. Saturday morning we would ceremoniously pass them out with the instructions that they could use one page per speaker.

They could take notes,

or draw picture of the topic

or of the speaker themselves–

or a combination of all three.

Now, for our family, it felt important to NEVER give the children the feeling that they had to sit here for 4-2 hour stints and not move or breathe or leave the room.

In fact, we told them outright that they could go play if they wanted to. But the incentive to stay in the room was that every half hour or so, I would pull some kind of surprise out of a secret brown bag–and whoever was here taking notes would get the treat.

Watching Conference in St. George Hotel

It could be muffins, or fruit rolls or Wheat Thins or mandarin oranges. The important thing was that the bag held things we rarely ever bought. So they really wanted to stick around.

Then, at the end of Conference on Sunday afternoon they would count up their number of speakers and we’d give them a Skittle or M&M for each one. That might not sound like much, but over the two days–there are close to 30 speakers and so there is potential for quite a handful of loot.

One year, I told the kids I would give them $5 if they could tell me the name of each member of the Quorum of the Twelve and the First Presidency–just by looking at their picture. Bribery may seem like a goofy tactic to some, but it made sense that it would be easier to listen to, and respect someone that they recognized–and $5 was a cheap way to help that happen. They all did it and the girls wouldn’t let me pay them. But the best part was later when one of the little boys came running up the stairs breathless, saying, “Hurry, you’ve gotta come downstairs! L. Tom Perry is on TV!”