Peachy King

I'm finding that making that list of 10 things I want to get accomplished has really kept me on the ball. Now I must fess up that I did have a giant M&M cookie about 3 days in.....then tonight Todd asked where that cookie I'd saved in the freezer for him went (into my tummy). So to make up for it, and because it was such a Fall-ish day outside, I made my Giant Gingersnap cookies and had a few. But otherwise, yes....sugar fixes can come in many other forms!
I also placed a huge food storage order and canned 2 dozen peaches all by myself....although now I'm wondering if I missed a few steps as I looked at this step-by-step process on-line just now. I just followed the directions a friend gave me. $50 worth of peaches gone bad would not make me happy. I also made 2 dozen bottles of peach/rasp and peach/staw jam which turned out delicious! I haven't gone to bed early AND I'm waking up early....bad combination. My aunt Lee just gave me ideas for more goals involving all sorts of "lists". It's a great post under the Jensen Family. She's full of great ideas! I have a few more goals I like to keep private, but now I see that posting them is probably a way to keep me more accountable :>

The girls and I attended a beautiful wedding a few weeks ago. A friend of mine took pictures with her camera and just sent them to me. Kenna smiles effortlessly, Camdyn wanted them over with!

Street of Dreams

Todd and I went to the Street of Dreams Saturday night (thanks Gibson's). First we stopped off for Oregon Blackberry Smoothies at Burgerville with my free coupon (I love free date nights).
This house has come down in price. I used to be 3 million and now it's 2.6 million. I'm sure they'd take 2 and a half. 11,000 sqaure feet and lots of lots of decks and courtyard but no grass! Beautiful view, pool, massage room, a couple game rooms and movie rooms and each bedroom was it's own suite. It was so fun being there at night. Who buys these homes??? Don't people have better things to spend their money on? I'm doubting whoever buys it will stock up on food storage. What good will that huge house do them then :>
Can't see it, but the Portland lights in the distance are breathtaking. One could just lie out here all night and be perfectly content.....unless of course you were worring about your gigantic mortgage.
Toddie the fire-man. I want one of these in our backyard. Perhaps Todd should put in a slate patio next for one of these?
If a house has an awesome kitchen then I'm sold. This was house #5 I think and I LOVED the kitchen. Knotty Alder is my favorite. That would be me getting ready for the day in my gi-normous bathroom and vanity.
Growing up in Arizona, we'd go through the Model homes. That was our favorite Sunday activity. Go for a drive and tour the homes. Each of us got "dibs" on a house. The others had to knock on the door and we'd show them around. Sometimes you got the crap house and that was just the luck of the draw. To this day I still love playing that game when I go to visit. Sometimes they even have Otis Spunkmeye's baking in the oven. Can the lure of a cookie really sell a home. That is how we sold our first home. I had a cinnamon dessert cooking in the oven and those are the same people who bought our home!

Winner takes all

I announced a contest today in one of my classes, but want to call it "The Biggest Winner". Women will ask me what can they do to lose weight or inches here or there....well there's not such a thing as "spot reduction". Eat right and do lots of cardio! I decided to give some extra incentive to those ladies wanting to tone up now that lazy days of summer are gone and the busy holidays are just around the corner. Oct 31st is our final weigh in and I have some pretty good prizes in store for the top three winners. Although, I believe being healthy can encompass all ranges of weight, shapes and sizes, it's all about feeling good in the body you are in. I'm happy to admit I'm on day 2 of no cookies! I was tempted last night to grab one but held firm. It seems I've made a new friend in my "doing hair thing" by exchanging some tips with a gal on line and my girls are actually really good at letting me try out a few of her techniques on them.

Top Ten

Goal #1 Wake up at 5 a.m. and be home by 7 a.m. to read scriptures with Griffin and get him off to school with a kiss and a note in his lunch from time to time. Today the poor kid got himself all ready and came to kiss us goodbye as T and were still in bed! Besides I love getting a crack on the day before the kids are awake and getting up early means going to bed early, goal #2!

My sisters and cousin have done posts on goals they want to accomplish. Since I tend to be more on the private side I keep them in my journal, but then I thought perhaps it might help me to remember and be more diligent if I post of a few of them. I find I'm better in long term goals than the short term ones. My plan is to accomplish these by the first of October....then make new one's or have created better habits and they need no longer be a "goal"!

So in no particular order, here are some more

Kenna just had woken up.....so this is 2nd day hair before I pulled it out. Now that school's back in I don't want the girls looking like orphans and want to try more hair techniques. I wonder if half the kids at school get a comb through their hair before they're out the door? Seriously.
I love doing little girls hair and my girls are growing too fast. Bows are played for me (or I'm just tired of making them) and Camdyn's a bit too old for them anyhow. Kenna's patience for new hairstyles might be running thin. It's time consuming. #3 Once we get our garage cleaned out (that will be on Todd's goal list) then it's time to stock up on food storage. We have the money, we have the resources, we just need to DO IT! #4

Speaking of food, anyone who knows me well knows that I AM a cookie monster. Ask my brother-in-law Tyler and he'll tell you that I'm also a "cookie snob". I'll admit that.
Cookie Monster and I have much in common. He likes to eat cruncy fruit, vegetables and......yep, cookies, cookies, cookies! Yes a cookie here and there is fine. I just eat them here, there and everywhere. I really wonder if I could go 3 weeks with no cookies. It's never been done. In fact I'm eating one right now just mentally preparing for this fasting of cookies. #5

I want to finsih my Thailand Scrapbook. #6
And not eat cookies in the process.....
Do more one on one reading with the 3 younger kids. Tasha Tudor is my most favorite author/illustrator of all time. I also want to get to bed at 9:30 myself and read rather than waste time downstairs on computer and TV. #7
Go to the temple this month. #8
Decide if I'm going to do the PF Changs Marathon the day after my B-day, then sign up. #9 And..... put on a very fun activity for our ward on Oct 3rd. I brainstormed some fabulous ideas for an Oktoberfest celebration. My committe and I are hard at work to bring it all together, and hopefully it will all turn out like I have it envisioned in my mind! We're planning on holding it outdoors because I think the cultural hall is a tomb that is a bear to decorate. Only the weather will tell. #10

Just because....

What else can make your day than a thoughtful gesture from a friend.....not because it's your birthday, or you're sick, or you just had a baby (although those are all great too!) but rather, just because you were being thought of.

I have a friend, who now lives in Oregon, that to this day I consider The Queen of Thougtful Gestures. Camille Zuro. My list could go on and on of things she did for me when I first moved into this ward. It was all those little things that added up to me wanting to emmulate her. When she moved I wanted to carry on the Camille Zuro role and fellowship others like she did to me. I think I had a good run.....then I had a few more kids and it sorta went downhill.

Two of my friends came by with "just because" gestures that really made my day. My good friend Karen Gibson is always bringing us treats that she makes for her boys when they come to her home for dinner. She, Dennis and Ryan give us extra tickets all the time to events that otherwise we'd miss out on. She brought by carmel corn, which was full earlier! Along with 2 tickets to the Street of Dreams in Clackamas.

On Monday nights I walk with my friend Scarlette and had to phone her and cancel due to a really bad pulled muscle or some mysterious pain radiating down my right calf. I could barely walk down the stairs let alone walk outside. She shows up at my door at 8 pm with a load of new magazines and a "get well so we can walk soon!" note.

There are many occasions where friends have reached out for no reason at all and those instances, although not noted here, do not go unnoticed.

Samuri Sword Fighter

One last hoorah. The weekend before school started I took the kids to hear a concert in the park. It was SO fun. We got a free CD of the band and won a raffle prize and t-shirt. There were booths with give-aways such as balloon animals, waterbottles, stickers, and glow in the dark cups. The girls wanted to come back for the showing of Harry Potter, so we went home for sleeping bags, pj's and treats. We did purchase carmel corn because the smell was overpowering. Even Brody was entertained by the huge screen in the middle of this large park. I love community events like this....especially when they're free! Our friends the Rushings borrowed our baby backpack to do this hike the week before, so we decided to go discover it for ourselves. We had never been to Beacon Rock before and didn't know what to expect.
There are so many beautiful weekends that Todd is working (and will for the rest of his career), that I decided to take the kids and make new discoveries. I told them they are now certified hiking kids, because that is one thing we can all do together....as long as I can manage Brody on my back that is!
It was pretty chilly when we got out of the van, but we warmed right up. Hiking to the top was so much fun, and when we looked up for the first time and saw all the switchbacks of wooden bridges it was amazing. They just kept going up and up and getting tighter together. It only took an hour round trip and the view of the Gorge was spectacular! We then drove on to the Skamania Lodge and did a hike there, took part in an obstacle course, found golf balls along the trail, picked blackberries, got hot cocoa, and played at a playground.

This week Brody turned 18 months.....It seems like he's been in our family forever.....or is it that I just can't recall the quiet, peaceful moments we had before he joioned our family? :> I can't comprehend the idle, selfish time I would have on my hands right now, had we not decided to have another child. Those days will come, and I'm in no hurry for them to get here. I just relish the few hours of peace I have while he naps and the kids are at school. So pretty much any calls between noon and 3:00, are not likely to be answered.

When Brody was about 16 months he started getting out 2 swords, bringing one to me and fighting. It was the cutest thing I'd ever seen. How do little boys have that instinct..... because he's not reaching for the Polly Pockets (unless it's to bite their clothes in pieces). He still doesn't say one single word, but understands when we say "go get your swords Brody". He really whacks away with them too! If you don't have one to defend yourself, you'll get hurt!
This would be an example of how not properly defending your position can lead to pain.
Then he pulls one of these and we're putty in his chubby little hands. He loves his (and Kennedy's) silky blankies.
It seems I've found another babysitter that can fill in when Griffin is away.....that would be the Backyardigans. They saved us on our drive to Utah. Into the Deep, Quest for Flying Rock and the Corn Maze one keep him GLUED to the TV.

Gorge-eous

Ever since I was a little girl I dreamed of having a house with a white picket fence set on a lake. Well, I married a Lake, but I still don't have that house with the picket fence. A few years ago I visited the site of a friends' new shop 25 minutes from where we live on Mt. Pleasant up the Columbia Gorge. I fell in love with the setting, the outbuildings and of course Linda's flair for decorating making it look like a little piece of heaven on Earth. A few years back the Markov's sold this property and moved their shop/shows to Texas. Very disappointing. Now 2 years later it's back on the market and at a very reduced price (as are all the homes here it seems). This was built in the early 1900's as the Mt. Pleasant School. Since then a newer school has been built right across the street and this 2 acres sits pretty much alone....unless you count the Mt. Pleasant Cemetary right next door. My kids said "this place is spooky", when we pulled up. Yeah, I'm thinking all those nights alone when T is at work would be a little on the scary side.
The kids and I were heading out for a hike up the Northside of the Gorge and stopped to take a peek inside the barn and her old shop which were unlocked. This has got to be one of the most beautiful settings I've ever seen with the Columbia River Gorge right out the back door.
This property is brimming with possibilities. If it weren't for the commuting and price of gasoline I think I could have some fun living in the sticks. There's the barn, the shop, (the old school gymnasium) and a 4200 sq. ft home. But I hate to drive when we can ride our bikes AND where would I run?

The house came alive when Linda and Ludmill moved in and renovated. A tribute goes out to Linda in these following shots when they lived in this home..... One of the most talented women I've ever known and privledged to work with at a few of her sales.
The school house sunroom/dining room.

Several flea markets were held at Willownest throughout the year and they were FABULOUS!
South side of the Barn and Potting Shed and more shots of the property below, with tents set up for various antique vendors.