Our boot girl

Last week we bought Hailey some boots because we were thinking of having her be a cowgirl for Halloween. She wouldn't take them off in the shoe store and then she wore them all week. Surprisingly every morning she would get dressed and her boots would match the outfit she put on, like the outfit in the photos. I didn't think she would have so many outfits that would go with them. I wanted to take a picture of her in her boots and then she started posing like you see in the second photo, who taught her to be a model? I'm afraid we bought the shoes too soon and she may not want to be a cowgirl by the time Halloween comes along but at least the boots are getting good use. I've never been a boot person myself but it is a nice change from the flip flops she wears constantly.

Yummy Wheat Bread Recipe

5 cups warm water
15 cups whole wheat flour
2 Tb dry yeast (two small pkgs.)
1 cup cooked oatmeal (cooled)
2/3 cup olive oil
2/3 cup honey
2 eggs
1 cup powdered milk
2 Tb salt
4 crushed vitamin C tablets

-Pour water into large bowl. Add the yeast and let sit a few minutes. Add 10 cups of the wheat flour and knead 3-5 minutes.
-Add the remaining 5 cups of wheat flour and all of the other ingredients. Knead for 7 minutes. The dough should pull away from the sides of the bowl.
-Divide into 6 portions and form into balls. Put into 6 well greased 46 oz. metal juice cans, punch down well to get the air bubbles out.
-Cover with a cloth. Let raise until double (30-60 minutes) Bake at 350 for 35 minutes. Let cool 5 minutes in the cans. Dump onto cooling racks to finish cooling.
*the flour measurements in this recipe are based on using hard white wheat. If using red wheat, you may need less flour in the second step. (judge by consistency)
Julie's Notes
-The cans it is talking about are the big metal juice cans that tomato juice and pineapple juice can come in. You can probably use loaf pans but as you can see from the picture it makes it so the bread doesn't have a bunch of crust.
-The vitamin C tablet is for ascorbic acid, it helps to hold the bread together better, I usually put in about 1/8 tsp.
-I have to half this recipe for my Kitchen Aid mixer because it won't hold that much flour. But I have also seen it done by hand if you do not have any sort of mixer.
-If you haven't been to the cannery lately (or ever) you may not know that they have a white wheat to choose from, it is lighter then the old red wheat.
-If you don't have a grinder or wheat you can buy some whole wheat flour from the store, the disadvantage is that the nutrients start to leave as soon as wheat is ground up but it is a good way to learn how to make bread until you can get your own wheat supply.

I just love this face!

Homemakers

Hailey and I were being homemakers last Saturday when Charlie was golfing. She was busy taking care of her babies while I decided to try out the hand crank wheat grinder so I could make homemade bread. I'm busy grinding away and I look over and Hailey has a mop in one hand and her baby in the other dressed up in her leotard.

Then she sees my taking a picture so she stops so that I can take a picture of her baby....she is such a MOM!

Then I want her to take a picture of me as proof that I was being so homemakery and after a few tries she managed to get a picture of me.

So then she thinks she is a photographer and 50 pictures later.....(thank goodness for digital)

Here is some of Hailey's photography....she did all the set up of poses herself.

The last picture Charlie thought was heading toward the abusive side but she was just using her creativity :)
By the way, after an hour of grinding wheat I made some delicious bread! I do recommend an electric grinder but a hand one is always good to have around. A friend here in Florida gave me the bread recipe and it is bread even your husbands will love so if anyone wants to try it out let me know.

Keeping things Updated

I'm not as good as I thought I would be at keeping things updated on here but then again I usually have my phases of dedication to projects, so you never know if I will have a lot to post or not. Anyways, things are going good. We have 2 1/2 months of pregnancy left and I have been feeling really good but I am now on the verge of entering the uncomfortable stage and a rapid weight gain stage. I'm about 7 months along and have only gained half of my pregnancy weight so that means the last 2 months I will gain the rest because we all know it is inevitable. I have been lax on getting things ready but I think it is about time to start getting Hailey out of the crib, clothes down from the attic, get the room ready and start thinking of names because it needs to be done.

6th year Anniversary

Charlie and I made it through another wonderful year of marriage. We both love each other more now then the day we were married and hope to continue that trend through the years. Last year we went on a 5 day Florida Keys vacation by ourselves to celebrate our 5th year but this year we were so worn out and broke from our vacation to Utah we didn't plan ahead. Every year can't be a full blown vacation, right? Our anniversary fell on a Friday which was also the day we were married but we didn't have a babysitter and Charlie happened to have a Corporate meeting that held his attention until almost 6 p.m. So we made the most of it and went to Longhorn Steakhouse and put Hailey on one side of the booth and us on the other and tried to forget she was there. Luckily she was well behaved that night (it is usually hit or miss) and we enjoyed a nice dinner. Then we put the unwelcome guest to bed and put a mattress in front of the TV and watched a romantic comedy and fell asleep.....(all those with young children know how that goes)
Charlie let me sleep in the next day and continued the celebration with a yummy breakfast and then an evening at Sea World. Once again Hailey came along and had tons of fun. At the end of the night Charlie said "Was this our Anniversary or Hailey's?" All in all we still enjoyed being together which is what really matters.



We didn't even get any pictures of Charlie and I together, oops!

August Vacation

Well we had a fun family vacation to Utah in August. We managed to have many fun events and not a lot of pictures so I only have a few to post. Events included.....
Golf
Outdoor movie night

Swimming

A hike up to Mt. Timpanogos Caves (with a siting of Lindsay Lohan on the trail, it's true!)

Jet Skiing

Baseball game, lazer tag, movie and dinners. We kept very busy, maybe too busy but we did have fun.