Monday, September 30, 2013

hello monday and a special guest

hello monday, hello mollye!

pretty much i'm giving you a gift today.
you can send me thank you cards later, gift cards are also accepted, of course.

i'm a sharer and what kind of girl would i be if i continued to keep my fabulous friend mollye all to myself without introducing you to this kick ass mom of 4?
not a typo, that crazy woman went and had 4 boys. 
not a typo, that woman has 4 BOYS. 
i mean, this girl ain't no quitter i will tell ya that much! i will also tell you that i absolutely adore mollye and i know you will too. 
oh, and her name isn't molly, it's mollye, that 'e' on the end makes her that much cooler right?!
i won't go into any stories (trust me, mama gots stories which may or may not include a wig, 2 girls, a disco ball cup and a cruise ship) because that, most definitely, is a whole 'notha post...or 5.
okay, so where was i going here? oh yes, my friend mollye.

first, i gotta make you sit through my monday hello's. sorry, i'll just do a few so we can get on with my girl.

hello little lemon
go ahead and turn yellow any time now. no worries, i'll keep waiting and waiting and waiting.


hello tiny
lil tiny bringing over flowers. i'm sorry my neighbor baby is cuter than your neighbor baby, unless he is your neighbor baby too, then we are tied.

hello storm trooper
d.i.y. mug i made yesterday in the name of love for national coffee day- up on blog soon.
hello high kicks
ask the girl to kick.... oh, and an "atta girl" to ms. high kicker too for scoring 3 times in saturdays game.

ahh i just love monday hello's.

and now, mollye:
_________________________________________________________


Hey there, my name is Mollye and I blog over at Mollye Taylor and her Boy Band.

I am 37 years old, married to the man of my dreams, and have 4 boys ranging in ages 5 to 17.  Yes, I’m tired.  All the time.  During the day I spend my time blogging, following blogs, reading blogs, commenting on blogs, and when I get some spare time, I may clean. 

My life has done a 180 in the past several months.  In July I was laid off from my job I was at for 8 years.  The best part of that job was the people and working from home.  I’ve been telling people for 8 years that I love my job.  And for about 2 of those years I wasn’t lying.  I liked the paycheck.  I liked the flexibility of working from home.  I liked the people.  Most of them.  But when I got laid off, my first feeling was of relief.  I didn’t cry or feel sorry for myself.  So here I am.  Still happily married, still have 4 kids, still tired, still unemployed, and happier than I’ve been in years.

It took getting laid off to gain clarity.  I talked about leaving my company for a long time but was too scared to do it.  Throughout the years I would come up with all these amazing ventures I wanted to start - open a restaurant, build a wedding venue on our property, write a book (which I still plan on doing someday), the list went on and on. 

I’ve always loved to write.  Writing is what makes me happy.  Writing is my therapy.  Writing is me.  So you may ask, why is it that I’m not writing for a living?  Not many times do you hear someone use the word “writer” without prefacing it with “struggling”.  It’s very hard to make a good living on writing alone.  You usually have to supplement it with that pesky job thing.  I was scared to go from security to obscurity.

There are millions of people who actually do what they love because they’re passionate about it.  Why shouldn’t I?  Why have I allowed my fears to paralyze me?  Lack of confidence?  Perhaps.  Fear of not making ends meet?  Certainly.  But something happened.  Something from deep within I didn’t know I had.  I decided I’m done going through the motions and instead will make my own motion.  I’m going to write.

I started up my blog again and entered a contest to be a mom blogger for a local credit union in Seattle.  I kicked my lack of confidence to the curb.  I stomped on my fear.  With heels on.  And I hate to wear heels.  I want to write for a living.  Here’s to following your passion.  And yes, I’m still tired.

____________________________________________________________________________



head on over and read all mollye's posts and follow along to keep up with her so when she becomes a famous writer you can say, "hey, i know that girl!!"
also, go read more monday hello's here and link up!


Friday, September 27, 2013

oh friday, i just love your aloha

oh yeahhhhhh, it's my day! get your aloha friday on and let's not be shy about this thing man! it's real, it's here, there is no denying it so let's do this!!!

last week while my mom was in the hospital having surgery we noticed there was a farmers market down in the parking lot of the hospital. it was small but so cute and such a great distraction as we waited 5 whole hours. 

i thought i would share a few of the pictures with you because well, i have them and you should see them. 
there is nothing you haven't seen before, i mean, it's not a carnival with a woman who has a 5' long beard that she grew in 3 days or a monkey that blows bubbles out of his (you get it) but, they are pretty and it was a bright spot in my day. 

so from me to you, here is a little aloha.



oh, and this last picture isn't from the circus either (although....) ahem, i'm sure i could find a few of us that would be more than freak show worthy.....
i wanted to give you a sneak peek of an awesome blogger and gorgeous, fun, witty, caring, smart ass cookie that you will get to meet on monday. yay you!!!
i know, i know, stop whining. monday isn't that far away and ya know what, all good things are worth the wait. 
trust a mama on this one.




sorry 'bouts the blurrr
it's hard to take a pic of 2 waaay too funny girls.
anyway, for right now enjoy your aloha friday and your week-end but come monday, get ready for that there girl on the left.






Wednesday, September 25, 2013

what i wore

i'm so glad to be back after taking the summer off from blogging, i missed y'all!  

i wasn't quite as prepared to jump back into the 'what i wore wednesday' posts. i spent the summer in cut-offs and tanks, with messy hair that didn't care. oh hey, lookit me, still with the hair that don't care. 
i should go take care of those roots at some point i 'spose.





after the month i've had i feel like i should just sorta sit back and be damn proud of 2 things. 
one, i am dressed. two, my legs are shaved. 
it's the little things really...

oh and it's wednesday, so ya know, get your hump on.

linkin up with:
the pleated poppy
rolled up pretty
get your pretty on
because shanna said so
wardrobe wednesday
lena b

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

caramel oat bars with chocolate



i have so many pics to go through from my summer that i just can't seem to find the time to deal. instead, i baked.

i am gonna say 1 quick thing about unsalted butter. it's dumb. there is nothing more annoying than prepping a whole area to bake, knowing you have all the ingredients, and then reading "unsalted butter" on your recipe card. 
who the heck keeps unsalted butter in their fridge? why go use unsalted butter and then have to add a bunch of salt anyway? dumb. i refuse it. so if the recipe calls for unsalted butter, just know that if you are at my house eating that cookie, it has salted butter and salt. that's all.

ta-daaaa.


caramel oat bars with chocolate (and salted butter).


this is the longest i have ever taken in making a cookie bar. i spent the first 30 minutes with one foot out the door, keys in hand, contemplating trekking to the grocer to get unsalted damn butter. 
eventually once you decide your family is gonna have the salted (let's just call it 'regular' butter because i mean really) butter then it takes a whole whopping 10 minutes to make. i made these (and ate these) in less time than it took to get over the butter dilemma.
so basically what i am trying to say is make these. make them now. make them with regular butter. in 10 minutes. or go through your summer photos and save yourself 8000 calories.

i shoulda probably just gone through the summer photos. damn salted butter.

 caramel oat bars

1 cup butter, softened
2 cups packed brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
3 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans 

30 caramels, unwrapped
3 tablespoons milk



preheat oven to 350 degrees.  line a 8x10 or 9x12 inch baking pan with foil, leaving about 1 inch extending over the edges of the pan. 

in a large mixing bowl beat butter on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. add brown sugar beating until combined. add eggs, vanilla, baking soda and salt; beat until combined. add your flour and mix until combined.  
stir in the oats.  
press 2/3 of the dough evenly into the bottom of the prepared pan.  sprinkle with chocolate chips and nuts.

in a medium sauce pan heat and stir the caramels and milk over low heat until melted and smooth. (*you can substitute caramels for a 12 oz. jar of caramel ice cream topping if you wish, just mix in 3 tablespoons of flour with the caramel sauce.*)
drizzle caramel mixture over chocolate and nuts.  

take remaining dough and flatten small pieces with fingers placing evenly over the caramel layer.  bake for 20-25 minutes or until top is just barely light brown, careful not to over bake!.  
cool in pan and use foil to lift uncut bars out of pan.  
cut into bars.


Wednesday, September 18, 2013

wearing laughter


normally this is where i post an exciting (sometimes not so exciting) outfit.
this week is a little different.
right now we are getting ready to take my mom in for surgery this morning.
a little over a month ago my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.
scary word that cancer. it really knows how to suck.


today i wear pink.
most importantly i wear pink on my toes and join the wave of laughing in the face of cancer.
so what i really urge you to wear today is your laughter, and maybe a lil pink.
feel free to join in, paint your toes and let your laugh be heard loud and clear.



Monday, September 16, 2013

hello monday



hello apples
found this little offering of apples and jams out in the country church left for any takers


hello shadows
me and the mom on a walk


hello soccer
it's been a long 3 months since we've seen you, it's nice to be back

hello technology
this is what you like to a 93 year old with an 18 year old trying to explain you


hello work
aren't you pretty
 

hello cancer
painted toes that will laugh in your face
join in and laugh why don't ya
paint your toes in colorful ways and support breast cancer awareness

what are you saying hello to this beautiful monday morning?


Saturday, September 14, 2013

chasing summer


i decided in june i was gonna take the summer off from blogging and really focus on my time with my littles. apparently summer is over, at least that is what the calendar says but when it's 90 degrees outside i call b.s.
you know you do too.

i love summer. i mean, full on, let's run away together and make hot little sunshine babies type o love.
deep.
i said i would start back september 1st but, ya know, that 90 degree thing again. 
i said i would start after my montana trip. 
i said i would start monday. 

today i walked into what was shortly ago my sparkling clean kitchen (i know because i woke up at 7:30 am, on a saturday morning, and cleaned it) and quickly discovered we had one of those california earthquakes in the form of a little blond haired girl and her friend. making cupcakes, in my now not so sparkly clean kitchen. disastrous.
so what does one do? well, she makes an announcement of course, that sounds something like this: "i'm gonna make a cup of coffee (only because wine is a poor choice at 3:30 in the afternoon right?? someone puh-lease tell me i'm wrong) without seeing any of this destruction and when i come back i'm sure it will all have been a mirage. oh, hope ya both know what a mirage is, if not, google it please without getting batter on my keyboard." 

i quickly escaped to my room (but not before pointing out 2 spots on the wall where batter was slowly drying in large splotches) saw my laptop was fully charged and pretty much decided that today i start back. i don't usually post on the week-ends but ya know, i figure i have at least an hour or 2 before i can enter that kitchen/seismic zone safely.

i have so much to write about being gone all this time but really don't know where to start. 
i've had a summer full of really great times, significant moments, hit a milestone, learned a bit of sad news and felt closure in things i had been holding on to. oh and pictures! do i have pictures for y'all.
i haven't really gone through them all so i will leave ya with a few and i'll see ya again next week. i think. depends on that 90 degree thing....


 campland or bust
our version of tandem biking
teddy roosevelt letting me be the boss man
biggest little
rock of ages with the hawaiian, middle little and littlest little

vegas pool time