Happy Birthday Ellie!!

Yes, it's true. Our baby turned 3 years old yesterday. We had a family party last night that included a Cinderella themed cake and too many presents. She loved all of her presents. My parents mailed her a Disney Princess sticker/coloring book, a wooden name puzzle, and a Hawaiian hula outfit complete with a coconut bra! We bought her a set of Disney Princess figures and also a set of just Cinderella characters and a Dora dress-up trunk. She was in heaven!!! Grandma and Grandpa Stephenson invited Ellie for a sleepover on Friday night. This is their tradition with the kids for their birthday's starting with 3rd B-day's. I think she was spoiled enough for one more year.

Yes, I'm a slacker!!!

Ok, I didn't realize how long it has been since I posted something. I blame part of it on my belief that I always need to post pictures with my blogs and I've been too lazy to transfer the pictures I've taken from the camera to the computer. I decided that you all would probably forgive me for not posting pictures if I would just post anything to let you know what has been happening with us lately. I wish I had some exciting news but I don't. I can honestly say that I'm ok with that. Sometimes it's nice to just live a normal, routine life for awhile. It's just been the same thing from week to week around here. School, occasional work, kids, laundry, ......that's what my life consists of. I did get some wild hair this weekend though. I decided to fianlly sew Ellie and Micah some play clothes from a bunch of old material I got from Roberts grandma last summer. I finally went to buy a pattern to make some shorts and ended up buy a pattern and some material for myself to make a couple of skirts. I'll have to keep you posted (maybe even with pictures) as to how my sewing kick is going. I haven't sewed anything else but baby blankets for awhile so this should be fun. For those of you who don't know, I just learned to sew about two years ago. My mom use to sew a lot when I was younger but never taught me how, mainly because I really didn't care to learn at that point. After getting married and having kids I decided I should probably learn how and you know what.....I LIKE it! (My mom is pulling herself up from the floor right now). Yes mom, I like it! It's fun to create something from a raw state. I like the feeling of accomplishment I have when I get done and believe it or not, I find it kind of relaxing to sew. I'm still learning and have to say that the seam ripper is my friend. Stay tuned to see how long it takes me to make everything.

Oh, here is an on going problem I have been struggling with...sinuses. I have been struggling with sinus infections since at least October. I am on my third round of steriods and antibiotics and the doctor has finally scheduled me for a CT scan this Friday. Most of the time I have been able to live with the problem but lately I have been having the worst sinus headaches! My head just throbs! It has been raining a lot lately and I can always tell when a storm is going to come through. I hope that the CT scan will tell them something. I don't care at this point if I have to have surgery, I'm just ready to finally get rid of this problem!

Guy Blog Continued...

Heather has been buried with her new job and the pressure of keeping up in school. So I will throw in a few additional comments to keep the blog rolling.

Anthony (my brother) and I had a guys day out last week. We had originally planned on going up to the St. Anthony dunes near Rexburg ID and riding 4-wheelers (Yamaha Banshees for those interested) in the sand for a few days. But we found out that the area was closed until the first part of May. So much for those plans...

Since we were determined to get our speed fix we drove down to SLC for an afternoon and went to the FastKart indoor speedway and raced go-karts for a few hours. It wasn't two days worth, but it was still really fun. We did a 40 lap race against some high school kids there on dates. There were 8 karts on the track at the same time. Proudly, Anthony and I pretty much dominated the race and lapped all of the other competitors twice. But in the end Anthony ended up winning because I got caught up in lap traffic. Another 10 laps or so and I could have taken him (-:

Below are the race result sheets. Anthony was Kart 2 and I was Kart 15. The lap times in boxes are the fast laps.

Time for a 'guy' blog

Hi everyone, this is Robert. I think it's my turn for a 'guy' subject entry to the blog. Heather does a really good job with our blog, putting up pictures and assorted happenings with our family. But I know that there are guys from our family and friend's list that look at our blog too. So I'm going to try and put my 2 cents in every once in a while. Hope you don't mind...

The photo to the right is our 'commuter' car. It is a 1994 Saturn SL1. Actually this was Heather's car when we first met, so since it was paid for it has just sort of followed us around for the last 9 years. I have to force myself not to complain about this car. (As a guy, I want 300HP+, a manual transmission, and 18 inch forged aluminum wheels, etc) This car has 80HP, a slushbox transmission, and 14 inch steel wheels with stock hub caps. If you need to pass someone on a two lane road, you need to plan 15 minutes in advance. Oh, wait I wasn't going to complain was I...

So, the good part about the car is it gets 35mpg consistently, has very seldomly stranded us, and as a recent miracle, passed 200,000 miles.

Since we really can't afford a new 300HP 'commuter' car, I just decided to give the car a gift for turning the big 200K...

...a Sirius radio to keep me company during the commute. Logan has no decent rock/alternative stations since they stopped broadcasting 94.9 The Blaze up here. Now I can finally listen to all of my Hair bands from the 90's. I love channel 20 'Octane' and 23 'Hair Nation' and no commercials on the new radio. Anyway...

So, other blog moms, have your husbands' chime in every once in a while. I would love to read about anything guy related.

Easter

Two posts for the price of one!!

So I didn't get my pictures posted last week so I'm posting twice today. Aren't all of you lucky! Above you will find a picture show of the Easter egg hunt we went to at a friends house last weekend. While the moms and kids were inside making bunny ears and Easter bags, the dads went outside and hid the eggs. Each family brought 24 filled eggs. The kids all rushed outside when it was time and ran around like crazy. They LOVED it!!! Micah and Ellie had a blast! (Thanks Merkley's for inviting us over.)
Next you will find pictures of the annual St. Patricks day dinner. I host this dinner every year for Roberts parents, brother, and grandparents. It's always a big hit. I think next year I will have to cook two corned beefs. We didn't have any leftovers this year. The kids even loved it!

Post #2

These are a few pictures of our annual St. Patrick's Day dinner. I cook dinner for my in-laws once a year and yes I do the whole dinner. We have corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, soda bread, green salad, sprite with green ice cubes, and some sort of a green dessert. It's a dinner we all look forward to every year. I love entertaining. I should do it more often.
Notice our lovely green tablecloth. It was a regift from my mother. Can you believe someone actually gave her that table cloth?!!? It's ugly but it works for St. Pat's Day!
Grandpa Mike decided to spoil Micah and let him sit at the "big" table while he sat at the bar with Ellie.