My Love of Recipes....

I have always loved to cook. I have an obsession with Costco and Cook books because of this love. However, I feel it's unfair that I grew up learning to cook for 5 people...and then I was reduced to two when I got married. That's just not fair...especially when those two don't eat leftovers very well, lol.

Anyways, I ran across this little Blip on MSN this morning

(it's such an entertaining place to find fun random things on a slow day at work)

And wanted to share it:

Healthy Breakfasts:

http://www.delish.com/recipes/cooking-recipes/low-calorie-breakfasts?GT1=47048

I have also learned to balance my meals better from this website:

www.caloriecount.about.com

To make sure I don't gain too much weight from eating all this food I love to cook.

My go to place for recipes when I'm looking for something new or to refer to something I ate when I was young is:

www.allrecipes.com

And I am newly discovering this website:

www.eatingwell.com

who created that little "Healthy Breakfasts" blip.

{life is too short to not eat good food}

I can feel it...

the summer is slipping away....

It makes me so sad that the summer is slipping away. No matter how hard I try to ignore it, the time won't stop.

Although I do love the fall.....

• Light Jackets
• Bon Fires
• Lots of food from Mom and Dad's garden {Thank You!}
• Warm Drinks
• Get to start wearing boots again sometimes...
• Short season is close to over {Thank Goodness}

I had such high hopes of getting our yard all finished and complete at the end of spring/ beginning of summer so we could have the rest of the summer to enjoy it, but it's just so much more work than anyone would ever think, lol.

It is turning out great, it just takes time... So I guess we'll have to have a bon fire in the back yard for Halloween {If you're allowed to during that time of the year} in our new firepit (if we get it finished) and grill out on the back deck (if we ever get the railings up)

I can't believe that we leave for Hawaii in 20 days... It's unreal. I'm so excited to just go relax.....ahhhh...

I can feel it already- and it feels so good, lol.

I want to just sit out in the sun on the private beach, eat lots of good foor, go snorkeling off that same private beach, take long naps in hammocks, enjoy the fresh farmers markets and massages and luau's!!

For the next little while we're going to:

• Get ready for the Warren Family Reunion
• Finish running electricity to our back yard/ shop
• Finish spreading the gravel in the back yard/ planters
• Try to get started on the firepit
• Lay the sprinkling system in the back yard and
• Wait for the grass seed I planted last Saturday to start growing {Crossing my fingers}

In the mean time, check out this cute link I found on MSN. They have some really cute ideas!

http://lifestyle.msn.com/your-home/staticslideshowrs.aspx?cp-documentid=24972431&gt1=32067

Ga-Loon....

We went to Lagoon this last weekend. It was super fun. We all went shopping at the Gateway Saturday night before we checked into our hotels. Then we ate at the yummy Breakfast buffet at the Little America before we headed to Lagoon, which a quick Pit-stop at Costco (love that place)!

I forgot the camera at home, so we just had to use my phone camera!

We had a great time! Thanks all that came and joined in!

Excitement...

I'm getting quite excited for the weekend to be here. I officially have 41 minutes.

After work I'm going to go home, change my clothes, then go tanning and go running at the rec. center with Trish. Then I"m going home to work on the yard with my hubby!

I'm so excited for tomorrow: as it is the first time in WEEKS I'll be able to sleep in. Awesome...

Once I do wake up though, I'm going to re-seed our front lawn. It will be great in the long run but maybe not so fun in the heat of the day {however} I won't give up my only day to sleep in, so I'll have to just deal with it.

After Justin gets off work we will head to Salt Lake to go to Lagoon with his Mom, Aunts, Uncle, Brother and Cousins.

{The last time I went to Lagoon was with Justin in 2007- one month after we met}

So it's been a while...

I'm going to try to resist draggin him through IKEA to find some cute lanterns to hang from Shepherds Hooks in the {new} flower beds in the back yard...

(For $6.99 how can you resist!)

We'll see how that goes!

Have a great Weekend everyone!!!

Discoveries...

I have been exploring different blogs and facebook accounts this morning and I've found some pretty cute stuff. Like this website:

http://www.ldscoloringbooks.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=46%3Agreen-gel-a-tin&catid=34%3Agreen-gel-a-tin&Itemid=63

Has free LDS coloring books. Just print them off and take them to church! Wa-La... Quiet Children (Like I'd know, lol)

There is also this great LDS site, that has all sorts of information on it. There are helps for Primary lessons...(which is basically all I've looked at so far) but they're very cute and helpful!

http://www.sugardoodle.net/joomla/

More Stickers…

Here are a few more stickers that I've done lately. Pretty fun stuff! Enjoy.

The sticker is on the planter

Summer Fun!

This summer is/ has been just jam packed with so much to do and I must say, it’s one of my favorite summers so far. Justin and I have loved being in our own house and spending time working in the yard, although fun might not always be the correct term….

It’s so rewarding to have our own yard and to be able to work on it and build it up into our own, much loved, enjoyable space.

We have enjoyed so many fun activities so far, and have so many more to come!
What do we have coming up?

Finishing the new Burm for the front yard and digging in the fire pit this week.
LAGOON this weekend!
Putting in the Sprinkling System/ Running Power to our shop Monday
Softball Monday night
Warren Family reunion Next weekend
Maybe going to UBIC for the First time ever August 7th
My Great Grandpa’s “Wadsworth Grandchildren” Family reunion in Blackfoot, ID on August 14th
Leaving for HAWAII on August 18th – August 23rd

We also have to: Put the railing up on our New back deck
Build and plant the flower boxes in between all our new trees in the back yard!
Put together the fire pit area
Transplant my perennials to their new home in the back yard
Reseed our front grass
Move Justin’s tool boxes from the garage to his new shop (so that I can)
Set up my wood working area in MY garage (so that I can)
Build some of These:

cute benches for my front porch and back deck!

The plans for this bench are here

http://www.knock-offwood.com/2010/01/plans-7-steps-to-distressed-bench-from.html

And Maybe SOMEDAY I will have enough energy to clean out my basement and have (my second ever) Garage Sale.

Wadsworth Family Reunion

One of my all time favorite trips of the summer. We always have fun getting together with my dad's side of the family. This year, we went to the Provo River Falls and rented a campground for the weekend. It was so great! So many people showed up, but we were still short about half. It was great to spend a weekend in such a beautiful place, with such great people, fun games and SUCH GOOD FOOD.

We always sit around the camp fire every night and sing songs while the uncles play along with the guitars.

Love you family! Thanks for the great time!

Hailey needed to wear Justin's hat to keep the rain off her head.
Eric and Kimberly playing Poker

Justin and Evie. This little girl followed us all over. She's such a sweetie!

Hailey and Me, sitting around the camp fire.

The dogs LOVED the mountain. The grass, the room to run, the weird things to eat and Especially the water to play in!

Playing in the falls.

Our Family.

Dad and Aunt Lavonne

Part of the Clan. We were a little low in numbers this year, but this is everyone that came.

Natalie took a nap on grandpa, and when she woke up and noticed it wasn't Tiffany holding her, she didn't even cry! GO Papa!

Dad and Hailey singing cowboy songs.

Koy wanted to make "mean faces" So funny.

Me and the girls...

Justin and Koy = Buds.

Tiff and Nattie.

He was getting ready to shoot me with a marshmallow gun....

Getting some Breakfast!

Super Cute!

I have finally gotten back into my Vinyl Cutting and it's been so much fun! I've loved cutting these and seeing how cute they've turned out. Lately though, I've also been able to help stick some of them on, or gotten pictures back from people of theirs and I'm loving that they're all turning out so cute!
If anyone wants any stickers cut, just call or E-mail me! I'd love to help you create some art for your home! Plus it's cheap! .10 per square inch for interior stickers, and they DON'T damage your walls. If you get tired of them, you can just peel them right off!
chelsiepratt@hotmail.com

This one the one on my laundry room wall. The LAUNDRY is in Gray and the "sorting out life..." is in black. I LOVE how it turned out.I just sit and stare at it now when I fold clothes, lol.

Above their bed in Chocolate Brown.
Over their dining room table in Black ( I LOVE THIS FONT!)

This one is purple. SO Cute.

My 4th of July plate (to replace the one that I lost) It is Gray, Red and Blue.

High Cholesterol?

I have to say, I’m completely loving July. Even though the 4th was a little chilly and I wore my jacket the whole time for the fireworks, it’s not half bad. I’m just glad it’s warming up. All my flowers are blooming, and I’m loving spending time outside with my girls and with Justin!
This week has been a fun one. We didn’t really have a whole lot we HAD to do, so we just flew by the seat of our pants, and of course, we always stay busy.
We have been having weekly family home evening’s again with all the friends, and the last two weeks we’ve been doing it at the park, the weather has been great. We play softball as our game, since we all need the practice and just enjoy the time outdoors. After FHE on Monday, Justin shocked me to death – he asked me if I wanted to go to the play with him….haha a play!!! Of course it was the “Damn Yankees” so it had to do with baseball, but we did go and I had a really good time. It started at 8 and lasted 3 hours though so we were both so old-people-tired by the time we got out of there, lol.
Tuesday night I was hoping to start gathering up some small things for the camper for our Wadsworth Family Reunion this weekend, but Justin decided we should go to the movie. I’m thinking…Man all this nice time alone with my guy…Gotta take advantage while I can. So we went to “Grown Up’s” – good show. I expected it to be a non-stop busting a gut laughing kind of show…and it didn’t quite hit that level, but it was still funny.
So Yesterday I had to cram all the shopping, and snack making and sort of packing into one night. Justin helped me and it was great.
We went to Walmart and got all our stuff gathered up. He makes fun of me all the time because when I go grocery shopping, I get everything I can think of that we possibly need so I don’t have to come back for a long time {Yes I’m one of the people you HATE to stand in line behind –sorry}. But I always have a super heavy cart, loaded to the top and it’s strangely in perfect order…haha. I keep the cans with the cans, the cold stuff together, the fruit and veggies together, the boxed items together and the stuff I don’t want smashed aka chips, bread etc. gets to sit up top with my purse. Needless to say, when Justin comes, we don’t make it through with such order—but we make it and I think that’s all that matters.
So after we get home, I tried 3 new recipes, all in one night: D for snacks for the reunion. I made (Don’t laugh, I had never made them before, I just watched my mom make them) Rice Crispy treats. I also made the Salty Chex and Gardetto’s snack mix and I made the sticky sweet Chex and slivered almonds and coconut snack mix. All easy to transport and store – to the mountain they go.
I was excited they all turned out so yummy…I just can’t eat as many of all of them as I want to— when we did our Evidence of Insurability physicals the other day, my results came back with a cholesterol score of 201!!! Seriously, I have eaten well and exercised my whole life….But oh well. I’ll just do what I have to do…
I’m excited for tonight though. We’ll be busy, after a meeting at my house at 4, then picking up the camper we have a Company BBQ for EOG @ 6 then we’re going to the rodeo at 7 or 7:30.
Then we get to leave for Provo River Falls for the Reunion tomorrow. So excited to see the whole family!!!

Fourth of July!

For the Fourth of July, Justin had to work so I spent the morning at home with the girls, then prepared my Primary Lesson. After church, Justin got home and we ate some lunch, then I took a nap until about 5:30 when we headed down to the park to Barbecue with my family. We had a blast just grilling and throwng softballs, footballs, and frizbees. Hailey was having so much fun playing on the park. I didn't get to take the dogs with us, because it was raining right before we left, so I knew they would just whine the whole time. The rain did stop while we were on our way to the park though, so we lucked out. After dinner, we played card games and talked, then the fireworks started!

I'm so grateful for my freedom. For my right to worship how, where and what I may. This is a wonderful blessing that we take for granted all too often. I was so blessed to be born in a free country. I'm thankful for the brave men and women who have and still do fight to defend our country and her freedom!

Hope everyone had a happy 4th of July!Playing Cards

Grandma and Natalie

Hailey decided it was her turn to push Pappa in the swing. Such a cutie!

Pappa n Hailey swingin.

{My Love} :D

Hailey had so much fun running around the park waiting for the fireworks to start!

Our Red (Maltese Cross) White (Petunia's) and Blue (Balloon Flowers) Flowers Decided to bloom in time for the fourth. So pretty.

This is my unfinished Fourth of July Wreath. I think I'm going to finish it anyway and keep it up for the 24th of July (Thanks Jada for that Idea)

My Dollar Store "Festive" Table setting. I had a plate that said "Land of the free because of the brave" That was my FAVORITE that I was going to put on the plates in the center, but I can't find it. I'll have to make a new one.