Love the smell of bread cooking...

I made bread today! Usually I only make bread under my Mom's watchful care. It usually is yummy wheat bread but today I used this recipe below and it turned out really good. The loafs didn't look perfect but heck it tasted pretty good.

I sure love the smell of fresh baked bread.

90-Minute Bread

From my Aunt Mary Jane

4 C Warm Water 4t Salt

4 Cake Yeast 4T Melted Shortening

8T Sugar 7-8 C Flour (or a little more)

Dissolve yeast in water. Mix in the rest. Cut into 4 pieces-Let stand 15-20 minutes. Knead 1-4 minutes. Form 4 loaves. Let stand 30 minutes, then Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.

Simple Abundance...

I have a whole stack of books on my night stand by my bed just waiting for me to read. This one I got last year from my Mom. I read a few pages here and there last year. But it has an entry each day and I thought I can keep up with that. So here goes...

Today the title was "This isn't a Dress Rehearsal" it talked about how so many times we save our fine china for a special event or we don't get dressed up if we are staying home that day. We hold back like an actress does to concern her energy for opening night when in fact this is it!

She talks about how it does take more effort to set an inviting table, but it enhances our enjoyment of eating.

While I love a good lounge day in my pajamas. I loved reading this!

Love the little moments...

Last night Cole was excited for Family Home Evening. He wanted to learn about the Gold Plates.

So that is what we learned about tonight. I sure love these little moments. I do say moments because our lessons don't last long but hey we are trying. Ha. ha.

I had to snap this pictures right during lesson so I can remember this when I'm old.

Dailey was having her own lesson with Dr. Seuss.

CTR

So now Cole is no longer my little sunbeam. He is now in CTR 4. He has great new teachers and he is way excited about it. In church he got the CTR ring which he thought was pretty cool. But doesn't love wearing.

Well this morning at breakfast he was telling his sister how she was not choosing the right. She was crying and he said you are being grumpy and not choosing the right. He got his ring and told her you need to "CTR Dailey" it was so dang funny.

Lucky Girl!

Warning... I am going to brag about my husband and how I am such a lucky girl because man did I score big when I married him.

I knew I was marrying a great guy. But sometimes I forget or take for granted just how great he is. The other night I was reminded once again.

I needed to make teacher signs for the chairs in primary, since it's the beginning of the new year.

Well I decided I wanted to make them into these little pennant flags.

Silly idea, totally not necessary. A simple piece of paper with the teacher name printed on them would have done the job.

Anyhow. We started the project at 11:30pm and he stayed up with me and helped me glue them together into the flags. Seriously it was late when we went to bed!! I love how he goes along with my silly last minute projects. And he is never grumpy about it. He always helps me with my calling. He is so dang great. Man am I a lucky girl.

More Christmas photos

Don't worry the M&M Toy is his gift to Jesus in our Nativity Story.
Yes! She loves the kitchen. Almost as much as I do.
Dailey is doing the cutest little smile where she scrunches her nose and squints her eyes.

This is where we find him now days. Yep looks like we are going to need to put a time limit on this baby. But Man are Kevin and I glad to have our phones back!

So this is Christmas...

We had such a great Christmas. We spent Christmas Eve and wrapped up gifts for our cousin Sherri and as a whole Bush Bunch we went to her house to deliver a box full of Christmas treats, food, and gifts. We caroled to her and gave her the gifts. She started to cry. It was a fun experience to be able to give on that special evening. We than all loaded up and headed back to the Grandma and Grandpa Bush's for our traditional Christmas Eve night.

Our appliance we pulled out was the Chocolate Fountain so we dipped till our hearts content. We also had a yummy dinner. Than on to the nativity story where the kids dressed up and we also sang songs. Than we did our gift exchange. We had my DAD, Andy, Garret, and Ryan. It is so fun to exchange. Cole was so excited to open gifts.

We than went home and Cole set out cookies and milk for Santa. He was so excited he did have a little bit of a hard time going to sleep. I was pretty excited too.

Than on Christmas morning we woke up and saw Santa had come! We had a nice relaxing morning here. Where Cole and Dailey ran into the living room and Cole went right for the chair where Santa left just what he wanted. An ipod. He sat right in his new chair and played it. It didn't really phase him that their were other presents.

Dailey went over to her new chair too and to the new red kitchen Santa brought her!! It was so fun to see them play with their new stuff and have such a good time.

We ate muffins and hot chocolate and played games till 11. Than we got ready to go to grandma and grandpa Dearden's house. We went and ate yummy treats and than had delicious soup.

This year Kevin's parents gave gifts through the whole month that were traditions that they did when they were little.

Oh how I love Traditions!!!

Some of the gifts that are their traditions were:

Christmas Pillowcases

Christmas plates and cups

Christmas Books

Christmas Apron and Christmas Cupcake pan

I think I am missing some but I am excited to carry on these same traditions with my kids.

Than the day of Christmas we all did our exchange and than gave gifts to grandma and grandpa and they gave us a pass to Hogle Zoo. Which we are way excited about. Thanks guys it was so thoughtful and nice!

Than it was off to the Bush home again because Uncle Jim was calling. We got their and he had been on the phone already for 15 minutes. He only could talk for a little over an hour. He is so dang great.

Than we did presents for grandma and grandpa and my Mom made all the little girls the prettiest little red squirt. She also made Cole a karate outfit which he of course loves!

Her time has been pretty crazy lately and wow her sewing all that was pretty dang great!

Thank you all Christmas 2010 was such an AMAZING One!