Fall Pinterest Party

I went to a Fall Pinterest party at my friend Stacie Skinner-Hoxie's house.  For those who have never been to a Pinterest party, you are missing out!  Everyone brings a food item that they made from Pinterest and a craft for everyone to make.  You can also bring things to show off that you have made too.
We had a great time chatting, eating, and crafting it up. Here are a few things we made and did.

Chocolate bats and ghosts 

Here are details on how to make these chocolate bar covers.

Candy Corn Fruit Treat

Layer fresh pineapple, mandarin oranges, and top with whipping cream.
A lot of Halloween treats are so sugary. This is a nice change up.

              

Sticky Note Clipboard

Materials:

* coaster

* mod podge

* paper

* sticky notes

* paper clamp

* cute tape (I am not sure what you call the stuff)

* flower (optional)

* hot glue gun

Clipboard

* Use a coaster from a restaurant or you can buy them at a craft store.

* Trace paper around the coaster.

* Mod podge paper onto coaster

* Mod podge on top of paper

* Let dry

*Stick sticky notes on top of coaster

Clamp

*Put tape on paper clamp

* Put the clamp on the board/sticky note

* Hot glue a flower on top

I'm a Mom!

This year seems to be the year of the babies.  Many of my friends have had babies recently or are currently pregnant.  It seems like anytime I get on facebook at least one of my friends has posted something about being pregnant or posted pictures of their new little addition to their family.  Many times I have read a status like, "When will this baby come?"   It seemed like everyone around me was waiting for their babies to arrive and their babies just didn't want to come as soon as their mommy wanted them here.  I never once even thought this.  In fact, I was quite the opposite.  I went to my doctor appointment two and a half weeks before my due date.  Everything went well and as I was heading out the door my doctor said to me, "I won't be here next week."  I knew she was going to be out of town and I had an appointment already set up with another doctor.  I didn't realize where she was going with things until she said, "All of my partners are great at delivering babies." I'm sure I gave her a frightened look and replied, "I am not due for another two weeks."  My doctor confidently looked at me and said, "This baby is coming sooner."  At that point I was flooded with emotions.  The main emotion was stress.  I had way too much to get done before our little guy arrived.  I hurried home with a car full of baby presents that I received from the wonderful staff at my school.  I put everything away and got the baby room organized.  I continued to work nonstop for the entire weekend.  I wrote about 30 thank you cards, cleaned the entire house, went shopping for groceries and other essentials, planned over a month worth of sub plans, went to church, and packed a hospital bag.  Late Sunday night I started feeling what I thought were contractions, but I wasn't too sure.  They hurt, but I could deal with them.  I have a high tolerance for pain and wondered if I ought to go to the hospital.  I didn't want to go and get turned away.  Eventually, I fell asleep.  The next morning I woke up feeling pretty good, with little pain.  I went to work and about lunch time I was feeling it!  I struggled walking around and as the day went on I realized that I probably was having contractions.  My students could tell that I wasn't doing to well.  One of them said "Mrs. Mattson, are you going to have your baby today?  Do we get to see him?"   I continued teaching until the students went home at 3:45.  At 4:00 some teachers came into my classroom and told me that I needed to get to the hospital.  I was pretty sure that I wouldn't be able to work the next day so I tried getting things ready for a sub.  I struggled to find the energy to get things together.  The teachers told me I needed to get going and they would take care of things.  I went to the office to let the principal know that this baby was going to be coming soon and that I probably wouldn't be there the following day.  By the time I was done talking, everyone told me I needed to get out of there!   I got home at about 4:30 pm and got a few more things ready for the hospital.  Garrett was at BYU.  I didn't want to bother him by having him come home early. But by about 5 pm my contractions were about 3-4 minutes apart and I was in a lot of pain. Garrett made it home by 6:10 and we sped to the hospital.  We checked in at the hospital at 6:30 pm and Rylan made his appearance at 9:22 pm.  He was eager to join our family. He is so precious and sweet.  We love him and are so excited to watch him learn and grow.

BEING A MOMMY TO THIS ADORABLE BUNDLE IS SO MUCH FUN!

Daddy and his boy

Garrett is the greatest daddy.  It is so cute watching him hold and play with Rylan.  Here are a few pictures that capture a glimpse of my two boys.  Love them!

Nike Shoes

I love these shoes.  Thanks grandma Linda.

Gardner Village Stroller Walk

Garrett came home from school and needed a study break.  Rylan and I wanted to get out of the house.  So we headed to Gardner Village to rake a stroll and look at all their crazy witches.

Love him!

Studio 5 and Change

Anybody that knows me well knows that I am not a fan of watching TV.  I would rather be cleaning, playing sports, crafting, sleeping, reading, shopping, cooking, hanging out with friends, partying, and the list goes on and on and on.  Staying home with a baby can get pretty quiet and limits my ability to do some of the above things because most of those things require my hands and a lot of attention.  Having a cute little bundle of joy around takes a lot of my attention and hands.  So I have turned to watch TV, really just the news and my new favorite show, Studio 5.  It is a local Utah show.  Today Garrett said to me, "I never thought you would ever find a show that would interest you and that you would want to watch."  It's true.  I love the show.  As I type this I realize why.  Studio 5 teaches all about the things I love to do.  Monday through Friday they have  bloggers and others come onto the show to teach about different topics including recipes, crafts, photography, health, style, relationships, decor, etc,.  It is very informative and I get so many great ideas.  I have learned so much and have done some things that I have learned already.  Garrett told me I can watch Studio 5 whenever I want after he tasted the taquitos I made for dinner.  If you are interested in Studio 5, you can watch it on channel 5 at 11 am or go to www.studio5.ksl.com and watch their clips and check out their great tips.  

One of the days they talked about wearing the clothes you already have, but changing them up.  So I tried it out.  I took a scarf and went to Pinterest to find a new way to wrap up the scarf.  

Fold scarf in half. Loop around neck. Pull only one strand of the scarf through the loop. 

Twist loop, then pull other strand through. 

 I also folded up my jeans. 

You can totally change your  look by adding a few accessories or wearing things in a different way.  

Baby's Room

We only have a two bedroom home so space is pretty really tight. We turned our office/treadmill room into a baby room too! Half of the room has a treadmill and Garrett's desk so he can study study and study some more.  The other half is all for Rylan.  The room use to be an ugly brownish/yellowish color, which was the original color when we moved into our home.  This summer while I was gone to Nevada, Garrett painted the room.  We love how it turned out.  Two of the walls are Hallowed Hush (blueish color) and the other two walls are a cream color.  I was at my friend, Carly's house and she had the Hallowed Hush color in her living room.  It was love at first sight!  I had been searching for the perfect blue/green color for the room and this was just the color I wanted.  Thanks Carly!  Picking paint colors is always so tough for me. It is so hard to decide on a color based off of a 2 inch square.  It was nice to see a room painted in the color and gave me more confidence in picking paint.  

My parents gave us the crib and my mom and her three sisters (my amazing aunts) gave us the turtle coral reef bedding and room decor. I cut out the brown vinyl lettering with a cricut.  The shelf is from Ikea.  and it doubles as a changing table.  I bought the green tub from a garage sale for $1.  It is perfect for holding blankets and burp clothes.  

We love how the room turned out. It's amazing how the color and decorations of a room change the atmosphere 100%!  After the room was finished I loved to just sit and look.  However, I think it had to do more with anticipating the arrival of our baby then the look of the room :)

Easy Apple Pie

I got this recipe from Studio5.  It is so easy and so delicious, as long as you follow the directions correctly.  I started off by cutting up two apples into thin slices, when I realized I didn't peel the apples! OOPS!  It took a lot of extra effort to peel the thin slices.  Have you ever tried peeling thin apple slices?  It's actually quite difficult and time consuming.  On to the recipe...  I didn't have all the ingredients that the original recipe called for. So here is my version.

Ingredients:

• 1 prepared pie crust (found in the refrigerated section)
• 3 large peeled, cored and thinly sliced apples (I only used 2, but 3 would have been better)
• 1 t. ground cinnamon
• 2 T sugar
• 1 T butter, cut into small bits
• 1 beaten egg
• 3 T jam
• whipped cream or cool whip

Instructions:

Place the pie crust on a cookie sheet. Place the sliced apples around the crust, leaving 1 inch border of the crust around edges. Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Put pieces of butter over apple slices. Fold the pie crust edge over the apples to make a crust. Beat an egg and about 2 tablespoons water.  Brush the edges with the beaten egg/water. Bake in 400 degree oven for 30 minutes. Brush the top of the pie crust with jam.  This just makes it look a little fancier and gives it a little more flavor.  I used peach jam. Cool. Serve with whipped cream or cool whip.

This is such an easy dessert and so tasty!  A must try!

Summer fun 2012

This has been a fun summer so far.  First I went to Fernley, Nevada for a family reunion.  I drove with my mom and Jacob flew to meet up with us.  

 We picked cherries to make delicious cherry dump cake.  It is so tasty and easy.  I ended up making it 4 times.  Each time it was a major hit!
Cherry dump cake: 
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Put 4 cups of halved cherries in a Pyrex dish
3. Evenly dump a cake mix on top (we used a white cake mix)
4. Melt  1 stick of butter and drizzle it on top of the cake.
5. Bake for 30-35 minutes
6. Eat with vanilla ice cream.

We also used the cherries for a cherry pit spitting contest.  

Ashley Christensen and I.  She had her baby boy, Jaxon, 1 week later.  I have 10 weeks to go to meet our baby boy.

I have some awesome aunts.  They like to have so much fun that it was a struggle to take a picture with them not being too silly or laughing too hard.

My grandpa Kay with his 5 granddaughters.

After visiting Nevada, my next stop was Oregon.  Where Garrett met back up with me.  My parents worked hard to put this fire pit together in the backyard. It looks so nice and is very relaxing back there.  So far we have roasted marshmallows and starbursts, hot dogs, and quesadillas.

  My Awesome cousin, Jennifer, threw a baby shower for me.  My aunt Alicia, cousin Allison, and my mom helped out with it too.  They did an amazing job.  The decorations were cute, food was tasty, and the company was marvelous.

 We played a really fun baby concentration game.

Everyone was so generous.  We got some very nice and adorable gifts.  I can't wait to put them all to good use.