Bambi is Racist

I don't think that I've blogged about this yet. Our dog, Bambi, is super racist. I don't think that she knows that she is racist...but she doesn't like Mexicans. I mean, I've complained about relatives who are racist and how I can't stand it...and I have this dog in my house who really doesn't like Mexicans (or tall men).
Fun picture first!

This is the house across the street from ours. The weather has gotten so nice that they have started working on cars across the street. I don't mind. They don't hurt me.

Anyway...they are Hispanic.

Bambi sits up here all day and stares out the window at them. If they start to cross the street, she starts barking and growling.

Pippen sits up there so that he can sun bathe.

Okay, so if it was just this one thing, I would say that she doesn't trust people outside the window. But one day we were at PetSmart and we were walking around. We walked passed DOZENS of people and dogs. She has no reaction to them. We walk down the fish aisle and this Hispanic woman was standing there minding her own business. She was just looking at fish food. Bambi went INSANE! She was growling and backing up behind me and barking...it was ridiculous! I was so embarrassed because Bambi scared this woman and me so bad.

The sad thing is....Bambi is half Chihuahua.

No Teacher's Dirty Looks!

I'm finished with my classes for this semester! I still have work though...which is kind of a bummer because Aaron has the whole week off of work. Well...actually...he has this whole week UNEMPLOYED.

Don't be worried! Be excited for us!! Aaron has been working for the past 6 months at a job he hates. He missed the AFV project so badly! The work that he was doing wasn't something that he enjoyed or even remotely liked. Sooooo...he is moving over to work on a different project. He put in his two weeks notice a little early so that he could get out of there ASAP!

I'm so ready for him to have a job that he enjoys again!!

But...back to me...I'm going to be going crazy Paleo this summer in a dramatic bid to get pregnant!! Other than that, I'm going to be working on photography and doing stuff around the house. Some of it might be boring. Some of it might be hard but all I know is...

We are going camping this summer!! And that is all I want for this amazing summer.

Happy Easter!!

Yesterday was Easter!! I wasn't that excited about it actually. I was excited about thinking about the Atoning sacrifice of my Savior but Aaron and I weren't planning anything special for the day.

But I woke up and GUESS WHAT?!? The Easter Bunny came!

The "Easter Bunny" was such a sweetie and got me a little stuffed animal and some "I'm Trying to Be Like Jesus" stickers! No candy for me since the "Easter Bunny" knows that I'm on a diet so that I can have his babies. :)

Anyway, after that we went to church. I love teaching the primary children especially our age group. They are so fixated on the hunting for Easter eggs and bunnies part of things that they miss out on the real reason for the holiday.

Aaron and I brought our 12 plastic eggs that had different objects that represented a part of the Easter story. The passed two years, the children loved it and this year was no different. I started off by telling the kids that we can't go back to Heavenly Father if we make ANY mistakes. And then I asked them if they ever make mistakes. They all said that they did. I told them that Brother Reinert and I did too! I asked them what we could do to go back to Heavenly Father since we have made mistakes. They didn't know. So I told them that Jesus did something really special so that we could go back to Heavenly Father. I asked them if they wanted to know what that was. They said that they did.

I brought a blanket so that we could sit on the floor (because this lesson involved a lot of talking and not a whole lot of chances to get off of chairs to wiggle) and they took turns getting to open an egg. We had 4 kids in the classroom so each kid got to open 3.

I also had a felt board story to fill in the gaps. I'm always feeling the spirit really strong when I give this lesson. I'm so thankful for my Savoir and I want the children to be able to feel that too. I didn't know if they were feeling the same Spirit in the room that I was.

We got to the last egg and our...most rambunctious boy got to open it. He opened it up and exclaimed, "What? This is empty?"

And I told him, "That is the most special egg of all. When they went back to the tomb to make sure that Jesus body was okay, guess what they found? It was empty just like that egg. Do you know what that means? He did it! Jesus died for our sins and was resurrected and that means that if we want, we can live with our Heavenly Father again, even if we have made mistakes."

Then I read this prepared statement from the manual. "That day Jesus' friends came to the tomb. They saw that the stone had been rolled away. There was an angel in the tomb. The angel said, "He is not here: for he is risen." Jesus died so that we can all live again after we die. We have Easter to remind everyone of the day Jesus arose from the dead."

As I was thinking, "I wonder if these kids are feeling this Spirit..." the boy who opened the last egg said, "THAT WAS AWESOOOOMMMMMMMMMME!"

It was a pretty great day at church.

When we went home, Aaron and I didn't have anything planned. Aaron asked me, "Remember last year when you hid those plastic eggs full of treats for the dogs? Do you want to do that again?"

Nothing screams, "WE CAN'T HAVE KIDS!" like doing an Easter egg hunt for your dogs. Except maybe dressing all of us up in themed Halloween costumes. But you know what? We have fun with our dogs so I decided that that was a great idea.

I went out and hid eggs for the dogs. Some places were easy.

And some were harder.

We decided to let the dogs outside but not to help them for a little bit and see if they caught on by themselves. The plastic eggs were filled with peanut butter and meat treats, so we figured that they would be interested at least by the smell.

Bambi, of course, figured it out a lot faster than Pippen. She walked around the yard and went over to the car to see what that random thing by the tire was and she loved what she found.

It took her a little bit of time to figure out how to open the eggs to get the treats but she wouldn't let me take it to open it for her. This is a picture of when she got the egg open.

I had to lead Pippen over to his first egg but he was REALLY excited when he found it. It was like the best day of his life!
When Bambi was done with her first egg, she ran to find another one. And was soon rewarded.
Pippen was having trouble trying to find another egg. He was too busy staring at his sister with hers to really look. I tried to lead him over to another egg....but as you can see from this picture...

His sister swooped in a grabbed it before he could get to it. So he stood there and watched her eat it....and probably cried a little inside.

Aaron took pity on our poor little puppy and helped him find another one...

Pippen doesn't really get what we are trying to tell him all of the time.

Finally he realized what we were trying to tell him. Guys...he is suppose to be a tracking animal. His breed was made to hunt and kill rats, mice, and other small rodents. He can't even find a peanut butter/bacon filled egg by himself.

But we love him anyway...

Bambi quickly found her 4th and final egg (I grew up in a family where it wasn't "find as many as you can" but rather, "Everyone gets the same amount so stop hunting and start helping after you have found 5 eggs").

It took Pippen awhile to catch up with her. Aaron helped him out with his last one too. Can you spot the egg in this picture?

Good job! You probably found it faster than Pippen.

When all was said and done, I think that the dogs loved it but...we didn't bother teaching them about the meaning of Easter...but at least they had fun.

It was a pretty good day for all of us. A day full of promises of wonderful things to come. Happy Easter!!

The Garden: One Month, 10 Days

Sorry I didn't write to tell you guys what has been happening with our garden. I know that you are all on the edges of your seats wondering how they survived our tips and how they are progressing!

(It is topics like this that remind me...this is an online journal...and somethings might only be interesting to me for years to come. Hopefully this will help us improve next year too!)

I didn't even think to get someone to watch our plants for us. I mean...they are plants...they can go a few days with out being watered, right?

Well....wrong. They were all looking pretty parched when we got home from California on Monday. The sunflowers...I'm sorry to say, didn't make it. They all died. Every last one of them. They were totally shriveled up and I could see that even if we got water into them, they wouldn't be able to pump it through with all of that dead membrane.

Everything else though lived.

Zucchini: They are both doing well but our late bloomer is going CRAZY! Seriously, I don't know if it is going to wait another month to move outside.

Parsley:

I'm actually a little worried about one of these plants...it is getting white spots on it and I don't know why...over watering? I find that that is a problem of mine.

Tomatoes:

I was feeling pretty good about them till I saw Aaron's grandpa's this weekend. He keeps a heating pad under them in the mud room. 1) I wish that I had a mud room 2) I wish that I knew to stick a heating pad under them! But they are coming along so I should complain.

Onions:

I have no idea whether they are growing or not. I haven't had much luck with root vegetables in the past so I worry.

Pole Beans:

I finally had to do it. I had to build them something to climb.

I will have to take a better picture for you tomorrow because the taller ones have already wrapped themselves around the string. It is actually a little scary to think of how much they move and how aware they are. Plants are absolutely amazing.

It is going to be a long month though. Our table has gotten really crowded.

I've been on my Paleo diet for 13 days straight and so I'm getting excited for the possibility of my own food from the garden. It is only a matter of time.

Yard Improvements

Yesterday, Ogden looked like this:

(View at my bus stop)

And today, because we live in Utah, was a perfect day for working outside. Aaron and I woke up, ate breakfast and immediately moved outside to work!

The Songkran party is going to be next weekend and we have to get this yard party ready!!

Last year we replaced the railroad ties but we didn't quite finish the end. We didn't know what we wanted to do at the end and we had a big pile of dirt that we had plans for that kind of...got abandoned. SO! We had to finished that up.

Oh, go back up to the picture of the pile of dirt. See the raspberry bush at the right of the pile of dirt? Yeah...that can't stay there.

Look we finished! That was fast.

We actually had to move a bunch of that dirt first. Then we had to rip out the raspberry bush and plant it over here.

Not a whole lot of root came up with it...so hopefully it won't die. If it does, we have plenty of raspberry where that came from! But I hope it lives because I will eat whatever I can get!

We also had to run to Lowe's to get one last beam to finish up this raised flower bed. And we got some other stuff while we were there.

Mandarin oranges? What are you doing here?

It is small enough to be an indoor plant during the winter and an outdoor plant during the summer! I'm actually pretty excited about this new addition to our garden plants!

Moving on to other things that we got done.

Check out how green and lush our backyard grass/weeds are!! Also, do you like our blue kiddie pool? Seriously, if you know who owned that before the wind storm, let me know...but we are totally going to use it for Songkran!

Aaron mowed it! Like a boss! And where did the kiddie pool go?
Oh! On the cement! Where it won't kill any grass or sit in the flower bed!
Because where the kiddie pool was staying, was the same place we were filling with the dirt from the before mentioned pile of dirt! We put black plastic over the ground where our garden is going to end up being.

Hopefully this will calm out weed problem down. Like...last year after sifting all the dirt, I feel like we spread the weeds to every single inch of dirt. Not to mention the dirt was the store bought enriched kind and so the weeds went WILD.

So...IT WILL BURN!

Oh, see that little plant right at the end of the black plastic toward the front? Yeah, that plant has been there since the original owner of the house planted it in the 1950's...and we can't kill it. We have tried! So, it is staying. I don't have it in me to try and kill it every single year.

The last thing that we did today was go over the yard with a high powered magnet to find all of the nails left from the roofing project. The magnet cost $15. How much does a tetanus shot cost? I think we got our money's worth.

A felt like it was a pretty productive day. There is nothing better than working hard all day and then sitting on your back step with your husband and seeing how much better everything looks.
Oh, we also started a vermicompost bin....sans worms. We will have to get the worms online since we've looked all over for them locally. Oh, and we are going to need a different bucket.

And that was what we did our first April weekend at home.

Paleo Diet: Chocolate Custard

Remember back in the post about going to California this passed weekend when I said that I made a dessert at Aaron's grandparents house because I was feeling deprived?

Well, I wanted to share that with you!

I've been on the Paleo diet pretty hardcore for 10 days now. Ever since my last period, I've been trying to eat as cleanly as possible so that we have the best chance for getting pregnant. But after going to the Olive Garden and seeing my most favorite dessert of all time, Black Tie Mousse Cake, I was DYING to have something chocolate. I seriously sat in my seat debating whether or not I should just get the cake. Finally I told myself, "Why don't you just go home and look up Paleo desserts and get yourself something nice to eat that won't be cheating." Luckily I had my sister-in-law there to coach me through it too. She has given up sweets for Lent and so she could feel my pain.

Anyway, the recipe that I found was this one.

All you need is a cup of chocolate chips (the darker they are, the less sugar you are ultimately putting into your body).

This brand is a little bit more expensive BUT it doesn't have any dairy (Nestle's has nonfat milk and milk and butter) but this brand just has coco butter which I can have. Also, this brand has less sugar than the others. The darkest chocolate of anyone else still had as much sugar as the semi-sweet of this brand. But for this batch, I grabbed the darkest.

Recipe:

1 cup dark chocolate chips

1 can of coconut milk

dash of cinnamon

No Rum...in mine. Sorry guys.

There are TONS of brands of coconut milk out there. I grabbed the Sun Luck for this one since I wanted to try out "Light" coconut milk.

Pop the chocolate chips into a saucepan with the coconut milk and heat that bad boy up!
I put in a little more than just a "dash" of cinnamon. Cinnamon is suppose to help the body absorb sugar and I need that in my body since I'm pre-diabetic.

After it reaches a boil, turn down the heat, pour it into a bowl and stick it in the fridge. I promise you that it will set up if you leave it in there for a couple hours. I didn't think that it would the first time that I made it but I assure you, it will have the same consistency as pudding.

Happy Eating!!

P.S. My goal at the moment is to "eat clean" not to lose weight. If you are trying to lose weight, this isn't an "eat all the time" option.

California: Baptism in Fremont

On Thursday, Michelle Harnish (and her son), Dee, Aaron and I got into Dee's car and drove all night and early into the morning until we got to Fremont. We were going to Fremont to watch the baptism of Dee's old Girl Scout leader!I got this on that car trip. It is a very sad story of stupidity. But Dee had awesome band-aids!

We got to the house at 6am. Almost exactly 12 hours since we left our front door. Aaron and I got a couple more hours of sleep before getting up and heading to the Oakland Temple.

Aaron was sealed to his family for time and all eternity in this temple. He wanted to be sealed to me in this temple as well but alas, I won that battle since I had more family in Utah than he did in California. But he has wanted to take me to the Oakland temple since we got married. Every time we come, something happens and we can't go. We were so tired but it was the only day we could go since the temple was closed on Saturday for General Conference!

We saw so many people that Aaron knew from church growing up. One woman was even helping me with something and didn't know who I was till she saw Aaron. It was really fun.

I loved sitting in the celestial room with Aaron as he told me about the first time he went through this very temple before he went on a mission. We sat in that room for a long time holding hands and talking quietly to each other. Nothing is more beautiful than the inside of a temple.

After we went through the temple, Aaron was nice enough to let me walk around taking pictures.

Afterwards, we went back to Aaron's parents house. I took a nap so that I could be pleasant to be around at the baptism.

Aaron's sister gave a wonderful talk about baptism. It was so cool that she got to speak at the baptism of her old Girl Scout leader! It was a beautiful service and so much fun afterwards. I got to talk to Lorraine Bodinger and congratulate her! She was such a bubble, vivacious, and genuinely kind person. I loved getting to know her and her family!

I also got to visit with a number of people that Aaron grew up with in his ward. I saw several familiar faces that were at our wedding reception almost 3 years ago. In true "Anderson" fashion, we were the last ones out the door. It is really hard to get me to stop "visiting" once I get started...even if I don't know the people that well.

The next day was General Conference! I've kind of turned into a General Conference dork. I LOVE IT! It is such an addicting feeling to pray for answers and then listen to someone tell you the answer over the television. Seriously...ADDICTING.

It didn't take too long before President Packer said, "At least you want children, and that desire will weigh heavily in your favor in your earthly lives and beyond because it will provide spiritual and emotional stability."

Wow....thank you President Packer for saying exactly what I needed to hear so early on in conference. His wasn't the only talk that answered a prayer that day.

After both the afternoon and morning session ended, the ladies headed out to dinner with Penny, Susie, Lorraine, Michelle (Lorraine's daughter), Barb, Dee and I. It was another fun opportunity to visit and catch up. I got to hear hilarious stories of camping trips with raccoon everywhere, Girl Scout slumber parties and other great times that these ladies had.

Later that night, Aaron, Dee and I headed over to Grandma and Grandpa Prince's to visit with them. I brought some ingredients to make myself a Paleo dessert since I was starting to feel deprived. We had a good visit and Grandpa tried to load us up with his amazing wood working. We decided to wait till the next night to make our final decisions on what we wanted.

Sunday was more glorious conference. After the first session, we decided to go for a walk. Mike, Aaron, Dee and I all headed to Lake Elizabeth to walk the paths. I brought my camera...so I was always lagging behind.

For the Sunday afternoon session Lorraine, Michelle, her boyfriend and two children came over to watch with us. When it was over we got to talk about everything which was fun. Lorraine is such an enjoyable person. We spent several hours talking...so much so that we were late for dinner with Grandma and Grandpa Prince!

Dinner was amazing and I got to cheat and eat potatoes!! Totally worth it! We played cards until late in the night. Dee and I picked out some of Grandpa's best wood working to take home.

Before bed Aaron, Dee and I all got massages from Barb. Aaron's been needing some work on his lower back so it was good for him to get some of that worked out. Aaron's mom also gave him some instructions for stretches to help him alleviate some of the tension after a long day at work.

Then, bed time.

The next day, driving. We got to see the Salt Flats but besides that...it was pretty much the end of our trip.