80 reasons we love Grandma Allen

My Grandma Allen, Orel Kay Lee Allen, turned 80 today.

She is awesome!

We had a surprise birthday party for her. Well, kind of a surprise... Grandpa had to get her there, with buckets of KFC chicken. I'm sure she figured it out. She's a smart lady.

I'm such a slacker and bum when it comes to birthday presents. I used to be a lot better at planning ahead, but not this time. Although in my defense, I had told everyone I was planning to make a Texas cake for her loooong before the party was planned. It's tradition. My Grandma loves Texas cake and ever since I can remember, she's always asked me which part of the cake has the most frosting. She's even been known to drink the leftover frosting on occasion.

So instead of a present {well, besides the cake}, I picked up some poster board, frantically emailed all of my cousins and family who weren't going to make it, and collected 80 things we all love about Grandma. I made my cousin, Nichelle, write the Happy Birthday part on the posters. She's artsy and crafty and ubber talented with stuff like this.

Here's the final list. Although I did have more than 80 things I'd collected from everyone. It was fun to read how many of us had the same memories with Grandma or the same traits we loved the most. I personally like the #1 reason the best - anyone named Kay must be awesome {I wrote that one!}. This obviously, also makes me her favorite. 

The fam-damily.

{Natalee and Blakely}

{The newlyweds... Nichelle and Eric}

 {The cake-ivores}

{Blakely and my Aunt Cara}

{Grandma with the only Tullis family around, Tim and Megan, while the rest of their family gallivants around Europe for the year}

{My Uncle Weston, Nicole and her squeeze... can't remember his name, but I like him}

I think every picture of my brother, Kurtis, is like this. People are going to think he has issues. 

But Anberlin is adorable as always!

The boys quickly lost interest in talking and started a rousing game of keep-away from Uncle Kurtis. 

{Pearl with her crazy flowers}

My parents got my Grandma a picture of her childhood home in Panaca. It was framed really nice and she was just tickled with it. Funny side story. For her birthday, my Grandpa told her that he would take her anywhere, ANYWHERE in the entire world that she wanted. You know where she picked? Panaca, Nevada. Podunk, nothing to do, hot as Hades, town Panaca. So funny!

And Jeff got her a box of sparklers. She giggled. {Read about the inside joke here}

It was a great evening, perfect weather in beautiful Cache Valley to celebrate the life of one amazing, fantastically funny, sassy, smart, kind, spiritual lady. I love you Grandma!

Candy dishes and the temple

We took the youth to the Ogden Temple open house. I've been pretty lucky to have gone through eight temple open houses {that I can remember}... Las Vegas NV, Bountiful UT, Mount Timpanogos UT, Nauvoo IL, Orquirrh Mountain UT, Draper UT, Brigham City UT, and Ogden UT. I love seeing all of the different and unique features in the temples.

The Ogden temple was beautiful. I loved the vintage white color of the granite. It was just gorgeous against the blue sky.

And the before and after renovation on the Ogden UT temple can't be beat!

 

{Image curtosey of the Desert News}

Not only did I get tickets for the Young Women and Young Men, but I drug my own family along. And yeah, we can't get a single picture of the four of us all looking or smiling at the camera or in this case, with the actual temple in the background.

My parents were married in the Ogden temple on November 17, 1978 on a very snowy wintery day! My Dad's family wasn't active in the church and the Logan temple was closed at the time. So he drove down to the Ogden Temple with a friend for his own wedding. When I found out the open house was happening and that the re-dedication was going to happen on my Mom's birthday, I took it as a heavenly sign to get them tickets for the open house.They don't have any pictures of them at the temple on their wedding day, so I told them this was their chance!

Cole was so funny about the open house. He kept asking what things were and Jeff obliged his many questions with answers like, "that's a door. Those are stairs. Yes, that's a picture of Jesus." Cole was super pumped to know the temple had drinking fountains on every floor and in every spot a little boy could get thirsty. When we got to the Celestrial room, he asked us, "Why is there no candy in the candy dishes?" Meaning the fancy, decorative, well, candy dishes. It was HILARIOUS! And when he found out Grandpa, Grandma, and Uncle Kurtis has finally made it, he decided we were going to go through the temple again. So back we went with Cole as our personal tour guide {now that he'd seen everything}. He explained to my Dad that you get to watch a movie in the temple {the endowment session}, there were lots of drinking fountains, and that there was no candy in the candy dishes in the Celestrial room. We laughed! And to be quite honest, it's a very good question/observation... in fact, I submitted a comment card for President Monson to see.

Kurtis and I decided to send Kimmy a temple selfie so she knew she was missing out on the fun. Oh, did I mention she up and got married?! What the?! To a guy none of us know? After she moved to Colorado? Yeah. Kind of weird but it made me laugh and smile... so Kimmy. Oh, and so she wouldn't feel bad about not being with us, we also took an ice cream selfie after the open house. You know. When we walked over to Farr's Ice Cream for a treat {along with everyone else in town}. And stayed too long, having our car get locked in the temple parking lot! Oops.

We watched the "super moon" rise over the mountains behind the temple... it was a beautiful way to end a lovely evening!

Pennies from Heaven

I stumbled across this penny getting into my car after a meeting today. And I promise you, it wasn't there when I got out of my car an hour earlier. 

I remembered reading something that said an angel tosses a penny from Heaven to remind you that they miss you. I couldn't help but hope this is true... and then in my searching for the poem behind my thought, saw a beautiful letter on Facebook from Mr. Lary Jones to his beautiful wife, my amazing and dearly missed Patty, who died two years ago today. I cried when I found the poem just moments after thinking of Patty.

I found a penny today

Just lying on the ground.

But it's not just a penny

This little coin I've found.

Found pennies come from heaven

That's what my Grandpa told me.

He said Angels tossed them down

Oh, how I loved that story!

He said when an angel misses you

They toss a penny down,

Sometimes just to cheer you up

To make a smile out of your frown.

So don't pass by that penny

When you're feeling blue.

It may be a penny from heaven

That an Angel's tossed to you.

1998 C. Mashburn

1st Day of School {only 4 weeks late}

I'm only four weeks late with the traditional first day of school photos.

I wanted to try and get some pictures of the kids before the actual first day of school. I figured Pearl was going to be so hyped up the last thing she'd want to do is fake a smile at her mother. I should have tried my luck when she was actually excited to put on her school clothes and pretend to go to school. There was a lot of whining and screaming on my part to "smile" and "look happy" and "look at me with your eyes" and "smile nice"... why? Why? Why?

Oh well. That little pipsqueak is still cute.

"Mom. Seriously?! Uh, this is so lame! I am totally annoyed at you."

And the famous face when she is absolutely DONE with pictures. Every. Single. Time. {And yet, these pictures always make me laugh and smile.}

Not to be left out, Cole insisted on joining our little photo shoot. Do you think he is influenced at all by his big sister?

And we can't forget the furry child. She's never far from me or Cole.

Pearl is doing fabulous in school. She's made new friends and really likes her teacher. A little boy in her class ran up to me the other day and said, "Are you Pearl's mom? Can she have a play date with me? We're friends." She's well behaved in class, listens, and tries really hard on all of her assignments and tasks. Pearl is way ahead with reading and gets 100% on her math tests. She loves, loves, loves her after school program too. And having the option {"We have CHOICES Mom!"} to eat hamburgers and grapes for lunch everyday - mixed in with the occasional PBJ from home {I need to step up my "sack"lunch game} - is an added bonus to her day. We haven't had very many arguments or meltdowns about bedtime or getting ready for the day because she is so excited to go to school every day. Now the homework... that's taken some getting used to. Thank heavens for after school programs and Jeff! Homework is always done and ready to turn in on Friday.

Now the boy. He's a whole other story. That twerp practically lives in timeout at school {and home some days too}. I feel bad for the kid and think some of the expectations the teachers have for a three-year-old boy are kind of ridiculous. He never naps, not even at home, and he doesn't know how to use "an inside voice" really well so during nap time he gets in a lot of trouble. But how in the world is he supposed to sit still without making a sound for two hours on a tiny mat? Ridiculous. Oh, and apparently pretend shooting your friends at school is also frowned upon. Double ridiculous. Fern boy never wants to go to school probably because he's always in trouble. He is a little pill to get ready and Pearl is an anxious wreck at even the slightest possibility that she will be late to her school. I don't blame him though, last week I had had it with all the notes and timeouts. When the first thing he tells you in the morning is that he will try to not get any timeouts or have any accidents, and then the first thing he says when you pick him up is how many timeouts he had, something isn't working and it's time to try out some new solutions. Uh. Have I mentioned I love the threes? Yeah. Way more fun than the twos. Oh well. Pearl was a little twerp at this age too and she's definitely grown up a lot since then.

Cookie Copy Cat

I rarely stray from my chocolate chip cookie recipe. It's just easier to make something you already know how to. Plus, they bring back memories of my teenage/college years with friends and trying to win over boys' hearts with a plate of cookies.

Jeff says that cookie nonsense didn't work on him. I'm not sure how I snatched him then, 'cause he got a lot of cookies. 

But in an attempt to avoid making six dozen cookies with the Young Women for our activity, I found a super cute, teeny, tiny Mini M&M's Chocolate Chip cookie recipe from Two Peas & Their Pod {Maria happens to be a former coworker of mine too}. The pictures are what convinced me to make them. Don't judge my copy cat pictures with Maria's. We tried them out for YW and they were such a hit, I made them the next night for my family. I usually decide, hey, the house is quiet, no one is bugging me, I think I'll not only make some cookies but take some pictures of them at 11 o'clock at night when there is zero natural light to work with.

These cookies were kind of pricey for the mini M&M's considering I'm not a food blogger with an endless supply of goodies in my cupboards {or heck, any edible food lately}. And I wasn't sure if semi-sweet mini chocolate chips would work so I got the regular sized milk chocolate chips. Note to self, buy the expensive, cute mini chips even if they are semi-sweet. But man were they easy to whip up and so fun to bake because I didn't spend three hours making batch after batch after batch like my usual chocolate chip cookie recipe. It makes a ridiculous amount of cookies. 

They really were teaspoon sized balls of dough. Super tiny and super cute! 

I love the pop of color the mini M&M's gives them.

I will definitely make these again. Now who's going to come and help me eat all of these?