Well, here's something interesting

I actually posted on this blog every day this month. I don't know that I've ever done that for a whole month before. Pretty cool.
Feel free to comment and tell me how awesome I am.

Peanut Butter Cup Recipe

Lalani asked for the peanut butter cup recipe from Valentine's, and I'm finally getting around to putting it on the blog.
I don't remember where I got this recipe. It's been so long, it was just one of those "hey, I think I'll try this" recipes and they turned out so well. I've done them several times. Jeremy loves them. And kids can help, too. My three-year old helped last time.

Peanut Butter Cups

1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/4 cup butter
1 Tbsp vegetable oil
1/4 cup peanut butter

Coat a small cup muffin tin with cooking spray. In a microwave-safe bowl, microwave chocolate with butter and oil, stirring often, until melted, 1-2 minutes. Pour about a tablespoon of chocolate mixture into each muffin cup.
Melt peanut butter in microwave 30-40 seconds. Spoon about 1 teaspoon of melted peanut butter over chocolate in each muffin cup. Top with another tablespoon of chocolate.
Chill in refrigerator 30 minutes, until set.

Catch of the Day

On their way to a Daddy-Daughter date to watch "Tangled."

Reasons to Celebrate

Just so you know, there are a lot of links in this to other posts I've written, mainly because this post is about celebrating and I like to blog about us celebrating.



We Telfords like to find reasons to celebrate. Jeremy's been working on a whole calendar of holidays for every day of the year. Some of them are more well known and you might see them on a wall calendar, such as Groundhog Day, and some of them are a little less well known and you might just hear about them from people celebrating, such as Talk Like a Pirate Day. And sometimes we just celebrate something that is special to us. But we love reasons to celebrate.
This week we celebrated two special days, President's Day and Jeremy's birthday.

For President's Day, we helped Nichole practice knowing what values coins had and who are on the coins (and some of the paper bills). We even taught them a little bit about some of the past presidents of the United States. For example, Franklin D. Roosevelt's head is on the dime because he started the March of Dimes. Did you know that? At one point I asked the kids to each get a teddy bear out so we could talk about the teddy bear being named after Teddy Roosevelt. Nichole grabbed one that belonged to me, but Jr. couldn't find one very easily. Our sweet hearted daughter handed him her special Build-A-Bear bear and said he could use her. That was such a sweet thing to do. She was definitely praised for that and her little brother was so grateful.

The kids enjoyed playing a game we found from FamilyFun magazine. We had a container floating in a tub of water and the kids tried to throw coins in the container (though they got a kick out of it when it splashed in the water, too). For a little more education, before they threw the coins they had to tell us the name of the coin and which president was on it or how many cents it was worth.

I even got a blurry picture of the first toss that landed in the container and not on the floor or in the water. In my defense, I was holding the baby at the time, but you can still see the coin in motion just before it landed in the container.

click to see it larger

Then the kids made sugar cookies with Daddy (which we'd been meaning to do since Valentine's Day, but hadn't gotten around to it yet).

For Jeremy's birthday, the kids wanted to know what theme the party was going to be (see, our kids know how we celebrate), so Daddy suggested it be balloon-themed. Worked for them. So that morning he made balloon animal shaped pancakes for the family.

He also pumped up a couple round balloons for the kids to play with. And he baked his own birthday cake and put frosting and candles on it (he said because that's the age he acts). But the kids did put the sprinkles on.

Even though Jeremy did so much of the work on his own birthday, I did make his birthday dinner. I never got around to making a balloon sculpture for him for his birthday, but he was happy with the present I got him.

At one point he needed a nap, but that didn't stop the kids from sharing the cards they made for him.

He did enjoy his birthday.


So there you have it. Some of our reasons to celebrate.

Happy Birthday to Awesome!

Now that's talent!

Happy 396 Months!

Me? Time

Vaccinations. 'Nuf said.

Interpreting Children's Language

Mommy, can I play with the stuffed animals?

Translation: Mommy, can I dump out all the stuffed animals so I can play in their crate?

Happy President's Day!

Jeremy built him especially for this day.

Hurray for Kindergarten

Just a few months ago, Nichole was barely able to count to 20. Now's she's connecting the dots to 92.

It's amazing how much they grow in kindergarten.

Mommy, Look

I'm like a hunter.

The KAT's Meow

Nichole: Can we pick two books?
Mommy: Ummm... I don't know.
Nichole: I'll take that as a Yes.





Nichole: I'm going to bring a picture home. A Valentine for you. But I'm not going to tell you because it's a surprise.

Jr.: Your eyebrows are brown... like eyebrowns.

Catch of the Day

The boys helped me walk Nichole to school. It was enough to put Jr. Jr. to sleep.

Balloon Zoo

Daddy: It’s like a baby giraffe.
Jr. and Nichole: No. It’s a mommy giraffe.
Daddy: It’s too small to be a mommy giraffe. It’s just a baby.
Jr: No. It’s big. It’s a mommy.
Daddy: We need to get you kids to the zoo.
Jr: No. Animals go to the zoo!

A Brief Rundown of Our Valentine's

Nichole, writing her name on the Valentines for her kindergarten classmates.

What we woke up to Valentine morning.

Valentine activity books and pencils from Grandma and Grandpa, as well as a little toy for the baby. Homemade cards for the kids from Daddy and a new clock for Mommy (it's an Elvis clock). And a set of 101 cookie cutters for the family (heh heh, we're going to have some fun).

Breakfast of pink heart-shaped pancakes, including one with an arrow through it.

I sent Daddy on a treasure hunt to find his peanut butter cups Jr. and I made for him. He was nice enough to share with all of us.

Nichole with her haul from her first school Valentine's party.

The ornament she made at the party for her family.

Valentine's 2011

The kids got Valentines from their cousins. Isn't this the cutest? My brother in-law and his wife do some pretty great things with their kids and my sister in-law in-law blogs about a lot of them. Check out her blog, two hands. She's an inspiration to me.

Plant a Seed

Jeremy won a mini herb greenhouse from Vineyard Garden Center in Orem. We thought it would be the perfect opportunity to share a Family Home Evening lesson about faith. And actually plant an herb garden since I never got around to it when Jeremy bought me stuff for planting herbs 2 years ago for Valentine's Day. (hangs head in shame). But this time we did it.
It had seeds for oregano, basil, and parsley. I showed the kids what the dried store-bought herbs look and smell like. We determined that oregano smells like pizza, basil smells sweet, and parsley smells like... hay or grass.

click on the pictures to see them larger- there are a lot

We put in the dirt pellets, added water, and waited for the dirt to grow.

Then it was time for the seeds. Nichole first with the parsley seeds. Next, Jr. with the teeniest tiniest oregano seeds. Last, it was Mommy with the not so small basil seeds.

Squirt them again with water and place them on the windowsill next to our avocado pit which by the way never sprouted. Sigh. Oh well, next time we have avocados we'll try again.

It only took a few days before we started to see progress. The first to push up out of the soil- the oregano. From those teeny tiny seeds. Amazing.

It wasn't long before the others started poking up as well.

The parsley grew fast.

Pretty soon we had a whole container full of plants.

I think I got more out of the lesson on faith than the kids. All we have to do is start with the smallest bit of faith, but we try. We nurture it with scripture study, prayer, church attendance, Family Home Evening (just like nurturing the seed with light, water, soil to grow in), and it will grow. The more we work on it, the stronger we get. Even from something as itty bitty teeny tiny as an oregano seed. Seriously, those things are ti-ny.

It's fun to see the progress of these little herbs.

And to see our own progress with our faith.