School again!

Well, summer is over and school is back and will be taking all of Dan's time for the next four months! Dan is so excited for it to start, and I think he is ready to go back to school, even though he says he'll miss Emmy and I. I know he will have such a great semester.

Emmy is growing like a weed lately, and getting so much more talkative. She sleeps in a big girl bed now, thank you Alana and Kenny for the toddler bed! She started almost a week ago, and here is the play by play:

Night 1 - would not sleep in her bed, cried until we put her in her crib.

Night 2 - Only fell out of the bed three times and cried until Mommy picked her up and tucked her back in. She was so excited to sleep in her 'big girl bed' though, and told all her family about it.

Night 3 - Fell right asleep, and at eleven, found her sleeping in the middle of the floor of her room! Put her back in bed, and checked at 3 a.m., same story, middle of the floor. She fell out at 6:30 a.m. and cried, but went back to sleep until 7:30.

Night 4 - only fell out once during the night, found her on the floor. And once in the morning which she cried about.

Night 5 - Slept great! Only fell out early in the morning and cried about it.

It has been that way since. I know toddler beds are really close to the ground, but I am ready for her to just stay in her bed! By the third night, I started looking for bed rails to add to the bed to help her not roll out. Finally found one that will work, and will go to Ikea this week to get it!

Grandma Fae and Aunt Nanny are visiting for a week! We are so excited they are here. We went to Tucson to visit Roger and Kelly, it was great to see them. The drive back took four and a half hours! There was a huge accident, in which two people died, and a semi truck burst into flames! Needless to say, Celeste and I were dying in the car with both our kids for that long! They really both did great, just a few tears toward the end of the drive as they got so tired of being in the car!

Dan's parents are coming to visit later the week, and we are so excited to see them! It has been several months since we have seen them, and we are excited to spend time with them!

Me, I'm plugging along in normal everyday life. I am working on a quilt for the MASD Fundraiser (work), which always drains me, it is a lot of work, but always fun to do as well. The summer seems to be dragging for me, and I can't wait for cooler temperatures. I start to feel cooped up and depressed as the hot summer days drag on and on and on! I'm sure most Arizonans feel the way by the end of the summer. Okay, I've talked enough :) Till next post!

Yum - Oh!

In the words of Rachael Ray, this recipe is yum-oh! Lots of friends have been asking for it, so here is the famous Cafe Rio Pork Salad recipe. . . . . . .

Café Rio Dressing
1 buttermilk ranch dressing packet (make as per recipe)
2 tomatillos (tomato like vegetable with a husk around them)
½ bunch of cilantro
1 clove garlic
Juice of 1 lime
1 jalapeño (Use the seeds too if you like it spicy. You could substitute a few drops of green tobasco for the jalapeno.)Use a blender to combine all the ingredients well. Refrigerate for several hours before serving.

Café Rio Rice
3 c water
4 t chicken bouillon
4 t garlic –minced
½ bunch cilantro
1 can green chiles—or equivalent fresh
¾ t salt
1 T butter
½ of an onion
3 c rice
Blend cilantro, green chiles and onion together in food processor. Bring water to a boil and add all ingredients, simmer covered 30 minutes.

Cafe Rio Pork
2-3 lbs of pork loin or shoulder
1 can of coca cola
1 small can of red salsa
1 cup of brown sugar
Cover pork with water and cook in pot until cooked through (about 1-2 hours).
When pork is cooked through, remove all the broth except 1 cup. Remove the pork and set aside. To the reserved broth, salsa, brown sugar, and coke (regular old coca cola) to the broth. Cut the pork into six to seven large chunks, fairly even, and place back into pot with the broth mixture. Cover and cook for another hour or two (the longer you cook it, the better the meat will be). Cook until the dark brown color of the broth mixture has colored most of the meat dark. Then shred the pork in the pot, and continue to simmer with the lid off. Let the sauce reduce until it is more thick and coats the pork completely, and its ready! The more you let the sauce thicken, the more sweet and tasty the pork is!

Assemble the salads like so:
Tortilla (home cooked are better than pre-cooked. you can buy them uncooked anywhere and just cook them at home, i promise it makes a difference )
Café rio rice
Black beans
Meat
Romaine lettuce
Pico de gallo (fresh made salsa with diced tomatoes, onion, cilantro, and fresh lime juice on it)
Tortilla strips (can buy the my nana’s brand in the frys on recker and mckellips)
Cotija cheese (can buy at the walmart on mckellips and Greenfield, or fresh and easy)
Dressing
Squeeze lime wedge on top

Enjoy! This is a family favorite. I know the pork isn't the most healthy thing I've ever made, and the recipe was made up by yours truly :) similar but drastically modified from other ones I have read. Feel free to adjust how you wish!

Cabin Fever

Living here in Arizona has its challenges - namely June July & August! These months are killer, and we all suffer from a little cabin fever.



Here are a few inside moments from the last few weeks.

We were re-arranging Emmy's bedroom due to a rain leak from the huge monsoon storm. We pulled out the bassinet, and she decided it made a great bed. She has also been climbing in and out of cardboard boxes with her blankets and toys. She thinks its a great hiding spot.

Emmy loves to read. I recently bought a basket of book fair books at a charity silent auction. She has read just about all of them, and just loves all the new books. She pulled out this book last week, and began to dance around the house with it call it the 'LIN book' (Layn book).

At first I thought she was trying to say alien, so I asked her. She gave me a blank stare when I asked, I didn't think she knew what an alien was. Then I asked her who she thought this was again. She replied 'lin' (Layn), and i repeated, Uncle Layn? 'Yeah!' she replied.

She is silly, I don't see any resemblance between Layn and this alien, do you?

Dan and I still don't see the resemblance, we love you Layn!

Dancing Emmy!

Here is the promised video of our little one busting a move! Note the arm swinging, a special talent of hers! She is such a dancing queen! She dances to anything that resembles music, even Papa's singing! There are several styles of dance that she has mastered - we'll just name a few, the arm swinging (daddy calls it the pirate dance), a bootylicious dance where she swings her hips like crazy (mommy calls it the rump-shaker, and it is usually saved by Emmy for special music, like church hymns), and the occasional happy feet moment (a move she has adapted from her cousin Ty). I love how she dances, although it is quite funny to watch, I love that she feels free to express her happiness any way the little dancer inside her feels to!




Emmy has become quite the big girl lately! She is a chatterbox! She has been repeating almost anything we say (including the occasional almost bad word like freakin' and crap!). It is so fun to watch her language develop.





We bought some new dresses on clearance at the Gap this weekend, and when I put one on her for church, she felt so 'pretty' we just had to take pictures. So, she climbed on Mommy's bed and .......
First she stood so pretty and still

Then she got antsy, so we sang a song (this little candle light of mine - papa's favorite)

then she started dancing - note the arm swinging as previously mentioned!

so we decided to wrap it up with one last cute shot!!!

She is so much fun! We just love her!

I Heart Monsoons!!!

There is nothing like a Monsoon storm on a summer night! I love these weather phenomenons here in Arizona! We got so much rain that we had three small leaks we didn't even know about before! And one of the funniest things about the storms is how localized they are! It was raining elephants and buffaloes here in far East Mesa where we live - and we lost our power for 45 minutes - but our friends only seven miles away didn't get a drop! Emmy was a bit frightened by the lack of electricity, but she adapted well. A dear friend of ours, Theresa, has bought her several lighted toys that simulate candles, only with colored LCD lights. She felt so cool carrying her own 'cancko' (candle in Emmy talk) around the house in the dark! Here is a picture of tonight's adventures! We are just glad to not have huge floods, and to have the electricity back before bedtime!

Oceanside, CA

My family has always been a bit of beach bums. When I was growing up, we would travel to Southern California every summer to spend time on the beach and visiting family. As a kid, I could spend all day everyday on the beach! For this year, our family vacation was on the beach! It was great! We stayed in a six bedroom, six bathroom house in Oceanside, CA pretty much almost on the beach. The only thing between us and the beach was a street and one row of houses. It was perfect for having little kids, cause the house was a very short walk from the shore, so nap time and meals were easy to keep up with.

While we were there in Oceanside, we also did a few really fun things. A weenie roast on the beach in a fire pit! Complete with smoress (or schmores :))

We went to Legoland. Brandt driving a car

Emmy sleeping

Emmy riding a Lego camel! Not the smoothest back for a camel, she didn't want to sit on him very long!

Dan was amazed at all the things they built out of legos (yes those really are all legos!), I think he could probably do that and have fun at it!

Celeste was in wheelchair! Here is a picture of her loving Dad pushing her wheelchair!

We also went to Torrey Pines and took family pictures. I haven't gotten a copy of the pictures taken by the rest of my family, but here are some shots Dan got with our crappy camera.

Roger and Kelly

This view was spectacular! Our crappy camera doesn't do it justice!

Our little family. - (the one shot I got from Celeste's blog, she took such great pictures!)

We had such a fun vacation! Thanks Mom & Dad Bentley! It was a perfect trip!

Back from Vacation

We are back, and I am working on a post that will probably be too long with tons of pictures, but in the meantime my friend Marquita posted this fun game, I thought it was too fun!

Here are the directions:
1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!
2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you.It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.If you don't want to play on your blog, or if you don't have a blog, I'll leave my memory of you in my comments.

Have a good trip down Memory Lane!