My favorite picture at the moment

Until I get a little more time to do a longer post, here is a picture of Gretel that makes me laugh. I asked her to put her fist under chin like this, (like in Napolean Dynamite) and she did. I love her little teeth-she is such a ham!

The best thing about Gretel is that she does just about anything you ask her to do. She's usually happy to sing anything, or say anything I ask her to. One funny thing she'll say in the appropriate voice is "Stella....STELLAAAAA" -you know, from the Seinfeld episode.

Sister Hailey & Mommy Dearest Visit!!

My mom and sis recently came to visit me! It was so fun, and I can't believe it's been almost 2 years since our last girls trip! All we did for one whole week was shop and eat out!! We ate so many naughty things every day; lots of ice cream, mud pie, cake- treats galore! (perfect vacation) Thanks mama for all the goodies; you and dad truly spoil us!

One huge reason they came when they did was because I needed a cut and color from my sista so I didn't have roots for my sis-in-law (Caitland's) wedding and Johnny's graduation which were both in May. So, I felt like a new woman after she worked her magic! Thanks Hab!

Here we are posing with some of our shopping bags....



My friend Abby took us shopping in San Fran the first day, which started things off with a bang! She used to live there, so she was an awesome navigator! Unfortunately I discovered my camera was dead after we got there, so no pics of that day:(

We went to Judy's for brunch, which is always delicious! Then we went to the most horrible place for dinner, called Anchor and Hope. Expensive, and we got only 4 or 5 bites of food because the portions were so small. (about 1/4 cup of gnocchi is what we each got!) We complained and realized that they were NOT in the customer pleasing business. And none of us are the type to complain....but really-it was the worst customer service any of us had ever experienced!
We were all starving when we left-it was so awful. We wished we would've gone to Wetzel's Pretzels instead. It's Hab's and my favorite pretzel shop, and even though they have one in San Fran's mall, we decided just to get one a different day from Roseville's mall. We were looking forward to it so much, so we felt like it was a cruel joke when we saw it covered up with a black curtain:



I wanted to sing, "So close-yet so far away!!" We were both so sad about it. Since that mall had a fire last year, just a few of places weren't open yet, and Wetzel's was one of them! We really should've gotten one in San Fran.

While Hab had my camera, she must've taken this picture because of the nipples on the mannequin! I just discovered it on my camera, so that was quite a surprise!
It gave me a good chuckle!


I took a picture of our "snack" at the food court.
We were too hungry to wait for dinner at Claim Jumper, so we ended up just getting mud pie and lemon bar brulee from there on our way home!

Gretel and I had a blast one day riding the train around The Fountains shopping center.

At Anthropologie

I wanted to show them the Sacramento temple, and while we were there, we saw some wild turkeys. My mom and Hailey still howl with laughter because I said, "That's so sad that we eat them on Thanksgiving." And as they laughed at this comment I asked, "Well isn't it?" They never answered....they said their shrieks of laughter should be the answer, but I was left feeling puzzled.

At Burr's ice cream shop in East Sac

At a candy store in Old Sac

One morning Hab wanted to make some really delish chocolate waffles. We normally don't love chocolate waffles, but these are great! They're from the "Our Best Bites" website, which I didn't know about until she told me. We topped them with strawberries and vanilla syrup. "Good idear, Steph!"

I've made them twice since then and topped them with bananas and caramel syrup. That is my fave combo!
The first time I did this was when I had Shauna over for her birthday-she loved her birthday breakfast way more than I expected her to! Then we did it once more for Abby's birthday.

Gretel Gumdrops playing with her kitchen after her hair had been freshly braided by Hab. I took pictures so I could practice later and hopefully have it turn out looking like it.

Below are pictures of when I've done her hair-these are my best efforts

Anyway, we had a really great visit! The theme song for our trip is one that my mom is obsessed with lately. My mom put her ipod on to play it almost every day! It's called "Just an old-fashioned girl" by Eartha Kitt, and it's really funny! I posted the video, and it's definitely worth watching!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IfGBQ-T_GY

Easter!

On Easter morning, Gretel got to look and see what the Easter bunny left her in her room. She also got to do a little egg hunt in her room, with eggs hidden behind stuffed animals, etc.
Her basket was hidden behind the rocking chair ("rock rock chair" as she calls it) and she was just loving it!
In this picture she is looking at the movie Tangled, so excited to watch it! Lately she says, "I'm so excited!" about lots of things, and I just love it.



Thanks so much to Mimi, for being the Easter bunny's personal shopper-you really got Gretel SO many cool things! She was really spoiled; she got books, new dishes/bib, a backpack, clothes, a sprinkler toy for the backyard, and hair accessories. Also, we each got a big dark chocolate-covered caramel carrot. My fave!! Thank you for everything, Mom and Dad!


Her very favorite thing that she can't live without is the magnetic alphabet toy! She also loves her glittery fairy wand and new bath toys.

Johnny and I got her some books, a coloring book that uses a pen filled with water (great church toy) some crocs for the pool/beach and sand toys for the beach

I thought she'd want to shove all the jelly beans in her mouth as soon as I opened the egg for her, but she mostly just wanted to pour them from one half of the egg to the other.

The crusty look!

Thanks Mom, for her Easter frock-and also for mine!

I didn't have time to snap a picture of her hair before church, so by this point it's way messed up because she'd been hiding in all the couch pillows, her favorite hobby.

But thanks Hab for teaching me how to French braid her hair! Even though I've known how to French braid, it's seriously hard to do on a baby with their little fine hair. Hab has mad skillz when it comes to braiding-she is better and WAY faster than I am. She gave me some tips to improve my technique, which I really appreciate! When she came to visit recently, (my next blog post) she whipped out her hair talents and I couldn't believe how much I loved Gretel's hair like that! So anyway, I've been practicing.

That night we got together with a few other families for an egg hunt. It was Shauna's fam, Abby's fam, along with Abby's in-laws' families too. Lots of fun!!

Gretel's favorite friend, Avery

Her other favorite friend, Chloe

Shauna's cute boy, Jack

Shauna's awesome daughter Skyler, who I just adore!!

All 4 of Shauna's kids

After Shauna did this impromtu pose, we also decided to be silly with our baskets

Tribond: We gave ourselves that name while playing a board game called Tribond. We were beating our husbands (boys vs. girls) and the three of us put our fists in the air, touching them together in celebration, and the name stuck.

I love how silly we are when we're together.

The best part of Easter was that Johnny said he wanted to cook! So he did the honey pecan chicken, I did the scalloped potatoes, (my first time making them, which is funny because later I found out that my Dad also made scalloped potatoes that night-kindred spirits:)) and we both did the salad. It was lots of fun being in the kitchen together. It was nice and relaxing. So after dinner and the egg hunt, we came home and watched Tangled! That's all Johnny cared about doing all day long-he's been dying to watch it and wanted to give it to Gretel early, but I made him wait until Easter when she'd get it in her basket.

I definitely miss our families and wish we could do an egg hunt with cousins, and eat dinner with everyone. But I'm grateful that we have such nice friends that invite us to do fun things with them. We have spent so many holidays with our friends here, and they feel like family, so we're very lucky.

We will be seeing a lot of family in the next couple of weeks, so we're really excited. It was such a treat to have Hab and my mom come and stay. We leave in a couple of days for Johnny's sister's wedding (YAY!) and then right when we get home from that Johnny graduates (double YAY!!)

Both his parents and mine are coming for the graduation, so that will be really fun!