One of the highlights of our summer is planting and caring for a Owen really loves it and gets excited to watch it grow. He loves to water it!


Owen had just found a worm and turned to tell us with excitement!

Austin found the fallen Grapes and loved them!! Then he figured out that there were lots more on the bush!

Yes, he is not only a trashboy and grap-eater, but also a tornado that makes a big mess and keeps moving on to th next thing to destroy!
Nates new fathers day tent in our living room. We had popcorn and watched a movie. Then had a slumber party! We had to test it out to see if we liked it!! :)







Their new pool!
Austin wasn't a big fan, but Owen and Dakota LoVeD it!!

Nate teaching my sister and I to shoot his big guns while she washere to visit!

My sister and I both decided we are not meant to shoot these and that they are scary!! Believe it or not the little one kicks much harder than the big one. And Notice Nate's smile. He is laughing at how stupid we look and how horribnle we are at shooting!!

Does that not look like a bad tough guy!!
Santa rosa state park swimming pool/Lake.

Dumpster diving

So we now have a dumpster diving baby. Austin loves to get in the garbage and dig out stuff, sometimes to play with others to eat. Somedays he pulls out some hidden treasures! Today he found some yogurt still in the cup, you can guess what he did with it. Sometimes he pulls out old broken toys that I was trying to sneak throw away, or annoying toys. Sometimes it is left over candy. Well today his treasure didn't treat him well. He pulled out a can and sliced his finger on it. Poor Boy. I tried to out pressure on his finger to stop bleeding but it didn't want to. I tried to put a bandaid on as tightly as possible without cutting off circulation, but he pulled it off. oh, my little trashboy. He gets into everything, climbs on everything and learns everything the 1st time he sees it. You can imagine how that is with 2 older siblings who, to put it nicely, can be hooligans. I just got called to be in charge of the Christmas program for our Branch. That will be interesting and a new adventure. The movie theater here is for sale so we are trying to buy it for $60,000. We are trying to get a fat down payment on it and doing the math can have it paid off in 5 years. Nate's over time just got cut off so that puts a damper on plans, but we have prayed about it and have confirmation after confirmation that it is good for us to do. So we will see for sure if money works out or not. We know some may call us crazy and sometimes God's Plan looks crazy from the outside, but you still have to faith to follow and not be chicken. You never know until you try and the worst that happens is you fail and by darn get back up and try again. So we love to hear encouragement, but never discouragement. We get enough of that from the world and ourselves. We love you and can't wait to see you all in August!

ENCHILASAGNA

So a lady in our branch made this yummy, well it is called chicken lasagna but, I think it is a mix so I Call it enchilasagna. It takes a little bit of work to make, but the efforts are so worth it!!

ENCHILASAGNA

8 TBS Butter
8 TBS Flour
4 C milk
1 TBS + 1 tsp Garlic salt, divided
3 tsp parsley flakes, divided
salt, pepper, and red flakesor powder to taste
1.5 lbs boneless skinless chicken breast cut into cubes
1 (4.5 oz) can chopped green chiles, not drained
3 TBS dry onion flakes
2 TBS fresh garlic minced (I used 1 TBS garlic powder)
1 tsp onion powder
12-15 lasagna noodles (your preference)
Grated Swiss cheese
Grated Monterey jac Cheese(these are the flavor key)


Preheat Oven to 350. In a 5 qt. saucepan melt butter over medium heat. Add flour blending well. Slowly add milk stirring constantly untill all is added and mixtureis smooth. add 1Tbs garlic salt, 2 tsp. parsley flakes, salt and pepper and red pepper to taste. Simmer the sauce over low heat, stirring occasionally, while cooking chicken as follows.

Put 1 TBS water in a large skillet and add to pan the chicken (I used Tofu), chiles, onion flakes, garlic, onion powder, 1 tsp parsley flakes, 1 tsp. garlic salt. Cook over medium heat until chicken is white throughout, stirring occasionally, Add cooked chicken to pan of sauce and cook over very low heat for about 15 minutes.
Meanwhile cook lasagna noodles according to package directions; drain well

Mix together 4 cups of cheese in a bowl.

Coat bottom of lasagna pan with a little sauce so lasagna doesn'tstick to pan. Add a layer of 3 lasagna noodles to pan and top with about 1/8 of cheese, then 1/4 of the sauce, then another layer of cheese. Continue layering until all ingredients areused, ending with sauce, then cheese.

Cover pan then bake for 1 hour(I did 375 for 40 minutes). uncover pan and let sit for 15 minutes before cutting portions and serving.

This is so good and the tofu Is good for you and tastes really good in this if you wanted to adventure out and try it. If not chicken is great!!!! It is so worth the work. Out kids love it and Nate loves it!! I also doubled the recipe and made one in a disposable pan and froze it!

Tongue Twisted

So today I was telling Owen and his friends how to crack the coconut on the trampoline. I started to say, " You count to 3 and then y..." my tongue twisted as I tried to make an effort to think of the right word and the only word I could get out was "Ya'll." The language is getting to me. OH NO!!! Just for your interest, some other phrases or words they use here are, yes ma'am, no ma'am, Yes sir no sir and so on. Also, Instead of saying I am going to do this really quick or get this quickly, they say I am going to do this right quick. The first person i heard say it was mt neighbor, I thought it was just a funny phrase she used, then I heard most everyone use it as time went on. Some words they use are not so favorable. I don't here swearing too often, but I always here people take the Lords name in vain. that is hard to hear! I will keep updating you on the different language that is used here. One thing I really liked is how all of the kids say yes ma'am and sir and the adults too. It was hard to here at first just cause I felt old and that their normal short yes or no was prolonged. I am lazy when It comes to speech. If I can shorten I will!! lol

TUUUCCCUUUMMCCCAAARRRIII!

Well we are good here. We are adjusting to Nate's weird work schedule. He gets this Thursday and friday off. I am excited. We thought about going to the zoo in Amarillo. Or they have a quarter-horse museum. We don't know yet. Or just relax and do nothing. Maybe polay a little Mario Kart!! Nate seems to like his job and the people he is meeting. I am making him be social. 3 nights a week me and some ladies go walking. Carolyn and Suzy. THey are really nice. Suzy is a few years younger than my parents and Carolyn is older. All our neighbors are older with grown kids and grandkids. We do have one neighbor, suzy, whose youngest is 7 and oldest 15. Owen and Daniel, 7 year old, play together alot! They have fun. This neighborhood we are in is one of the nicest in town. We don't typically have to worry about cars speeding by or cars at all for that matter. It is not a busy area. And it is old people, they drive slow! lol Today we went to our neighbors softball game. Her name is Tori, she is Suzy's daughter who is 10. Dakota loves her and follows her around and Tori is really good to take care of her. Tori comes over and helps me sometimes. She cleaned my Kitchen the other day. :) The 15 year old, Eliano, loves Austin and Austin loves him. He helps me out alot too. All of Suzy's kids say "yes ma'am" and "No ma'am". They are good kids, but it took me some getting used to to hear ma'am. Now Owen and Dakota are saying it. The people here are really nice. Suzy has lived here her whole life so she has an in and introduces me to everyone. She is awesome. Did I mention her husband is a Leuitenant? So nate works with him. He loves Archery and hunting!! Nate and him seem to get along well. Carolyn is really sweet and very easy to talk to. She is one of those friendly loves everyone type. She never says bad things about people. Everyone is really good to help me with the kids. Now if I can find another mom my age I could say my circle of friends could be complete. Although I can never have too many, but the ones I have are great! My neighbor had a baby Tarantula in her yard and I called the exterminator cuz I wasn't going to have those roaming around!! I haven't seen any since. We have an area for a garden. We have bought seeds and now have to plant. We have grape vines in the backyard and from what I understand they are, DELICIOUS!! The kids seem to like it here. Owen misses his friends in Rio Rancho and UTAH, but has one here that helps. Dakota is talking alot. Some of her favorite phrases are: "Austin crying" Austin awake" "Do it self" Mommy go get diaper. Lol she cracks me up and is so strong-minded. She is so big and independent. She is a nurturer, a lover and definately a girl! Austin is walking all over the place while holding onto furniture. He is like a storm and he will be clean for days then one day he hits and destroys everything along his way and is on to the next thing before you can finish cleaning up the first. He is getting 4 or 5 teeth all out once. they are just starting to poke througha little bit.. I still can not officially say he has his 1st tooth. He is talking a few words and will try to imitate yuo. It is soooo cute. Owen is telling all sorts of tales. He even tried spreading rumors about me and they spread fast here. He told our neighbor today that I went to the doctor and that I had a baby in my belly. Ummm.. NO it is NOT true! Today he told me as we watched the many birds we get in our back yard that, " He saw a big daddy bird the other day and the baby and mommy too." Me: Oh yeah. that is cool. O: THe baby was looking for his mommy and daddy. Me: oh. where were they> O: He found his mommy but not his daddy. Me: oh. really? Where was his daddy. O: Work Me: hmm. What do birds do for work? O: they bite people. Me: Oh that hurts. THat is sad. O: No, they bite bad people. Me: ooohh! Then a few minutes later after watching the birds some more he came back and said, "they eat worms for work too." I thought this was a very interesting observation of his considering our situation. We just moved to a new place and Nate has started a new job where he fights bad people. Just thought it was interesting. Well that is all for tonight. I am tired! Peace Out

Duty Station

Hey you all, Has any one heard of Tucumcari New Mexico? I hadn't either until now. I will soon be living there with my little family. It is along the Interstate 40 near the Texas boarder, about 3hrs away from Rio Rancho. It's a small town of about 5,900+ people. There is a lake near the city and lots of ranches. Maybe I will buy me a couple horses, cows, and maybe even some ducks. Owen wants a duck and a rabbit. That is one good thing about small towns. You can have that kind of stuff. There is a small branch out their. Not sure if they have a church or what, but at least there is a branch. Not even sure if they have a Wal-mart or if we have to travel for an hour to go shopping, that will be interesting. :) I think we will head out that way in a couple weeks to check out the town and try to find a place to live. Cost of living is cheap there. So that will be nice. I am a little nervous but excited. Hey if any one does come to visit, we can atleast go to the lake :()
Dad Hall, sorry the more I try to make some money the further away from Nephi I get. Thank you for all your support. That goes for everyone. Thank you so much for your support. I don't ever call or write, but I hope you all know your greatly appreciated. Thank you for sacrificing so much so my family could come with me to New Mexico, and so they could come up and visit you all. That was awesome. Sorry I couldn't make it. I wish I could have come with them. We are tring to come back in August. Thank you again for all your help, and support.

Read the 2nd post first.

I forgot to tell you how the lady who helped me off the plane commented how I was a brave mom. I told her I was just crazy. She smiled and said, "maybe a little bit of both." That made me feel good that somebody noticed my efforts. I would do it all again! dakota on the way down to the ground aka landing. puked with all of the turbulence, but not bad an was mostly liquid adn I caught half of it in the puke bag. Because we were not supposed to get up while landing, I pushed the attendant button to get a towel or something afraid that we would be rushed off the plane before I could clean her up. The attendant, seeming annoyed, got right up to my face and said, "Is this an emergency?" I said "no, but she puked everywhere." she then nicely said, "Oh." and walked away to get towels. I guess you are not supposed to push that button while landing unless it is an emergency. Oh well. It has been atleast 8 years since I had been on a plane. Excuse me for not knowing. lol :)