SPRINKLES, number 3 on my list of things to do

If you see me wearing only this shirt this fall, I do not apologize. It says Red Velvet on it and I got it at Sprinkles.

If you see me waisting away down to a gaunt skeletal frame I don't care. Nothing taste as good as the cupcakes at Sprinkles.

If I do not visit all the the other cupcake places on my fall to do list, why bother, they won't be as fun or taste as good as Sprinkles.

If you see me with a new pet, I may just have gotten it so I could name her Sprinkles.

Suffice it to say, I visited Sprinkles and it rocked my world.

Innocent, unknowing me before I went in, I wish I could tell you

to run because cupcakes and frosting will never be the same for you again.

apple spice, red velvet, black and white, strawberry, pumpkin, coconut,

and milk chocolate

Halloween decor, it's time.

I have said it before, I'll say it again. I'll know I have made it when I can buy all the Halloween decorations I want, not when $19.99 for a haunted house at Target looks offensively expensive. But it is time to get out my Halloween stuff and I do have some great stuff.

Here is my new best friend that my

Mother-in-Law got me for my birthday last year.Notice the birthday cards in the background.And here is an old friend.

I saw this on the Internet and thought they would be cute with my
daughter and niece's photos on it.

And this would be my ideal fireplace and how it would be decorated.

Number 6, update all my photos in my frames

I didn't have a great photo of Max, so Friday we went outside and took some. I know I'm his Mom, but I just think he's sooooo stinkin cute! These are the rest.

I love this photo of Auri because I know she is laughing at Max.

T. G. I. Sunday Night

I know it makes me unpopular, right up there with saying I don't like August and doughnuts, but I really don't like Saturdays all that much. When my kids don't have a sports activity there is that need to entertain and make it fun and meaningful for them. When they do have sports, there is a lot of sitting or standing in cold cold weather.

But I love Sunday nights. They are all the same. I do a lot of prep work for the coming week, I cut my breakfast fruit, boil my eggs, and make cookies for the kids. During the holidays it gets more fun, we watch a Christmas movie and do all this. I also love T.G.I Mondays. After the mad rush of Monday morning, after the bus has gone, we have a quiet Monday morning.

What kind of mother lets her 2 year old play with a knife?

Happy 2 year Anniversary Heart Valve

As I reflect on the 2 years since my open heart surgery I thought of a list of things that I wish the post op-nurses and doctors would have told me to prepare me for my recovery here are some of the things that they did and did not say:


What they did say- It will take you a year to recover, tell someone if you start to experience symptoms of depression, call us if you have lots of fevers.


What I wish they would have said: It will take you almost 2 years to recover, the first 2 months you won't know what hit you.


I wish they would have said: You did some bad things that you felt guilty for in your 20's but nothing can prepare you for the guilt you are about to experience. You'll feel guilty for not holding your baby for 2 months, and for neglecting your older kids for the next 4 months. You'll feel guilty for resenting your friends and sisters for being a better Mom than you. You'll feel guilty that you are a 30 year old woman and your Mom has to come over and help clean your house. Why didn't the nurses and doctors tell me about all the guilt!?!? Do they not train them for that in nursing and medical school huh, huh?


I wish they would have said: You don't need to go back to the gym 5 days a week 2 months
post-op. You don't. No, Seriously, Don't. It will probably do more damage than good.


I wish they would have said: Don't worry about the scar, no one cares about it, you won't be able to remember what you look like without it, and you won't even see it any more after a year.



I wish they would have said: Now you get 2 birthdays! Your actual one and the one on the date that they stopped your heart and breathing for 4 hours. Celebrate them both by buying yourself something pretty.

My Fall list of things to do

I love the fall and I love lists and since I felt like I had so much success with my summer list of things to do I have thought long and hard and I have come up with a suitable list of things to get done this fall. Here they are in no particular order and they do not match the pictures.

By the way, we went to our favorite farm this Saturday and I let the kids run around a bit. I think it is important that my kids see that food grows on trees, it does not come from boxes with SpongeBob on them.

1. Find a decent recipe and make Pumpkin Soup.

- In fact I'll take it one step further, have a pumpkin soup tasting party where we taste test pumpkin soup recipes, find the most outstanding one, make a huge pot every other Sunday night and have a cup every day for lunch until Thanksgiving.

2. Re-do my fireplace. It has bugged me since we moved in. It needs to be re tiled and repainted. Auri isn't even in the photo that hangs above it.

3. Visit St. Cupcake, Cupcake Jones, and Sprinkles and see which is best.

4. Get a Washington State Drivers License. I have lived here 4 years. It's time.

5. Make a fall play list.

6. Update all the photos in the house, Auri is less than 3 months in all of them.

7. Re-paint my bedroom. I am tired of green and this past spring I got new bedding, I want the walls to go with it.

Summer wrap up

I can now check off number 8 on my summer list of things to do, which was to make molasses bread. I don't mind saying so myself, but it was AMAZING! I will defiantly make it again and again and probably into rolls around Thanksgiving so I can eat it with Turkey sandwiches.

I also added a number 11. Make Banoffii Pie, and I did it as a back to school treat for Max.

I didn't complete everything on my list but I got the gist of the list, which was to DO STUFF. Last Summer was just not fun at all for me, Auri was still an infant, I was tired all the time, and really struggling with my weight.

This is Auri Last summer.

And this is my fun happy beautiful child this summer!

She is so much more fun to hang out with.

She really wants to take the picture in this photo.

But this is what we did this summer, we cooked out little hearts out. We made dozens and dozens of cookies, literally, I got to the point where I would stop putting the cookie sheets away after I washed them, I'd just set them out to dry knowing I'd use them tomorrow.

Chocolate mint cookies

Snicker doodles, Warren's Favorite

Low-fat triple chocolate, my favorite.

Above is me last summer. I was about 15lbs heavier and dieting(I went on 4 different diets). I was crying a lot, seeing doctor after doctor, being tired and cranky all the time, not wanting to do anything and I was just wishing summer was over so I could start wearing sweatshirts again to hide my huge body. Below is me this summer, I can't honestly say how much weight I have lost because I still have a crippling paralyzing fear of the scale. I am just going by estimation. But I have lost my fear and loathing of food and as you can tell by all the baking I have been doing I have kind of turned into a foodie. I think loosing the stress from dieting helped me loose the weight.

I do love a good list, I have already started thinking about my fall list of things to do.