I never blogged about our WA trip

Oops. Just haven't been in the blogging mood lately. But I'm going to start blogging again, I promise. It's just we haven't done anything to the house lately, which is mainly what I blog about.

Anywho... In JULY (yeah, that long ago, yikes) we made our first trip up to WA to visit my sister-in-law as well as our 3 beautiful nieces. We went for Bella's birthday mainly, but it was also over 4th of July. We had such a wonderful time.

The first day we went to Mulkateo Beach. We had Ivars fish and chips, and ice cream and then hung out on the beach.


We watched the sun set (at 10:30PM... weird!). It was gorgeous.


The next day we went out to this mountain (not sure the name of the mountain) but they have these ice caves. It's where the snow on the side of the mountain melts and the waterfalls come down and make these caves out of the ice on the base of the mountain. Pretty cool!










The next day we kind of just chilled out and hung around the house (we stayed with SIL). We made Dinosaur crafts for Bella's birthday party. All and all a nice relaxing day.

The next day Hubs, Romeo, Kaya and I went down to Seattle and took a ferry over to Bainbridge Island. Taking the ferry was a great experience. I loved it. The Island, eh. It wasn't really anything special. There wasn't much to do. We just walked around a bit, had lunch, and then came back.

Here's the Ferry we took. BIG boat. Which is good, because that means no motion sickness!


Bye Bye Seattle...





Hello..... Island?? Um... where are the palm trees? It was a little weird to see Pine trees on and ISLAND. But this is Washington I guess. :/





The next day was the 4th of July. Which was AWESOME in WA. I am convinced there's no other way to do the 4th of July, than in WA. The husbands went down to the indian reservation where they have "Boom City" which is where they sell tons and tons of fireworks. And i'm not talking sparklers. I'm talking REAL fireworks.

Here's what they came back with... boys!




Here are the girls. I just love this picture. Bella is so silly. This is what she did when Uncle Brian told her to give Kaya a hug. Don't I have the cutest nieces?


And this is the best picture I got of the fireworks at night. Unfortunately, as I think I may have mentioned before, my camera doesn't do well at night. If I take the flash off, it makes everything blury. It has other settings, but the only one that really works is the auto flash.


I'm going to say that's part one of our WA trip, and I'm going to end here and say I really really want to live there.

...to be continued.

Paramore

Ok, so I'm a total teenie bopper when it comes to two things. 1.) Twilight and 2.) the band Paramore. They are one of my favorite bands. They are so good. The lead singer, Hailey Williams. She's just so talented. Not to mention drop dead beautiful. And I love her because she doesn't try so hard like most girls in bands. She's just naturally awesome. She can head-bang but then at the same time be girly. Her voice is just beyond beautiful. Gives me goosebumps. Have you ever heard them play acoustic? LOVE!

She's just so cute, and sooo young too. And ok, we all know I love her hair. haha


Anyway, they're new album Brand New Eyes is pretty much amazing. These two songs in paticular are just outstanding and I have had them on repeat for the last week.

Misguided Ghosts


All I Wanted. Great Love song. My favorite part is where it goes,
"I could follow you to the beginning
Just to relive the start
And maybe then we'd remember to slow down
At all of our favorite parts"


And of course there are a ton of upbeat fun songs like "Ignorance" etc.

Cupcake Swap!

This past weekend, my friend Kirstin hosted a cupcake swap. That's right, you heard me, a CUPCAKE SWAP! It was loads of fun. She said there were 900 cupcakes there. Wow!

I made Martha's Coconut Cupcakes. They turned out delicious! I am so proud of myself, because I am definitely NOT a baker. And I made them from scratch. Everything, including the frosting.

Here is the recipe for the Coconut Cupcakes:
Ingredients

Makes 2 dozen

* 3 cups cake flour (not self-rising)
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, room temperature
* 2 1/4 cups sugar
* 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
* 1 cup coconut milk
* 8 large egg whites
* 1 1/4 cups shredded sweetened coconut
# Frosting: (NOT from Martha)
# 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
# 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
# 1/3 cup coconut milk, room temperature
# Seeds scraped from 1 split vanilla bean or 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
# 1/8 teaspoon salt
# 1 1/2 cups sweetened flaked coconut, lightly toasted (for garnish)
Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two standard 12-cup muffin pans with paper liners; set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter and 2 cups sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes, scraping down sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in vanilla. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the milk and beginning and ending with the flour; beat until just combined. Transfer mixture to a large bowl; set aside.
4. In the clean bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat egg whites on low speed until foamy. With mixer running, gradually add remaining 1/4 cup sugar; beat on high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form, about 4 minutes. Do not overbeat. Gently fold a third of the egg-white mixture into the butter-flour mixture until combined. Gently fold in remaining egg-white mixture; stir in shredded coconut.
5. Divide batter evenly among the muffin cups, filling each with a heaping 1/4 cup batter. Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until the cupcakes are golden brown and a cake tester inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes. Transfer pans to a wire rack. Invert cupcakes onto rack; then reinvert and let cool completely, top sides up. Frost cupcakes with seven minute frosting, swirling to cover. Cupcakes may be stored in a covered container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Garnish with fresh coconut just before serving.
Frosting Directions:
# For frosting:
# Using electric mixer, beat butter in large bowl until smooth. Add sugar, 1/3 cup reduced coconut milk, seeds from vanilla bean, and salt. Beat on medium-low speed until blended, scraping down sides of bowl. Increase to mediumhigh and beat until light and fluffy.
# Using pastry bag fitted with large star tip, pipe frosting onto cooled cupcakes. (Alternatively, top each cupcake with 2 tablespoons frosting. Using small offset spatula, swirl frosting over top of cupcakes, leaving 1/2-inch plain border.) Sprinkle with coconut. DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 day ahead. Store in airtight containers; chill. Bring to room temperature before serving.
# * Available at many supermarkets and at Indian, Southeast Asian, and Latin markets.

If you like coconut, I highly recommend these cupcakes. They're super sweet, but delicious.

Some of the other awesome cupcakes...


That's right. Bacon. And chocolate. Together. Ummm.... I didn't try them but I heard they weren't bad.










And the Latte Girls! It was great seeing these girls again. :)

Our Memorial Day Weekend

Wow! I started this post a while back and forgot about it. Geeze. I'm a bad blogger these days. I've been more consumed with reading vampire books, watching season 1 of Tru Blood on DVD, not to mention watching the New Moon Trailer over and over and over again..... I'm officially obsessed and officially a loser.

Anyway, We had a great, relaxing Memorial Day weekend. Friday I had a wedding to work, but afterwards we went for a quick trip to Sedona. Our favorite getaway spot here in AZ. It really is a "hidden gem".

We didn't get in until 9pm, checked in to the hotel and got settled. It was raining quite a bit, so we took the dogs out to potty then let them calm down for a bit. Once they looked like they were pooped from the ride up and were done being curious, we put them in their crates and went out to find some late dinner. Unfortunately, by this time it was about 10 till 10:00. We got to a restaurant, but they closed at 10:00, and even though it was 9:50, we didn't want to be that guy. You know, the one that shows up right before a restaurant is about to close, and keeps everyone there late. That's rude, IMO. So we searched for a short period of time for a restaurant that was open later, but came up empty handed. So we decided to just grab some pizza from Dominos and a couple 6 packs of beer and went back to the hotel. So Friday night was kind of a bust, since we got there late and it was raining.

Saturday morning we got up, and thankfully the rain let up, and the sun came out a bit. We went and got some breakfast then headed out to find a good hiking spot. We stopped at a tourist spot to get a "Red Rock Pass" (the pass you need to park and hike, basically), some good info on a non-touristy place to hike, and a map. We drove up passed Slide Rock about 5 miles, and found our spot. It was less of a hike, and more of a "brisk walk" as the tourist place lady called it.

So here we go with the pics...



Gizzy is my little adventure dog. He loves the outdoors and creeks especially! He jumps from rock to rock, splashes around in the creek and just has a good ol time.



This is when he found a deeper part and straight up jumped off that big rock into the creek. Too funny!



On our way back we found this tree that was COVERED in Lady Bugs. I have never seen anything like this before.




Lily isn't as impressed with the creek as Gizmo.

The Two Items I've Wanted Really Bad

I finally got! A rug and a new chandelier! FINALLY! I've been dying for these two things since we moved in, especially the chandelier. I am so happy to get rid of that horrible 70's fixture that was there before. I feel like these spaces are almost complete now. We still need to remove the popcorn ceilings and replace the ceiling fan.

S.I.S.T.E.R.S

This weekend my sister and I finally got tattooed together. We've been wanting to do this for a while, but haven't gotten around to it. She originally wanted the chinese symbols for sister, and I wasn't feeling that, so I decided we'll do a sparrow, and she was ok with that. So, we had Husband's friend Justin do it for us. Husband recently did some work over at Justin's house, so instead of paying him with money, he's paying in him with tattoos.

It's not the best picture, since it's taken with my phone and also, it's hard to take a picture of your own wrist.


Anyway, Justin is an amazing artist and a really cool guy. He works at Golden Tooth Tattoo (link to Justin's myspace page), so if you're in need of a new tattoo, he'll hook you up.

Lily Loves The Sprinklers

Miss Lily LOVES the sprinklers. Every morning when I go out and turn them on, this is what she does...


"Oh hey! What's that?!"


"NOM NOM NOM! Bite the water!"


"WEEEE! OMG I LOVE SPRINKLERS!!"


"OMG Mommy! Did you see that?! These things came out of the ground and got me all wet! It was fun! Will you throw my toy in the middle of the yard? I like playing fetch in the sprinklers!"



...and repeat. This is a daily thing now. Oh and please ignore the status of my backyard. Husband has decided to tear it apart. His OCD is getting the best of him. He is removing the rock and brick. He also removed the tree. He absolutely hates the fact that grass grows through the rock and wants it all grass back here. Whatev.