Autumn Colors

I love Autumn. The vibrant colors of the leaves, the final harvesting of vegetables and the preparations for Halloween. This isn't my favorite season, but it's certainly one I love. We spent many weekends through September and October taking pictures through the canyons and in our own yard. We visited Squaw Peak in time to see these vibrant colors.


We also visited a nice spot somewhere in American Fork Canyon right before the big color change. We roasted marshmallows and hotdogs and loved the scenery found in every direction. I feel so blessed to live in an area where there are so many beautiful places to visit.




Here are some fun photos we took in our yard. I am so delighted that we have one of the most colorful yards in the neighborhood.







We also visited Gardner Village this year as a family and enjoyed the festive atmosphere. Although the crowds were a bit much, it's one of my favorite memories in the month of October.

Halloween 2008

Halloween for the Pearson family was quite exciting this year. Anna thorougly enjoyed trick or treating, and always went straight for the sucker candies. Several days after Halloween, she continued to say "Trick or Treat" hoping that I would give her more candy.

I didn't make all our Halloween costumes this year, as I have in years past. My days are far too busy chasing after my baby and toddler, and my evenings are often spent cleaning the house. This year I only made one costume and that was for Levi. He decided a month ago to dress as a wizard to match Anna's witch costume. I'm very excited that the costume turned out quite well. This is also the first time I have seen Levi actually get excited over a costume. We used a broom handle wrapped in natural fibers for his staff. I even attached an orb to the end, but Anna decided to play with the staff and destroyed the orb.



Ian dressed as a Dalmatian puppy to match my Cruella DeVil costume. Ian made it quite clear that he disliked his costume, so we have very few pictures of him dressed up, and even less of him smiling.



We attended a party at Levi's work, a trunk or treat at the church then the neighborhood trick or treating. We have a lot of candy, and Anna is constantly searching the house to find where it is hiding. She just doesn't understand why she has eat real food when there is candy available. This is one battle I'll be fighting for a very long time.



Now that things have settled down a bit. I hope to start potty training my adorable 2 1/2 year old. I can start putting all the candy to good use as an incentive in this next challenge.

Scrapbooking Like Crazy!

I haven't been around the blogging block in a while and that is because I have been spending my very limited free time doing scrapbooking. It all started when the Scrapbook Expo visited about a month ago. I found deals that were 75% or more off retail. I spent 2 hours at the expo and left with enough supplies to keep me busy for a very long time. I have been creating fabulous page layouts almost every night, and I am happy. I am more patient with the kids, I am excited to see my works of art and I am doing something that is just for fun with no kid intervention. I love it!

I do have a question for all you scrapbookers out there. I'm curious to find out what adhesives you use on your layouts and pictures, and why you use them. I have recently discovered that adhesives go fast and are rather expensive to replace. Next time I purchase some, I'd like to be armed with the advice from my best scrapbooker gals!

French Fruit Tarts

I have joined a local cooking club, and last Tuesday we were all asked to bring something from a bakery. When I think of a bakery, I remember the delicious looking items I saw in the windows as I backpacked through Europe. I decided to recreate some one of these items, and it was a success.



French Fruit Tarts
Chef Melissa Pearson


Ingredients
2 cups all purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
½ cup butter
2 teaspoons sugar
1 egg yolk, beaten
cold water

For the filling
8 oz soft cream cheese
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
Raspberries and/or blueberries

For glaze
4 tablespoons apricot, peach or mango jam
4 tablespoons water

Makes 24

Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Cut the butter into the flour. Add the sugar. Add the egg yolk and enough cold water to make a smooth dough. Knead lightly and cover with plastic wrap. Put into the fridge for thirty minutes. Roll out the pastry 1/4 inch and cut out rounds of pastry using a 2 to 3 inch pastry cutter. Line the tins with the pastry rounds and put into the fridge for 15 minutes. Heat the oven to 400 degrees.

Prick the bases of the tartlet cases with a fork. Bake in the oven for twelve minutes. Put on a wire rack to cool.

Make the glaze by putting the jam and water into a small pan. Bring to a boil, stirring all the time. Put jam mixture into a clean pan and keep warm. To make the filling, beat the cream cheese with the sugar and lemon zest. Spread a little in each pastry case. Top with a selection of fruits and using a pastry brush, brush a little glaze onto the fruit, covering the tartlets up to the pastry edge.

Keep in mind that you will need one or two mini muffin pans to make the tarts.

Dancing with Levi

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9 Months Old

Today Ian turned 9 months old. He's celebrated the day by going to the doctor for shots, which he was very unhappy about. He then spent many hours playing toys with Anna, or I should say that he spent many hours trying to play with toys that Anna kept taking away from him.

Ian is my tall skinny boy. His height is in the 75th percentile while his weight is in the 25th. He's been crawling around the house since 7 months old, and is fast enough to keep Atticus the cat running for cover. Ian is very curious about everything and rarely misses anything happening around him. In only 9 months, he's grown so much and still fills my life with joy. How on earth did I ever get by without him?

Tonsillectomy

On July 31st I had my tonsils savagely ripped from my throat and placed in the garbage. What sort of cruel world do we live in where people walk into these torture chambers (called hospitals), willingly sign the consent forms saying they acknowledge that they could "die" from the procedure and won't sue the doctor, and then allow themselves to be put to sleep while crazed doctors and their sidekick nurses go to town cutting into their bodies? It is our world! We are the people who sit by and let these things happen. the Doctors and Nurses could very well be vacationing in Hawaii during our painful recoveries. They give us drugs like Percoet and Loratab to keep us happy until the pain subsides, but what we don't realize is that we're given just enough medicine to keep us happy for like 4-5 days, and the pain doesn't stop that early. No my friends, the pain rarely stops that early.

I stumbled across this website before my surgery and boy did the advice on it help! Most people think that tonsil removal for an adult would be easy, but let me assure you that it is quite difficult.

I am so grateful that Levi took a week off work to take care of me and the kids through the most difficult stage of my recovery. He was wonderful! He made sure I stayed hydrated, ate at least a little food, and kept me up on my meds. He took complete care of the kids, the cat and the house as well. By the end of the week, he was anxious to get back to work! I imagine that he found homemaking life a bit more challenging then he expected. :) Thank you Levi!