A quick trip to Walla Walla............

On March 7, after leaving work early, Jim and I headed off to Walla Walla, WA. Jim's best friend, Casper, (He was our best man at our wedding) and his family were throwing an 80th Birthday Party (open house) for his mom. Ellie was like a 2nd mom to Jim while he was growing up so of course we had to go. I was up for a little vacation. At least until the morning we were supposed to leave! I felt fine at first but by 10:00 I felt like I had bad heart burn which turned to queasiness... and at 2 when I left work I was told I looked greenish and I felt achy! OH NO!!! I had so looked forward to going to Boise and out to dinner with Jim somewhere nice!
Anyway, I slept all the way to Boise curled up in a fetal position in the direct sunlight on the passenger side of the car, fighting chills and nausea! Finally we made it to the Motel in the nick of time if ya know what I mean! I went straight to bed, and Jim ate at the restaurant in the motel by himself, only to come back an hour later to tell me it was the BEST burger he had ever eaten!! Oh man!! being sick on a vaction is noooo fun at all!

I took photos of myself and sent to Sarah and Andrew so someone would feel sorry for me! hahaha! We slept good all night and then in the morning got up and I felt ALOT better.... Walla Walla here we come!

 We were on our way after a nice breakfast at IHOP. I dozed off and on all that day feeling much better than I did the night before. We got to Virginia's house around 5 ish. We just visited that day, and ate homemade enchilada's and Mexican rice for dinner. We were couch potatoes all the rest of the evening.
Friday we got up and got ready for the day. The day was ours to do whatever we wanted. First we met J.D. (Jim's brother) for lunch at a little taco place that was delish! Wish we had one here!! They were like El Viquero's tacos, only it was a fast food place ! YUM! Then we wandered the downtown area in Walla Walla a bit.. that always makes me want to open a little Bakery shop of my own there! There are lots of Winery's in Walla Walla and downtown has tasting shops, and it attracts ALOT of tourists! Plus Whitman College is there, so there are lots of young kids... I think a little bake shop would do great! only if I had the money!
Anyway, we shopped and got birthday cards for Ellie. We went to Walmart to help Virginia invest in a big flat screen T.V. She's been looking for one for a few years but could never make up her mind on just what one she wanted. With our help she finally picked one out! it was on sale and everything.... but alass it was out of stock! So we thought , 'Hey let's drive to Pendleton, OR (only about a 45 minute drive) and get it at the Walmart there (no one thought to call first) so we were off! I played Tetrus on Jim's phone in the back seat! I was so happy to see green hills that I snapped a pic.....

 And I bet you can guess what happened??? Once we arrived and looked at the TV's again, she changed her mind and wanted a different T.V. which they were out of too! as well as the first one! Shazam!! no T.V. night for us!
So we drove back to Walla Walla, and ate at the Teriyaki Grill where they have wonderful fish tacos! YUM! As you can tell I was feeling back to my old self! Then we relaxed and went to bed.
Saturday we got up and I made my Symphony brownies to take to JD and Cari's BBQ later in the day (did I mention Walla Walla is always about a month ahead of us here in seasons, so it was warm and sunny) Virginia made a pasta salad. And then we were off to walk around downtown Walla Walla again. We ate lunch at "Sweet Basil's Pizzeria" yummy! Awesome little Pizza place where you can buy pizza by the slice, I got a Pesto pizza that had artichokes and olives on it! Delish!

           (I wouldn't mind opening one of those here too if I knew it would make it!)
Then we went to Ellies party, after driving through the countryside looking at houses. Ellie has diabetes and has lost most of her vision, she can see shapes, so Jim had to lean in really close and give her a hug and tell her he was there! She was sooooo surprised that he came, she almost cried which in turn made me tear up! Goodnesss.... I was glad we went. Then we visited with Casper for 2 hours! I must say, it's amazing how much Casper looks like my old high school boyfriend.. isn't it funny... no matter where you go , there are always people who remind you of people you know, or they are the same people but a different person... does that make sense?  do you know what I mean?? it's weird.....

It was a nice visit and party, meeting people I had heard about before but never met.... then we headed over to JD and Cari's for grilled Burgers, pasta salad, baked Broccoli (of which I need to get the recipe.. it was Yummo) a raspberry walnut salad, and brownies... YUM! We visited rather late with JD, Cari, Breanna and Breann's friend that came with her for the weekend. FUN! After we were all exchanging yawns, we knew we were all tired, and went back to Virginia's for the night. It was daylight savings time too so we had to move our clock ahead an hour... which was bad because on our trip home we would lose another hour... yeesh.!

Sunday morning came too soon! We got up and packed, ate breakfast with Virginia, and then we were off again!! It was raining, but at least we were glad it wasn't snow..... at least until we got to the blue mountains... then we hit a snow storm worse than we'd seen all winter!! It was soooo bad that we couldn't see the tracks of the car in front of us at one point!

After we got over Dead man's pass, and down the mountains it turned to rain again. Then we had clouds and bad wind!

Tumble weeds were blowing across the road and dust was bad... there was one time that tumble weeds blue up and into the air and over the road that Jim looked at me and said "Dorothy, we're not in kansas anymore!" Goodness, I think we had every kind of weather you could imagine (well I guess we could have actually been in a hurrican or tornado) but we made it home safe after a long day of driving.
We got unpacked and relaxed for a bit... then it was time to go to bed so we could both get up for another day of work.....
It was a good little vacation... but too short.

My "Relay for Life" Auction cake....

A girl I work with came up to me about a month ago, and asked if she could hire me to make a cake. She had been volunteered to make a cake for the "Relay for Life" cake auction at her church and since she doesn't 'do' cakes or baking she asked me if I wouldn't mind. Of course I say I wouldn't mind!! She said I could do whatever I wanted with an 8 inch 2 layer cake and the color purple!!

This is what I came up with!

It was yellow cake with raspberry filling.... and I had this new gumpaste flower kit and thought I would try it out. I wasn't even sure how I was going to decorate it until that Saturday morning before she needed, other than I had made a few roses and leaves... it just seemed to come together!! I was happy with it...

Shannon took it to the cake auction, and later sent me a text message that it had sold for $90!! How cool is that??? I had told her rather than pay me to make a donation towards the Cancer Society as well (thinking that it would be 10 or 15, because that is what I would have charged since it was a good cause) Later I got a thank-you and she said she had made a donation of $30 to the Cancer  Society! Wow!!

All in all it was a good day!

Happy 25th Birthday Sarah!

This post is a little late..... Can't believe how quickly time goes by! To think 25 years ago on Feb. 20th I had one of the happiest days of my life when my little 'Weeskit' was born. At least that 's what Grandpa B. liked to call her. Who knew what good 'Friends' we would become.

She was the cutest baby ever....

that turned into the cutest little girl ever...

And she loved her brother very much......

and she grew up into a beautiful young lady..

who loves to be silly.....

and manages to look cute while doing it....

she loves to shop...

and loves to eat....

all in all we love having her in our family...

Sarah came home for her Birthday weekend! We had a good time just spending time together.. We made Sarah's birthday pasta for Sunday dinner, which was yummo! Sarah helped me throw everything together, it was Chicken, bacon, sundried tomatoes, mushrooms and artichokes with bowtie pasta and Sundried Tomato alfredo sauce. YUM!
Later we went down to Mom and Dad's with Sarah's cake of choice.... out of all the cakes I make and can decorate and her all time favorite is the boxed Jello Strawberry Cheesecake mix... so that is what she gets!!

After eating cake and opening cards... with money in them of course. What else do you get a 25 year old girl who loves to shop???..............

Sarah and I challenged Grandpa and Grandma to a game of scrabble... that's are favorite thing to do. It's quite funny when we all get tired in the evening and try to come up with words. I often have to consult the dictionary where we learned that the Peacock is the male and the Peahen is the female of the PeaFowl family and we found out the meaning of the word "Teem" and it's actually a word which gave gramma the giggles and she turned blue she was laughing so hard and we had to remind her to breath... I think it's the time of night that we play, and the length of the game when you play super scrabble that gives us all the giggles....We do have fun! I always seem to lose though even with the dictionary.
Then Monday rolled around and it was Sarah's actual birthday... isn't that what makes birthday's fun?? to celebrate the whole weekend long??
Andrew and I took Sarah to the mall... and she didn't find a thing to spend her birthday money on. She saved it for the Salt Lake City malls. My but she is turning into a 'big city' girl I guess! We also let her pick a restaurant for lunch and she picked the Blue Hashi (can't remember quite how to spell that) of course! for Sushi! it was good, and they gave Sarah the most delicious-dessert-ever free for her birthday ( I think it helps when you know one of the manager's there too!)
Then Andy went back to Rexburg for school and Sarah and I came home. It was lovely to have both of my kids home for the weekend! And lovely to spend time with my daughter... later just the two of us went to Rupes' for gooey ice cream Sundays and onion rings and fries!
                       Happy 25th Birthday Sarah!! wonder what this next year will bring???