Get Off My Back Jim & Becky!

I haven't been taking very many pictures lately, so I haven't posted anything worth talking about. Here are somethings that have been happening that you might get a kick out of...

Brooke went in to use the bathroom by herself and came out looking like this. Something wasn't quite right when I looked at her.

Remember a few posts back when Becky did Brooke's hair and makeup? Well, while my mom was down here helping Emily get settled in, I went over to Becky's house without the kids to make aprons with my mom and sisters and Becky decided to do my hair and hers. Here are a couple pictures of my styles. The rest are way too scary to put on here. These are the real deal glamour shots, Motherload should try these sometime.




Becky put curlers in her own hair without a mirror. This is what she came out with.


I had to take some pictures of Brooke for Grandma Kay and the only way I could get her excited about it was by putting mascara on her. After that she loved having her picture taken.

This is her favorite strawberry shortcake shirt that she wears at least two or three times a week. Yes, it gets washed after each wearing.

This is her "No, you rrraaaawww!" face that she plays with Dave.

Wes is never around anymore for pictures. He is either at school or with friends playing. I need to take more pictures of him to post. I also need to figure out a way to get some pictures of Dave on here.

Checkin' Out Em's Place

We went to visit my youngest sister Emily at her new place. It is actually pretty big, I was surprised.

I call her bed "Everest" because it is up so high. I told Seaka to get up on it and she just pouted. So Emily tried to make her happier. Check out Brooke's pout, priceless.

Then she heard a train and it made everything better. She always covers one ear when she hears something, so Em was doing it with her.

Brooke is trying on Emily's glasses. They would not stay up on her! But she is still posing for the camera with her overly pursed lips.

When we left Brooke kept asking me, "Where "Em-meoly" is?"

Later Gramea, Brooke and I went to get something to eat at the Lion House. Yumm. Brooke liked this huge "water-bottle". I don't know why, but both of my kids have called waterfalls, "water-bottles".

Grandma's Got a New Do at 92

Saturday was Christina's baby shower for her baby girl, Mardi Ione. Mardi is doing really well, she is home from the hospital...finally! Yeah! The baby wasn't there, they can't take her out for a year. Only to doctor's appointments. We got to see pictures of her and she is really cute, she now weighs over 7 lbs!

So I had heard that Grandma Ione got a new do, all my memories of Grandma are of her hair permed. Tight curls all over her head. Not anymore. She was tired of it. I told Grandma she needs to go and have it "set" every week. Mom told her to try and spike it.

Here are my sisters and I with Grandma. What do you think Dad? Mom was over talking to Aunt Myrl, so she wasn't in it. Oh, this was a self-portrait too!

Grandma requested this picture. It is of my cousin Amy and I.

Grandma and Ashley (my sister Becky's baby). Look at those thunder thighs on Ashley. They are the best. It's her "chubba-wubba".

Meet the Taylor's

The Taylor's live up the street from us, my kids love playing with them. The other day Kristen (the mom) and I were husband-less and went together to a BBQ, so her older children watched Wes and Brooke up at their house. Brooke adores Whitney (on the left) and Courtney (on the right) of her. They always primp her whenever we go over there. They introduced her to nail polish. Carter is a couple of months older than Brooke. It looks like tonight Brooke had the royal treatment. She put makeup on Whitney and Courtney, they put it on her, they played dress up, and did Brooke's hair.

Seaka and Carter.

I'm a "Girl Cow" oh, I mean Cow Girl

My mom, sister Emily, Wes, Brooke and I went to Cracker Barrell for dinner the other night and while waiting for our table looked around the gift shop. I love their Halloween costumes for little girls. It's where I bought Brooke's witch costume last year. The past couple of times our family has gone in there to eat I have been eyeing a princess costume for her. My mom found this cowgirl one and we loved it.
My mom and sister babysat the kids when I went to back to school night and Brooke played dress up. She put it on and called herself a "Girl Cow"! They corrected her, I hope!

I caught her mid twirl. It makes her look chunky! How cute is that.

Pose for the camera. I love the hand on her hip and the knee slightly bent.

So this is Ashley's costume, but I had to put it on her. Sorry, Becky! I couldn't pass it up. It was way too cute.

I loved the headband that comes with it. And the wings were so stinkin cute. If Brooke could just be 3 things for Halloween, it would be perfect!

Brooke Loves Makeup (and my 100th post)

Everyday Brooke is asking if she can have makeup on since we played dress up at Aunt Becky's house. Today I finally gave in and put some eye shadow on her and some blush and mascara. Not too much.
Here she is, the final product. She loved every second of it. What a pretty smile, I think. I made the mistake of letting her put the eye shadow and blush into her purse that she is clinching in her hands.

I love how long her eye lashes are. Thanks Papa Wes for passing those down to me and my kids!

See the colors aren't too bad. Her expression is great. Now go back to the school lunch entry and see what happened when I came upstairs for a few minutes. She went wild with the white eye shadow and smeared the mascara making it look like a black eye.

When we came home from eating with Wes, I wiped it all off and she went right back to work, this time with pink and did a pretty good job keeping it all on her eye lids.

Nicole & Kelsey's Cooking Class Begin

Did anyone watch this last season of Next Food Network Star? Remember Kelsey? She was our favorite. Well, she made it to the final 4 and was cut in Vegas. She is now back in Utah and living around here, newly married and she and long time friend Nicole (who also went to the French Institute of culinary School) have started doing these cooking classes/demonstrations.


So I brought my nice big camera to take lots of pictures of the food (and Kelsey) because we were obsessed with the show. Even our husbands would watch on Sunday nights up at Dave's parents after dinner. We had our opinions on everyone, we would tell Lisa to open her eyes and chill out. It was fun to watch together. Anyway, I left the big camera in the car so I wouldn't be a stalker again. You read it right. Last year while we were all in the Hamptons on vacation (Dave's family) we had an Ina Garten (Barefoot Contessa) day. We went and visited different places that were mentioned in her cookbooks. One of them being Iacono Farm, were she buys her organic fresh chicken. The chicken lady gave up Ina's home address (and told us to tell Ina that she sent us), where her show is filmed, and we went to spy and hopefully get a glimpse of Miss Barefoot herself. We did find her house, here is my proof.



The next day I took Dave back to show him where she lived and somehow, don't ask me how, we ended up driving up her driveway! Then I guess Dave can talk me into anything, he convinced me that we are only here once and that I will always regret not doing this, that I need to walk up to her door and see if she was home. Ya right! But I did. It must be the crazy Newman in me. As I approached the front door, she was coming down her stairs inside and saw me, so she opened the door, she looked awful. She asked if there was something she could help me with. I basically told her we are a crazy family from Utah and other states that came to the Hamptons just so we could have a Barefoot Contessa day and make all her yummy recipes that we needed to get the ingredients from her local stores. She thought that was really neat. She told me how she was very sick, but still stuck her hand out to shake mine (I am a total germaphobe now that Brooke was in the hospital from being sick so young with RSV). She said it was very nice to meet you. And I couldn't wait to go and put GermX on my hand to get it clean or at least think it was clean. So now I am the family stalker...



Now back to the cooking class.

Meet Kelsey and Nicole. They make great food. If you want to go to one of their classes here in the valley, go to their blog at Nicole and Kelsey's Cooking Classes.

These are the champagne grapes that were grilled and go with the grilled flat iron steak with blue cheese butter. Delicious.

Kelsey is grilling the peaches for the skillet scones with homemade vanilla bean ice cream. So good, I wanted seconds.


Oh look. I had to take another self-portrait of Holly (my sister-in-law) and I for my family. The tradition lives on. (Man do I look short or what?!)

Ok, let me explain. We could eat more, I had just eaten quite a bit of the appetizer of grilled pita with pesto, white bean puree, and olive tapenade. So my plate wasn't very full. It was more like a very expensive restaurant. Here we have a sampling of the steak with the butter and grapes, and the grilled asparagus with lemon. I didn't want to eat too much, I still had dessert coming.

It was so good. I have to thank Kay for taking all of us to this. I had such a blast talking to Kelsey and getting to know both of them. She was great answering all of our silly questions.