Rainy days are perfect for...

We made regualy boxed cake mix, but frosted them with brown butter frosting. YUMMM!!!

Ants in my pants!

With an old house, there comes a lot of character. Sometimes that character is charm. Other times it's quirks. Often it's in surprises, like the one we've been getting. I'm not talking about the creaking of the floor in the quiet of night, or when you jump as the furnace kicks on, fearing an explosion... I'm talking about the residents of this house. Not the former occupants, but this home's residents. They've obviously lived here a long time, long enough to form secret passages and know the ins and outs of the house. We thought it was the rain, bringing in some ant activity (maybe a party?) that got rained out, but as the days progressed, and the numbers increased, we started rethinking our strategy, (which at that time was to keep the house clean and put out ant traps).
Well, after waking up Sunday morning to ants all over the kitchen, we started realizing the problem on our hands. We used cinnamon around the holes we knew they were coming from-which works by the way!
But when yesterday we awoke to lines of ants crawling up the kitchen cabinets and into the cereal...we got down and dirty. If we had an adequate vacuum that had enough power to suck them up, we'd be less likely to jump to our 2nd resort...fogging.
We had actually purchased 6 fumigators for use with the spiders-don't get me started-which we used on the ants too. The downside...getting the house ready for fumigation. (seriously...why don't people just spray for bugs?) This task wouldn't have been so daunting had we been in a real "vacation" home. Now THIS particular house appears to us to be a project that the kids didn't want to take on after mom and dad died. There are knick-knacks everywhere, family pictures and albums left in the drawers, and old, useless appliances in the cupboards. Whatever. We still had to cover it. So we packed up our food, and bagged the plates and cutlery. We left the house for 3 hrs- during naptime mind you-, and came back to a pleasant odor, and no ants.

I was pretty sure this had done the trick, unless the ants went into their holes and hid from the poison. This morning I found a few crawling around the bathroom floor, but they dissappeared a while later (scouts, maybe? "The coast is clear"!) We've been pleased not to see any ants today. Thanks to the Edwards' for helping make it happen!

I think I'm in love

Maybe this was one of our best Valentine's Days. Maybe It was fabulous because of what happened last year, which was NOTHING. Not one thing. Not even a card! I thought for sure it would be yet another bust due to the overwhelming amounts of work Evan needed to do. But thinking about the holiday made me a little sad and at times resentful, so I mentioned it to Evan, not knowing if I'd regret doing so, for the sake of a really genuine Evan and whatever that brought to me. I didn't want him to do something just because I mentioned it, or because he felt he HAD to- but really? Aren't we in love? At least do SOMETHING! Anyway....He did say that he couldn't win. Don't get me wrong, he does show affection, and is always good for mother's day, and anniversaries and such. It just happened to be a sore spot from last year.
I woke up to a note that asked me to meet him for lunch that day, and he arranged for Mary to watch the kids. It was wonderful.
I showed up to the restaurant to see this:

Inside was this:

Soooo yummy!
He also gave me a new one of these:

It's a new Sansa Clip, an MP3 player. My last one broke and I've missed it terribly.
He totally redeemed himself this year. Whether I said something or not, he really did it right this year.
I love him a lot. He is perfect for me.
At the end of the day, I gave him this:

I make him a card every V-Day. The inside isn't pictured, but I think it's the best one yet.

California Lovin'

I absolutely love it here. For all who don't know, we moved to California! Yeah! No! Just kidding. Evan's work has a project in which they're teaming up with a company out here, and they needed Evan and his Utah co-worker, Matt, to come out here for a month to work with them, and light a little fire under them. The thought of leaving home to come out for a month was a little sobering, but after thinking about it, I'd rather be here with him, than home without him. All our food and gas and expenses are paid for, it's warmer, plus we're here with Matt and his wife, Mary, and their 1 yr old daughter, Izzy. The company is great!

We left Jan 31st and drove out over 2 days. It was fun having another family to travel with. The boys did great, as we've now come to expect. (I don't know where their good travel abilities come from.)

Here's the view of the backseat!

Did I mention we're in San Luis Obispo? We love, love, love it here! I could live here, it's so beautiful-and it sounds like I just might be here awhile!

Here's us at the beach:

We went to the old train depot in town. Porter was in heaven:

Evan's sister Terri flew in for the weekend to get away from the snow. She's the favorite aunt, and thus, the kids had an awesome time. We drove the 3 1/2 hours down to Disneyland to celebrate my birthday, and see some friends.
We got there late, and crashed with Brent and Linnae, who graciously put us up in 3 different rooms of the house. The next morning it was Disney time! I was so excited, it was hard to contain myself as we walked into the park. Porter was in heaven.

 Here's Porter with Kirsi:

His favorite ride was the cars:

Or maybe "it's a small world"

Or maybe meeting Mickey Mouse:

Mostly we liked being having Terri along

We've had a great time being able to play, and discard all sorts of housekeeping responsibilities, and being able to play with the kids, and go wherever we want, whenever we want.

Here's some pics of us playing:

 Matt and Mary

Henry is such a good sport. This is basically how he spends most mornings out and about. He's clearly not sad about it: