At our ward Christmas Party (amazingly) Hudson put on a costume.
He even changed costumes.
He didn't make it to the stage though. It was too much. We were amazed that he even put one on.
Today it's a story about Emmelyne.
Take a good look at this video. It's quite rare.
You see when I took the three older kids on their first (and so far only) ski trip almost two years ago, Brigham and Emmelyne took a half day lesson. Being the Father of the Year candidate that I am, I snapped a few photos, shot a few videos, and then went skiing.
When I came back a couple of hours later I looked around for Emmelyne. One of the instructors then asked me, "Are you Emmelyne's dad? She's asleep in the lodge."
What?
"She said she was tired and wanted to sit down for a minute. Next thing we knew she was laying down on her jacket and fell asleep. We've never had that happen before."
So the video you just watched is the only evidence that Emmelyne really did ski that day.
We need rain in the valley and snow in the mountains!
Make it a great day!
Hi all! Charles here. I know there hasn't been much activity here on the Davis Family Farm blog. Honestly Danee's kind of been busy. If you don't already know she has 5 kids and a way tougher life than I do.
Anyway, I thought I'd help out on the blog side for a while. We'll see how long this lasts. I'm guessing things will be pretty succinct from me.
I have two questions for you this morning:
1. Should I be worried that I found Hudson lying on the couch this morning at 5am-ish (sorry Danee, I didn't pick things up before the picture, but at least there's scriptures lying around)? He's five, very independent, and I'm a little worried that he is no longer coming in to our bed when he wakes up in the middle of the night. Should I be worried?
2. I used Picasa to upload these photos to the blog and make this post. Is that what you use? Is there something better out there?
Happy Holidays!
OK this is Brooklyn. I made this for mom & dad for their anniversary in July. (It's a little late i know) OK not quite sure how to actually put it on the blog but here's the site:
http://www.slide.com/r/s-J91Yj97z_2CgASndTgY_rKukJMNhQb?previous_view=mscd_embedded_url&view=original
yes I made that
yes I know I ROCK
Run - do not walk to your kitchen and make this. I wish that I could take credit for this great food picture BUT I can take credit for making this for dinner last night. LOVED IT! I always love it when I can find a main dish recipe that does not require meat. This recipe was pretty inexpensive since I had most of the ingredients on hand. The only thing that I had to pick up was bean sprouts and green onions. Everything else was in my cupboards or fridge. I loved that you can make this recipe ahead of time and that it is best served at room temperature.
I am not posting the recipe here. You will have to click here to get it on Leigh Anne's website. She always has amazing recipes with great pictures that she takes. Isn't it great to have pictures so you know what it should look like? She always posts a "Friday Favorite" that you will not want to miss, so check back often. Do not become distracted with her other amazing recipes like Skirt Steak Tacos, Fast Fire Flank Steak, Strawberry Cream Pie, and Rosemary Chicken Pizza to name only a few. These are real life, would cook for your family, tried and true recipes. I have no doubt that you will love what you see. When you visit her blog click on the Friday Favorites or the Cookie Jar to get some awesome stuff.
Thanks Leigh Anne for sharing.
Everyday life in the Davis house is always, shall we say, interesting. Today was no exception. Brooklyn has a nasty habit of getting into "things" . Just to touch them, feel them, smell them. Yes, I realize that she is my oldest and should be well beyond this habit however I have failed as a parent because she still does it.
Today I had to run to the bathroom in between chapters of reading Breaking Dawn. I made my trip fast so as to get back to my book. When I was in there I noticed that the first aid kit was pulled out of the cupboard , as is often the case here with all the cuts and scrapes, but this time I noticed that the bathroom smelled a bit - shall we say - minty. The kind of minty that burns your nose. Well back to my comfy chair and my vampire book. As I started my next chapter I started to wiggle in my seat. ( Stop reading now if you are worried about TMI) Ok, now I was getin' seriously wiggly in my seat. I started putting it all together and yelled for my dear sweet Brooklyn. Here is our following conversation:
Mom: Did you get into the Icy Hot in my bathroom?
B: NO, ok maybe I took off the cap but I just put a little on my finger.
Mom: And then what did you do with it?
B: Well it felt weird so I hit it off my finger into the garbage?
Mom: Anything else?
B: Oh yeah, I wiped my finger on the toilet paper.
Mom: Great would that we the same toilet paper that I just used when I went to the bathroom??????
Her eyes got big and then there was a laughing, " sorry, mom"
Luckily for her she had probably knocked most of it off in the garbage so my pain and suffering did not last long. Is there a rule that we still have to love her? Just kidding.....it is good blogging material.
So I have mentioned before that this kid is pretty much in love with his stuffed animals. He could be totally entertained by them all day. This little piglet gets especially high usage. Besides using Theodore the chipmunk Hudson will grab "the pig" and bring me the "If you give a pig a pancake" book. Not only does he bring the pig with him to read the book he puts "the pig" in the same position of the pig on that page. It really makes reading the book to him all that more fun.
This is Hudson's other fetish - sleeping in odd places and anywhere except HIS BED.
I have never slept with my babies.....
I have never had kids climb into my bed in the middle of the night......
......Until this one
They broke the mold with him.
He typically will sneak into our bed (only on Charles' side) around 3:30 or 4:00 am. He is so little we do not even know that he is there until our alarm goes off. Recently he has been taken with climbing into his sister's bed. He climbed right into Brooklyn's mummy sleeping bag with her. Sometimes he has been known to improvise if the bed gets a little tight. Here is Hudson completely asleep and perfectly content to finish out the rest of the night sleeping in a box! I swear he has his own bed and a comfy place to sleep.
Before I put this up on Craigslist I was wondering if there are any takers out there (locally) who would be interested in this Kitchen Aid mixer and it comes with the slicer/shredder attachment. This mixer has been my old standby until I recently got my Bosch mixer that mixes up 4 loaves of bread at once. This will last you for years. Trust me. My aunt has my great grandmas original Kitchen Aid.
I am selling it all for $70. The retail new is about $275. Let me know if you are interested or have someone you know that is. You can just leave your contact info in the comment section or email directly daneedavis@gmail.com
This little bit of heaven is a Golden Graham smore. You will never want to go back to the traditional smore after this AND you can make them anytime of year without having to brave camping with 5 kiddos.
P.S. I am working on my food photography skills right now. I was so worried about the "natural lighting" and making sure that it did not fall off the rock that I put it on, or that it did not get eaten by ants that were crawling on said rock, or that lizard that was also crawling/slithering around it would not appear in the picture that I did not realize that there was a rip in the dumb paper plate. How do you photography people do it? So many details to watch for!
Golden Graham Smores
3/4 cup of light corn syrup
3 TBSP butter
1 pkg (11.5oz) milk chocolate chips - you can also use semi sweet in a pinch
1 tsp vanilla
9 cups of Golden Graham cereal
1/2 bag of mini marshmallows
Grease a 9x13 pan. Heat syrup,butter, and chocolate chips in a pan to boiling. Stir constantly. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Pour over cereal and toss until coated. This is a tricky part and requires a lot of arm muscles: Fold in marshmallows. Spread out in pan. You will not be able to wait til they are cool. Trust me.
Charles and I headed out for a quick 24 hours way from the kids to celebrate our 13 year anniversary. I guess that it was unlucky number 13 because on the actually day I was sick with strep throat, Brigham was still laid out on the couch from his injury and that night I had been asked to teach a class on "Simplified Entertaining". ( Too bad that I was a day late in finding this lady's blog. She is my new favorite person. I spent way too much time dissecting her 10 commandments of entertaining. Plus she loves to can. Kindred spirits I tell you. That is a whole other post.) Not much of an anniversary. Oh well.
My brother let us use some of his rewards points to stay at the Berkeley Marina. It was great. It was right on the marina and we could just walk out and go see all of the cool boats. Some were old, some were fancy, some were majestic. We stopped in at this little greasy spoon to share some fish and chips. It is always one of those things that I think sounds good and then I get it and wonder why I did. This one was pretty good though. I guess that it was not too much of a greasy spoon since they did have a wonderful fruit stand inside and they did not have milkshakes. What did you expect, we were in Berkeley!
This is Charles and I on a chocolate factory tour. Lame shot I know but this is the only one that I took. I promise that is Charles in the picture with me. We tested different grades of chocolate and it is official: I am definitely a MILK CHOCOLATE girl. The dark stuff just dries my mouth out and gets it all chalky.
It had been so foggy when we got there that it was not until the next morning that we that we could see the Golden Gate bridge from our hotel. There was no one out on the docks to ask for a picture so her I am - all by my lonely self!
We enjoyed Chicago style pizza that night at the recommendation of Brent and Amber. A really fun little place in Berkeley called Zachary's pizza. They are in Oakland and San Ramon too. I was a little unsure about Chicago style pizza , in fact I almost chickened out at the register but I am glad that I didn't, it was super. We also stopped by Omega Salvage. Fun place to look around. Charles was not too amused with the place. He thought that their slogan should be, " We sell used stuff for way more than you can buy it for new" Some of the items there were unique but ALOT of it was stuff that you honestly buy anywhere. I guess that is the fun of it to find the treasure hiding away.
All in all it was a much needed 24 hours away. And we certainly enjoyed the hotel's free amazing ( I think the best that I have ever had but not quite worth $10.99 for 6 to take home - the kids would not have appreciated them properly) chocolate chip cookies.
So I have to brag for a moment. I might get in trouble for this but I am going to be a rebel and do it anyway. I have to brag not about my incredibly brave, good looking, always obedient, uber smart....the list goes on and on......children. This post is for bragging about my amazing manly man of a husband. This is a picture of Charles with a few friends riding around Lake Tahoe. Yes the whole lake! Not only do I deem that an amazing feat in itself BUT he did it riding a bike that is a hand- me-down, honestly older than he is, weighs more than he is bike. When he goes riding with friends they commonly refer to this as the "cash register" because it makes so much noise when it shifts gears. As if that were not enough he has had to revise this bike and make it a SINGLE speed bike people just to get it to go! Single speed I say. You know those mountains that surround Lake Tahoe? Yes those. Well he went up and down those on pure manly man strength. No help from any sissy gears. Who needs gears? I do believe that he earned some serious man respect among the ranks when he showed up with that thing. Luckily he finished just in time to get back to help me take Brigham to Urgent care. ( I know that I am probably so busted for posting this and that Charles may come in right behind me and delete it so read fast people because this may be gone in a minute)
Charles took some of the kids on a bike ride back to the scene of the crime of Brigham's accident and this time they made it all the way down to the water. These are not all my children. Lauren and Jason Hall were with us also.
Well here is a picture that a few people have been waiting for. We went camping up at Sugar Pine Point in Lake Tahoe. It was beautiful as always. However within 24 hours of being there we were frantically driving around the lake trying to find an Urgent Care Center. Brigham had gone on a bike ride with Grandma and Grandpa and a few other kids. Charles was on a bike ride around Lake Tahoe with some friends and so I was just waiting back at camp with the little ones for all my biker family to return. Charles got back from his ride and with in 10 minutes of his arrival Grandma was bringing Brigham back with her. He was holding something up to his mouth and she told us that he had had an accident on his bike. He was such a trooper and got back up on his bike and rode back about a mile and a half and did not cry until he saw his dad. His lip and mouth were really bloody and we decided that we should find a place to have him looked at. Our friends were also in Tahoe for a family reunion and they have a brother in law that is an ER doctor. I debated on calling them but I did not want to bother them on their vacation. So off we went to find a doctor. When we went to the ranger station the girl had NO IDEA where to send us and just handed us a phone book to look it up. No good. We called 411 on our cell phone and they were unable to give us anything close. We said a prayer in the car along the way and soon after we passed a fire station that actually had a fireman standing outside. What luck. No- not luck - answer to a prayer. She told us some rough directions how to get to an Urgent Care that was about 5 miles away. When we got where we thought that she told us to go we were still lost. Guess what? Another fire station with more firemen out front. We were able to get better directions and they even stopped traffic so we could get back on the busy highway. Once we were there we had a short wait where we had the nicest nurse, who had all boys and reassured Brigham that everything was going to be ok but that he was going to need to get stitches. He was very nervous at that point but she was great with him and really helped calm his fears. Then we had a great young lady doctor who stitched him up something great! She was very calming and complimented him on his bravery. She said that she has had grown men not do as well and she was serious. 6 stitches, 2 lost teeth, 2 screwed up front permanent teeth, 2 bottle of Motrin, 1 bottle of Tylenol, countless straws and $400.00 later we had a cleaned up Brigham who showed how brave he could be and was such a good sport to still go to the beach with us and tried so hard not to ruin our family vacation. He was such a trooper. Here is his picture about 24 hours later. He kept telling us not to take anymore picture picture of him. He could not even stand to look at himself in the mirror for a while until the swelling went down. After we got back from camping he was still down and out on the couch. That was ok because I joined him there for a few days coming down with strep throat the day after we got back from camping. All in all it was really a fun trip despite the bear getting all the way in to the cab of the truck for a brownie bite, 4 of my 5 kids sick (on Motrin,Tylenol or Robitussin), and raining ash over our entire camp for the last 2 days from all the fires, but seriously it was FUN! That is what makes life interesting. It would be so boring if everything always went smoothly.
If I told you that I would give you a million dollars if you could identify these VERY well known icons do you think that you could do it? Easy you say? I say not. For if you answered Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse, and Piglet then you would be wrong dead wrong! For what I did not tell you was that we were talking about reality according to Hudson. IF you knew this little piece of information you would have clearly guessed these guys: Alvin, Simon and Theodore! 
For the past 2 weeks we have had these little guys traveling everywhere we go. And I mean everywhere. I am constantly hearing the humming of the Chipmunk theme song. Never mind the fact that just 2 weeks ago these little ones were the Wonderpets. But we have SO moved on from that. Have I mentioned that my child goes OCD on stuff like this? Let just say that this is how last night went:
I was on the computer finishing up some stuff and he ahas already been tucked into bed which really means nothing in his world because there are always 10 more trips out of his room after that.
He walk up to me and bows his head and folds his arms and starts praying.
Mom: Did you want to say your prayers again?
Hudson: yeah
Mom: Ok sit here and we can say them together.
Well he did not need any help. He knew exactly what he wanted to say.
Hudson (in his Little mouse tiny whisper of a voice that he always uses to say prayers): Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Please bless I say "Mom Can I have the Alvin and the chipmunks movie" and mom says ok Hudson you can have the movie. In the name of Jesus Christ Amen.
One track mind I tell you. ONE TRACK! Funny enough he was out again 5 minutes sitting on Charles' lap doing the exact same thing and repeating the EXACT same prayer verbatim! Did I say one track mind? Yes ONE TRACK!
