Just Me!!

  Charlie is so sweet! While I drew my own picture for my Birthday card (she asked me too) she make me a cake (aka a small cheesecake we had in the fridge and stuck a candle in it) and played some tunes from Moana for me. I really enjoyed making this stick figure "Wegley Portrait" for myself. I was very proud of it, since I have zero Artistic talent.  I love art though! Art class at Western is where Mark and I met and fell in love.    She even set out Uno cards for us. We played three hands and then moved on to Zombies....                    Tina is in town so we all met up at Black Bear for frozen yogurt. We pretended it was for my birthday but I think it was so we could hang out one more time before she flew back to Hawaii! I love spending time with this side of the family. They are so fun to be with. Pranksters and jokesters and just really great people. Unfortunately Mark had to take Charlie home because she threw...

       I love Monday's. It's a quick chance to get a break before finishing out my work week. I get to sleep in, chill with Mark and reconnect, make dinner (which we had a yummy chicken taco rice bowl instant pot meal), create bath bombs, play a couple games of Coup, and wash Charlie's hair. It is so relaxing. I'm laying here at 816pm and my kids are mostly ready for bed, chores are done, house is clean, and I'm ready to hand these rascals back off to Mark tomorrow. I also get a little added pleasure because I get to watch the Bachelor on Monday Nights as well!

No I didn't do a ton of projects. My kids were the project! They had an extra day off so we pretty much stayed at home and did some vegging together. Lots of movies, games, eating meals from home, and one family date to the movies. Most important thing I did was wash, condition, comb, dry, and braid Charlie's hair! It takes about an hour for all that. It's getting so long.          

I got my first recipe box from Mark's Grandma Wegley in December of 1997. She loved to cook and could make the meanest Boston Chocolate Cream and Lemon Meranguine Pie. She wrote me a lovely note, and gave me the box full of her recipes!  My second box came after Grandma Fenstermacker passed away. Mom gave it too me. Just recently I reorganized the box. I found at least 5 Porcine meatball recipes, 12 fudge recipes from various people, several tips and tricks recipes, and her famous Calico bean recipe.    1. My favorite tofu chili that has a wonderful cilantro pesto as a topper. It came from my mom's vegetarian cookbook. 2. Sonic the Hedge Hog Chili Dog- we got this out of Ethan's Sonic books when he was about 12-14 years of age. 3. Mrs Leander's Pumpkin bars-I think my mom watched her kids 4. Broccoli Cornbread by Mrs Wanda Deiterich (Wendy Knobloch's mom). It is so amazingly moist and yummy. I made this a lot in Arkansas! 5. Reeser's Peanut Butter Bars from Arli...

Charlie's birthday always sneaks up on us! We decided to have it be just us this year since everyone is going in different directions this month. What we still wanted more importantly was to make sure this girls last single digit year was a fun one. I decided she deserved a pamper day. We spent the afternoon making bath bombs together, giving her a pedicure in her new foot bath, listening to Peter and the Wolf on vinyl and drinking wine (apple-grape cider), letting her play with her best friend Audrey on their scooters, opening gifts with grandpa and grandma, and eating (her fav food) pizza (ham and pineapple) and a multicolored cake. She was gifted: 1. 25 dollars in $1 from G&G 2. Hatchimal (which hatched in 1.5 hours) 3. Diary that locks 4. Wii dance game 5. Clothes     

I'm so happy our East Coast wanderer is on her way home. I've missed her, her siblings miss her, her snakes miss her, her kitties miss her, and her dad is missing her. She is having a blast and we are thrilled she had this opportunity. She is feeling and trialing her independence as much as I can tolerate. She has made us proud so I need to remember that and back off a little.  Hope D.C. Blew your mind Val!!    

WITHOUT prompting, ask your family these questions and write EXACTLY what they said. These are the things we do for fun when we are away;) *What is something I say a lot?  V- you are a bit random in word choice but i guess "ho" because you pick up on the trends of your children E-  Lyrics to a weird song or something awkward C- "Clean your room up!" M-   "I'm so tired" *What makes me happy?  V- Owls and cleanliness... but family is also a big virtue of yours  E- Me C- Hugs and kisses M- Being at home in the quiet with nothing to do *What makes me sad? V- seeing other peoples unhappiness, since you are an empath E- Me C- leaving Misha M- getting older   *How tall am I?  V- As ethan says "short lol". shorter than me at least.  E- lol short C- 11 feet M- 5 1/2 ft *What's my favorite thing to do? V- chill with us, and scroll on facebook, watch shows. lots of things. E- Be with you're fam  C- Like to clean M- Goi...

             Our traditional get away to close the year, 2016! We chose the Hood River and Skamania Lodge in Stevenson Washington. We drove through to Skamania on Thursday and stayed till Saturday morning. We had a fun time swimming, hot tubbing, playing games in the lobby, roasting smores by the fire, and getting our last few Geocaches of  2016! Our room was a Groupon so it was a steal of a deal. It was more fun bringing the kids here with us, then when we came here by ourselves. The kids are at that perfect age, and we rarely want to be without them. I think they know it too because we used to have a strict bedtime every night but now we don't care when they go to bed. We love spending time with them. Of course Ethan and Charlie like to fight sometimes but it is far better than it was a few years ago. On the way there we stoppped at Vista House (geocached there),  Multnomah Falls, and drove across The Historic Bridge of the Gods. ...