Family Picture w/8 Weeks Left

I thought we should take a few pictures of me pregnant with our second girl. Do you have any idea how hard it is to coordinate a 2 year old and a dog? Not much more to say, but enjoy the picture.

Tucson Spring Gardening

For those of you who live in a colder climate, I hope this post does not upset you, but maybe encourage you to come and visit. :) We have had a pretty mild winter with next week's forecast in the lower 80s and when we went to Costco yesterday they had this beautiful lemon tree on sale. We have been needing to plant a new tree since we lost the peach tree last year, but never really got around to it so we decided now is the time. We planted the lemon tree and cut-back our bushes getting ready for spring growth. I even got so into the gardening mood that I determined in a couple of weeks I may plant some vegetables and fruit. Here are a couple of pictures of my gardening team.

Valentine's Day

Thanks to my parents always celebrating Valentine's Day as a family event, I have grown up thinking of Valentine's Day more as a day to show love for all of those around us rather than a romantic holiday (don't think Steve is completely off the hook-I still like flowers and chocolates). With this in mind we started a new family tradition this year--fondue! I thought it would be a fun and flirty dinner/dessert and yet family friendly. Note, I have never had fondue myself and here I was going to attempt to make it. Well I did some research and determined to combine a couple of recipes I found for a cheese fondue. We had cubed ham steak, asparagus, potatoes, cauliflower, and french bread for dipping and it was delicious! So good we had to take it over to the neighbors and let them try it and they raved about it and almost licked the bowl clean. We then had a chocolate fondue with bananas, strawberries, and angel food cake for dessert. YUM! YUM!

Ellie Growing

You can probably tell by the pictures being posted that Ellie is growing so fast. I keep squeezing her tight and telling her that she needs to stop growing so fast, but she then resoundly replies, "I'm going to be a big sister and I need to grow big." What can you say to that. :)

Tucson Snow

So believe it or not Tucson is home to the most southern ski resort in the Northern Hemisphere. I have been wanting to take Ellie up Mount Lemon to play in the snow, but with the 80 degree weather we have been having there hasn't really been an opportunity. Well today's weather provided an almost snow like experience with a hailstorm which Ellie thought was snow when she saw it all over the grass outside. So we bundled her up in our Tucson Winter clothes and let her go outside to play in the "snow". She loved it and didn't want to come in an hour later to take a bath. I think Ellie has seen more snow here in Tucson than at Grandpa and Mimi's in Idaho. And who says Tucson doesn't have seasons?



























January 2007 we received over 2 inches of snow at our house. This was Ellie's first encounter with snow. I love that the snowman has oranges off of our tree for his buttons and is scratching his head like what is happening here. And look at the cactus in the background with the snow on top. CRAZY!