The solution to my problems...

Well at least the solution to one of them. As many of you know, and those who don't, I will confess, I HATE grocery shopping. To me it is at the top of the list of horrible chores that must be done. The stores gross me out, the people at the stores sometimes gross me out, and no matter how well you do it, you have to do it again. (I used to work at WinCo, so I am allowed to be grossed out, just thought I would throw that in.) OK, so here is my solution. Drum roll please.............. Tyler does it for me. I make a 2 week menu and then put together a shopping list. Every other Tuesday, after he gets off work at the Planetarium, about 8:15, he heads straight over to WinCo and does the grocery shopping. I am loving this, I haven't been to WinCo in 6 weeks and I couldn't be happier! Thanks Tyler, you are the best.

My children have a weird side

This evening as we were heading to bed Tyler peeked into the kids' room to check on them and then insisted I come in and look. This is what we found, they are in sleeping bags, that's cool, Cinderella is tucked neatly in next to Elise, (yes it is Elise's not Reagan's, he's not that weird), that is cool too, but here is where the weirdness comes in. Look closely at what Elise is sleeping on, an under-the-bed, storage bin. Why? I am not sure I want to even ask, she is 3, need I say more?

While I am on the subject of weird, yesterday, we decided to take a family walk, so we told the kids to get shoes on and let's go. They both decided they wanted to wear hats, that's ok, but look at the hats and they refused to change them. Now look at Reagan's legs, he wanted to wear his soccer socks, with shorts. Why Reagan? "I don't want my legs to get cold." "Well then put on some pants." But, it's hot outside." OK!!!

While walking, he said, I am tired will someone carry me? "UM that would be a NO!" so he dropped to the ground and started doing push ups? Why Reagan? You can hear his answer for yourself on the video.

Then there is Mollie, sweet little Mollie, but she is weird too. For dinner, we had some pasta salad. She decided the pasta salad was better in her hair, thus the really greasy look going on. I tried to put elastics back in her hair, the mayonnaise ate them. I am not kidding we went through 3 elastics, all three broke in the mayo infested hair. Plus, notice the item in her hand it is a pig, she has taken it everywhere for the last three days, we buy her dolls and other girlie things, and she wants a plastic pig.

No kidding, they are all weird, but I love them and wouldn't change a thing about them, I love their weirdness.

Girls night out

So, last night I hosted our girls night out get together, so much fun. We went with a chocolate, Chic Flic theme. I set up the chocolate fountain, love any excuse to use that. Each of the ladies brought a fun chocolate treat or things to dip in the chocolate fountain. We had bananas, strawberries, cookies, rice krispie treats, marshmallows, ooey gooey delicious caramel brownies, to die for chocolate cake, creamy and sophisticated ricotta pie, and we even had a veggie platter, so all around, good food. For drinks I made Serendipity Frozen Hot Chocolate, sooooooo good!
6 1/2 oz pieces of chocolates
2 tsp store bought hot chocolate mix (it's fun to try the creative flavors like chocolate cinnamon or caramel de leche, or dark chocolate!)
1 1/2 Tbs sugar
1 1/2 C milk
3 C ice whipped cream
Chop chocolate into small pieces. Place in a double boiler over simmering water. Stir occasionally until melted. Add hot chocolate mix and sugar and stir until melted completely (this part takes a little while). Remove from heat and slowly add 1/2 C milk until smooth. Cool at room temp. In a blender, place remaining cup of milk, room temp chocolate mixture and ice. Blend on high speed until smooth and the consistency of a frozen daiquiri. Pour into glasses and top with whipped cream.

After trying all the fun goodies, we watched the film Enchanted, I love that movie. We ended the evening with Blogging discussions and lessons.
I made some fun party favors a little bag of chocolate bath salts to send home with everyone. It was a fun little addition to the evening, that wasn't going to be more calories.
Thank ladies for a great night, I loved it!

Aaah, the memories

I have enjoyed some of my blogger friend's Flashback Friday posts, so I decided to do one as well, but it is on Thursday, like Ashlee does. Recently I have come across friends from the past in the blogging world, so this is "An Ode to the Massachusetts Group". Forgive the horrific scrapbooking, but alas I did my best at the time.

We went on a Boston Stake Youth ski trip my sophomore year to Vermont, where we stayed in a great ski lodge, goofed off, skied a lot and had too much fun. (sorry Ben about the sleeping picture it was on the page).

My favorite trip of all with the ward friends was the temple trip to Washington DC on the bus, does anyone remember the bus (it stunk really bad). I wish I knew what some of these people were up to now, but sadly I have lost track of too many, most disappointing is Brenda, does anyone know where she is?

For my 15th Birthday, my mom threw a surprise party for me with all of my friends from the Marlboro Ward. I think the middle picture is from that and the rest are from a get together at my house where we played games, like "If you love me baby, smile" and other weird Mormon games.
Some of my best memories as a teenager are from the two years we spent in Massachusetts. Some of the best people in the world were in that ward and we felt very lucky to be a part of that for a short time.

Go Jayhawks and Go ME!!!

I have to brag, I won the 8th annual Tyler/Alicia NCAA bet this year. I feel a bit sheepish bragging as I have only won 2 of the last 8 contests, but alas, I will enjoy the sweet taste of victory for the year! Our final score was 71-50, (not the game, the contest score). We had a fun evening with our traditional family style Nacho platter and a great game. I love when the games are close, who wants a blowout in the championship? So congratulations Kansas Jayhawks and Congratulations to me!!! Thanks for all the support and rallying from the blogger world, I needed it and it paid off!

Even Mollie got into the action, she loved the nachos!

Larsen Family Itinerary

Today for the Wasatch Back training, the schedule suggests a 50 minute run, so Tyler and I decided to run it together and leave the kids with Grandma Larsen. So we dropped them off and headed over to the Canyon Rim trail at the top of the Canyon Springs Grade and started running. Rather than do the trail, we decided to turn up and cross the Perrine Bridge and head down onto the other side of the Canyon toward the Blue Lakes Country club. What a beautiful run. It was a little chilly, but not bad, UNTIL... we hit the bridge. You know how they say in bad weather, a bridge is icier than the road, well now I can see why. The minute we were over the water, the wind increased by about 200 mph (sarcasm) and the temperature dropped by a good 15 degrees (serious). It was unreal. The left side of my face was completely numb, it was crazy. Coming back over the bridge on the return route was a little better but not much, it just froze the right side of my face.

Anyway, we picked up the kids and made it home in time for Conference. I love conference weekend. I love it with the memories of watching it before children, it was relaxing, uplifting and overall a peaceful weekend. Now we watch it with children and it is still a great weekend, but I think my adjectives have changed. It is now loud, insane and anything but relaxing, but I still love it.

We got to listen to the speakers over the giggles of the kids as they ran around the house shooting marshmallows at one another with the Marshmallow shooter. We listened to talks while they emptied every toy from the toy closet, and then didn't really even play with them, I think they just thought they looked better on my living room floor than in the closet. We finished the evening off with yummy fish tacos, said good-bye to Tyler as he headed out for the Priesthood session. So off to bed to wake up again and listen to more talks. I love conference weekend.

Parent Teacher Conferences

I got to go to Reagan's Parent Teacher conference today, and mind you I don't have a problem with this, I was a teacher for 6 years, did many of these, so it is good to be on the other side. I even made arrangements with my good friend Jeanette to switch kids while she went to hers, and all seemed to be going great. I decided to take Mollie, it just makes things easier and after Jeanette hauled my other two to her house, I jumped into the mini-van, or Bat Mobile as Tyler and the kids call it, with Mollie. My car would not start, are you kidding me? My dear, wonderful, obedient children continue to "forget" to turn off the back lights and run my battery down, this is the 3rd time in the last 6 months. I was not happy, so I quickly grabbed the stroller, put Mollie in and off we went to the conference. Reagan is a great kid, got wonderful reviews, his writing and reading are good, he does well with others, he listens and then it came, and I knew it was coming, "He talks, he talks a lot!" OK, really, how could he not, look at his parents. There is nothing quiet about our house. That was the one thing my mom was always told at conferences, "She is a good student, but she likes to talk." Yep, I think it is rather fitting. The best part of all, he loves school and it shows.