Monday, er, Five

Tip Five: 

#1- My sister Melissa has been staying with us this week. She's been homeless as she's waiting to be able to move into her new apartment and decided to crash at our house for the week. I can honestly say I've never loved the time period between when you have to move out of your old college apartment and when you can move into your new college apartment so much! We've loved having her. We've eaten some good food, played in Lydia's little pool, and put her to work helping us get our yard ready for our plants this weekend. (That girl is buff! She was helping me put topsoil in our front flowerbed when we discovered a giant rock buried in the clay-dirt. She singlehandedly dug it out leaving a gaping hole to fill with topsoil. So glad she was there!)

#2- We made salsa with my awesome family last week and had these beauties left over: After a few google searches I discovered that the small cans of chopped green chilies that we love so much are actually anaheim peppers, which are the peppers in the left two bags. We read that you can just chop them and freeze them and then use them instead of the cans. I was really excited and the day after we got home from Morgan, I pulled out my chopper and got to work. I chopped and froze a bunch of anaheims. I roasted some then froze them in little piles. I seeded, halved, and froze the jalapenos. It was awesome! Except for the fact that I didn't have any kitchen gloves so I just tried to do it all with my bare skin. I thought that I'd just hurry really fast and it would be fine. Cue me spending the rest of the day soaking my fingers in a bowl of milk and baking soda. Skin. Was. On. Fire. Haha. All's well that ends well. I can't wait to start using these chilies instead of the cans.  

 #3- My Grandma Knowles was in town and so Lydia and I went out to dinner with her. Melissa (and Blake) was able to come, my cousin Ashley made it, and my Aunt Berthene was there as well. It was so nice! We had a great time catching up and spending time together.

#4- We finally installed a baby gate at the top of our stairs. I love it! It's so nice to be able to just lock the gate and not worry about Lydia climbing over the obstructions that I have been putting it away. It took us so long to put it up because we had to install it into the baseboard and that was causing some problems. (Our pretty 6" baseboard is too tall to just put the gate above it.) I picked up an extra piece of baseboard from a neighbor and when we were in Morgan last weekend, I asked my dad if he would cut off a couple of inches for me so I could finally install the gate. His response? "Cut off the end? Well, do you want a shape? A heart? A star? I can make whatever shape you want!" I laughed out loud. Honestly, I hadn't even thought about making that piece look pretty. I was just going to cut off the end of the baseboard into a square so that I could hang the gate. I had already resigned myself to an eyesore at the top of the stairs for the next ten years as the tradeoff for a functional baby gate. But my dad pulled out the big guns and after I printed off this quatrefoil shape for him he made this beauty for me! Melissa helped me hang it and I love it so much!

(I have to confess, I screwed three giant screws into the wood for safety and then photoshopped them out so you could see how pretty it is. I'm going to pull the giant screws out, countersink them, then putty and paint over them. So this is what it will look like.)

#5- Hello, my name is Shantel. Once upon a time I grew two big beautiful zucchini plants. I planted them late in the season and so they just barely started producing. Here is my first homegrown zucchini.

Unfortunately, the story doesn't end there. My beautiful zucchini plants (which I am still kicking myself for not taking a picture of) just happened to end up in the center of a giant sink hole. And so, in preparation for our giant planting day, Melissa and I knew that we had to transplant the zucchinis, meaning, we had to dig them up, put all the fill dirt down, then plant them again. My research on the internet said that this was not going to be easy. Boo. But it had to be done. We pulled them out and in minutes they started wilting. After filling in the almost 10" deep sink hole, we planted our babies back into the soil and they were practically dead. I'm so sad! They wilted down even more than they are in this picture. I keep holding out hope that they will come back, but I'm afraid my first zucchini that I picked is destined to be my last. So sad! The worst part is, I didn't take a single picture of my big beautiful zucchini plans and didn't show them off to hardly anyone. *sigh* Next year. Next year.

 I had this post almost completely finished on Friday, but my Friday's are evolving into fairly busy days lately. I might have to come up with something else to post all my random tidbits from the week. But until I do, I'll probably just keep posting these Friday Five's whenever I can get them done. Also, Saturday was a huge success where we planted a bunch of plants and a couple of trees in our front yard. I can't wait to finish and then show you photos. Yay! 

Announcing...HBM's Merger with Eide Bailly

This is a "Guest Post" written by David about one of the big changes coming our way. Read on...


Hansen, Barnett, & Maxwell was founded in 1965 when Keith Hansen, Keith Barnett, and Paul Maxwell merged their practices. Since then the firm has continued its growth and now has 9 partners and more than 50 employees. In the fall of 2010 Shantel and I went through the recruiting process to determine which firm we would choose to work for. Our final two options came down to Deloitte (a large National firm) and Hansen, Barnett, & Maxwell (HBM).

We really liked Deloitte and I had a lot of good friends that were going to work there. However, working at one of the "big 4" accounting firms requires a lot more hours and a lot less time at home. I knew that if I joined Deloitte, I probably would not want to work there for more than 2 or 3 years at most. In retrospect, I don't know if I would have lasted that long. They require a lot of hours and I wouldn't even get to see my family much during busy season. However, HBM was the perfect fit. We really liked the culture and the people we met. While busy season is certainly busy, they don't require the same kind of hours and have a much better work/life balance. HBM also has a great client base where I would have the opportunity to work on some really good clients. In addition, all the partners started their careers with HBM and I knew that if I wanted, I could start and finish my career with HBM.

We made our decision to join HBM and knew right from the start that it was the right choice. In January, I will have been with HBM for 3 years. Shantel and I are so grateful to work for such a great company. I really enjoy my co-workers and we have fantastic partners who really care about the employees.

With that being said, I am happy to announce that on September 1, 2013, HBM will merge with Eide Bailly, a large regional firm based in North Dakota. You can check out their website and the big announcement. Over the years, HBM was approached by numerous firms about merging and never even got past initial discussions because the culture and fit did not work. When Eide Bailly approached HBM they felt like it was a much better fit and after a ton of due diligence, knew that it would be a fantastic opportunity. Joining Eide Bailly will allow our firm to provide more services to our customers and allow the partners more time to focus on doing what they love, which is providing great service to our clients. The merger will make Eide Bailly the first regional firm in Utah.

The merger came as quite a shock to most people in our firm. Shantel and I were a little hesitant (Shantel is still a little hesitant) to embrace the change, but having met with numerous Eide Bailly people and talking to HBM's partners, we can see what a great opportunity this will be. Eide Bailly is one of the 25 largest accounting firms in the nation with about 1300 employees (including HBM).

With the merger comes a lot of changes, but more importantly, a lot of things will stay the same.

The Same:
Office (for now we will be in the same office although we be moving in the next year or two as we will be combining with Lake Hill Myer, another recent Eide Bailly acquisition)
Partners- We will continue to work for the same great partners.
Clients
Co-workers
Software- Eide Bailly and HBM both use Prosystems Engagement, so no big change.

Different:
The name
The CPE location (for the first 5 years of CPE is usually in Fargo, ND and other trainings are often held in Minneapolis, which I am excited about as I have never been to either of those cities.)

Overall it is going to be a fantastic thing. Although I must admit the change has made things quite crazy at work. We have had numerous meetings about the transition and trying to get ready. Plus I help a ton with recruiting which means that we have to get everything ready knowing that come September when recruiting starts we will be Eide Bailly.

We are grateful for the many partners from HBM (current and past) who did so much to establish such a great firm. As we say goodbye to HBM, we give them our thanks. We are excited for our future with Eide Bailly and are grateful to have a job with such a great company.

Family Canning Time

Last weekend my little sister Jenna was planning to be home in Morgan and so naturally, David, Lydia, and I packed up and headed that way ourselves. Any time we can spend with family is golden in our book and we make an effort to go up anytime Jenna is able to come down from Idaho. The original plan was to hang out on Friday and bottle apples on Saturday. (Yay for fall canning!)  Unfortunately, when we went to the fruit stands on Saturday morning - we were informed that apples weren't "on" yet and that we needed to come back in a couple of weeks. Boo. We were so disappointed. It seems like every year we go at the end of the apple season and have slim pickings, so this year when we tried to go a little earlier - we missed it altogether. Not to be deterred from our canning plans, we switched gears and decide to make salsa. The fruit stand that we were at had a "Salsa Special": 1/2 bushel tomatoes, 2 green peppers, 2 onions, and $5 worth of hot peppers. We jumped on that deal (twice) and headed home with a massive amount of produce. 

Do you know how many hot peppers $5 will buy? A lot. A lot, a lot, a lot. They were having a buy one get one free deal on buckets of anaheim peppers that they layered on top of the salsa deal so we had peppers coming out of our ears. They said we didn't have to take all of them - but if we were going to pay for them, we were going to take them!

We got an assembly line going, and started scoring, blanching, peeling, and dicing the tomatoes. Our bushel of tomatoes measured out to be 90 cups of tomatoes. Holy cow! I don't think we realized how much salsa a bushel was going to make. We had a great time chatting as we diced, even if it was a bit stressful for a while trying to decide which recipe to use. (The Utah State Extension recipe that is supposedly tested for food safety called for like 20 onions and a million peppers. It was super intimidating. So we found one online that professed to be safe as far as the acidity of the tomatoes was concerned and prayed that it wouldn't give our family botulism. 

 

(Don't judge this picture. We had a line of people cutting tomatoes at the counter and no place for our giant pot, so I had it next to the counter where I could dump the diced tomatoes. We didn't think about how it was the perfect location for Lydia to snitch out of. After this picture, we made room for it up on the counter. We really are sanitary people.)

 

Meanwhile, Lydia was having the time of her life playing with Grandma and Grandpa's toys. They set up the princess tent, which she loved. I can't believe we didn't get a picture of her in it - she played in there all day. She also found this flag and she walked around like a professional flag dancer, waving and spinning it around. 

This is how many peppers we had left. SO many. However, we found out that you can chop and freeze them and then use them as a replacement for the little cans of chopped green chilis. I'm so excited to try it out. Honestly. I think that I may be just as excited for the chilis as I am for the salsa. 

And here is the final result! I'll be honest. I'm surprised at how few bottles our 90 cups of tomatoes actually ended up filling. However, we had a great time and I am SO so excited for all of the yummy salsa we made.  

Honestly, I just love spending time with my family and love making memories like this. I hope that my kids love each other as much as I love my siblings and that we make an effort to do fun things like this as a family. It's important and wonderful. 

3:07 in the AM

Lydia is a pretty darn good sleeper. It took her about eight months to figure it out, but once she got it... she got it. Most nights she goes down at eight and then wakes up at 7:30 the next morning. 

However, this was us at 3:07 A.M. on Saturday night/Sunday morning. 

It's our own fault for thinking that we could drive home from Morgan at 10:30 and then just move her from the car to her bed when we got home. (In our defense, we've done it countless times with no problem.) She woke up just a bit too much in the transition and was alert and ready to play. And play. And play. I tried cuddling with her/nursing her in the chair in her room. I tried bouncing her on my shoulder. Finally, we ended up downstairs where she played with her toys and I alternated between falling asleep on the couch, reading her books, and mindlessly scrolling through pinterest. 

We were both pretty tired the next day, but as I look back at this picture (that was taken and snapchatted to my mom and sister) I am grateful for such a happy baby. I'm grateful that I have her and am the one who is able to stay up with her at all hours of the night. I'm grateful for the technology that allowed me to capture that moment. I laugh as I remember her running around, pushing her popper and turning over her music block. I can still see her little grin, as if she knew that she was cheating the system and getting some bonus play time. 

Dear Lydia, I love you and I love that I am your mom. 

Friday Five

Five of the best things that happened this week:

1- We had our house sprayed for spiders and wasps. You see, this weekend we found a black widow outside in our rock wall, which totally freaked me out. After calling many pest control places, we found Beeline Pest Control (they were very affodable, had great reviews and were the only office with Saturday hours). It basically took me all week to finally stop freaking out so much - but I am a happy girl thinking of all those scary spiders curling up to die.

2- We went swimming with the Cooper's. I swore to myself that I was going to go swimming every week this summer to take advantage of our awesome pool (I love swimming), but unfortunately I haven't quite made that goal. However, it was SO nice to just go and relax in the water. Lydia and Elsie took turns floating in the baby pool-float, Carson ran around and played in the shallow end of the water, and Ashley and I had a great time relaxing in the sun.

3- David and I finally finished planting ground cover in our rock wall. All of the original dirt had completely washed out, so we had to back fill everything like crazy before we could plant our plants. Hopefully everything will take root and work to keep the dirt in place between the rocks. (And hopefully keep scary spiders at bay.) Each night after we put Lydia down, I would change into long pants, tennis shoes, a long sleeve shirt, an overshirt, and then tuck my sleeves into my gardening gloves. We joked that the only spider protection I was missing was a head cover. Thankfully, it looks as if the bug spray did it's job well as we didn't have any other spider problems this week. Next week we will start working on our front yard!  (Our rock wall went from having big gaping holes went from to having pretty plants like this.)

4- I was able to watch my niece and nephews for a couple of hours this week. Aubrey, Jacob, and Nathan came over and we had a great time playing games, going to the park, eating some yummy food, and letting them follow Lydia around the house. Nathan beat me soundly as we played monopoly. In my defense, I was playing three separate games at the time. Monopoly with Nathan, CandyLand with Aubrey, and a game of Jacobs creation using Monopoly Deal cards and lego ships. I loved every second of it. Once again, I am so grateful to have family close by. It's nice to be able to help out, grow relationships, and know that we have such a great support system.

5-My dear friends, Tausha and Kayla, came for a visit. These Barclay girls (now Bentz and Hall girls) were two of my very best high school friends. I love them both so much. Tausha has been living in San Jose, California for the last year and is in the process of moving to Arizona. Kayla lives in the Washington DC area. They are visiting their family in Manti for a couple of weeks and took the time to come up and visit for a couple of hours. I wish these girls lived closer, but I'm so glad that I got to visit with them. Landon kept following Lydia around trying to give her a hug (which resulted in something much like a body-slam that dropped them both to the floor). He was so sweet and earnest. Lydia wasn't sure what to think about that - but she certainly liked to get as close to him as possible to watch what he was doing. My fondest hope in life is that Lydia and Landon will fall in love and make these girls my real sisters. (Well, something like that - related at least.) Haha.

Happy Friday!

My Laundry Room

I love our house. I love the kitchen, the stairway, the tech center, and the master bathroom. I love the way it looks and love the way it feels. However, if someone asked me to pick my favorite room in the house - I would easily pick the laundry room. Easily. As we were looking to buy a house, our real estate agent must have thought that I was crazy because one of my biggest concerns was the size/condition/location of the laundry room. Houses were not even considered because of their less-than-impressive laundry rooms. When we finally found this house - I was in love. It's right next to the bedrooms, it's self-contained, it has a counter, storage, and a sink. It's perfect. After never having a washer and dryer of our own in the almost-four-years since we'd been married (and the almost-eight-months of Lydia's life) - the sight of these beauties in my perfect little laundry room was heaven.

We opted not to buy the washer and dryer pedestals for $300 more (on sale from the usual $500 more). Such a lot of money for such useless things. I think that my parents store their lightbulbs in the drawer under the dryer - and they can't even open the drawer under the washer because of the required plastic tub. Such a waste of space. Prior to even moving into our house, I was perusing Pinterest and found a pin that linked me to Ana White's building plans for a washer and dryer pedestal.  I knew that this is what I wanted and I enlisted my dad to help me! 

David and I took a weekend and headed to Morgan, where my dad so willingly set aside all of the other projects that he was working on and helped us to build my dream laundry stand. We measured laundry baskets and last minute called the McArthur Sales office to see if they would go and measure the laundry room for us. (Our house was in the final stages of completion, but we hadn't closed yet.) Thank goodness we thought to have them go measure - because we would have built the stand just a few inches too long (I was planning to just go along with the online plans, because I figured that it was for a side-by-side washer and dryer and obviously a washer and dryer would fit in the space). Bless Jesse Curtis for his willingness to go measure for us - because we would have been really sad! 

We left the laundry stand at my parents house, because - well - we still weren't living in our new house yet. David and I helped with the bones of the stand, but my wonderful dad did all of the finishing touches on his own. He used MDF to trim everything out and make it look beautiful. No raw edges showing on this beauty. Thankfully my parents were willing to let it take up space at their house while we waited for ours to be completed. 

Finally we moved in.. The only trouble was that the laundry stand is heavy like, "there is no way I could ever move it on my own" heavy and "I was afraid that we'd have to rent a semi-truck to get it to my house" heavy. Life was pretty crazy and so it stayed at my parents house for another month or so. 

Meanwhile, our there was a lot of this going on: 

And some of this:  

And way too much of this: 

My little sister Melissa and her trusty white Subaru volunteered to deliver the stand to us. Her rock-climbing muscles assisted my dad in loading it up, and they were the only thing that enabled us to get it unloaded when she arrived at my house (David was still at work). Seriously, I carry a baby around all day long, why is it that I have absolutely no upper body strength? Regardless, there was much celebration now that my laundry stand was now at the same address as my laundry room. I hadn't decided what color to paint it, but I quickly realized that white was the way to go. The stand took my spot in our garage while I made plans and gathered the supplies needed to get my paint on. My craft-blog-stalking led me to believe that spray paint would get the job done nicely. One naptime later, we were left with this: 

Boo! It looked like a child had scribbled on it with an old white marker. That was an entire can of spray paint. Realizing that any money saved on not buying brushes or other paint supplies would quickly be spent on another 20 cans of spray paint - I headed back to the store for some real paint and small rollers. 

Two and a half coats of paint, several days drying time, and five strong men later - my beautiful laundry stand was finally at home in my laundry room. Isn't it lovely? 

I love how much room it gives to me. That extra space for baskets is invaluable, and it really is much nicer to have the washer and dryer a bit higher as you as changing loads. It's so pretty, and the details make me smile. (Ignore the little purple toy of Lydia's - I didn't realize it was there where I started taking pictures.) Isn't that little trim so nice? 

Before and after: 

The other day my mom and I were talking about The Fly Lady, and some of the tips she has for keeping your home clean and organized. One of her big things is to always keep the sink clean. My mom jokingly told me that I would have a hard time with that. (We have a rule at our house for the after dinner time, especially when we have guests over: Dishes wait until tomorrow.) We kind of laughed about it, but I totally understand the philosophy. Sometimes if you have one area that you make an effort to keep tidy always - the rest of your house doesn't seem so daunting. It may be weird - but I think that my laundry room is that for me. I love looking through the door and seeing my happy curtains, white laundry stand, and clothes hanging out to dry. It makes me feel as if I've accomplished something, and it makes it easier to clean other areas (like the bathroom across the hall). I love that this area is organized and lends itself to being clean. There is just enough space that clothes don't pile up, and I love to be in this room - so it's easy for me to just fold the laundry as soon as it is done and then put it away. I don't have to stress about bringing my laundry into the main room to fold. It's just all right there. It makes me a happy happy girl. 

 I know that it seems a silly thing to love - but I really do. I can't help but get a smile on my face each time I walk past this happy little room. I have some big plans for it in the future (subway tile, pretty printables, a drying rack, etc... You can see some great ideas on my Pinterest board The Laundry Room) but for right now, I love it just the way it is.

Happy Laundering!