16 Years of Marriage and what I learned a Zion hike

I had a wonderful anniversary with my husband this past weekend. It really is one of my favorite anniversaries so far. Usuually we get to take a week vacation in the winter -- just the two of us. But this year it just was not happening. So we decided to take a short weekend getaway for our 16th anninversary.

Last week was insane for me and I almost canceled the whole thing at the last minute. But Tom happily came home at 3:30 and we jumped in the car dropped off the kids at their nana and papa's house to spend the night and we headed to Springdale. We had decided to stay at a the Majestic View Lodge. It is a really cool place. Very rustic and the views of Zion National Park are amazing. Now Sprindale is  a cool little place. It is just kind of shut down in the middle of January. All the great restaurants are closed until February. But our lodge had a decent restaurant and we had the whole place to ourselves. 

The next morning we ate breakfast at this yummy local southwestern cafe called Oscars. I stuffed myself ridiculous with huevos rancheros. And then we headed into the snow dusted Zion.

Zion in winter is an amazing experience. First of all Zion never gets old. The majesty of Zion is overwhelming; it is as if you are feasting yourself on one amazing view after another. Tom and I had such a great time driving the scenic road through Zion. We were just awestruck by this different side of Zion. The red cliffs were dusted in snow and the icicles hanging over cliff overhangs was beautiful. On our way back we decided to take the Canyon Overlook hike. This was totally a spontaneous thing. Tom always gets more spontaneous when we are out exploring nature. I thought it was a short hike. This is one of the hikes we have never been on and we thought it was a short trek to a little overlook. We were wrong. We were not even remotely dressed appropriately, or at least I was not. But I thought hmm. I want to go take a hike it can't be that long and it wasn't terribly cold.

So Tom and I set off on a beautiful and amazing hike that was more like an hour and a half, long and icy and treacherous at moments. But in the quiet of that setting and with the person I love more than anyone else, I realized some things. That hike taught me more than one lesson and I am grateful we decided to take that journey. Often in nature I discover truths that apply to all of life and marriage. Here is what I learned.

1. If you are going to spontaneously jump into an adventure with little or no research or prep -- always go with your husband.
2. My husband loves me. He will always look out for my safety first. The truth is he always does this. It was just so obvious as he walked before me and found the safe spots and then held out his hands to help me over the rough spots.
3. It is not a bad thing as a woman to let your husband lead sometimes. It protects you and strengthens your marriage.
4. If your husband really loves you he will help you and hold you when you need it and trust you to do it on your own when you are really OK.

5. Sometimes the slippiest parts of a journey or trail are not in the ice and snow where we are watching and stepping carefully but in the dry and safe places where we become too comfortable. I can't believe how many times Tom almost lost his balance when he was walking in the dry and level places. Over the past year I have personally learned that it is when we are most complacent that we are in most danger of falling. Isn't it nice to know that your best friend is there just in case you fall anyway.

6. The journey can be just as breathtakingly beautiful as the destination. Never ignore the discoveries along the way.

7. It is really frightening to watch your husband slide backward down an icy embankment and know that you can't get to him in time. And then watch him slide two more times because he insisted on coming back up to get you even when you told him to stay put. Silly man. I already learned from his mistakes.

8. My husband makes a really great tree. He is strong and solid and if I slide toward him he will dig in and stop me from falling.

9. Some views really are worth the trek even if the trek is longer and harder than you thought it would be.

10. Some views are better when shared.

I love my husband. He makes me laugh and cry, think and smile and yes even holler in frustration but I love that I am taking this journey of marriage and life with him

I also love that he took me later that night to our favorite restaurant to gorge ourselves on some of the best food in Southern Utah at Orchids Restaurant in St. George

Christmas at the Hughes

It was a wonderful family and friend filled Christmas season. I was pretty unprepared this year but somehow Christmas came and food and treats were made and passed out to neighbors. All the gifts were bought and arrived on time. And we had a great time having parties with friends and family.

In the midst of it all Rebecca had her first swim meet ever. Now she did not want to do this. I basically pulled her out of bed, kicking and screaming. She has not fallen in love with swimming yet, she was worried about the meet and she was really tired for the early morning arrival time at the pool. But she swam two races. She did it and swam her hardest and I am proud of her for trying.

Somewhere along the way we fit in our annual tradition of decorating a gingerbread house, which included Santa's sleigh this year. Now I know it is not beautiful but it is definintely yummy looking.

And then along came Christmas eve. Which we held at Tom's parents' house. There was yummy food, a birthday for my nephew Jack, a nativity skit that focused on the three wise men or wisewomen in this case. Those cute little kids did exactly as I asked them to do. They read their parts and were excited to act out their parts. I was happy to be indulged by my cute nieces, nephew and kids. Then we had the present game -which is really a white elephant game. It was a fun night.

Busy Christmas Elves

Cute 99 year old Nana Ora in her apron. 

 Joseph, a.k.a Jack, mary aka Becca, Baby Jesus aka Claire, shepherd aka Kate.

 The three wisewomen Hannah, Lia and Elise and Isaac the narrator.

 Isaac serenades us with some background Christmas music

Tom in one of the white elephant gifts. He looks very elfish.

Poor Sophie she is still trying to understand the present game.

The annual Christmas Eve party wrestle with Isaac wrestling with his younger cousins.

Alon came Christmas morning. Yes that is a snuggy. Santa gave in and brought the ridiculous things to the Christmas Eve party.

 Pet Shops and Disney Fairy dolls make happy girls.

 Isaac gets the long awaited cell phone. He can barely take his eyes off it long enough to open the other presents under the tree.

Nana makes all the girls cute aprons. I love my owl apron.

Jack's birthday

Happy New Year. Maybe I will be a better blogger this year.

12 Days of Giveaways

Alive! Utah ( my online magazine that also happens to be my obsession) is going to have 12 days of giveaways. And let me tell you they are awesome giveaways even if they do lean towards being more for the femenine side. So I am telling you if you have not already become a registered user at my site you need to go there now and register so you can make comments on each daily prize. You will need to back each day to enter for the next day's prize. So get signed up now so you don't miss your chance to win awesome prizes like a $50 gift certificate to Recycled Consign and Design, A lift ticket to Eagle Point Ski Resort and more more more more.

Hurry go get signed up and check out the detalis at http://aliveutah.com/

Apple Cider Bars

Here is what happens when your first photo attempts are blurry and you make a yummy new snack. All that ends up being left is an itty bitty little bite left for a photo op.

I love apple cider.Which is odd because I hate straight apple juice. Must be all those mulling spices. I am a spicy kind of gal.  The 100 percent stuff is my favorite. But in a pinch I will drink the powdered mix stuff. While you might be able to use the powdered apple cider mix for this recipe if you can have the real stuff go for it. However this is a food storage blog and this recipe would be a great addition to your food storage recipe arsenal.

So how could I resist trying the recipe found on the bakck of the Litehouse Apple Cider. Like I said these bars got gobbled -- for breakfast, for snack, for dessert. I was a little afraid of the Cheerios on the ingredient list but they add a really tasty crunch. I also substituted 1 chopped apple for the dried apple chips because I have a box full of apples waiting to be used. However, I love that I can pull apple chips out of my pantry to make this recipe even when apples are not in season.

The end result: These bars have a mildly spicy tang reminiscent of a warm cup of cider.

The Recipe
1 1/4 Cups sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup softened butter
4 Cups Cheerios (I used Honey Nut Cheerios)
1 Cup Apple Cider
1/2 cup chopped dried apples or 1 cup diced apple
1 egg
1 cup oats
1/2 tsp salt
1 Cup raisins
1 TB vanilla
1 1/2 Cups flour

Heat oven to 350 degrees farenheit. Boil 1 Cup cideer and apples in saucepan until liquid is reduced to 1/4 cup.

mix sugar, butter, peanut butter, cider, vanilla and egg in a large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients except for Cheerios.

Gently stir in cereal.

Pour into ungreased  9x13 pan and Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool and cut into bars.

Lessons from Kids

Sometimes I rock the house as a mom. I really put every effort to be there for my kids. Sometimes I also feel like the giving in this mom child relationship is a little one sided. But every once in  awhile I am reminded of what my kids give me. My children have taught me and given me gifts beyond price, beyond the value of a little extra help around the house.

During my postpartum depression they literally saved my life. They were the reason I woke up everyday. During a severe illness and surgery they saved my life again as they gave me the will to get better and be their mother again. Over the past year they have literally saved and strengthened my testimony in the gospel. As I faced (and frankly continue to face on some days) a spiritual 30 something crisis, my children's faith and spiritual needs have driven me to strengthen myself - to rediscover my faith and my testimony -- to search out a relationship with Christ.

Just this week and again today I was strongly reminded that 1. Sometimes I do not rock the house as a mom (my children have also taught me humility on more than one occasion.) Sometimes I blow out it at the moment they are at their best. And there is a strong lesson in this as well.

2. The holy ghost is a real and wonderful gift that must not be ignored.
Occurence #1 I dropped 12 year-old Isaac off at a 3 hour party at the SUU pool. He ran in and I took off. I never even thought to check and see if everything was still a go for the party. I headed off with my girls to Wal-Mart to buy 3 birthday presents for all the parties we had this weekend. I spent an hour in Wal-Mart (at least) As soon as I got in the car. I had this strong thought come to me. What if the party was not at the pool what if Isaac is stranded there. I had forgotten my cell phone and knew he could not call me.
I brushed (with some effort) this thought away and chalked it up to paranoia. If there was really a problem he had money he could go swim anyways or he could do some of the other fun stuff they have at the SUU gym. He could call his Dad. Everything was fine. I decided to finish my errands. 45 minutes later. I decided to check on Isaac anyway. I went into the gym and pool and soon discovered that no one was swimming that night. There was a giant swim meet. Isaac and the party were no where to be found. I started to panic. Where was Isaac. I walked around the corner and found Isaac playing raquetball by himself in one of the courts. His party had never shown up and they had been unable to contact us to tell us plans had changed.  He was pretty upset. He had tried to call me and then he informed that he had said a prayer asking that I would know he needed me to come get him.

Isaac's prayer was answered. The Holy Ghost clearly gave me an impression of the scenario that might be occuring. I flat out ignored it at least for a while. I was devastated. I promised my son never to ignore a prompting to come to his aid again.

Secondly, today in church we talked about the Holy Ghost. Suddenly it came to me that everytime my little 5 year old Lia begs us to remember scripture study each night (we always forget and sometimes we decide not to do it anyway) she is asking for the experience of having the Holy Ghost testify the truth to her. She doesn't have that constant companionship yet and she must feel the peace and truth of the gospel as we read scriptures to her. I realized that in not being more consistent as a parent with this simple family task that she so truly wants in her life I was denying her the opportunity to feel and learn to understand the presence of the holy ghost testifying to her. At that moment I again felt terrible. But I also felt as if now I will be more consistent in getting our family scripture study done.

Sometimes lessons are painful to our pride. But they are always good when they come from our children.

I love Fall

I really do love fall. Too bad it has to be followed up by that icky season Winter. There are so many fun family traditions for us this time of year.

I also love Halloween (well not the horror side of it). I come from a family that has very ambivalent feelings about Halloween. My mother hates it, my dad doesn't love it and my sisters go along with it but they don't get super excited about making costumes and jackolanterns and making tacky halloween themed treats. I don't care what they say they don't get giddy about putting bats and skeleton rings on their daughter's witch tutu. I am the Halloween freak in my family.

Tom and I went to our adult party this year dressed as Calvin and Hobbes

Rebecca was a witch. And I got all crafty and made that tutu myself. Excuse me while I give myself a pat on the back. Craftiness like that only happens once a year.

Lia decided to be a blue haired rapunzel. We are a little twisted around here.

Isaac's costume is my favorite because it was FREE. He made it himself. Here he is with the pack of kids he ran around with that night.

A shot of our jack-o-lanterns.

Yep Halloween is fun. But our playing in the leaf tradition is even more fun. It is an hour of sheer abondonment. Every year I take my kids to the park with all the giant trees and we cavort in the leaves.
This year for the first time even Tom decided to come and while he sat back and watched the fun he also couldn't resist getting in on the leaf fight.

 

 

The life we lead

It would be a massive understatement to say that I have been busy. The past month feels more like 3 months worth of stuff. Sometimes I honestly believe that a day has more than 24 hours. We squeeze so much into every day.

In the past month we have said goodbye to summer, we have welcomed Fall with a trip to the pumpkin patch, a trip to see my brothers and my sister Nicole in Salt Lake for the weekend. (A much needed trip, I was so homesick for my family. I had not seen them in over a year), time at the Iron County Fair, soccer, a big birthday bash and a night out to see Tarzan. And of course there have been massive hours at school and at work and so much more.

My most recent anxious moments have centered around Becca.
My dear sweet Becca turned nine and then within a week it came to my attention that I would need to pull her out of the Charter school all my children attend. It is a really long and angst filled story but suffice it to say that I decided that the Charter School was no longer the best choice for her. We are back to trying out Fiddlers starting next Tuesday. And my anxiety is ridiculous. I never thought I would choose to go back to Fiddlers. But here we are and I pray that I have made the right decision. Her brother and sister are remaining at the Charter school for the year. They seem to be progressing and doing well there.

Here is a few photos of us over the past month.

Pumpkin patch. We came home with 140 pounds worth of pumpkins. We are greedy about pumpkins.

We went with a few friends.

My niece Alexa. I got three new nieces this year. Here is one of them. Too bad she just moved to New Zealand. I held her as much as possible.

Bret, Jess and Cody. Now happily settled in New Zealand.

Jake is a little tired out after a few too many horse rides at the sibling reunion in Salt Lake My brother is such a good sport.

That's what you get for sticking your tongue out at me Nicole.

Oh look, she is cute. And so is her hubby and her youngest child Cami (my other new niece).

 A beautiful drive up Cottonwood Canyon

Becca and I see Tarzan at Tuacahn.

Becca turns 9 with some ghoulish treats and fun friends. Oh the day of baking that preceded her party was intense.

A witch and a really happy dead guy.

Forgot this one. Becca got to meet some of the cast of Tarzan. This is Kala.

And finally we watched lots of soccer and Tom and I are relieved it is over.