Pinewood Derby

Gentlemen, start your engines! This last week Stephen participated in his first real Pinewood Derby! He and Greg spent countless hours getting ready for the big night. A neighbor friend helped cut and shape the wood into the car Stephen designed. Stephen then sanded, glued and painted the car, placed really cool flame stickers and even had a driver! His car did fantastic in the races. Both Stephen & dad were very pleased with their work. Greg really got into the whole event checking out websites for the best performing derby creations and researched wheel and axel designs. Way to go guys!

Yummy Banana Bread

I don't normally post recipes on this blog, but a few of my friends have requested this yummy recipe for banana bread. I can't take the credit - it's not my recipe. It came from an old ward recipe book my mom had and I've always used it. Happy baking!

Pre-heat oven 350 degrees

Beat together:

1 cup sugar

1/2 c. shortening

Add:

2 eggs

Mix until fluffy

Add:

1 tsp. baking soda to 1/2 cup buttermilk (use 1/2 c. milk + 1 tsp. lemon juice)

Sift together:

2 cups flour

1 tsp. salt

Alternate dry ingredients to sugar/egg mixture adding buttermilk with each mixing.

Add:

1 cup mashed bananas (about 3)

1 Tbsp. vanilla

1/2 cup chopped nuts (if desired)

Pour batter into greased/floured bread pans. I can usually get most in a large pan and then use a small pan for the rest of the batter.

Bake for 45 minutes for the smaller loaf pans, 60 minutes for the larger pan.

For muffins, bake 15-18 minutes. yields about 24 muffins.

2 Cute!

Emma celebrated her 2nd birthday in pink princess style. Although she wasn't impressed with the pink cake and pink presents, she was impressed with the SpongeBob SquarePants doll, book and coloring book! Finally we get a girl amongst all the Price boys and what does she love? BobBobPa (her version of SpongeBob SquarePants). She did allow the princess tiara for a little bit and ate her cake with proper etiquette. I know that this party was more about me than her and I thank all those that contributed to her passions. That night she went to bed with her BobBob doll and all I could hear from her room was her version of the opening song. Needless to say she hasn't gone to bed with it since. She is currently teething and not very happy at the moment but she is such a joy to our family. Stephen loves being the big brother and showing her how to be "big". She can go up and down the stairs, loves nursery, knows who Jesus is and says thanks. I just wish I knew what she was jabbering on about....

Hey, someone had to wear the crown!

Happy Easter!

Was it really Easter just a few weeks ago? It was a bitter cold Saturday morning when we went to the fastest Easter Egg Hunt ever! Thank goodness it was over in 10 minutes because we were all getting cranky from the cold. Emma wasn't sure what to do with the basket and candy on the ground so mom was there to show her the ropes. Dad & Stephen headed over to the older kids hunt and came away with a few prizes and few candy.

This is the image we woke up to on Easter morning. Nice Spring Break, huh? Luckily, it melted pretty fast & we did enjoy some nicer weather and were able to get out and play before heading back to school/work.

Discovery Gateway

A few Saturdays ago we took the kids to the Discover Gateway in downton SLC. This place is amazing! There are so many cool hands-on interactive sites to play with, explore, create, pretend. Both Stephen & Emma had a ball - sometimes quite literally. Emma loved the grocery store set-up. She shopped for lots of food, got into some of the display cases and then rang up her groceries at the cashier counter. She loved that. Stephen spent most of this time in the water works pushing ping-pong balls up and down the wet waterways. He was soaked through but didn't mind. My favorite part was watching the kids' faces light up with each set they played in. We completely exhausted the kids that they went to sleep without a peep that night. Good times, good memories. Enjoy the pictures.

Green Thumb

Stephen came home from cub scouts a few weeks ago with a styrofoam cup all decorated with grass seeds planted in the dirt. I thought, "Oh, great, another plant we'll kill before it even surfaces." Well, I've been watering faithfully and keeping it in as much sunlight as we were getting in Utah and wouldn'tcha know it....we got grass! It will probably be the best looking grass we'll have all season. Its grown so much I've had to "mow" it a few times already. Maybe we should put Stephen in charge of yardwork this year....

Stephen plays the piano

Back in early March Stephen participated in a regional piano federation competition. After months of working hard to memorize and play with flair he played 2 pieces in front of 3 judges. The highest rank is Superior which is what Stephen scored! At this level they are looking for memorization and stage presence and Stephen definitely has both! All three judges were very impressed with Stephen and his level of maturity. Congratulations Stephen!