What can you get at Lake Tahoe for $20?

A lot if you're checking out garage sales.

I don't know if my mom will forgive me for letting you in on the secret, but the best place to go garage saling (I know that's not a real word) is Lake Tahoe. I think it's my mom's favorite thing to do at Lake Tahoe because there are a lot of wealthy people with vacation homes there that they are cleaning out and remodeling, so many items are barely used and most of the owners don't bother to haggle over prices. And there's not much of a market for kids' items, so even when you start out late in the day, you can find some gems.

We spent an hour garage saling Saturday morning. I spent $20 (and I am not much of a haggler myself) and here's what I ended up with.

A child-size doctor's coat to go in Creed's dress-up box, which I don't have a photo of, but I assure you that it is cute.

A toddler carrier for hiking (which I have been wanting, but wasn't willing to pay full price for since Larry works so much that I don't think it will get a ton of use). I also spotted two jogging strollers, but I knew I would be pushing it just to get the backpack home. I thought I would have to leave the backpack at the cabin for use next summer, but my dad the engineer miraculously fit it in along with all of our luggage and my mom's garage sale purchases.

A Little People farm, which it seems was mixed up with the Little People Zoo, thus the kangaroo, but luckily, my mom bought the zoo and the train set at the same sale so we can get it sorted out.
Kids books, which you know I don't NEED, but it's nice having 25 cent copies that Creed can drag around in his wagon without causing concern. I also had a copy of Go Dog Go, but I gave it to Marissa as part of a compromise, so I could buy this vintage copy of Richard Scarry's Going Places that we both spotted. Hello, 50 cents for one of the most charming books ever!
Who can resist Pip pip goes to London?
And Creed is already enjoying the section in the back on things that go with beautiful illustrations like this.

Creed takes a trip to Tahoe

Creed did remarkably well on the nine-hour drive to my grandparents' cabin at Lake Tahoe. We just relaxed with my parents and grandparents our first few days there. The downside of traveling without Larry was this is the only picture that I ended up with of my. In fact, I didn't take pictures of a lot of the things that I meant too because I always had my hands full with Creed. I wasn't sure what he would think of the beach. Would the water and waves scare him? Would the water be too cold? Would he try to eat the sand?

Well, I shouldn't have worried. He was fearless and charged right into the water until it was up to his chest. He giggled at the waves from passing boats. He was happy to spend hours playing in the sand. He was so busy that despite my best efforts, I couldn't even get him to look up for a picture.

He also loved watching grandma, aka the yoga queen, do a little yoga on the beach
And he loved playing in the sand with her too.
And grandpa spoiled him every morning by sharing his green drink. My parents have been on a diet and they drink a green shake every morning made with OJ, spinach, and a bunch of fruit. I can't get over the way it looks, but Creed LOVES it. He could not get enough.My sister Marissa and her husband Mike and baby Logan arrived Wednesday night so we headed back to enjoy the blue lake. This time we went kayaking and even Creed got in on the fun (although he's mad here because they arrived back on shore and I made him keep his life jacket on for one more picture). When we lived in Hawaii we had a house on the beach and spent a lot of time out on the ocean on our kayaks, boogie boards, row boat, wind surfer, and catamaran so it was nice to be out on a kayak again.

He just looked so funny all bundled up.

It was so fun to spend a little time with Marissa and her family. I kept wishing they didn't have to live so far away.

It was fun to see how much Logan has grown up. I have a feeling Creed and Logan will be great friends one day.

It was especially nice to arrive home in the wee hours to this site.

Larry has never made or even purchased a cake for my birthday before so I was totally surprised.

More trip details to follow. I'm off to unpack and sort some laundry.

Did I mention . . .

That Creed and I hitched a ride with my parents and are spending over a week at Lake Tahoe with them? A great place to celebrate my 28th birthday, don't you think? I just wish Larry wasn't stuck at home, working and studying for the boards.

See you next week!

Martha, Martha, Martha

For those you you Martha doubters out there (I'm not naming names, but you know who you are), I have decided to feature some ideas that I love from my Martha Stewart Living subscription every month. The September issue just arrived, but I have to share a few ideas that I love from back in July.

First off, I love these red, white, and blue ribbon star banners. And don't they make cute straw decorations too?

I think they would look really good with these Patriotic fans. You would have the cutest Independence Day party on the block.

Now, usually the recipes are a little beyond my skill level, but the July issue had really tempting ice cream and popsicle recipes. Like this one for ice cream mixed-berry pops.

And this one for ice cream sandwiches made using thin brownies on the outside (so simple, why didn't I think of that?)

It looks like the September issue isn't up online yet, so check back later for that, but you're still in for a treat because Martha already has her Halloween stuff up (Don't you love how I refer to her by her first name, as if we are chums?) I was in Michael's the other day and you can already buy the Martha Stewart Halloween items. Here's an awful picture from my phone.

This year, Martha is running an online Halloween workshop that you can sign up for to get her editor's Halloween tips to craft a creepy Halloween.

And for the next eight weeks, you can check in for the Halloween idea of the day. Today's idea for this baby costume made me laugh.

And don't forget to check around her site for other Halloween ideas. I think I want to try to make these invisible pops this year. And did you know that Wal-mart just started carrying some of the Martha Stewart craft products? I was a little surprised by that, but I'm still curious enough to want to check it out.

Creed Gets A Haircut

It's kind of hard to capture Creed's hair on film because it's so white, but trust me when I say this kid was getting shaggy. The top was too long to stay up in a mohawk and when he wore baseball hats, he had a little ponytail sticking out of the hole in the back so it was time for a haircut. I've trimmed his hair in the past, but it's so hard to get him to hold still that I decided it was time to let a professional do the job.

Here's the before. Doesn't seeing him sitting with that cape on, sucking on his binky, just make you smile? I thought he would be kicking and screaming, especially when it came to the clippers, but he was so absorbed in the Baby Einstein DVD they put in for him that he didn't mind most of the time.
And here's the final product.

It ended up a little shorter than we wanted, but I still like it. Larry and I are both shocked at how grown up he looks with shorter hair.
Truth be told, he really has grown up a lot lately. He's picking up new words all of the sudden and loves to parrot different noises. He loves the Count on Sesame Street and says, "Ah, ah, ah" just like him. It cracks me up.

He's been having a fun summer spending lots of time at the park and out in his little wading pool. Even though he doesn't say a lot of words, he says a couple of phrases like, "I did it!" and "What that?" and the other morning when I started to lay down while he was playing he looked at me and clearly said, "Mama, no no no!"

And now when you ask him questions and he doesn't know the answer, he does this.
He's only 16 months old so why does he suddenly seem so grown up?

A View Of Our Weekend

Our weekend started out so well. Larry and I actually went on a date and he planned it! We saw Salt Lake Shakespeare's production of Twelfth Night. It was a modern setting so I wasn't sure how it would go, but it was great. We particularly enjoyed Festes, the fool, who had an amazing voice and Malvolio (and in my opinion those two really make or break this play). I whispered to Larry that Malvolio looked like a grown up version of Duckface from Full House (a kid that Stephanie teased) but I was totally surprised when we looked at his bio in the lobby and he was Duckface on Full House. Oh yes, we had a brush with fame. You know you're jealous! Saturday Larry got off of work much earlier than expected so instead of working on our talks for church the next day, we met up with the Randall's and drove down to Payson Canyon. I went camping once there in high school, but I did not remember how beautiful it was. We checked out The Devil's Kitchen which is touted as a mini Bryce Canyon.

We checked out Mount Nebo

The steep cliffs made some of us a bit nervous And then we stopped at Payson Lake. Oh I was dying to stay and camp! We HAVE to go back soon. It was gorgeous. The kids couldn't resist dipping their toes in the water.

And those lead to babies being stripped down to their diapers and diving in

I have to say one of my favorite views with this newlywed couple on their vespa

Our gracious hosts, Jason and Melinda even ended the evening with two batches of homemade ice cream that rocked. Their recipe for cake batter ice cream is posted on their blog.

Peer into my crystal ball

My future holds a project related to fortune telling. I can't reveal all now, but I need your help! That's right all of you reading this, I need your help. I need eight highly entertaining fortunes similar to those that you would find in a fortune cookie. I want them to be actual fortunes about things that will happen, not, "Confucious says . . ." Something that would make you smile or giggle if you got it in a fortune cookie. I've come up with five decent options so far, but I need at least three more. Obviously, they have to be fortunes you wouldn't mind me using in one of my designs, but there's something in it for you too. If I use a fortune that you came up with, I'll mail you a copy of the finished product.

On a sidenote, have you been reading Eva's blog? She started doing profiles of creative people every Thursday and she posted a little about me yesterday and you can check it out here. Be sure to check out the rest of her blog for more of Eva's thoughts and projects and some updates from Kirk in Poland too.

You're never too old to play dressup

One night while Candice and Marissa were still in town my aunt babysat after the babies went to bed so the grown-ups could go see a movie. We saw Get Smart because it was the only movie that no one objected to seeing. I was not that excited about it, but it was actually surprisingly funny and I'm so glad that I went.



Well, after that we had spies on the brain so we decided to do our own secret agent photoshoot. We dragged Eli along with us for some thrift shopping where we all picked up sweet jackets and then we picked up wigs at a costume shop. You weren't allowed to open them so we didn't know until we got home that I ended up with the ugliest wig you have ever seen. I'm not kidding, it looked nothing like the package, and it was getting late so we had to smooth it down as much as we could and go ahead with the shoot. It looked sort of like Mary Ann from Giligan's Island's hair; ratted up huge and flipped out at the end, just like every cool spy wants to look. At least it was dark so you can't tell how huge and horrible it was compared to Candice and Marissa's sleek wigs. My parents kept cracking up while my dad was shooting these pictures; I'm not sure if was the wig, the weird poses that we were coming up with, or the people staring at us posing in the street as they drove by, but whatever. You're never too old to play dressup.

Why it was a bad idea to give Creed Chef Boyardee

Subject: Creed
Problem: Subject refuses to consume pasta of any kind
Hypothesis: Subject may be lured into eating not-so-healthy Chef Boyardee ravioli with meatballs (which technically should not even be called food) and then adapt to eating actual pasta.
Result: Complete and utter failure Evidence 1 - Subject was died orange and left an orange ring in the tub

Evidence 2 - Subject used his hair as a napkinEvidence 3 - Subject picked apart the ravioli to eat the "meat" and left all pasta to be analyzed

Picture Perfect

My whole family hadn't been together in ages and we almost forgot to take a new family picture. In fact, we didn't get our act together until after all of the husbands were gone so it's just the Borups. I'm wearing Cacndice's clothes because I was only down with Creed for the night, and I only brought shorts and t-shirts. What's that you ask? Who was the photographer? My dad paid Grant $5.00 to take our picture while the babies watched from their carseats. Pretty good for five minutes of work, eh?