Twenty two years ago today, my lovely mother-in-law had her third baby, my wonderful husband, Ben! I am so blessed to have him in my life. I couldn't ask for a better husband. Here are some things I love about Ben. (disclaimer: this is mostly for Ben, if you get nauseous at cheesiness, I would close now. haha)1: He encourages me, and sometimes forcefully(haha), to try new things. For instance, I had never had sweet potatoes but I really didn't want to try them, they just looked sick. Well he made some and I felt bad that no one was going to try them but him... so I worked up the courage and tried it. They were amazing! Which brings me to my next favorite thing about Ben...
2: He is an awesome cook. From the time we were dating I always knew this. One time he made me waffles with homemade syrup (yum!) and another time I came to his house to find him scooping out baked pumpkins to make a pumpkin pie from scratch. From that moment on I knew we were destined to be together. Hahaha.
3: He is patient with me. I will be the first to admit that I can be a difficult wife. I think it is partly to do with the fact that I am a self-diagnosed OCD... haha. One day when I was hugely pregnant with Andrew, I started crying in the car that I really wanted a good peach... (dang those cravings!) All Ben said was, "Okay, we will drive all over town then to find you a good peach."
4: He is so thoughtful. He watches the kids every morning so I can sleep in and he always empties the dishwasher before he goes because he knows I hate doing it. He is even good to me when I don't deserve it. When we were in high school, my car got broken into and they stole all my cds. Even though Ben was annoyed at me for the circumstances surrounding it... (long story, won't go there) He bought me all the Smashing Pumpkins cds again because they were my favorite band at the time. There were like 10 discs!
5: He makes me feel good about myself. Ben just really doesn't care, for the most part, what people think about him. Granted he doesn't want to come off like a bad person, but if someone doesn't like him, he doesn't care. One particular bad hair day, I was bawling to Ben about how I was so ugly and what people were going to think of me. I think his first thought was probably that I was retarded but he told me that it didn't matter what people thought. He said that if someone was going to judge me by the way I look and decide not to be my friend than it would be good news for me because I wouldn't want friends like that anyway. I didn't think anything could make me feel better, but that comment did. He is always telling me how beautiful I look even when I feel like an ugly. Hahaha.
6: He is always inspiring me to do better. When I first started dating Ben it seemed that we would never go through the temple, be active in church, etc. etc. But Ben has changed so much so that we could be together forever. When Andrew was blessed by Ben's dad, he promised everyone that he would never ask someone else to bless one of his children, he kept true to that and blessed Olivia. He is one of the most humble and spiritual people I know.
7: He is a great father. I never realized how much I missed out on not having a dad around until I saw Ben bounce Andrew and Olivia around the hospital room when they were born. He is always going on about how Olivia is the most beautiful baby in the world and how Andrew is his best bud. He never uses the excuse that he has no time (even though he doesn't!) when he gets home. He gets right down and plays and talks with them both.
Anyway--- I could go on and on and on about the things I love about Ben. It's a good thing I married him I guess. I will just have to tell him the rest of the things over dinner tonight! Whoo Whoo! A night out without children! Another miracle. Happy Birthday Benny!
If all else fails, I try stickers. They keep Andrew entertained for at least half an hour. And as you can see, Olivia's random household item of choice is... sunglasses! 
Andrew loves this hungry hungry hippo game. He has been trying, very unsuccessfully, to get Elmo to play with him for the past month. Well forget that, Olivia looks like a willing opponent.
This is Andrew "helping" me make Ben's birthday cake. Haha. My children crack me up. Here are some recent pictures and stories that keep me entertained. So... 
Andrew then begins to tell me what happened... First of all... Diesel (the black train) is going to be going to time-out. Why? Because he hit Thomas (the blue train) and Thomas fell down. Diesel is in trouble he says... Hahaha. 
Andrew loves to make Olivia laugh! Usually he throws things over her head and says, "Where's Deah? (his nickname for her)" Then he pulls it off and she laughs and laughs. This time he decided to help her swing. I had to watch him because he started to get a little wild! She seemed to be enjoying herself though. 
I decided this month is bread making month. :) I have always wanted to learn how to make crazy french breads. So... my first experiment was CIABATTA. I didn't really know how hard this bread was to make or anything, I just really liked it and the only place I can find it is at bakeries. Halfway through the recipe, I went and looked online and it said it was not a beginner's bread... haha. Oh well. I don't think it was too hard to make but it did take a lot of time. Ben and I started at about noon and we finally ate hot bread at 9:00 pm. But... most of it was just sitting time, not actually working for that long. I was literally standing by the oven watching when we finally got to bake it! If I can do it, anyone can do it. For those of you that haven't had ciabatta, I highly recommend it. It's crunchy on the outside and soft and airy on the inside. DELICIOUS! I read that they use it to make paninis and other sandwiches. This morning I had a scrambled egg sandwich and it was amazing. This recipe made 6 little loaves, I halfed one to make a sandwich, so you could probably get 12 sandwiches with it. Last night we just ate it with honey butter though. If any of you decide to try it out, I would go to the library and get Martha Stewart's baking handbook, it's in there and it was pretty easy to read and figure out. The next thing I am going to try is olive oil bread and baguettes.... hmm we will see how that goes. Happy Baking to me! 
I love making food for visitors! I can't wait until my kids are old and we do our own little holiday dinners and make it all fun and fancy. I am going to go nuts! Anyone that knows me knows that I will find any excuse to make new desserts. My next project is Ben's birthday cake. I want to do something awesome! So... should I make option 1) Chocolate Devil's Food Cake with ganache frosting... option 2) German chocolate cake with coconut frosting or option 3) Plain jane yellow cake with chocolate frosting...? Hmmm decisions decisions. 
In Olivia news... She tried her first food the other day, rice cereal. Yummy! She also had a doctor appointment today and she is in the 95th percentile for her height, 50th percentile for weight. She is a tall girl! She rolls all over the living room and laughs out loud and makes a lovely "grrr" sound when she is excited. She is also teething so that is wonderous. :)
