Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

One of our favorite family recipes is Pumpkin Chocolate chip muffins. I usually only make them in the fall. They are to die for! They are moist and super

yummy!

It's kind of like having a little pumpkin with your chocolate.

I bought these cute tins at Target in the dollar section and fixed and filled them up

to share with family and friends.

I thought I would share, because I thought it turned out pretty cute.

Below is the recipe.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

Mix all dry ingredients together

1 2/3 C Flour

1 Cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp ground cloves

1 tsp salt

1 tsp Baking soda

1/4 tsp Baking powder

Mix all wet ingredients

1 cube margarine melted

1 C pumpkin

2 eggs

I melt the margarine and then add the pumpkin and then the eggs. This helps to cool the margarine so that you don't cook the eggs.

Then I hand mix the wet and dry ingredients along with 1 1/2 C of Chocolate chips.

Use paper liners and fill. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes

I usually triple this recipe. a large can of pumpkin makes three recipes. These are so good and one batch is never enough!

ENJOY!

Third Times a charm!

This was my third marathon! I can hardly believe it.  Even though I did it I can't believe it.  Am I crazy?  Do I need to get my brain checked? A friend of mine asked me why I run.  I told her I like to run because it proves that I can do hard things.  If I can do this, I can do anything and I can endure many things.

Above is a picture of some of us waiting in line for the port-a-potties.  One of the joys of running a marathon is all the fun port-a-potties waiting for you all along the way.

This is me running the last mile of my 26.2 miles.  I was so happy to be done.  I was excited because I was able to run this marathon faster than the other two that I ran.  I finished in 4 hours and 30 minutes.  I enjoyed the training and the long runs more this time.  The other times I had a lot of worries.  This time I knew what I was getting into and I felt prepared for it.

These are my cute friends Tara, Talli, and Jen.  They are some of my  running buddies.  They were so sweet to put signs up for all of their friends.  I actually missed seeing my sign while I was running.  I appreciated knowing that I had friends and family cheering me on.

This is cute Reed coming in.  He was tripped at mile 2 and hurt his shoulder, but still came in with a time of 3 hours and 28 minutes.  He qualified for Boston with an injury.  What a man!

Jen, Reed and I with our MASH shirts on. We weren't able to get into the marathon with the lottery.  We donated to this charity and were able to run.  Jen said that this was the most expensive shirt in her closet.  Can you believe we paid to do this? 

At the end of the race they give you a finisher ribbon.  I am so happy and proud to say that I am a finisher.  Will I run again?  I will have to wait and see if my brain has another malfunction! 

How do you cook a roast?

   My cute daughter Amy, who has been married for a year called me today to ask me how to cook a roast.  I hung up the phone and it reminded me of all the calls I made to my mom when I was first married.  How to cook a roast was definitely one of those questions.  It is amazing how life comes full circle.  It is hard to believe that at one moment you are holding your first sweet baby in your arms and then in a blink of an eye she is married and asking you how to cook a roast.

  It made me realize how quickly life is moving and that I need to hang on and enjoy the ride.

Recent Photo Shoots

In the spring I took these pictures of Drew and Wes Bowen.  The pictures of Drew were for his baptism announcement.  It was so fun to shoot these two amazing and adorable boys.

I did a photo shoot of the witt family in July! These guys are great friends and it was so fun to try some new locations, they were so fun and patient.  I thought we got some great shots! 

St George here I come!

I know this will sound crazy, but I am signed up to do the St. George Marathon in 2 1/2 weeks.  I have been training for the past four months.  I have been fitting all the weekly long runs in.  This past Saturday I completed my last long run!!  twenty miles!  I ran with Talli, Emily and Mandy!  We actually had a fun time running and talking.  I am excited to run the marathon in a few weeks!

New Calling

For the Past about two years I have been serving in the Stake YW presidency with some of my dearest friends, Stephanie, Jen, and Joelle.  It has been such a busy and fun calling!  Jen and I especially had so much much fun coming up with silly costumes for all the stake dances.  I have learned so much from serving with these amazing women.  I consider them some of my dearest friends.  

About three weeks ago I was in the car driving home from my week in New Port with my family.  I was thinking this next week, is going to be the last week before school starts, I was going to have a peaceful week hangin by the pool with the girls and maybe doing a little back to school shopping.  Well,  I received a phone call from our stake executive secretary saying that president Parker wanted to meet with Reed and I.  I had a wave of panic and let's just say I didn't sleep much that night.  I went in to meet with president Parker and was called as the new Stake YW president for our stake.  I felt pretty overwhelmed for the next week.  I went through the process of submitting names for counselors.
This is a picture of my New presidency, Paula malan(secretary), Karen Perez(1st counselor) and Becky Jackson(2nd counselor).  We had to scramble and plan a beehive conference that was on the calendar.  We decided on a friendship/flower theme.  These ladies are also dear friends and I am so excited to serve with them.  They were all amazing at the conference.  I truly didn't have to ask any of them to do anything.  They would see a need and immediately take care of things.  I am so grateful to them.  I am also grateful to my Heavenly Father for allowing me to serve in this amazing calling with these outstanding women.
Becky and I made these cute bee cupcakes!  I thought they turned out pretty cute!  I thought they were totally "Beehive-ish".
These are some of the cute seniors that came and helped with the conference.  Cute/tall heather is on the end in the stripes.
This is Lauren and all her "peeps" at the conference.
After dinner the girls attended a rotation of three classes.  One was a class by Talli Pouson on friendship.  The next class was a craft taught by gwen Hawkins, cute flowers for their hair.  The last class was a spa room Led by Ashley Burton.  The girls seemed to enjoy all the classes.  The teachers all did an excellent job and were so gracious and willing to serve.  As a leader you truly appreciate people that say yes and then do an awesome job!
This is cute Austin Greenlaw and Ginger Zamora.  The senior girls helped in the spa room.  They gave all the Beehives manicures.

Family Fun!

A few weeks after my Utah family trip I headed back to Utah to participate in the "A New You" program. This was my eighth summer attending. This year I was asked to help plan the New Program that would take place in Utah. I spent the year meeting with Barbara Jones and her assistant Linda. It ended up being a wonderful week. The salon that we toured was wonderful and all the evening concerts were amazing. I took pictures, but some how they were lost, I was pretty sad. I thought I would still talk about it and what a great program it is. When that week was done, I flew directly to Orange County to spend the week with my family.
We had everyone there. Amy and Bryan were able to drive down and Kara was home for a few weeks from BYU Idaho. We had the best time together. We rode bikes at the board walk at New Port, we read lots of books and we just enjoyed being together.  We were even able to see the traveling broadway play "Legally Blonde".  It was a totally girly thing to do.  Bryan and Reed are pretty good sports to put up with all the girl stuff.