In the winter time . . .

Here is a picture I took of the sunset during our lovely blizzard today. While the blizzard is not actually my favorite, it is kind of fun to have a snow day every now and then where it is mandatory to stay in the house, drink hot chocolate, and watch Napoleon Dynamite. (I'm even considering baking some biscotti to go with the hot chocolate.)

And, for as crappy as the weather is, the sunset was still beautiful and made a gorgeous pink blanket of clouds above, so for that I am thankful.

More Ryker

Ryker's Photo Shoot

More to come . . .

Ryker Glen Rainey

Congrats to Rachael & Brandon, who had another bouncing baby boy today, 13 months to the day after the previous bouncing baby boy. Ryker Glen Rainey was born this morning and weighed in at 8 lbs. 10 oz and I think 20 1/2" long.

Both he and Rachael are doing well, although he was "grunty", which is apparently not uncommon for C-section babies and so they have had him in the NICU all morning. When I left around 2:00 p.m., they said he was doing very well, color was better, was on room air, and were hoping to get Mama in with him soon.

Fun to have another new baby in the family! I figured out this morning that we have seven kids who are ages 3 and under and four of those kids are 1 and under! Lots of little ones to play with.

It is done.

This is the score of my last and so very final section of the CPA Exam. Yes, I passed!!! I cannot describe the euphoria I feel at the thought of NEVER having to take another exam EVER AGAIN IN MY LIFE! :)

2010 Walk to Cure Diabetes

Here are some of the pics from the 2010 JDRF Walk to Cure Diabetes. We had lots of fun and everyone survived the walk, even the little ones. Our team was able to raise $1,845 and I heard from the news that $35,000 was raised from the Idaho Falls Walk! Thanks to everyone who donated and participated, we certainly appreciate it very much!

September Sunset Spectacular

There were some really cool clouds tonight and Kade said I should take a picture, so there you have it.

Also, I recently acquired Photoshop CS5 and don't have any clue how to use it.
So I went to the resource of all knowledge . . . YouTube, and found a tutorial on enhancing color. Needless to say, I messed around for a bit and came up with this.

Team Garrett

Most of you probably know that my nephew Garrett, who is 5, was diagnosed with Type 1 Juvenile Diabetes not long before his 3rd birthday. So, last year I participated in the JDRF Walk to Cure Diabetes. My friend Jordyn, who has a niece that was diagnosed at the same age, and I decided somewhat at the last minute that it would be a fun thing to do and it was for a good cause. We had a lot of fun, there was a LOT of people there, and we were able to raise a couple hundred dollars.

This year, we have organized "Team Garrett" which includes me, my mom, sisters, kids, nieces and nephews, and an aunt and uncle on Garrett's Bingham side of the family. So far we have raised $643.00! However, I still have not met my goal of $250.00 and am hoping to still raise donations if possible. If you are able to donate, any amount helps, even a dollar.

We will be walking Saturday, September 18th at Snake River Landing and I am getting really excited. We will even have official "Team Garrett" t-shirts! It is a great cause and I hope that with the money that is raised that someday they will be able to find a cure for this disease.

To donate, you can go to my site at http://walk.jdrf.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=extranet.personalpage&confirmid=87729588 or email me at lyndsgood@hotmail.com.

Thanks you!

Zucchini's Special Purpose

So I've never been a fan of zucchini. The only way I could say that zucchini actually sounded appealing to me would be battered, deep-fried, and immersed in Ranch dressing. I've never felt the need to plant zucchini and typically when friends offer to give me some, I pass.

Then the other day, my very good friend Ann Polson shared a wonderful recipe and a zucchini with me. And now I am sharing with you. You're welcome.

(And while the picture is not one I took, it is what the cake looks like, so I figured since my cake is all but gone, I could borrow someone else's picture.)



Zucchini Cake

1/2 C. butter
1/2 C. oil
1 3/4 sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 C. sour cream

Combine ingredients.

2 1/2 C. flour - do not sift
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
4 T. cocoa

Mix together wet ingredients, then add to dry ingredients and mix.

Add: 2 C. grated zucchini

Pour into 9 x 13 pan.

Sprinkle top with:
1/4 C. sugar
1/3 C. chocolate chips (or more)
chopped pecans or walnuts (But why would you use walnuts when you could use pecans?)

Bake at 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes.

Then I highly recommend eating the first piece while it is still warm, with a large glass of milk, as this is the best possible way of eating cake. (Especially when your family are all asleep in bed.) The best part . . . you can't even taste the zucchini in the cake, it just makes it super moist and delicious!

Also - a shout out to Kade's football team - Rigby 1 7th graders - they won their third game tonight which makes them 3-0 for the season. Undefeated, baby!

Baking IS my therapy!

So Courtney just got home from an almost week at Annie's (thanks Annie!) and Kade's been at Scout Camp all week, which means it has been a very quiet week. Tomorrow we get to go see Kade at camp so Courtney and I decided to bake a treat to take to the boys (if they last that long . . . seriously). My old standby as far as treats go has always been chocolate chip cookies. I love things like lemon bars, chocolate cake, cheesecake, etc. but there is just something about chocolate chip cookies (and the dough) that never lets me down. Simple goodness.

So I am sharing my favorite recipe along with pictures I took to experiment with the "food" setting on my camera. (Seriously, there is a food setting. Seriously.)

Nieman Marcus Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 C. butter, softened
1 C. white sugar
1 C. packed brown sugar

2 eggs
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla

2 1/2 C. oatmeal (grind the oatmeal in your blender until it looks like flour)
2 C. flour

lots o' chocolate chips (or broken up Rolos and chocolate chips)

Mix ingredients together and Bake at 350 degrees for 11 minutes. Try not to all of the dough before you get them baked.


Mmmmmmmmm . . . cookie dough.


The finished product. Hope they make it til tomorrow!

July

Not much time to write, but I uploaded these pics the other night and finally thought I'd post them. I'm certainly not complaining, but my new camera takes such high quality pictures that it takes for-ev-er (said like the Sandlot) for them to upload, so I have to have other things to do while they are loading.

Anyway, Courtney turned 10 on July 5, we were camping again but managed to get back in time for our traditional birthday celebration with Kesley who turned 9 on July 5 as well.


Here are the girls waiting to blow out their candles. (I am pretty sure Courtney is hypnotized.)


This is our traditional "put your cheeks together so I can have a picture of the birthday girls faces" picture. I have quite a few of them from previous years, I'll have to see if I can dig them out.


And finally, here is a picture of the wicked awesome smoke cloud in the sky after the INL fire on Tuesday night. I really like my new camera.

Other than that, I did in fact pass my last class, which means that I am totally and completely done with school forever and ever and now only have to pass stupid Audit, so I am back to studying, begrudgingly, but am loving not having homework, group projects, papers to write, etc. etc.

Happy July everyone!

Almost Done

I have officially earned an acronym! :) Friday was the big "Orals" day, where I got to show I actually learned something during my time at ISU. Near the end of your educational experience as a graduate student, you get to travel down to Pocatello, they give you a case and you have three hours and only what's in your backpack (and your noggin) to prepare a power point presentation outlining the issues at hand, perform a SWOT analysis, Porter's Five Forces Analysis, come up with alternatives, make a recommendation, and offer steps for implementation. Then your "committee" gets to grill you and ask questions that under normal circumstances you would easily know the answer, but under this much pressure and stress . . . but, HIP HIP HOORAY, I PASSED!!! (I wasn't super worried about not passing, but it is still stressful.)

The fun thing is, after I demanded my diploma on the spot, the graduate student guy in charge said that while I wouldn't get my diploma until August or so, I could put "MBA" on my resume THAT VERY DAY!!! On the spot, I was instantly an MBA, just like that! How incredible is that!?!? The really fun thing is that I only have TWO CLASSES LEFT TO ATTEND AND THEN I AM DONE WITH CLASSES FOREVER AND EVER AND EVER!!! (I know, I know, I am using a ton of capitals and exclamation marks, trust me, you would too.)

So, as I walked to the parking lot, I had a moment. I realized that I have worked my ass off for the last 5 years to get here and that while I am so glad to be done, I have learned that I am tougher than I ever thought I was and that I can accomplish anything I set my mind to. I almost got a little teary. Almost. Anyways, that is enough of my moment of being proud of myself, now we are back to just being happy to be done, well, almost done.

I will be retaking the stupid audit section of the CPA exam probably sometime in August, I'm still trying to make myself think about it, so far I only can think that it sucks.

Meanwhile, the kids and I had a day of fun Saturday, since we have all been starved for fun for some time now. We had breakfast outside, went to the zoo, then later went to the lake, and finished with a hot dog roast at our house. Kellie and her kids joined us for everything except the breakfast outside. It was a beautiful day and we had a great time.

Also, we got to go camping last weekend at Fall Creek with Brad, Stacy, and some other friends. We had lots of fun and went on a big long trail ride on the four wheelers and motorbikes. Here are some pictures from camping, I know I don't have any of Court, but I promise there will be more to come, as it is her birthday very very soon.


The falls at Fall Creek, I was testing out my camera on scenery, I need a class.


Stacy and I after riding for four hours, we are dirty girls.


Cowboy Kade


Greg and Kade at the falls.


More scenery.

Cheese

So, I got a new camera. It's a Nikon D5000 and is very fancy and I really have no idea how to use it, other than the basic point and shoot. No worries though, I will take a class (probably sometime in July) and learn how to do all that fancy stuff and take all of your family/baby/senior/wedding/boudoir pictures and be amazing.

But for now, here are some I took while we were camping.


Here is Kade, handsome as ever, just doing his best to be cool. (It is not hard to be cool when you are 12. It is much harder to be cool when you are 34.)


Courtney, looking cute. (Again, harder to be cute when you are 34.)


Again, children, cool and cute.

And that my friends, is all for now, since it is taking the computer a ridiculously long amount of time to load each picture. Good night and good luck.