Somebody had a birthday...

And their name is Danny...

Dan and his birthday ice cream sandwich.

My hubby turned 25 on Saturday!  One whole quarter of a century!  We went up to visit his parents for the weekend, and a lot of eating was involved.  Saturday night we went out to dinner at Woodranch Barbeque (I think that's what it was called...regardless it was delicious).  The servings were huge, but we all thought we could handle dessert, fools that we were.  Dan basically wasted his free ice cream sundae, because he was too stuffed to handle another bite.  Don't worry, we took our cheesecake to go.

Dan and his momma

Not the greatest picture of me, but Dan was actually smiling for the camera in this one. =]

Sunday night, Carrie made one of Dan's favorite dinners--chicken enchiladas.  Then we had two desserts (at Dan's request): home made ice cream sandwiches (a Snow family birthday tradition!) and raspberry brownies.

Let me tell you a fun story about those brownies.  When Dan and I were dating, my lovely roommate Lacey made us some delicious brownies, very similar to BYU's brownie recipe.  Half of the brownies had mint frosting, and the other half had cherry.  Dan fell in love with these cherry brownies.  They became the stuff of legend.  My family has a mint brownie recipe that we make all the time, and every time we had it, Dan would say, "These are awesome, but I bet they would be even better with cherry frosting like Lacey's brownies.  Those were incredible."  He's been asking me to make him cherry brownies every year for his birthday since I've known him (that'd be the past three years.)  I finally decided that this year was the year.  I thought it wouldn't be that big of a deal.  Instead of mint extract in the frosting, I'd just add cherry extract.  Simple enough. Except for the part where they don't seem to sell cherry extract in Southern California at any grocery store.  At all.  They sell every other flavor imaginable.  I could have made Dan rum brownies.  But alas, no cherry.  We were starting to worry that maybe cherry extract didn't exist, and somehow Lacey had cherry super powers to make her frosting...but after texting she told us that cherry extract was indeed the secret to the frosting, and that it was really weird that we couldn't find it at the grocery store.  No worries, we used raspberry extract and those brownies were just as delicious.  But we've learned our lesson that apparently cherry extract is one of those items to stock up on while in Utah...like Grandma Sycamore's bread.

Another Danny favorite.

Happy Birthday to my handsome, intelligent, comedic, sports-obsessed, one-in-a-million husband.  I love you!

Carrie’s Cake Mix Cookies

1 box cake mix, any flavor
2 eggs
1/3 c. oil

Mix ingredients together. Roll mixture into balls and place on cookie sheet. Bake at 350˚ for 8 to 9 minutes.

The kids like to add Reeses Pieces to chocolate cake mix or M&Ms to yellow cake mix.

Carrie’s Birthday Ice Cream Sandwiches

1 pack age chocolate cake mix ¾ c. shortening
2 eggs
1 carton ice cream (box shape is better)

Mix together cake mix, eggs, and shortening. It will be very thick. Roll into 28 walnut sized balls and drop onto cookie sheet. Bake at 350˚ for 10 minutes. Let cool. Cut ice cream from carton into 14 pieces (7 times lengthwise, then cut in half). Place ice cream in between two cookies; smooth around the edge. Put in freezer and freeze hard before serving. Makes 14 ice cream sandwiches.

(P.S. I know a few of you have been asking for pictures of my baby bump.  I'll post some as soon as I get one.  It's kind of rough to justify taking a picture of my belly when the first thing anyone says to me when they see me is, "Wow, you don't even LOOK pregnant." I know it's weird, but somehow a fetus the size of an onion really is in there.  However, I think I hit a turning point yesterday, because a few people said I'm finally starting to show.  So pictures should probably be coming within this next week, if I had to guess.)

An Award!

My cousin Autumn (of Stay Gold, Autumn) awarded me with the "tell me about yourself award."

Pretty straight foward: 

1. Say 7 facts about yourself.  2. Pass it on.

1.  I am 16 weeks and 5 days pregnant.  I get more and more nervous about being a mom everyday.  But also excited.
2.  I'm a writer, but out of practice.
3. I just moved into a new apartment.  I have so many ideas for it, but afraid that I don't have the skills, time, or energy to complete what I envision. 
4. I have two canker sores in my mouth right now and they are KILLING me.
5. I just chopped off all my hair.  It's all because my husband won't shave his beard.
6. I hope we raise our family in the South.  I just love it there.
7. This one time in high school, I tripped in the parking lot and fell on the hood of a car.  I set the alarm off, and then that alarm set off the alarm of the car parked next to it.  I ran away.  Except my whole gym class saw.

I give this award to:
Shalee
Lisa
Lyse
Becky

A list.

Today was made of:

rain
crisp air
hot chocolate
sweater dress and tights
unpacking
planning, planning, planning
leftover potato soup
straight hair that gets messed up because of the rain
new fancy desk at work and so much drama/chaos
organization
daydreams
friends
contentment

Hello October, I think I love you.

Classic

This is my littlest brother, Jack.

He's making a weird face because he's nervous for his first day of preschool.

Jack is probably the funniest little kid ever.  As you read that statement, you're probably thinking, yes Lauren, but you're clearly biased since you're related to him.  Don't worry, I have a story that will help to prove my point.

Almost everytime I talk to my mom, she has a Jack story.  My personal favorite is this gem she told me last week.

Jack loves to have his hair gelled "up" (as seen in the above photo).  However, my mom normally keeps the hair gel out of his reach to prevent any unnecessary messes.  So imagine her surprise when one evening Jack came down the stairs, his hair goopy with sticky gel. 
Mother: "Jack, what is in your hair??"
J: "Gel!  I did it myself!"
M:"Ti (my other brother) did you leave the gel out???"
Ti: "No, I haven't even used it today."
M: "Jack, where did you get that gel from?"
J: "The toilet!!"

Yes, ladies and gentleman, Jack had determined that the little dispenser inside the toilet bowl was filled not with cleaning fluid, but hair gel.  So naturally he reached right in and scooped himself out a bit.

It's the stories like these that make me so excited for Baby Snow.