RISE and Shout

See these?

These are called Yummy Chocolate Cupcakes Waiting for Frosting.
What you might not know is that they are vegan. Yep. No dairy and no eggs.

Unless you are also baking with these restrictions, you have NO idea how truly RARE it is to get a nice puffy top on cupcakes or muffins! To achieve RISE. It makes me want to jump for joy.
(And obviously it happens so rarely around here that I actually photographed them.)


Just look at these!!! I'll probably make these again next week for a certain two year old birthday celebration...

Now, frost (*with dairy free frosting of course*) and eat. :)

Vegan Chocolate Cake (or cupcakes!)
from allrecipes.com

Prep Time: 15 Minutes
Cook Time: 45 Minutes
Ready In: 1 Hour
Servings: 8
"This is a really simple, yet very tasty cake. You can use rice flour or something other than wheat. You can also add chocolate chips and, or nuts."
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon distilled white vinegar
1 cup water
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease one 9x5 inch loaf pan.
2. Sift together the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt. Add the oil, vanilla, vinegar and water. Mix together until smooth.
3. Pour into prepared pan and bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool.

It's Not Even April Fools Day

This was Utah's big joke today. Too bad I can't say APRIL FOOLS!!!

These are my poor tulips.

And this is the view of my street. Yep, it's all sticking. I would have shot a picture of the mountains, but they are covered by clouds right now - as well as snow.

It's a blasted wintry wonderland out there!

PREPARE YOURSELVES, oh visitors with California blood!!!

Camping in Austin

Our last day in Austin, the adults were all busy packing up and preparing to go... so we let the kids CAMP in the living room! Notice the blazing fire? (This is my kind of camping by the way...)
Sam thought it was fantastic.
Trav did too, but then found other things to do. Which is why you won't see him in many of these pics.
Sam and Soph loved to switch sleeping bags.
Here's one pic of all four kids in their bags... mostly anyway.
Cute little Soph
Here they are "sleeping"
Zack LOVES to pretend to sleep.
Sam catching some Zs.
Soph's sleeping too.
Then, about 2 minutes later, they all woke up!
This was a hit activity. (Thanks Bryce for setting everything up)
And, we had to go home. Here we all are in the van going to the airport. Notice how lovely and healthy Trav and Soph look? They were SO sick! Poor little cousins!
Thanks for the fun time, LaPs. We loved coming to visit! Come visit us soon!

Austin Random Part 2

One day in Austin, it got really quiet for too long. You know - the dangerous quiet? I went to investigate and found these cute cousins coloring together (and Sam playing too). Luckily, no coloring on the walls, white bedspread, or anything else. They were color wonder markers they found. Phfew!

Zack and Soph actually get along really really well.
They colored happily together for about 30 minutes.

Then Trav and Zack went outside to play. The light was perfect, so I had to snap some pics.

This picture is hilarious. This is the look Zack gives anyone (including me) if he feels we are interrupting his important current task.

But, then he waved to me. I love his waves.

Trav was pretending to eat berries off of the bush behind him. Leese wasn't too thrilled. :)

Trav thought it was a fun game...

Zack loved playing with the chalk.

And showing it to me.

Sam was playing outside, but then I couldn't find him. Turns out, this empathetic soul went in search of his sick cousin who was watching Little Einsteins. Empathy or tv addiction?

Sam stayed with Sophie for a long time.

Poor Soph felt pretty miserable.

But that didn't stop my silly Sam - who STILL hasn't caught this bug! I'm pretty sure it's gone for good now... Wish I had his immune system!

FHE Never To Be Forgotten

First of all, Zack has started smiling for the camera! I LOVE these smiles!

For FHE (Family Home Evening), we re-enacted the Samuel the Lamanite story from the Book of Mormon. We cut out paper arrows for the kids to throw at Samuel the Lamanite.

Here's Zack with his arrow.

Sam being Samuel the Lamanite
Here are all the "bad guys" with their arrows.

Throwing their arrows at Sam...

Soph was concentrating very hard...

Soph showing me her arrow

Now it's Soph's turn to be Samuel the Lamanite.

Sam being the bad guy

Sam and Bryce throwing arrows!

Look at these "bad guy" faces! I think Soph would win...

Meanwhile, poor Leese felt pretty sick. In the end, Trav and Soph caught it before we left. I had it last week. And Zack is just getting over it now. Ick!

Cute cousins
Somehow, this ended with all the cousins on the stairs.
Being silly.
ALL cousins looking somewhere close to the camera. AMAZING.

It was so much fun! Sam insisted we do this for FHE at our house when we got back.