I wanna know who you are!!

Ok, I found this site tracker on a friend's blog. Its pretty cool because it tells me how many people visit my blog, how long they are on it, and so forth. I looked on it today, and it said I had 16 people view my page today. I have 2 people who leave me comments regularly. That DOES NOT add up. If you read my blog, please...PLEASE just leave me a little Hi, or hows it going. Thats all! I'm a curious person, so unless my two stalkers just visit my blog over and over, which I doubt they are that bored, leave me some sort of response so I know who you are!!!!
Thanks Mom and Emily =)....atleast I know you two care!!

Down on the Farm

When I first moved to California, I never imagined miles upon miles of farmland and dairies. Even more, I never dreamed I would be living on a farm. It is the coolest thing though. We have this beautiful house and land. We have so much land surrounding us with beautiful animals. The best part is the neighbors are a good 1/4 of a mile away! I couldn't live like some people do in these packed neighborhoods where the next house over can see into your fenced in back yard. Anyways, every now and then, the kids and I take a little walk up the road. There are mostly cows and horses, but sometimes we see chickens and rabbits. They really love the horses, though. They are such gentle creatures as well as extremely beautiful. Here's some pics of our walk (or this day was bikeride)


Cell Phone pics....what can I say

Camera Crazy

This is what happens when 2 kids get a hold of the camera!!!



Sure are cute little stinkers!

Little Einstiens

I think one of the best things about being a mom is just watching the minds of my children work. Sean has weekly homework for Kindergarten, and Mackenzie wants to be just like Sean. So, I usually make a copy of Sean's homework for Mackenzie so she can be like Sean! She has tons of workbooks that she loves to draw or write in. I'm so glad they do like homework, although I don't know how long that will last (probably not long).

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Speaks for itself

Obviously there is nothing better to do today!

70 words

Speedtest

Scared

Ok, so Friday I am going in to have my gall bladder removed. At first I wanted it done. I was having a bunch of "attacks" and they were almost unbearable. Now I regret not going into ER so I could just have it out right then and there. I'm just feeling sort of nervous and really wanting the whole day over with. I scheduled it way back in January so it would not conflict with my school. I know I have a good Doctor. I have heard a lot about him. I do wish the hospital was the one in town. Instead I have to go 30 minutes away. I guess I do deserve the rest I will be getting afterwards. I do feel a little better knowing I can receive a priesthood blessing! I am so grateful for that.
OK, I feel a little better =)

Oh, and yes, I must do this....


Have a great day!!

Birthday Gift and Vinyl Letters

I think I finally conquered my lifelong goal of finding a gift for Bryce and Deborah that literally knocked their socks off! (Yes, I know they are reading)
If you don't already know, we are huge animal lovers. Between us, we have 4 dogs and 3 cats. They have a retreiver/cocker mix named Ginger which is 15 or so, and they added Hana, a black lab, and Kali, a yellow lab 2 years ago.
I came across this wonderful quote a few months back which says "Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our life whole."
I knew I had to do something for them that included that quote.
So I was just browsing through blogs one day and came across Shelly's blog. She is on my blog list to the left. She made this cute vinyl board with that quote. It turned out so dang cute!! I can't wait to get more ideas for her to help me out with. She has a blog called Wonderfully Wordy which has many of her creations, along with submissions from her readers. She is very affordable and completes and ships very quickly. I'm so glad I found her!!

Look what I can do!!

Well, this is what can happen when a mom gets so caught up in catching up her blog and does not pay attention to her children!

Thank you Leelou

I found a wonderful site that has so many awesome layouts for a blog! You have to check her out. Thank you for helping me out!!!

Technical Difficulties

Well, I am trying to get a new background layout for my blog so it wont be so BLAH...but I'm not doing something right. So, my Mary Kay icon is not up like the previous post says...But hopefully I will get things straightened out maybe tonight or tomorrow!

Mary Kay

Now that Mothers Day is fast approaching, why not treat that special lady in your life to some pampering! I am an Independent Beauty Consultant with Mary Kay and we have many fabulous products! Just click on the Mary Kay icon to the right of my blog and it will take you straight to my Mary Kay website where you can order online. If you place an order between 4/24/08 and 4/26/08 10pm Pacific time, I will take 20% off your order. You just have to tell me you ordered by seeing this on my blog!

HowManyOfMe.com

There is 1 person with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

How cool is that. I mean there are almost 230,000 people with the name Danielle and only 1150 people with the name Gilbride.
I guess I am pretty unique (for the time being)

Thanks Emily!!!

YAY!!! My first Tag!

My dear wonderful friend Emily just tagged me. I feel special!!! LOL Here's what you need to do.

1. Pick up the nearest book (at least 123 pages).
2. Turn to page 123.
3. Find the 5th sentence
4. Post the 5th sentence on your blog.
5. Tag 5 people.


"Whatever is handy," said Ralph, who hesitated to place an order when he could see Keith did not feel like going to dinner at all.
The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary

Ok, so now, I have to tag 5 people...I don't know that 5 people even read my blog..so I tag all of those who are reading this!

Saturday Getaway

Saturday the 12th, we all went on yet another day trip. I always enjoy them. I love to get out of the house and enjoy such fun times with my family! Monday, the 14 was Bryce's birthday, so he chose a couple of places to take us. First off, we headed for Berkeley which is right outside of San Francisco. We only had to drop a garden gate off to someone who had bought it on eBay.

The place we went to is called Armstrong Woods in Santa Rosa. This place is absolutely amazing. I'm not sure if it is a state park or what...the kids called it a Forest, so thats good for me. The whole way up there, Bryce and Deb were saying just how gorgeous it was and how peaceful and calm it felt to be in the woods. I had no doubt it would be a fun place, but its one of those places where you just have to be there and experience it yourself to understand how awesome it is. They compared it to the calmness felt in the temple, which was very true. Just for a moment, the kids were very quiet. It felt like we were the only people in there and it was so peaceful and calm...just like the temple. It makes me realize just how much Heavenly Father loves us by allowing us to enjoy such creations as this. I would love to go up there by myself one day and be able to enjoy the drive and all the different hiking trails. If you are ever in northern California, I definitely say this is one of the places you must come to.


The kids had a ball just being able to run and play and especially climb.

We also went to Goat Rock Beach. It was a pleasant change of scenery since we usually go to Carmel. It was very beautiful. There were even Seals that we could see very closely!

I will have to upload more pics later. Something is going on with the system.

Upcoming trips..
Utah in June
NC in July!!!
DISNEYLAND in September!!!

Major Re-cap!

Here I am almost 2 weeks later finally updating my blog. It really does get hard when you get behind! The week we returned home from the beach was just like any normal week. Kids got back to school, cooking, cleaning and laundry quickly resumed!


I look forward to every April and October. The first weekend of those months are General Conference in our church. This is where we get the privilege of hearing from the "head" leaders of the church. This year was especially exciting since we had the opportunity to watch a Solemn Assembly to sustain our new Prophet, Thomas S. Monson along with his two counselors, Henry B. Eyring and Dieter F. Uchtdorf. As I stood in my own living room to sustain these 3 wonderful men, of whom I have not even met, I knew that these were men of God. What a powerful spirit I felt in my home when I stood along with the other MILLIONS of faithful Latter-Day Saints to sustain them. That was only the beginning. What a wonderful spiritual meeting that Saturday morning was. Perhaps the most remembered speaker was Russell M. Nelson. He spoke about Salvation and Exaltation. It was just what I needed to hear, especially when he spoke on Families. My favorite quote was "The home is to be God’s laboratory of love and service. There a husband is to love his wife, a wife is to love her husband, and parents and children are to love one another". I just really needed to hear his words because I know that I can have that opportunity to have a temple marriage and raise my children in the gospel. He even told us how to discipline our children. And its EASY....It is just up to us, as parents, to be slow to anger and be patient. The counsel is easy, whether we can do it is up to us.
The rest of conference was fabulous. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and I look forward to hearing them sing for conferences.
Sunday morning and afternoon sessions were equally as spiritual and great. I learned so much from M. Russell Ballard from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. His counsel was exactly what I needed to hear since he spoke mainly to young mothers. I would post my favorite quote, but that would be impossible. I would be quoting the entire talk. Instead I will post a link to it at the bottom.
I think this was the first truly meaningful conference I have watched and listened to. I have enjoyed all the past conferences, but this one was especially memorable. I can't wait to get the Ensign(our church's monthly magazine) and read, re-read and study these talks so I can apply them to my life.
Now, on to catching up!!!



Here's that link: http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-851-37,00.html
Oh, and the pictures aren't wanting to come up...I'll try to fix that!

Mormon or Not, Please read this

I'm sure everyone knows about the FLDS leader who was just sentenced to 10 years in prison on the polygamy JUNK. Anyways, for those who read my blog that know I am mormon, but do not fully understand our beliefs, I just want to make sure everyone knows that we are not in ANY way affiliated with those who still believe in that stuff. I wish that would be the first thing any news program said or wrote before getting into the full story. Well, I found this great blog that really sums up a lot and I would love for everyone to read it. This gal puts it very nicely what we believe.

www.thegabblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/just-for-record.html

Also, for the real truth in our beliefs and teachings, you can visit:

www.lds.org
www.mormon.org
www.jesuschrist.lds.org


I just felt the need to get that off my chest!
Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Going Home

All good things must come to an end. The kids started school the next day, so we had to get outta there and get home. The majority of the morning was just packing and cleaning. We have to leave the doublewide looking immaculate when we leave. We took a little stroll around the block on our bikes which was fun, but cold. I sure hope we have another opportunity to stay there again. It may not be available much longer. Oh well, hence the opening sentence. We met up with Bryce's son Bryan for lunch. This place has to be the best Mexican restaurant I have eaten at (well, it may tie with El Jardin). Oh, its called the Whole Enchilada. Everyone raved about the fish tacos, so I figured I would try them. OH MY GOODNESS....I was ALMOST in Bubba Gump heaven. It was great. We had a great visit with Brian. We just missed his wife, Crissy. She had been sick all week and didn't feel quite up to it. Hopefully we can see them again soon!

It was really nice to get away, but it was so good to be home. Now off to unpacking.
Next vacation: End of June to UTAH!!!! Let the countdown begin

playlist.com....really cool site

Just taking a little break from posting about the beach trip. I added a bunch of my favorite songs to the player at the bottom of my blog. Its nowhere near a complete list of all my faves, but they are the ones I listen to pretty much every day while I'm on the computer. The site is free and the have tons of songs that you can add to your own playlist. Only thing is you can only listen to it on the computer...No downloading to the ipod darn it. Its still great. Check it out!

Laaaazzzzyyy Day

Saturday was a VERY relaxed day. I was kinda fidgeting all day. We were supposed to get up early and go to some estate and garage sales, but it had rained throughout the night. I probably should have just taken the truck and went somewhere...ANYWHERE!!! But I ended up reading a little more of my book and actually went back to sleep for a while.

Finally, at 3pm, we went to see the movie Horton Hears a Who. It was a really cute movie and the kids loved it! That was my second Steve Carrell movie on our vacation (even though on Horton, he was just a voice) and I really like him, so I think I may just join in on The Office bandwagon. He's a very good actor. I remember him in Bruce Almighty and he was just hilarious. Haven't seen Evan yet, but I should. Anyways....after the movie, we came home and started a 500 piece puzzle. Oh my. I had given Deb a puzzle of the Nauvoo Temple a couple of years ago. We figured we would bring it along on our trip since we had never put it together before. There were atleast 10 different BRICK buildings. Now you can just imagine how hard that was trying to put the right brick building together. After 3 hours, I had to stop. So, I went to Cold Stone for a treat!! Nothing like some cake batter with oreos to get rid of a headache. I tried to help out once I got back, but no such luck. Deb was just glued to the puzzle and would not stop! I don't think I have ever seen her tune everything else out quite so easily...LOL. Darn, I should have taken a picture.

How could I forget???

I totally forgot the best part of our 2nd day. We actually were able to take all five bicycles to the beach. We all got new bikes for christmas. Gotta love Santa!! Anyways, we definitely wanted to take a little ride despite the slight chill in the air. It was still a very beautiful day. We decided to go to Pacific Grove which is literally down the street from Monterey's Cannery Row. There is a very nice bike path (which is only supposed to be for bikers....NOT PEDESTRIANS) We weren't sure how it would be with the kids being so free and fast on their bikes. It turned out to be probably the most fun I had the whole weekend. Sean and Kenzie are getting where they can really ride their bikes pretty well. It was just so funny to me to watch them, especially Kenzie, just pedal their little hearts away.















It really was a wonderful day. I can't wait to do it again!

Day 2

,
We all had a very nice, relaxing morning. We are so lucky to have this cute place to stay in Seaside. Did I mention its free??? Deb works for the guy who owns the mobile home park and he kept one open for his staff and family to use. Unfortunately, we won't have access to it much longer. Anyways, we weren't sure if it was going to rain or not today. It ended up sprinkling a little. We headed up to Santa Cruz to a beautiful antique shop called Wisteria. It is such a beautiful place to go. When we head to the coast, we always stop here and another antique shop called Crawfords.


Its always fun to go to places like that. We didn't get to spend too much time there since we got a late start. But afterwards we went to a wonderful place called Gayles Bakery. This is one place we always go to as well. They have really good food and especially wonderful desserts!!

Once we all got home, I put the kids to bed and then I went back out to shop. There was a nice strip mall with Old Navy, Bed Bath & Beyond, and some other shops. I keep asking the question, Why do I even go to Old Navy. I find all these cute clothes, but nothing ever looks good on me. So frustrating.

After my no-luck shopping quest, I reluctantly went back to the beach house. I wanted to do something, anything, but there just wasn't too much to do. So, the movie tonight was Enchanted. Oh, what a delightful movie! It was just so sweet. Another must see!!
Well, just another day closer to the end. Off to bed I go.

First Day of Bliss

Today was a very nice day. We got up when we wanted to, ate breakfast when we wanted to, and got dressed when we wanted to. Well, of course the kids were awake long before we were, but at least they were courteous and played board games until someone woke up!

Around lunch time, we headed out to the beach. With books in tow, along with sand pails, shovels, sand machines, towels, sunscreen, water, and chairs we headed for Carmel beach. I LOVE that place. Not only is the town so quaint and cute, but the beach is known for being pet friendly. There are so many dogs and puppies that just run and play and fetch Frisbees. People are so friendly, which is a good thing since Sean is not afraid to go up to them and ask, "Can I pet your dog?"
We are definitely an animal loving family.

I am not much of a novel reader, but I decided to pick up Nicholas Sparks' "At First Sight". Wonderful book, but I actually threw the book at a certain point because I wasn't expecting what happened. Guess you'll just have to read it to see. Anyways, the three of us are sitting on the beach with our novels and the kids are having a blast playing in the sand. They love walking along the ocean, so of course they did that too!


After freezing our tails off we finally leave and go back to Monterey. If you have never eaten at Bubba Gumps, you HAVE to go there! I am not much of a seafood lover, but give me their Mahi-Mahi fish and chips and I am in HEAVEN!!! Ahhhh, I am gleeking right now!

I brought my camera in for this very reason. To capture the pure, heavenly taste of this delectable meal. I finally remembered halfway through eating. Then I felt kind of dumb taking a picture of my food (now I know how Heather W. felt taking pics of her food on her vacation!) but eh, who cares! I'm simply pleased. This is not an elegant seven course meal by any means, but its is DELISH!
Its such a cute place to go for dinner. The whole restaurant is themed around Forrest Gump. Hence the RUN, FORREST RUN signs. If you need the waiter, you flip the sign to run, forrest
run. Its cute. Then most of the time, the waiters come by and ask all these trivia questions about the movie.
The building is on the pier, so we are overlooking the ocean. Very beautiful sight....that is until we spot a bird that is perched on the building, looking inside at all of us patrons, eating. This bird begins to salivate. I mean, dripping! It was hilarious. Too bad I didn't catch a pic of that!



So, our night of fun is over. After everyone went to bed, I stayed up and watched Dan, in Real Life. What an awesome movie! Of course, any sappy little love story I will watch! I recommend this movie to anyone!

So, here's to the end of a nice, relaxing day! Three more to go....YAAAYYY!!!

I'm really still alive

Yes, we have been home for a week and no, I havent gotten around to updating on our trip. That is a priority now! Hopefully tonight I will be able to get some pics up of the beach, kids, and my favorite food in the world! Have a great one!