February 2021

Easton has hit the magical age where Mickey Mouse will entertain him when I need a few uninterrupted minutes.

I kept the Christmas cards up on the wall for all of January and then turned them into a heart banner as I have done in years past.

Peyton got to go to Activity Days in person! They made Valentine boxes.

I decided that I needed to start eating better, so I spent the month learning how to count macros. At first I wasn't anywhere close to my protein goal, but now I've figured it out and can actually reach my goal some days. I've lost a few unwanted pounds, but more than anything I've found that I have a lot more energy throughout the day and my run times have gotten a whole lot faster without really changing anything else.

One of the things I found was these protein waffles. They aren't good on their own, but with toppings they aren't bad at all.

Rog was at a church meeting, so I gave the boys a bath. I remembered some bath pictures I had taken about a year earlier, so I took some pictures to compare. February 2021.

January 2020.

This little chunk has grown up so much! February 2021.

January 2020.

Peyton got a haircut after almost a year. This was the before. It wasn't looking too bad, but it was time for a trim. We forgot to take an after. 

We had a Super Bowl themed day at High. It ended up being a cheer day. It was so fun to dance in my cheer skirt again!

Peyton has been working on her back handspring and I convinced her to let me spot her.

Rog got the kids involved in helping him paint the cabinets for our second oven.

We went downtown for the Portland Winter Light (non)Festival. They had different locations spread throughout the city. This was our favorite one we saw. 

We went to Salt and Straw after.

When you're freezing, but your ice cream is so delicious!

We had snow in our forecast which always makes me nervous.

I was hoping we'd be able to avoid snow days since we were still 100% virtual.

We woke up Friday morning to snow and the kids did have school. Easton was confused about all that white stuff on the ground.

I hung up all our lanterns for Lunar New Year.

I made fried rice, orange chicken, and dumplings for dinner. I made the fried rice from scratch, but the orange chicken and dumplings were both from Costco.

And we watched Mulan for movie night.

I was making a cake for Valentine's Day, so I baked the cake layers that night.

The next morning we woke up to find that the power had gone out during the night. Easton wasn't happy about missing his morning Mickey, so we let him watch one episode on a phone. I could tell our house was already cold, so I didn't want to get out of bed!

We considered driving to the Hobbs since they had power, but we didn't think we'd be able to make it. The roads were a mess and many trees were down. Everything was covered in a layer of ice.

Our neighbor let us borrow his generator for a bit that afternoon. Around 2:00 our power came back on after it being out for about 12 hours. 

The kids had some fun playing in the snow.

When the power was out, I was worried I wouldn't be able to make the frosting for my cake and finish it. I was so happy when the power came back on because it meant my cake layers wouldn't go to waste!

I was going for a chocolate covered strawberry cake. I did my white cake with strawberry frosting, strawberry jam in between the layers, and a chocolate drip. It was my first time doing a chocolate drip. (My other cakes have been a white chocolate drip.) I used Winco chocolate chips and it ended up a lot more runny than the white chocolate ones I've done with higher quality white chocolate. I think next time I will do a higher quality chocolate, so it doesn't drip so far down. 

We had invited the Martyns over for Valentine desserts Saturday night. At the last minute we invited the Yates and the Sullivans over since they were still without power. Peyton made some brownies for the kids and the adults ate the cake.

After everyone left and we got the kids to bed, I got our valentine mailboxes ready. Each of the kids got a couple little things and a bag of assorted red, white, and pink candies. Corbyn got some i-clips bookmarks and a nice Rubix cube. (He already had a cheap little one that he learned on.) Peyton got a mini panda stapler and Mickey earrings. Logan got a maze book and a Mario figure. Easton got a new Snuggle Puppy book and ultra washable crayons. Rog got blue light glasses and a bag of red peanut butter M&Ms. I got Mickey earrings (they were buy one, get one free) and Twizzler Cherry Bites.

We woke up and luckily still had power. I made us some heart egg toast and bacon for breakfast.

Church was cancelled because of the storm. We had kind of a chill day. I got dinner all made (baked spaghetti and garlic pull apart bread) and cooking in the oven and then the power went out again about 5:00. I left dinner in the oven until the oven wasn't warm anymore and then pulled it out. The spaghetti wasn't as warm as it usually is, but to our great surprise, the bread cooked through. 

We pulled out our battery powered tea lights and had dinner by candlelight.

I hadn't taken a picture of the kids in their valentine outfits, so I tried to take one by the light of the fire. It didn't really turn out very well, but it looks better in black and white.

We got the kids to bed and then around 10:30 the power came back on - this time for good. We were lucky because so many people were without it for many more days than us! We got a valentine picture of us before we went to bed.

The morning of February 15th, Rog's uncle, Rey, passed away from COVID. That day COVID got a whole lot more real for us. Before that we had known family members and friends who had COVID and we knew people who had family or friends die from COVID, but until that day we hadn’t personally known someone who died from COVID. 

Rey and his wife, Marillyn had a profound impact on Rog in his late teenage years. He lived with them and worked for Rey’s company a few summers before his mission and also for a few months while we were dating.

He was incredibly generous with his money and his time. And he was always silently serving others. We had our reception at a location that allowed you to bring your own food to serve. We got cookies and brownies from BYU and cheesecakes from Costco to serve. We had overlooked bringing knives to cut the cheesecake. But we didn’t even realize this until later when we found some knives that didn’t belong to us and asked around to find out where they came from. Rey had seen that we didn’t have knives and went out to get some for us. We still have one of those knives and I use it frequently. That knife will always remind us of an incredible man who was always serving like the Savior did.

We know he is in a better place and we know we will see him again someday. Until then, we will strive to be more like him.

We had put together some valentines for friends that we delivered over the next few days when we could get out. Yoda valentines from Corbyn.

Panda valentines from Peyton.

Maze valentines from Logan.

And goldfish valentines from Easton.

My mom got us the Don't Miss This Poster Set and a frame to hang it with for Valentine's Day. 

 

Corbyn helped put a diaper on Easton and he somehow got it on backwards! 😂

After the snow/ice storm there were downed trees everywhere. It was sad to see them when we were driving around for the first week or two after the storm.

We celebrated Mardi Gras with gumbo and dirty rice...

Beignets...

And beads!

Running in the snow in Oregon is not the same as running in the snow in Utah. Since it usually only happens once a season, I just wait until it all melts to run again. Thank goodness for High and indoor weight workouts to get me through that time.

We didn't miss any days of school for the snow, but we did miss 3 days of school because of the power outages. This was our first day back and it wasn't even a full day. We finally had a full normal day a week after the snow started.

I made banana muffins and Easton worked on the important life skill of licking the paddle.

I finished this Jungle Book puzzle. At first I was missing one piece...

But luckily I found it! Crisis averted!

Peyton and Kinley love to coordinate and wear the same outfits.

I filled up another High punch card.

Blake was disappointed we didn't end up having to come stay at their house during the power outage, so Diana invited Corbyn and Peyton to come have a sleepover. We've decided we aren't going to do sleepovers as a general rule, but cousins are an exception. We met Diana in Portland Saturday afternoon and they slept over that night. Then we went to the Hobbs' house for dinner on Sunday and took them home with us.

It was pretty quiet with just the 2 little boys at home.

At the Hobbs Corbyn and Peyton got to enjoy Voodoo Donuts. 

And Peyton and Skyler dressed in matching outfits.

It's always fun to see these two cousins together.

We pulled out the N64 at the Hobbs and played Diddy Kong Racing (a favorite of ours when we were growing up) for a few minutes.

Rog's parents moved from Colorado to Utah, so Rog flew to Colorado to help. He helped them load the moving van, drove it to Utah with Tay, and then flew home from Utah.

While he was gone we played the “What am I wearing and how did I do my hair?” game that we used to play when he didn’t work from home. I was shocked when he guessed correctly what shirt I was wearing.

Hair isn't so impressive since I only do it a couple different ways.

One night I found Corbyn asleep like this and I thought it was pretty funny.

Most mornings I got the kids ready for virtual school and then set up Easton in front of Mickey while I got my workout in. On the days I ran I locked the kids in the house and had extra incentive to hurry home.

My big kids are getting to be big helpers. (Peyton especially!)

But they are no substitute for Rog! We were all happy to have him come home!

The day after he got home was extra busy for me with High in the morning, a service project with the YW and YM to help ward members clean up their yards from the storm, and giving blood.

My February project was this wooden compass for the guest room (that will become Corbyn's room when Easton learns to crawl out of his crib).

While I was at it, I made this print. Both were designs I got in the Silhouette Design Store, picked the colors, and printed out.

Both go in this wall collage.

And that was February!