Project Life: June 24 - 30

This was one of my favorite weeks of the summer! It's the week my siblings and I pulled off a surprise 40th anniversary party for my parents. The beginning of the week was questionable because I could barely get out of bed thanks to a stomach bug/trip to Mexico. Luckily by Wednesday, I was up and moving again and ready to party.

Our kids got together during the week with about 20 friends to practice and preform a play. It was a perfect summertime activity. They did it last summer and I hope it's a new summer tradition!

The party invite is at the top of the page. Getting those invites out was quite an ordeal thanks to awful customer service at Snapfish, but the invites did make their way to the guest. Actually each of the guests ended up getting 3 invites thanks to the Snapfish errors which was a bit embarrassing, but at least people were invited!

Party Invite /// Pulling off the Surprise /// Cake Table /// Table Decor /// Slicing the Cake

Post Play Celebration at Wendy's /// Doing a Play with Friends /// Card Games /// Mexican Food /// Hanging with the Family /// Anniversary Party

I also did one insert since there were so many Anniversary Party photos that I wanted to include. I had to narrow it down for this album, but I need to figure out what to do with the rest of the photos.

Another great summer week documented!

Products Used:

InLinkz.com

Strawberry Lemonade Slush

One of our favorite summertime treats we like to mix up is a Strawberry Lemonade Slush.  It's so cold and refreshing. We like to make this when we are out enjoying time at our pool.

 

A bonus is that it's only around 20 calories per serving!

 The idea for this slush came from my spinning teacher at the gym a few years ago. She listed the ingredients in class once and I've worked on adjusting the quantities.  I love that it's a light drink that everyone is my family loves.



Strawberry Lemonade Slush

15 Strawberries, rinsed
1/2 Packet of Crystal Light Lemonade (enough to make 1 quart)
3 cups of ice
1 1/2 cups water

Put everything in the blender and blend for about 30 seconds or until slush is well mixed. I throw the strawberries in whole with the stems attached.

Hope you give it a try!

Salted Caramel Cheesecake

Whatever your weekend plans are, I highly encourage you to add "make THIS Salted Caramel Cheesecake" to your list. I've made it twice this summer and it was amazing both times.

 
I found this recipe via Pinterest and decided to give it a try. This recipes calls for A LOT of salt and I cut it all down by at least half and think there is a nice, mild salty flavor, but it's not overwhelming. It would be so sad to mix up a beautiful cheesecake only to have it be too salty, so if you make it, go easy on the salt.

Don't be intimidated by this recipe. I'd never even made a cheesecake in a springform pan before and it turned out perfectly.  I had to borrow the pan from my sister for the first cheesecake, but went to Target and spent under $11 for my own pan so I can make this cheesecake whenever I want!

I'd also never made homemade caramel before, but the directions are clear and easy to follow. My caramel did take a little longer to brown than the recipe, but with a little patience, it turned out.

We had a cook-off at church last weekend and I decided this cheesecake was the perfect candidate for the competition. Guess what? It won first place. I really can't take much credit because I just followed the recipe. But I'm just saying that it really is worthy of beating out 20+ other delicious desserts.

Let me know if you make it! I'd love to hear if you love it as much as I do.

Project Life: June 17 - 22

Today I have another week of Project Life to share with you. I'm feeling a little burn out on the project, but I'm going to keep it up because I know it will be worth it in the end.

Summer was in full swing this week and we spent a lot of time with family and went down to Mexico to the beach for the weekend.

Father's Day Celebrations /// Celebrated my Mother-in-law's Birthday ///Swimming in our Pool

Beach in Mexico /// Octopus! /// Pool Time in Mexico /// Mango Flower


The supplies were pretty simple this week. I used up a bunch of scraps sitting on my work desk. Got to love that.

InLinkz.com

Project Life: June 10 - 16

With the start of summer, my time to work on Project Life pages seemed to disappear. I guess we were too busy traveling and keeping the kids busy and home that I just didn't have time to get to creating the PL pages. Luckily I was busy taking lots of pictures and collecting little bits of things along the way. A large pile of goods has been stacking up and now it's time to tackle those Project Life pages.

On our first full week home on summer break, our three kids did a week long summer choir camp where they performed a play with lots of singing and choreography. We spent that weekend with friends at the AZ Grand Resort which is only 15 minutes from our house. They offer great summer rates that include the hotel, waterpark, breakfast and spa credits. How could we resist?

I also spent some time on a web chat with my four siblings planning the 40th Anniversary Party for my parents that we had at the end of June. The top photo show my computer screen with all of our little screens on the chat. Love that technology can connect people in three different states for a real time video chat. So cool.

While we were staying at the AZ Grand, we went to Rustler's Rooste for dinner. It's a fun western style (tourist trap) type restaurant on the hotel property. We had a guy do some really cool magic tricks for us while we waited for our dinner. We were happy to tip him because he really did a great show and it was the highlight of dinner.

Although creating these pages can be a bit tedious when I'm weeks behind and have a big pile of things to fit in the album, it's always so fun to look at the completed pages and have a record of what we did each week. I'm committed to finished this project through the end of the year, but I'm going to have to assess at the end of the year and see if I'm up to doing it again.

This week's supplies:

InLinkz.com

King's Beach Snow Cones

One of our family's favorite things to do on vacation is find a treat to enjoy sometime during the day. While we were in Lake Tahoe earlier this month, we enjoyed some time one day out on the lake kayaking. After coming to shore, we visited a farmers market right at the beach.   When we saw the Shave Ice stand at the farmer's market we knew we had found a treat we needed to test out. (Doesn't it seem like it should be shaved ice? I'm always perplexed by this.)

The best way to enjoy a snow cone is with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream at the bottom of the cup. A fun bonus at this shave ice stand was that ever snow cone came with a lei. Someday I'd like to enjoy a snow cone in Hawaii, but for now, these Tahoe snow cones were pretty near perfect.

Hope you are enjoying the weekend!

Layout Supplies /// True Stories Kit /// August Add-on

Hello, Mexico

Last month we drove about 4 hours south to go to the beach in Rocky Point, Mexico. I was a bit apprehensive about driving into Mexico because tourist have been warned that it could be dangerous. We'd never been down to Rocky Point, but since it's our closest beach, it seemed like it was worth a visit. Thankfully the drive went smoothly. Except for when we thought we had a flat tire about 30 minutes into Mexico in the middle of nowhere. Luckily it was a false warning from a car readout and we didn't have to deal with a flat tire.

We were able to rent a beautiful condo from a friend of a friend and we felt so lucky to get to spend a few days there. There was tile, granite, wood and beautiful furnishings everywhere. We felt like we were at a resort! The view from the balcony was gorgeous. It overlooked the condo pools, the beach and the ocean. The was where I found all six kids (we went with another family) standing when I first came into the condo.

The balcony ended up being one of our favorite places to relax while we were there. We ate all of our meals on the balcony. We'd brought all of our food down in coolers and we had so much good food to eat. We were hoping to avoid and food related illness plus save lots of time and money since we had 11 people in our group. I loved cooking and enjoying our meals with the sound of the ocean waves in the background.

Hopefully we will get back for a return visit sometime soon!

Layout Supplies /// True Stories Kit /// August Add-on