Professional baking scientists

You might not know this but...
Mikie and are are basically professional bakers.

I know.
Shocking.
But, as you can see..
We are wearing aprons
And we have flour on our faces.
Which means...
Professional.
Bakers.
Obviously.

Actually...
I think we were more like scientists
Because we were experimenting on all the ways to improve oatmeal cookies...

Mikie did most the work

While I sat around eating the experiments....

NOT!

This picture is much more accurate.
Ok, actually...
I'm not sure who made the cookies
because all I remember is eating lots and lots and lots of dough

But I think we eventually put some in the oven....
See
There's like six cookies in there!

But lets be honest....

The cookie dough tasted way better than the actual baked cookies.

But have to warn you.

The cookies had one severe side effect....

Cookie Coma.

But don't worry
It was totally worth it.

Spring!!

Good news everybody!!

Flowers.

On trees.

And they're pink!

I'm almost 97% sure that it's spring.

3% of me has this feeling that winter didn't get the memo.
Because it's pretty much really cold outside.

Come on winter!
Take a hint!
It's OVER.
Take your cold and your clouds and
Get OUT!

The flowers are freezing!

The lesson of Winter

Something I've noticed...
Something that's happening is this thing...
It's called:
Winter.
No matter how much vitamin D I take
(And I take a whole lotta buncha)
It's still not SUNNY!
Why did I leave California again?
I forget.
Look at this little girl.

I left this!

I could have been sitting on the beach building sand castles
Letting the sand sift through my hands
Laying there forever, just doing nothing
With this little girl.
No wait.
By myself.
I forgot, I don't actually know that girl.
shoot.
Well anyhow, I could have been all by myself on the beach....
No wait.
I forgot. I wasn't going to live at the beach.
I was going to live in some non-castle passing out hot dogs.
Ohhhh yeah....

hmmm.
Thank goodness I came back!
Even if there isn't a lot of sun or sifty sand...
there's still beaches...

and I mean

I know people.

And also...

Come on Mindy
It's SEATTLE!
It's supposed to be like this in January.
And February...
And March
Probably a little of April...

I guess winter is supposed to be like that.
That way, I remember how much I love the sun.
If it was always there I would forget that I loved it so much.
I would take it for granted.
Like I do with everything in my life.
So thank you winter.
For opening my eyes to see that the sun does not belong to me..
It's a gift

Lessons about cupcakes, and love

On Wednesday
Jennie turned 23
It was a big day....
I mean, 23 is a big deal
Jennie is a woman now.
She's a grown up.
To celebrate her transformation into this journey of adulthood, we invited over Jennie's best friend...

Poppy
As you can see
She made Jennie cupcakes.

She even let Jennie help!

After spending some time with Poppy, I realized something...
Poppy has a lot of insight and wisdom on life.

Not only did she teach us how to make delicious cupcakes...

Poppy taught us how to love.

While Jennie and I would have been content to have a party with just the three of us, Poppy saw someone who was being left out, and took the initiative to include him in our adventures.

Mister Kawits!!!

She opened right up to him and made him part of the group.

She did everything she could to make him feel comfortable.

She even took care of his medical needs.

I often overlook those in need of friends.
Recently though, the tables have turned,
And I find myself being the one in need.
And I now see how important it is to be a Poppy.

But you know...
The best part of the whole thing was...

Poppy didn't even realize how wonderful and selfless her gift of friendship was.

She simply opened her heart, and loved.

Beach house blues

I'll tell you about a little place where I live.

No. Not Seattle.

I mean, I suppose physically I do reside in Seattle...

Mentally...

I live at my beach house.

I live in a quaint little town on the shores of an imaginary beach in some other world. The weather is always exactly what it should be, and everyone is happy and life is perfect as I have allowed no space in my imaginary life for troubles or worries.

The beach house is spacious and airy, with wood floors, french doors, and a cozy couches. Every morning I sit on my porch swing and sip hot coffee with this really great guy I married until our scruffy dog begs us to walk him along the beach. We spend the afternoon working on our treehouse, where we hope to sleep on hot summer nights. There's a gazebo with twinkle lights that extends out into the water where we dance on clear nights. And every Saturday we walk down the beach to our favorite cafe and.....
Well. You get the point.
Anywho
Today was especially gloomy, so I went away to my beach house.....
And I suddenly got really sad.
Because
I realized something...
It's not real.

Dang dreams
Keep on ruining reality.

North Pole Pen Pal

BIG NEWS!!!
Biggest news I've ever had in my whole entire LIFE!
Even bigger than Santa's boogers on my coffee table!!
I know....
Hard to believe that there even could be any bigger news.
But, life surprises you sometimes.

Ok. Let me begin the story.
About a month ago, I wrote a letter to Santa Claus.
My first letter ever.

Since it was my first, I had to make sure everything was perfect.
So I wrote it inside of a magical fort...

With my two good friends, Jennie and Mark.

We took our Santa letters very seriously, and even dressed up to deliver them to the nearest mailbox.

We walked for blocks and couldn't find a single mailbox!
Not even at the library!
We almost put our letters in the book return box out of desperation...
But alas!
We finally found a mailbox...
An old abandoned mailbox... in the middle of nowhere.
But, a mailbox is a mailbox.
So we put our letters in with the faith that they would be delivered to the north pole.

And....

THEY WERE!!!

Not only did Santa get my letter.....

HE WROTE ME BACK!!!!

I think Santa Claus is a fourth grader from Alaska...

Who knew!

All this time I thought he was an old man.

Santa Snot

Good news everyone!
SANTA CAME TO MY HOUSE!!!

And you wanna know what he left me???

Magic Snot!

That's right. Santa sneezed magic boogers all over my table!!

Do you see it? It's all over the table!

I scooped all the snot into an envelope and I'm going to save it FOREVER!
However, I didn't save all of it.
Jennie and I sprinkled each other with the magic boogers and you know something? I think it worked because I was able to eat just as much, if not more than Santa would.

It was MAGIC!!!

I hate it when you're too full to eat mass amounts of delicious food. That happened to me on Christmas Eve, and I was kinda upset about it...
But not on Christmas! Santa really saved the day!

I'll have to save the magic snot for next time I go to a party with really great food-- now that I know what it's effects are.