Halloween......

...So for Halloween this  year DeBran and Rachelle had planned a chili cook off/trick or treating party....  Jaime and I went with the kids for a little while and then we went back to her house to take the kids trick or treating...  they were dressed as thing 1, and thing 2....  First we had to do a photo shoot with Brody and his pumpkins!!  ;)

...haha!!!  this one cracks me up!  :)

Happy Jaike  :)  Oh how I LOVE this picture!! 

and my failed attempt at a picture...  he wouldn't have it!  ;)

The boys had a great time trick or treating, Brody kept saying "other house?"  he did get tired towards the end though...  and requested to go home....  and well Jaike boy fell asleep on the way back...  haha!!  On my way home I stopped by Jessica and Bobby's to drop off some chili, and I got to visit with Ella, for a little bit....  oh and she shared her candy with me....  skittles, because she really had no memamems in her basket!!!  ;)  I hope everyone had a happy halloween...  I know I did!!!  ;)

Thankful sunday... :)

"Reflect Each Day On All You Have To Be Grateful For And

You Will Receive More To Be Grateful For." -Chuck Danes

Here we are on the last day of my "birthday month" and I have so much to be grateful for, it was literally a full month of celebrations, not only for my birthday, but for other things as well....  and for that I am grateful, I am grateful to have been busy with friends and family for what seemed like everyday!  :)

I think it was literally last thursday when I finally got to just stay home in my "comfy" clothes, and "catch up" on everything from laundry to bills.... and although I enjoyed, dinner dates, movies, shopping and yogurt with friends it was time to just stay home....  even if it was for only a day!!  ;)

I've mentioned this one before, but it continues to be something I am REALLY grateful for on a daily basis...  I am grateful for a job, one that is is steady for the most part....  ;)  yes, there are some days when I have a love/hate relationship with it, but I am still grateful for it everyday!!  :)

.....And I can't forget about my mom and my sister, who went completely out of their way to make my favorite dinner/cake for my special day!  :) My mom never ceases to amaze me, the way she goes completely out of her way to compleately please us on our b-days....  :) Thanks mom, for making my birthday dinner special!

This time around I am also grateful for facebook, and for technology in general...  I mean how else would one get so many birthday wishes from all around the world in one day??  seriously I felt an overwhelming amount of love from EVERYONE that day!!  thanks to everyone who made me feel special!!  :)

Then there was "Maria" day....  that is definitly a day full of thanksfullness and gratefulness for me...  I'm not one who likes to be the center of attention...  but Maria day seems to always be a good day for that!!  and I enjoyed every bit of it...  I wont lie!  ;)  I really am thankful to be surrounded by such an amazing amount of people.... and grateful because I am surrounded by so many people that made me feel so special that day!!  :D  until next year!!  :)

ummmmm....  what can I say I am grateful that I have "artsy" friends, although I'm not so sure I'm grateful about "zombie walk"...  what can I say, it wasn't my thing....  ;)  but Matt tried, and for that he gets extra points...  ;)  not many things make me feel uncomfortable, but zombie walk was definilty one of them!! I'm thinking I may be busy for it next year!!  ;)  lol

....I'm also thankful for Delta for delivering my grandma safely to us from Guatemala for a visit....  I'm certain that her being here will only cause me to gain a few more unwanted pounds, since she will undoubtedly be making a home cooked meal EVERY NIGHT!!!  :)  I can hardly wait!!  :)  I am also grateful that she will be  here to celebrate the holidays with us this year...  because this  year we're definitly going BIG!!!  we didn't celebrate any holidays last year, and we plan on making up for that this year....  :)

....  I think I should thank the UPS man who delivered my birthday surprise too...  how else would I  have gotten chocolate covered strawberries delivered to my doorstep??  ;)

Oh yeah then there was the surprise D-land/birthday weekend celebration that Bea and Vides flew out for....  Vides was sick, but she stuck it out....  :)  thanks girls for flying out...  :)

....and I can't not thank my friends, you guys seriously make me the person who I am...  Thank you for always accepting me for who I am, and for making me feel oh so special on Maria "day", and on every other day for that matter....  :)  and yes thanks even to Matt who may have introduced me to the one thing I may never want to do ever again!!  haha!!

so there you have it....  I'm sure there is more, but I can't think of them now!!  :) 

.....and now it's time to move forward and get ready for the holidays...  i can hardly wait, this is seriously my FAVORITE season!!  :)  I think it may be time to bring the snowmen out!!  ;)

"be grateful to people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom." ~Marcel Proust

The Recipe Club....... a review

So as you may already know, I LOVE to read....  the last book I finished was the recipe club, it was on all you magazine's book club list, so I thought I'd give it a try....  and let me tell you I wasn't dissappointed....  it was a good book, once I got the hang of who was writing what.....  and some of the recipes looked amazing....  I can't wait to try some of them out!!  :)  the overall story was good too...  it was about 2 girls who grew up together, and were best friends the whole time....  but they did grow apart and mostly kept in touch due to this recipe "club" they had made up when they were younger....  it was definitly a good one....  and I do recommend it!!  I have it, if anyone is interested and wants to borrow it!  :)

Halloween time at Disneyland!!

... so the birthday celebration continued the weekend after my birthday....  Bea and Vides flew out on saturday and Gaby and I took Vides to Disneyland while Bea went back to the house and "relaxed" with my parents....  we had such a good time...  Vides wasn't feeling very well but she was a trooper and she had a great time!!!  :)
naturally we had to take pictures in the parking lot before we even went in...  haha!!!  I don't know who was more excited....  her or us!!  ;)

haha....  Vides and Gaby! 

Vides planned our whole afternoon on our way to D-land....  our first stop was pirates!! it's her favorite ride!!   "yo ho, yo ho, a pirates life for me!!  ;)"

....then we were off to winnie the pooh!

...and of course we had to stop at small world.... another one of her favorites!  :)

awwww..... she was so tired!!  :(

....BUT so excited to be going on small world.....  look at that smile...  haha!!

...smile MJ!

and then we ran into this here halloween picture spot.....  :)

...after that we decided to leave, it had been a long day for all of us...  and the next morning I was getting up at the crack of dawn to go with Jaime to her hygenist test....  and we were going back to Disneyland the next day so off we were..... but not before we saw the fireworks in the parking lot...  haha!!  I LOVE fireworks....  and it just so happened that Vides does too....  she truly enjoyed herself...  and well so did me and Gaby!!  :)

so pretty!!!  :)

on sunday morning, I woke up early and left....  the rest of the family woke up, had breakfast, and then got ready to go meet me at D-land.....  we ended up meeting at California Adventure, and our first ride was the bugs show....  and well let's just say that it was NOT a fan favorite!!  ;)  at least we enjoyed picture taking at the beginning!!  ;)
posing with their "bug" eyes!

on the Heimlick ride....  this is the one that made it all better..... sort of!  ;) 

and the crazy ladybug ride with me....  ummmm....  she definitly enjoyed herself!!  haha!!!  ;)

....and then we ran into Jessie, and a soldier, Bea and I REALLY wanted to take our picture with Jessie....  V wouldn't have anything to do with her....  and just when it was our turn Woody showed up!!  YES!!!!!  smile everyone!!!   :)  and of course we had a jazzilion cameras, so we're all looking in different directions...  oh well!!!  it's cute anyway!  :)

Gaby, Mike, and Bea rode the rollercoaster while me and V ate churros and waited for them to come thru!!  :)

.....and on our way to dinner and disneyland, we ran across the parade...  naturally we had to stop, it's hard for uncle Mike to say no to her...  who am I kidding??  it's hard for ALL of us to deny her...  so we were all starving, but waited for the parade to finish...  she was stoked!  :)

Happy Halloween everybody!!!  :)

Here's to fun halloween/birthday weekend celebrations...  Thanks Bea for flying out here with the baby to hang out with us....  we had a great time....  and I LOVED that V kept saying thank you to us for taking her to D-land two days in a row...  :D  I can't wait until we go for Christmas.....  :D  I have a feeling she's going to really lose her marbles....  the holidays are definitly one of the best time to go visit Mickey and his friends!!  :)

chocolate covered pretzels....

sooooo.... Bea and the social committe at her school are throwing a baby shower, she said she's done with the cheesy, favors that they usually come up with, and wanted to know if I had any ideas....  ummmm...  I had a few, but none were as cool as as these chocolate dipped pretzel sticks.....  ;)  Thanks Jessica for the idea, otherwise we may of ended up with m&m's in a baggie!  ;)
What I liked was that they weren't that hard to make at all!!!  I went to michaels and picked up a couple of bags of white candy melts, then I picked up a few bags of chocolate chips and pretzel rods and got started.....  :)  yummmmm...  here goes nothing, this was my first time making these so I literally had no idea what to expect!  ;)

I started with the white one's.....  first I melted the candy melts, then I "dipped" them, and then stuck them in the freezer for a few minutes!!  ;)

ta-da!!!  I LOVED the way they turned out!!  :)  the white one's were definitly my favorite!!  ;)

.... and the chocolate one's turned out nice too....  we ended up not using these though, because they turned white the next day....  I think this is the biggest challenge when using chocolate anything to dip....  :(  they looked good the first day though!!  ;)

then we wrapped them all up in baggies, and tied them with wraffia....  and attached a homemade baby shower themed tag!

 .... and I packaged them up in this container so that they could travel to SF with the girls!  :)  I think most of them made it....  I was sad to hear that some didn't make it though!!  :(  looks like I'll have to work on the "packaging" part of the projects!  ;)

 I was so happy with the way they turned out!!  :) 

a yummy surprise!! :)

..... the day after my birthday brought a tasty surprise straight to my doorstep!!  :)  Thanks to the Jensen family for my surprise I LOVED it....  and I enjoyed the strawberries thoroughly, and I did share the brownie bites with two of my little "people" friends...  there was NO way I could of eaten all of those treats by myself!!!  ;)

The box.....  :)

The inside....  haha!!  I was soooooo excited to get my hands on the contents, but I did control myself long enough to take a few pictures of the contents to share with everyone!!  ;)

...These little guys greeted me first!!  ;)  they were halloween themed chocolate covered strawberries, and let me tell you, they were delicious!!!  :)

They were followed by halloween themed brownie pops....  these guys were so cute that I decided I want to make christmas themed ones this year!!  :)

Thanks again Sheri for thinking of me on my special day....  the treats were delicious!!  :)

a fabulous "Maria" day!!! :)

.....so anyone that knows me knows that I HATE to be the center of attention....  I'd much rather have someone else be it...  ;)  I don't know why it just kinda makes me feel uncomfortable, being the center of attention that is!!  ;)  However, it happens once a year, I call it "maria" day....  haha!!  It's a day in which I get celebrated.... and I LOVE every minute of it...  :)

This  year's celebration started the night before with dinner and cake made by my mom and sister, and it continued onto my actual b-day day, this is the first year in I can't remember how long that I haven't had to work, so I was at a loss of what to do...  hahaha, especially since everyone in the family was working!!!  and then Rosie called and said we were going to breakfast... in an hour!!!  ahhhhhh.....  so I got ready and met her at Mimi's.....  :)

hahaha!!!  I forgot my camera, so camera phone pictures was the best we got!!!  :)  I can't believe I've known her for, I think we decided, almost 15 years.....   neither one of us could really even remember.....  We've definitly had our share of good times over the years!!  :)  Thanks for a yummy breakfast Rosie

.... and these here were probably my/our favorite part of breakfast...  :) the  breakfast sandwich  was good too....  ;)  one thing I have to say about my friends is that they appreciate food as much as I do, as you can see though, I DEFINITLY appreciate butter more... ;)

Rosie and I went to the mall for a bit, picked up my free b-day starbucks, shopped around a little, talked some more....  and just plain caught up....  it had been forever, well maybe not forever, ;) since we'd really seen each other....  :)  That's what I love about her, that it doesn't matter how long it's been, it always seems like time hasn't really passed.....  :)  and that's what I LOVE about these girls too!!  :)

Jaime and Jessica were next....  after I left Rosie, I went to Jaime's and hung out there with the boys for a bit, while she ran out for an appt, we napped, and watched cars, seriously a perfect afternoon...  haha!  ;)  then she came home and suggested we go out to dinner instead of going to D-land like we had planned...  the weather was kinda yucky so I agreed, plus after a few hours of relaxing on the couch with a disney movie, I didn't really feel like going anywhere!  :)  I ran to run an errand and stopped at Jessica's on my way to have me some homemade apple crisp....  it was soooo tasty too!!!  :)  Jessica invited all the girls for our last minute dinner and then we were off to Lucille's, naturally I ordered the tri-tip salad....  It's my absolute favorite!!  :)

Thanks to the girls that were able to make it in such short notice, I missed the one's who couldn't come, but I'm sure we'll do something soon!!!  :)

Happy Birthday to me!!!  :)  what a yummy dessert...  too bad I was super full from all the day's meals to enjoy all of it though!!  ;)

Thanks to everyone for making "Maria day" such a special one!!  :)

Happy Birthday to me!!! :)

So this year we celebrated my b-day a day earlier....  seems like everyone's schedule is busy these days, and it was a shot in the dark to see if my brother could join us!  he couldn't but we celebrated anyway!!  :)  Plus Jaime and I thought it would be fun to go to D-land on my actual day, which didn't happen either...  haha!!  Just goes to show that no matter how much we "plan,"  life will always take it's own course!!  ;)
Gaby made the cake, and Mike was nice enough to "decorate" it!!  :)  thanks guys, the cake was yummmy!

My mom made an amazing dinner....  it doesn't look that great on the picture, but let me tell you it was amazing!!!  :)  thanks mom, chicken in wine sauce is one of my favorites!!  :)

I love my sister  :)

hahaha!!!  the "must-have" picture with the parents!!  :)

group shot!!  third try!!  haha!  ;)

haha!  this picture cracks me up!  appearantly something was FUNNY!!! 

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me!!  :)

....  making a wish and blowing out the candles! 

... enjoying a piece of that yummy chocolate cake and a glass of milk!!  ;)

Thanks mom for a yummy dinner and gaby for a tasty cake....  and for coming over to celebrate with me!!  :)