Absolutely DELICOUS!

We recently purchased salmon from these local fishermen (wildforsalmon.com).  They are a couple from Bloomsburg who actually fish in Alaska and bring back an AMAZING product!  We highly recommend!  Even both Stan and Annalise ate some salmon burgers last night -- now that's sayin' something because neither one is a fan of seafood!

One Last Time

Last night we went to Knoebel's with the Smiths for the last time this summer.  We had a great time!  One thing though that occured to me again last night is how much Annalise has changed this summer.  Last weekend I took Anna to the park and as I was watching her play it really hit me how much her playing and physical abilities have advanced in such a short time.  I thought back to the beginning of the summer and how shaky and somewhat nervous she was about going on the playground equipment and then last week I watcher her zip around with ease on most things there.  Well, last night at Knoebel's I thought back to the beginning of June when we had her there for the first time of the summer.  At that time she was a little impatient waiting in line because at 18 months she just didn't get she had to wait.  She never carried on, but I definately had to keep her occupied while waiting.  Also, back at the begininng of the summer she didn't really understand that she had to get off the ride when it was done either.  Again, she never had a fit or anything like that but she used to try hold on so I couldn't get her out.  Back then (a whole 3 months ago), she was afraid of certain rides and was really preoccupied by the little stones that cover part of the park and I spent a lot of time cleaning off her hands.  Well, fast forward to now and again, like my realization at the playground last week, she has grown so much this summer!  She gets it now that she has to wait in line, no more holding onto the rides when I get her off, no more preoccupation with the rocks and while she was afraid of one ride (the frog hopper) once she got on it, she wasn't afraid to actually get on.  It makes me kinda sad when I think about how quickly she is turning into such a big girl!  Anyway, here are a few pictures of our fun!

It took about 1/2 hour to 45 minutes for us to get two slices of pizza!  While we were waiting Anna pointed out many things to me.

She started by showing me the pretty flowers

Then I got her out of the stroller because it felt like forever and Stan was still not back and she continued pointing out rides.

and pointing out more rides

and more rides

and then a little bouncing

and finally some pizza!  We would've gotten something else but we never thought the line would take that long to get through!  It was one of those things though that once Stan had already waited so long he wasn't going to get out of line!

Anna and Aidan on the Frog Hopper

One thing that is tough with Anna is the fact that she is so tall so even though she is only 21 months old, she is a little over 36 inches tall and therefore is tall enough to ride all the rides over in the kiddie part even though she is not yet even 2 years old.  I have not let her ride anything that goes up in the air because I don't trust that she won't decide to stand up when she is up in the air.  I made an exception to this with the Frog Hopper (for those who are familiar) because even though it goes up in the air I couldn't see anyway that she could get out of it and she was asking over and over to go on it.  It started out fine but then she quickly decided she didn't like it.  My poor babe had to stay on it though until the ride was over.  She didn't cry while it was moving but kept saying "All done!" which was hard for me because I could hear her from the ground.  Anyway after it stopped she did start to cry but quickly got over it.  As we were walking away though she asked to go on it again.  I told her I think we should wait till next summer for it =)!

Over the Frog Hopper scare and lovin' the fire trucks!

Hair Clippers

I am not sure why Anna calls hair clips, hair clippers.  Maybe because of nail clippers?????  Anyway, I was quickly getting ready to run some errands and Stan was occupying Anna for me since she is usually glued to my side.  When I came out of the bathroom Annalise had all of the hair clippers she could find in her hair.  Apparently she had asked Stan to put them in for her.  I wish I would've gotten a picture of that!

Head full of clips

Look at all my clippers!

All done!

Not a Good Idea!

I very quickly regretted showing Annalise this whistle the other day.  It mysteriously disappeared over night!

I Think We Need To Go Shopping!

Well, not really, she actually has a ton of pants.  I new she had gotten taller over the summer because the child grows like a weed but I didn't realize how much taller she had gotten until I put these pants on her last Saturday morning.  It was a little chilly in the morning when we went for a walk so I put these pants on her that she has not had on since the beginning of June.  They fit fine then and this is how they fit now!

Too funny!

The "Biiiiiiig Bug"!

This morning Anna and I found this biiiiiiiiiig bug (what she calls it) with a missing wing.  It was flopping and spinning around the driveway and Annalise kept saying "get it, Mommy".  I put it on a tray thingy so that she could take a closer look at it.  She didn't want to get too close to it but she was definately intested in it.  That's my girl!

"Over there!  A Biiiiig Bug!"

You can't really tell from this picture, but it is big.

Checking it out, but staying back.

She continued with her usual summer morning routine of opening any junk mail and perusing the flyers in the newspaper.

Anna had enough of that and decided to play with Riley.

She then took the papers to the front porch to "read".

All done "reading".  I can tell that she is trying to pick the flowers on the sly.  I guess I caught her in the act!

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake

Yep, that's right, Perfectly Chocolate.  This recipe is one of my favs and I have used it for years.  It comes from my Hershey's Classic Recipe cookbook and I just thought I would share!

 Is your mouth watering yet?

CAKE

2 cups of sugar

1 3/4 cups of all purpose flour

3/4 cup Hershey's Cocoa Powder

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1 1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 cup boiling water

1.  Heat oven to 350 degress.  Grease and flour 13x9x2 inch baking pan.

2.  Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, bakng powder, baking soda and salt in a large mixer bowel.  Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla.  Beat on medium speed of electric mixer for 2 minutes.  Stir in the waer (batter will be thing). 

3.  Pour  batter into prepared pan.

4.  Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted into the center comes out completely clean. 

5.  Prepare frosting.

FROSTING

1 stick (1/2 cup) butter or margarine

2/3 cup Hershey's cocoa powder

3 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup milk

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1.  Melt butter.  Stir in cocoa.  Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating to a spreading consistency.

2.  Add a small amount of additional milk if needed.  Stir in vanilla.

(In the picture above I also added p-nut butter and chocolate chips because I had a few left over from another recipe I made recently and just wanted to use them up).