Valentine's Day Dinner

For Valentine's Day this year, we decided to do a dinner at home. Thais has been begging to go out for Sushi, but four kids + a restaurant=stress so I brought the sushi restaurant home.  We cleaned the house, put on the love station on Pandora and went over Valentine's day trivia while we sipped sparkling cider. Love  these Valentines of mine :)

                                                                       Eli-Boy
                                                    Heaven came knocking at my door

It whispered of a baby boy.

My heart feared could I raise one more

and do my best as a mom to four?

Fast forward time, my fears asunder

His dimples are the world’s eighth wonder.

What is this spell he’s got me under?

My little Eli boy!

Born to me in the month of love.

He fits our family like a glove

A gift from Heaven up above

My sweetest Eli boy.

I love the Gap between his teeth

I love to watch him fast asleep.

I love to watch him watching me

I love my Eli boy.

Heaven blessed despite my fears.

His perfect eyes bring mine to tears.

A son to love me all my years.

My child, my Eli boy.

Gracie's First Birthday

We celebrated our little Gracie's first birthday in Michigan. My friend Madison bought her the most adorable cake and we just had dinner with a few friends and let this little girl try cake for the very first time.

                                         Here we are at My friend Kristen's house.

                                                                            Gracie opening a few presents....

                                               Jordan and Spencer: we joked all summer that they look like brothers

                                                     Another shot of the guys.

The Butchart Gardens

I have so many posts I need to make about the cruise we took in August, but this was probably one of my favorite days. This was the day we spent in Victoria visiting Butchart Gardens. It was breathtaking! 

Here are just a few varieties of flowers grown in the garden.

Free Books on Motherhood!

Just thought I would share the love of motherhood. One of my favorite books by Linda Eyre, I didn't plan on being a Witch can be downloaded for free! Check it out!




http://powerofmoms.com/two-favorite-motherhood-books-free/

Detroit's Eastern Market

A couple of weeks ago we decided to go to one of Detroit's famous farmers market called the Eastern Markets. It has been around since the late 1800's. I was in heaven looking over all of the open-air-stalls with local fruits, veggies, plants, jellies, and farm fresh eggs and meats. I have been changing my eating habits a bit after reading Dr. Joel Fuhrman's book Eat To Live, and the lifestyle requires you to drastically increase the  amount of fresh fruits and veggies you eat each day so we loaded up on tons of  delicious produce. We got artichokes, corn, kale, beets, cucumbers, tomatoes, cantaloupe, nectarines, asparagus, grapes and cherries just to name a few. I love watching my kids devour fresh artichokes for dinner, or snacking on cucumbers and carrots. It is also a lot cheaper to eat this way. We got bags and bags of produce for a lot less then when I buys all of my snacks at Costco. 

A little family shot in front of the market.

The website said that on a given Saturday there are about 40,000 people that come and shop the market

I love the idea of buying local produce!!

Some fun things for the kids to do.

I just love snapping pictures of this girl! 

The kids loved all of the free samples :)

I just loved that this local baker was rockin' the hat and everything. 

At the end of the market we listened to this local artist for a while. He was GOOD! He reminded me of Ben Harper..

We needed some bread so we thought we would check out a local bakery. They had huge thick loaves of homemade bread for 1.75 a loaf. 

Of course, there were a few other things besides bread that caught our interest.

We let the kids each pick out a treat.

This is me showing that I can be strong and resist a chocolate eclair that was calling my name! 

One of the farmers gave me a green tomato to try. I have always been curious about what a fried green tomato tastes like after seeing the movie

They were pretty darn good I have so say. Although, isn't anything good fried?!?