Pumpkin Pancakes with Apple Cider Syrup

I got this recipe from the sisters cafe. There are so many great recipes on their blog, I have made multiple things from their site and have never been disappointed. I made these weeks ago and am still thinking about them, and I am sure a few of you have heard me talk about how good they were. So here's your chance to try them out for yourself!

Pumpkin Pancakes
2 c. flour
3 Tbs. brown sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. allspice
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 c. buttermilk
1 c. pumpkin puree
2 eggs
2 Tbs vinegar
2 Tbs oil

In one bowl mix together the buttermilk, pumpkin, eggs, oil and vinegar. Combine dry ingredients separately and them stir into pumpkin mixture just until combined. Heat your pan or griddle (lightly butter or oil if it is not seasoned), using about 1/4 cup for each pancake. Brown on both sides and serve hot with apple cider syrup.


Apple Cider Syrup
3/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. brown sugar
2 Tbs. corn starch
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
2 c. apple cider
1 Tbs. lemon juice
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/4 c. butter

Mix sugars, cornstarch, cinnamon and nutmeg well. Add apple cider and lemon juice. Bring to a boil and continue boiling for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in butter. Store leftovers in the refrigerator, use within a week or two.

Halloween

The trunk or treat is always the highlight of our Halloween festivities, especially this year when the kids weren't able to go trick-or-treating because of the holiday being on a Sunday.

Tristan was so entranced by all of the decorated cars. He would stop at one that was all decked out and stare at it forever and talk to the people about how cool it was. He kept saying, "wow, that's pretty cool!" He loved it.

The above two pictures are from our Hatch family Halloween Party, it is really fun just to celebrate together as a family.

While Andrew was in the Netherlands in the beginning of October my mother-in-law came to stay with us. She was nice enough to help me make Carter and Parker's costumes this year. Parker was a vampire and Carter wanted to be a king. They would not have turned out nearly as well if she wasn't here to help. Thanks again, Colleen!

I wish we could have gotten Tristan to dress up. He absolutely refused to wear any costume we put on him and I had 4 for him to choose from. He is one stubborn boy. In this picture he is wearing the vest to his cowboy costume and even that was a struggle to get him to wear.

Birthdays at a glance

It's hard to believe that Tristan's and Parker's birthday are 3 months apart and I am just getting around to blogging about it. For Parker's birthday I let him pick what he wanted to eat for every meal, and he told me he wanted bacon and sausage for every meal. That boy loves meat. I talked him into just having it for breakfast. Luckily he agreed.

I am still getting used to the fact that he is 5 years old already! Happy Birthday bud!

Unfortunately we were moving on the day of Tristan's birthday and by the time we got around to celebrating it I was super tired. So Tristan's birthday was very simple, luckily he didn't seem to mind :)

He is such a cute boy. We love having him in our family!

Happy Halloween

Utah in pictures

I had to throw this picture in. Andrew holding a baby girl is not something you are likely to see again for some time. :)

Lounging out.

Here is the famous Hatch family candy launcher. I actually think this is a new and improved model. Those Hatch boys are always thinking of ways to make things bigger and better. Below is the family waiting patiently for candy to rain down from the sky.

Doesn't he look stylin' in his pink and purple jacket?

The boys visiting their Grandpa Hatch

I miss those Utah mountains! This is the view from my grandparents front yard. Right about now I'll bet those mountains are covered with the beautiful colors of fall.

Hanging out with the family

We got the chance to go up to Flaming Gorge with my grandparents while we were in Utah. I went there a lot as a child and going back brought back some very fond memories. I almost forgot how pretty it is there. Above is a picture of the boys chilling in the trailer.

The boys decorated some pine cones for me and since they would not last the trip back to California Andrew took some pretty pictures of them.

Grandma and Grandpa Albertson

As always, we had a ton of fun visiting Utah and I am already counting down the days until we get to visit again over Christmas.

Catching up

I have been really, really bad about blogging lately. Our desktop is acting up so Andrew downloaded all our pictures to his laptop and for some reason I never think to blog when he is home. A lot has happened over the summer including both Carter and Tristan's birthday, a trip to Utah and us moving to a different apartment because ours was being torn down, and of course us finding out about #4, but we did manage to blog about that. I decided to start with the furthest back. Carter's birthday was in June, he asked for a Speed Racer cake and a pinata. We had a lot of fun making both and I think he had fun on his birthday.

Baby Boy Number 4 and Counting

We just found out the gender of our baby today, we are happy to announce we are having a fourth boy, can you believe it? Well anyway, we are excited and look forward to having our fourth baby. We originally posted this as a survey to see what people might guess it would be but we couldn't wait to tell everyone.

Here are a few pics.

Graduation

Sorry to disappoint any of you who thought I might be talking about Andrew's graduation. That is still a little ways away.
This year I did another preschool co-op with some of the mom's in the ward. It was such a great class that both Parker and I enjoyed. The mom's were so creative and Parker loved getting together with his friends every week. At the end of the year we decided to do a short "graduation ceremony" at the park. Thanks Jackie and Von for the diploma's and balloons! They were so cute!Congratulations Parker.....

Brooke....

Millie....

and Blake!

Mmmm....Butter!

One of Tristan's favorite things to do is get in the fridge. He does it constantly!!! Shortly after him discovering his new trick I started noticing bite marks and chunks missing from almost all our butter sticks. I thought it was pretty gross that Tristan would think to bite straight butter...yuck. Later I was talking to another mom that said kids actually will crave fat when they are not getting enough because it is good for their brain development. Well, the next day I caught him red handed! The picture above is him sitting next to a half eaten stick of butter while trying with all his strength to open a sour cream container. Since then I have noticed him opening the fridge and going straight for the butter before anything else. I already give him whole milk and now he is downing butter sticks, how much fat does one kid need?!? I'll bet this means he'll be really smart.....right?

Introducing....

I know you have probably all heard of the Cricut. It cuts out all sorts of images from paper. They are really neat and I think it would be great to have. Well, I got an email today introducing the Cricut Cake!

"This easy to use personal electronic cutter precisely cuts frosting sheets, gum paste and more! Cricut cake is so versatile, it's the perfect companion for every occasion in life, including holidays, birthdays, weddings and graduations!"

I believe it, don't you? Especially the part where it says "it's the perfect companion for every occasion in life." Okay, so the promo is super corny but I still want one. I just don't want to shell out the $400 it costs to get it.

Mother's (a sentimental post)

By the end of every Mother's Day I feel so very grateful for fathers! I have such a sweet husband that takes the time to make sure that I have a nice relaxing day off. He let me sleep in so that he and the kids could make Mother's Day cards for me. He got the kids ready for church, cleaned the house, made dinner, got the kids ready for bed and did it all with a smile on his face. I think Mother's Day is good for him too because he realizes just how much I have to do on a normal day. ;) Thanks for everything, Andrew! I love you!
I am truly grateful for all the mother's in my life and for the good example they are to me, and I would like to say thank you to my wonderful mother for being so great! She has always been my #1 cheerleader and has supported me through thick and thin.
Andrew emailed me this article this morning and I loved reading it. It made me realize how important the role of a mother is and how quickly time passes. We only have a few short years to be home with our children, we need to take advantage of each and every second!
For you young mother's, if you have a few minutes to read this article please read it!

LDS.org - Ensign Article - Daughters of God

I feel so very blessed that I have to opportunity to be a mother. I love my children with all my heart and think they are amazing! I am going to try this year to be a more patient, loving and kind mother. My children deserve it!

Goodbye Mrs. Natalie!

This is Parker's Mrs Natalie. She has been his preschool teacher every Thursday morning for the past year. Parker loves her and she is so sweet with him! I think he secretly has a little crush on her. He is always writing notes to give to her and he often asks where she is when we are at church (her and her husband are also in our ward). In January we found out that she and her husband are moving to Utah. Parker was so sad, and so were we! They have been such a great family to have in the ward and we will miss them very much. So thank you Mrs Natalie for being such a great teacher to out little Parker and good luck in Utah!

So now that Mrs Natalie is gone I have decided to teach Parker at home, hopefully all will go well. Wish me luck!

Harvard's "Mormonism 101"

For anyone interested in an enlightening and interesting read about the Mormon faith, I recommend this talk to you which was given by Elder Dallin H. Oaks as part of an annual lecture series at Harvard Law School called "Mormonism 101".

Fundamental Premises of Our Faith - Talk Given by Elder Dallin H. Oaks at Harvard Law School - LDS Newsroom

Time away

My sweet Grandparents have been planning on going on a family cruise for their 50th anniversary ever since I can remember. Well they celebrated their 50th anniversary last month and we were so excited to celebrate it with them by going to the Mexican Riviera! In all, 17 members of my family were able to be there and we had a blast!!!

This was our wait team on the ship. They served us all week long and they were awesome! Dewa (on the right) even cried when we left. They were so sweet.

This is a picture of Cabo San Lucas. It was beautiful there!

Our second stop was Mazatlan. I think this was our favorite port because we had such a good time. We took a boat ride to a place called Stone Island. On the Island there are no hotels and no other tourists. I felt like we really got to see what Mexican life was like. It was kind of humbling seeing the conditions some of them lived in with no electricity or running water. It made me realize how many things we take for granted. But we really did have a good time there. We were able to go kayaking in the ocean, and we also got to ride on a banana boat that was being pulled by a fishing boat. Our favorite was going horseback riding along the beach. It was so much fun. The only other time I have been horseback riding before this was on a small trail where you were pretty much nose to tail with the other horses. This was much better than that!

Do you see that beautiful scenery behind us? Amazing!

There was a man walking around the beach with his iguanas so we stopped to take a look and he kept saying, "Take a picture, take a picture." So we thought, why not, and took some pictures with the iguanas. Then after we were done he said, "50 pesos." We should have known he wanted money.

On our boat ride over to Stone Island we passed right by our ship so we were able to get some great pictures of it.

Any guess why this rock is so white? Yep, it's bird droppings. Our tour guide called it a Mexican glacier.

I thought the prettiest port of all was Puerto Vallarta. I was amazed at how beautiful it was. We were able to go zip lining there which was a first for me, I was a little nervous about going zip lining in Mexico but once we got there I surprised myself by having a really good time!

After we were done zip lining they had a hut with a few animals inside. I was so excited when I found out you could actually go inside and hold them!


Here Andrew has a scorpion on his forehead, and tarantula in his hand and a python around his neck. No, thank you! Crazy man!

Here is a super cheesy picture of us sitting next to our towel animal.

So as you can tell we had a lot of fun on our cruise to Mexico and for any of you that are thinking about doing a cruise, you should DO IT! You will not regret it!

What did we miss while we were gone? Well, we missed 7 days of straight rain, a tornado warning at Carter's school but most of all we missed our three beautiful children. I don't think I could of handled another day without seeing them. I was so excited to come home to them, and then about 5 minutes later I was ready to be on the ship again. Just kidding!

Thanks a million times to my wonderful mother-in-law who was brave enough to take our kids for a whole week! We thought we were leaving her in the beautiful California sun, boy were we wrong. Thanks again, Colleen!