VALENTINES DAY!

This was Jake and my's first valentines as a married couple! We were excited for this fun day to come! I woke up in the morning and realized Jake wasn't there. Then I looked up at the door and he walked in with breakfast! Cute boy! Ok, I have a challenge for anyone that looks at this blogpost. Look up "Gordon Ramsie"- how to cook a perfect egg! Jake followed his you tube video on how to make perfect scrambled eggs and they were fabouls! They were so fluffy and tasted so cheesy and there was no cheese in these eggs! crazy! Jake did put jalepenos in them though because I could eat those in every meal! This was a great way to start the day! Then Jake got the movie "Naked Gun" going for me to finish while I ate breakfast because I feel asleep watching it the night before and wanted to finish it!

After watching the movie, I got ready for the day and then went to run some last minute errands. 

I forgot that if we were having dinner at home we would need candles and a table cloth! So after some adventures at TJ Max, Target, Bed Bath and Beyond, I found some things we could use for our Fondue Dinner! Our first Valentines we spent together we had dinner at the Melting Pot. We thought it would be fun to do our own Melting Pot dinner, so we bought a Melting Pot cook book and went for it!

When Jake got home I was so excited to give him his Valentines and part of his Birthday Present! Ever since he has had a gold wedding ring, he has wanted a gold watch. He has never really had a watch he wears alot so I was excited when I found this awesome Burberry mens gold watch! I thought it was so cute! Happy Valentines Jakey! He loved it! He just needs to take it to store to get some links taken out of it.

Right before Jake got home our new chair came in the mail! Our poor landlord had to carry it in. Shes a trooper. I was so excited I took it out of the box right away so it would be cute in our living room when Jake got home. It is smaller then we thought it would be, but we still like it! and Love the color!

Well now it is time to make dinner! Pinch bowls are my new favorite cooking tool! They are so handy to get everything ready so you have it to through in what your making when you need it! We were getting ready to make our cheese bacon fondue!

We didn't realize we needed a double broiler and our stainless steel pots have rubber on the bottom of them so we had to get creative! We used a pot instead! Surprisingly it worked really well!

All our toppings ready to dip in cheese! The potatoes and bread were my favorite. Jake liked the broccoli! The peppers were good, but oh the potatoes!

Course one is ready to be served! We left the pan with water underneath to keep the cheese a good consistency. We liked this cheese mix but it was not our favorite. If we were ever to make this one again we would do half the recommend horse radish. It was just such a strong taste it seemed to over power the cheese. Maybe next time well try the swiss cheese.

For our main course we marinade steaks! They were delicious! We were going to do the boil sauce and raw meat like they do at the Melting Pot, but I am so glad we didn't because without a dishwasher, the dishes seemed endless! Have you ever cooked steak in the oven? It was delicious! First you sear each side of the steaks in a pan and make the fire alarm go off with all the steam....(the fire alarm is right next to the oven where steam sets it off). Then you put them in the oven at 450 degrees for 10 minutes and it makes super juicy, yummy steak!
So remember how I love the Bachelor show? Well, Jake and I took a break from dinner and ate our steak and watched the Bachelor! It was awesome! After, we decided to do all the dishes pilled up in the sink before we started cooking dessert because after dessert would mean more dishes.... only one plate dropped and broke in the process....

Last but not least, Turtle carmel Fondue! Ok this was great!!! We loved this one! We used chocolate chips to melt and it worked great! For some reason this picture caught the steam from the pot and made it foggy. The strawberries, bananas and pound cake were my favorite in this concaution. Jake liked the strawberries, Oreos and marshmallows! This was a great dessert to end the night!

I am not going to lie, after so many dishes(even though Jake did most of them) and cooking a big meal we were so pooped. Ok, I was really tired and wanted to sleep. So Jake was so sweet and finished up the dishes while I got ready for bed. We read scriptures, said prayers and watched Signified. I think after I feel asleep Jake watched Fringe. That show is to scary for me to watch. This was an awesome Valentines! As much fun as making a big dinner was, I would only recommend either doing a desert or appetizer fondue or else its to much work! This is what I would do if we did it again,
Option one....cheese fondue, grill steak, Golden Spoon in freezer for dessert.
Option two...salad, grill meat, chocolate fondue.
Less mess and clean up, and still good food to eat!

Awesome Valentines 2011!

The first weeks of February

Now being an official house wife I have been trying to be more domestic! For dinner I made Jumbalia soup for dinner and then a fruit pizza for desert! We ate the fruit pizza for some yummy breakfast left overs as well. Very nutritional... I am loving our cute octopus plates and currently only have two sets. We use those and a few of Jakes childhood plates until the rest of our dishes come in the mail! Jakes parents are awesome and got us the rest of our dinnerware for Jakes upcoming birthday! Thanks mom and dad! Best gift ever! This is our new kitchen table! We got it online at Target and were very pleased with it! Our house is finally starting to come together nicely! All we are waiting for is some kitchen items to come in the mail, and then a chair and our house will be done! Then we will put up some pictures of our new home! 

I made valentines funfetti cupcakes! I was so excited to finally use this super cute cupcake stand! Thank you McKlay family! I have found that with making cupcakes with four eggs, no water, amount of vegetable oil on the package and one cup of butter milk makes the best cupcakes ever! I am learning that if I make treats I need to hurry and take some to the neighbors or Jake will eat all of them. Literally. Maybe the only other time will be Jakes birthday.

Made some Betty Crocker blueberry muffins. Betty and I have been becoming the best of friends lately! She always gives really good suggestions on how to do some good cooking stuff. These muffins were good but I feel they needed some more sugar inside them. They were fun to try for breakfast and use up the rest of the blueberries that were going to go bad. I feel the hardest thing so far for me as a new house wife is using up all the food before it goes bad. I need to come up with a system.

Jake is the best at helping around the house! We found out that we do not have a dishwasher (except one on wheels that hooks up to the sink...which is good but..) for two people it is easier to hand wash the dishes.

Jakes a good sport at trying out food I make. Hes a trooper. Todays meal was stuffed salmon tomatoes. The tomatoes guts were taken out, chopped up, mixed in with rice, fresh cooked salmon, cucumber and ranch dressing with cheese on top and put in the broiler. It was good, but if I ever make it again I would probably do tuna guts inside instead or heat up all the insides before putting them in the tomato. 

Jake surprised me and brought me home flowers! He is the best! Thanks Roberts for the super cute vases! Love them!

Pizza always hits the spot! Dominos has been cookin up some amazing pizza lately. Deep dish, fantastic and regular garlic crust!...fabouls! This pizza was delicious, especially with ranch to dip it in! Jake and I ate pizza while we watched Kronks new groove and caught up on the Bachelor episodes. Ok, lets talk Bachelor. Such a trashy show, but so entertaining. Probably should not watch it, but.......

Early Valentines present! I was telling Jake about the cutest books my friend Aimee was telling me about to decorate with and Jake ordered me some for valentines! Thanks team! I love them! If you don't like to read, reading a cute book would make all the difference. This is a book you could judge by the cover. (That line was really cheesy.)

I decided since Valentines was coming up we needed to make the house more appropriate for the season. I watched a lot of season five of "The Office" and cut out a bunch of hearts and put them together! I was exited to punch hole and put in cute brads with my "cropadile.' Jake took pictures of the hearts he liked the most. Here they are. Each heart was double sided so the weight would be even. They have been spinning in our kitchen all week. It has been fun! 

Dont mind the clutter on the table....were still moving in..haha but we hung up the hearts in the kitchen!

As the days are passing, the flowers are blooming and looking more beautiful! They are also starting to smell even better to!

Put the valentines present on the bookshelf! I like it! Jake thinks we may need a few more books. Well see. They are inside the shelves on the turtle tank! I also put the apple juice bottle with the topaz in it from when Jake and I got engaged. Funny.

The books in place.

Jake and I had a fun night meeting up with Marin, Drew, Heather and her freind Garret. We all met up and then went on an adventure out to find some hot pots.

Jake met an Indian friend on the way. He was a kind soul.

We saw a group of deer on the way so we got out of the car and tried to catch one to see if he wanted to join us at the hot pots. We were also lost and wanted to ask the deer for directions. They neighbors whose house they were in front of ended up telling us instead.

We have arrived. Time to jump in.

This is the edge, close to the water. The pots were really fun. It was probably only two feet deep so you could sit in the warm water and feel warm mud beneath you. There were pot holes in threw out the water. Marin and Heather were cracking me up though because they were walking around finding the holes and they would just drop and sink! The holes were like muddy quick sand with a warm whorl pool inside. Quite cozy. Well have to go back for another fun adventure!

We put the camera on a log. It worked out well. After a fun time and all nice and warmed up, we were hungry! We stopped at In-and Out Burger for a midnight snack before we went to bed! We all smelt of some serious sulfur.

This is the awesome Valentines/Jakes Birthday package! Thanks Mom! Full of lots of great stuff and yummy treats!

Saturday was a great day! Jake and I woke up and he worked on some school work while I did an eyelash client! I love doing eyelashes! I need to start to build more of a cliental! They are so much fun! Then I felt like some chocolate chip pancakes, so made some of those!

After I went to Costco to meet up with Stacey. We both had some groceries to get and thought it would be fun to go together. Jake stayed home to do school work. While at Costco, a lot of adventures happened. I got there a little earlier, so I decided to look at the jewelry. I found a really cool ruby ring. Maybe someday that ring will be on my finger. Then Stacey and I went side by side down all the isles at Costco, trying samples and getting our groceries. Stacey told me about the wonders of Pesto Sauce. She told me about wonderful mozzarella, tomato spinach sandwiches she would make with it! She sold me with that so I had to get pesto sauce! and later today a panini sandwich maker! We even saw Heather Parker! Costco felt like a great success! After a good trip we took our items up to the cash register. I went to get my debit card out to pay for the items I had selected and somehow my card was not in my purse. I went for a back up card, that was not in my purse. I went for backup number three, and no where to be found. Then I realized my license was gone to. Then it hit me. My goods were still in my snowboarding pants. Well, I then called Jake to come save the day. Then Staceys items rang up. Then it was discovered her Costco card had expired. So then we thought, oh lets just use my Costco card. But Mr. Costco said that if we used my card I had to pay for it. I had no cards to pay with. Stacey and I were laughing so hard. Holding up the line at Costco on a Saturday is frowned upon. Oh well, they ended up just letting Stacey and I pay. Then we waited for Jake to arrive to get our groceries.  When he got there we jumped back in line. My neck was so itchy. It had been itchy since I got dressed earlier that morning. I realized there was a tag itching my neck. My dress was on backwards. A dress that has frills and pleats in the front and a playing back was on backwards. Woops. Time to go home and change. 

After going home and changing Jake and went to go run some errands. We ran to Bed Bath and Beyond to go get a panini maker! We used it on Sunday with the pesto sauce.....yummy! Thanks Stacey for the great suggestions! Then we ran to BYU to get some special heart shaped Junior Ments. We have been to multiple stores looking for them and they are no where to be found. Then we got a yummy snack at Taco Bell. Ok, coolest thing we learned! You can get any burrito from taco bell and ask them to grill it! It made it so much more yummy! Recommend that to all Taco Bell lovers. Next we went to the phone store to see what they had to offer for family plans. This is new to us. Next, we went to pick up some flowers Jake had ordered for me! He wanted to pick up the flowers with out me but the store was going to close so we went to go get them any way! 

Here are the flowers! And the fabouls Junior Mints! Jake told the florist at the "Flower Patch" that he wanted the flowers to reflect a desert (like arizona). He also told him he wanted Billy Bobs in it! I thought it turned out cute! I like them!

After taking the flowers home we thought we would run to Ikea really quick before we met some friends for dinner. Jake thought since I put my dress on backwards, it was time to get a mirror for our home. I would agree with that. We got a super cute, huge mirror that we both really liked from Ikea! Then we drove down to meet up with our friends Heather and her lover Tanner. He came in town from the holy lands of Arizona. We met for dinner at the Bombay house! 

We love the Bombay House! Two nights in a row! Wahoo! Tuna and Jake are looking at this picture. Its a good one. After a yummy meal, we went to Target to do some grocery shopping for our upcoming Valentines Fondue adventure. More to come on that....!

Sunday was a great day! We got to go to church and we are really liking our new ward! Then we made some sandwiches with pesto sauce on our new panini maker! After five loads of laundry, scpyping and cleaning the house, we ended the night watching "Naked Gun." It was hilarious. A great old time movie.

A great Friday!

Today was an awesome day! I got to meet up with my old roommate staceypants down at riverwoods. There we got some yummy treats and subway and made the trek up the canyon to go snowboarding! Wow, so late in the season, and this was my first time going! It was a blast though! When we arrived I had never felt so at home, yet a fish out of the water. The first few runs I was a bit shaky, but after that I tried to find my "swagga" and started to feel more comfortable gliding on the snow! How I miss snowboarding! I must start going my usual 5+ times a week! Maybe.....after a great day at the mountain Stacey and I went to a cute bakery and got  some cup cakes and carrot cake. It was delicious! Cant remember the places name though. Ill have to get that next time I go! Then I came home and so glad, Jakes birthday present had come in the mail! Wahoo! And even better, Jakes mom sent us an awesome Valentines package! It had wonderful candy and fun red and pink surprises! Thanks mom! It even had fun stuff to make Jake a birthday cake! What a great mom! Then Jake helped me unload my gear and we got ready to go to the temple! We had a fun time there and then went to the always delicious, Bombay House! Yum! Today has been a perfect day! Wonderful weather, great food, awesome company! And it all ended with watching some "Boy Meets World" and eating some treats with Donkey Kong.

Welcome Home!

When Jake and I got home from our honeymoon, this was on our couch! I was so excited! Jake made a cute sign and got me a pillow pet! I had always joked about getting one and he got me one! I love it. It is really nice that it has options. It truly is a pillow, or a pet.

This is also what we came home to.......right after finals week at school we had to move over all our stuff to our new apartment and had no time to unpack or organize.

While we were on our honeymoon, Jakes mom and Wesley stayed at our place while he was getting ready to leave for the MTC to go on his mission! Wahoo Wesley! Sadly our place was in boxes, but they were the best and stalked up our fridge with food!

Lets not forget the food she got for our cupboards to! That was the best thing ever to come home to!

So.....now is time to organize. We are a little worried at this point everything is not going to fit...

box overload.....Don't mind the sweet apple boarder print.....its growing on me.................

Tuna was so excited to get back to our place because he missed the turtles. So did Jake and I. I am glad the turtles now have an official father figure. They have been eating their own poop a lot lately, and doing some sneaky things. You will see below. I think it will be nice to have another authoritarian figure in their lives.  I cant believe we have had the turtles for over a year now! They are getting so big! Tuna really wanted to hold to turtles so we thought that would be ok. We told him he had to be really gentle. Tuna is holding Herbie in this picture. Tuna was really gentle. He made sure to put out his hand for Herbie to put his head on when he started to come out of his shell.

In this picture Tuna is holding Maxwell. This is a happy team!

OK this is where the sneaky turtle picture comes in! We are not sure who, but one of the turtles dragged this poor guppie by its tails up on the dock to roast in the sun. Actually not a bad idea. Who knew turtles liked grilled fish to? Well this guppie was a huge one so I wanted to know who was planning on eating it. I staked out the aquarium all morning and before I knew it, the fish was gone and I had no idea who ate him. I need to go buy more guppies for the children because this was the last guppie. They had about twenty guppies that kept having babies and more babies, but now there are none.....I am fine having savage children.

Look how innocent they look with that fish chillin on the dock to die....