Boxes and Froyo, ya’ll. Boxes and Froyo.

The biggest snowflakes I think I have ever seen. | Eating dinner at Da Pineapple Grill. No really, it’s called “Da” and this was the best picture we got. Every time we take a picture, my camera puts a box over brads face and asks, “Did someone blink?” Oh no, he just has small eyes? So you get one brad eye. | Cake batter, Red Velvet, Green Apple, Raspberry, and Vanilla froyo at Kiwi Loco. With everything from cheesecake to nerds. We are not so good at this sort of thing. We’ve been spoiled with Cold Stone. Let us choose from a menu where someone has done the “hard work” of tasting flavor combinations for us, please. We know our place. | Watching one of my favorite movies at Kiwi Loco. Better known to me as, “Nine-ning McKeen Movie…caaar.” Want to know what Madagascar is called? “Maga-dascar..I like to move it, move it.” | The view from the couch. Oh you like my new ottoman? It’s a cardboard box full of Pyrex glassware [fancy] and topped with a pillow. I’ve been watching HGTV, can you tell?

We’re moving on Tuesday. This is the ninth time I’ve moved since I could remember moving. Third time I’ve moved down the street, so what I’m getting as is, I’ve got serious packing skills. Serious enough to put on my resume. Thanks mom and dad!

For your information, I totally impressed Brad with my Draco Malfoy impression the other night. They should have hired me for that character. In fact, maybe I’ll  get into character while moving the perfectly boxed boxes. That’ll really impress him. Skills, people.

Speaking of HP, I was making dinner the other night and found a very special noodle AS Brad was reading Harry Potter. There’s no such thing as coincidence.

Sight for sore eyes

Excuse me while I virtually gain weight...

I am going to attempt this.

I say attempt because my past couple baking ventures have been, well, ventures. As in- chocolate chip, sugar, and snicker doodle varieties of volcano-shaped disks. Gooey-"put that back in the oven for 10 more minutes," brownies. Lastly, dense banana bread bricks.

It's not me, it's the altitude here in Idaho. I seriously love baking, but I'm no Martha Stewart. Although, I wanted to be her when I was younger. I have fond memories of sitting on the kitchen counter with my mom helping her pour ingredients into the mixer to make cookies, and my dad calling me the next Martha. The altitude makes it hard to bake and run. Even though I am used to it now, I'm still embarrassed and bitter at how pathetic my distance became once we moved here. Baking wise, the goods rise faster and then fall before it's finished baking. Hence, volcanic cookies.

In an attempt to feed my baking hunger with my eyes, I found a blog called Bakerella. She's known for her Cake Balls.
haha. sorry, I couldn't resist.

But seriously, She is so creative with cake! She makes mini cheesecake balls, mini whoopi pies, and even mini pies on sticks! Not everything she makes in mini- she does have a regular size baking section too. Both, equally makes me drool on brad's laptop.

You can find the recipe here
I am going to try it soon, and report what happens. If I don't blog about it, it probably didn't go so well.

yum-mayyy!

halloweenie :[

It's Halloween!
..and I'm sick as a dog :[

Last week was my first full week as a teacher with my class! It was fun and exhausting. Hence, why I am sick. I've been drinking two emergenC's a day and I've washed my hands so much that my knuckles started bleeding, and I still got sick! Did I mention Zicam is my new bff? Bradley is so good at taking care of me, even though he is starting to get sick too. Yesterday, He let me watch Princess and the Frog, and the Love Guru. He made me hot honey/lemon/emergenC tea and ran to wal mart to get medicine. So I've been taking claritin d, sucking on ricola, and putting similisan ear drops in my ears constantly....the itchy ears are the worst! He didn't even get mad at me for waking him up last night with my terrible coughing fits. He's the best :]

On Tuesday we had a few couples over to carve pumpkins! Chase and Ali, Brandon and his girlfriend Robyn, and Travis and his girlfriend Lindsay all squeezed into what we thought was our big kitchen and carved away. Here is our pumpkin:

And everyone's finished pumpkins!

Left to right
Chase and Ali's, Travis and Lindsay's, Brandon and Robyn's, and mine and Brad's

At work we had a Halloween carnival for the kids! Since I had two year olds we mostly just gave them the candy and treats since they didn't know how to do the games. I was dressed up as a crayon, and brad made my costume! He can do anything with duct tape, some of the teachers were pretty impressed :]

Fairies, Vampires and Devils were popular this year :]

My Parent's decided to stop in Rexburg on their way down to Texas! They are moving there for a year for my dad's new job. It was so good to see them and they brought along Maximus! I missed my little baby max so much! I have a picture of him on my dresser, but that's not as good as being able to cuddle with him. My Mom helped me make dinner for them, and my dad gave me a much needed adjustment. I was starting to get sick the night they came so we just stayed home that night and they left the next morning. It was a short trip but it will hold me over until Christmas :]

Brad's parents bought us plane tickets home! It's official! I am sooo thankful because I have been so homesick. My oldest brother and his wife, along with baby Vivienne moved to Spokane earlier this month so all the siblings are in Washington state except me :[ Tyler and Kortni will move here next year after they get hitched so that will be good to have them close. So my parents will be going back to Washington for Christmas also! I am so excited!

This week, I am just going to try and get better...and not get brad more sick. Tomorrow for family night, I am going to try and get things to make caramel apples. Think Mrs. Prindables...Oh yeah, that's what I'm going for.

Send us your healthy vibes!

P.S.- I just finished Catching Fire and I'm reading it again before I start Mockingjay!

Catching up!

I started the post over a month ago...sorry it's taken me so long :[

Brad had his friends over to visit! It was fun, we did lots of things and it was nice because they reminded me of when we'd all hang out back home. One of the nights, we went to this restaurant called Big Juds. It's known for their hamburgers, and they're really big hamburgers. Really, they have huge ones. Man Vs Food went to the one in Boise, I'm not sure if he finished it or not. Brandon and Mike both ordered it, I'm not sure if they ordered the double or the triple but needless to say...

HUGE!
They finished half their own, it was impressive. I'd never be able to eat that, I barely finished my own burger haha. While they were here they went with brad, brandon and travis to the ice caves. I opted out. They didn't get any pictures because it was dark, but let me tell you, you will never catch me in an ice cave. Brad told me there were parts where they were sliding on their backs with the ceiling a foot above their faces. Brad said it was a good thing I didn't go haha.

They spray painted tee shirts and they were very proud of them, brandons was hilarious:


They were only here for a couple days, but it was fun!
The fair was here! It was nothing like the Puyallup fair (it was a sad comparison, especially the food options) But Idaho is very proud of it! First, we went to see the horses. I don't like them that much, they're too big. They are beautiful, big animals though! Everytime I would go to pet one, I would hesitate and they knew I was nervous so they would turn their head :[ So I took pictures instead :]


I thought this one had awesome hair-And then the goat...their eyes are weird, brad and I both agree they are kinda crazy looking. Like they are always watching...

Princess...OPRAH...and Spaz. I thought it was hilarious how they named one Oprah! For food we had smoked turkey leg....it tasted just like ham!

This next picture, brad wanted me to stand by those HUGE horses with the hairy feet. I was nervous to get close because it could have probably jumped over the bar that it was behind.It was the biggest horse I've ever seen! If you know me very well, you'd know that I do not do well near horses- if the earlier pictures weren't enough of a hint haha.

If I had gotten any closer I think I would have had a panic attack. Don't let the nervous smile fool you. I was afraid it was going to eat my hair so I'm glad it turned it's head!

I'll try and post again soon, I have a lot to catch up on :]

Crafts, Bowling, Pennies, Shirts, Golf, and home made juice!

So, last Saturday it was my mothers birthday!!! I miss her so much, you never realize how much you need your mom until you're expected to not need her anymore. In my case, it was getting married. I still need my mama :[ I call her almost every other time I make dinner. "How do I cook frozen hamburger?" was one of my first phone calls haha. So to show her how much I love and miss her, I made her a fancy watch bracelet :]I love you mom! I miss you and dad so much! I can't wait to come home for christmas! So we live by the train tracks, very close actually. We had just gotten home from getting delicious Millhollow frozen yogurt and we hear the horn coming. All of a sudden, brad leaps from the couch to the other room and runs out the door. I knew instantly what he was doing. He had grabbed a couple pennies, to see if the train would flatten them and how much. The train flattened them like this:

They got pretty flat, it's impressive...christmas presents anyone? haha just joking. So that night we decided to have a little date night so we went to this movie theater/bowling alley/arcade called Fat Cats. We didn't have impressive scores, brad won but I got the one and only strike :]!

This ball was only 7 lbs...clearly, you can tell I'm struggling.

The afterwards....
The first was mine, I always get All Lovin No Oven: Cake batter ice cream, chocolate, cookie dough, and whip cream. Brad's was halfway gone before I got to take a picture of his haha. He always gets, Birthday Cake Remix: Cake batter ice cream, brownie, sprinkles and whip cream. They are both delicious, and I refuse to find out how many calories I consume every time we go :]

Guess who likes to golf? well, I like to go to the driving range. Brad got us a big bucket of golf balls and taught me how to use a driver, a number five? and a putter. I am not really sure, they all look the same to me. It was nearly 100 that day, and no clouds so it was hot!

Notice in this picture, how I didn't hit the ball? That happened a lot.Brad was such a good golf teacher, he is very patient and explained everything very well. I even hit one ball past the 150 sign, for real!

As for dinner, a couple that I made that we really liked were:
Chicken Fajitahs!Chicken Milanese with Spaghetti!
Brad said this was the best thing I've made so far. It really was sooo good, he asked for it the next night too haha!

One of the gifts from my parents that we got was a Jack Lallane's Power juicer. We went to the store and bought apples, carrots, oranges, strawberries, bananas, watermelon, lemons, limes, white nectarines, wheat grass, spinach, and mango's. The first time we pretty much did all of them but watermelon, mango's, wheat grass and spinach. It did not taste good, it was so lemony and sour! It tasted like sour lemonade but looked like carrot juice. So we went to the gym and when we got back we put the juice in a blender with yogurt, ice and a banana. It was sooo good!




We like juice at our place haha :]
So another thing we did last week was make our own shirts! We had brandon, travis, chase and his wife, ali come over and we got shirts and spray paint from wal mart. We all did different things with tape and stencils. Brad cut out a horse for his, and I hole punched construction paper and used that as a stencil. And for the back I twisted it up into a little cone and sprayed painted it to make it look tye dye. Brad made another the other day but I'll post it for next weeks blog. he was also very proud of that one.


That was pretty much our week, it was lots of fun :] Missing everyone at home, we love you guys!

This week: death by snow cone, bad habits, wet marbles, dinner, and cards :]

This past week went by pretty slow. I guess that's what happens when you don't have jobs haha. It's amazing how many bad habits you can develop in just one week. The main one is, going to bed late and waking up even later. Last night, neither of us could fall asleep until 4am, FOUR AM! and we didn't get out of bed until one today. I've been on a baking high this week. I think that could develop into a bad habit for sure! I made chocolate chip banana bread and made an oreo dessert. It came from a box, and it was like a frozen delicious cheesecake!

Sooooo yummy!

So other then applying to jobs in the area we have just been hanging out. We applied to a craft store here and brad had mentioned before about putting lucky bamboo in the bathroom. So while we were there we passed a whole lucky bamboo section! While brad was picking some out, I found the jars full of what looked like marbles. I, being curious and feeling like I should touch them, did just that. They were soft and wet marbles, they were amazing! we couldn't stop touching them haha! So we ended up buying clear ones, as well as some green glass pebbles to fill a jar we have. Brad should be an interior designer :]

So we had a lot of the amazing wet marbles left, so the directions said to just let them dry up back to their origonal size (which is smaller than rice!) So here is a funny story and another reason why I think brad and I were meant for each other. I was in the kitchen alone, and every once in awhile when I would pass the bowl filled with the extras, I would sink my hands in them. They feel so wierd, like little eye balls or something! It made me feel like a child because I couldn't leave them alone they felt so squishy, it was just silly. Later, I walk into the kitchen and I see brad mushing his hands in the bowl, and as soon as he heard me he looked over his shoulder like he got caught being weird haha! We laughed a lot and since it was out in the open that we were both doing it, we just did it together and talked about how cool they felt haha


Anyways, I think my cooking has improved. I made a chicken bow tie pasta with a really simple alfredo sauce with broccoli and garlic bread. Brad loved it! That night we made cookie dough milkshakes for dessert, well brad did and I ate it really quick :]


That dinner was funny, brad is hilarious and he is seriously my favorite dancer. He is so silly, and he knows it too. His dance moves crack me up, I was trying to get him to dance on camera and he wouldn't do it! So I got me begging him to dance on video, I figure it's the next best thing. But he does do a ballerina twirl in it :]

So the Madison county fair is going on, and it's the tiniest fair ever. Like of.all.time. It had tiny rides, and they only had one kid on them and they didn't look too impressed either. So if youre curious as to why the post heading says death by snow cone, this is why. I have food allergies to corn. And corn syrup is used to flavor snow cones. The last time I had one though, I was fine! So i figured I was in the clear and got a Peach Raspberry with cream. That was friday, today is sunday and I between then and this morning I had been rolling around, wimpering in pain like a kicked puppy. It was terrible. Never again will I trust a snow cone.Looks innocent, right? and by innocent, I mean delicious.

On Sundays we go over to Brads Aunt Belinda and Uncle Mikes house for dinner and tonight we played cards afterwards. We played Crown, which is like Rook. Everyone in my family knows that I suck at it haha. Brad helped tell me when I could lay down my cards, good thing he's honest because he would go right after me! I ened up doing second worst, with a final score of 164! Also on sundays, byu-i students will sing hymns underneath the stadium bleachers and brad wanted to take me so we met up with some people we know, and went to there place afterwards.

It was a good week, regardless of being sick. I love my husband, miss my family so much. Especially my parents, it was my mama's birthday this week and we got to webcam with them and walked the laptop around the apt so they could see our place. It was nice :]
We're planning on going to the sand dunes this weekend with a bunch of people, so I'll possibly blog about that next sunday.

From rexburg, with love :]