Mini Dose of Happiness

Today was busy, long, and not to mention, a monday...ew! I got a lil 'Mini Dose of Happiness' from this video, and wanted to share it! He's super cute and has mad skillz!

This video is also really great. It's just a new clip, but I like it!

Compliment of my life "You look like a little girl"

Some people amaze me!

I walk into BJ's Wholesale with my boss Bro. Durrant. A lady from his ward is there, and he introduces me to her. I politely and properly introduce myself to her, and she replies with "You look like a little girl".

Who says that? Soooo annoying!

What made it worse was that the same situation happened the day before. We were at a Christmas party and my boss introduced me to a fellow, the guy looks at Bro. Durrant in bewilderment and says "YOU HIRED A LAUREL!??" Gez people!

Maybe everyone I meet has turrets syndrome. Maybe I look sooooo young I send people into utter shock, and they loose all sense of tact, politeness, and social skills. Maybe I should start wearing my Grandma costume regularly.

Any Ideas???

Holy Snow!!!

It snowed sooo much last night!! We woke up to the sound of someone shoveling, peeked outside and saw a beautiful winter wonderland! So, I did what every normal person does....I put my down jacket on over my PJ's, slipped on my wool clogs, grabbed an umbrella and went on a walk! Ok maybe it's not that normal :) But I bet anyone else from the south experiencing their first big snow would totally do the same thing!

 

Christmastastic Weekend!

Christmas time is officially here! We kicked off the first weekend of December with 4 fun Christmas events!

New Haven Christmas Tree Lighting!!! We went with the Streeter's and Pope's downtown on Thursday to see the huge Christmas tree lighting on the New Haven Green. The weather was great, and we had lots of fun! Highlights included free cheese, free apple cider, free hot chocolate (x2)...and oh ya, the TREE of course!

Emily, Audrey, and Jeff

Whitney and Rose

The Tree!

We also went out and got ourselves a lil tree over the weekend. We went to a tree farm in Hamden and chopped down the PeRfEcT Christmas tree :) Daniel has declared the tree is now a part of our family.

Broken Arrow Nursery

Here it is!!! Daniel working hard to saw it down.

Here's me pretending to help. I am laughing because I couldn't even move the saw :)

"We" did it!! Daniel was excited to wear his lumber man jacket to the tree farm :)

You can't really tell, but it was lightly snowing while we were out roaming the tree fields. It was pretty neat, very 'Christmas-y'.

Later we went to a Christmas Concert put on by our wonderful Skate Choir. Don't let the lack of pictures fool you...it was amazing!!! Two thumbs up!

At the end of the day we attend the annual PA Christmas party. As we walked out of our apartment we found everything covered in a fresh layer of snow! This is my car! I yelped with excitement to realize it had been snowing!

It was a great end to a wonderful day. Despite the snow, we headed out the the PA party downtown. We enjoyed seeing so many Whitehall PA's, and all of Daniel's classmates. They served us a great dinner, and we enjoyed lots of dancing! LOTS of dancing!

This is a great action shot of our friends Kyle and Makayla. Apparently they are professional swing dancers! They were tearin' up the dance floor!

More dance floor awesomeness came from our finger mustaches! Next to me is the PA director sporting a snazzy stach, and next to Daniel is Kassidy and Lance who are Whitehallers in the 2nd year PA class.

Stach Swap

Feelin' the Love.

Phew!!! So on Saturday we chopped down a tree, went to the concert, and then the PA party. We were enjoying ourselves so much that it wasn't until Sunday morning that I realized we had had such a busy day. We slept through the alarms and woke up at 9:30. Church begins at 9:30.

Still Thankful...

I didn't get to do as many Thankful posts as I wanted, so I'll just wrap up a few really quick :)

- I am so thankful for my family! My Mom, Dad, Larry, Brian, Jessica, Kristian, Colin, My Whatcot, Cardon, Skelly, and Dickman grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins. I am also very thankful for the family that I have joined through Daniel. His immediate family, and extended family are a wonderful group of people that I am very glad to know and be apart of.
- Speaking of Daniel....I am so thankful for him and for our marriage. He is the best, and with out getting too gushy or emotional, I just want to say that he is so wonderful and such a great man. I am thankful for his kindness, friendship, love, humor, protection and support.
- I am thankful for the Gospel. It has provided me so much support and pure joy. I love living the gospel and the happiness it brings to my soul.
- I am thankful for my healthy mind and body. A strong mind and body are invaluable to me, and I feel blessed to have both.
- I am thankful to be here in New Haven, and for Daniel to have such a wonderful opportunity to attend Yale. It has been a joyous, and sometimes stressful, journey so far. I sometimes ask myself and Daniel....'Is there anywhere else you'd rather be?'....and the answer is always no.

The list could go on, but these are some really important ones I wanted to mention before I lose all sense of thankfulness as I begin blogging about the festivities of Christmas!!!!! (half jk)

Thankful for this Sunny & Fabulous Weekend!

I am so thankful, and feel very blessed that it has been so sunny and beautiful. I feel like the wonderful sunny rays are shining down just for me, they are like a gift from God :)

This weekend I went on a great sunny walk with my friend Whitney (who shares my love of house gazing), attended a fun and yummy 'Pie Party' (I made a creamy peanut butter pie), went to the Yale vs. Harvard Football game and the traditional PA Pre-game Pizza Party at Mary's house (the director of the PA program), went out on a girls night to see the movie New Moon, and discovered how I can get sunshine rays all winter long!

This is it! The sun shines right into my kitchen window, and today I was doing dishes in super bright and warm sun. I even wore sun glasses it was so bright, and got pretty toasty from the rays. It was great!...and yes, I am a weirdo....and possibly sunburned now....Yay!

Here is the Pizza Party! Look at that spread! The pizza was amazing! Even ore amazing is that they made it out of a TRUCK with a built in brick oven in the back!

 

Here's us at the Yale vs. Harvard game. We were winning till the very end, and then they beat us 14-10. The Halftime show was as crazy and weird as we expected. It was like a drama-geek play that was narrated over the loud speakers and acted out by students on the field. It was pretty funny/weird.

It has been a great weekend!

Thankful for...learning how to cook!

I remember being at my wedding showers, receiving cookware, recipe books, mixing bowls and baking sets. Each time I would open one of these gifts, I would exclaim "I don't know how to cook, but I can't wait to learn!". I was 100% serious, and now a year and half later, I have grown leaps and bounds in my cooking skills. It's been a fun journey and I've noticed a few things....

1. I love allrecipes.com and am a very loyal allrecipes chef. What I love/need are the comments and reviews from people that have already made the recipe. They give advice and confirm that it is actually a good recipe, and tips about how they made it wonderful. I am frightened to make anything not on all recipes...even despite the heavy alluring pull of my cookbooks at home, and the super-duper awesome ones at the store.
2. I only cook things that I like. I don't love this observation about myself, however it's true :) I know that Daniel really loves a few certain foods, but I don't make them very often at all...bad wife!!!
3. If something takes way too long, or I had a difficult time with it, I develop an aversion to that food, and wont eat it again for a very, very, very long time....even if it tasted good.
4.  I am extremely non adventurous when it comes to cooking meats. I basically only cooked with beef and chicken. Other varieties are minimal: ham (only once) and sausage (a few times), pork (once in a slow cooker, so that doesn't really count) and fish....well, I have cooked shrimp and scallops, Daniel made red fish once...but still, very limited fish use also.
5. I don't really cook my restaurant favorites. I love Sushi, Thai, Pasta's and Mexican food the most, yet I make these the least...? My new cooking goal is to make these kinds of foods more often, as well as Daniel's favorites :)
6. I have found these 3 basic things to be the most helpful when cooking. Taste your food. Use lots spices and flavorings. Don't cook a recipe with out personal advice, or a 5 star rating :)

These are some really great items that I love to make. These are very easy (require no skill at all) and very yummy! I follow the comments on all of these :)

Slow Cooker Tortilla Soup - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Slow-Cooker-Chicken-Tortilla-Soup/Detail.aspx

Spicy Garlic Lime Chicken - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Spicy-Garlic-Lime-Chicken/Detail.aspx

Salsa Chicken - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Salsa-Chicken/Detail.aspx


Kielbasa with Peppers and Potatoes - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Kielbasa-with-Peppers-and-Potatoes/Detail.aspx

Ham and Potato Soup - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Delicious-Ham-and-Potato-Soup/Detail.aspx