Life in the Hempelmann House

Scott does Iceland!

2012-02-18T20:44:00.000-08:00

Scott was sent to Iceland for a flight test on the 787...a trip of a lifetime! They were looking for strong winds for their test. It was windy enough when they arrived, but they had to take a mandatory 20 hour rest period. Once they were ready to test, the winds died down, so they had some free afternoons to tour the area while they waited to see if the winds would pick back up.
Scott and some friends drove out to this beautiful waterfall, Gullfloss.

Scott visited Hallgrimur's Church which has a very tall bell tower. He rode an elevator up 8 stories to the top of the bell tower to view the town of Reykjavik.

The view from the top...

Iceland has many geysers. Scott and some friends went to a outdoor pool heated by hot springs. While they were there it started to snow...Scott says it was beautiful! This is a geyser called Blesi...

Since they were unable to find the needed winds to complete the test in Iceland, they checked the weather forecast and saw strong winds in Newfoundland, Canada. They packed up and headed there for a couple days. On one of his afternoons off, Scott and some friends walked to this lookout on the waterfront called Signal Hill.

Before they could make their return flight to Seattle, the pilots had to take a rest day. So everyone had one last day to tour the area. Scott and his friends got a rental car and drove around to see the sights...

The Cape Spear Lighthouse is the oldest lighthouse in Newfoundland and is at the eastern most point of North America!

Such a wonderful way to see the world...by having Boeing pick up the tab! :)

Megan's Baby Shower

2012-02-12T19:52:00.000-08:00

This weekend we celebrated my wonderful friend, Megan, and her sweet baby girl. She is due at the end of March and I'm so excited to meet her Baby Girl!

Megan is very loved by her family and friends and received so many wonderful things for her Baby Girl!
Sarah and cute little Hadley were there too, so I got some more snuggling time in with this sweet little girl...

Megan with Hadley...I can't wait to see her with her precious little girl in just a few weeks!

It will be so fun to see Megan's baby girl and Hadley grow up together just a couple months apart...I know they will be such sweet friends.

Scott's Birthday!

2012-02-12T19:42:00.000-08:00

Scott turned the big 2-8 this year and we celebrated with our wonderful friends!

We started out at a indoor go-cart place and had SO much fun racing each other!

Afterwards, we headed to dinner for burgers and beers. Scott got the beer sampler and was one happy boy!

Happy birthday, Scott! You are such an amazing person! I love you!

Baby Room Sign

2012-02-12T19:24:00.000-08:00

Last November, we took a trip to Leavenworth with our friends Sarah and Nick, and Megan and Josh. While perusing the cute shops, Sarah saw this cute sign:

But it was $50 or $60, and I told Sarah I could make her something similar for MUCH less. Our snow days presented a perfect time to make the sign!

I started by giving Sarah some font options, and then used my Cricut to cut the saying out in vinyl. I rubbed the vinyl on the canvas using transfer tape to keep it all straight. Scott helped a lot with this part to make sure everything was straight and the spacing was even. After the letters were on, I painted the whole thing white to seal the letters and prevent the green paint from seeping under.

After the white dried, I painted over the whole canvas a couple times with green to get the color Sarah wanted.

Then I made sure it was completely dry (I was a bit inpatient with this part, so I busted out the hair dryer...).

Once it was completely dry I started to carefully peel off the vinyl letters and because I just can't keep Scott away, I let him help too. :)

Our sign all finished...I can't wait to see it hanging in Hadley's sweet nursery!

Snow Days!

2012-01-19T17:31:00.000-08:00

We've been hit with a crazy amount of snow and ice, so this week has been filled with SNOW DAYS! We got about 5 inches of snow on Wednesday...

The ruler has about a 1/4 inch on the bottom before the 0 mark, so it's really close to being 5 inches!

When we woke up on Thursday, we had about a 1/2 inch of ice on top of all the snow and lots of icicles!

Scott and I trekked down the hill today for a tasty lunch out! It was fun getting out to see the world all frozen and white.

While we were out it started to snow again! It's been snowing all evening and it's already built up about a 1/2 inch on top of the ice from last night. School is cancelled again tomorrow! It was a 1 day work week for me! We'll see how much more snow we get tonight!

Celebrating Granny's Life

2012-01-15T23:23:00.000-08:00

This weekend we joined together with the Hempelmann family to celebrate the life of Scott's wonderful Granny. Granny lived a long, adventure filled life and it was wonderful to hear stories from her 98 years of life.

Family flew in from all over the country to remember Granny. It was wonderful to meet new family members and catch up with others! Sadly, I didn't get any pictures as we were busy chatting away and enjoying our time with family.

Rest in peace, Granny. We'll never forget your loving ways and silly, joking personality!

Sarah's Baby Shower

2012-01-07T20:40:00.000-08:00

Today I co-hosted a baby shower for one of my best friends, Sarah! She is due with a baby girl in February. I'm so excited to meet her sweet little girl and know that she is going to be a wonderful mommy!

Sarah is planning on decorating the baby's room with jungle animals, so we used elephants, giraffes, and monkeys as our shower theme!

I had so much fun making these cute onesies and lovies for Baby Girl! I can't believe she'll be making her big debut in a month!

Sarah got so many fun outfits and sweet things for Baby Girl!

We had a fun candy buffet and cute little totes for guests to take home candy! (It was hard to get a good picture as this is in front of a window and a chandelier.)

Sarah is such a sweet friend and I'm so excited for her and her husband, Nick. It has been such a joy experiencing this pregnancy with her and I'm BEYOND excited to meet Baby Girl! I know they are going to be amazing parents to their precious little girl!

Seattle Fun!

2011-08-12T12:31:00.000-07:00

Scott's wonderful sister, Emily, and her husband, Bryce, came to visit us this last weekend! We had such a fun time exploring the city together...

We started with lunch at Pike Brewery and then had fun exploring the market!

Then we headed out to the Redhook Brewery and Chateau Ste. Michelle. Sadly, all their tours were booked for the day, but we still had a lot of fun exploring the grounds of the winery!

The next day we headed out to the I-90 bridge to watch the Blue Angels! It was AMAZING! So fun watching as they fly right over head!

We had such a fun weekend together! I wish Emily and Bryce lived closer so we could have fun adventures together more often!

Beach Fun with Friends

2011-08-01T22:13:00.000-07:00

Scott and I spent last weekend on the Oregon Coast with some of our best friends! On our way to the beach, we stopped in Astoria to check out the Goonie's house!

Our next stop: Seaside! Seaside is such a fun beach town. We bought gobs of taffy at the Candyman shop, fed seals at the aquarium, ate yummy fish and chips, and had a bonfire on the beach! We even got in some game time at the arcade (the boys were in heaven!).

After our fun in Seaside, we headed to Cannon Beach for the purpose of our trip - to celebrate the wedding of Steve and Rebecca! It was a perfect day at the beach for a wedding and the beautiful Haystack Rock in the distance made it even more spectacular! We even got to spend some time with Scott's parents and sister, Theresa!

The next day, we spent a few hours in Cannon Beach exploring the cute little town and walking along the beach near Haystack Rock.

Then we headed to our last destination on our beach adventure - Rockaway Beach! We spent the afternoon hanging out at the beach. Scott, Jessica, and Armaan took their traditional dip in the ocean. Looking brave before heading into the freezing ocean...

We finished our trip with a beautiful sunset and a stop at the Tillamook Cheese Factory on our way home the next day!

It was such a fun weekend at the beach with wonderful friends. Scott and I are lucky to have such amazing friends that we've known since high school!

Celebrating our 1 year!

2011-08-01T15:41:00.000-07:00

To celebrate our 1 year anniversary, Scott and I headed to Victoria for the weekend. We had such a great time together! We walked onto the ferry in Port Angeles and stayed right in downtown Victoria.

One day we explored the city on a bus tour. It was so fun to see so much of Victoria that we wouldn't get to see on foot.

It was such a wonderful weekend together!

Our 1st Anniversary!

2011-07-24T08:00:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's already been a year! We have had so many wonderful adventures together this year. It's amazing to be married to my best friend and someone I love to be around 24/7.

July 2010 - Fiji

Everyone says that your first year of marriage is the hardest. It was such an amazing and fun year for us! If this is supposedly the hardest year of our marriage, I'm excited for what's to come!

February 2011 - Puerta Vallarta, Mexico

We even survived our kitchen remodel which many people told us would be a true test our relationship. I love that we're both so easy going and not overly opinionated making it a smooth remodel.

February 2011 - Leavenworth

I can't wait to see what adventures the next year brings for us!

Family Name Sign

2011-07-23T18:06:00.000-07:00

I've seen some cute name signs around blogland and have wanted to make my own for awhile. A few months ago I bought a cabinet door from the As-Is section of IKEA and just got around to painting it (a beautiful sage green color). I used the wonderful Cricut to cut out our name and the year we were married. The sign seemed a little plain with just our name and date, so I tried to cut out a quatrefoil border with the Cricut. After 2 attempts, I called it a fail and looked for something different. I saw this stencil on Tatertots & Jello and knew it was exactly what I wanted, but it seemed like SO much work, so naturally I put it off for a couple weeks.

When my friend, Megan, suggested a craft day I decided to finally sit down and work on the stencil. I printed it out at 50% so the scale of the stencil would work better with my frame. After carefully cutting out the stencil, I went to town tracing it onto the frame...that's all I accomplished during our craft day! It took forever! Later I tried painting the stencil using a small paint brush and knew immediately that it was not going to work. So I took my second trip of the day to JoAnn's (a nice man working there said, "I recognize you. Do you come in often?"...um, clearly I come in too often!) and bought a white paint pen...SO much easier to use! I put on 2 coats using the paint pen and while it's not perfect, I love how it looks! Now I just need to find a place to hang it...

Done, Done, Done!

2011-07-23T17:42:00.000-07:00

Our kitchen is officially DONE! (It's been done for awhile...I just forgot to blog about it until now...oops!) The reordered end panels finally arrived and we were able to put the finishing touches on our island.

We added the end panels to cover up the seam between the two cabinets, added some decorative molding to the base and added an outlet on each end of the island.

I'm still not so sure about the white outlet with the wood outlet cover, although I'm not sure there are better options.

It's SO nice to be done and be able to fully enjoy the kitchen without those little details on our mind. And now we can get onto our next project...finishing the garage!

Our kitchen remodel is {nearly} done!

2011-06-05T21:53:00.000-07:00

Our kitchen is {almost} done and it's beautiful! It's a huge change from how it used to look and we LOVE it!

Before...looking from the living room into the kitchen.

Before...in the kitchen looking toward the living room.

After about 2 months of work, we are finished! (Well, almost finished...the company we ordered our cabinets through originally ordered the wrong end panels for our island, so we're waiting on the new ones to come in so we can put the finishing touches on the island, ugh.) We can't believe how much the whole living area has changed and feels SO much bigger now!

The extra storage from the island is wonderful too! All of the wedding gifts that were being housed in our guest room closet now have a home!

We love the whole thing and we have a huge sense of accomplishment having done nearly all the work ourselves!

A New Ride!

2011-05-30T20:33:00.000-07:00

With the promise of a job for me next year, Scott and I decided it was time to buy me a new car! My old car, which was affectionally called the "Red Maraca", had treated me pretty well in the 6 years I owned it, but it was becoming more and more unreliable. (It left me stranded a few times in the last year.) Scott has been researching a lot in the past couple months and knew that the Mazda 3 would be a great car for us!

It's such a nice car and has MANY features that my red maraca didn't have, like a non-moldy trunk space and a right side mirror, haha. :) But really, it's pretty awesome - keyless entry and push button start, dual climate control, bum warmers, and a navigation system!

So much more than we even wanted, but it's what they had on the lot and we got a great deal!

Scott and I are thoroughly enjoying it and are glad to have a reliable car for me to drive now.

A Furry New Friend :)

2011-05-30T20:21:00.000-07:00

There is a cute, furry new friend in the neighborhood...I'm pretty sure it's Scott's new best friend. :) He's such a friendly and cute cat...he has no tail and his owners have named him "Nubs"!

He likes to hang out and distract Scott from working on the kitchen...

Nubs is fun to have around...it's like having a cat without the responsibility of having a cat. :)

Even with all Nubs' distractions, we're nearing the finish line on our kitchen remodel! Pictures to come soon!

School Art Auction

2011-05-02T22:29:00.000-07:00

My school just hosted a fun art walk and auction. It was such a fun night full of beautiful projects and the unveiling of our new stained glass windows in the entry of the school. They are really magnificent and were inspired by student artwork...definitely something to stop by and see if you're in the area.

As part of the auction, each class made an art project. Most classes have involved parents that think up a project, buy the supplies, and lead the art project with the class. Since I have little to no parent involvement, I chose a project that wouldn't require too much time and money to complete.

I thought a flower pot would be a fun spring project that would get parents excited to spend their money! :) Each student drew and colored a flower or bug (with very guided instruction) and I attached each with mod podge. With a couple coats (or 5) of polyurethane to protect it from the weather, it was ready for some beautiful tulips!

I was so excited at the auction because 2 of my classroom parents were fighting over it and in the end it sold for $100. Not bad for a flower pot! It was so cute I contemplated having the students draw more pictures so I could make myself one (without the $100 price tag!)...we'll see if we have extra time this year. :)

Kitchen Remodel

2011-05-02T22:06:00.000-07:00

We're about a month into our kitchen remodel and it's looking GREAT!

This is what we started with...a wall in the middle of nowhere that blocked the kitchen from the rest of the house.

Looking into the kitchen from the living room.

Looking into the living room from the kitchen.

Scott had a GREAT time with demolition!

Busting out the wall...such a difference already!

The wall is GONE! It's so bright and open!

The tile floor is gone (well, technically it's still in that pile on the floor, but it's not attached anymore!) and the countertops are coming out!

Funny story - As we were loading chunks of countertop in the truck to take to the dump a neighbor stopped by to see what we were up to. After some chatting, we learned that the previous owner had installed these countertops just a year before we moved in! We felt a little bad tearing them out so soon, but it's not our fault he had bad taste! :)

Now that we've finished the demo, we've started the finishing work to make it beautiful! The new island cabinets have been installed (pictures to come!) and the countertop guys are coming out tomorrow to template! We hope to tile the floor this weekend and finish up with painting! Hopefully we'll have a finished kitchen to show off in a couple weeks! :)

Homemade Samoas!

2011-04-09T14:05:00.000-07:00

I've been feeling the urge to bake since I've been on Spring Break all week, so I cleaned the dust out of the kitchen yesterday (remodel pictures to come soon!) and made these delicious homemade samoas!

Samoas are my FAVORITE Girl Scout cookie, so when I saw this recipe at In Katrina's Kitchen, I knew I had to try them! They are delicious! They are even better on the second day once the carmel mixture has softened the cookie a bit...YUM!

Goodbye Popcorn!

2011-04-02T16:40:00.000-07:00

Scott and I are SO excited to be starting our kitchen remodel! We've ordered the cabinets and they are scheduled to arrive at the end of April, so we've got a month to get everything ready. We imagine this project should be fairly easy - just take down a wall, rip out the floor, and add an island...piece of cake! Haha!

There was just one slight issue with this "easy" project...most of the house had popcorn ceiling, but the kitchen didn't. Our options were either to (a) scrap off all the popcorn ceiling or (b) add popcorn to the kitchen (although the idea of adding MORE of the dreadful popcorn gives me the heebie-jeebies!). So we had our popcorn tested for asbestos (this would help determine our options) and it was asbestos free, so we started scrapping!

The finished dining room! It is so much brighter and lighter!

Thank goodness we don't have carpet because it created quite the dusty mess! We're still trying to get rid of all the dust!

It was a lot of work, but our ceiling looks SO much better and it hasn't even been retextured! Once the wall comes down, we'll texture the whole ceiling!

Next up - removing the wood from above the mantel and the wood wall from the entry way. There is just way too much wood in this house! (I do realize these projects are not kitchen related, but are easy to do since we'll be working on the ceiling more!)

Leavenworth Adventures!

2011-03-08T22:34:00.000-08:00

This past weekend we went to Leavenworth with some wonderful friends to celebrate our friend, Armaan's birthday!

Scott and I had never been to Leavenworth in the winter and it's such a beautiful town covered in snow! We had such a great time exploring (and eating our way through) town! :)

Our first stop was the Munchen Haus! It's my favorite place to eat in Leavenworth!

(Photo by Trudi)

After lunch we headed down to the waterfront park to take in the beautiful sights of winter!

For dinner we headed to Armaan's favorite place to eat - King Ludwig's! We shared this gigantic platter of food which included half a chicken and a ham hock! Delish! :)

(Photo by Trudi)

The next day we got a chance to play in the snow down at the waterfront park! Since the snow had become pretty icy, we were only able to make this small little snowman.

Such a wonderful way to spend a weekend - with fabulous friends in a beautiful town!

Vallarta Zoo

2011-03-01T22:14:00.000-08:00

One of our days in Puerto Vallarta we walked to the local zoo (lucky for us it was only a 5 minute walk from our resort!). The Puerto Vallarta zoo is SO different than any zoo in the US. For only $10 we could hold a baby animal and for $5 we could get a bag of food to feed the animals!

I choose to hold this cute baby monkey! He was just 6 months old!

Scott got to pet this adorable baby jaguar!

We had SO much fun feeding all the animals in the zoo and could get MUCH closer than any zoo in the states!

This was likely the most fun we've ever had at a zoo! It was amazing seeing the animals up close and feeding and holding the animals was an experience we'll never forget!

Adventures in Puerto Vallarta!

2011-03-01T22:02:00.000-08:00

Scott and I spent this past week in beautiful Puerto Vallarta! We went with our friends, Megan and Josh, and had a blast soaking up the sun!

This was the view from our balcony on the top floor! :)

We headed into town a few times during the week to explore the city. We saw the beautiful Our Lady of Guadalupe Church,

walked along the Malecon (a boardwalk full of sculptures),

and hit up the market to buy some fun trinkets!

We took advantage of the open bar and tried a variety of drinks (we'd never heard of some before - Dirty Monkey and Alfonzo XIII were some interesting drinks!).

We went on a couple of excursions, the first one being a sunset cruise/dinner/show called Rhythm of the Night. We took a catamaran out to a private beach for a delicious dinner and a fun show (sadly I didn't get many pictures).

Our next excursion was called Outdoor Adventure. It involved riding a mule up a hill and then taking ziplines down! On the way down we also got to repel down the side of a waterfall and then zipline into the bottom of a waterfall! Sadly, we didn't get any pictures of this as we were not allowed to take cameras with us for safety reasons and at $15 a picture, we weren't about to buy one of their pictures!

Our last excursion was a sailing trip! We sailed aboard a 50 foot sailboat and saw a whale family (baby included!), dolphins, and a sea turtle! It was such a wonderful and relaxing experience to take in the sights of the towns along the bay while laying about a boat. :)

We also took an amazing trip to the local zoo! I took SO many pictures that I'll put it all in another post! :)

Heart Felt Pillow

2011-01-29T18:52:00.000-08:00

I've been itching to make some holiday pillows and finally sat down to made this cute Valentine's pillow! It was my first pillow making experience and I think it went pretty well (just don't look close, because I didn't stuff it very full and I couldn't figure out how to finish the opening nicely...oh well!). After I finished making my little red pillow out of some left over felt, I cut lots of little white circles (about 2" wide).

My original idea was to sew each felt circle on, but after sewing a few it seemed too complicated and time consuming. So I busted out my trusty glue gun and went to town! :) First, I folded the circle in half and put a small glob of glue in the middle before I folded it in half again.

Then I smeared the tip of the felt circle in hot glue and placed it on the pillow. I kept gluing and placing until the felt circles created a cute little heart.

I'm not sure that hot glue will make this a durable pillow, but for now, it's a cute addition to our entry way!

6 Months!

2011-01-24T21:30:00.000-08:00

Scott and I have been married 6 months today! I feel so lucky to have met my best friend in life. I couldn't imagine spending my life with anyone else! Our silly sense of humor, childlike behavior, and love of organization, DIY projects, lazy Saturday mornings, and adventures has made us perfect for each other! :) The last 6 months have been filled with many amazing and wonderful adventures together!

We traveled to Fiji to celebrate our new life together.

We took a trip to beautiful Spokane to celebrate the wedding of my sister-in-law, Emily, to her wonderful new husband, Bryce!

We experienced our first snow day together! Hello, sleeping in and hours of TV! :)

We had our first Christmas tree adventure!

We've had such a wonderful start to our marriage! I'm excited to see what the next 6 months bring as we finish up our first year as husband and wife! We've got some wonderful adventures planned - a fun trip to Mexico in February, celebrating Scott's birthday with friends, a trip to Leavenworth with amazing friends, and hopefully finishing up our BIG garage redo! :)

"How does one celebrate 6 months of wedded bliss?", you may ask. I'm not sure how others celebrate, but here in the Hempelmann house, we are celebrating with hamburgers and fries from a drive-thru, a slice of our wedding cake (still delicious!), and by sharing the Advil Cold & Sinus, the Robitussin, and a box of Kleenex! :) Not how we imagined spending our evening together, but we're both still recovering from horrible colds that just won't go away. Hopefully we'll be healthier at 7 months and can go out for date night! :)

Girl's Craft Night!

2011-01-22T16:19:00.000-08:00

Last night I had a fun craft night with some WONDERFUL girls from work! We had a great time chatting and crafting the night away. I feel SO lucky to work with such an amazing staff!
I made this cute Valentine's wreath that I saw on The Idea Room Blog.

It was a fun, easy project. You need red felt (I had a bunch left over from a failed Christmas tree skirt project), a foam heart wreath, and a bunch of sewing pins. I used a cup to trace a circle and just started cutting away...I cut probably 250 or so circles (with the help of Scott and Grace!).

Fold each circle in half and in half again.

Push a pin through the tip of the folded circle and push into the wreath form.

Grace finished up some super cute mittens and then wanted to learn how to sew! Megan and I helped her make this fun drawstring bag to hold all of her knitting items!

Megan sewed the whole time and made a variety of "original" projects. :)

Some other wonderful girls from school were there too, but I forgot to take pictures before they left. Craft night with wonderful friends is a great way to end the work week! :)

Garage Redo

2011-01-16T17:48:00.000-08:00

Since moving into our house, finishing the garage has been on our long list of things we wanted to do...waaaayyyy down at the bottom. But we got a GREAT deal on some drywall from a contractor friend of my dad's, so we decided to use our week off over the holiday to get it done. We were sure that it would be a quick, easy, and inexpensive project!

Near the beginning of the project...we had already taken down the plywood from this wall.

The garage only had 1 outlet and it was on the ceiling to power the garage door...not helpful for anything else! We're adding 2 outlets on each wall, 2 lights on the front of the garage, a light on the side of the house, and a light on the back of the house. 175 feet of wiring later and we're ready to continue...

I even helped too! :)

My family has always offered to help with any home projects we decide to tackle, so they came up for the day to help hang our drywall. We are SO thankful for all their help and support!

We had drywalled all but half of one wall when Scott and I both caught terrible colds and have had to take a break from the garage redo. We're hoping to feel better soon so we can finish up the drywall. Then we have to wait for the weather to warm up to tape and mud. Not quite the quick and inexpensive project we expected, but the garage is looking great!

Move More and Eat Less

2011-01-05T22:21:00.000-08:00

Now that we're 5 days in to the new year, I have finally decided that I'd like to make a resolution for the new year! At first, I had thought that it was a waste of time to make a resolution because no one ever keeps them for longer than a month or two, but then I came across a wonderful blog that inspired me, most specifically this post. I decided that if I was going to make a resolution that has potential to stick it needs to be a broad goal; specifics will just get me down if I'm not able to follow through completely.

So, with some inspiration from Cathy, my goal for the new year is to Move More and Eat Less! I'm so excited about this goal right now because I feel like it's a goal I can actually achieve. I'm not setting myself up for failure by saying that I'm going to lose 30 pounds by June or that I'm going to work out 5 days a week. As long as I'm heading in the right direction by moving more and eating less, I should be a healthier person by the end of the year!

This week I'm back to counting points for Weight Watchers like I did last fall. I'm hoping this will bring me back to the reality of portion sizes after a food filled holiday season. :) I found this GREAT blog called Gina's Skinny Taste with yummy looking recipes and she has already calculated out the Weight Watcher points! I'm so excited to try some of these recipes!

Next up is joining the gym! I'm really excited to get back into working out. I've missed since I've moved up to Seattle - I use to take a fun kickboxing class with my wonderful friend, Darby. Once I kick this chest cold, I'm off to the YMCA to sign up! :)

Seahawks' Game!

2011-01-05T19:08:00.000-08:00

On January 2, Scott and I went to the last Seahawks' game of the year. It was a fun game to watch, but it sure was COLD!

As we sat in 30 degree weather for 4 hours, I wondered why football was a fall/winter sport and began to feel like I was sitting in a stadium full of crazies! (I'm amazed at how much love people have for the game of football and the Seahawks...it takes a lot of love to be freezing cold for 4 hours!)

Garden D'Lights

2010-12-30T00:25:00.000-08:00

Tonight Scott and I had dinner with our WONDERFUL friends, Sarah and Nick and Megan and Josh! After a delicious dinner, we visited the Bellevue Botanical Garden for their Garden D'Lights display. It was amazing to see what they could make with lights! It was hard to capture in the dark, so I only got a couple good pictures, but it was a spectacular sight!

Photo from Sarah

I feel so lucky to have such amazing friends!

Monks and Mandalas

2010-12-30T00:09:00.000-08:00

While Scott and I were visiting our families for Christmas, the local library was hosting a group of Tibetan Buddhist Monks from India who were visiting to raise money for their monastery. As part of their visit, they created this beautiful sand mandala to spread a message of peace.

It was amazing to watch them create this intricate piece of art with just sand and small metal tubes. It took them 3 days to create and we visited in the middle of the 3rd day, so they were nearly done when we took these pictures.

When they finish, they just sweep their work away. They have such patience and perseverance...it's incredible!

Homemade Christmas Presents!

2010-12-29T23:46:00.000-08:00

I had SO much fun making presents for some of my wonderful family members this year! I am so inspired by all the amazing projects I see on other blogs, that I just HAD to make some of them! :) Now that Christmas is over, I can share some of the fun things I made!

Superhero Capes

I saw this cute tutorial on a blog and knew my cousin's sweet boys, Craig and Brett, would have so much fun with them! I made Craig's cape with a "Super Craig" on one side and the Captain America symbol on the other side to match Craig's Halloween costume. Brett's cape was "Super Brett" on one side and Batman on the other.

Craig taught me some awesome superhero moves! :)

Sweet Little Chef Aprons

For my cousin Greg's sweet girls, Lauren and Holly, I made these cute little aprons! Again, I saw this tutorial and knew I just HAD to make them for someone...who better than two sweet little girls?! I'm loving ruffles right now, so I decided to add a cute little ruffle around the edge. Lauren LOVES purple and Holly LOVES pink, so I made them each their own apron in their favorite colors!

I was SO excited to find cupcake fabric in purple and pink! I LOVE cupcakes and I hope Lauren and Holly do too! :)

Family Tree

While browsing Etsy one day, I came across a fun family tree that I knew my Grandma would love! With a little scrapbook paper and a canvas, I recreated the tree for my family. The great thing about this tree is that it can be added to as more people join our family. (My Grandma made it clear that it seemed a little small and could use additional family members! Hahaha, I love my Grandma, but she is going to have to wait a couple years!)

I also made a cute apron for my sister-in-law, Emily, for our secret santa gift exchange, but just realized I forgot to take a picture of it before I sent it off to her...oh well.

Homemade gifts are so much more exciting to give - I loved watching each person as they opened their gift! I know homemade gifts are some of my favorites (Scott and I got an amazing quilt and a fun family cookbook for our wedding that I LOVE!). I can't wait to start thinking of ideas for next year!

Gingerbread Houses

2010-12-12T11:08:00.000-08:00

Last night we had some friends over for a wonderful holiday dinner and gingerbread house decorating! We have such wonderful and fun friends...we always have such a great time when we get together!

Melissa and Zack started out building a super cute homemade gingerbread house...

and then it all collapsed! :(

Such a fun and wonderful evening with friends! We were sad our friends Anna and Tanner couldn't join us because Anna got strep throat. :( Hope you feel better soon, Anna! :)

Over the river and through the woods...

2010-12-11T16:34:00.000-08:00

to a Christmas tree farm we go!

Scott and I headed out to North Bend to find a beautiful Christmas Tree! Our friends, Megan and Josh, tagged along for the adventure!

The first tree farm we went to was a bust...the trees looked terrible! So we headed to another tree farm - Christmas Creek Tree Farm. They had a wonderful selection of trees! And while they were a bit expensive, they were very nice and they even had Santa there! :)

Our "perfect" tree!

Enjoying the beautiful scenery!

We're so excited to make this a yearly tradition!

Apple Cup Cupcakes!

2010-12-11T16:22:00.000-08:00

Our friends, Dan and Carissa, hosted a fun Apple Cup party potluck last Saturday. Everyone was asked to bring a dish that included apples, so one of the things Scott and I took were these Applesauce Spiced Cupcakes! Aren't they cute?!

I used the recipe for the Applesauce Spice Cupcakes from Martha Stewart's Cupcake book:

Makes 18 cupcakes

Ingredients
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup lightly packed light-brown sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 cups unsweetened applesauce

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF. Line muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves.

2. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, cream butter and both sugars until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. On a low speed, add applesauce and then the flour mixture, beating until just combined.

3. Fill each cup 3/4 full with batter. Bake about 20 minutes.

4. Frost with Brown-Sugar Cream-Cheese Frosting (see below).

Frosting
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1 cup packed light-brown sugar

With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, cream cheese, and brown sugar until smooth. Spread cream-cheese frosting on cupcakes. Cupcakes can be refrigerated in airtight containers up to 2 days.

After I frosted the cupcakes, I dipped them in red sprinkles, stuck 1/2 of a pretzel in the top and cut a leaf shape out of green sour candy!

Snow Day!

2010-11-23T14:59:00.000-08:00

With all the snow and ice we received yesterday and last night, school was cancelled today! :) Thank goodness...Scott and I both had quiet an experience getting home last night, so it's nice to just sit around and enjoy the snow today!

We ventured out this afternoon to check on my car (I parked in the grocery store parking lot across the freeway) and had lunch with some friends!

See our shadows down in the corner? The freeway looked fairly clear, but you could see where a few cars had lost control.

I'm thinking the rest of the day calls for crafting, baking, and movie watching! :)

New Job!

2010-10-31T11:49:00.000-07:00

I'm so excited that I finally have a job for this year! AND it's a WONDERFUL position - 2nd grade! I started in the classroom last Wednesday (October 20) and it's been a crazy week and a half! It's been a bit of a rough transition setting up a classroom, getting to know the students, and trying to jump right into a new curriculum, but I'm getting through it (with a lot of help from Scott!). We even had a field trip on Thursday! It was interesting to take a class full of students on a trip when you've only known them for a week!

My classroom is mostly set up at this point - everything is put away and organized! :) The school is SO nice...they tore it down and rebuilt it in 2008.

The room has SO much storage...although I can't reach 1/2 of it! Haha! :)

It's so nice to have built in bookcases too!

I'm so grateful to have a teaching job for this year at such a wonderful school!

Pumpkin Carving!

2010-10-31T11:37:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, Megan and Josh brought their pumpkins over and we had a carving party!

As you can tell from this picture, I don't have the same amount of patience for carving as everyone else. :)

After a lot of hard work, we had a bunch of cute pumpkins!

Wolf (Scott), Smiley Pumpkin (Julie), Vampire Pumpkin (Megan), Pirate Pumpkin (Josh)

Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-31T11:24:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago, Scott and I went to the pumpkin patch with our wonderful friends, Megan and Josh. On our way, we stopped at Snoqualmie Falls for a picnic lunch and then stopped by Salish Lodge to chat with our friend, Tyler, the head chef at Salish.

Then we were on our way to the patch. This year we decided to check out Jubilee Farms. (Megan and I are on the hunt for a "perfect" patch to take our kids to one day! haha)

Jubilee seemed to be the perfect patch upon arrival - great location (way out in the country) and no admission! We took the hayride out to the patch and started our search for the perfect pumpkin...

After A LOT of searching, we found the perfect pumpkin! We took the hayride back to the barn area to find out that pumpkins cost 50 cents a pound! Our 16 pound pumpkin was going to cost $8! That seemed like a lot for a pumpkin...especially since we had seen pumpkins at Trader Joe's for $3! :) So we put our pumpkin back, enjoyed some apple cider, left without our cute pumpkin, and headed to a cheaper "patch" - Trader Joe's! :)

After some searching through the "patch" at Trader Joe's (and getting some VERY odd looks for taking pictures), we found some great pumpkins! I love sunny fall days at the patch with friends! :)

Pleated Bag

2010-10-14T21:04:00.001-07:00

I've seen SO many fun sewing projects on blogs lately and have been so inspired! I haven't had much practice at using my sewing machine, but other people make it look so easy, so I figured it couldn't be THAT hard. :)
I just finished sewing a Christmas present for someone that I wish I could share, but I don't want to give it away - it turned out pretty cute! Because of this secret project, I was feeling more confident about my sewing skills, so I decided to try making this cute guy that I saw on La Maison Reid.

I love the burlap, but didn't think it was really me...so I used some fabric I already had to make this guy:

I LOVE it, but you can't see the cute pleated detail because the fabric is too busy. I might try it again sometime with a more plain fabric...or maybe I could try making larger pleats. :) I used black fabric on the inside and added a pocket inside out of the damask print. I'm honestly really proud of myself - there are only a couple mistakes (you can't even really see them) and I worked on it ALL day (I usually don't have that kind of stamina for crafty projects)! :)

Mrs. Hempelmann :)

2010-10-11T20:54:00.000-07:00

The school year is in full swing and I'm still hopeful for a job! :) After interviewing for a 2nd grade position on Friday, I decided to make something for my potential new classroom (silly, I know!). :) My sister-in-law, Emily, received a fun teacher sign for her classroom in her new name for her birthday. I was so inspired and knew I could try to make my own using my Cricut. It's not as cute as Emily's...but it's fun and hopefully will find a home in a new classroom soon! :)

It was pretty easy to make (once I made up my mind, haha). I started with a wood board that I bought at JoAnn's. I painted the edges and covered it with scrapbook paper...it looked horrible! The seams showed from the paper and the paper I chose ended up being too busy. So I flipped it over and painted it red...also bad idea - I used white letters and it looked so boring and reminded me of Mickey Mouse...not the look I was going for! :) Then I remembered this fun teacher fabric I had in my school stuff. Only there was a slight problem - ALL of my school stuff is shoved into one of our basement bedrooms and I did a poor job of labeling the boxes. I trekked down there anyway and after 10 minutes of searching, I found it!

I used spray adhesive to stick the fabric on the front and then used a glue gun to secure the edges to the back (I forgot to take pictures of this...I was just ready to finish my sign already! Sorry!). I cut out letters on my Cricut - this took me MANY attempts with my new last name...it's so long and I'm not used to THAT many letters! Haha! I finally got the letters to fit and glued them on using glue dots.

I'm hoping my cute sign will find it's home this week! I'll keep you posted! :)

Pumpkin Fun!

2010-10-11T20:34:00.000-07:00

I love all things pumpkin! The other day I decided I wanted to make pumpkin ice cream...so I found a recipe for pumpkin ice cream in our Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream and Dessert Book.

It's really yummy and very pumpkin-y! Here is the recipe if you're interested:

Sweet Cream Base:
- 2 large eggs
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 2 cups heavy or whipping cream
- 1 cup milk

Whisk the eggs in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk the sugar, a little at a time, then continue whisking until completely blended, about 1 minute more. Pour in the cream and milk and whisk to blend.

Pumpkin Ice Cream:
- Sweet Cream Base
- 1 cup unsweetened canned pumpkin
- 1 teaspoon ground or freshly grated nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Pour about 1 cup of the Sweet Cream Base into another bowl, add the pumpkin, nutmeg, and cinnamon, and stir until blended. Return the pumpkin mixture to the remaining base and blend. Transfer mixture to an ice cream maker and freeze following the manufacturer's instructions.

So easy and yummy! And you're left with a 1/2 can of pumpkin...just enough for another pumpkin recipe! :) I decided to make a loaf of my cousin Tami's pumpkin bread...it's so DELICIOUS!

Cousin Tami's Pumpkin Bread Recipe:
3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
16 oz. canned pumpkin
2 tsp. salt
3 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. allspice
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. cloves
2/3 cup water

Mix ingredients together and put into two greased/floured loaf pans. Bake at 350 degrees for 55-60 minutes.

I made a 1/2 batch and added a handful of chocolate chips before baking. It was absolutely delicious...although I shouldn't be allowed to make yummy bread if I have no where to take it (I think I ate 3/4 of the loaf...eek!). :)

SOUNDERS!

2010-10-06T16:06:00.000-07:00

Last night, Scott and I attended the US Open Cup Championship game with some friends to cheer on the Sounders!

I LOVE going to soccer games! The fans are hilarious as they get REALLY into the game and the players are hysterical...they are such drama queens! Every time a player from the other team bumps them or touches them, they fall down and roll around like they are dying. Once they realize no one cares, they jump up and run to join the game...so funny! :)

It was a great game as the Sounders won the US Open Cup for the second year in a row!

Drew Carey is a co-owner of the Seattle Sounders, so at the end of the game he came out to celebrate the win with the team. I think that's the closest I've ever been to a celebrity! Haha! :)

I feel so lucky to live in a place where we can attend events like this whenever we'd like!

Boo!

2010-10-05T10:40:00.000-07:00

It's FINALLY October!! That means I can finally bust out all of my Halloween decorations and finish all those projects I've been waiting to complete! :)

I have a bunch of frames at home that are just screaming out to become a craft! :) At one point in our wedding planning, we wanted to have picture frames on every table. I started collecting cheap frames at Goodwill before I decided that it would be too expensive to collect THAT many frames. So now I have all those frames to play with!

First, I spray painted the frame black. Then, since the frame came without anything to hold the frame in, I made due with what I had - a Cuisinart box from a wedding gift! :)

I glued some scrapbook paper directly to the cardboard and cut out some letters on my Cricut (I used just the basic fonts I already had, but I think it would look even cuter with some fun fonts!). I didn't take many pictures of this process as it changed a lot as I was trying to figure out what would fit and what would look good...I cut out A LOT of letters before I found a combination that I liked. :)

After I glued the letters on, it seemed a little plain. So I added some ribbon and more of my dollar store spider/bat rings! Just cut off the ring and glue it on (I used a couple Zots and they are holding well!).

So fun! I love easy and free projects! :)

We're going to the chapel...

2010-10-04T15:17:00.000-07:00

...for Emily and Bryce's beautiful wedding!

This past weekend, Scott and I travelled to Spokane for Scott's sister, Emily's, wedding! It was such a beautiful weekend (mid 80s!)...perfect for a wonderful fall wedding. :)

We started out on Thursday night having bachelor and bachelorette parties for the bride and groom. The girls started out at a fun martini bar for dinner and drinks before we met up with the boys for a few more drinks. :)

Emily practicing for married life with a "blow job" shot! ;)

Sisters! (Notice the "fun" straw in front, haha!)

Drinks with the boys! :)

On Friday, the girls had a wonderful, relaxing day together, starting with manicures and pedicures!

Emily and her mother-in-law...isn't Emily such a beautiful, glowing bride-to-be?!

Another beautiful bridesmaid, Maggie!

All our beautiful hands...we're ready for the big day!

Before the rehearsal dinner on Friday afternoon, Scott and I took a walk along the river to the falls with his dad and sister, Stephanie. I couldn't believe how nice the weather was and how beautiful the falls were!

Saturday was the BIG DAY! Since I was in the wedding party, I didn't get any pictures of us getting ready or of the ceremony (which went perfectly!). After the ceremony, we all headed to The Luxury Box for the reception!

Introducing Mr. and Mrs. Thomas!

(It was quite dark inside, so I didn't get great pictures, but you get the idea! :)

Such a wonderful weekend spent celebrating two amazing people! Congrats Emily and Bryce!

Ghost Candles

2010-09-27T21:59:00.000-07:00

So I couldn't wait for October to arrive before I made another Halloween craft! Haha...it's just so hard to wait when you get inspired and then realize you already have everything you need!

As I was cruising around blogland, I saw this collection of super cute painted pumpkin jars. I didn't feel like painting, so I thought about using tissue paper instead! I was hoping I had orange tissue paper (knowing full well that I didn't), but once I saw the white I knew I could make ghosts instead!

I have a ton of these vases left over from our wedding (I believe they are from the dollar store).

Using a piece of tissue paper, I tore a piece the size of the jar. I like the uneven edges at the bottom to give it a more ghostly look, but you could use scissors to give it a clean edge. Then I used mod podge to glue it to the vase.

I did only a bit at a time, rubbing the tissue flat as I went. I didn't worry about creases or folds in the tissue...I figure it gives it a more ghostly look. But be careful to not rub too hard or your tissue will rip...

Luckily mine was at the beginning and my tissue wrapped around the vase enough to cover it up!

I finish wrapping the tissue around the vase and then waited for the mod podge to dry.

Once it's dry, I used a Sharpie to draw on a face (although I'm sure you could use black paint also).

I think they are pretty darn cute for a "free" and quick craft! :)

Halloween Crafts!

2010-09-26T21:42:00.000-07:00

I've been SO inspired by other blogs and started our fall decorating with halloween fun, until Scott told me I was being ridiculous decorating so early! Hahaha! I left out the Halloween decorations I started with, but am waiting until October arrives to add more. :)

Potion Bottles

I saw these cute potion bottles on a blog and LOVED that they had a printable of super cute potion labels!

I found some bottles I had around the house (and bought the little one at the dollar store), filled them with colored water and candy (frog bones!) I bought at the dollar store. I also bought a pack of spider and skeleton rings at the dollar store. I cut off the ring part and, using a glue dot, stuck them onto my containers.

Once October arrives (so Scott will stop looking at me like I'm crazy! haha), I think I'll add a couple more to my collection! This project only cost $4!!! I got everything at the dollar store - 2 bags of bone candy, 1 glass jar, 1 bag of spider and skeleton rings! I love inexpensive crafts! :)

Trick-or-Treat Sign

While I was at the dollar store, I saw this cute, sparkly, purple trick-or-treat sign. I've seen lots of cute signs on blogs lately and knew immediately what I could do with it!

I brought it home, found a frame I had lying around, put a piece of scrapbook paper over the glass, and attached the trick-or-treat sign. I used more spider rings and some twine to decorate it a bit more. Cute-ness for only $1! :)

I can't wait for October to roll around so I can get out the rest of my Halloween decorations! :)

Wine Tasting!

2010-09-26T20:57:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend, we went wine tasting in Woodinville with our wonderful friends! We had such an amazing time and tried some tasty (and not so tasty) wines!
We started at Cheatau Ste. Michelle - such a beautiful winery! We went on their wine tour and learned a lot about how wine is made and how to taste a good wine.

While waiting for the tour to begin, we shared a bottle of wine in their beautiful patio area.

We toured to a few other wineries and had a great time. Our boys also joined us, although I didn't get any pictures of them, haha!

We can't wait to go again! We definitely need to start earlier so we can tour more in a day! :)

We did the Puyallup!

2010-09-20T17:56:00.000-07:00

I LOVE fairs! I've always heard so much about the Puyallup Fair, but had never been in town while it was going on. Since I now live in Seattle, I was SUPER excited to go this year! It's been raining like crazy around here, but we braved the weather and headed to the fair.

Our friends, Megan and Josh, went to the fair last week and told us about the famous fair scones. The first thing we saw when we got into the fair was the Fisher's Fair Scone booth and immediately got our fair scone. They were delicious - so warm and yummy! We later found out that we didn't need to get one right then and there because there are like 8 different booths around the fair! No wonder there wasn't a line for the famous fair scones. ;) All the different booths makes them seem a little less special. I'm used to the Clark County fair where you have to wait in line for forever for the famous Dairy Women's milkshakes...oh well, I guess I should be happy there was no line! :)

We saw ALL the animals! It's so much fun to see so many different types of animals all in one place. :) These hairy looking cows are Highland Cattle...they were huge!

We thought these dumpsters were so funny (we're real mature like that!). :)

These cute little piggies were so tiny! Look at the cute little spotted one! I wanted to take one home! :)

We took in lots of free shows! Our favorite was the Mutton Bustin' - kids under 6 try to hold onto sheep for at least 6 seconds. It was hilarious!

I had a hard time getting a good picture...there were so many people standing around. You can kind of see the sheep coming out of the gate...the little guy is holding on so tight you can barely see them!

We also watched the Pirate High Dive show...it was crazy! This guy dove into a pool from 80 feet up!

We had SO much fun at the fair! We can't wait to go back again next year!

Fall Projects!

2010-09-20T17:31:00.000-07:00

I've been SO excited to decorate the house for fall. We never really got to last year as we were still moving in and getting everything situated...so I've ready this year! The fall weather has rolled in and the trees are beginning to change - it's time to bust out the fall decorations! When I looked in our fall tub, I sadly discovered that I had far fewer fall decorations than I thought. Since I'm currently unemployed, I've been trying to decorate on a budget and it's going really well! :)

Fall Centerpiece

I'd been looking around the house to make some sort of fall centerpiece for our table. I already had this fun vase and I bought a set of pumpkins and gourds from Michaels...I figured it was a better investment than real pumpkins and gourds. The vase by itself seemed so boring on the table and I remembered a cool silver beaded circle that I'd used before on this table, however, silver doesn't really scream fall, so I decided to make my own fall circle for underneath the vase. I took some brown scrapbook paper I had on hand and cut and taped until I had a nice circle.

Then I used some fall leaves I already had and, starting in the center, used a hot glue gun to glue the leaves onto the circle. I overlapped the leaves so the brown paper wouldn't show through. Such an easy project and I love the final product!

Fall Wreath

Our entryway needed some fall fun and I knew just what I wanted to make! I've seen wonderful, colorful fall wreaths all over blogland and wanted to make my own! I already had a foam wreath from The Dollar Tree, I bought 4 fall leaf garlands from The Dollar Tree, and some beautiful fall orange ribbon from Michaels.

First, I wrapped the ugly green wreath in my beautiful orange ribbon so that the ugly green wouldn't poke out from behind the leaves.

Then I cut the leaves off the garland and, using my hot glue gun, just started gluing the leaves on. I overlapped and filled in the holes until I was happy with it's fullness. Then I looped a piece of the orange ribbon through the wreath and hung it from our entry shelf!

Such fun and easy projects for only a couple bucks! :)

Paper Pumpkins

2010-09-13T15:19:00.000-07:00

It feels like fall has arrived! The weather is colder and cloudier, Starbucks has pumpkin spice lattes, and fall projects are popping up all over blog land! I've been so inspired to decorate and create.

One project that was very easy (especially since I already had everything at home) was scrapbook paper pumpkins. I saw them in a few different places, but can't remember exactly which site now (sorry!).

You need about 14 strips of 1" paper (I used 2 different papers for each pumpkin), a piece of brown ribbon, and a piece of green ribbon. Punch holes in the ends of each piece of paper.

Then gather the papers together (I alternated colors so they would be mixed up in my pumpkin) and slide the brown ribbon through all pieces, tying a knot at the end.

Then pull the ribbon through the hole in the other end of the paper strips. Squeeze the paper down until you get the pumpkin shape you'd like. I tried to make a tall pumpkin, but the paper was too heavy that it squished itself down...so short pumpkins seem to work best.

At this point I added a loop of green ribbon through the hole for a leaf.

Then pick your pumpkin up and separate the paper strips until they look like a pumpkin!

Such a fun and easy project! It's probably too early to be decorating for fall, but it's just so fun! :)

End of the World

2010-09-12T23:31:00.000-07:00

For the 3rd year in a row, Scott and I have attended the End of the World Rod Run with my parents in Long Beach. I grew up going to multiple car shows a year and it's nice to continue this tradition with Scott! It was a perfect weekend at the beach...sunny and warm! :)

Friday night we watched the slow drags...it's a competition to see who can coast and end up closest to the finish line. It's quite the interesting "race"!

Saturday we headed to the show bright and early. My parents and their friends have WAY too much fun together...and never forget anything! Meet "King James & Queen Bad Nancy"! Hahaha!

Scott loves oogling at all the beautiful cars. He found "the one" while wandering this year...

As soon as we've saved up enough money this baby is going to be his! :)

Before we headed home, we took one last cruise through main street in the back of my parents car! Such a fun weekend...we're already looking forward to next year (and even more to the year when we can take our own car)!

Leavenworth!

2010-09-12T17:13:00.000-07:00

Since Scott worked over 20 hours of overtime while he was in California last week, he decided to take a day off this week and we headed to Leavenworth for the day! (That's one perk of being unemployed...I have ALL the time in the world to do as I please!) We always love visiting Leavenworth...we've made it a yearly tradition!

We had lunch at our favorite place - Munchen Haus! We wandered through town and purchased another Christmas house to add to the village we started last year! Then we took a walk along the waterfront...it was such a beautiful day!

Before we headed home, we took a little detour to the Aplets and Cotlet's factory in Cashmere.

It was so much fun to watch how they make the candies...it's such a fast process!

It was so fun to get away for the day and spend some quality time with Scott!

Labor Day Getaway!

2010-09-07T22:35:00.000-07:00

Scott and I were invited to go camping with some friends in Ocean Shores over the long weekend. We LOVE the beach, so we jumped at the chance to squeeze in a camping trip while the weather was still decent.

We bought a new camera just before the trip (my old one suffered an unfortunate death during my bachelorette party, oops!), so I had fun playing with it in the car. :)

The weather was amazing on Saturday and Sunday, so we spent lots of time on the beach!

On a previous Ocean Shores trip, Scott and I had rented mopeds to ride on the beach. It was so fun, so we talked our friends into renting some. Since it was a holiday weekend, the sand was more chopped up than usual from all the visitor traffic, but we still had fun exploring the beach!

Our friend, Megan, found a cool nature trail and we spent some time exploring!

Scott and I were so excited that we were able to get in at least one camping trip this year since most of our summer was spent planning the wedding. Such a wonderful way to end the summer! :)

We all scream for ice cream!

2010-08-25T20:50:00.000-07:00

Scott and I received so many wonderful gifts for our wedding. One fun gift we received from our wonderful friends, Megan and Josh, was an ice cream attachment for our Kitchen Aid. Scott and I were super excited to try it out.

The first time we made a vanilla ice cream that was rather complicated - it involved a lot of cooking and chilling and we just wanted to eat our ice cream! :) It turned out rather delicious, but the process was a bit complicated.

For our 2nd try, I found an easy looking recipe from our new Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream book for Raspberry Ice Cream! It was pretty easy...

Just mashed up some raspberries with sugar...

Mixed the raspberries with some heavy cream and more sugar (it's a very healthy ice cream, haha) and poured the mixture into the frozen ice cream bowl!

Mixed it for a few minutes, then froze it for a few hours, and it was ice cream! And it was delicious!

While the ice cream is really yummy, one thing I don't like is the little ice crystals the raspberry chunks make...it really breaks up the creamy goodness of the rest of the ice cream. Such a fun gift...my waistline is not thanking me, haha! :)

New Life and New Blog

2010-08-23T20:20:00.000-07:00

After more than a year of planning, I'm finally married!

And now that I'm married, I have a new name, a (some what) new life, and thus, a new blog to showcase our adventures as newlyweds!