Our 1st Anniversary!

The hubby and I decided to celebrate our 1st anniversary, by going to Santa Barbara for the weekend. I still can't believe that it has been a year, that we have been married! We headed up to San Simeon, on Friday night. Now I am sure most of you are wondering, "Why San Simeon? ". Well, we had plans to visit Hearst castle the next day. Neither David nor I had ever been there. During, our trip to Miami in January, we visited the Vizacaya Museum and Gardens, which is considered the Hearst Castle of the east coast. We figured why not be able to say we have been to both!

We woke up Saturday morning and it was really sunny but oh so cold! The grounds were so beautiful and especially Neptune's pool. We definitely want to go back to do one of the different tours. I would like to see the bedrooms. Our tour consisted of one of three guest houses, Neptune's pool, the bottom level of the house, and the indoor pool. We also recommend watching the movie, either before or afterwards as it will give you a lot of additional information regarding the Hearst family.









After Hearst castle, we took a couple of pictures at the bay and then headed down to Cambria for lunch. The hubby's family recommended, The Old Stone Station. It's a small little place with a lot of character, great prices and some really good food. I got the fish & chips and David the ribs & blackberry cobbler.







We then headed on down to Santa Barbara and we stayed at, the Hotel Oceana. We got an awesome deal on Priceline's, Name Your Price. Overall the hotel has some really cute decor, but our carpet was a little on the gross side. Considering how much we paid we weren't disappointed.

For dinner Saturday night, we headed over to Brophy Bro's, which I found online at Santa Barbara.com. It had a ton of great reviews and was considered more of a local place, loud and very busy. We headed on over and got some great fish. I wouldn't consider it a romantic spot, but we enjoyed the experience and we would go back.

Sunday, morning we headed over to State street and did a lot of window shopping. We went into Anthropologie, when David set a couple of their kitchen timers for 5 min and then told me we had to immediately leave! You gotta love my husband! I also longingly looked at Restoration Hardware, which I love, but could never afford in a million years.

We grabbed lunch at Zia Cafe. They had great chips & salsa and margaritas. For dinner, we went to the Santa Barbara FisHouse. I got the best Ahi tuna! Amazing! We definitely would go back there as well. Monday morning, we walked over to Sambo's for breakfast. Both Saturday and Sunday morning, we saw a line out the door. I got the crab cakes benedict and David just the pancakes and eggs. So very good!

As you can tell our vacation centered around food, which always seems to happen. After breakfast, we headed on back. We got home very quickly, which was awesome because I hate LA traffic! We also pulled out the top of our wedding cake and had piece. It was still really good. Thanks Melissa for doing such a good job wrapping it up!

I wish it had been a little bit warmer and that we would have been able to do a little wine tasting but overall we had a great time! I am definitely looking forward to what lays ahead for us!

One is more than enough

We have been going through all our camping equipment, for an upcoming trip and we have so much stuff! Luckily, we have an annex which we can store all of it in, so it doesn't take up space in the apartment. The downfall of having an annex though, it's really easy to collect items you don't need or even forget you own them. We pulled some of it out today and we realized we have 3 air mattresses! Why do we need 3?! I don't get it!

Update: We just found another. That makes 4! One twin, 2 queens and 1 king!

Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble

David and I stopped by the grocery store to stock up for the week the other day. I was passing through the produce section and scanning all the different fruits and vegetables, when the rhubarb caught my eye. I have been wanting to make a Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble for a really long time, but it hasn't been in season. I grew up with my mom making this recipe for us and I have always really loved it, so you can understand why I was excited. It came out great, just like my mom's. I read an article in my, Cooking Light magazine, about freezing rhubarb which I would love to try since it isn't available year round. Anyways, this is sooo good!

Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble
Source: Mom

Ingredients:

Crust:
1/2 cup of sugar
6 oz of butter
2 cups of flour

Filling:
2 pounds of Rhubarb, or 3 stalks
1 large container of strawberries
1/2 cup of flour
1 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of light corn syrup
1 Tbls butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Crumble Crust:
Combine all ingredients in mixer and mix on low till crumbly. Use about 1/3 to 1/2 of the mixture to cover the bottom of a deep pie dish. Place remainging mixture to the side for the top.

Filling:
Clean and cut rhubarb and strawberries into small pieces. Toss with 1/2 cup flour and pour into pie dish. In a small saucepan, mix sugar and corn syrup; stirring constantly bringing the mixture to a boil over moderate heat. Pour this syrup over the rhubarb and dot the top with the butter cut into bits. Sprinkle remaining crumble crust over the top of pie. Bake for 25 minutes or until crust is golden brown.

Wedding Mishap

So I totally lied about posting pictures of our trip to Santa Barbara for our anniversary. Sorry! Dinner plans changed and we ended up at my Bil's house with the rest of the hubby's family. We ended up staying quite late and I basically went home and went straight to bed!

Anyways, our anniversary has caused me to look back on our wedding several times over the past couples of days. Especially at work because one of my coworkers wasn't working here when we got married, so I had to give her a recap of the wedding. I have realized, that we forget so many of the little details. I wish I had started this blog earlier and had written down aspects of the wedding like emotions and feelings. But alas, I didn't.

When telling my coworker about the wedding, I remembered one funny instance that I really don't want to forget! It's not of the actual wedding, but of something that happened later. Basically, we had made plans to stay at the Mission Inn the night of our wedding and then the next day fly to Hawaii. The next morning when I woke up and tried to get dressed, I realized I was missing my jeans! I had two options, put my dress back on or wear a pair of David's jeans. I went with the second option. You know you would have too! They were so huge on me and I had to use one of his belts to make them stay up. I am laughing about it right now, as I think about the whole situation. I was definitely rocking the humongous jeans when we checked out!

Turns out, whoever packed up the overnight stuff in the room we got ready in, forgot my jeans or didn't see them. I had packed my overnight bag and took it to the wedding, as everyone got dressed at the location. I had planned on wearing the jeans that I wore over to the location the next day. I still don't know who packed everything up to this day, but to whoever did: Thank you for doing so because this is a great memory!

No Target?

David and I went up to Santa Barbara, this past weekend to celebrate our 1st anniversary. We had a great time and of course it never feels long enough! This post isn't a recap of our trip though, as I haven't downloaded the pictures yet. Hopefully, I will have time to update everyone about our trip this evening.

Anyways, your probably thinking what is this post really about? Well, we were looking for a Target and couldn't find one. We kept thinking there was something wrong with the GPS and that there was no way Santa Barbara didn't have a Target. We called a friend who lives in the area and it turns out the GPS was right, they don't have a Target. So we asked, how about a Walmart? Nope, no Walmart and no Costco! How can that be? It's not like Santa Barbara is podunk town, its a pretty good sized city. I don't know if I could handle not having a Target!

My question is, since they don't have a Target where do they go shopping?

Image Source: www.caam.ca.gov

Another Year Older

Every year on my birthday, it is weird to think that I am another year older. Like clock work, your birthday rolls around and you can't stop it. They just keep coming and coming. I actually wouldn't mind staying at the age I am right now forever. That would be quite nice actually! I start thinking about what the next year holds in store for the hubby and I, and I am excited. We have been extremely blessed by the Lord. I constantly have to step back though and be reminded of all our blessings: family, amazing friends, our church, jobs that afford us the luxuries of having Disneyland passes, going out to eat and the ability to go on trips. What an amazing Lord we have!

Anyways, I am sure you all want to know how my birthday went. In the past, I have always taken my birthday off and spent the day with David. This year I wasn't able to do this, as I had used all my vacation time on our Miami trip that we took in January. The work day went a little bit slower than normal, but that was okay. My coworkers were sweet enough to get me little presents and took me out to lunch to our favorite little Mexican restaurant for lunch.

We went out to dinner with the hubby's family and our friends to Table for Two, in Riverside. We had a good meal and then headed over to Dairy Queen for desert. No birthday cake for this birthday girl, instead I got a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate. After ice cream, we headed back to our friends house, to watch The Office. I unfortunately fell asleep on their couch and missed the show. Good thing we have tivo!

So all in all it was a good birthday with hopefully many more to come!

Image Source: Avery.com

Birthday Tea

Birthday's, Birthday's and more Birthday's. April is full of them! I am lucky to share this great month of April, with my good friend Rachel, along with several others. We started the birthday celebrations off, by going to Bennihana's last week to celebrate Rachel's birthday. We were a little disappointed with our experience there, but it was great to spend the evening with great friends and celebrate what an awesome person Rachel is. I won't bore you with all the little details as to why our experience wasn't good, but to make a long story short, average food and lack of entertainment from our chef = a not so good experience. Sorry Bennihana's, I would have loved to have given you a raving review but I just can't.




The birthday girl with her gift certificate for a pregnancy massage from us girls.

Then last week, the girls surprised me for my birthday, by taking me to the Blooming Teapot, in Old Town Temecula. It was very cute and the food was really good. Oh and you can't forget the tea! We had 3 choices of tea and my favorite was the Peach Blossom! It was great to get to spend the day with just the girls, hang out and talk. I feel very blessed to have such good friends!







It doesn't stop there either. Since tomorrow is my actual birthday, we are going out to dinner tomorrow night with the hubby's family and some other friends. The birthday celebrations aren't over yet!

Cranberry Orange Bars

I bookmarked this recipe a long time ago and finally had the all the ingredients in my kitchen to make it. Well, I had dried cranberries and not fresh, but I figured I would try it anyways. They came out really good and were all gone in one day! Eventually I would like to try the recipe with fresh cranberries but I am afraid they might be tarter than when the dried cranberries are used. Overall they came out really good and that's all that really matters!

Cranberry Orange Bars
Source: Good Things Catered

Ingredients:
1/2 cups of butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups of sugar
2 eggs, at room temperature
2 Tbsp fresh orange juice
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups of flour
1 tsp of baking powder
1 Tbsp of orange zest
2 cups fresh cranberries (I used dried cranberries)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Beat together the butter and sugar until creamy. Add the eggs, orange juice and vanilla and mix until combined. Mix in flour and baking powder. The mixture should have a cookie dough consistency. Fold in orange zest and cranberries. Spread batter evenly in a 9x12 prepared baking pan. Bake for about 40 minutes until golden brown on top.

Note: I halved the recipe and used an 8x8 baking pan and baked it for 20 min. I am really glad I checked it half way through as they would have been super dry if I had baked them for the 40 min.

Change Is Good

Normally with time and a little adjusting, change is normally always a good thing. It's amazing how little changes, at either work or home can make your day. For example, yesterday I re-arranged my desk at work. Not really sure why, but I did. Probably because I got bored with how it was. I am not very surprised though, because I send so much time in this space. Let's see... that's 2080 hours at my desk a year or 124,800 minutes! Wow!

When re-arranging, I really tired to use my space to its full potential and be more organized. The mountain of paperwork is never ending and I always feel like my desk is a mess. In reality its not messy, its just that there is just a lot of paperwork that passes over my desk in one day. I moved my computer and now I can see more of the room. Before, I used to face the corner and had my back to the door. The whole desk re-arranging made my day and I went home in a good mood.

Then today, I was having some very annoying excel problems. Long story short, none of the formulas on Excel were working. I called over the office manager and she couldn't even figure it out. We tried installing the new version of Office Professional and that didn't work. I am sure in time, we will figure out whats going wrong with the formulas. Until then, I am really enjoying the new format for Outlook and Excel!

I like these types of changes!

Food Rut

I haven't done a food blog in over a month, so I really suck! It's not like I haven't been cooking anything. In reality, I have been cooking a lot. We have been really trying to cut down on how often we eat out. A to eat healthier and B to save money. We have actually been really good about it too. I have been cooking almost every night during the week and only eating out on the weekends. I also made this amazing coconut cream pie for Easter, but I didn't take any pictures of it before it was all eaten. I just guess that means I have to make it again! :)

I believe the problem is that, I think I am in a food rut. It seems as if, I have been making the same one of two things over and over again. I think one reason, is that we don't eat red meat very often. I don't think we do it on purpose either. I guess I don't really think about buying it, when I am the grocery store.

My goal is to make more items that don't include chicken and to buy vegetables that I don't normally get. I made some really good couscous tonight. I don't think I have ever made it for David. I cooked it in some chicken broth and added cooked onion and red pepper, cilantro and a little bit of diced jalapeno. It came out really good and David really liked it a lot. I will be definitely making that again.

I currently have these Cranberry Orange bars in the oven. If they come out good, I will hopefully blog about it tomorrow.....

Well I'm back and the cranberry orange bars came out really good! We went over to a friend's house and they are already all gone!

Anyways, that's it for tonight. Goodnight!

E for Excellant

The wonderful Nanette, over at Say It Don't Spray It, nominated my blog for the Excellant Blog award. I was completely surprised to see me blog listed, as I don't see myself as an awesome writer or witty. Let alone, no way near being snarky. In my eyes, I am just plain old me. I often wonder how people view myself and my blog when they stumble across this page. Definitely something though, that I will never be able to understand. Anyways, thanks so much Nanette for nominating my blog! If you get a chance, head over to Say It Don't Spray It, as she has a great blog herself.

I am supposed to pass along the award to 10 other awesome bloggers and it was really to hard chose. I am definitely more of a lurker than commentor and I wanted to include blogs that I comment on frequently. There were a couple though, that I lurk on and I am sure they don't know I exist, but I just couldn't leave them off. They snuck their way back onto the list.

In considering which blogs to pick, I took in consideration the length of time the person has been writing, how long I have been reading and how often they post. Some of the blogs I have listed have certain topics they blog about for example: Cystic Fibrosis, Infertility, or International Adoption. Others are about everyday life, such being as a newlywed or mom.

So here they are in alphabetical order. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do, as they do really rock.

Confessions of a Cf Husband

Definitely, Maybe... a Journey in TTC

Learning Patience

Fried Okra

Mrs. Mogul

Musings of a High School Teacher

Rocks in My Dryer

The Soapbox

Opps, that's 8 and not 10. Oh well!

Love/Hate Relationship With Technology

Today, I have definitely had a love/hate relationship with technology. Most of the time, we are extremely lucky to be able to work in a day and age of copiers, faxes and computers. The technology that we have is amazing, as it allows us to be extremely productive within the 8 hour work day.

This all great until the day, it all decides to not work on you, which in fact is today! I came into work to find that my printer wasn't working. When I left yesterday it was and to my knowledge no one touched it while I was gone. It took awhile to get it to work, but eventually it was up and running again. I still have no idea what was really wrong with it. Little did I know though, this was just the start of many other issues.

I was given the task of copying a mountain of paperwork, thus killing a huge section of our dwindling rain forests. The darn copier decided it didn't like me and was eating the paper, thus I had to make more copies and kill more trees. I am sure I am now am the office expert on fixing the darn thing.

It then started printing blurry pages, which I had to shred as they were still partially legible. Our shredder decided it didn't like me as well and decided it was going to jam. One of my coworkers jokingly said I should have just stayed home today!

Then finally my computer wouldn't allow me to burn some Cd's. It keep telling me to insert a disk, when one was already inserted. I took the same disks to my boss's desk and they worked fine. What else can go wrong?

Thankfully, the day is almost over and I soon get to go home. Hopefully, tomorrow the copier will be having a better day and thus I will have a better day as well! :)


Image Source

Almost One Year, Crazy!

It's finally April, which has to be one of my favorite months! Spring is in full bloom and the weather is great. I always have loved this month, as Easter is normally in April, not this year though. It is also my friend Rachel's birthday, and starting this year our wedding anniversary is this month as well. Oh and I can't forget MY birthday!

I am really excited this year though, because we are jam packed with stuff going on. April last year was just a blur, as we were consumed with all the wedding details and getting everything together. We barely even celebrated my birthday, as it was the week of the wedding. It will be nice to have a normal April. I am definitely looking forward to it.

I am still amazed though, that it has been almost a year since we got married. I went back to my myspace blog, that I used to keep and has all the wedding details on it. I really should transfer those over to here, but alas that is a lot of work. It's really interesting though, to read up on what I was doing about a year ago, for all the wedding plans.

So I realized that I have not blogged in awhile. The bridal shower went
well. My girls did a great job of decorating. It was really pretty. Got some
good stuff too! :) We are past the one month mark. We are working on the little
details now. Putting ribbon on things and buying the last little decorations.
Next project to work on is the programs which will be some work. Thankfully
though we are going to have someone else design them for us and we just have to
print them and put them together. It's all coming together!

Haha, little did I know, I would just end up making the programs myself! Boy, they were a lot of work, but they were worth it though, as they came out beautiful!

Wow, it's amazing how time flies!

Don't Judge A Restaurant By It's Cover, Opps I Mean Book

There is this amazingly good, whole in the wall, Mexican place near my work. I have to thank my coworkers for introducing me to the place, as it is definitely somewhere that I would never stop at myself. As run down as it looks on the outside, there is always a line (we normally call in our orders) and there are always several truckers pulled over on the side of the road to get food. I always get their carne asada tacos and they are so good!

Last week, I took David there and he loved it. On Sunday after church, we were hungry and he suggested going back for lunch. We invited some friends of ours to meet us there and the looks on their faces when they pulled up were great. I am sure they were thinking to themselves what did we agree too? What's neat is that everyone seemed to really like it.

It's always awesome knowing the local places and getting some good authentic Mexican food. That is one of the things, that I do love about living here. Don't even try to find any authentic Mexican food in Indiana!