Cooking Adventures

I love to cook. I really love to bake things. Here are a few of the things that I have been able to make and experiment with.

These cupcakes and cake were made for Zach's 30th Birthday. It isn't a very good picture to see the decorating on the cupcakes, but oh well.

This cake was made for a 4th of July party. It was so much fun to make. Connor liked to lick all of the frosting bowls and cake bowls.

These cupcakes were for Ethan's first birthday. The colors were made by painting a pastry bag with different food colorings and then putting white frosting in it. The first cupcake I made I think was more food coloring that it was frosting. Oops.

Zach and I saw on some show where they were talking about some great sandwiches. One of the sandwiches that they talked about was chicken breast, mozzarella sticks, and marinara sauce. We decided that we wanted to try it. We took some extra breaded chicken breasts and toasted them until they were pretty crispy. Then we made the mozzarella sticks and put marinara on it. We got some nice bread to put them on. I think that was one of the best sandwiches that I have ever made. May not be the best for you, but it sure it good for the taste buds. Looking at the picture makes me want to make it again, right now.
Zach's Grandma, Nana, wanted a special treat for a get together she was having at her house. She asked me if I would make this cupcake bouquet. I think that is one of my favorite cupcake creations to make. It turned out good and I hope that everyone liked it at the party.

I made this cake for my Father-in-laws birthday. It was a chocolate cake with apricot and cherry on the top and chocolate pieces on the side. It was a good first try, but I can't wait to make it again and I am sure it will be better.

New Tree

We had a tree in our front yard that died about 2 years ago, well it died soon after we put it in. We had to have one because of the HOA requirements and so we left it there until we got a new tree. I think that it started to become a fire hazard. It was so dry and so completely dead. We pulled out the old tree with the Jeep. We were both kind of surprised by how easily it came out. It really had no roots.

Zach then dug a bigger hole for the tree.

Here is the new tree going in. Connor helped put the dirt in it and some of the neighborhood boys came and helped. It is still alive and has nice leaves on it. Hopefully it will grow really fast so that it can catch up with the other trees around.

Projects

We have been doing some projects around the house. Here are a few of the things that we have done recently.

Zach built a retaining wall around our flower beds in the front of our house. He did a great job and I am really excited about it.

Here it is almost finished. We needed a little more glue, but it is all done now.

Our bathroom was just plain white and so we decided to make it a dark blue.

Here it is in the process of being painted. We wrapped everything in tinfoil that we couldn't get off the wall.

It took many coats to finally get it done. Here was the first coat being put on.

Here it is finished. We love the dark blue with the white and silver.

We love this picture. It is one that we took when we were in Zions when we were first married.

We hope that there will be many more projects to come.

Connor's Eyes

A while ago we found out that Connor was going to need surgery on his eyes. His left eye would turn in slightly. We got a call that the surgery would be on March 17th. They went in and removed the muscles from both of his eyes and then reattached them. The doctor said that there was little risk in the surgery. He told us that Connor's eyes would feel like he had dirt in his eyes until the stitches got soft.


Connor had a hard time waking up from the surgery so Zach was there to try and keep him calm and not rub his eyes.


We all had to have name tags on so that they knew we were with Connor. They even put a name tag on Ethan. It says Zach's brother because Connor's first name is actually Zachary.
Here we were trying to get a picture of his eyes after he woke up, but it wasn't quite working. The surgery went really well. Hopefully we won't have to go see the eye doctor for much longer.

Disney on Ice

Zach's Mom got tickets for some of the grand kids to go to Disney on Ice on March 13th. Connor was very excited. He kept calling it Disneyland on Ice. We kept talking about how fun it was going to be and watched Cars so that he would know some about it before we got there.
Here is the group of everyone that went. It was very cold that day and was even snowing when we came out of the show.
Connor's got into it from the beginning. He was clapping and dancing along.
We had great seats and were able to see everything so well.
Cars was Connor's favorite part. He loved watching the cars drive around on the ice.
Ethan was able to go too. He was amazed at the lights and music. He fell asleep on Zach's lap about half way through the second half. It was a great time to be out with family. Thanks Gramuzzy!!

First Fort

We built our first for the other night. You are probably thinking why it has taken so long for us to make one, but to be honest, I just hadn't thought of it. Connor and I built a little one and then expanded on it when Zach got home. We told him that we could sleep in it when it was bed time. He was very excited. We really didn't expect to last until he actually fell asleep. We were right. We lasted about an hour and then he wanted to sleep in his bed. But it was a fun time in there together. Here is the inside of it with Zach and Connor.

Here it is from the outside. It is not that much to look at, but a good first try.

Dish Time

I really don't like doing dishes. Actually I hate doing dishes. When we got married, we decided to make a rule about dishes. Whoever makes dinner doesn't have to do the dishes. It works out really well. Connor now likes to do the dishes with Zach and Ethan usually gets in on it also. Here they are doing the dishes together.